Been doing a lot of reading around European, specifically British, religious history over the past few weeks and several interesting similarities have come up. So, I thought I'd share them.
If I had to guess I'd imagine the "self sown seeds" that keep coming up is a hunter gatherer period with small populations, then the mention of agriculture and mining is the agrarian revolution and then after that the first cities and the problems that seem inherent in lots of people living in close quarters with all their base needs being met by others and so free to cause all manner of mischief.
As for the flood myth. It's been confirmed by archeological and geological evidence that there have been massive historical floods in the Sumer, southern Mesopotamia, in the BCs. Seems reasonable that such a thing, being rare and devastating would carry forward in stories and be spread out as people went their ways and adapted them to their own localization.
But hey, that's just a theory. A HISTORICAL FABLE BASED THEORY.
Sources:
Ovid's Metamorphosis, translations by Brewer and Milville
The Poetic Eda, The Voluspa, various translations
The Prophecies of Morrigan, Irish Text Society
The Kali Yuga discourse by Markandeya
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