The Epic of Gilgamesh

The Epic of Gilgamesh
Author(s): Paul W. Pruyser and J. Tracy Luke

Source: American Imago , Summer, 1982, Vol. 39, No. 2 (Summer, 1982), pp. 73-93
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/26303754
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The Epic of Gilgamesh 73
The Epic of Gilgamesh

The ancient Mesopotamian Epic of Gilgamesh, re
covered by archaeologists more than a century ago, has
been carefully reconstructed, and widely studied from th
historio-comparative-literary point of view. Freud and Jun
once exchanged brief comments on the epic in their corr
spondence, and Joseph Campbell focused on its archetypa
concerns.1 However, the Gilgamesh Epic has been relatively
neglected in psychoanalytic studies of ancient narratives
Like some other epics, this one covers a sizeable time spa
in the hero's life course and can thus be approached as
developmental history. Moreover, the epic was in all like
hood enacted as a liturgical drama in the religious cult, and
can therefore be approached as a pedagogy; we should im
gine a fascinated audience making temporary identifica
tions with the epic's dramatis personae.
Sigmund Freud was fascinated with ancient mytholo
gy.2 Clinical observation led him to associate dream sym
bolism with mythic images, and neurotic symptoms wit
ideation or characterization in ancient stories. The classic
1 Sigmund Freud and C. G. Jung, The Freud/Jung Letters, William McGuire,

ed., Ralph Manheim and R.F.C. Hull, trans. (Bollingen Series, XCIV) Princeton,
1974), pp. 445-446, and 448-449. Jung hints at linking Utnapishtim, the Gilga
mesh epic flood hero with gnomic utterances (later in his own work Jung would
associate Utnapishtim with Longfellow's Hiawatha and the Wandering Jew (p. 445,
n. 2). S. Freud (pp. 448-449) referred to the brothers, Gilgamesh and Eabani
(=Enkidu), correctly sensing that the story intends for them to be twins and thus
from a common mother. He does not elàborate his suggestion that Enkidu is
Gilgamesh's "afterbirth" (p. 449), nor do we.
Joseph Campbell's interpretation is in his The Hero with a Thousand Faces
(New York, 1949), pp. 185-188. Elsewhere in psychoanalytic literature Theodor
Reik, Myth and Guilt: The Crime and Punishment of Mankind (New York, 1957), pp.
67-68, briefly describes the Gilgamesh epic and accurately senses its connection
with Genesis.
2 For the collected references on myth and mythology, see conveniently, An
gela Richards, compiler, "Indexes and Bibliographies," in Sigmund Freud, St. Ed.,
24 (London, 1974), pp. 325-326.
American Imago, Summer, 1982, Vol. 39, No. 2, pp. 73-93.

Copyright © 1982 by Wayne State University Press. Detroit, Michigan 48202.

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74 J. Tracy Luke and Paul W. Pruyser
illustration of this process in Freud's research is of course

his discovery of the Oedipus complex, which he described
through the imagery of Sophocles' tragedy. Central and
fundamental to psychoanalysis as this discovery remains,
the oedipal theme does not exhaust Freud's use of mythol
ogy. Of equal importance to Freud was the way in which
myths confirm the theory of phylogenetic inheritance.3
This was a profound observation in an age that was all too
eager to disassociate modern rational man from "primi
tives." Freud maintained that our psychic inheritance was
far more pervasive and influential than his contemporaries
conceded, and he was wise enough not to pretend that we
could disavow that heritage, nor to absolutize it by fixating
its themes and images into archetypes residing as templates
in a collective unconscious, as Jung did.
Freud repeatedly encouraged his psychoanalytic col
leagues to interpret mythology, and considered such studies
essential in the ideal psychoanalytic education. With charac
teristic modesty, he understated his own contributions to
modern myth studies.
We will seek to extend Freud's focus by a consideration
of the therapeutic potential of mythology. Bennet Simon's
recent study deals with therapeutic qualities in ancient
Greek epic poetry, drama, and philosophy, and we build
upon his work by noting that some of these qualities appear
in the ancient Epic of Gilgamesh.4 While rather specific in
this intent, our study shares with a much broader literature
the view that ancient stories are highly potent, creative, life
facilitating and value setting expressions of human experi
ence and longing. Harry Slochower in his Mythopoesis exa
mines this outlook in detail while offering a psychoanalytic
appraisal of mythic themes in literature from the Old Testa
ment story of Job to the writings of Thomas Mann. He
emphasizes the remarkable tenacity of mythic themes
through the process of mythopoesis, the essential contribu
tion of myth to human self understanding, and the precari
3 Sigmund Freud, "An Infantile Neurosis and Other Works," St. Ed., 17 pp.
119-122, 203-204, 261-262; "Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (Part
III)," St. Ed., 16, p. 371.
4 Bennett Simon: Mind and Madness in Ancient Greece: The Classical Roots of
Modern Psychiatry (Ithaca and London, 1978), pp. 78-88.

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ous situation of mythopoesis in the flux of contemporary

life.5
Known in considerable detail since the late nineteenth
century, the Gilgamesh Epic consists of eleven sections (tab
lets), each with three hundred or fewer lines of narrative
poetry. The story's central figure, Gilgamesh, was an early
Sumerian king whose historicity is now certain. He had be
come legendary long before the full development of this
epic poem, ca. 2000 B.C. Discovered fragments indicate
that this epic was popular throughout the ancient Near East
from the beginning of the second millennium B.C. until at
least the mid-sixth century B.C. References to the docu
ment in this study will follow the reconstruction and transla
tion by E.A. Speiser, in James B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near
Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament (Princeton, 1955)
[hereafter abbreviated ANET], and "The Epic of Gilga
mesh: Notes and Additions," by A.K. Grayson, in James B.
Pritchard, ed., The Ancient Near East: Supplementary Texts and
Pictures Relating to the Old Testament (Princeton, 1969).
The Epic of Gilgamesh is a highly formalized and ritu
alized story about a heroic king whose arrogant behavior
initially results in a social crisis in Uruk, the city where he
reigns. The gods intervene by creating his double from a
savage who is humanized in the hope of thereby constrain
ing Gilgamesh. However, Enkidu, the double, and Gilga
mesh become fast friends. They set out on a great adven
ture and are highly successful; but their exploits also bring
them into conflict with the gods, who retaliate and punish
them by inflicting a fatal disease on Enkidu. His death pre
cipitates a further crisis for Gilgamesh. Now fearing death,
he embarks on a search for immortality, ignoring the advice
that his quest is folly and that there are other alternatives.
With the aid of Urshanabi, a boatman, he crosses the myste
rious ocean to the dwelling place of Utnapishtim, the Me
sopotamian flood hero and the only mortal to have ever
been granted immortality. He too must disappoint Gilga
0 Harry Slochower: Mythopoesis: Mythic Patterns in the Literary Classics (Detroit,
1970), pp.12-46. Slochower recognizes a similarity between the Gilgamesh Epic
and Western mythopoesis and identifies the epic as "the first major story which
explicitly sounds the motif of unrest in the hero's quest," see pp. 336-338, and
notes 21-25.

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mesh, but sends him home with a magic prickly plant of

'eternal youth' which Gilgamesh loses to a serpent trickster.
The tale ends with Gilgamesh returning to Uruk, now
pointing out its grandeur to his new friend Urshanabi. The
original crises appear to have ended and Gilgamesh is ready
to resume his kingly responsibilities.
From this sketch, we sense that the narrative involves a
developmental process and is a liturgical drama. As we exa
mine the story in detail, we will use Erikson's developmental
stages of human growth as a general guide,6 asking what
specific life stages are suggested by the story; what the in
tent may be of the crises described; what regressions or
progressions occur; and what is the meaning of the appar
ent growth and conflict resolution. We will watch the rise
and fall of critical emotions and events, the roles of dramatis
personae and ritual acts.
In all likelihood, the epic also served as story line in the
Mesopotamian New Year's festival which centered in the
cult of the goddess Ishtar. Thus, a double reading is indi
cated. On the one hand, the epic is a narrative about one
man's developmental history, with which any reader can
identify. On the other hand, the story is the temporal frame
for a lengthy ritual whose object is the worship of Ishtar.
Supported by a chorus and punctuated by priestly acts, the
epic was ritually enacted in front of a crowd which was to
attain personal guidance for life and achieve healing from
its participation in the liturgy.
I. The Heroic King

Judged by its texts, the ancient Near East scarcely re
members a time when there was no king. The story of Gil
gamesh opens with great tribute to its hero, Gilgamesh,
king of Uruk. We are told that he "saw everything to the
ends of the lands, all things experienced, the hidden he
saw, laid bare the undisclosed, brought a report of before
the flood, achieved a long journey, weary and worn".7 Thus,
6Erik H. Erikson: Childhood and Society, second edition (New York, 1963), pp.
247-274.
:ANET, p. 73; I, i, 1-7

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he is presented as a journier who has survived a perilous

adventure, now returning as a source of wisdom. We are
invited to inspect his city which Gilgamesh built and his
greatest accomplishment is the Eanna, the temple of the
goddess Ishtar. Gilgamesh is not only king and builder
creator, he is almost a god, and a mighty "wild ox lofty;"
valiant in battle, he is unconquerable.
Such is our introduction to this epic's central figure. We
notice that he is not a true mythic hero with secretive ori
gins or miraculous birth8 and he does not solve any great
cosmic problem. Like ancient pilgrims coming to the New
Year's festival, we are brought into Uruk to attend a sacred
liturgical drama that stages a legendary person slowly ac
quiring some wisdom and growing from brutish selfishness
and lust to acceptance of his mortality. He is thus ready to
pay homage to Ishtar.
II. The Narcissistic-Phallic Crisis.
As soon as we are brought into Uruk and our expecta

tions have been heightened, everything in the drama
changes. There is a crisis, "the nobles of Uruk are gloomy"
(depressed), and they speak as a chorus, "Gilgamesh leaves
not the son to his father, . . . Gilgamesh leaves ,not the
maid(en) to her mother." And at the heart of the complaint,
we learn, is that Gilgamesh even takes for himself "the
noble's spouse". To state it fully, "day and night is unbri
dled his arrogance". Unambiguously, the "bold, stately,
wise, shepherd of Uruk,"9 is presented as having become a
rampaging stud. Thus, at the opening of the drama, our
"hero" is a child-king, exhibiting the full energies of phallic
initiative, claiming everyone for his lust. Walking a tight
rope between glory and destruction, his fate is uncertain. If
we have appraised his situation accurately, we will be alert
to clues about rivalry, excessive need for a favored position
with his mother, incest, and castration threats.
At this point, we note that the story, and the liturgy in
8 Otto Rank, The Birth of the Hero, translated by F. Robbins and Smith E.
Jelliffe (New York, 1952), pp. 61-94.
*ANET, pp. 73-74; I, ii, 11-17, 24, and 28.

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which it functions, begins with a presentation of the classical

oedipal conflict. The seriousness of this situation can be
estimated by the haste in which the gods intervene. The
great Sky god Anu and his council are called and they in
struct the goddess Aruru, divine mother of Gilgamesh, to
create his double, his "imago," who is expected to counter
act and subdue the arrogance of Gilgamesh. From clay, Ar
uru creates Enkidu, a wild creature of the steppe, garbed
and hairy like a bull and at home with wild animals. So
strong and crafty is he, that the rural folk are terrified
when he disrupts their economy. One hunter and his son
discuss their plight and form a plan. They will seek the aid
of king Gilgamesh, obtain a prostitute who will come into
the steppe to mate with Enkidu, and thus civilize him. The
son sets out to find Gilgamesh, explains the difficulty, and
Gilgamesh proposes exactly the plan that the hunters had
conceived. Thus, our child-king may be problematical; but
he is not dysfunctional. He continues to act kingly in at
tempting to solve this problem in the outlying region of his
domain. More importantly, he is unmindful—like Oedi
pus—that he may be contributing to his own undoing. The
wild man Enkidu, about to be tamed, may in turn try to
tame Gilgamesh.
III. Elaboration of the Oedipal Crisis.

The harlot plays a complex and vital role in the drama.
Through her acts and words, the intensity and diversity of
the sexual crisis will be fully elaborated. We are likely to feel
ambivalent about her rescuing mission: she humanizes En
kidu but also alienates him from his idyllic animal inno
cence. She mates with Enkidu for six days and seven nights,
a ritual act that at once reflects ancient sacred marriage
custom, and male fantasy of unrestricted erotic pleasure.
The drama views this intercourse with warmth and appro
val, setting it in sharp contrast to Gilgamesh's wild sexual
excesses. What is staged here is the ancient ritual of sacred
marriage, the hieros gamos, which is a definite clue to the
epic's cultic use. But the contrast is not unambiguous—for
the harlot lass may also be a disguised, experienced mother

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lover who incestuously weakens Enkidu; or she may be a

matron of culture forcing him too swiftly from "sucking the
milk of wild creatures" to cleanliness and good manners,
and demanding from him a pseudo-maturity that now
obliges him to guard the flocks of the shepherds so that
they may rest. The play is very intense as it elaborates these
sexual conflicts. Here, our story tellers create a high-strung
situation. The symbolism of images and characters allows us
the distance to tolerate the strain; but the erotic nooks and
crannies give the story an intense personal tone.
As she prepares to bring Enkidu to meet Gilgamesh in
Uruk, the harlot lass is pleased with her work. She pro
claims that Enkidu is now 'godlike in wisdom'. No doubt,
she has produced a change in Enkidu, and he is also
pleased. Showing some signs of growth, he "yearns for a
friend". At the same time, the prostitute warns him of the
danger in his presumption of unlimited strength. While re
minding Enkidu of the might and beauty of Gilgamesh, she
is carried away by her own thoughts, and a secret meaning
is suggested when she says to Enkidu:
[Up then, let us go that he may see] thy face.

[I will show thee Gilgamesh; where] he is I know well.10
So we learn that Gilgamesh did not choose this lass at ran

dom; she is mistress to both heroes. Appropriately, this in
tensifies their association as "doubles" and in this way, the
harlot lass becomes an equivalent of Aruru, the divine
mother of Enkidu who, by another name Ninsun, is soon
introduced as the mother of Gilgamesh. The two heroes are
not merely doubles, or friends; their genealogy makes them
brothers or twins. Their attachment to each other, a near
identity, serves to heighten the disaster that lies ahead when
Enkidu will die. Also, in stressing the unity of the divine
mother and of the offspring, the drama draws the hearer
participants into its action by making them wonder about
the father. Is there a father at all, and if not, was he killed
in a primal crime? Apart from the brief activity of the sky
god Anu, no father is mentioned. Enkidu is very much in
,0ANET, p. 75; I, V, 4-5.

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the hands of women (Aruru and the harlot lass) and we will
note that Gilgamesh is also tightly bound to his mother.
As the harlot lass brings Enkidu to Uruk, Gilgamesh
has two anticipatory dreams which he takes to his mother
for interpretation. In the first dream, a star from heaven
falls on Gilgamesh, weighting him down so that he cannot
move, while all the citizenry of Uruk kiss the star's feet (we
are not told how he freed himself), and he proclaims "thou
didst make it vie with me", an opinion in which she concurs.
Gilgamesh is strongly attached to and dependent on his
mother^ Interpreting the dream, Ninsun understands only
the manifest content. She tells Gilgamesh that the star is
Enkidu coming to rescue and befriend him. We interpret
the dream differently: the star is the absent (murdered)
father, come to weigh Gilgamesh down as if the latter car
ried a load of guilt for his wish to replace him. The guilt
and the father's imago render him impotent and the
people's kissing the feet of his father and ignoring Gilga
mesh's anguish intensify his despair. And there is ambiva
lence; while wishing to have the burden of the punishing
father removed, he also feels love-longing for the idealized
father and his friend-to-be, Enkidu. In describing these
feelings, Gilgamesh senses that they are displaced from the
woman to the man. Still, he holds his mother responsible
for his plight, comes to her for counsel, and shows no signs
yet of having either the energy or the inclination to detach
himself from her.
The second dream is in series with the first. An axe
mysteriously appears in Uruk and the citizenry crowds
around it. They are curious but do not touch or kiss it.
Gilgamesh repeats the experience of the first dream except
that he does not feel weighted down. He picks up the axe,
feels drawn to it "as to a woman", places it at his mother's
feet, and again claims that she made him vie with it (she
again agrees). Ninsun's interpretation runs true to form:
She identifies the axe as Enkidu. The weapon is construed
as a rescuer, coming to provide strength to Gilgamesh. At a
deeper level, we cannot overlook the oedipal-phallic import
of the axe as Gilgamesh's fear of castration. His guilt feel
ings and castration fear are handled counterphobically: his

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carrying the axe lifts the weight of the father from him
(unlike the first dream), but hardly solves his problem.
In these ways, the ritual drama intensifies the hero's
narcissistic-phallic crisis.
IV. Onset of the Latency Interlude.

Thus, we are prepared for the meeting of Gilgamesh
and Enkidu in the market place of Uruk, in front of the
temple of Ishtar. We are the populus, milling about, uneasy
as Enkidu enters the market precinct and moves to the door
of the Eanna, in order to prevent Gilgamesh from entering
the sacred bed of the goddess.11 As Gilgamesh appears, a
violent struggle in the form of a ritual dance ensues. The
heroes charge each other like the wild bulls they imagine
themselves to be. They lock horns, and senseless with rage,
they smash posts and walls trying to overpower each other.
Finally exhausted, they fall to the ground, kiss each other
and "form a friendship". Enkidu has succeeded in prevent
ing a primal crime; the goddess-mother was not violated.
The interlude of latency is at hand. The narcissistic-phallic
excesses will be replaced by brotherhood and cooperation.
The dance ends with relief for all.
We are appropriately suspicious when resolutions in ac
tual life crises or mythic dramas are accomplished easily, or
when there is too global a change in affect. Emotional
growth is rarely simple or clean cut in its stages; indeed it
may be uncertain at times whether progression or regres
11 Enkidu's arrival is greeted with these words:
"The nobles rejoiced:
'A hero has appeared
For the man of proper mien!
For Gilgamesh, the godlike,
His equal has come forth.'
For Ishhara (a form of Ishtar) the bed
Is laid out.
Gilgamesh
At night...,
As he approaches,
Endiku stands in the street
To bar the way
To Gilgamesh
... in his might."
ANET, p. 78; II, V, 23-26.

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sion is at hand. Realizing these possibilities, we discover that

the brotherhood of Gilgamesh and Enkidu has vestiges of
their earlier struggle. Gilgamesh redirects his energies as he
proposes to Enkidu that they journey to the Cedar Moun
tains in the north and slay the monster Huwawa (Assyrian:
Humbaba) who guards the secret dwelling place of Ishtar.
Sexual prowess is giving way to social ambition, and the
chorus of elders enters once again, cautioning Gilgamesh
that his wish for fame is childlike. Unable to dissuade him,
they urge that he rely on the wisdom of Enkidu, and hope
for his success.
As Gilgamesh and Enkidu are ready to begin their ad
venture, we recognize that the ritual drama has reached the
point at which the king must leave his throne and city. This
change is made explicit when the nobles, speaking now as
the Assembly of the city, entrust their king to Enkidu and
implore that he be returned safely. A religious rite accom
panies this event. The mother of Gilgamesh officiates in the
prayers, 'adopts' Enkidu as her own flesh, and places
around his neck a medallion of the priestesses, the devotees
of Ishtar. An element of maternal longing to retain the sons
predominates here, and we realize that the heroes' depar
ture will also involve a struggle to emancipate themselves
from their attachments to this woman.
It may well be that in the ancient festivities, during the
time when Gilgamesh and Enkidu were away, the ritual
drama permitted a public orgy. Excessively stimulated by
the presentation of the sexual crises, the hearer-participants
could have been encouraged to act out their conflictual feel
ings and to work through their experience so as to be pre
pared for the later phases of the ritual.
V. Reaching Toward Identity and Intimacy.

The journey of Gilgamesh and Enkidu to the Cedar
Mountains is marked by close companionship, some role
confusion regarding who will lead and who will follow, and
moments of fear and isolation, mixed with acts of mutual
reassurance. The heroes have left their mother(s) behind,
exhibit considerable bravery and willingness to take risks.

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Idealistically, they believe that their assault on the Huwawa

monster will bring an end to evil. We watch them struggle
with growth from latency to adolescence and young adult
hood, and when, with the aid of the Sun god Shamash, they
succeed in slaying the evil monster, it would appear that
their journey will meet with total success. Yet, beneath the
surface, serious difficulties remain. As Gilgamesh chops
down the cedar forest to reach the monster, and as we learn
that the monster guards the sacred mountain abode of Ish
tar, he finds himself enmeshed in vestiges of an earlier cri
sis: this time, Gilgamesh has succeeded in smashing the
door to her chamber. But Enkidu, who once prevented him
from penetrating her abode, is now on his side. The omi
nous danger of incest looms again, hidden in what passes as
a noble deed.
After slaying the monster, Gilgamesh washes himself
and puts on his royal attire. We have not yet mentioned the
earlier account of ritual washing, cutting of the hair, and
reattiring of Enkidu at the time of his domestication. Such
washings are familiar elements of blood guiltiness, expia
tion, and purification in ancient Babylonian myths and rites
and we will see their reappearance at later turning points in
this cultic drama.
As soon as Gilgamesh has purified himself and put on
his royal robes and crown, the goddess Ishtar appears as a
seductress, proposing marriage to him. She also offers ma
terial gifts of unimaginable splendor. Her offer seems irre
sistable. But now, Gilgamesh has indeed matured; entirely
on his own, he refuses her offer. Unfortunately, his new
self is so frail that the refusal is clumsy. In fact, Gilgamesh's
terror of Ishtar shows through as he rages at her, calling
her an untrustworthy whore, and reciting her many infi
delities with other lovers. Nowhere else in this story are the
heady dangers of incest and total union with the gods so
vividly and explicitly portrayed. Gilgamesh's fierce handling
of his powerful emotions triggers Ishtar's rage. She be
comes a mean divine child and manipulates her father Anu,
forcing him to send down the Bull of Heaven to retaliate
for her injured vanity. In the ancient Near East, the symbol
of divine male power, this Bull of Heaven is always the

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imago of the father, out to slay the wayward sons, only to

run the risk of being slain by them. In what appears to be
another ritual dance, the two heroes engage in combat with
the cosmic bull, and when Enkidu (not the irate Gilgamesh)
drives his sword into the neck of the bull, the dance be
comes a sacrifice: the successful slaying of the father must
be followed by an expiatory act. The awesomeness of these
events is verbalized by two choruses. The women of Ishtar
begin a wail of mourning, while the men of the city admire
the kill, divide it as booty and trophy, and set in motion a
heroic banquet for the victors.12 Gilgamesh and Enkidu now
enter the great gate at Uruk. The wailing women have dis
appeared, and in their place, erotic lyre maidens raise a
festive chant. It would appear that the heroes have come of
age through their daring adventure.
Caught up in this celebration, we might fail to notice
that Ishtar has disappeared. How totally out of character
for the great Queen of Heaven to leave us with neither a
blessing nor an admonition! Rejected and defeated, she just
seems to slip away, leaving the drama as the heroes did
earlier. Where has she gone? Perhaps we have discovered
here the cultic context for another Akkadian story known as
"The Descent of Ishtar to the Nether World." Just as Gilga
mesh passed through a narcissistic rage, so did the Queen
of Heaven. Momentarily, in the drama, Gilgamesh will be
gin a final regressive-progressive journey, from which he
will return to kingship in Uruk. Apparently, Ishtar must
make a parallel journey in order to prepare for her return
to eventually meet the king at her sacred temple bed, where
their intercourse will generate the New Year. The epic
drama has now reached a critical turning point. The phallic
arrogance of our child-king and the castrating envy of the
daughter of heaven are now left behind and a new motif is
introduced: that all men are mortal.
12 We will want to note carefully how the sacrificial killing of the Bull of
Heaven, the father imago, is followed almost immediately in the story by the
compensatory sacrificial death of Enkidu. Readers will not miss the remarkable
way in which this early story supports Freud's thinking in "Totem and Taboo," St.
Ed., 13. Perhaps no story from antiquity declares as unequivocally as this epic,
Freud's perception that the attempts at resolution through sacrificial rites were
always inadequate.

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VI. A Crisis-Precipitated Regression.

No sooner do the victory festivities end and the heroes
fall fast asleep, than Enkidu has a dream of his death. The
gods override Shamash's objections and demand a compen
satory death for the killing of the Bull of Heaven. The
sacrifice will be a human life, the life of Enkidu who slayed
the bull. Readers who know biblical themes will have a sense
of familiarity here as death is introduced as punishment for
human misbehavior.13 As Enkidu tells the dream to Gilga
mesh, he is panicked, hysterical, and feels the sickness of
death come upon him even as he speaks. Enkidu rages at
the news that he will die. For a moment, he even lays claim
to the axe of Gilgamesh, wishing that he had smashed the
door with it. How strange this would sound if we did not
know what a fight it was, and what door it was, and that
with the axe he seeks not the door but the divine lady
within. Next Enkidu turns his rage on the harlot lass, curs
ing the day of his birth. Only when Shamash reminds him
of all the good things in his life that he gained from the lass
is he brought to acceptance of his death: "his vexed heart
grew quiet". His own death fear resolved, Enkidu praises
and blesses the harlot lass.
Upon Enkidu's death, Gilgamesh experiences panic
and terror. In the liturgy, a wild dance appears to begin.
Gilgamesh pulls out his hair, tears off his clothes, throws a
lion skin over his body, vows not to shave, takes up his
sacred axe, and flees into the steppe. He is fully aware that
he is fleeing from the fear of death. He is determined to
find Utnapishtim (a parallel to the biblical Noah), the only
mortal who survived the archaic flood and gained immor
tality. Surely he can give to Gilgamesh what he has gained
from the gods.
Who is the dancer before us now? Moving with too
rapid and faltering steps, he throws glances in every direc
tion, fearing danger on all sides. He clutches the axe he
once brought to his mother, and hides beneath the skin of
an animal that personifies his goddess. He feels totally alone
and abandoned, fears the dark, longs for a garden paradise.
13 Genesis 3:17-19.

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He dances like a frightened child just learning to walk; he

stumbles back through the crises of earlier days when trust,
belonging, autonomy, and self-esteem all hung in precari
ous balance, tipped this way or that by the actions and
moods of adults, of parents. The death of his twin, a part of
himself, now drives Gilgamesh into a deep regression, and
his dancing makes us uneasy; with each successive move
ment, some moment of our own first unsure dancing may
emerge and make us identify with the disturbed hero.
The dance ends as Gilgamesh, still hiding beneath the
lion's skin, exhausted, pale and drawn, approaches the Inn
of the ale-wife, Siduri. This kindly and wise goddess who
eases man's anguish with words and libations, dwells on the
shore of the mysterious sea. Spying the axe in Gilgamesh's
hand makes her misidentify him as a killer (if it is a mis
identification). She bolts the door of the Inn, refusing him
entry. He threatens to smash her door with his axe—by
now, we understand this threatened act as a ritualistic repe
tition of a forcible entry to a motherly woman. We realize
that his fear of and anger at women have not been fully
resolved. Only after he has told her his story does Siduri
unbolt the door. She too attempts to discourage Gilgamesh
from continuing his ambitious journey, urging him instead
to return to a normal human life. She shares with him a
profound insight about life and death:
Gilgamesh, wither rovest thou?

The life thou pursuest thou shalt not find.
When the gods created mankind,
Death for mankind they set aside,
Life in their own hands retaining.
Thou, Gilgamesh, let full be thy belly,
Make thou merry by day and by night,
Of each day make thou a feast of rejoicing,
Day and night dance thou and play!
Let thy garments be sparkling fresh,
Thy head be washed; bathe thou in water.
Pay heed to the little one that holds on to thy hand,
Let thy spouse delight in thy bosom
For this is the task of mankind.14
hANET, p. 90; X, iii, 1-14.

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We sense that the journey and the drama are nearing an

end. Surely with all the insight Gilgamesh has gained for
himself, the ale-wife's sober reference to reality and warmth
should be sufficient. So we are surprised to find that Gilga
mesh cannot hear her; ambition still drives him to find new
pursuits. He insists that he must cross the sea, and demands
that she show him the way to the boatman. He also asks her
to give him the "markers" for his crossing of the steppe or
the sea. She tells him that Urshanabi possesses the "Stone
Things" and the "urnu snakes" which he "picks in the
woods." These references take us by surprise, for elsewhere
in the story, the "markers" that journiers use are morsels of
bread, broken off and dropped at various intervals. No
where earlier do we find indications that Gilgamesh "picked
snakes" or "broke stones" (as Urshanabi will soon claim that
he did). Since a snake and stones reappear as important
elements in the drama's final episode, we must seek to cap
ture their meaning(s).
Snakes represent the phallus as well as eternal life or
rejuvenation. In the journey to the sea of death another
phallic motif consists of the long punting poles, chopped
from trees, which in turn repeats Gilgamesh's earlier act of
chopping down the sacred forest that protects Ishtar's sa
cred abode. Apparently, Gilgamesh keeps carrying and us
ing his axe, by means of which the Bull of Heaven was slain.
Now, Urshanabi suddenly confronts Gilgamesh with his
prior phallic and castrating activities and says with accusa
tory intent: "Thy hands, Gilgamesh, have hindered the
crossing! Thou hast broken the Stone Things, hast picked
the 'urnu' snakes. The Stone Things are broken, the 'urnu'
is not in the woods."15 The accusation sounds as if Gilga
mesh has violated a taboo, and another taboo declaration is
forthcoming when Urshanabi warns Gilgamesh not to touch
the Waters of Death with his hands, but to have recourse to
punting poles.
The mysterious "Stone Things" could refer to standing
stones, altars, cairns, and boundary markers, all abundant
in the ancient Near East, and considered inviolate. If Gilga
mesh had broken any of these in his previous adventures,
r°ANET, p. 92; X, iii, 37-39.

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he had transgressed a taboo. Alternatively, the Stone

Things could refer to tablets carrying identifying marks or
ritual prescriptions, or oracular statements of someone's des
tiny or fate. To break such tablets would be a sacrilegious
act, a defiance of the Gods. We lean toward the second
interpretation since Gilgamesh's defiant attitude is one of
the epic's major themes. A third symbolism may have been
condensed into the second one: Stone Things may repre
sent Ishtar's jewelry, much touted in other Akkadian docu
ments in which they are clearly tied up with Ishtar's divine
identity. If Gilgamesh had broken these sacred jewels, he
would have committed another act of sacrilege of which
Urshanabi holds him responsible for having impeded the
crossing to, or of the Waters of Death. One step removed
from jewels as Ishtar's ornaments is the jewel's astral sym
bolism: Ishtar is akin to the Roman Venus, the planet, and
the constellations as well as the rainbow are her cosmic
jewels.16 And thus, the astral meaning of the "broken
stones" is the lack of astronomic guidance that seafarers
would need—the "hindered crossing" of which Urshanabi
warns.
When Urshanabi (Babylonian: Sursunabu), t

man, hears of the valor of Gilgamesh, the purpo
journey, and the death of Enkidu, he reluctantly
ferry him across the ocean to Utnapishtim. When
ing poles are used up just short of passage across th
of death (when phallic prowess has run out), Gilgam
the wits to pull off his garment (the lion's skin?) an
on his hands as a sail. Though we may admire h
live, we surmise that his reliance on a pseudo-om
lion's skin must be given up eventually. Even as I
self was required to be naked before she was all
meet the Queen of the underworld, Gilgamesh m
16 The removal of Ishtar's jewels is described in great detail in t
her descent into the underworld (ANET, pp. 107-108). There is a
association between the goddess' (in this case Innana) jewels and
"ordinances," called her "me" (ANET, p. 53 and n. 11). A remark
between the Gilgamesh epic's flood narrative and the Genesis (chs
involves the lapis necklace of Ishtar (ANET, p. 95; XI, 162-165), wh
the rainbow following the storm in Genesis. In the same setting, th
Ishtar never to forget the flood parallels Yahweh's promise never to
one (Genesis 9:13-17).

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naked before Utnapishtim on the far shore of the mysteri

ous sea.
When Utnapishtim ("the Faraway") sees the

ing in his direction, he perceives that the "bro
are with the journiers in the boat, and that ri
boat is "one who is not her master." Clearly, in h
Gilgamesh is indulging in another act of arrogan
garding his divinely ordained fate (breaking th
destiny) and, by punting and sailing across the
Death, seeking union with the immortals.
Gilgamesh is shocked to find that Utnapishtim
different than himself. This ambivalent observat
that Gilgamesh wishes to have what Utnapishtim
(immortality), but finds Utnapishtim too much l
to possess any special magic. Utnapishtim does
our hero: he reminds Gilgamesh that nothing is p
and that death is a mystery. He does not conce
gamesh the story of his own rescue from the
subsequent gift of immortality, but makes plain
take and confusion among the gods were involved
likely to happen again. He concludes his story w
mate disappointment for Gilgamesh: "But now, w
thy sake call the gods to Assembly that the life w
seekest thou mayest find?"17 The answer is ne
but known to Gilgamesh and to us all: there
Gilgamesh falls into an exhausted sleep, awa
week later with a final pleading inquiry to Utnap
[What then] shall I do Utnapishtim,
Whither shall I go,
... wherever I se[t my foot], there is death.18
VII. Progression, Generativity, and Maturit

Hidden within emotional crisis are the seed
insight and growth. This promising vision, redi
our century, was apparently held in antiquity.
religious claims of "redemption", however they
nANET, p. 95; XI, 197-198.

ISANET, p. 96; XI, 230-233.

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problem, its origin, or the desired outcome, ascribe to this

view. In our epic drama, Gilgamesh will now receive this
profound insight from Utnapishtim. The power and intent
of the conclusion of this epic are easy to overlook because
Gilgamesh does not get what he came seeking, which intro
duces an unmitigated disappointment. More significantly
however, a snake-trickster episode in this final scene draws
the modern reader's attention to a more familiar paradise
lost story in which a snake and a woman wanting to be
helpful to a man (Utnapishtim's wife urges him to give Gil
gamesh a departure gift) result in their despair, their expul
sion from a garden of immortality, and a pronouncement
of the inevitability of death.
Utnapishtim helps the sleep-confused Gilgamesh arise
and calls Urshanabi the boatman in order to instruct him:
Take him, Urshanabi, and bring him to the

washingplace.
Let him wash off his grime in water clean as snow,
Let him cast off his skins, let the sea carry (them) away,
That the fairness of his body may be seen.
Let him renew the band round his head,
Let him put on a cloak to clothe his nakedness,
That he may arrive in his city,
That he may achieve his journey.19
Urshanabi carries out these instructions. A ritual bathing of
the king and preparation for his reinvestiture are clearly
the cultic prescriptions. The casting off of the lion's skin
and allowing himself to be seen as he really is are tell-tale
symbols of the regeneration and renewal that the liturgy is
intended to produce. Gilgamesh is no longer a young, nar
cissistic aggressor, but an old, wise and humble ruler.
Just when Gilgamesh and Urshanabi are ready to set
off to sea for their return to the ordinary world, the wife of
Utnapishtim, perhaps failing to understand what has trans
pired, urges her husband to give Gilgamesh a prickly plant
whose possession bestows eternal youth. It lives at the
water's bottom. All Gilgamesh must do is to tie rocks to his
feet and dive for the plant, risking the pain of grasping it.
>9ANET, p. 96; XI, 238-244.

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Perhaps Utnapishtim's wife is a final female enticer, dis

guised to be sure, but not completely lacking in power to
lure Gilgamesh even if for only a moment. At any rate,
Gilgamesh dives for the plant, obtains it, heads for home
with Urshanabi, seeming now to have obtained everything
he wished for and more.
Having landed near Uruk, Gilgamesh sees a cool well
and decides to bathe once more. We will be tempted to see
him as obsessive, but this time, he has something to be ob
sessed about! He must make a risky choice between follow
ing the instructions of Utnapishtim or preserving the magic
of the immortal's wife. While Gilgamesh is washing, a snake
steals the plant and carries it off, eating it as he goes. Lest
we imagine that the plant had no magical power, the snake
promptly sheds its skin, thereby hinting to Gilgamesh that it
now has the immortality (or eternal youth) which the hero
had wanted.
Gilgamesh experiences brief remorse and weeps; weep

ing and sadness overtook his earlier raging and ambitious
ness. Then he arises and the mythic drama comes suddenly
to a close. We are back where we began at ramparted Uruk,
and this time we walk in procession behind Gilgamesh and
Urshanabi. Our old king is remarkably different from the
brazen youth he had been. He looks zestful and refreshed,
though older. He holds Urshanabi gently with one hand
and points with the other to features of the city. 'Look at
the terraces, the foundations, and the brickwork. This is
Uruk. I am responsible for these buildings. Look at the
orchards and fields around the city, how lush they are. Ob
serve the gaiety of the people. And here is the Eanna, the
temple of Ishtar. I built and care for her house, because she
is my protectress'.
Mature and adult, Gilgamesh is now the guide of the
boatman who once guided him. He takes pride in his city
and his accomplishments, but knows that he needs the city
and its people as much as they need him. As Gilgamesh
approaches the temple of Ishtar, we note that he no longer
has his sacred axe, and his mother is nowhere in evidence.
He does not need weapons or her advice any more. And of
one thing we can be sure: this time he will not need to

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smash his way into the temple of Ishtar. As he comes to her

now, she will welcome him to her chamber, having herself
returned from an underworld journey in preparation for
this moment of the king's rearrival.
And so our ritual drama concludes. Its setting is not in
doubt. Here is the story that must be told, the experience
that must be lived, over and over again in preparation for
the hieros gamos, the sacred marriage of king and goddess,
the latter represented by a priestess. We have discovered
through our psychoanalytic approach to the epic how both
the trials of Gilgamesh and the story of Ishtar's descent to
the Nether World were part of the religious life and
thought of the ancient Babylonians and Assyrians. The po
tency, danger, and awesomeness of sexuality are apparent
throughout this drama. We sense that in this setting, sacred
intercourse was not a decadent, magical, orgiastic rite that
sought to ease the pain of living through periodic over
stimulation and legitimated promiscuity. Only with the ma
turity achieved by arduous reinterpretation of the erotic
past and the absorption of eros by thanatos are the partici
pants made ready for the union of the hieros gamos. The
New Year's ceremony was not merely concerned with the
fertility of fields and the viability of government. The
epic—and the cult around it—reach specifically toward in
dividual maturation and familial relations.
The Gilgamesh epic is not merely about death and re

birth; it is notably a liturgical drama in which youthful
erotic preoccupations become overtaken by thoughts of
death, first leading to fierce narcissistic protest, and then to
acceptance in sober resignation that still leaves room for
living-on with periodic renewal. Nature has its cycles, but
human beings have to make do with a limited time span
whose end is foredoomed. What counts is the quality of
their trek through life, the experiences that men garner
and what they learn from each leg of their journey, each

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turning point they encounter, each fork they find in the

road, each crisis they meet. Though men will not live
forever, they should love and work as long as they can,
taking pride in their city and their institutions.
Paul W. Pruyser, Ph.D.

lhe Menmnger foundation
Topeka, Kansas 66601
J. Tracy Luke, Ph.D.

Aima college
Alma, Michigan 48801

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The Epic of Gilgamesh

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The Epic of Gilgamesh

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The Epic of Gilgamesh

Author(s): Paul W. Pruyser and J. Tracy Luke

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