Miraculously preserved on clay tablets deciphered only in the last century, the cycle of poems collected around the character of Gilgamesh, the great king of Ukruk, tells of his long and arduous journey to the Spring of Youth, of his encounters with monsters and gods and of his friendship with Enkidu, the wild man from the hills. Also included in the epic is a legend of the Flood, which agrees in many details with the biblical story of Noah.
Table of Contents:
Map of the Ancient Orient -- Introduction -- 1. The History of the Epic -- 2. The Discovery of the Tablets -- 3. The Historical Background -- 4. The Literary Background -- 5. The Hero of the Epic -- 6. The Principal Gods of the Epic -- 7. The Story -- 8. Survival -- 9. The Diction of the Epic -- 10. Remarks on this Version -- Acknowledgements -- The Epic of Gilgamesh -- Prologue: Gilgamesh King in Uruk -- 1. The Coming of Enkidu -- 2. The Forest Journey -- 3. Ishtar and Gilgamesh, and the Death of Enkidu -- 4. The Search for Everlasting Life -- 5. The Story of the Flood -- 6. The Return -- 7. The Death of Gilgamesh -- Glossary of Names -- Appendix: Sources.
"The work of synthesis has been accomplished, and with a remarkable degree of tact and imagination."
--Times Literary Supplement
N. K. Sandars studied, soon after the war, with Professor Gordon Childe at the Institute of Archaeology, University of London, and took the diploma of the Institute. She continued to work at Oxford, taking a B.Litt. degree in the prehistory of Europe, and thereafter she worked on the prehistory of the Aegean, receiving a studentship at St. Hugh's College, Oxford, a scholarship from Oxford University and a travelling prize from the University of Liverpool. She has travelled extensively in Europe and in the Near and Middle East, and has taken part in excavations in the British Isles and overseas. She has contributed article to various journals and is the author of Bronze Age Cultures in France, Prehistoric Art in Europe, Poems of Heaven and Hell from Ancient Mesopotamia, and The Sea Peoples. She is a fellow the British Academy and of the Society of Antiquaries of London and a corresponding member of the German Archaeological Institute.