You're Dead to Me - Epic of Gilgamesh: myths and heroes in ancient Mesopotamia

Episode Date: March 13, 2026

Greg Jenner is joined in the ancient world by Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid and comedian Marjolein Robertson to learn all about the famous Mesopotamian poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh. Sumerian poems about a legendary king called Gilgamesh began to be composed sometime in the third millennium, and were told and retold throughout Mesopotamia until a Babylonian scholar named Sîn-leqi-unninni wrote down what has become the standard version. The tale he recorded tells of a tyrannical king of Uruk, Gilgamesh, and the transformative journey he takes with his enemy-turned-friend (and possibly more), Enkidu. In the 3100 lines of the poem, they fight forest guardians and celestial bulls, anger the gods, and even challenge death itself. In this episode, we retell the story of Gilgamesh, exploring the history of the epic’s composition, what it tells us about ancient Mesopotamian storytelling and beliefs, and how it was rediscovered in the nineteenth century, written in cuneiform on clay tablets housed in the Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh. We also look at the themes of companionship, community and environmental protection that are still relevant today, and ask the question: is Gilgamesh just a legend, or was he based on a real king?If you’re a fan of captivating myths and legends from the ancient world, heroic kings and impossible quests, and historians decoding ancient texts, you’ll love our episode on the Epic of Gilgamesh.If you want more ancient history with Dr Moudhy Al-Rashid, listen to our episodes on the Babylonians and Cuneiform. And for more from Marjolein Robertson, check out our episode on Robert Bruce.You’re Dead To Me is the comedy podcast that takes history seriously. Every episode, Greg Jenner brings together the best names in history and comedy to learn and laugh about the past.Hosted by: Greg Jenner Research by: Katharine Russell Written by: Katharine Russell, Dr Emmie Rose Price-Goodfellow, Dr Emma Nagouse, and Greg Jenner Produced by: Dr Emmie Rose Price-Goodfellow and Greg Jenner Audio Producer: Steve Hankey Production Coordinator: Gill Huggett Senior Producer: Dr Emma Nagouse Executive Editor: Philip Sellars

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Ian Glenn, and this is Real Vikings. Remote Scottish monasteries overrun with pagan warriors, longboats cutting through Canada's icy waters, Norse traders in the desert sands of North Africa. The Vikings terrified the medieval world, yet they beguile us today. Who were they really?

Real Vikings From the Noiser podcast network Listen wherever you get your podcasts Hello and welcome to You're Dead to Me The Radio 4 comedy podcast that takes history seriously My name's Greg Jenna I'm a public historian author and broadcaster And today we are grabbing our bestie

And gallivanting back to ancient Mesopotamia To learn all about the epic of Gilgamesh And to help us on this daunting quest We have two very special guides In History Corner She's an honorary fellow at Wolfson College, University of Oxford, where she researches and teaches on the history of Mesopotamia, Keneaform and the Akkadian language.

You might have read her wonderful recent book between two rivers, ancient Mesopotamia and the birth of history. It is glorious. And you'll remember her from our episodes on the ancient Babylonians and Kineaform. It's Dr. Moody and Rashid. Welcome Moody. Thank you. Thanks for having me. It's awesome to be back. We love having you back. And in Comedy Corner, she's an award-winning, comedian, actor and storyteller.

You might have seen her sell-out Edinburgh Fringe show or caught her on Breaking the News or Rosie Jones's disability comedy extravaganza or her new Radio 4 show Human Watch. And you'll definitely remember her from our episode on Scottish hero Robert Bruce, not Robert the Bruce. It's Mary Lane Robertson. Welcome back, Mary Lane. Hey, thank you for having me back to teach me more stuff.

Mary Lane, last time you let slip that you have a degree in archaeology. Yes. And we immediately went, uh-uh, this is interesting. How much will she know? Well, that's the thing because I did not know much about Robert Bruce at all, but I did do my dissertation on the epic of Gilgamesh. But I did my dissertation on how has the imagery from the Epic of Gilgamesh changed according to different power struggles across Bronze Age.

And it was so bad that I almost failed my entire degree because of it. And I thought, oh, Gilgamesh, I remember this. And then I thought in my brain and I don't. So what's really... I can't even remember which one's the Tigris and which ones are Euphrates. I'm really rusty.

Okay. So a refresher course for you. It will be. It'll also be like me bringing shame to the university. I don't know if I should even name the university I went at this point. Because when you said about it,

I was like, I'd love to hear about this again, but I don't remember anything about it. Okay. Well, we can fix that. I remember Bronze Age. Okay, so we have two Bronze Age experts in the room? I wouldn't call myself that.

Okay. We have two people who know roughly when it was. You still look worried. Yes. Well, because also I get confused because Shetland, our Bronze Age was probably whatever else was already on the market of... A bit later. Yeah. Okay.

I am a bit behind on both aspects of this show. Well, today on the podcast, we're going to explore all sorts about Gilgamesh. And by the end, you will be an expert too. Okay. Fabulous. Right. Let's get cracking them. It's something my university couldn't do.

So, what do you know? Okay, this is the So What Do You Know? This is where I have a go at guessing what you are. Our lovely listener might know about today's subject, and you might have heard that the Epic of Gilgamesh features a great flood narrative, similar to the biblical story of Noah. Or maybe you've encountered Gilgamesh as the King of Heroes from the Fate anime series, or if you've read Leifshifax's 2024 novel, There Are Rivers in the Sky,

or listen to Johnny Flynn and Robert McFarlane's Gilgamesh-inspired album Lost in the Cedarwood. But if you're a movie buff like me, you're plain out of luck, because no one's done any kind of movies about Gilgamesh, which is very disappointing. So who exactly was Gilgamesh? Was he really that epic? And how do bull penises fit into our story? Oh, I'm already lost. Let's find out.

Right, Dr. Moody. We'll start with some basics for my benefit and perhaps Mary Elaine's benefit, although I'm sure it all come flowing back to you. What exactly is the epic of Gilgamesh? So it's a long poem from ancient Mesopotamia that tells a transformative journey of a king called Gilgamesh, who ruled the city of Uruk. It's originally about 3,000 or 3,100 lines long, but only about 2,400 or 2,500 remain, compared to, for example, 15,000 in the Iliad.

It's written in Ceneoform on 12 tablets, and we have to remember that Ceneoform was a script, not a language, used in ancient Mesopotamia, which is the region between and around the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, in what is now Iraq, Syria, and parts of Turkey, which was home to a succession of civilization, like the Sumerians, the Acadians, Assyrians and Babylonians. Well, that's a very good summary. Well done.

I already have a question. Go for it, yeah. So do you say the tablets were a script not a language? Sorry, if that's really obvious to all the listeners. No, it's fine. This is for their benefit and mostly mine. Well, it's not obvious at all. So Cuneiform was a writing system like the letters we used to write English,

also get used to write like French and German with some variations. And it was used in antiquity to write. bunch of languages that were all mostly unrelated to each other, including Hittite, which is an Indo-European language related to English, but primarily Sumerian and Acadian and the various dialects of Acadian. And the tablet, so Kineoform is impressed. So it's kind of hard to actually write out with ink. Very easy to impress with a reed stylus into clay. So the story of Gilgamesh has recorded on these beautiful clay tablets in the Keneiform script. We do have an episode on Keneaform, which Moody, very sort of a, very sort of a,

very brilliantly guided us through with Phil Wang as well. Okay, Mary Elaine, you've already said Bronze Age. How long ago do you think the epic of Gilgamesh was first written down? I should know that the Bronze Age was around 3,000 BC? Yeah. Is that right? That's about right, yeah. But we probably go a little later with our first recording of the actual story.

Yeah, so we don't actually know how old this story itself is because it has these oral roots that we have hints of in the language, and other references. So it was probably recited, for example, in the courts of kings, including the kings of Ure, around 2,000, 2000 BCE, but it's probably older than that. And then some of the earliest tablets written kind of records of versions of this story come around that time period, the 3rd millennium BCE, or the 2000s BCE. And then there's a standard version, there's an old Babylonian version, and then there's a kind of standard Babylonian version, which is the one that gets copied over and over and over and over again that comes from around probably 1,100 BCE,

written by a scholar named Seen-Lekhi-Unini. He named in a later literary catalogs, we're not too sure to what degree we can call him the author. Does he just establish the most popular version? This raises fun in the nerdy sense questions about authorship in ancient Mesopotamia where it's more like people are links in a chain in the life story of a story. The tale itself, the story itself is more important than the author as well as the kind of divine origins, the perceived divine origins of everything

that gets written down, all knowledge, wisdom and literature. Is that like the Homeric amalgamation of storytellers? Like Homer wrote this, or it's lots of stories gathered up and recited over the years. Absolutely. Yeah, so the story of the alien, sorry, the story of, oh, you put the alien in my head now, The story of Gilgamesh is possibly 5,000, 6,000 years old,

but our earliest records are about 4,000. I think we probably should say, this is important, actually. Gilgamesh was not always the name of the character. What? Do you want to guess what his original name was? Stephen. Stephen. Stephen King of O'Rourke.

It wasn't Gilgamesh. No. Woody? What was his name? It was Bilgamesh. Bilgamesh. Oh, no, that's one year than Stephen. Gilgamesh is basically a late variation of, like, the signs used to write Bilgamesh.

And there are around five Sumerian poems that tell distinct stories about Bilgamesh. But they're not strung together as one narrative until the later Acadian or Babylonian version that we talked about. Oh, it's adorable. Bilgamesh, he just sounds like a sort of, like a slight disappointing brother. Yeah, he does. You know, there's Bilgamesh and Wilgamesh and Gilgamesh, the French cousin. You know, there's a whole family of them. And of course, there's Phil Gamesh who sang in the air tonight.

Yeah, and Lady Gamesh, the final one. Like Smurfette. The boring question you probably get asked a lot is, is Gilgamesh a real guy who then gets turned into a literary folk hero? Or is this pure speculation, pure fantasy? Nobody really knows the answer to that. He's on what we would, he's referenced in what we would consider a semi-historical document, which is called, we call it the Sumerian king list,

basically a list of kings in southern. what is now southern Iraq, what we would call Sumer. But it begins with these mythical primordial kings like Alulim who ruled for 30,000 years or Atana, who ruled for 400 years. So we know that these are probably not real people, or maybe they are based on real people, but these are not their real reigns. And Gilgamesh has referenced on this having ruled for 126 years, which maybe if it's lunar months is potentially doable. Oh, really? Possibly also not. There are real kings on the list, though, that we know existed that are corroborated from other sources like King Sargon, who ruled for a couple of decades around 2300 BC.

He's referenced, we know him from other documents, and there are a whole bunch like that. So is he a literary character who moved into the history books, or is he a historical figure who took on legendary proportions? That's interesting. I remember looking at the list, and some kings last for 3,000 years, some seven. Yeah. And then I was like, I said changing

politicians. But I was like, could it have been that 3,000 years was a family name that then got listed as one royal member? That's a really interesting

possibility. Thank you. Because it's such a formulaic thing and each king is, and one queen actually named Kubau is given a number of years that they reign for.

It's probably years. But I think the impossible length speak a little bit to this ideology of kingship that they're trying to establish in the same document saying look how old kingship the existence of a ruler like this is. And if something is old is obviously important and legitimate in ancient Mesopotamia, they really revered their ancient history. So I think these impossible reigns feed into that ideology. And then with that setup, they can go on to list the real kings who were ruled for seven years or 50 years. So Gilgamesh may be Israel. He's certainly

becomes a model for what a king should be. Is that fair? Absolutely. There are kings that model themselves on him like Shulgi, who rules around 2100 BCE and who even claims to have the same mom as Gilgamesh. That can't happen. If Gilgames ruled 126 years, you can't have the same mom as the next person. She has found a way to defeat menopause. I want what she's having. Yeah, exactly.

It was pills. Okay, so Gilgames. All the estrogen. Yeah, I mean, yeah. So Gilgamesh, he's sort of King Arthurie, but maybe realish. It's, okay, we're sort of in that sort of territory. Mary Lane, Hercules in Greek myth, is half mortal, half God. Yes.

Gilgamesh, he's slightly more complicated. He's two-thirds God, one-third human, which feels weirder somehow. I don't know why. The ratio feels off. That's a polyamorous parenting. Oh. How would that happen? How could it be thirds of a creation?

Maybe you're right. Is that like a stone into Zeus's thigh kind of situation? That's a good question. Yeah, Moody, how do you get a one-third mortal two gods? Yeah, how do you do point six-six god? I think he'd do that because in the background of the Gilgamesh epic, there is this deity called Aya, who's the god of wisdom. He's quite a mischievous god. He's never really front and center. He's kind of like interwoven into the story.

The number that represents him is two-thirds of 60, forgetting what that is. number is now. 15. Is that right? I don't know. Two-thirds? Yeah. Four-thirty-something. I don't know. I'm not a mathematician. Don't remember the number itself. I just remember the ratio. And that that might be what's built into Gilgamesh here is a reference to Aya, the mischievous god of wisdom. Oh, okay. Possibly. This is harking back. So he's, yeah, okay. Is he meant to be the father so that? No. So Ninsun, the mother of Gilgamesh is the goddess. That's the divine bit. Oh, okay. And it's a mortal dad.

Oh, so godly mom, mortal dad. And then somehow Aya pops into the mix. Yeah, yeah. Makes him only one third God. Yeah, I mean, that's... What? Sorry. It's all right.

Math is my weakest point. I think we can all agree. None of us are particularly good on the math. Two gods and one mortal makes one third God. I mean, the obvious question, Mary Lane, if you could have a godly body part, what would you choose? If you could be one third God or two-thirds God, what would you go for? Oh. two-thirds god

but like I would go for we have a goddess in Shetan called Seymidth, the mother of the sea I'd go for her so I could swim and boot and breathe with the seals So you go kind of mermaid that's the you'd want sort of fishy body

Yeah top a fish Top half fish Why not Just a fish head And leg They're going to have eyes on either side The one thing that we can see As a divine physical attribute

Gilgamesh has Is height How tall is our king Gilgamesh, Bilgamesh. Well, I always feel like when they want to make themselves grandois, if that's the word

and how you pronounce it in French. Sorry, are you saying grandiose there? No, I'm saying grandoise as in very large and grand. Oh, I like it. They want to make themselves super tall, but also I feel like back then

they were just shorter anyway. So I think he went for the lofty height of 5-11. 5-11? Yeah. Like a giant among men. Yeah, but back then,

surely would be. You go by the Shetland Diet of Picks, they're all tiny. Okay, Moody, how tall is Gilgamesh, according to the story? So he is nine feet tall in the sun. Yeah. And in one translation by Sophos Hell, which is a gorgeous translation, he's 18 feet tall, which would be more of an inconvenience, probably, than anything else. I know people want tall men on Tinder, but like nine feet's too tall.

You can't buy many clothes for Christmas. Yeah. I mean, the shoe size alone, come on. Nine foot or 11 foot. Or 18, you said. 18. So they're like, let's double it. No, no, notice.

By the time it's hit now, we might as well double it. 18 feet. Okay, so he's basically as big as a bus. So when you saw those statues of them from back in the day, they're like, oh, no, that's just a scale. Life-size Gilgamesh. So our main character is two-thirds divine. He has a minor name change from Bilgamesh to Gilgamesh. He is adjusting his palace doorways to 18 feet, possibly.

Moody, how does our story of Gilgamesh begin? Is it, do we meet him in adulthood? Do we meet him as a king? We do. He's the tyrannical king of Uruk. He violates brides on their wedding nights. He exhausts the men and boys by forcing them to build a humongous wall, which is real, an archaeological wall, and play violent sports. And finally, the women beg the gods and goddesses to create a match or an equal for Gilgamesh to challenge him and just calm this guy down, really. Right. Is it an opponent or a friend they're trying to create? So the word can be translated as equal or match, but there's a lovely children's version of this. I don't know how you write a children's version of the horrifying tale where it's basically like he's lonely and miserable and so he needs a friend. Yeah, so who knows?

So I studied this at university and the version I learned was he's lonely and needs a friend. Which makes me question what source I used. But I'll tell you this, when I did my course in Romans, I used to use rotten. Romans. Did you? A horrible history books? Yes. And my professor said, how did you know that? Because I used to come out with facts that the professors didn't know and I'd have to be like, cool. Terry, dearie. And he's being my references. Okay, so he needs a friend or he needs an equal to sort of match him in the ring.

Who is created, or who is sent down to match or fight or play with Gilkamesh? So the gods create Enkidu from clay and divine blood. There's a really beautiful description. He's born in silence. In other words, not with the cross. of childbirth. He's at first a wild man. He's described as being very hairy and almost animal-like. And he lives among the animals, the gazelles. And he causes grief to hunters because he's constantly foiling their traps and rescuing the animals. Yeah. So Gilgamesh learns about this when the hunters complain, effectively. He learns about Enkidu from the complaints. So he's an animal rights activist. He's going along sabotaging traps

and things. Exactly. Okay. And Gilgamesh is like, this guy's ruining my hunting. Okay. I'm going to go sword and now. Okay. How do you think tyrannical? Gilgamesh addresses this new threat? This is the one time I think I'll get this bit right. This is the one thing I remember from the story, which take from that what you will. They get a really attractive lady. They do.

Yes. They cover her nice smelling oils. And they're like, show him why he wants to enter society. And she seduces him. And Anki-Doo is like, I'd rather be with humans and animals. And thus,

ends my knowledge Beautifully put And suitable for Radio 4 So well done Moody, I mean Mary Lane did a very beautiful elegant description It's a bit more

Julie Cooper novel Isn't it? It's a bit more sort of racy than that It's not love It's sort of romping Yeah Absolutely

But they're not married No No So who is the woman Who is sent along Yeah So he sends Gilgamesh sends a woman

called Shamhat to seduce in Kidu effectively. She's a temple worker, maybe a sex worker, a priestess of Ishtar. We're not really sure how to translate the word that's used to describe her, Ishtar being the goddess of love and war. And they have sex for seven days and seven nights, possibly more. Afterwards, she becomes civilized, and the animals actually reject him after this. No way. Yeah.

So they're just like, no, we can smell that you've changed. Oh, my God. Yeah. What? Yeah, so you respond on, actually. Does that have any kind of similarities to the Garden of Eden story and Adam and Eve living in harmony of nature and then getting this knowledge and then being outcast from the garden itself?

It's an interesting question. Yeah, it is sort of similar, isn't it? It is. A man who lives with nature and then a woman comes along and ruins it. I'm sorry, given the best seven nights ever. I was going to say, ruins it or vastly improves his life, let's be honest. And then Gilgamesh sort of shows up. Yeah, or Enki-Du sort of shows up to Uruk.

Oh, he's the other way around. Yeah, okay. So Enki's told that Gilgamesh is kind of demanding this right to sleep with brides on their wedding night, and they meet on the threshold of one of these bride's houses and start wrestling. The verb is it'sab to they take hold over, they seize each other, which is the same phrase used later when they embrace. And it's also a phrase used for marriage in other sources. Oh, really? You seize someone in marriage, which is very romantic.

And they turn out to be equally matched. They kiss and make friends. And Gilgamesh caresses Enkidu like a woman. There's some really interesting imagery being used and quite direct, I would say. Okay, so the obvious question that you say match. You know, we've had this idea of Enkidu being sent down to be a match for him. But it sounds like there's an almost more than romantic, almost, you know, platonic love, but there's also like an attraction maybe.

Yeah, I think there's definitely a romantic love. Okay. And they tell us this with a lot of language, like he's going to love him like a bride. They caress each other. They kiss. Later in the story, it gets reprised in different ways. So I think matches, maybe it's, I don't know if it was deliberately vague, but I think our translation is nicely vague because it covers all the bases, really,

of what their relationship takes on. It's quite modern the polyamory here, isn't it? Because we've got, you know, Gilgamesh sending along a lady to seduce his future boyfriend. It's quite open. Yeah. I mean, this feels like a love between two men. Yeah, I think it absolutely is, even if kind of earlier translators were reticent to say that.

The Victorians were like that. They're just good friends. Yes, exactly. They were just flatmates. They're just flatmates. They just live together as friends. They're just bros, okay? They're just bros, and they're just like watching rugby.

A beautiful story of love. Moody, could we hear some of this beautiful Arcadian poetry then? Gilgamesh shunatam in Kiddu washeb mahar charymtym. That's a really beautiful language. It is really beautiful. And in English then, would you mind translating that for us? Yes. So as Gilgamesh was relating the dream, Enkidu was sitting before.

the temple woman. The two of them were making love together. He forgot the wild where he was born. For seven days and seven nights, Enkidu was erect and he coupled with Shamhat. More literally, he poured out with Shamhat. Right. Yes. Okay. This is pretty spicy stuff. Yeah, it's quite graphic. They did not mince their words. They wanted it to be quite clear what was happening. Very clear what's happening. Okay, seven days and seven nights of being erect. Well done for him. So we have that sort of beautiful poetry And we have Gilgamesh meeting his match in Enkidu So what is the first adventure they go on?

And what spurs the adventure? Why don't they need to go on a quest? So we have this scene where Anki-Doo is feeling sad I'm keeping in mind that lots of bits are missing from the epic We're not 100% sure why. And to cheer him up, Gilgamesh decides they need to make a name. He needs to make a name for himself. But Enkidu is not so keen.

They go on a quest effectively. kill the guardian of the cedar forest, Chumbaba. So these forests are in what is now Lebanon and devastatingly less than 1% of the original Cedar forest remains. And real kings did go into these forests and get timber to build their palaces, to build their thrones, etc. So that is their first side quest. The first side quest is let's go kill a forest guardian.

Yes. To cheer you because your friend's feeling sad. What do we do when your friend is sad? Let's go kill some sort of god. Wow. Okay. We've been too loving. Let's bounce that out by being around.

Could that be the forest that Anki-Doo is estranged from or is it a different forest? It's a different one. This one they have to travel to and takes them quite a while to get there, although they'd cover huge distances in the matter of days. Well, he's 18 foot tall. He's got a very long stride pattern. Is Enkidu as tall as Gilgamesh? Well, I mean, he is described as as equal, so,

but they don't give his proportions. They just say he is big and dazzling and all these other things. Big and dazzling? That's a great Tinder profile Hello, Incadu, big, dazzling Open to anything Okay, I mean so they're going off to go and cut down a famous tree Moody, what is Humbaba's physical vibe?

What's he look like? He's terrifying, so he's quite dragony. He is a mix of things, oh, that's spot on. There's fire that comes from his lips from an earlier Sumerian version of this exact same story They write, his pugnacious mouth is a dragon's maw, his face is a lion's grimace, his chest is like a raging flood. No one dare approach his brow, which devours the reed beds. So during and after the battle, Enkidu and Gilgamesh are not sure why they've done it, why they've taken on this monster and killed him.

It's really, it's weirdly reflective and almost regretful and sensitive. So in the battle, they're going like, why are we doing this? I don't know. Exactly. And then they do it anyway, even though they're having these moments. of reflection along the way, which is kind of unexpected for an epic dragon battle. When Baba pleads for mercy, Gilgamesh refuses, and afterwards, Enkidu questions why they've done this. Why have they gone and destroyed the guardian of the forest and cut down so many of the trees?

So it's a really interesting scene. I feel for Enkidu. He's made his first friend, and his first friend is a bad influence. Yeah. Dragging him on these stupid quests. He just wants to hang out in the forest. Oh, okay. So Enkidu and Gilgamesh primarily has killed an important.

forest guardian. One of the gods, I mean, is he a god? Is he of that level? Is he created by the god? I think his name is written with a defined determinative. I don't know if he's a god, but he's definitely not a mortal, you know, an easy-to-kill figure. He's quite a... Okay. So he's important, right? He's defending the forest. What do you think of the repercussions for Gilgamesh, having committed this crime? I just feel like Gilgamesh has shown no remorse so far that I just don't seem showing remorse now. Also, I feel like Gilgamesh, if he's really or not, has had a real hand and rank in his tail. So I'm like, Gilgamesh did something bad, but he's still great. Oh, you think he authors his own quest narrative?

For sure. Oh, okay. And you think he's going, no, put that I was really tall. 18 feet, 18. Make me tall, make me older, but my name start with a G. I defeat the forest monster. I don't know. Do they fall out?

Does I think he do fall out for Gilgamesh? That's an interesting answer. I don't want them to break up, though. I want Gilgamesh to grow and learn and go to therapy like I was promised, but maybe they have to break up. Well, that's how rom-coms work. So is it a rom-com, Moody? What happens next? Not quite.

Although there is a third party who enters the scene, who is quite a powerful one. So after the fight, the goddess Ishtar, who's again the goddess of love and war violence, those two things don't seem like the same remit. No, she's quite a... She's a very volatile goddess. Sure.

Yeah, she takes the same pleasure in lovemaking and murderer, I guess. Yeah, she's an interesting figure. Sure. And she sees Gilgamesh and falls in love and proposes marriage. But Gilgamesh rejects her listing all her dead or otherwise diminished former lovers, one of whom gets turned into like an earwig or something like that. And she gets pretty angry and calls on her father, Anu, the sky god, to send down the bull of heaven, which is the consolation tourist,

to kill Gilgamesh. That's me. I'm Torres. Are you? Yeah. Okay. Well, you might not like what happens next in this story then. Why?

Well, because the ball of heaven is sent down to kill Gilgamesh. To kill Gamish. And Gilgamesh, he's not being punished for slaughtering the innocent forest guardian. He's being punished for rejecting a sex god. I feel like he's learned nothing. But he's going to fight now a celestial bull. Mary Lane, how would you go about defeating a celestial ball? You take it to a celestial abattoir in the head.

heavens around killing time. Yeah? Humane gun on the head. Okay. Spoken like a true farmer. Yeah. Yeah. It's a good old bolt.

Well, I mean... Into the skull. How does... I mean, I don't know if they've got the old bolt gun back then. I mean, Moody, can you give us the gory details of the goring? Yes. So they work together, essentially, because the Bull of Heaven is quite a destructive creature.

And as he approaches Uruk, everything he does, essentially ends up killing huge amounts of people. Every, you know, every time he breathes, some huge gulf opens up in ground and swallows people up, et cetera. For memory, Enkidu grabs him, and then Gilgamesh stabs him in the head between the horns. So, yeah. Bolt gun's pretty accurate, then. Yeah, just a sword in this one or a blade of some kind. Okay.

They cut out the heart? Yes, they cut out the heart. They offer it to Anu, the Sky God, and then they throw its penis at Ishtar. I mean, that feels like a very childish move. Yeah, yeah, quite, it's quite the move. And she's the goddess of love and desire and stuff. Yeah. Does that have an effect on her?

You know, I'm trying to remember the scene, but I think there is like a worship scene of this penis in the temple to some degree, where she gathers temple worshippers and they're like, sorry penis. I just remember you of Aphrodite's conception. Yes. When she's born from the actual testes of Kronos. That's right, yeah.

But then this is very much not her being born from it, but having it thrown at her. But this bull had been sent down by Anu because Ishtar had been rejected, and then they killed the ball, hand the heart back to Anu and go, there you go, that's what happens to your bull. I mean, I'll chuck a bull's penis at the woman who proposed marriage. It's very petty. It is. There's no growth here emotionally, is there? No. It takes a while for that to happen.

So I think I was right. He doesn't learn anything. There's nothing. Okay. But to be honest, I suppose here he's just defending himself from a bill that is attacking him. But he did really shame Ishtar for that to happen. He did. And throwing the penis is not a very grown-up move.

Come on. Let's all be adults here. So then what happens to Gilgamesh and Enkidu? So the gods are pretty angry. I mean, they've killed a whole constellation, which is bad. They sentence Enkidu to death. And he actually dreams of being in the underworld. So why not Gilgamesh?

Yes. Because Enkidu is just like the whole thing. the guy who's been dragged along. Yeah, he's sort of like, Gilgamesh is sort of like that typical, like, entitled guy that just never has to face consequences for anything he does. But he's about to face the ultimate consequence in a way because Enkidu does die. He dreams that he's in the underworld and he dies. And Gilgamesh is utterly grief-stricken.

Right. To the point where he won't even let them take the body away. And there's all this imagery of him of him mourning. And some of it compares him to like a lioness. So there's like a woman mourning her cubs, I mean a female lion mourning her cubs. So it's such a loss. He won't let them take the body away until a maggot crawls out of Enkidu's nose and he's finally like, okay, yes, you are dead and I have to let go.

And he arranges this huge funeral and lists, you know, tons of gifts given in Enkidu's memory. Wow. So a very powerful scene. So Gilgamesh has been punished by having the one thing he loves taken from him. Yeah. Mary Lane, what do you think Gilgamesh, a grieving Gilgamesh? does after the funeral? I mean, I still don't think he's learned time.

You don't think he's grown from this? No. Okay. I think he wants revenge. Oh, so you think he's going to go John Wick? Would you go after Anu? Wow. That would be a power move.

I mean, I wouldn't put it past this guy. Okay, so Marilene thinks that the sort of revenge mission he's going to... I mean, to be honest, if he did go for a revenge mission, that would probably be the most, like, coherent structural journey thing he's done so far in this story. So maybe he doesn't. But currently, he'd go for revenge. Okay. Interesting. Yeah.

I mean, you're right that there's no growth in that he then... Instead of being like, I should be less horrible and calm down, he becomes really anxious about death and he embarks on this new quest to attain immortality. So it's quite a self-involved anxious reaction. He turns into a check billionaire. He's like, I don't want to die. I'm going to live forever. I'm going to download my consciousness.

I'm going to get my son to give me his blood. so I can live forever. Okay, so he goes on a quest for immortality. Yes, and he seeks out the wisdom from one of the sole survivors of the great flood, the only immortal living man. There is an immortal living woman alongside him that doesn't really get mentioned, unfortunately. She's just his wife. He is an end bird.

Pretty much. So he goes in search of a man called Uta-Napishti, who is in an early, version of the flood story called Atrahassis, a name that means he is very wise from the word Watrum, which means huge or exceeding, and Khasasu, which means to understand. So he's huge of understanding. Okay. And Uttana Pistti is his name in this story. So his new name is Uttanapis but he used to be Atrahasis in the older myths. Exactly. Okay. It's all coming back to us. The flood myths will sort of, we might know vaguely from Noah and the book of Genesis. The obvious question, I suppose, is, is that book just ripping off the Gilgamesh narrative?

Or are they both sort of speaking of similar events? Or is there a kind of literary connection? Yeah, I mean, I know there's a literary connection between the Atra Chasis, earlier Atra Chasis myth. And there is also a Sumerian flood story that's even earlier. And the tablet in this Gilgamesh epic, which is Tablet 11, that reprises this whole story. And it tells us that, you know, in broad brush strokes, the gods forgot basically to build death. into human DNA. And so population just explodes. Really? Yeah, and it's just too loud. And they're like, we can't sleep. We got to get rid of

these people. So Enlil tries. He sends down famines and plagues. But Eya, well, he's called Enki in this earlier one, but in this story, he's Ea. Again, the mischievous God of Wisdom, who we've already talked about, he thwarts all these attempts. So they decide to send down a deluge that will wipe out all life on Earth. And they make all the gods and goddesses swear an oath that they will not tell anybody about this. They will not. So Aya finds a workaround in that he, instead of telling Atrochasis in the old myth or Utanapisti in this one, directly, he's talking to a wall, which is sort of how I feel when I'm talking to my children.

And so it's through the wall that this man hears a warning that this is to come and he builds a boat and fills it with the seed of all life. He's the lone survivor of the flood. And because his software doesn't have death built in, He's just living forever with his wife. Yeah, and Gilgamesh is like, he must know how to live forever, so I'm going to go find him so that I didn't have to suffer the way Enkidu did. I'm Ian Glenn, and this is real Vikings. Remote Scottish monasteries overrun with pagan warriors,

longboats cutting through Canada's icy waters, Norse traders in the desert sands of North Africa. The Vikings terrified the medieval world, yet they beguile us today. Who were they really? Real Vikings. From the Noisor Podcast Network. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

Okay, so the flood myth's really important. One person is saved. Gilgamesh is desperately trying to sort of get the secret of knowledge. Does he sink or swim in his quest to live forever? Yeah, I mean, it's quite a quest. He has to go through, you know, he basically has to journey beyond the edge of the known world. He goes to Mount Mount Mount.

The Twin Mountains, which is where the sun rises and sets, which is guarded by these half scorpion, half human guardians. Awesome. Then he has to, which who take one look at him and they're like, you look terrible, dude. Like, we'll just let you through. No way. Yeah. You look exhausted. With all terrible is like he's broken mad.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, really? Yes, yeah. Like, you're not going to put up a fight. Just go ahead. They feel sorry for him. Yeah. That's kind of embarrassing, actually.

Like going to a nightclub and then like you don't like, you just pose a problem. here. Yeah, just come in. It's fine. Yeah, you just sit in the corner and be sad. Exactly. Here's maybe the dumbest question that'll ask all time because you said the sun both rises and sets there.

Is it a real mountain that we know of geographically? We think it might be the Zagros mountains. Oh, really? Sort of bounding kind of the heartland of what we call ancient Mesopotamia. But, you know, and there are expressions like when someone dies, they go to the mountain and the netherworld, underworld, underworld may begin in the mountains. So it's kind of this like unknown region that makes its way into mythology in all sorts of interesting ways. So he doesn't have to fight the scorpion men because they just sort of look him and go, you look depressed.

Go on. Exactly. You look like you do with the night out. And then this doesn't sort of get better. He then has to walk through a pitch black tunnel. I can't remember if it's 12 hours or 12 double hours. And then he exits onto this, you know, fantastical supernatural world where the trees are studied with gemstones. Oh, wow.

And he reaches the scene and speaks to an innkeeper named Shaduri, who also says, wow, you look like you're in a bad way. I love that there are pubs in the gemstone forest. It's great. It's just nice to know that there are pubs everywhere. It's not very stereotypical about it, but this is the man's equivalent to if I used to go out without makeup on and other people are like, why am I laying? You look really ill.

You look so ill. What's wrong with your face? I'm like, just having covered him in a foundation. Okay. He speaks to the innkeeper called Shiduri. Shiduri, yeah. And she directs him to what are called the waters of death that you have to cross with a specific ferryman called Uroshanabi, I think, is his name, to reach Uttanapish.

Okay, so that's kind of river stick stuff, right? So people who know the Greek myth are kind of going, I've heard this before. So these myths are sort of interfolded and they keep echoing each other. But this is a much older myth than the Greek ones, I suppose. Yes, yeah, I would say. I mean, I don't know when the Greek ones were before. They're later. They're later.

They're later. It's definitely, yeah. Okay. So he's crossing the waters of death. That sounds scary. All that to be immortal. It sounds like a naught. It's quite a palava, Marrielaan.

I mean, would you bother? To live forever? Yeah. No. Well, I don't know. If you could go on that journey and then you'd have forever to think about it. I mean, it means they'll live forever about Enki-do,

which I find really strange because he's so sad by his friends dying. He's like, I don't want to meet my friend next plane of existence or under the mountains where you think we go next. I want to live forever without my best friends. That's true. Yeah, that's true. To go on a magical quest like that, it's all that I've always wanted.

You know, when you're like, Floor to the Rings. I'm not bothered. I'm all right at home. Yeah, quite happy on the sofa. I'd love a big old quest, to be honest. No, I'm just watching Netflix, it's fine. It feels like when you go out in Burns and we work in the sheep, and then the sheep dog would invariably run away and you spend the rest of the day looking for the sheep dog,

we're trying to tell ma'am that the dog ran away. Is that a quest or is that just not trying to get in trouble? Same thing. Same thing. Okay. So having crossed the waters of death, having gone through the gemstone forest, walked through the tunnel of darkness, having not fought the scorpion man because they took pity on him, does Gilgamesh get eternal life? No. Oh. What? Got it. Almost, but not quite. So Uttanapistee basically takes one look at him and says, you're on the wrong quest.

He recounts the whole flood story, explains that Gilgamesh can't and shouldn't follow this path. to immortality. And he challenges Gilgamesh to stay awake for seven nights, which is, incidentally, the sort of length of various elements of the flood story, the sex marathon. Yeah. You know, seven days and seven nights is quite a big theme. This conquering sleep is sort of like conquering death and Gilgamesh fails. And I think he wakes up to seven loaves of bread that have been baked each day, just to prove. Just seven breakfasts that he hasn't ate in. Yeah. Exactly. And so Uttanapistee explains that eternal life is. is not an individual survival.

It's not the survival of Enkidu. It's not Gilgamesh. It's not even his own survival, but the survival of the whole community. And because life can end in an instant, you should make the most of what time that you do. Ah. Yeah.

So this guy who's got huge wisdom, that's his name, his wisdom is the survival of community, of memory of passing on is more important than your own life. Exactly. And the tech billionaires are like, no, I want to live forever. That's really beautiful. Yeah.

Will Gilgamesh see the beauty in me? You're worried he's not going to learn. He'll throw a willie at someone else. It's a good point. Does our scary, tall, violent, sad king finally go, oh, I've been chasing the wrong thing all along? Nope. Gilgamesh, come on.

I know. So he's... I think I don't remember it because I've blocked it. He was just so disappointed in this guy. He's relentless. He's just so... refusing to grow as a person. Exactly. Not yet.

Not yet. Okay. So Uttanapesti is like, well, okay, fine. There is something called the plant of heartbeat, which you can find at the bottom of the bottom of the ocean, basically. Right. In the Apsu, with this sort of subterranean lake or freshwater source, which is a mythical source of kind of nourishment, of groundwater,

but also of wisdom in ancient Mesopotamia, because it's the home of Aya. Again, we keep coming back to Aya. Yeah. or Enki in Sumerian. So there's this connection between water, wisdom, and memory, as we know. So Frozen 2. Yes.

Yes. That famous documentary. Yes. Frozen 2 were a very important film in my life with a six-year-old daughter. Water has memory. Water has memory. This story is like Babylonian. So it's very, very far away from the Hittites.

They had versions of it, though, so it traveled. Because in Hittite, in Hittite, in Hattel. Hattusely, is that right? Hattusha, yeah. Hatusha, sorry. Their capital, there was the, but beside it, they called it like a liminal space where they had this, like, water going into this tunnel and they thought it was something to do

with like a passage to internal the realm or that kind of wisdom. Interesting. Is an interpretation in archaeology, which is the classic, we don't know. We don't know. Ritual. Could be ritual. Ritual, could be ritual. Ritchal, ritual.

Like, that's where we washed our hands. Yes. So, strike that from my notes. That's lovely. Yeah. Yes, because the Hittites would come along later, I suppose. The Hittites are... They're around the same time.

Oh, yeah? Yeah, and they are using Kenea form as well. So the myth does travel, and they have versions of the Gilgamesh epic. Although I don't know when they date... Sure. Yeah, they were like, he was 3'5. And his name was Stephen. Okay, so the water and wisdom, the kind of plant of heartbeat, Gilgamesh knows where to get it.

Does he pop on his scuba gear and go diving? He does, you know... It does, yeah. He ties these heavy... stones to his feet and he goes and retrieves the plant of heartbeat. He does. Resurfaces and he takes a shower and a snake steals a plant. Oh, don't you hate it when that happens.

It's a yonk goes straight over to eat and it's like, yo'eefe. Let's try some of this apple. There's another one. But the apple come from, don't think of it is. I mean, snakes are quite, you know, they're good and bad in mythology of ancient Mesopotamia. Sure. So they're ambiguous. It's a cheeky snake.

It's a very cheek. It's a yoink moment, as Mary Lane said. Okay, so the snake has stolen his eternal life. Yeah. Gutting. Yeah. Does Gilgamesh now get the memo and go, okay, I'll give up on the whole Living Forever thing.

At long last. O'ray. Personal development. Yes. Is that personal development or tired? Just fatigue. I mean, everyone's like, man, you look terrible. I feel like he should just, I don't know, join a book club.

He just needs, like, you know, just. I mean, maybe he did, and that's when he wrote this. That's it. At the book club, like, the theme this week was longing. And he's like, and I wrote about my book club. Myself. Another chapter about me. Okay, Moody, tell us about Gilgamesh's personal growth.

Yeah, so he finally returns to Uruk, and we have this scene that reprises the very beginning of the myth, where he's looking, he's surveying the city. And he seems far more aware now of what's at stake. He looks at the different elements that make up the city, civilization, human life, and sees that it's more important than his own ego and individual success. and he is wiser. He finally brings that wisdom back to Uruk and will ideally incorporate it into how he rules. And this kind of personal growth narrative has led some scholars to call it wisdom literature,

but who knows exactly? He kind of has everything. Ah. Yeah. It's quite a beautiful, low-key ending to a story that's involved scorpion men, magical bullpenuses, a seven-day sex marathon, a snake stealing stuff out of the bath.

Like, we've had real kind of wild stuff. And in the end, it's just one man going, Oh, we should all die. That's what humans should experience. Yeah, that's part of it. But as a group, we can still live. Right. Memory lives on as a community.

Yeah. I would like to point out that he went to this adventure when he killed Special Forest Guardian, his best friend died, killed a bull of heaven, offended so many gods, find this of rare fruit that got stolen, troubled all these different people. And it feels like when he got out to city,

he just had, you know what, guys, let's be peaceful. and the women of the city were like, this is what we said from day one. The women were like, we were always like, let's be peaceful. Yes, it is like a celebrity being like, I've been on a journey of acceptance, and I've learned that I have faults and I accept those faults. And it's like, you are a dick. YouTube apology video. We have known for a long time you are.

I do remember the end bit of the story. Was it the secrets that he learns is to build structures that sound for all time, have a lineage of offspring that carry on your bloodline and have great stories that are told forevermore? Yeah, he writes his quests down on a, I think it's a lapis lazuli tablet and he buries it somewhere in the wall and he says someone will find this someday

and remember me. And lo and behold, here we are remembering Gilgamesh. Because those walls of Uruk are still standing. They are, yeah. And they're like nine kilometers. is long and they're very thick and they're very real. I think archaeologists estimate 300 million bricks. Wow.

In this thing. So he did it. Yeah. Eternal life. He nailed it. Did he build those walls before, after the adventure? Because it sounded like before he's working the men and the boys to the bone. And he's going to say, yeah.

So once again, has he learned? Yes, my lasting memory is this thing where I forced everyone to slave labor. We should talk about how the story of Gilgamesh, the epic of Gilgamesh was rediscovered in modern times. This is how the ancient world. well understood it. This is how it was passed down through their generations. But I guess we then received it much later on. Could you talk us through the modern text history? Yeah. So the first Acadian texts were found in 1849 by Austin Henry Laird in Nineveh and the Library of Usher Bonapal. And these were ones that were copied down by scribes. And obviously with the death of scribal training,

no one copied them down anymore. So they just get buried. But there are strands of the story that may have survived into other forms of literature. So, for example, some have argued that Gilgamesh is in the Arabian nights under a different name, Bulukhiyya. Some disagree with that, so, you know, take it with a grain of salt. And there's even an argument that the green man in the Quran al-Qadr, who is this wise man who guards the sea and teaches knowledge, he might be atra chasis. So there are some elements that have survived.

Once Kinnafoam was deciphered, parts of it got translated. And in the 1870s, a self-taught working-class Londoner called George Smith, who was studying clay tablets at the British Museum. He was the first to translate the epic into English producing a translation of this flood tablet, tablet, tablet 11, that was quite an exciting discovery at the time. And Mary Lane, George Smith, our working class self-taught Londoner, he was so thrilled to have, you know, produced this translation. How did he celebrate? Oh Did you do it Gilgamesh style? Or go on a killing spree.

Oh no, he didn't have too much to drink, did he? He certainly let go of his inhibitions. Oh no, did he just like an Enkidu and get naked and run through Carvin Garden? He literally did. No, I do. Really? Really? He ran naked through the, was it the British New Zealand? That's right, yeah. Stripped off his clothes and just ran screaming naked through, shout out of it. I did it.

He did it. That might be the one I'm not. to have got right this whole time and it was a total stab in the dark. He got naked and drawn through the museum. That's what Victorians really were up to. You know, we think of them as prim and proper, but no, they're getting naked. They're running around celebrating. Translating Tablet.

That's amazing. Yeah. So George Smith celebrated naked at his translation in 1870 of Tablet 11. Since then, we have other translations that people can go and read. Which ones would you recommend? Yeah, so in English, there's a wonderful critical edition by Andrew George, if you want to get really into the nitty-gritty of the language. But I think the most beautiful translation,

I've read is by Sophos Hell. I have very accessible translation with some wonderful essays as well. Fabulous. And there was a new scene discovered. Is that right? Yes, from Tablet 5, about five or six years ago, maybe a bit longer. So we're still finding bits of Gilgamesh's story? Yeah, I think it was the sex scene, actually. Was it? Was it? Was it?

Seven days. Yeah. You find more of just the most gratuitous part of the story. It doesn't add any more plot or character development, just it's real saucy. Was it by the original authors? That sounds like fanfic to me. Yeah, it does a bit. What else did they do?

Well, that's amazing. Okay, so that is the story of Gilgamesh, Mary Elaine. You've studied it at university. You've studied it the second time. How do you feel about Gilgamesh now? You could put some of this into your next show, perhaps, some of this storytelling tropes. Well, I do like it because I do like how,

because I remember the end in the beginning, because I think it's a really sweet thing that the lesson in it is for like to carry on is have these great deeds or these stories written about you or these structures or like he's inadvertently done the things to have immortality because as the innkeeper no utenapestam. Uta Napishti said was like community

community is what lasts if you have a strong community and they carry on the stories and it kind of falls in with that beautiful belief in like lots of like indigenous tribes in Turtle Island like North America where telling a story about how someone earned their name is telling their true character, which means I've never forgotten. So, I mean, we had a lot of laughs about Gilgamesh, but you don't forget him.

And I like the idea that then thus telling stories, which is what I want to do is like, what stories can you tell to remember other people or other things that have happened? Beautiful. It's nice. It is nice. It's really nice. Well done us. Yeah. The nuance window!

Time now for the nuance window. This is the part of the show where Marianne and I sit silently to contemplate our mortality. for two minutes, while Dr. Moody regales us with something we need to know about the epic of Gilgamesh. My stopwatch is ready, so take it away, Dr. Moody. The epic of Gilgamesh has meant and will mean different things to me throughout my life. It's about power, grief, community, death, love. But right now, as we watch one interconnected crisis after another unfold, I want to tell you what I think it could mean in this moment.

Humbaba was the guardian of the Cedar Forest, appointed by the god Enlil, to keep the ancient Cedars safe. He had the face of a raging lion. he breathed fire, his cry was a deluge. In ancient Mesopotamia, people sometimes used sheep entrails to predict the future, and one omen says that intestines shaped like Chumbaba's face, foretell the arrival of a usurper king. Imagine the face of this monster, like the coiled intestines of a dying animal, slippery, bloody, palpitating. I used to wonder why create such a terrifying creature to guard trees. Like many of you, I bear witness daily to the destruction of a once-thriving

world to line the pockets of a handful of people with already full pockets. It has helped me understand the mythology of Chumbaba. But the Gilgamesh, who slayed Chumbaba and chopped down trees as tall as the sky, was not the same broken man who clawed his way to Uttanapisti, the oldest man in the world. He was looking for the key to eternal life, but he found instead a lesson in how to live. I think the crux of Uttinapisti's message is this. Instead of trying to live impossibly long lives, let us do more with the short time that we have. For Gilgamesh, this means acting as a shepherd to the people in his care, and by extension the places they rely on. When he returns to Uruk and surveys the city, he sees people's homes, the date orchards, the clay pits, and the temple

which represent domestic life, agriculture, crafts, and religion. This is worth fighting for, he realizes. The survival of each successive generation confers immortality on the whole. Our well-being is tied to the well-being of those around us, and to the places that sustain us, to the waters that give us life, to the trees that give us air, the land that Humbaba gave his life to guard. I think there is a timeless lesson in these 12 tablets and their unexpectedly flawed hero, selfish, cowardly, violent, vulnerable, relentless, and eventually enlightened. What are the chances that this story has survived from its earliest oral tellings to a fragmentary translation over 4,000 years later? and what are the chances that it might contain just the call to survival, community and care that we need. Amazing. Beautiful. Thank you so much.

Thank you. So nice. That's such a nice way to take a message about to make it hopeful. I think that's what you need is hope. Yeah. I think so too. I hope so anyway. Yeah, absolutely.

He definitely need more of the humanity and less of the monsters. So what do you know now? Well, it's time now for the Sir, What Do You Know Now? This is our quick-fire quiz for Mary Elaine to see how much she has. Learned slash remembered, second time around. How are you feeling, Mary Lane? Less confident than when I had in my dissertation, that was for those spelling mistakes. You've got some beautiful notes, some of them illustrated.

There's some words, too. It's mostly illustrations. I only did three pages this time. But they are very dainty and delicate. Okay, thank you. We've got ten questions for you. Ten? Jeez, Louise.

Here we go. Best is in Gilgamesh. Okay, question one. In the epic, what proportion of Gilgamesh is human to God? I remember this. It's one-third of? Well, I wrote here that he's one-third God, even though there's two gods and one human involved in the other way around.

One third human, two-thirds God, but I'll let you have it because you remember the ratio. Okay, thank you. That's very kind of you, Greg. Question two. What event tames the wild man Enkidu? His lover for seven days. Yeah, absolutely. A week-long sex marathon.

You said it. Question three. Ishtar was the goddess of two things. Can you name what they were? Love? Yeah, and? Violence? The two things that somehow go together, apparently.

Well, it's like they're embraced, isn't it? Yes. She does sound quite scary. Dominatrix? Maybe, maybe. Question four. Who is Humbaba and what happens to him? Humbaba is a guardian in the forest,

a great serpent-like dragony creature, and he is killed by Gilgamesh. Enkidu's whole name Dund. That's right. Absolutely. Well remembered. Question five. How long does Gilgamesh wait before ending his morning period for Enkidu?

Oh, geez, Louise. They're so busy drawing a dead anchor, but they love us seven days. That's right. It's always seven days, isn't it? The answer is well done. The maggot comes out of his nose and he's like, okay, time for a funeral. He's dead. Question six.

Do you remember who was Sin Lequi Unini? And why is he important in our story? Lequiunini? Yeah, Sin lequinini. Sinelequilionini Yeah He's not in the story He gives us the story

Oh he's the homeric kind of author Yes Is he the author or is he an amalgamation of many people Or like folk people who carried the stories And he went to court like I've written this Yeah You know like that French author That's right

That's right That's right That's right Yes he is the sort of He gives us the official standard version Is that right? Yeah Okay well done

Question seven What was Gilgamesh's original Sumerian name Bilgamesh Gilgamesh. I love it. Question 8. Why does Gilgamesh seek out a man named Uta Napishti? Because he doesn't die. He's immortal and he wants to figure out how he's immortal. And he's like, oh, I just wasn't programmed that way, bro. That's right. Question 9. What wisdom does Gilgamesh gain at the end of the epic story? That it's about living through communities as a whole, that immortality is about our communities continuing to live and thrive.

Absolutely. And question 10, George Smith, the scholar first translated to be. The epic in English. Buzz, I know the answer. The touristy did what at the British Museum? Race naked through in celebration. Absolutely, yes. We all should. Fantastic, Marlene.

10 out of 10 there, because you got the ratio right. So well done. A perfect score. Thank you. That makes up from my dissertation. I was going to say, you get a first-class degree. Congratulations. And if you want, email me and I'll send you the dissertation

and you can be disappointed in me like my professors were. Well, I'm not disappointed. Moody, are you disappointed? Not at all. Good, see? Thank you. Well, thank you so much, Mary Elaine. Thank you so much, Dr. Moody.

And listener, if you want more ancient history with Dr. Moody, check out our episodes on the Babylonians and the one on the history of Kenea form, which people love. People really, really love that episode. It's one of our most popular ever. That's amazing. It's lovely. For more epic myths, we've got one on King Arthur, of course.

And for more, Mary Elaine, we have the episode on Robert Bruce, not Robert the Bruce. If you enjoyed the podcast, please share the show with friends. Subscribe to Your Dead to Me on BBC Sounds to hear new episodes, 28 days earlier than anywhere else. If you're outside the UK, you can listen at BBC.com or wherever you get in the podcasts. And yeah, I just like to say a huge thank you to our guests in History Corner.

We had the magnificent Dr Moody Al Rashid from the University of Oxford. Thank you, Moody. Thank you, Moody. And in Comedy Corner, we have the marvellous Mary Elaine Robertson. Thank you, Mary Elaine. Cheers, very much. Thank you. And to you, lovely listener, join me next time as we delve into another dramatic historical epic. But for now, I'm off to go and grab a mate to help me beat up a tree.

Bye! Your Dead to Me is a BBC Studios production for BBC Radio 4. This episode was researched by Catherine Russell. It was written by Catherine Russell, Dr. Emmy Rose Price-Goodfellow, Dr. Emma Noghous and me, the audio producer was Steve Hankei, and our production coordinator was Jill Huggett. It was produced by Dr. Emmy Rose Price Goodfellow,

senior producer Dr. Eminoghose, and our executive editor was Philip Sellers. Hello, I'm Misha Glennie, the new presenter of In Our Time. If you enjoyed that episode about the epic of Gilgamesh, you might be interested in learning about another. ancient work from Mesopotamia 4,000 years ago.

It's the code of Hammurabi, a great black pillar that's now in the Louvre carved with 300 laws on anything from an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth to proving your innocence by swimming across the river Euphrates while weighed down with stones. And Gilgamesh gets a mention too.

That's in our time on BBC Sounds. I'm Ian Glenn, and this is real Vikings. Remote Scottish monasteries overrun with pagan warriors, longboats cutting through Canada's icy waters, Norse traders in the desert sands of North Africa. The Vikings terrified the medieval world, yet they beguile us today. Who were they really? Real Vikings from the Noisor Podcast Network.

Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you.