The Story of Gilgamesh

Once upon a time, many thousands of years ago, there lived a king called Gilgamesh in a city in Mesopotamia. The city was called Uruk. It was close to the river Euphrates. It was night. Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, went out into the dark and looked over his city. People, his people, lived in these houses and they worked hard for him. Every day, he told them to work hard for him. There was a big wall around the city, around the temples, the palace and all the houses. The workers had built that for him, too. Gilgamesh always made them work. The Gods had given him super-human strength. He was proud and arrogant. But he was alone, too, because there was nobody like him anywhere in the world.
 
He had gone into the streets of Uruk because of a dream. Now he was waiting for his mother, a priestess of the Sun God. She wanted to explain the dream to him.
“Mother”, he shouted, when she was near him. “In my dream I saw a great axe lying in the middle of the city. Nobody knew where it came from. I took it and brought it to my room in the palace. Can you tell me what my dream meant?”
“That is a good dream, my son, be happy”, said the mother. “This axe is a man. You will find him, and he will be your friend and brother.”
 
This dream became true very soon. The Gods had decided to give Gilgamesh a friend. In the steppes of the country, they had made a man. The had used mud and clay and dirt and earth and had formed a man, as strong as a lion, who had lived with the animals and had drunken water with them at the watering holes in the desert. Dark hair covered his body, and he had long hair on his head.
One day a priestess found this wild man. She called him Enkidu. She gave him some clothes. She taught him how to eat. She showed him civilisation. She cut his hair. The animals did not like him anymore and so she brought him into the city of Uruk. At the city gate, a very big door in the wall around the city, Enkidu met Gilgamesh. First, the two heroes looked at each other, then they fought. It was a terrible fight. Nobody could win, and in the end, Gilgamesh stood up and said: “Enkidu, you are the axe I saw in my dream. You are my friend and my brother!” From that day on, both were best friends. They went together everywhere.
 
Because life in the city was boring, they went to the Forest of the Cedars. There they fought the guardian of the forest, the giant demon Humbaba. Then they hacked down giant trees: They were the Gods’ trees. The Gods were angry.
They sent Bull of Heaven down to Uruk. Every time the bull breathed, hundreds of people died. Working together again, Gilgamesh and Enkidu killed the Bull of Heaven. The Gods were angry, again.
 
The Gods were really angry: “Enkidu must pay for this! He must be ill! He must lie in bed! He must have bad dreams. Enkidu must die for this!” For nine days, Enkidu had a temperature, and Gilgamesh looked after him. He saw that Enkidu had enough to drink and a bit to eat. Then the king of Uruk saw that life left his friend. Enkidu was lying quiet and still. He did not move or breathe, and Gilgamesh cried. But crying did not help against death, because Enkidu was dead. There was a big funeral for Enkidu. But Gilgamesh was afraid: “What if I must die, too?“ he asked himself. He was afraid of death. “There is only one man I know who has never died. He is as old as the hills and still alive. Utnapishtim, the great-great-great-great-grandfather of my family. He lives in a country far away from here, but I want to visit him and see if he can tell me the secret of life and death.”
 
So Gilgamesh went out, he walked east, where this man, lived. He walked through a steppe and came to the mountains that were as high as the sky. They were so high that he could not climb over them. At the foot of the mountains, there was a small entrance. There were two guardians, two figures with strange bodies. A man and a woman, two scorpions with human faces. They called: “Young hero, where are you going? Why is your cloak so dirty? Why are you crying?”
He answered: “I must cry, because my brother Enkidu lies still and quiet, and I am searching for the source of life.”
“Gilgamesh, there is no chance for you. You can’t climb over this mountain; you can’t walk through this entrance. Twelve hours is the time you need for this way. You must die before you see the sun again.” But Gilgamesh said: “I want to do this. I must do it.” And the scorpion woman said to the scorpion man: “Let him go through. He is half man, half God.” And the scorpion man said: “You are a hero, Gilgamesh, go your own way. The door in the mountains is open for you.”
 
Step by step, Gilgamesh walked through the dark tunnel. It was totally dark around him. He did not see what was behind him; he did not see what was before him. But he remembered Enkidu, and that gave him the power to go on. After nine hours, he felt the wind, after eleven hours he saw a small light at the end of the tunnel, and when twelve hours were over, he stepped out of the mountain and into the garden of the Gods.
 
It was beautiful. Really beautiful. He had never before in his life seen anything so beautiful. This beauty was all new to him. All plants and all flowers were of gems. The fruits were diamonds and rubies and sapphires and emeralds. The sun was shining in the trees, a beautiful light was everywhere. Close to the exit of this garden, where the ocean was, was the house of Siduri. She gave food and drink to the people who came in this garden. She invited them to stay. Siduri was shocked when Gilgamesh walked in: “Young hero, where are you going? Why is your cloak so dirty? Why are you crying?”
He answered: “I must cry, because my brother Enkidu lies still and quiet, and I am searching for the source of life.” “Gilgamesh, there is no chance for you. Stay here and have fun every day. Have a party as long as you can. Your are a man. And because you are a man, you must die one day.”
 
Gilgamesh did not listen. He left this paradise and went down to the sea. There he saw a fisherman who was working on his boat. “Take me with you”, said Gilgamesh. “I am looking for a man from my family. He cannot die and he lives on the other side of the sea.”
The fisherman answered: “You must go over alone. Go into the forest and cut down a long, thin tree. With it, you must push the boat forward. But be careful, because you mustn’t get yourself wet. This is the Sea of Death. When the water touches you, you die.” Gilgamesh did what the man told him. When he saw the land on the other side, he had no trees left. He took his cloak and held it in the wind. With the wind in his sail, he came to the other side.
 
Utnapishtim saw him when left the boat. “You must be Gilgamesh”, he said. “No other hero is so strong.” Then he asked: “Young hero, where are you going? Why is your cloak so dirty? Why are you crying?”
He answered: “I must cry, because my brother Enkidu lies still and quiet, and I am searching for the source of life. Tell me, Utnapishtim, how is it that you haven’t died?”
“Gilgamesh, there is no chance for you. A long time ago, the Gods killed everybody in the world with a huge flood. But they told me to build an ark, a big ship for me and my family and my animals. That is how they saved my life. Then I came here and built my house. Since that time I have lived here.“
 
Gilgamesh asked him: “Tell me what I must do. I don’t want to die.” The old man asked him: “Can you stay awake for seven days? Seven days without sleep? When you can do this, I will tell you what you can do.”
“Of course I can stay awake for seven days,“ said Gilgamesh. Then he sat down. But he so tired from his long walk, that he slept the next minute.
“There, our hero sleeps”, said Utnapishtim to his wife.
“Do you want to wake him up?“ she asked.
“No, but I am going to put a bread next to him for every day he sleeps.”
After seven days and seven nights, Gilgamesh woke up. “Have I slept only a short time?”
Utnapishtim showed him the seven pieces of bread. “The first bread is dry, the second one green, the third one hard like a stone, the fourth one has become dark, the fifth one is still soft, the sixth has been baked a moment ago. My wife is working on the seventh one.”
 
Then Gilgamesh saw that he had failed the test. “Wash yourself, put on fresh, clean clothes, and go home to where you came from”, said Utnapishtim. “You can’t stay here.”
Gilgamesh did what Utnapishtim said. He cleaned himself, his skin was white again, and he was no longer dirty. “But because you are a hero, I want to tell you something”, said Utnapishtim. “Down at the bottom of the sweet sea is a magic plant. When you find it and take it, you will find new life. Gilgamesh went home, over the sea. At the deepest place of the sea, he went down and dived into the water. He found the magic plant, took it and swam back up again.
 
On the other side of the sea, Gilgamesh walked home. He walked for days. At one place in the dry and hot desert, he found an oasis with fresh water. He took off his clothes and had a bath. But then a snake came. It saw Gilgamesh and his clothes and the magic plant on his clothes. It ate the magic plant. Gilgamesh ran to the snake and touched it. It was too late. The snake left its old skin and got away. Now Gilgamesh had the old and dry and dirty snakeskin in his hands. He cried.
 
So Gilgamesh came back to Uruk. He was no longer bad and terrible to his people. He was now a good kind. He had become mild. He often thought about his brother Enkidu. One day, he saw Enkidu’s ghost. Enkidu spoke to him. Gilgamesh heard his voice: “Oh friend, do not forget me. I lie still and quiet. Heavy is the earth, and terrible is my end.” This is what Gilgamesh answered: “Enkidu my brother, do not say things like that. Don’t cry. I took off my clothes in the oasis and had a bath. A snake ate the Plant of Life. It left its dirty skin. It looked like silver when it got away. I know now that it lives. Wait for me Enkidu. I, too, will leave my skin and come to you. We will be brothers again.”


non volio 2005