WH-1 Mesopotamia: Lecture 3: Epic of Gilgamesh
Part 1: Essential Questions
A. What does the Epic of Gilgamesh tell us about the
religion and philosophy of ancient Mesopotamian
culture?
B. What are the similarities and differences between
the ancient Mesopotamian flood literature as
ecorded in the Epic of Gilgamensh and the Biblical
account of Noah given in the Book of Genesis?
Part II: Original Source Material and Class Notes
(textbook supplement page 35)
The transition from writing to literature probably required many hundreds of years. For centuries
writing was a tool of commerce, a matter of contracts and bills, of shipments and receipts; and
secondarily, perhaps, it was an instrument of religious record, an attempt to preserve magic
formulas, ceremonial procedures, sacred legends, prayers and hymns from alteration or decay.
Nevertheless, by 2700 BC, great libraries had been formed in Sumeria; at Tello, for example, in
ruins contemporary with Gudea, DeSarzac discovered a collection of over 30,000 tablets ranged one
upon the other in neat and logical array. As early as 2000 BC Sumerian historians began to
reconstruct the past and record the present for the edification of the future; portions of their work
have come down to us not in the original form but as quotations in later Babylonian chronicles.
Among the original fragments, however, is a fragment found at Nippur, bearing the Sumerian
prototype of the Epic of Gilgamesh, which we (shall now) study in its developed Babylonian
expression.
Durant, Our Oriental Heritage, pgs. 131-132
1) The Epic of Gilgamesh is the most famous relic of
MESOPOTAMIAN literature; what we know is based on
12 broken tablets from the library of Ashurbanipal (King
of the ASSYRIANS Born ca. 669 BC and founder of one
of the world’s best-preserved ancient libraries)
2) Comparable to the ILIAD of Homer—it is a collection of
loosely connected stories going back to Sumeria (ca. 3000
BCE); part of it is the Babylonian account of the FLOOD.
Gilgamesh was a LEGENDARY ruler—a descendent of a
race that had survived the flood.
3) Gilgamesh, ruler of URUK, is described as follows: “Two
thirds of him is god, One third of him is man, There’s none
can match the form of his body…All things he saw, even to
the ends of the earth, He underwent all, learned to know
all. He peered through all secrets, Through wisdom’s
mantle that veileth all. What was hidden he saw, what was
covered he undid; of times before the stormflood he brought
report. He went on a long far away, giving himself toil &
distress; wrote then on a stone the whole of his labor.”
Fathers complain to ISHTAR (the principal, whimsical
goddess of the Babylonians) that “he leads their sons on
exhausting toils, building the city walls throughout the day
and night” and husbands complain that “he leaves not a
wife to her master, nor a single virgin to her mother.”
4) Ishtar begs Aruru (Gilgamesh’s grandmother) to create
another son equal to Gilgamesh in strength & cunning, so
that the husbands may have peace because Gilgamesh
will be kept in constant conflict. Aruru creates ENGIDU,
a man with the strength of a boar, the mane of a lion, and
the speed of a bird. He hates the society of men,
preferring to “browse with the gazelles, sport with the
creatures of the water, and quench his thirst with the beasts
of the field.”
5) A HUNTER tried to capture Engidu with nets but failed.
So, he went to Gilgamesh and requested a priestess from
the temple who he would use to ensnare Engidu using sex.
“Go, my hunter” replied Gilgamesh. “Take a priestess,
when the beasts come to the watering place let her display
her beauty’ he will see her, and his beasts that troop around
him will be scattered.” When the hunter & the priestess
find Engidu, the hunter says: “There he is, woman!
Loosen they buckle, Unveil thy delight, That he make take
his fill of thee! Hang not back, take up his lust! When he
sees thee, he will draw near. Open thy robe that he rest
upon thee! Arouse him in rapture, the work of woman.
Then he will become a stranger to his wild beasts, who on
his own steppes grew up with him. His bosom will press
against thee.” Then the priestess loosened her buckle,
unveiled her delight, for him to take his fill of her. She
hung not back, but took up his lust. She opened her robe so
that he rest upon her. Engidu forgot where he was born.”
6) Engidu stays with the woman for 6 days/7 nights but then
tires of her. He awakens to find all the beasts with whom
he grew up gone, and he grieves greatly. But the priestess
tells him: “Thou art superb as a God, why dost thou live
amongst the beasts of the field? Come—I will conduct thee
to Uruk, where is Gilgamesh, whose might is supreme.”
Engidu replies: Lead me to the place where is Gilgamesh. I
will fight him and manifest to him my power, so that the
Gods and the husbands will be well pleased.”
7) Gilgamesh overcomes Engidu, first with STRENGTH,
and then with FRIENDSHIP. They become devoted
friends, and defend Uruk during war, from which they
return with glory and victory.
8) Ishtar, seeing Gilgamesh in victory, falls in love, saying:
“Come, Gilgamesh, be my husband, thou! Thy love, give it
to me as a gift; though shalt be my spouse, and I shalt be
thy wife.” Gilgamesh rejects her, noting that her previous
lovers, once she tired of them, had terrible fates. Having
been rejected by Gilgamesh, Ishtar asks the great God
Anu to create a wild beast to kill Gilgamesh. Anu relents
after Ishtar threatens to suspend the impulses of love and
desire throughout the universe, thus eventually ending all
life. But Gilgamesh, with Engidu’s held, kills the beast,
and when Ishtar curses Gilgamesh, Engidu throws a
severed limb of the beast into her FACE. In revenge,
Ishtar afflicts Engidu with a fatal illness.
9) The remainder of the epic relates the mourning of
Gilgamesh over the death of Engidu. Gilgamesh becomes
obsessed with death and how it could be defeated. One
man—SHAMASH-NAPISHTIM—had eluded it—and so
may hold the secret of deathlessness. HIS STORY:
Marduk, the Babylonian God of creation, fashioned man
from a lump of clay. However, the Gods became
dissatisfied with the men whom he had created, so they
sent a great flood to destroy them along with all their
works.
10)
Ea, the God of Wisdom, took pity on humankind,
and decided that at least one man and his wife. This man
was Shamash-napishtim, who built an ark, survived the
flood, sent out a DOVE to see if the waters had receded,
and landed the ark on top of a mountain. He then offered
sacrifices to the gods, who desperately missed the
offerings of the men whom they had destroyed, and so
“snuffed up the odor—the gods snuffed up the excellent
odor, the gods gathered like FLIES above the offering.”
11)
Gilgamesh decides to seek out Shamesh-napishtim,
regardless of what it takes to find him. After many trials
and much suffering, he reaches the Happy Island where
Shamesh-napishtim—the possessor of ETERNAL life—
lives. Gilgamesh asks him the secret of immortal life. The
answer: the story of the flood is told at great length; the
Gods made him and his wife immortal because they had
saved the human race. He gives Gilgamesh a plant that will
extend life, but the plant is stolen by a snake during
Gilgamesh’s return trip.
12)
When Gilgamesh returns to Uruk, he prays that
Engidu would appear to him. He does, and Gilgamesh
inquires about the state of the afterlife. The response: “I
cannot tell it thee; if I were to open the earth before thee, if I
were to tell thee that which I have seen, terror would
overthrow thee, thou wouldst faint away.” Gilgamesh
responds: “Terror will overthrow me, I shall faint away, but
tell it to me.” Engidu describes the miseries of Hades, and
here the fragmentary epic ends.
INDEPENDENT SCHOLARSHIP CHALLENGE: Read the
Epic of Gilgamesh (we have a copy available or find the full text
online) and make a table that compares/contrasts the details of
the Genesis account of the flood and the Babylonian account as
given in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Note: we do have a Septuagint
(Greek copy of the Old Testament based on the work of 70
ancient translators) available if you wish to study the original
Greek Genesis text—see me for help on this!!!
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