Epic of Gilgamesh

EPIC OF GILGAMESH. - Alongside the Enūma eliš the Babylonians and Assyrians had another national poem, whose central figure was G. (Gišbil-ga-meš), the presumed very ancient king of the sub-Babylonian city of Uruk ('Erekh in the Old Testament), whose walls and famous temple called Eanna he is said to have built, since it was the seat of the god Anu. It is very probable that G. is in fact a historical kingly figure. Of this poem there was a recension in the Sumerian language, of which some fragments have survived, an Old Babylonian recension, certainly dating back to the era of the first dynasty of Babylon (ca. 1900 to 1600 B.C.), also surviving only in fragments, and a Neo-Assyrian recension, whose numerous and extensive fragments were found in the library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal among the ruins of Nineveh. Some lacunae in the text have been filled with various passages from the version in the Hittite language. Fragments of the Hurrian translation are also known. The poem is divided into twelve books. The penultimate contains a description of the universal flood. It is written in verse, in that poetic language that was proper to the poems and hymns to the gods of the Old Babylonian era.

The E. of G. is a hymn to friendship, to the cordial and profound comradeship that bound the king of Uruk to his most beloved friend Enkidu, heroic like him and ever ready to fight and to give his life for his companion, for his ibru talimu. Onto this principal motif of the epic another motif is grafted, that of man's impossibility of obtaining eternal life: this has been reserved by the gods for themselves, and it is therefore entirely useless for G. to seek to obtain it for his dear departed friend Enkidu.

The first words of the poem, Ša nagbu imuru, "he who has seen everything," give the Babylonian title of the poem. G., as king of Uruk, treats the inhabitants of the city as a tyrant, and these naturally complain and address their laments to the gods, who charge the goddess Aruru to form a man, entirely similar to G., whose task will be to put an end to the King's abuses. Aruru fashions Enkidu, hero of the steppe, all covered with hair, who dwells with the animals, very strong and savage. He destroys the hunters' nets, and one of these, on the King's advice, takes with him a prostitute whom he leads to Enkidu in order to tame him. Indeed, carnal relations with the woman refine Enkidu and make him malleable to her designs. She turns him from a savage into almost a citizen and finally leads him into the city. Here he meets G. after the King had been informed of his arrival in various dreams. Enkidu clashes with the King when the latter goes to lie with his own lover and succeeds in defeating him: from the enmity of the two arises an indestructible friendship. They become inseparable companions and set about performing certain heroic deeds, among which the poem describes in detail the one against Humbaba on the mountain of the cedars, sacred to the goddess Ištar. The deed ends with the killing of the guardian just mentioned. But this killing arouses the wrath of the goddess, who immediately thinks of avenging herself for the affront suffered, all the more so since she, after G.'s return to Uruk, full of admiration for the King's heroism, had offered herself to him as a lover, but had been rudely rebuffed by him. To wash away the shame brought upon her she turns to Anu, and he sends against G. and his friend the celestial bull, which, however, is seized by the two and killed. Indeed Enkidu takes one of its thighs and, having climbed onto the city walls, throws it against the goddess. Still more enraged by this new affront, she unleashes a disease against the intrepid hero, who dies, bitterly and long lamented by his desolate companion and by the whole city. After burying him, G., inconsolable and as if mad, goes in search of Utnapištim, the hero of the universal flood, who had been made immortal by the god Enlil. He finds him after a long journey and has him narrate how he attained eternal life, with the aim of obtaining it for Enkidu and also for himself. But Utnapištim cannot confer it on him; he does, however, give him a plant for rejuvenation, which is then taken from the hero by a serpent. Returned home, he evokes the spirit of Enkidu from the underworld and has him describe the life that the dead lead there. With this melancholy note the poem ends: man cannot be immortal.

Giuseppe Furlani