The epic’s prelude offers a general introduction
to Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, who was two-thirds god and one-third
man. He built magnificent ziggurats, or temple towers, surrounded
his city with high walls, and laid out its orchards and fields.
He was physically beautiful, immensely strong, and very wise. Although
Gilgamesh was godlike in body and mind, he began his kingship as
a cruel despot. He lorded over his subjects, raping any woman who
struck his fancy, whether she was the wife of one of his warriors
or the daughter of a nobleman. He accomplished his building projects
with forced labor, and his exhausted subjects groaned under his
oppression. The gods heard his subjects’ pleas and decided to keep
Gilgamesh in check by creating a wild man named Enkidu, who was
as magnificent as Gilgamesh. Enkidu became Gilgamesh’s great friend, and
Gilgamesh’s heart was shattered when Enkidu died of an illness inflicted
by the gods. Gilgamesh then traveled to the edge of the world and
learned about the days before the deluge and other secrets of the
gods, and he recorded them on stone tablets.
The epic begins with Enkidu. He lives with the animals,
suckling at their breasts, grazing in the meadows, and drinking
at their watering places. A hunter discovers him and sends a temple
prostitute into the wilderness to tame him. In that time, people
considered women and sex calming forces that could domesticate wild
men like Enkidu and bring them into the civilized world. When Enkidu
sleeps with the woman, the animals reject him since he is no longer
one of them. Now, he is part of the human world. Then the harlot
teaches him everything he needs to know to be a man. Enkidu is outraged
by what he hears about Gilgamesh’s excesses, so he travels to Uruk
to challenge him. When he arrives, Gilgamesh is about to force his
way into a bride’s wedding chamber. Enkidu steps into the doorway
and blocks his passage. The two men wrestle fiercely for a long
time, and Gilgamesh finally prevails. After that, they become friends
and set about looking for an adventure to share.
Gilgamesh and Enkidu decide to steal trees from a distant
cedar forest forbidden to mortals. A terrifying demon named Humbaba, the
devoted servant of Enlil, the god of earth, wind, and air, guards it.
The two heroes make the perilous journey to the forest, and, standing
side by side, fight with the monster. With assistance from Shamash
the sun god, they kill him. Then they cut down the forbidden trees,
fashion the tallest into an enormous gate, make the rest into a
raft, and float on it back to Uruk. Upon their return, Ishtar, the goddess
of love, is overcome with lust for Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh spurns her.
Enraged, the goddess asks her father, Anu, the god of the sky, to
send the Bull of Heaven to punish him. The bull comes down from
the sky, bringing with him seven years of famine. Gilgamesh and
Enkidu wrestle with the bull and kill it. The gods meet in council and
agree that one of the two friends must be punished for their transgression,
and they decide Enkidu is going to die. He takes ill, suffers immensely,
and shares his visions of the underworld with Gilgamesh. When he
finally dies, Gilgamesh is heartbroken.
Gilgamesh can’t stop grieving for Enkidu, and he can’t
stop brooding about the prospect of his own death. Exchanging his kingly
garments for animal skins as a way of mourning Enkidu, he sets off
into the wilderness, determined to find Utnapishtim, the Mesopotamian
Noah. After the flood, the gods had granted Utnapishtim eternal
life, and Gilgamesh hopes that Utnapishtim can tell him how he might
avoid death too. Gilgamesh’s journey takes him to the twin-peaked
mountain called Mashu, where the sun sets into one side of the mountain
at night and rises out of the other side in the morning. Utnapishtim
lives beyond the mountain, but the two scorpion monsters that guard
its entrance refuse to allow Gilgamesh into the tunnel that passes
through it. Gilgamesh pleads with them, and they relent.
After a harrowing passage through total darkness, Gilgamesh emerges
into a beautiful garden by the sea. There he meets Siduri, a veiled
tavern keeper, and tells her about his quest. She warns him that
seeking immortality is futile and that he should be satisfied with the
pleasures of this world. However, when she can’t turn him away from
his purpose, she directs him to Urshanabi, the ferryman. Urshanabi
takes Gilgamesh on the boat journey across the sea and through the
Waters of Death to Utnapishtim. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh the
story of the flood—how the gods met in council and decided to destroy
humankind. Ea, the god of wisdom, warned Utnapishtim about the gods’
plans and told him how to fashion a gigantic boat in which his family
and the seed of every living creature might escape. When the waters
finally receded, the gods regretted what they’d done and agreed
that they would never try to destroy humankind again. Utnapishtim
was rewarded with eternal life. Men would die, but humankind would
continue.
When Gilgamesh insists that he be allowed to live forever,
Utnapishtim gives him a test. If you think you can stay alive for
eternity, he says, surely you can stay awake for a week. Gilgamesh
tries and immediately fails. So Utnapishtim orders him to clean
himself up, put on his royal garments again, and return to Uruk
where he belongs. Just as Gilgamesh is departing, however, Utnapishtim’s wife
convinces him to tell Gilgamesh about a miraculous plant that restores
youth. Gilgamesh finds the plant and takes it with him, planning
to share it with the elders of Uruk. But a snake steals the plant
one night while they are camping. As the serpent slithers away, it
sheds its skin and becomes young again.
When Gilgamesh returns to Uruk, he is empty-handed but
reconciled at last to his mortality. He knows that he can’t live
forever but that humankind will. Now he sees that the city he had
repudiated in his grief and terror is a magnificent, enduring achievement—the closest
thing to immortality to which a mortal can aspire.
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