The Gilgamesh is "the first great heroic narrative," an evolving work in its origin that stretches across an entire millennium from 2500 - 1500 B.C.  Originally a collection of tales and story fragments, Gilgamesh recalls the adventures and rule of an historical Gilgamesh, king of Uruk in ancient Mesopotamia.  The narrative fragments and legends were told widely and recorded piecemeal over a wide area during the centuries following his reign.  The current work, the "official version," was found on clay tablets written in "cuneiform" emblems fashioned by a wooden or bone stylus.

Readings

Masterpieces of the Ancient World, pp. 1 - 12
Introduction to "Gilgamesh," pp. 16 - 18
"Gilgamesh," pp. 18 - 47

Study Questions

1) Trace the shift in the attitude of Gilgamesh as he determines to enter the forest and do battle with the giant, Enkidu.

2) What is the lesson Gilgamesh receives regarding his quest for eternal life?

3) As the earliest known example of heroic literature, what features seem to define the pattern of heroic character and action that might follow in the evolution of the genre (type) of narrative?

4) Trace the universal cycle of the "Hero of Initiation" in the Gilgamesh narrative: 1) the departure, 2) the journey, 3) the transformation, and 4) the return.

Key Concepts

Archetypal Hero Patterns
Hero narratives tend to fall into four different types, defined by the nature of their central characters.  The four types include 1) the Hero of Adventure, 2) the Hero of the Quest, 3) the Scapegoat Hero, and 4) the Hero of Initiation.  

Oral Narratives
Like so many narratives of the ancient world, the Gilgamesh has a rich origin, apparently, in the oral tradition of the Akkadian/Sumerian people.  The introduction traces, in part, the evolution of the narrative and its appearance in the Sumerian clay tablets.