Gilgamesh tablet XI | |
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Material | clay |
Size | Length: 15.24 cm (6.00 in) Breadth: 13.33 cm (5.25 in) Depth: 3.17 cm (1.25 in) |
Writing | cuneiform |
Created | 7th century BCE |
Period/culture | Neo-Assyrian |
Discovered | Kouyunjik |
Present location | Room 55, British Museum, London |
Identification | K.3375 |
The Gilgamesh flood myth is a flood myth in the Epic of Gilgamesh. It is one of three Mesopotamian Flood Myths alongside the one including in the Eridu Genesis, and an episode from the Atra-Hasis Epic. Many scholars believe that the flood myth was added to Tablet XI in the "standard version" of the Gilgamesh Epic by an editor who used the flood story from the Epic of Atra-Hasis. [1] A short reference to the flood myth is also present in the much older Sumerian Gilgamesh poems, from which the later Babylonian versions drew much of their inspiration and subject matter.
Gilgamesh's supposed historical reign is believed to have been approximately 2700 BC, [2] shortly before the earliest known written stories. The discovery of artifacts associated with Aga and Enmebaragesi of Kish, two other kings named in the stories, has lent credibility to the historical existence of Gilgamesh. [3]
The earliest Sumerian Gilgamesh poems date from as early as the Third dynasty of Ur (2100–2000 BC). [4] One of these poems mentions Gilgamesh’s journey to meet the flood hero, as well as a short version of the flood story. [5] The earliest Akkadian versions of the unified epic are dated to ca. 2000–1500 BC. [6] Due to the fragmentary nature of these Old Babylonian versions, it is unclear whether they included an expanded account of the flood myth; although one fragment definitely includes the story of Gilgamesh's journey to meet Utnapishtim. The "standard" Akkadian version included a long version of the story and was edited by Sin-liqe-unninni, [7] who lived sometime between 1300 and 1000 BC.
The first Gilgamesh flood tablet was discovered by Hormuzd Rassam in Nineveh and was in the collection of the British Museum but had not been translated. In 1872, George Smith, an assistant at the British Museum, translated the tablet from the seventh-century B.C Akkadian. Reportedly, he exclaimed, "I am the first man to read that after more than two thousand years of oblivion".
While on a subsequent archeological expedition to Nineveh in Iraq, Smith found on May 7, 1873 a portion of a tablet containing the missing part of the flood story, describing the provisioning of the ark: "Into the midst of it thy grain, thy furniture, and thy goods, thy wealth, thy woman servants, thy female slaves...the animals of the field all, I will gather and I will send to thee, and they shall be enclosed in thy door." [8] [9]
A much older Cuneiform tablet dating to 1646-1626 B.C., about one thousand years before the Book of Genesis is believed to have been written, and known as the Epic of Atra-Hasis describing a great flood was discovered in 1898. J. P. Morgan acquired it and today it is in the Morgan Library & Museum.
In 2007, Andrew George translated a 3,200 year old tablet dating to around 1200 B.C. found during excavations at Ugarit. The tablet contains a fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh, including parts of the story of Utnapishtim and the flood. [10]
The Gilgamesh flood tablet 11 (XI) contains additional story material besides the flood. The flood story was included because in it, the flood hero Utnapishtim is granted immortality by the gods and that fits the immortality theme of the epic. The main point seems to be that Utnapishtim was granted eternal life in unique, never-to-be-repeated circumstances. As if to demonstrate this point, Utnapishtim challenges Gilgamesh to stay awake for six days and seven nights. However, as soon as Utnapishtim finishes speaking Gilgamesh falls asleep. Utnapishtim instructs his wife to bake a loaf of bread for every day he is asleep so that Gilgamesh cannot deny his failure. Gilgamesh, who wants to overcome death, cannot even conquer sleep.
As Gilgamesh is leaving, Utnapishtim's wife asks her husband to offer a parting gift. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh of a boxthorn-like plant at the very bottom of the ocean that will make him young again. Gilgamesh obtains the plant by binding stones to his feet so he can walk on the bottom of the sea. He recovers the plant and plans to test it on an old man when he returns to Uruk. Unfortunately, when Gilgamesh stops to bathe it is stolen by a serpent that sheds its skin as it departs, apparently reborn. Gilgamesh, having failed both chances, returns to Uruk, where the sight of its massive walls provokes him to praise this enduring work of mortal men. The implication may be that mortals can achieve immortality through lasting works of civilization and culture.
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Lines 1-203, Tablet XI [11] (note: with supplemental sub-titles and line numbers added for clarity)
Note: 'Apsu' can refer to a freshwater marsh near the temple of Ea/Enki at the city of Eridu. [12]
In addition to the flood story material, (lines 1–203), tablet XI contains the following flood story elements:
List of titled subparts, Tablet XI-(by Kovacs): [13]
These are some of the sentences copied more or less directly from the Atrahasis version to the Gilgamesh epic: [14]
Atrahasis Epic | Gilgamesh Epic, tablet XI |
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"Wall, listen to me." Atrahasis III,i,20 | "Wall, pay attention" Gilgamesh XI,22 |
"Like the apsu you shall roof it" Atrahasis III,i,29 | "Like the apsu you shall roof it" Gilgamesh XI,31 |
"I cannot live in [your city]" Atrahasis III,i,47 | "I cannot live in your city" Gilgamesh XI,40 |
"Ninurta went forth making the dikes [overflow]" Atrahasis U rev,14 | "Ninurta went forth making the dikes overflow" Gilgamesh XI,102 |
"One person could [not] see another" Atrahasis III,iii,13 | "One person could not see another" Gilgamesh XI,111 |
"For seven days and seven nights came the storm" Atrahasis III,iv,24 | "Six days and seven nights the wind and storm flood" Gilgamesh XI,127 |
"He offered [a sacrifice]" Atrahasis III,v,31 | "And offered a sacrifice" Gilgamesh XI,155 |
"the lapis around my neck" Atrahasis III,vi,2 | "the lapis lazuli on my neck" Gilgamesh XI,164 |
"How did man survive the destruction?" Atrahasis III,vi,10 | "No man was to survive the destruction" Gilgamesh XI,173 |
The Epic of Atrahasis provides additional information on the flood and flood hero that is omitted in Gilgamesh XI and other versions of the Ancient Near East flood myth. According to Atrahasis III ii, lines 40–47 the flood hero was at a banquet when the storm and flood began: "He invited his people ... to a banquet ... He sent his family on board. They ate and they drank. But he (Atrahasis) was in and out. He could not sit, could not crouch, for his heart was broken and he was vomiting gall." [15]
According to Tigay, Atrahasis tablet III iv, lines 6–9 clearly identify the flood as a local river flood: "Like dragonflies they [dead bodies] have filled the river. Like a raft they have moved in to the edge [of the boat]. Like a raft they have moved in to the riverbank." The sentence "Like dragonflies they have filled the river." was changed in Gilgamesh XI line 123 to "Like the spawn of fishes, they fill the sea." [16] Tigay holds that we can see the mythmaker's hand at work here, changing a local river flood into an ocean deluge.
Most other authorities interpret the Atrahasis flood as universal. A. R. George, and Lambert and Millard make it clear that the gods' intention in Atrahasis is to "wipe out mankind". [17] The flood destroys "all of the earth". [18] The use of a comparable metaphor in the Gilgamesh epic suggests that the reference to "dragonflies [filling] the river" is simply an evocative image of death rather than a literal description of the flood [19]
Other editorial changes were made to the Atrahasis text in Gilgamesh to lessen the suggestion that the gods may have experienced human needs. For example, Atrahasis OB III, 30–31 "The Anunnaki, the great gods [were sitt]ing in thirst and hunger" was changed in Gilgamesh XI, line 113 to "The gods feared the deluge." Sentences in Atrahasis III iv were omitted in Gilgamesh, e.g. "She was surfeited with grief and thirsted for beer" and "From hunger they were suffering cramp." [20]
These and other editorial changes to Atrahasis are documented and described in the book by Prof. Tigay (see below) who is associate professor of Hebrew and Semitic languages and literature in the University of Pennsylvania. Prof. Tigay comments: "The dropping of individual lines between others which are preserved, but are not synonymous with them, appears to be a more deliberate editorial act. These lines share a common theme, the hunger and thirst of the gods during the flood." [20]
Although the 18th century BC copy of the Atrahasis (Atra-Hasis) epic post-dates the early Gilgamesh epic, we do not know whether the Old-Akkadian Gilgamesh tablets included the flood story, because of the fragmentary nature of surviving tablets. Some scholars argue that they did not. [21] Tigay, for example, maintains that three major additions to the Gilgamesh epic, namely the prologue, the flood story (tablet XI), and tablet XII, were added by an editor or editors, possibly by Sin-leqi-unninni, to whom the entire epic was later attributed. According to this view, the flood story in tablet XI was based on a late version of the Atrahasis story. [22]
As with most translations, especially from an ancient, dead language, scholars differ on the meaning of ambiguous sentences.
For example, line 57 in Gilgamesh XI is usually translated (with reference to the boat) "ten rods the height of her sides", [23] or "its walls were each 10 times 12 cubits in height". [24] A rod was a dozen cubits, and a Sumerian cubit was about 20 inches. Hence these translations imply that the boat was about 200 feet high, which would be impractical [25] with the technology in Gilgamesh's time (about 2700 BC). [26] There is no Akkadian word for "height" in line 57. The sentence literally reads "Ten dozen-cubits each I-raised its-walls." [27] A similar example from an unrelated house building tablet reads: "he shall build the wall [of the house] and raise it four ninda and two cubits." This measurement (about 83 feet) means wall length not height. [28]
Line 142 in Gilgamesh XI is usually translated "Mount Niṣir held the boat, allowing no motion." Niṣir is often spelled Nimush, [29] which is described as the newer reading. [30] The Akkadian words translated "Mount Niṣir" are "KUR-ú KUR ni-ṣir". [31] The word KUR could mean hill or country; it is capitalized because it is a Sumerian word. [32] The first KUR is followed by a phonetic complement -ú which indicates that KUR-ú is to be read in Akkadian as šadú (hill) and not as mātu (country). Since šadú (hill) could also mean mountain in Akkadian, and scholars knew the Biblical expression Mount Ararat , it has become customary to translate šadú as mountain or mount. The flood hero was Sumerian, according to the WB-62 Sumerian King List,. [33] In Sumerian the word KUR's primary meaning is "mountain" as attested by the sign used for it. [34] From the word mountain, the meaning "foreign country" is developed due to mountainous countries bordering Sumer. KUR in Sumerian also means "land" in general. [34] The second KUR lacks a phonetic complement and is therefore read in Akkadian as mātu (country). Hence, the entire clause reads "The hill/mound country niṣir held the boat".
Lines 146-147 in Gilgamesh XI are usually translated "I ... made sacrifice, incense I placed on the peak of the mountain." [35] Similarly "I poured out a libation on the peak of the mountain." [36] But Kovacs [37] provides this translation of line 156: "I offered incense in front of the mountain-ziggurat." Parpola provides the original Akkadian for this sentence: "áš-kun sur-qin-nu ina UGU ziq-qur-rat KUR-i" [38] Áš-kun means I-placed; sur-qin-nu means offering; ina-(the preposition) means on-(upon); UGU means top-of; ziq-qur-rat means temple tower; and KUR-i means hilly. Parpola's glossary (page 145) defines ziq-qur-rat as "temple tower, ziggurat" and refers to line 157 so he translates ziq-qur-rat as temple tower in this context. The sentence literally reads "I placed an offering on top of a hilly ziggurat." A ziggurat was an elevated platform or temple tower where priests made offerings to the temple god. Most translators of line 157 disregard ziq-qur-rat as a redundant metaphor for peak. There is no authority for this other than previous translations of line 157. [39] Kovacs' translation retains the word ziggurat on page 102.
One of the Sumerian cities with a ziggurat was Eridu located on the southern branch of the Euphrates River next to a large swampy low-lying depression known as the apsû. [40] The only ziggurat at Eridu was at the temple of the god Ea (Enki), known as the apsû-house. [41] In Gilgamesh XI, line 42 the flood hero said "I will go down [the river] to the apsû to live with Ea, my Lord." [42]
Lines 189–192 (lines 198–201) in Gilgamesh XI are usually translated "Then godEnlil came aboard the boat. He took hold of my hand and brought me on board. He brought aboard my wife and made her kneel at my side. Standing between us, he touched our foreheads to bless us." [43] In the first sentence "Then dingir-kabtu came aboard the boat" the Akkadian determinative dingir is usually translated as "god", but can also mean "priest" [44] Dingir-kabtu literally means "divine important-person". [45] Translating this as Enlil is the translator's conjecture.
Enlil, later known as Elil and Ellil, is an ancient Mesopotamian god associated with wind, air, earth, and storms. He is first attested as the chief deity of the Sumerian pantheon, but he was later worshipped by the Akkadians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and Hurrians. Enlil's primary center of worship was the Ekur temple in the city of Nippur, which was believed to have been built by Enlil himself and was regarded as the "mooring-rope" of heaven and earth. He is also sometimes referred to in Sumerian texts as Nunamnir. According to one Sumerian hymn, Enlil himself was so holy that not even the other gods could look upon him. Enlil rose to prominence during the twenty-fourth century BC with the rise of Nippur. His cult fell into decline after Nippur was sacked by the Elamites in 1230 BC and he was eventually supplanted as the chief god of the Mesopotamian pantheon by the Babylonian national god Marduk.
Enki is the Sumerian god of water, knowledge (gestú), crafts (gašam), and creation (nudimmud), and one of the Anunnaki. He was later known as Ea or Ae in Akkadian (Assyrian-Babylonian) religion, and is identified by some scholars with Ia in Canaanite religion. The name was rendered Aos in Greek sources.
Gilgamesh was a hero in ancient Mesopotamian mythology and the protagonist of the Epic of Gilgamesh, an epic poem written in Akkadian during the late 2nd millennium BC. He was possibly a historical king of the Sumerian city-state of Uruk, who was posthumously deified. His rule probably would have taken place sometime in the beginning of the Early Dynastic Period, c. 2900 – 2350 BC, though he became a major figure in Sumerian legend during the Third Dynasty of Ur.
Eridu was a Sumerian city located at Tell Abu Shahrain, also Abu Shahrein or Tell Abu Shahrayn, an archaeological site in Lower Mesopotamia. It is located in Dhi Qar Governorate, Iraq, near the modern city of Basra. Eridu is traditionally considered the earliest city in southern Mesopotamia based on the Sumerian King List. Located 12 kilometers southwest of the ancient site of Ur, Eridu was the southernmost of a conglomeration of Sumerian cities that grew around temples, almost in sight of one another. The city gods of Eridu were Enki and his consort Damkina. Enki, later known as Ea, was considered to have founded the city. His temple was called E-Abzu, as Enki was believed to live in Abzu, an aquifer from which all life was thought to stem. According to Sumerian temple hymns, another name for the temple of Ea/Enki was called Esira (Esirra).
"... The temple is constructed with gold and lapis lazuli, Its foundation on the nether-sea (apsu) is filled in. By the river of Sippar (Euphrates) it stands. O Apsu pure place of propriety, Esira, may thy king stand within thee. ..."
The Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic from ancient Mesopotamia. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with five Sumerian poems about Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, some of which may date back to the Third Dynasty of Ur. These independent stories were later used as source material for a combined epic in Akkadian. The first surviving version of this combined epic, known as the "Old Babylonian" version, dates back to the 18th century BC and is titled after its incipit, Shūtur eli sharrī. Only a few tablets of it have survived. The later Standard Babylonian version compiled by Sîn-lēqi-unninni dates to somewhere between the 13th to the 10th centuries BC and bears the incipit Sha naqba īmuru. Approximately two-thirds of this longer, twelve-tablet version have been recovered. Some of the best copies were discovered in the library ruins of the 7th-century BC Assyrian king Ashurbanipal.
Ziusudra of Shuruppak is listed in the WB-62 Sumerian King List recension as the last king of Sumer prior to the Great Flood. He is subsequently recorded as the hero of the Eridu Genesis and appears in the writings of Berossus as Xisuthros.
Enūma Eliš, meaning "When on High", is a Babylonian creation myth from the late 2nd millennium BCE and the only complete surviving account of ancient near eastern cosmology. It was recovered by English archaeologist Austen Henry Layard in 1849 in the ruined Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh. A form of the myth was first published by English Assyriologist George Smith in 1876; active research and further excavations led to near completion of the texts and improved translation.
Atra-Hasis is an 18th-century BCE Akkadian epic, recorded in various versions on clay tablets, named for its protagonist, Atrahasis. The Atra-Hasis tablets include both a cosmological creation myth and one of three surviving Babylonian flood myths. The name "Atra-Hasis" also appears, as a king of Shuruppak in the times before a flood, on one of the Sumerian King Lists.
Mount Nisir, mentioned in the ancient Mesopotamian Epic of Gilgamesh, is supposedly the mountain known today as Pir Omar Gudrun, near the city Sulaymaniyah in Iraqi Kurdistan. The name may mean "Mount of Salvation".
Uta-napishtim, was a legendary king of the ancient city of Shuruppak in southern Iraq, who, according to several surviving narratives, survived the Flood by making a boat.
Ubara-tutu of Shuruppak was the last antediluvian king of Sumer, according to some versions of the Sumerian King List. He was said to have reigned for 18,600 years. He was the son of En-men-dur-ana, a Sumerian mythological figure often compared to Enoch, as he entered heaven without dying. Ubara-Tutu was the king of Sumer until a flood swept over his land.
Eridu Genesis, also called the Sumerian Creation Myth, Sumerian Flood Story and the Sumerian Deluge Myth, offers a description of the story surrounding how humanity was created by the gods, how the office of kingship entered human civilization, the circumstances leading to the origins of the first cities, and the global flood.
The Instructions of Shuruppak are a significant example of Sumerian wisdom literature. Wisdom literature, intended to teach proper piety, inculcate virtue, and preserve community standards, was common throughout the ancient Near East. Its incipit sets the text in great antiquity: "In those days, in those far remote times, in those nights, in those faraway nights, in those years, in those far remote years." The precepts are placed in the mouth of a king Šuruppak (SU.KUR.RUki), son of Ubara-Tutu. Ubara-Tutu is recorded in most extant copies of the Sumerian king list as being the final king of Sumer prior to the deluge. Ubara-tutu is briefly mentioned in tablet XI of the Epic of Gilgamesh, where he is identified as the father of Utnapishtim, a character who is instructed by the god Ea to build a boat in order to survive the coming flood. Grouped with the other cuneiform tablets from Abu Salabikh, the Instructions date to the early third millennium BCE, being among the oldest surviving literature.
Sumerian religion was the religion practiced by the people of Sumer, the first literate civilization found in recorded history and based in ancient Mesopotamia, and what is modern day Iraq. The Sumerians widely regarded their divinities as responsible for all matters pertaining to the natural and social orders of their society.
The concept of a garden of the gods or a divine paradise may have originated in Sumer. The concept of this home of the immortals was later handed down to the Babylonians, who conquered Sumer.
The cuneiform KÚR sign is used extensively in the Amarna letters. It also has a minor usage in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Its usage in the Amarna letters is due to the letters' topics of "hostilities", "war", or "warfare" in the discord amongst the city-states and the regional discord in the Canaan region. A large subset of the Amarna letters are written by vassal kings in governorship of cities, towns or regions in Canaan.
The cuneiform sign tu, and for TU-(the Sumerogram, capital letter, in the Hittite language and other cuneiform texts, is a common-use syllabic sign for tu, and also with a syllabic use for "t", or "u". It is not a multi-use sign, with other alphabetic sub-varieties.
The cuneiform sign MÁ denotes a ship or boat. It is used in Sumerian and as a Sumerogram for the Akkadian word eleppu. MÁ is usually preceded by the determinative for items made of wood, namely GIŠ: GIŠ.MÁ, or GIŠ.MÁ, .
Cuneiform zu,, is an uncommon-use sign in the 1350s BC Amarna letters, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and other cuneiform texts. Alphabetically, it could conceivably be used for letters z, s, ṣ, or u; however in the Amarna letters it is used mostly for personal names or geographical names.
Mesopotamian mythology refers to the myths, religious texts, and other literature that comes from the region of ancient Mesopotamia which is a historical region of Western Asia, situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system that occupies the area of present-day Iraq. In particular the societies of Sumer, Akkad, and Assyria, all of which existed shortly after 3000 BCE and were mostly gone by 400 CE. These works were primarily preserved on stone or clay tablets and were written in cuneiform by scribes. Several lengthy pieces have survived erosion and time, some of which are considered the oldest stories in the world, and have given historians insight into Mesopotamian ideology and cosmology.
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) (Volume 1) in the original Akkadian cuneiform and transliteration. Commentary and glossary are in English