Enuma Elish
Enuma Elish: The Oldest Written Creation Myth The Enuma Elish is composed of close to one thousand lines of cuneiform script that have often been compared with the Old Testament creation story in Genesis I. The story features a great battle between gods Marduk and Tiamat that results in the creation of the Earth and mankind. The storm god Marduk is ultimately declared a champion, which enables him to rule over the other gods and become the chief god in Babylonian religion. Marduk uses Tiamat’s body to form the sky and the earth. He forms the great Mesopotamian rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris, from the tears in her eyes. Finally, he forms mankind from the blood of Tiamat’s son and spouse Kingu, in order for them to serve the gods. Extract.
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The Enuma Elish and the Atrahasis
The Enuma Elish and the Atrahasis, in circulation 3,800 years ago, were Mesopotamia’s creation and flood epics, making them 1,000 years older than Genesis. The link in the title takes us to the transcript of a one-hour and eleven-minute lecture. The transcript includes photos and maps. The linked page contains a link to the audio file and other study aids.
The Epic of Gilgamesh
Episode 3: He Who Saw the Deep
Hello, and welcome to Literature and History. Episode 3: He Who Saw the Deep. This show covers the most famous piece of writing from ancient Mesopotamia, the Epic of Gilgamesh. If you haven’t read the Epic of Gilgamesh before, you are in for a treat. For 2,700 years, the story of Gilgamesh, the mythical king of Uruk, circulated in the ancient world. Variations were written in multiple languages, young scribes copied central episodes in the narrative in order to learn how to write, and in the land between the rivers a hundred generations heard and read the mythical king’s story and found something that spoke to them. Episodes and poetry of Gilgamesh can be found in the Books of Genesis and Ecclesiastes, and upon its discovery in 1853 and first English translation by George Smith in 1872, the world looked on in awe. Physical copies of a story older than Islam, older than Christianity, older than Buddhism, older than the Old Testament patriarch Abraham, had been found in what was then the Ottoman Empire. It was one of the most important discoveries in literary history.
The story exists in dozens of different cuneiform tablets scattered around Mesopotamia and Anatolia. The tablets themselves are frequently broken, chipped, scarred, and otherwise time-worn. The epic’s translators, both in the nineteenth century and today, have had to cobble together thousands of years of fragments, fill in missing gaps, and conjecture about obscure languages that no one has spoken for thousands of years. Nonetheless, we currently have readable, cohesive versions that bring the ancient story to light.
Most of what you’re about to hear was compiled from earlier sources by a single scribe between 1300 and 1000 BCE. The historical Gilgamesh is thought to have lived around 2800 BCE. His story was written first in Sumerian, and then Akkadian cuneiform, a medium which fell fully out of use around 100 BCE.
- Gilgamesh Meets Enkidu
- The Battle with Humbaba
- The Heroes Face Ishtar and the Bull of Heaven
- The Gods Turn Against Enkidu
- The Journey to Uta-napishti
- The Bittersweet Journey Home
