Epic of Gilgamesh, an ancient Mesopotamian epic, recorded in the Akkadian language about Gilgamesh, the king of the Mesopotamian city-state Uruk, and his adventures. This is the oldest epic tale in the world; it was written 1500 years before Homer wrote the Iliad.
The fullest text of the Gilgamesh epic is written on 12 incomplete Akkadian-language tablets found in the mid-19th century by the Turkish Assyriologist Hormuzd Rassam at Nineveh in the library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal (reigned 668–627 BCE). The gaps that occur in the tablets have been partly filled by various fragments found elsewhere in Mesopotamia and Anatolia.
In addition, five short poems in the Sumerian language are known from tablets that were written during the first half of the 2nd millennium BCE; the poems have been entitled “Gilgamesh and Huwawa,” “Gilgamesh and the Bull of Heaven,” “Gilgamesh and Agga of Kish,” “Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld,” and “The Death of Gilgamesh”.
Here we present an adapted version of the epic.
Tablet I
Where the bright Euphrates directs its water to the Sea, the City of Uruk rises. There are no walls more powerful than of Uruk in the whole world, as if not only one ruler had built them, but seven sages put their spirit and work onto them. When you rise up to these walls, walk between the teeth, and feel the bricks with your hand. Remember Gilgamesh, who saw everything to the edge of the universe, reported the times before the flood, got around all the mountains, went on a long journey and returned to his city, where he built the Temple of Hannah (the Temple of goddess Ishtar in Uruk).
Gilgamesh was the king of Uruk; he was a god in two-thirds, and a man for one-third. Among mortals, he had no equal man and did not know where to make his strength. He raged day and night with a faithful retinue, not leaving his son to the parent, and daughter to the mother. And the people prayed to the great goddess Aruru (the earth and fertility mother-goddess): “You, who gave birth to Gilgamesh and gave him exorbitant power as a gift, create a man who would be equal to him. May Gilgamesh be compared a courage with him. Let him compete in power, so that we taste peace”.
And Aruru listened for this request. She created a likeness of Anu (divine personification of the sky, and supreme god) in her heart. Then she washed her hands in the water, pinch off a piece of clay, threw it into the steppes and sculpted Enkidu with her own hands. His body was covered with thick hair. There were hairs on his head, like on Nisaba (the goddess of the harvest). Together with gazelles, he grazed in the steppes, he was with beasts at a watering hole, delighting his heart with water, like all creatures of the earth.
Once at a watering hole one young hunter saw him. He saw and stopped immobilized. His heart pounded, and his cheeks turned pale. Returning home, the hunter told his father what frightened him. The wise parent advised the son: Listen, my son! You will not be able to catch the man whom you met. But the greatest warrior, similar to immortal gods, lives in Uruk. Like a stone of heaven, his hands are strong. Go, my son, to Gilgamesh, appearing under his eyes, and tell everything without hiding.
The hunter came to Uruk and told Gilgamesh what he saw in the steppe. The king sank into his thoughts, his face became darker than a night, and wrinkles appeared on his forehead. But time was gone on, and his face brightened from the thought and the decision that the gods had sent him.
And Gilgamesh went to the temple of the mistress Ishtar, the will of whom the people and animals of the steppe are obedient. When the King arrive, the harlots, who meet in Ishtar’s temple, went out and tried to attract attention by a look and a gesture. But he only asked Shamhat, who was the most beautiful among others. “No, I didn’t come for that,” Gilgamesh strictly told her, “for which strangers come to your famous temple. You should leave the temple and go to the steppe, where I had a rival. By your art you need to attract his wild heart, let him follow you, like a lamb on his shaky legs, or like a foal running after his mare.”
Six days were over, and each of these days seemed to the hero as long as a month. Having forgotten the affairs and amusements, the king waited at the gate, hoping that the lions would not touch the woman, and when she would meet a giant who had not knew a woman’s love, she would win and show him the way to Uruk.