Gilgamesh Summary

GILGAMESH SUMMARY
Tablet One
The story introduces Gilgamesh, king of Uruk. Gilgamesh, two-thirds god and
one-third man, is oppressing his people, who cry 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 sleep with brides on their wedding 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 respond to the people's pleas by
creating an equal to Gilgamesh who will be able to stop 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
because Enkidu is uprooting his traps. The trapper tells Gilgamesh about the
man, and it is arranged for Enkidu to be seduced by Shamhat, a temple
prostitute, his first step towards being tamed, and after six days and seven
nights of love making she takes Enkidu to a shepherd's camp to learn how to
be civilized. Gilgamesh, meanwhile, has been having dreams about the
imminent arrival of a beloved new companion.
Tablet two
Shamhat brings Enkidu to a shepherds' camp, where he is introduced to a
human diet and becomes the night watchman. Learning from a passing
stranger about 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 way, and they fight. After a fierce
battle, Enkidu acknowledges Gilgamesh's 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 will not be
deterred.
Tablet three
The elders give Gilgamesh advice for his journey. 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
Gilgamesh and Enkidu journey to the Cedar Forest. Every few days they
camp on a mountain, and perform a dream ritual. Gilgamesh has five
terrifying dreams about 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 as good
omens, and denies that the frightening images represent the forest guardian.
As they approach the cedar mountain, they hear Humbaba bellowing, and
have to encourage each other not to be afraid.
Tablet five
The heroes enter the cedar forest. Humbaba, the ogre-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 battle commences. The
mountains quake with the tumult and the sky turns black. The god Shamash
sends 13 winds to bind Humbaba, and he is captured. The monster pleads for
his life, and Gilgamesh pities him. Enkidu, however, is enraged and asks
Gilgamesh to kill the beast. Humbaba curses them both and Gilgamesh
dispatches him with a blow to the neck. The two heroes cut down many
cedars, including a gigantic tree that Enkidu plans to fashion into a gate for
the temple of Enlil. They build a raft and return home along the Euphrates
with the giant tree and the head of Humbaba.
Tablet six
Gilgamesh rejects the advances of the goddess Ishtar because of her
mistreatment of previous lovers like Dumuzi. Ishtar asks her father Anu to
send Gugalanna 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 becomes frightened, and gives in to her.
Ishtar leads the bull of heaven to Uruk, and it causes widespread
devastation. It lowers the level of the Euphrates river, and dries up the
marshes. It opens up huge pits that swallow 300 men. Without any divine
assistance, Enkidu and Gilgamesh attack and slay it, and offer 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.
Tablet seven
In Enkidu's dream, the gods decide that one of the heroes must die because
they killed Humbaba and the Bull of Heaven. Despite the protestations of
Shamash, Enkidu is marked for death. Enkidu curses the great 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 will bestow great honors upon him at his funeral, and will wander
into the wild consumed with grief. Enkidu regrets his curses and blesses
Shamhat. In a second dream however he sees himself being taken captive to
the Netherworld by a terrifying Angel of Death. The underworld is a "house of
dust" 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.
Tablet eight
Gilgamesh delivers a lamentation for Enkidu, in which he calls upon
mountains, forests, fields, rivers, wild animals, and all of Uruk to mourn for
his friend. Recalling their adventures together, Gilgamesh tears at his hair
and clothes 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 great banquet is held where the treasures are
offered to the gods of the Netherworld. Just before a break in the text there is
a suggestion that a river is being dammed, indicating a burial in a river bed,
as in the corresponding Sumerian poem, The Death of Gilgamesh.
Tablet nine
Tablet nine opens with Gilgamesh roaming the wild wearing animal skins,
grieving for Enkidu. Fearful of his own death, he decides to seek Utnapishtim
("the Faraway"), and learn the secret of eternal life. Among the few survivors
of the Great Flood, Utnapishtim and his wife are the only humans to have
been granted immortality by the gods. Gilgamesh crosses a mountain pass
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 Mount Mashu at the end of
the earth. He comes across a tunnel, which no man has ever entered,
guarded by two terrible scorpion-men. After questioning him and recognizing

his semi-divine nature, they allow him to enter it, and he passes under the
mountains along the Road of the Sun. In complete darkness he follows the
road
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 full of jewelladen trees.
Tablet ten
Meeting the ale wife Siduri, who assumes, because of his disheveled
appearance, that he is a murderer or thief, Gilgamesh tells her about the
purpose of his journey. She attempts to dissuade him from his quest, but
sends him to Urshanabi the ferryman, who will help him cross the sea to
Utnapishtim. Gilgamesh, out of spontaneous rage, destroys the stone-giants
that live with Urshanabi. He tells him his story, but when he asks for his help,
Urshanabi informs him that he has just destroyed the only creatures who can
cross the Waters of Death, which are deadly to the touch. Urshanabi instructs
Gilgamesh to cut down 120 trees, 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
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 great flood. To save Utnapishtim the god Ea told him
to build a boat. He gave him precise dimensions, and it was sealed with pitch
and bitumen. His entire family went aboard together with his craftsmen and
"all the animals of the field". A violent storm then arose which caused the
terrified gods to retreat to the heavens. Ishtar lamented the wholesale
destruction of humanity, and the other gods wept beside her. The storm
lasted six 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 smell the sweet savor and gather around.
Ishtar vows that just as she will never forget the brilliant necklace that hangs
around her neck, she will always remember this time. When Enlil arrives,
angry that there are survivors, she condemns him for instigating the flood.
Ea also castigates him for sending a disproportionate punishment. Enlil

blesses Utnapishtim and his wife, and rewards them with eternal life. This
account matches the flood story that concludes the Epic of Atrahasis (see
also Gilgamesh flood myth).
The main point seems to be that when Enlil granted eternal life it was a
unique gift. As if to demonstrate this point, Utnapishtim challenges
Gilgamesh to stay awake for six days and seven nights. Gilgamesh falls
asleep, and Utnapishtim instructs his wife to bake 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 sleep.
After instructing Urshanabi the ferryman to wash Gilgamesh, and clothe him
in royal robes, they depart for Uruk.
As they are leaving, Utnapishtim's wife asks her husband to offer a parting
gift. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh that at the bottom of the sea there lives a
boxthorn-like plant that will make him young again. Gilgamesh, by binding
stones to his feet so he can walk on the bottom, manages to obtain the
plant. Gilgamesh proposes to investigate if the plant has the hypothesized
rejuvenation ability by testing it on an old man once he returns to Uruk.
'There is a plant that looks like a box-thorn, it has prickles like a dogrose, and
will prick one who plucks it. But if you can possess this plant, you'll be again
as you were in your youth'
'This plant, Ur-shanabi, is the "Plant of Heartbeat", with it a man can regain
his vigour. To Uruk-the-sheepfold I will take it, to an ancient I will feed some
and put the plant to the test!'
Unfortunately, when Gilgamesh stops to bathe, it is stolen by a serpent, who
sheds its skin as it departs. Gilgamesh weeps at the futility of his efforts,
because he has now lost all chance of immortality. He returns to Uruk, where
the sight of its massive walls prompts him to praise this enduring work to
Urshanabi.
Tablet twelve
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 it has been suggested that it is derived
from an unknown version of that story.:42 The contents of this last tablet are
inconsistent with previous ones: Enkidu is still alive, despite having died
earlier in the epic. Because 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 as an 'inorganic appendage' to the epic. Alternatively, it 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", it both connects the Gilgamesh of
the epic with the Gilgamesh who is the King of the Netherworld, and is "a
dramatic capstone whereby the twelve-tablet epic
ends on one and the same theme, that of "seeing" (= understanding,
discovery, etc.), with which it began."
Gilgamesh complains to Enkidu that various of his possessions (the tablet is
unclear exactly what different translations include a drum and a ball) have
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 return. Enkidu does everything which he was told not to do. The
underworld keeps him. Gilgamesh prays to the gods to give him back his
friend. Enlil and Suen don't reply, but Ea and Shamash decide to help.
Shamash makes a crack in the earth, and Enkidu's ghost jumps out of it. The
tablet ends with Gilgamesh questioning Enkidu about what he has seen in
the underworld.

Gilgamesh Summary

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GILGAMESH SUMMARY

guarded by two terrible scorpion-men. After questioning him and recognizing

Ea also castigates him for sending a disproportionate punishment. Enlil

suggested that "its purpose, though crudely handled, is to explain to

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