The ark landed in Armenia, and according to Josephus, the locals were still showing off pieces of it in the first century CE. He calls the site Apobaterion (αποβατηριον)—"The Place of Descent"—and cites multiple non-Jewish historians who confirmed the tradition. Berosus the Chaldean wrote that people chipped off bitumen from the wreck and wore it as protective amulets. Nicolaus of Damascus described a great mountain called Baris where survivors of a massive flood came to shore.
But Josephus starts the story long before the ark. For seven generations after Seth, humanity stayed virtuous. Then everything collapsed. The angels of God took human wives and fathered sons of terrifying strength—beings who "did what resembled the acts of those whom the Grecians call giants." Violence and arrogance consumed the earth.
Noah tried to talk them out of it. He begged them to change. They ignored him. Worse—he feared they would murder him and his family. So he withdrew.
God loved Noah for his righteousness and decided to act. He would destroy the entire human race and start over. He shortened the human lifespan to one hundred and twenty years. Then He gave Noah the blueprint: an ark of four stories, three hundred cubits long, fifty wide, thirty high, braced with cross beams, sealed against the violence of the water. Noah loaded his family, pairs of every creature—some by sevens—and provisions for the journey.
The rain fell for forty days. The water rose fifteen cubits above the earth. Every living thing outside the ark perished. After one hundred and fifty days the waters began to recede. Noah sent a raven—it returned, finding no dry land. Seven days later, a dove—it came back muddied, carrying an olive branch (Genesis 8:11). The earth was clearing.
When Noah finally emerged, he sacrificed to God and begged Him never to flood the earth again. God answered: the destruction was not His desire but humanity's own doing. He set the rainbow in the sky as a sign—the bow of God, Josephus calls it—a promise that the waters would never return. He permitted humans to eat animals but forbade the consumption of blood, "for therein is the life." And He demanded justice: anyone who shed human blood would answer for it.