Enkidu- Mesopotamian HeroHero"Wild Man"

The Wild Man Created by the Gods

The people of Uruk had cried out to the gods. Gilgamesh's demands for labor on the city walls and his claim to every bride on her wedding night had pushed them past endurance. The goddess Aruru pinched off a piece of clay and threw it into the wilderness of the steppe. "Let her create a partner for Gilgamesh, mighty in strength, and let them contend with each other, that Uruk may have peace." Enkidu was made not as a monster to be slain but as an equal to the tyrannical king.

Life in the Wild

Enkidu's first existence was purely animal. The epic describes how "his whole body was shaggy with hair, he had a full head of hair like a woman... He knew neither people nor settled living." He roamed the steppe with the gazelles, ate grass alongside them, and drank at the watering holes with herds of wild animals. He was, in the text's vivid phrase, strong as a meteorite from Anu's sky.

A hunter discovered him at the watering hole, and the sight was so unsettling that the hunter's face "went pale with fear." Enkidu was destroying the man's livelihood: he filled in pit-traps and tore out snares, letting the animals escape. Unable to capture game, the hunter went to his father, then to Gilgamesh, for help. Gilgamesh's solution was not violence but seduction: he sent Shamhat, a priestess from the temple of Ishtar, to the watering hole.

Shamhat found Enkidu and exposed her body. For six days and seven nights they lay together. When Enkidu finally rose to return to his animals, the gazelles fled from him. They no longer recognized him as one of their own. His body had been weakened by the encounter, but "his mind was filled with wisdom." He sat at Shamhat's feet, looking up at her face, listening to her words. The wild man had become human.

The Transformation

Shamhat told Enkidu of Gilgamesh and Uruk. He wanted to see these things for himself.

She taught him to eat bread and drink beer. "Enkidu ate the bread until he was sated, he drank the beer, seven jugs of it. His mood became free, he started to sing, his heart grew merry, his face glowed." She gave him clothes and led him toward Uruk.

On the way, Enkidu performed his first civilized act of valor: he protected shepherds from lions and wolves, becoming "their watchman." The creature who had once freed animals from hunters' traps now stood guard over domesticated flocks.

The Battle with Gilgamesh

Enkidu learned that Gilgamesh was exercising the royal prerogative of sleeping with brides on their wedding nights. He went to Uruk to stop it.

When Gilgamesh approached a wedding house, Enkidu blocked the door with his foot. "They grappled with each other at the entry to the wedding house. In the street they attacked each other, the public square of the land. The doorposts trembled and the wall shook." Their combat shook the city until Gilgamesh threw Enkidu. But rather than killing his defeated opponent, Gilgamesh's fury subsided. Enkidu acknowledged Gilgamesh's supremacy; Gilgamesh embraced Enkidu. "They kissed each other and became friends."

Gilgamesh's mother Ninsun adopted Enkidu, placing him alongside her son. The wild man created as a rival had become the king's closest companion.

Adventures with Gilgamesh

Together, Gilgamesh and Enkidu journeyed to the Cedar Forest to slay Humbaba, its terrifying guardian. Enkidu, who knew the forest from his wild days, warned against the quest: "My friend, I knew that country when I roamed the hills with the wild beasts. The forest stretches for ten thousand leagues in every direction. Who would go down into it?" Humbaba's roar was the flood, his mouth was fire, his breath was death. But Enkidu accompanied Gilgamesh despite his fear.

During the journey, Gilgamesh had a series of ominous dreams that Enkidu interpreted as favorable, urging his friend onward. When they reached the forest and confronted Humbaba, the guardian addressed Enkidu bitterly: he knew the forest and its rules, he should have guided Gilgamesh away rather than led him there. When Humbaba pleaded for mercy, it was Enkidu who urged Gilgamesh to strike without hesitation. Together they felled the great cedars and killed Humbaba.

When the goddess Ishtar proposed marriage to Gilgamesh and was refused with cutting insults, she sent the Bull of Heaven to destroy Uruk. Enkidu seized the Bull by its tail while Gilgamesh thrust his sword between its horns. Then Enkidu tore off the Bull's hindquarter and hurled it in Ishtar's face: "If I could only get at you, I would do the same to you!"

The Dream of Death

The gods convened to determine punishment for slaying Humbaba and the Bull of Heaven. Anu declared that one of the two heroes must die. Enlil chose Enkidu. Shamash protested, but Enlil overruled him.

That night, Enkidu dreamed of his fate. A figure with the face of a lion and the talons of an eagle seized him, beat him, and transformed him into a creature with feathered wings. He was dragged to the House of Dust, where "the one who enters is stripped of his garments... they see no light, they dwell in darkness. Dust is their food, clay their bread." He saw former kings serving as kitchen workers and priests kneeling before Ereshkigal on her throne.

Enkidu grew ill. For twelve days he weakened, cursing the trapper and the priestess who had first drawn him from the wild. He wished he had remained a beast who knew nothing of mortality. But Shamash reminded him: Shamhat had given him bread, beer, fine clothing, and "did she not give you handsome Gilgamesh for a friend?" Enkidu relented. He blessed rather than cursed those who had made him human.

On his deathbed, Enkidu lamented: "Happy is the man who falls in battle, but I must die in shame." He had wanted a hero's death, not the slow wasting of divine punishment.

Gilgamesh's Grief

Enkidu's death shattered Gilgamesh. "Enkidu, my friend whom I loved, who went with me through every danger, the fate of mankind has overtaken him." Gilgamesh refused to accept that Enkidu was truly dead, keeping vigil over the body until a worm fell from its nostril.

The grief drove Gilgamesh into the wilderness. "Shall I die too? Am I not like Enkidu? Grief has entered my heart. I am afraid of death." He shed his royal garments, wrapped himself in animal skins, and set out to find Utnapishtim and the secret of eternal life.

Enkidu and the Netherworld

A separate Sumerian tradition, preserved in "Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld," tells a different story. Gilgamesh's pukku and mikku, perhaps a drum and drumstick, fell through a hole into the underworld. Enkidu volunteered to retrieve them.

Gilgamesh warned him carefully: do not wear clean clothes or anoint yourself with fine oil, for the dead will recognize you as living. Do not carry a weapon or a staff, for the spirits will swarm you. Do not kiss the wife or child you loved, do not strike the wife or child you hated, for the underworld's rules are absolute. Enkidu ignored every warning. He wore fine clothes, he carried a staff, he kissed and struck. The underworld seized him.

Gilgamesh petitioned the gods. Enlil refused. Enki relented, and through a hole in the earth Enkidu's shade rose briefly to speak with his friend. He described what he had seen: the unburied wandering in torment, the stillborn child playing at a golden table. Then the shade sank back below.