In the Epic of Gilgamesh

Epic verse form from Mesopotamia

Epic of Gilgamesh
The Deluge tablet of the Gilgamesh epic in Akkadian
Written	c. 2100–1200 BC ^[1]
Country	Mesopotamia
Language	Akkadian
Media type	Clay tablet

The Epic of Gilgamesh ()^[2] is an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia, regarded as the earliest surviving notable literature and the 2d oldest religious text, after the Pyramid Texts. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with v Sumerian poems about Bilgamesh (Sumerian for "Gilgamesh"), king of Uruk, dating from the Third Dynasty of Ur (c. 2100 BC).^[1] These independent stories were later used equally source material for a combined epic in Akkadian. The first surviving version of this combined epic, known as the "Former Babylonian" version, dates to the 18th century BC and is titled after its incipit, Shūtur eli sharrī ("Surpassing All Other Kings"). Only a few tablets of it have survived. The later Standard Babylonian version compiled past Sîn-lēqi-unninni dates from the 13th to the 10th centuries BC and bears the incipit Sha naqba īmuru ^{[annotation i]} ("He who Saw the Abyss", in modern terms: "He who Sees the Unknown"). Approximately 2-thirds of this longer, twelve-tablet version have been recovered. Some of the all-time copies were discovered in the library ruins of the 7th-century BC Assyrian king Ashurbanipal.

The first one-half of the story discusses Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, and Enkidu, a wild man created by the gods to finish Gilgamesh from oppressing the people of Uruk. After Enkidu becomes civilized through sexual initiation with a prostitute, he travels to Uruk, where he challenges Gilgamesh to a test of forcefulness. Gilgamesh wins the contest; however, the two become friends. Together, they make a vi-day journey to the legendary Cedar Forest, where they programme to slay the Guardian, Humbaba the Terrible, and cutting downwards the sacred Cedar.^[four] The goddess Ishtar sends the Bull of Heaven to punish Gilgamesh for spurning her advances. Gilgamesh and Enkidu kill the Balderdash of Sky after which the gods make up one's mind to judgement Enkidu to death and kill him.

In the second one-half of the epic, distress over Enkidu's death causes Gilgamesh to undertake a long and perilous journey to discover the hole-and-corner of eternal life. He eventually learns that "Life, which you look for, y'all will never find. For when the gods created human being, they permit expiry be his share, and life withheld in their own hands".^[5] ^[6] Nevertheless, considering of his slap-up edifice projects, his account of Siduri's advice, and what the immortal human Utnapishtim told him about the Bully Flood, Gilgamesh's fame survived well after his death with expanding interest in the Gilgamesh story which has been translated into many languages and is featured in works of popular fiction.

The epic is regarded as a foundational work in the tradition of heroic sagas, with Gilgamesh forming the paradigm for later heroes like Hercules, and the epic itself serving as an influence for the Homeric epics.^[7]

History [edit]

Ancient Assyrian statue currently in the Louvre, maybe representing Gilgamesh

Singled-out sources be from over a 2000-yr timeframe. The earliest Sumerian poems are at present generally considered to be distinct stories, rather than parts of a unmarried epic.^[8] They engagement from equally early on as the 3rd Dynasty of Ur (c. 2100 BC).^[9] The Old Babylonian tablets (c. 1800 BC),^[8] are the earliest surviving tablets for a single Ballsy of Gilgamesh narrative.^[10] The older Erstwhile Babylonian tablets and later Akkadian version are important sources for modern translations, with the earlier texts mainly used to fill up in gaps (lacunae) in the afterwards texts. Although several revised versions based on new discoveries accept been published, the epic remains incomplete.^[11] Analysis of the Old Babylonian text has been used to reconstruct possible earlier forms of the epic.^[12] The most recent Akkadian version, also referred to equally the Standard Babylonian version, consists of twelve tablets and was edited by Sîn-lēqi-unninni,^[13] who is thought to have lived sometime between 1300 BC and 1000 BC.^[14]

... this discovery is evidently destined to excite a lively controversy. For the present the orthodox people are in great delight, and are very much prepossessed past the corroboration which it affords to Biblical history. Information technology is possible, however, as has been pointed out, that the Chaldean inscription, if 18-carat, may exist regarded as a confirmation of the statement that there are diverse traditions of the deluge apart from the Biblical one, which is perhaps legendary like the rest

The New York Times, front end folio, 1872^[xv]

Enkidu, Gilgamesh'south friend. From Ur, Iraq, 2027–1763 BCE. Iraq Museum

Some 15,000 fragments of Assyrian cuneiform tablets were discovered in the Library of Ashurbanipal in Nineveh by Austen Henry Layard, his assistant Hormuzd Rassam, and W. Thousand. Loftus in the early on 1850s.^[xvi] Late in the following decade, the British Museum hired George Smith to study these; in 1872, Smith read translated fragments earlier the Society of Biblical Archeology,^[17] and in 1875 and 1876 he published fuller translations,^[18] the latter of which was published every bit The Chaldaean Account of Genesis.^[16] The cardinal graphic symbol of Gilgamesh was initially reintroduced to the world as "Izdubar", before the cuneiform logographs in his proper noun could be pronounced accurately.^[16] ^[19] In 1891, Paul Haupt collected the cuneiform text, and 9 years subsequently, Peter Jensen provided a comprehensive edition; R. Campbell Thompson updated both of their work in 1930. Over the next 2 decades, Samuel Noah Kramer reassembled the Sumerian poems.^[eighteen]

In 1998, American Assyriologist Theodore Kwasman discovered a piece believed to have independent the outset lines of the epic in the storeroom of the British Museum; the fragment, found in 1878 and dated to between 600 BC and 100 BC, had remained unexamined past experts for more than a century since its recovery.^[20] The fragment read "He who saw all, who was the foundation of the land, who knew (everything), was wise in all matters: Gilgamesh."^[21] The discovery of artifacts (c. 2600 BC) associated with Enmebaragesi of Kish, mentioned in the legends as the begetter of 1 of Gilgamesh's adversaries, has lent credibility to the historical existence of Gilgamesh.^[22]

In the early 2000s, the Gilgamesh Dream Tablet was imported illegally into the United States. According to the United states Department of Justice, the tablet was encrusted with dirt and unreadable when it was purchased by a US antiquities dealer in 2003. The tablet was sold by an unnamed antiques dealer in 2007 with a letter falsely stating that it had been inside a box of aboriginal bronze fragments purchased in a 1981 auction.^[23]

In 2014, Hobby Lobby privately purchased the tablet for display at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.^[23] ^[24]

In 2019, the Gilgamesh Dream Tablet was seized by US officials and was returned to Iraq in September 2021.^[25] ^[26]

Versions [edit]

From the diverse sources found, two principal versions of the epic take been partially reconstructed: the Standard Babylonian version, or He who saw the deep, and the Old Babylonian version, or Surpassing all other kings. Five earlier Sumerian poems nearly Gilgamesh have been partially recovered, some with primitive versions of specific episodes in the Babylonian version, others with unrelated stories.

Standard Babylonian version [edit]

The Standard Babylonian version was discovered by Hormuzd Rassam in the library of Ashurbanipal in Nineveh in 1853. "Standard Babylonian" refers to a literary style that was used for literary purposes. This version was compiled by Sin-liqe-unninni sometime between 1300 and 1000 BC from earlier texts.^[fourteen] ^[27] I affect that Sin-liqe-unninni brought to the work was to bring the issue of mortality to the foreground, thus making it possible for the character to movement from beingness an "adventurer to a wise man."^[27] According to Lins Brandão, the standard version tin can exist seen in this sense equally sapiential literature, common in the Middle Due east.^[28] ^[29]

The Standard Babylonian version has dissimilar opening words, or incipit, from the older version. The older version begins with the words "Surpassing all other kings", while the Standard Babylonian version has "He who saw the deep" (ša naqba īmuru), "deep" referring to the mysteries of the information brought back by Gilgamesh from his meeting with Uta-Napishti (Utnapishtim) about Ea, the fountain of wisdom.^[eleven] ^[30] Gilgamesh was given cognition of how to worship the gods, why death was ordained for man beings, what makes a good king, and how to alive a skilful life. The story of Utnapishtim, the hero of the inundation myth, can also exist plant in the Babylonian ballsy of Atra-Hasis.^[31] ^[32] The Standard version is also known as iškar Gilgāmeš, "Series of Gilgamesh".^[27]

The twelfth tablet is a sequel to the original eleven, and was probably appended at a later appointment.^[33] It bears little relation to the well-crafted xi-tablet epic; the lines at the outset of the first tablet are quoted at the stop of the 11th tablet, giving it circularity and finality. Tablet 12 is a almost copy of an earlier Sumerian tale, a prequel, in which Gilgamesh sends Enkidu to think some objects of his from the Underworld, and he returns in the class of a spirit to relate the nature of the Underworld to Gilgamesh.

In terms of class, the poetic conventions followed in the Standard Babylonian version appear to exist inconsistent and are still controversial among scholars. There is, even so, all-encompassing apply of parallelism beyond sets of ii or iii side by side lines, much similar in the Hebrew Psalms.

Genre [edit]

When it was discovered in the 19th century, the story of Gilgamesh was classified as a Greek epic, a genre known in Europe, fifty-fifty though it predates the Greek civilisation that spawned epics,^[34] specifically, when Herodotus referred to the works of Homer in this way.^[35] When Alfred Jeremias translated the text, he insisted on the human relationship to Genesis by giving the title "Izdubar-Nimrod" and by recognizing the genre every bit that of Greek heroic poetry. Although the equalization to Nimrod was dropped, the view of "Greek epic" was retained.^[19] Martin Litchfield West, in 1966, in the preface to his edition of Hesiod, recognized the proximity of the Greeks to the centre eastern center of convergence, "greek literature is a Nearly East literature."^[36] Ane departure between the Greek epic poems and Gilgamesh would be the fact that the Greek heroes acted in the context of war, while Gilgamesh acted in isolation (with the exception of Enkidu's brief existence) - and could equal Heracles.^[37]

Considering how the text would be viewed from the standpoint of its time is tricky, as George Smith acknowledges that there is no "Sumerian or Akkadian discussion for myth or heroic narrative, but as there is no ancient recognition of poetic narrative as a genre."^[38] Lins Brandão 2019 recognizes that the prologue of "He who Saw the Completeness" recalls the inspiration of the Greek Muses, even though there is no god'southward assistance hither.^[39] It is besides made explicit that Gilgamesh rose to the rank of an "ancient wise human" (antedeluvian).^[40] Lins Brandão continues, noting how the verse form would have been "put on a stele" ("narû"), that at first "narû" could be seen as the genre of the poem,^[forty] taking into consideration that the reader (or scribe) would take to pass the text on,^[41] without omitting or adding annihilation.^[42] The prologue as well implies that Gilgamesh narrated his story to a copyist, thus being a kind of "autobiography in tertiary person".^[43]

Content of the Standard Babylonian version tablets [edit]

This summary is based on Andrew George's translation.^[11]

Tablet one [edit]

The story introduces Gilgamesh, rex of Uruk. Gilgamesh, ii-thirds god and one-3rd human being, is oppressing his people, who weep out to the gods for help. For the young women of Uruk this oppression takes the form of a droit du seigneur, or "lord's right", to slumber with brides on their wedding ceremony night. For the young men (the tablet is damaged at this point) it is conjectured that Gilgamesh exhausts them through games, tests of strength, or perhaps forced labour on building projects. The gods reply to the people's pleas by creating an equal to Gilgamesh who volition be able to finish his oppression. This is the primitive man, Enkidu, who is covered in hair and lives in the wild with the animals. He is spotted by a trapper, whose livelihood is being ruined considering Enkidu is uprooting his traps. The trapper tells the sun-god Shamash about the man, and it is arranged for Enkidu to be seduced by Shamhat, a temple prostitute, his kickoff step towards being tamed. After six days and seven nights (or two weeks, according to more recent scholarship^[44]) of lovemaking and teaching Enkidu most the means of civilization, she takes Enkidu to a shepherd's military camp to larn how to be civilized. Gilgamesh, meanwhile, has been having dreams near the imminent arrival of a beloved new companion and asks his mother, Ninsun, to help interpret these dreams.

Tablet ii [edit]

Shamhat brings Enkidu to the shepherds' camp, where he is introduced to a human nutrition and becomes the nighttime watchman. Learning from a passing stranger most Gilgamesh's treatment of new brides, Enkidu is incensed and travels to Uruk to intervene at a wedding. When Gilgamesh attempts to visit the wedding chamber, Enkidu blocks his fashion, and they fight. After a fierce battle, Enkidu acknowledges Gilgamesh'south superior strength and they become friends. Gilgamesh proposes a journey to the Cedar Forest to slay the monstrous demi-god Humbaba in order to gain fame and renown. Despite warnings from Enkidu and the council of elders, Gilgamesh is non deterred.

Tablet three [edit]

The elders give Gilgamesh advice for his journeying. Gilgamesh visits his mother, the goddess Ninsun, who seeks the support and protection of the sun-god Shamash for their adventure. Ninsun adopts Enkidu as her son, and Gilgamesh leaves instructions for the governance of Uruk in his absence.

Tablet four [edit]

The second dream of Gilgamesh on the journey to the Forest of Cedar. Ballsy of Gilgamesh tablet from Hattusa, Turkey. 13th century BCE. Neues Museum, Frg

Gilgamesh and Enkidu journeying to the Cedar Woods. Every few days they campsite on a mount, and perform a dream ritual. Gilgamesh has five terrifying dreams nearly falling mountains, thunderstorms, wild bulls, and a thunderbird that breathes fire. Despite similarities between his dream figures and earlier descriptions of Humbaba, Enkidu interprets these dreams equally good omens, and denies that the frightening images represent the forest guardian. As they arroyo the cedar mountain, they hear Humbaba bellowing, and take to encourage each other not to be agape.

Tablet five [edit]

Tablet V of the Epic of Gilgamesh

Reverse side of the newly discovered tablet Five of the Epic of Gilgamesh. It dates back to the sometime Babylonian period, 2003–1595 BC, and is currently housed in the Sulaymaniyah Museum, Republic of iraq

The heroes enter the cedar forest. Humbaba, the guardian of the Cedar Forest, insults and threatens them. He accuses Enkidu of betrayal, and vows to disembowel Gilgamesh and feed his flesh to the birds. Gilgamesh is afraid, but with some encouraging words from Enkidu the boxing commences. The mountains quake with the tumult and the heaven turns blackness. The god Shamash sends 13 winds to demark Humbaba, and he is captured. Humbaba pleads for his life, and Gilgamesh pities him. He offers to make Gilgamesh king of the forest, to cut the trees for him, and to be his slave. Enkidu, all the same, argues that Gilgamesh should kill Humbaba to found his reputation forever. Humbaba curses them both and Gilgamesh dispatches him with a blow to the neck, as well as killing his 7 sons.^[44] The 2 heroes cut downwardly many cedars, including a gigantic tree that Enkidu plans to fashion into a gate for the temple of Enlil. They build a raft and render home forth the Euphrates with the giant tree and (perchance) the head of Humbaba.

Tablet six [edit]

Gilgamesh rejects the advances of the goddess Ishtar because of her mistreatment of previous lovers like Dumuzi. Ishtar asks her father Anu to send the Bull of Heaven to avenge her. When Anu rejects her complaints, Ishtar threatens to raise the dead who will "outnumber the living" and "devour them". Anu states that if he gives her the Balderdash of Heaven, Uruk will confront 7 years of dearth. Ishtar provides him with provisions for 7 years in substitution for the bull. Ishtar leads the Bull of Heaven to Uruk, and it causes widespread devastation. Information technology lowers the level of the Euphrates river, and dries up the marshes. It opens up huge pits that consume 300 men. Without any divine assistance, Enkidu and Gilgamesh attack and slay it, and offering up its heart to Shamash. When Ishtar cries out, Enkidu hurls one of the hindquarters of the bull at her. The city of Uruk celebrates, but Enkidu has an ominous dream near his future failure.

Tablet seven [edit]

In Enkidu's dream, the gods decide that one of the heroes must dice because they killed Humbaba and Gugalanna. Despite the protestations of Shamash, Enkidu is marked for death. Enkidu curses the nifty door he has fashioned for Enlil's temple. He also curses the trapper and Shamhat for removing him from the wild. Shamash reminds Enkidu of how Shamhat fed and clothed him, and introduced him to Gilgamesh. Shamash tells him that Gilgamesh volition bequeath peachy honors upon him at his funeral, and will wander into the wild consumed with grief. Enkidu regrets his curses and blesses Shamhat instead. In a second dream, however, he sees himself beingness taken convict to the Netherworld by a terrifying Affections of Death. The underworld is a "business firm of grit" and darkness whose inhabitants eat clay, and are clothed in bird feathers, supervised by terrifying beings. For 12 days, Enkidu's condition worsens. Finally, after a lament that he could not meet a heroic death in battle, he dies. In a famous line from the ballsy, Gilgamesh clings to Enkidu'south torso and denies that he has died until a maggot drops from the corpse'south olfactory organ.

Tablet eight [edit]

Gilgamesh delivers a lament for Enkidu, in which he calls upon mountains, forests, fields, rivers, wild fauna, and all of Uruk to mourn for his friend. Recalling their adventures together, Gilgamesh tears at his pilus and dress in grief. He commissions a funerary statue, and provides grave gifts from his treasury to ensure that Enkidu has a favourable reception in the realm of the dead. A smashing banquet is held where the treasures are offered to the gods of the Netherworld. Just before a interruption in the text at that place is a suggestion that a river is beingness dammed, indicating a burial in a river bed, as in the corresponding Sumerian verse form, The Death of Gilgamesh.

Tablet ix [edit]

Tablet ix opens with Gilgamesh roaming the wild wearing animal skins, grieving for Enkidu. Having now become fearful of his own decease, he decides to seek Utnapishtim ("the Faraway"), and larn the cloak-and-dagger of eternal life. Among the few survivors of the Dandy Inundation, Utnapishtim and his wife are the simply humans to accept been granted immortality by the gods. Gilgamesh crosses a mount laissez passer at night and encounters a pride of lions. Before sleeping he prays for protection to the moon god Sin. Then, waking from an encouraging dream, he kills the lions and uses their skins for clothing. After a long and perilous journey, Gilgamesh arrives at the twin peaks of Mountain Mashu at the cease of the earth. He comes across a tunnel, which no human being has ever entered, guarded by two scorpion monsters, who appear to exist a married couple. The husband tries to dissuade Gilgamesh from passing, but the wife intervenes, expresses sympathy for Gilgamesh, and (according to the verse form's editor Benjamin Foster) allows his passage.^[45] He passes under the mountains along the Road of the Sun. In consummate darkness he follows the route for 12 "double hours", managing to complete the trip before the Sun catches up with him. He arrives at the Garden of the gods, a paradise total of precious stone-laden trees.

Tablet 10 [edit]

Gilgamesh meets alewife Siduri, who assumes that he is a murderer or thief because of his disheveled appearance. Gilgamesh tells her almost the purpose of his journey. She attempts to dissuade him from his quest, but sends him to Urshanabi the ferryman, who will help him cantankerous the bounding main to Utnapishtim. Gilgamesh, out of spontaneous rage, destroys the stone charms that Urshanabi keeps with him. He tells him his story, but when he asks for his help, Urshanabi informs him that he has but destroyed the objects that can help them cross the Waters of Death, which are mortiferous to the touch. Urshanabi instructs Gilgamesh to cut downwards 120 copse and fashion them into punting poles. When they reach the island where Utnapishtim lives, Gilgamesh recounts his story, asking him for his help. Utnapishtim reprimands him, declaring that fighting the common fate of humans is futile and diminishes life's joys.

Tablet eleven [edit]

George Smith transliterated and read the "Babylonian Flood Story" of Tablet Xi

Gilgamesh observes that Utnapishtim seems no different from himself, and asks him how he obtained his immortality. Utnapishtim explains that the gods decided to send a dandy alluvion. To save Utnapishtim the god Enki told him to build a boat. He gave him precise dimensions, and information technology was sealed with pitch and bitumen. His entire family unit went aboard together with his craftsmen and "all the animals of the field". A violent storm then arose which acquired the terrified gods to retreat to the heavens. Ishtar lamented the wholesale destruction of humanity, and the other gods wept beside her. The tempest lasted 6 days and nights, after which "all the human beings turned to clay". Utnapishtim weeps when he sees the destruction. His boat lodges on a mountain, and he releases a dove, a swallow, and a raven. When the raven fails to return, he opens the ark and frees its inhabitants. Utnapishtim offers a sacrifice to the gods, who aroma the sweet relish and gather around. Ishtar vows that just as she will never forget the brilliant necklace that hangs around her neck, she will always recall this fourth dimension. When Enlil arrives, angry that there are survivors, she condemns him for instigating the inundation. Enki also castigates him for sending a asymmetric penalisation. Enlil blesses Utnapishtim and his wife, and rewards them with eternal life. This account largely matches the alluvion story that concludes the Epic of Atra-Hasis .^[46] ^[32]

The main bespeak seems to be that when Enlil granted eternal life it was a unique gift. As if to demonstrate this signal, Utnapishtim challenges Gilgamesh to stay awake for six days and seven nights. Gilgamesh falls asleep, and Utnapishtim instructs his wife to broil a loaf of bread on each of the days he is asleep, so that he cannot deny his failure to keep awake. Gilgamesh, who is seeking to overcome death, cannot even conquer slumber. Later instructing Urshanabi, the ferryman, to launder Gilgamesh and clothe him in royal robes, they depart for Uruk. Every bit they are leaving, Utnapishtim'due south married woman asks her married man to offer a departing gift. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh that at the lesser of the sea at that place lives a boxthorn-similar plant that volition make him young again. Gilgamesh, by binding stones to his anxiety so he tin can walk on the bottom, manages to obtain the constitute. Gilgamesh proposes to investigate if the plant has the hypothesized rejuvenation power by testing it on an old homo once he returns to Uruk.^[47] When Gilgamesh stops to breast-stroke, information technology is stolen by a ophidian, who sheds its skin as it departs. Gilgamesh weeps at the futility of his efforts, because he has now lost all gamble of immortality. He returns to Uruk, where the sight of its massive walls prompts him to praise this enduring work to Urshanabi.

Tablet twelve [edit]

This tablet is mainly an Akkadian translation of an earlier Sumerian poem, "Gilgamesh and the Netherworld" (also known as "Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld" and variants), although information technology has been suggested that information technology is derived from an unknown version of that story.^[48] The contents of this last tablet are inconsistent with previous ones: Enkidu is still alive, despite having died before in the epic. Considering of this, its lack of integration with the other tablets, and the fact that it is almost a copy of an earlier version, it has been referred to every bit an 'inorganic appendage' to the epic.^[49] Alternatively, information technology has been suggested that "its purpose, though crudely handled, is to explain to Gilgamesh (and the reader) the various fates of the dead in the Afterlife" and in "an awkward attempt to bring closure",^[l] it both connects the Gilgamesh of the epic with the Gilgamesh who is the Rex of the Netherworld,^[51] and is "a dramatic capstone whereby the twelve-tablet epic ends on ane and the same theme, that of "seeing" (= understanding, discovery, etc.), with which information technology began."^[52]

Gilgamesh complains to Enkidu that various of his possessions (the tablet is unclear exactly what – dissimilar translations include a pulsate and a ball) take fallen into the underworld. Enkidu offers to bring them back. Delighted, Gilgamesh tells Enkidu what he must and must not do in the underworld if he is to render. Enkidu does everything which he was told not to practise. The underworld keeps him. Gilgamesh prays to the gods to requite him back his friend. Enlil and Suen don't respond, but Enki and Shamash decide to help. Shamash makes a crack in the globe, and Enkidu's ghost jumps out of it. The tablet ends with Gilgamesh questioning Enkidu about what he has seen in the underworld.

Old Babylonian versions [edit]

This version of the epic, chosen in some fragments Surpassing all other kings, is composed of tablets and fragments from diverse origins and states of conservation.^[53] It remains incomplete in its majority, with several tablets missing and big lacunae in those institute. They are named afterwards their current location or the place where they were found.

Pennsylvania tablet [edit]

Surpassing all other kings Tablet 2, profoundly correlates with tablets I–II of the Standard Babylonian version. Gilgamesh tells his mother Ninsun about two dreams he had. His female parent explains that they mean that a new companion will soon arrive at Uruk. In the meanwhile the wild Enkidu and the priestess (here called Shamkatum) have sex. She tames him in company of the shepherds by offer him bread and beer. Enkidu helps the shepherds past guarding the sheep. They travel to Uruk to confront Gilgamesh and stop his abuses. Enkidu and Gilgamesh boxing but Gilgamesh breaks off the fight. Enkidu praises Gilgamesh.

Yale tablet [edit]

Surpassing all other kings Tablet Three, partially matches tablets II–3 of the Standard Babylonian version. For reasons unknown (the tablet is partially cleaved) Enkidu is in a distressing mood. In society to cheer him up Gilgamesh suggests going to the Pine Forest to cut downward trees and kill Humbaba (known hither as Huwawa). Enkidu protests, as he knows Huwawa and is enlightened of his power. Gilgamesh talks Enkidu into it with some words of encouragement, but Enkidu remains reluctant. They prepare, and call for the elders. The elders also protest, but later Gilgamesh talks to them, they agree to let him go. After Gilgamesh asks his god (Shamash) for protection, and both he and Enkidu equip themselves, they exit with the elders' blessing and counsel.

Philadelphia fragment [edit]

Peradventure another version of the contents of the Yale Tablet, practically irrecoverable.

Nippur schoolhouse tablet [edit]

In the journeying to the cedar woods and Huwawa, Enkidu interprets one of Gilgamesh's dreams.

Tell Harmal tablets [edit]

Fragments from two different versions/tablets tell how Enkidu interprets one of Gilgamesh's dreams on the fashion to the Woods of Cedar, and their conversation when entering the wood.

Ishchali tablet [edit]

After defeating Huwawa, Gilgamesh refrains from slaying him, and urges Enkidu to hunt Huwawa's "7 auras". Enkidu convinces him to smite their enemy. Afterwards killing Huwawa and the auras, they chop down part of the forest and discover the gods' undercover habitation. The rest of the tablet is cleaved.

The auras are not referred to in the Standard Babylonian version, but are in one of the Sumerian poems.

Partial fragment in Baghdad [edit]

Partially overlapping the felling of the trees from the Ishchali tablet.

Sippar tablet [edit]

Partially overlapping the Standard Babylonian version tablets IX–X. Gilgamesh mourns the death of Enkidu wandering in his quest for immortality. Gilgamesh argues with Shamash nearly the futility of his quest. After a lacuna, Gilgamesh talks to Siduri about his quest and his journeying to meet Utnapishtim (hither called Uta-na'ishtim). Siduri attempts to dissuade Gilgamesh in his quest for immortality, urging him to be content with the simple pleasures of life.^[v] ^[54] After one more than lacuna, Gilgamesh smashes the "stone ones" and talks to the ferryman Urshanabi (here called Sur-sunabu). After a short discussion, Sur-sunabu asks him to carve 300 oars so that they may cross the waters of death without needing the "stone ones". The remainder of the tablet is missing.

The text on the Old Babylonian Meissner fragment (the larger surviving fragment of the Sippar tablet) has been used to reconstruct possible before forms of the Epic of Gilgamesh, and it has been suggested that a "prior form of the story – before even than that preserved on the Old Babylonian fragment – may well have ended with Siduri sending Gilgamesh dorsum to Uruk..." and "Utnapistim was not originally function of the tale."^[55]

Sumerian poems [edit]

There are 5 extant Gilgamesh stories in the course of older poems in Sumerian.^[56] These probably circulated independently, rather than being in the form of a unified epic. Some of the names of the principal characters in these poems differ slightly from later Akkadian names; for example, "Bilgamesh" is written instead of "Gilgamesh", and there are some differences in the underlying stories such every bit the fact that Enkidu is Gilgamesh's servant in the Sumerian version:

The lord to the Living One'south Mountain and Ho, hurrah! stand for to the Cedar Forest episode (Standard Babylonian version tablets II–5). Gilgamesh and Enkidu travel with other men to the Forest of Cedar. There, trapped past Huwawa, Gilgamesh tricks him (with Enkidu's assistance in one of the versions) into giving up his auras, thus losing his power.
Hero in boxing corresponds to the Bull of Sky episode (Standard Babylonian version tablet VI) in the Akkadian version. The Bull's voracious appetite causes drought and hardship in the land while Gilgamesh feasts. Lugalbanda convinces him to face the beast and fights information technology alongside Enkidu.
The envoys of Akka has no corresponding episode in the epic, only the themes of whether to testify mercy to captives, and counsel from the urban center elders, also occur in the Standard Babylonian version of the Humbaba story. In the poem, Uruk faces a siege from a Kish army led by King Akka, whom Gilgamesh defeats and forgives.^[57]
In those days, in those furthermost days, otherwise known as Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld, is the source for the Akkadian translation included equally tablet XII in the Standard Babylonian version, telling of Enkidu'due south journey to the Netherworld. It is also the main source of information for the Sumerian creation myth and the story of "Inanna and the Huluppu Tree".^[58]
The great wild bull is lying down, a verse form nigh Gilgamesh'south death, burial and consecration equally a semigod, reigning and giving judgement over the dead. After dreaming of how the gods decide his fate later on death, Gilgamesh takes counsel, prepares his funeral and offers gifts to the gods. Once deceased, he is buried under the Euphrates, taken off its class and later returned to it.

Translations [edit]

The first direct Arabic translation from the original tablets was published in the 1960s by Iraqi archaeologist Taha Baqir.^[59]

The definitive modern translation is a two-book critical work by Andrew George, published by Oxford University Press in 2003. A book review by Cambridge scholar Eleanor Robson claims that George'south is the most significant critical work on Gilgamesh in the last 70 years.^[threescore] George discusses the state of the surviving material, and provides a tablet-by-tablet exegesis, with a dual linguistic communication side-past-side translation.

In 2004, Stephen Mitchell supplied a controversial version that takes many liberties with the text and includes modernized allusions and commentary relating to the Republic of iraq War of 2003.^[61] ^[62]

Afterwards influence [edit]

Human relationship to the Bible [edit]

Diverse themes, plot elements, and characters in the Hebrew Bible correlate with the Epic of Gilgamesh – notably, the accounts of the Garden of Eden, the advice from Ecclesiastes, and the Genesis overflowing narrative.

Garden of Eden [edit]

The parallels between the stories of Enkidu/Shamhat and Adam/Eve have been long recognized past scholars.^[63] ^[64] In both, a man is created from the soil past a god, and lives in a natural setting amongst the animals. He is introduced to a woman who tempts him. In both stories the man accepts food from the woman, covers his nakedness, and must leave his former realm, unable to return. The presence of a snake that steals a institute of immortality from the hero subsequently in the epic is another point of similarity. However, a major difference between the two stories is that while Enkidu experiences regret regarding his seduction away from nature, this is merely temporary: After being confronted past the god Shamash for beingness ungrateful, Enkidu recants and decides to requite the woman who seduced him his final approving before he dies. This is in contrast to Adam, whose fall from grace is largely portrayed purely equally a penalisation for disobeying God.

Communication from Ecclesiastes [edit]

Several scholars suggest direct borrowing of Siduri'southward communication by the author of Ecclesiastes.^[65]

A rare saying about the strength of a triple-stranded rope, "a triple-stranded rope is not easily broken", is common to both books.^{[ citation needed ]}

Noah's inundation [edit]

Andrew George submits that the Genesis flood narrative matches that in Gilgamesh so closely that "few doubt" that information technology derives from a Mesopotamian account.^[66] What is particularly noticeable is the mode the Genesis flood story follows the Gilgamesh flood tale "signal past point and in the same society", even when the story permits other alternatives.^[67] In a 2001 Torah commentary released on behalf of the Conservative Motility of Judaism, rabbinic scholar Robert Wexler stated: "The nearly probable supposition we tin make is that both Genesis and Gilgamesh drew their material from a common tradition nearly the flood that existed in Mesopotamia. These stories so diverged in the retelling."^[68] Ziusudra, Utnapishtim and Noah are the corresponding heroes of the Sumerian, Akkadian and biblical inundation legends of the ancient Nigh East.

Additional biblical parallels [edit]

Matthias Henze suggests that Nebuchadnezzar's madness in the biblical Book of Daniel draws on the Epic of Gilgamesh. He claims that the writer uses elements from the description of Enkidu to pigment a sarcastic and mocking portrait of the male monarch of Babylon.^[69]

Many characters in the Ballsy have mythical biblical parallels, most notably Ninti, the Sumerian goddess of life, was created from Enki'south rib to heal him after he had eaten forbidden flowers. It is suggested that this story served as the basis for the story of Eve created from Adam's rib in the Book of Genesis.^[lxx] Esther J. Hamori, in Echoes of Gilgamesh in the Jacob Story, too claims that the myth of Jacob and Esau is paralleled with the wrestling match betwixt Gilgamesh and Enkidu.^[71]

Book of Giants [edit]

Gilgamesh is mentioned in i version of The Book of Giants which is related to the Book of Enoch. The Book of Giants version institute at Qumran mentions the Sumerian hero Gilgamesh and the monster Humbaba with the Watchers and giants.^[72]

Influence on Homer [edit]

Numerous scholars have drawn attention to various themes, episodes, and verses, indicating that the Epic of Gilgamesh had a substantial influence on both of the epic poems ascribed to Homer. These influences are detailed by Martin Litchfield West in The East Face of Helicon: West Asiatic Elements in Greek Poetry and Myth.^[73] Co-ordinate to Tzvi Abusch of Brandeis University, the verse form "combines the ability and tragedy of the Iliad with the wanderings and marvels of the Odyssey. Information technology is a work of run a risk, only is no less a meditation on some fundamental issues of homo being."^[74] Martin West, in "The E face up of Helicon," speculates that the memory of Gilgamesh would accept reached the Greeks through a lost poem about Heracles.^[37]

In popular culture [edit]

The Epic of Gilgamesh has inspired many works of literature, art, and music.^[75] ^[76] Information technology was simply after Globe State of war I that the Gilgamesh epic reached a mod audition, and simply after World War Two that it was featured in a diversity of genres.^[76]

Notes [edit]

^ In 2008, manuscripts from the median Babylonian version found in Ugarit, written before the Standard version, already started with Sha naqba īmuru.^[1] ^[3]

References [edit]

^ ^a ^b ^c Brandão 2020, p. 23.
^ "Gilgamesh". Random House Webster'due south Unabridged Lexicon.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. 21.
^ Krstovic, Jelena O., ed. (2005). Epic of Gilgamesh Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism. Vol. 74. Detroit, MI: Gale. ISBN978-0-7876-8021-iii. OCLC 644697404.
^ ^a ^b Thrower, James (1980). The Alternative Tradition: A Study of Unbelief in the Ancient World. The Hague, The Netherlands: Mouton Publishers.
^ Frankfort, Henri (1974) [1949]. "Chapter Seven: Mesopotamia: The Adept Life". Before Philosophy: The Intellectual Risk of Ancient Man, an essay on speculative thought in the aboriginal near East. Penguin. p. 226. OCLC 225040700.
^ Temple, Robert (1991). He who saw everything: a verse translation of the Ballsy of Gilgamesh. Random Century Group Ltd. pp. viii–9.
^ ^a ^b Dalley 2000, p. 45.
^ Dalley 2000, pp. 41–42.
^ Mitchell, T.C. (1988). The Bible in the British Museum. The British Museum Press. p. 70.
^ ^a ^b ^c George 2003.
^ Abusch, T. (1993). "Gilgamesh's Request and Siduri'southward Denial. Part I: The Meaning of the Dialogue and Its Implications for the History of the Ballsy". The Tablet and the Whorl; Near Eastern Studies in Honor of William W. Hallo. CDL Press. pp. one–fourteen.
^ George, Andrew R. (2008). "Shattered tablets and tangled threads: Editing Gilgamesh, so and now". Aramazd. Armenian Periodical of Almost Eastern Studies. 3: 11. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
^ ^a ^b George 2003, p. ii.
^ "The New York Times". The New York Times. forepart page. 22 December 1872.
^ ^a ^b ^c George, Andrew R. (2008). "Shattered tablets and tangled threads: Editing Gilgamesh, then and at present". Aramazd. Armenian Journal of Near Eastern Studies. three: seven–30. Retrieved 12 September 2018.
^ Smith, George (3 December 1872). "The Chaldean Business relationship of the Deluge". Sacred-Texts.com . Retrieved 27 March 2020.
^ ^a ^b George 2003, p. xi.
^ ^a ^b Lins Brandão 2019, p. 11.
^ "Offset lines of oldest ballsy verse form plant". The Contained. 16 November 1998. Retrieved 16 September 2019.
^ Evans, Barry. "Information technology Was a Dark and Stormy Night". North Declension Journal . Retrieved 16 September 2019.
^ Dalley 2000, pp. 40–41.
^ ^a ^b Bevan Hurley (27 July 2021). "The states seizes Ballsy of Gilgamesh tablet, considered 1 of globe's oldest works of literature, from Hobby Lobby". Independent UK.
^ Clark, Dartunorro; Williams, Pete (27 July 2021). "Justice Department seizes rare, ancient tablet illegally auctioned to Hobby Lobby". NBC News . Retrieved 28 September 2021. {{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
^ "Gilgamesh tablet: US authorities take buying of artefact". BBC News. 28 July 2021. Retrieved 28 September 2021. {{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
^ Helsel, Phil (23 September 2021). "Aboriginal Gilgamesh tablet taken from Iraq and bought past Hobby Anteroom is returned". NBC News . Retrieved 28 September 2021. {{cite spider web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
^ ^a ^b ^c Brandão 2015, p. 105.
^ Brandão 2015, p. 120.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. 15.
^ Brandão 2015, p. 105, 106.
^ Tigay 1982, pp. 23, 218, 224, 238.
^ ^a ^b Brandão 2015, p. 106.
^ George 2003, pp. xxvii–viii.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. 10.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. 12.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. thirteen.
^ ^a ^b Lins Brandão 2019, p. 22.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. fourteen.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. 17.
^ ^a ^b Lins Brandão 2019, p. 18.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. xix.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. 24.
^ Lins Brandão 2019, p. twenty.
^ ^a ^b Al-Rawi, F. N. H.; George, A. R. (2014). "Back to the Cedar Forest: The Beginning and Stop of Tablet V of the Standard Babylonian Ballsy of Gilgameš" (PDF). Journal of Cuneiform Studies. 66: 69–90. doi:ten.5615/jcunestud.66.2014.0069. JSTOR 10.5615/jcunestud.66.2014.0069. S2CID 161833317.
^ Foster 2003.
^ George 2003, p. xxx.
^ George 2003, p. 98. "'There is a plant that looks like a box-thorn, it has prickles like a dogrose, and will prick one who plucks information technology. Just if you can possess this establish, y'all'll be again as you were in your youth.' ... Said Gilgamesh to him: 'This plant, Ur-shanabi, is the "Institute of Heartbeat", with it a man can regain his vigour. To Uruk-the-Sheepfold I will take it, to an aboriginal I will feed some and put the establish to the test!'"
^ Dalley 2000, p. 42.
^ Maier, John R. (1997). Gilgamesh: A reader. Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers. p. 136. ISBN978-0-86516-339-3.
^ Patton, Laurie L.; Doniger, Wendy (1996). Myth and Method. University of Virginia Press. p. 306. ISBN978-0-8139-1657-half-dozen.
^ Kovacs, Maureen (1989). The Epic of Gilgamesh. University of Stanford Printing. p. 117. ISBN978-0-8047-1711-three.
^ van Driel, G.; Krispijn, Th. J. H.; Stol, M.; Veenhof, Chiliad. R., eds. (1982). Zikir Šumim: Assyriological Studies Presented to F.R. Kraus on the Occasion of His Seventieth Altogether. p. 131. ISBN978-ninety-6258-126-9.
^ George 2003, pp. 101–126.
^ Brandão 2015, p. 119.
^ Abusch, T. Gilgamesh's Request and Siduri'southward Denial. Part I: The Significant of the Dialogue and Its Implications for the History of the Epic. |11.05 MB The Tablet and the Scroll; Near Eastern Studies in Honor of William W. Hallo, one–14. Retrieved ix September 2013.
^ George 2003, pp. 141–208.
^ Katz, Dina (1993). Gilgamesh and Akka. Brill. p. 14. ISBN978-90-72371-67-half dozen.
^ Kramer, Samuel Noah (1961). Sumerian Mythology: A Study of Spiritual and Literary Achievement in the Third Millennium B.C.: Revised Edition. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Academy of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 30–41. ISBN978-0-8122-1047-7.
^ Helle, Sophus (2021). Gilgamesh: A New Translation of the Aboriginal Epic. Yale Academy Printing. p. 144. Taha Baqir published the first Arabic translation of Gilgamesh in 1962
^ Mawr, Bryn (21 April 2004). "Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2004.04.21". Bryn Mawr Classical Review . Retrieved 18 October 2017.
^ Jarman, Mark (1 Jan 2005). "When the Low-cal Came on: The Epic Gilgamesh". The Hudson Review. 58 (ii): 329–34. JSTOR 30044781.
^ Mitchell, Stephen (2010) [2004]. Gilgamesh: A New English Version. Simon and Schuster. ISBN978-0-7432-6169-two . Retrieved nine November 2012.
^ Gmirkin, Russell (2006). Berossus and Genesis, Manetho and Exodus. Continuum. p. 103.
^ Blenkinsopp, Joseph (2004). Treasures old and new. Eerdmans. pp. 93–95.
^ Van Der Torn, Karel (2000). "Did Ecclesiastes copy Gilgamesh?". Bible Review. Vol. 16. pp. 22ff. Retrieved 18 October 2017.
^ George 2003, pp. 70ff.
^ Rendsburg, Gary (2007). "The Biblical flood story in the light of the Gilgamesh flood account," in Gilgamesh and the earth of Assyria, eds Azize, J & Weeks, N. Peters, p. 117.
^ Wexler, Robert (2001). Aboriginal Near Eastern Mythology.
^ Leiden, Brill (1999). The Madness of King Nebuchadnezzar...
^ Meagher, Robert Ant (1995). The meaning of Helen: in search of an ancient icon . U.s.: Bolchazy-Carducci Pubs (IL). ISBN978-0-86516-510-half-dozen.
^ Hamori, Esther J. (Winter 2011). "Echoes of Gilgamesh in the Jacob Story". Journal of Biblical Literature. 130 (iv): 625–42. doi:ten.2307/23488271. JSTOR 23488271. S2CID 161293144.
^ "One-time Testament Pseudepigrapha – Merely another WordPress @ St Andrews site".
^ West, Martin Litchfield (2003) [1997]. The East Face of Helicon: West Asiatic Elements in Greek Poetry and Myth. Oxford: Clarendon Press. pp. 334–402. ISBN978-0-19-815221-7. OCLC 441880596.
^ Abusch, Tzvi (December 2001). "The Development and Meaning of the Epic of Gilgamesh: An Interpretive Essay". Journal of the American Oriental Gild. 121 (four): 614–22. doi:10.2307/606502. JSTOR 606502.
^ Ziolkowski, Theodore (2011). Gilgamesh Among U.s.: Modern Encounters With the Ancient Epic. Cornell Univ Pr. ISBN978-0-8014-5035-8.
^ ^a ^b Ziolkowski, Theodore (1 November 2011). "Gilgamesh: An Epic Obsession". Berfrois. Retrieved eighteen October 2017.

Sources [edit]

The Epic of Gilgamesh: The Babylonian Epic Poem and Other Texts in Akkadian and Sumerian . Translated by Andrew R. George (reprinted ed.). London, England: Penguin Books. 2003 [1999]. ISBN0-fourteen-044919-1. OCLC 901129328.
The Ballsy of Gilgamesh. Translated by Benjamin R. Foster. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company. 2001. ISBN978-0-393-97516-1.
Dalley, Stephanie, ed. (2000). Myths from Mesopotamia: Cosmos, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others. Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-nineteen-953836-2.
Tigay, Jeffrey H. (1982). The Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic. Academy of Pennsylvania Printing. ISBN978-0-8122-7805-7.
Sin-léqi-unnínni, ed. (2020) [2017]. Ele que o abismo viu (in Brazilian Portuguese). Translated by Jacyntho Lins Brandão (1 ed.). Autêntica. p. 320. ISBN978-85-513-0283-5.

External links [edit]

Translations of the legends of Gilgamesh in the Sumerian linguistic communication can be establish in Black, J.A., Cunningham, One thousand., Fluckiger-Bell-ringer, Due east, Robson, Eastward., and Zólyomi, G., The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature, Oxford 1998–
- Gilgamesh and Huwawa, version A
- Gilgamesh and Huwawa, version B
- Gilgamesh and the Bull of Sky
- Gilgamesh and Aga
- Gilgamesh, Enkidu and the under world
- The death of Gilgamesh
An Former Babylonian Version of the Gilgamesh Epic by Anonymous at Project Gutenberg, edited by Morris Jastrow, translated past Albert T. Clay
The Epic of Gilgamesh, Complete Bookish Translation by R. Campbell Thompson
The Epic of Gilgamesh past Kovacs, M.Thousand.

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_of_Gilgamesh