Enkidu

III
Enkidu appears in Sumerian mythology as a mythical wild-man raised by animals; his beast-like ways are finally tamed by a courtesan named Shamhat.

Described as shaggy and hairy, with hair like a grainfield, Enkidu wears no clothes but lives as animals do: eating grass and fighting with other beasts for space at the water-hole. After Shamhat's seduction, however, the animals run from Enkidu, and he has no choice but accept human ways and live as humans do: he cuts his hair, puts on clothes, and eats bread and drinks beer.

In many ways, Enkidu's transformation may represent the seductive power of the Mesopotamian city-states. His origins upon the steppe, and his life as a companion of the wild beast, suggests the nomads living on the fringes of the territory of southern Iraq's early farmers. His subsequent transformation, and acceptance of life in Uruk, becomes a mythologized account of their slow approach to, and subsequent assimilation within, the boundaries of early agricultural civilization.

Enkidu in the Epic of Gilgamesh

Enkidu first makes his appearance in Tablet I of the Epic of Gilgamesh. He acts as the foil and mirror to Gilgamesh, his equal in every way. Created by the goddess Aruru from a piece of clay which she tosses out onto the steppe, Enkidu (is raised by wild beasts.)

(Enkidu is tamed by the harlot Shamhat.) She seduces him, and they lie together for seven days and nights. After being exposed to the pleasures of human sexuality, Enkidu is unable to run with the beasts of the field and the forest any more. He despairs until Shamhat persuades him that life in Uruk as a companion and friend to Gilgamesh is not so bad. "Why roam the step with wild beasts?" she asks him. He returns with her to Uruk. There, he first fights with Gilgamesh, and then becomes his friend.

Enkidu assists Gilgamesh in his fight against the monster Humbaba, then is killed by the gods for slaying the "Bull of Heaven." Gilgamesh mourns over the body of Enkidu for several desperate days, and then allows his friend to be buried after a maggot falls out of Enkidu's nose. Gilgamesh's close observation of rigor mortis and the slow decomposition of Enkidu's body provides the hero with the impetus for his quest for eternal life, and his visit to Utnapishtim.

Bibliography

The Epic of Gilgamesh, Foster, Benjamin R. trans. & edit. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2001. ISBN 0-393-97516-9

See also