Like many works of classic literature, Gilgamesh is said to be based on a real person with a real history. After all, he is named as one of the kings on the historical rolls and served his kingdom for 126 years according to the Sumerian king list. Now I think we can all agree that there is no way that Gilgamesh was a god, or even part god and it is highly unlikely his reign spanned that kind of timeframe. People of ancient times liked to think that their rulers were gods because they hoped that it gave their people favor over competing entities in the ancient world. But let's just take a moment to examine all of the things that supposedly made Gilgamesh great, and a king worth remembering.
1) Gilgamesh built a wall around the city (or rather he supervised the building of a wall around the city).
2) Enkidu and Gilgamesh travel to the Cedar Mountain where Gilgamesh slays the monstrous Humbaba.
3) Gilgamesh, with Enkidu's help, slayed the Bull of Heaven who had been ordered by Ishtar to kill Gilgamesh.
4) Gilgamesh slays an entire pride of lions all by himself.
5) Gilgamesh kills the stone giants and single handedly chops down 120 trees in order to cross the Waters of Death.
6) He finds a legendary plant on the bottom of the sea which will give him immortality.
Now on the surface, these seem like great accomplishments and certainly would make Gilgamesh a king worth remembering. But let's look at it from the realistic view from the modern world. Except for the very first thing on the list, there are no witnesses to any of the other events. Sure Enkidu supposedly saw some take place, but his role as servant or friend (lover?) can certainly put his motivations to tell the truth in question. At the end of the day, what you really have is a man who supervised the building of a wall and spent some time outside of the city.
An alternate story could be told of a prominant contractor who got tired of his life in the city building fences. He knows that the people of the city would never approve of his homosexual relationship and he leaves with his lover for a life on the road where they make ends meet doing odd jobs and living off of love. When his lover gets the AIDS virus, they return to their home city where his lover dies. Now they both know that Gilgamesh will never be able to find another man that he loves as well as Enkidu, so they concoct this fabulous story to explain where they had been which will allow Gilgamesh to return to his previous life.
Now I don't really believe my alternate story, nor do I believe that Gilgamesh and Enkidu were secret lovers. But, this story is certainly every bit as plausible as the one told in our text. The bottom line is that at the end of the day, you have a man who supervised the building of a wall, and there is nothing that is even remotely heroic about that.
You know, John, we rarely tell epic stories about events that we believe in 100%. Even the James Bond films or The Transporter series, which some may argue could happen--at least theoretically, have moments that stretch the boundaries of believability. Same goes for Jackie Chan's films. Or even romantic comedies for that matter.
ReplyDeleteThat's not the point to these stories. You're not supposed to believe that they are real, and many would argue that the people who originally told them didn't believe that they were factual histories. For a lot of these societies, the boundary between the real and the fantastic wasn't nearly as clear-cut as it is for us. It worked perhaps more like the continuum I showed you in class.