Gilgamesh

Bernarda Bryson's retelling adapts the ancient Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh for a younger audience. The narrative is set in a mythological version of ancient Mesopotamia, a world bounded by the mountains of Mashu and circled by the Bitter River, whose waters are fatal to the touch. The gods govern this world: Anu rules the skies, Ea the deep waters, Enlil the earth, Shamash the sun, and Ishtar the goddess of love. Gilgamesh is king of Uruk-of-the-Walls, the most splendid of the seven cities of Sumer, protected by towering walls from armies, floods, wild beasts, and the fire-breathing monster Humbaba.

The city elders secretly petition the gods, complaining that Gilgamesh drives them ceaselessly to build the walls higher. They want Anu to create a wild, unconquerable man to destroy the King. As the gods debate, Ishtar signals the goddess Aruru, who molds a man from clay: savage, unkempt, and crowned with two majestic horns. Aruru carries him into a cedar forest. This is Enkidu.

Enkidu wakes with no knowledge of who he is. He befriends the forest animals and, when a lion attacks, discovers his own strength, defeating the beast but then tending its wounds in pity. A young hunter discovers Enkidu freeing captured animals, and the eldest elder of Uruk presents the report to Gilgamesh. The King sends Harim, a priestess from the temple of Ishtar, to bring the wild man to the city. Harim enters the forest alone, and when Enkidu sees his first human being, awe overcomes him. She teaches him language, grooms him, and fashions him a garment. When she leads him from the forest, the animals flee and Enkidu weeps, but Harim assures him he is now a man. At a shepherd's hut, he learns to eat bread, drink wine, and tend domestic animals.

Meanwhile, Gilgamesh's mother, Ninsun, a queen with the gift of prophecy, interprets a troubling dream: a double-edged axe from the sky represents a man as like Gilgamesh as a brother, and the dream portends danger. Gilgamesh laughs, declaring that as a being two-thirds god, he fears no man.

Harim leads Enkidu through the gates of Uruk. Near the temple of Ishtar, the city is assembling to choose a bride for Gilgamesh. When the King approaches, Enkidu blocks his path. They fight furiously, demolishing the threshold and walls, until Gilgamesh weakens and falls. Enkidu lifts him to his feet, and they clasp hands, pledging eternal friendship. The wild man sent to destroy the King has become his brother.

Gilgamesh announces they will climb the mountain and destroy Humbaba. Enkidu weeps, warning that the monster is the appointed servant of the gods, but Gilgamesh argues that Humbaba oppresses the people. Even if he fails, he will die a hero and make an everlasting name. The elders come secretly to Enkidu, insisting he must go since only he knows the way and whoever enters the cedar gate first will be killed first. Enkidu relents. Ninsun blesses them and petitions Shamash not to sleep until her son returns.

They reach the cedar mountain in three days. At the gate, Enkidu is thrown backward with paralyzing force, but Gilgamesh lends him strength. Deep in the forest, Humbaba crashes down upon them, his breath withering branches and setting fires. After a desperate struggle, Enkidu perceives the dying monster drawing breath for a final blast of fire, leaps on him, and releases the fire harmlessly among the stones. Humbaba dies, and gentle rains fall.

Ishtar, watching from the sky, falls in love with Gilgamesh and offers marriage. Gilgamesh refuses and catalogs her history of destroying those she loved. Ishtar shrieks and ascends to the heavens. The heroes return to Uruk to the greatest celebration the city has ever seen.

Ishtar assembles the gods and demands vengeance, threatening to release the dead from the underworld to devour the food of the living. The gods yield, and Anu creates the Bull of Heaven, a divine beast meant to devastate Uruk and kill Gilgamesh. The Bull roars through the city, trampling hundreds. After a desperate battle, Enkidu thrusts his sword between the beast's nape and horns, killing it. Ishtar appears on the wall cursing both heroes, and Enkidu hurls the Bull's leg at her.

That night Enkidu dreams of the gods' judgment: Enlil pronounces that Enkidu must die for their offenses. Enkidu grows feverish, cursing Harim in delirium for luring him from the wild. Shamash reminds him that Harim gave him speech, clothing, and Gilgamesh's friendship, and Enkidu reverses his curses, blessing her with eternal favor. For twelve days he lies dying with Gilgamesh beside him. On the thirteenth day, Enkidu dies. Grief-stricken, Gilgamesh sets out alone to find his ancestor Utnapishtim, who lives forever beyond the Bitter River, and learn the secret of life and death.

He reaches the mountains of Mashu, guarded by scorpion men whose look is death. Warned that the underground caverns span a full day's journey of utter darkness, Gilgamesh presses on. His heart and mind fail in the blackness, but the north wind revives him, and he emerges into the Eastern Garden, a paradise of jeweled trees. Shamash and the wine maiden Sabitu both counsel him to accept mortality, but Gilgamesh refuses. Sabitu directs him to the boatman Urshanabi, who ferries him across the deadly Bitter River.

Utnapishtim scolds Gilgamesh for his unkempt appearance. Gilgamesh asks how Utnapishtim became immortal, and the old man tells the story of a great flood: Enlil sent a deluge to destroy mankind, but Ea warned Utnapishtim indirectly, instructing him to build a ship carrying the seed of every living thing. For six days the storm raged until all mankind turned to clay. Afterward, Enlil granted Utnapishtim and his wife immortality, moved by Ea's argument that the innocent should not have perished with the guilty. Utnapishtim asks who will intercede for Gilgamesh.

Utnapishtim challenges Gilgamesh to stay awake for seven days, since the immortals never sleep. Gilgamesh falls asleep immediately; loaves baked daily at his head prove he slept the full seven days. Utnapishtim's wife urges her husband not to send the young man away empty-handed, so Utnapishtim reveals that at the river's bottom grows a thorny weed whose flower restores youth. Gilgamesh dives into the deadly water and retrieves the plant, but when he stops to bathe at a spring, a serpent seizes it and slithers underground, shedding its skin as it regains its youth.

He returns to Uruk, where he makes Urshanabi climb the walls and behold the city. Gilgamesh declares he must find Enkidu. Shamash instructs him to discard clean garments, sandals, staff, and spear before approaching the underworld. Ignoring this warning, Gilgamesh sets out in royal attire. Enlil and Sin, god of the moon, refuse his pleas, but Ea orders Nergal, gatekeeper of the underworld, to open a hole in the earth.

At a wild steppe, a wind rushes from the ground, followed by a strange form made of moss, roots, and trailing vines. This is Enkidu. The friends embrace. Enkidu describes the underworld: Kings serve as servants, and the dead are sustained according to the sons they left behind. Gilgamesh pleads with Nergal to release Enkidu, but Nergal refuses, rebuking Gilgamesh for violating Shamash's instructions.

Gilgamesh turns to flee, then hesitates. After months of wandering, he has found Enkidu at last. He walks toward his friend, bows, and falls into the dust. He lies on his face for seven days while Enkidu kneels beside him. He dies, and the earth seizes him. Gilgamesh dies a mortal's death, but his life is not as an empty wind. The people of Uruk mourn him while singing of his deeds. Scribes preserve the story on tablets of clay and rock. Uruk crumbles into the earth, but the name of Gilgamesh endures, remembered as the most glorious of heroes, the most eminent of men, with Enkidu as his companion.