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The Epic of Gilgamesh ( / ˈɡɪlɡəmɛʃ /) [ 2] is an epic from ancient Mesopotamia. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with five Sumerian poems about Gilgamesh (formerly read as Sumerian "Bilgames" [ 3] ), king of Uruk, some of which may date back to the Third Dynasty of Ur ( c. 2100 BC ). [ 1] .
- Aaron Shaffer, Herbert Mason, Jean Bottéro, Stephen Mitchell, Andrew George, Morris Jastrow, Albert ...
- 1999
Aug 1, 2024 · Epic of Gilgamesh, ancient Mesopotamian odyssey recorded in the Akkadian language about Gilgamesh, the king of the Mesopotamian city-state Uruk (Erech). The fullest extant text of the Gilgamesh epic is on 12 incomplete Akkadian-language tablets found in the mid-19th century at Nineveh.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Gilgamesh, the best known of all ancient Mesopotamian heroes. Numerous tales in the Akkadian language have been told about Gilgamesh, and the whole collection has been described as an odyssey—the odyssey of a king who did not want to die.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Historical & Legendary King
- Development of The Text
- Summary
- Legacy & Continuing Debate
- Conclusion
Gilgamesh's father is said to have been the priest-king Lugalbanda (who is featured in two Sumerian poems concerning his magical abilities which predate Gilgamesh) and his mother the goddess Ninsun (also known as Ninsumun, the Holy Mother and Great Queen). Accordingly, Gilgamesh was a demigod who was said to have lived an exceptionally long life (t...
The Akkadian version of the text was discovered at Nineveh, in the ruins of the library of Ashurbanipal, in 1849 by the archaeologist Austin Henry Layard. Layard's expedition was part of a mid-19th century initiative of European institutions and governments to fund expeditions to Mesopotamia to find physical evidence to corroborate events described...
The Epic of Gilgamesh begins with an invitation to the reader to engage in the story of the great king who, at first, is depicted as a proud and arrogant tyrant. He terrorizes his people, sleeps with the brides of his subjects on their wedding night, and consistently uses force to get his way in all things. The gods decide to humble him by creating...
Through his struggle to find meaning in life, Gilgamesh defied death and, in doing so, becomes the first epic hero in world literature. The grief of Gilgamesh and the questions his friend's death evoke resonate with anyone who has struggled with grief and a meaning to life in the face of death. Although Gilgamesh ultimately fails to win immortality...
In the present day, fascination with Gilgamesh continues as it has since the work was first translated in the 1870s. A German team of archaeologists, to cite only one example, claim to have discovered his tomb in April of 2003. Archaeological excavations, conducted through modern technology involving magnetization in and around the old riverbed of ...
- Joshua J. Mark
Apr 30, 2020 · The oldest surviving literary work is The Epic of Gilgamesh. It was composed nearly 4,000 years ago in ancient Mesopotamia (roughly equivalent to where Iraq and eastern Syria are now). No one knows who wrote it, or why, or what readership or audience it was intended for.
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Many analysts and scholars agree that The Epic of Gilgamesh is almost four-thousand years old. However, it is confirmed that the story was actually very well known in Ancient Mesopotamia...
The standard Akkadian Epic of Gilgamesh was composed by a scribe named Sîn-lēqi-unninni, probably during the Middle Babylonian Period (c. 1600 – c. 1155 BC), based on much older source material. In the epic, Gilgamesh is a demigod of superhuman strength who befriends the wild man Enkidu.
