A Critical Appraisal Of Beowulf And Gilgamesh

A Critical Appraisal Of: Beowulf And Gilgamesh Essay, Research Paper

A Critical Appraisal of: Beowulf and Gilgamesh

There are many differences and critical comparisons that can be drawn

between the epics of Beowulf and Gilgamesh. Both are historical poems which

shape their respected culture and both have major social, cultural, and

political impacts on the development of western civilization literature and

writing. Before any analysis is made, it is vital that some kind of a

foundation be established so that a further, in-depth exploration of the

complex nature of both narratives can be accomplished.

The epic of Gilgamesh is an important Middle Eastern literary work,

written in cuneiform on 12 clay tablets about 2000 BC. This heroic poem is named

for its hero, Gilgamesh, a tyrannical Babylonian king who ruled the city of Uruk,

known in the Bible as Erech (now Warka, Iraq). According to the myth, the gods

respond to the prayers of the oppressed citizenry of Uruk and send a wild,

brutish man, Enkidu, to challenge Gilgamesh to a wrestling match. When the

contest ends with neither as a clear victor, Gilgamesh and Enkidu become close

friends. They journey together and share many adventures. Accounts of their

heroism and bravery in slaying dangerous beasts spread to many lands.

When the two travelers return to Uruk, Ishtar (guardian deity of the

city) proclaims her love for the heroic Gilgamesh. When he rejects her, she

sends the Bull of Heaven to destroy the city. Gilgamesh and Enkidu kill the bull,

and, as punishment for his participation, the gods doom Enkidu to die. After

Enkidu’s death, Gilgamesh seeks out the wise man Utnapishtim to learn the secret

of immortality. The sage recounts to Gilgamesh a story of a great flood (the

details of which are so remarkably similar to later biblical accounts of the

flood that scholars have taken great interest in this story). After much

hesitation, Utnapishtim reveals to Gilgamesh that a plant bestowing eternal

youth is in the sea. Gilgamesh dives into the water and finds the plant but

later loses it to a serpent and, disconsolate, returns to Uruk to end his days.

This saga was widely studied and translated in ancient times. Biblical

writers appear to have modeled their account of the friendship of David and

Jonathan on the relationship between Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Numerous Greek

writers also incorporated elements found in the Gilgamesh epic into their

dragon-slaying epics and into stories concerning the close bond between Achilles

and Patroclus.

Gilgamesh is definitely the best known of all ancient Mesopotamian

heroes. Numerous tales in the Akkadian language have been told about Gilgamesh,

and the whole collection has been described as an odyssey.the odyssey of a king

who did not want to die. This is one of the major differences between the

heroic characters. Beowulf, in order to achieve immortality through the tales

of his bards, must perish in battle to accomplish this task. A similarity

between both characters is their desire to obtain immortality. They both have

different techniques in trying to reach their ultimate destination, although

both share the unique qualities of being flawless, strong, and heroic to the end.

The fullest extant text of the Gilgamesh epic is on twelve incomplete Akkadian-

language tablets found at Nineveh in the library of the Assyrian king

Ashurbanipal (reigned 668-627 BC). The gaps that occur in the tablets have been

partly filled by various fragments found elsewhere in Mesopotamia and Anatolia.

In addi tion, five short poems in the Sumerian language are known from tablets

that were written during the first half of the 2nd millennium BC; the poems have

been entitled “Gilgamesh and Huwawa,” “Gilgamesh and the Bull of Heaven,”

“Gilgamesh and Agga of Kish,” “Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Nether World,” and

“The Death of Gilgamesh.”

The Gilgamesh of the poems and of the epic tablets was probably the

Gilgamesh who ruled at Uruk in southern Mesopotamia sometime during the first

half of the 3rd millennium BC and who was thus a contemporary of Agga, ruler of

Kish; Gilgamesh of Uruk was also mentioned in the Sumerian list of kings as

reigning after the flood. Much like Beowulf, there is, however, no historical

evidence for the exploits narrated in poems and the epic.

The Ninevite version of the epic begins with a prologue in praise of

Gilgamesh, part divine and part human, the great builder and warrior, knower of

all things on land and sea. In order to curb Gilgamesh’s seemingly harsh rule,

the god Anu caused the creation of a Enkidu, a wild man who at first lived among

animals. Soon, however, Enkidu was initiated into the ways of city life and

traveled to Uruk, where Gilgamesh awaited him. Tablet II describes a trial of

strength between the two men in which Gilgamesh was the victor; thereafter,

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