This document provides background information on the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the earliest works of literature. It discusses how the stories of Gilgamesh were originally oral traditions among the Sumerians before being written down in cuneiform on clay tablets around 2100 BC. It also describes the rediscovery of fragments of the Gilgamesh tablets in the mid-19th century and the process of translating and understanding their significance. The document provides context about Gilgamesh's reign in Uruk and outlines some of the major stories and themes contained in the epic, including Gilgamesh's friendship with Enkidu and their journey to defeat Humbaba, as well as the famous flood story that has parallels with the biblical story

1. Broken Tablets:
Gilgamesh and the Origin of Writing
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2. Narrative/Story Technology

3. The Text
The Story
The Narrative
The Tablets
The Monuments
The Inscriptions
Stories cannot be separated from the media
in which they are told.

4. Some Facts to Get Started
• Gilgamesh was a historical figure: a renowned
King of Uruk around 2800-2750 BCE
• Stories of Gilgamesh survived his death and
were eventually written down by scribes
• Gilgamesh comes from ancient Sumeria, site
of the earliest civilizations (modern-day Iraq)
• Oral poems from 2500-2300 BC. The first
Sumerian copies inscribed around 2100 BC.

5. • Today’s version of Gilgamesh is compiled from
73 tablets in various languages
• About 60% of the text is preserved
• Existence of the Gilgamesh tales only known
for about 150 years
• Ancient writers described the epic as “The
Gilgamesh Cycle,” a poem in 12 songs (or
cantos) about 300 lines each
Some Facts to Get Started

6. • The author of Gilgamesh also drew inspiration
from other literary sources
• Early tales didn’t form a cycle; there was no
connecting theme
• Before the Gilgamesh Cycle, there existed a
number of short heroic tales in the Sumerian
language about Gilgamesh
Some Facts to Get Started

7. The world of Gilgamesh in the context of
the contemporary Middle East

8. Gilgamesh
• Fifth ruler of the first post-diluvian
dynasty of Uruk
• Great builder of temples and
cities; restored Uruk after the flood
• Known as a great judge; prayers
addressed to him
• 2/3 God, 1/3 human being
• His mother was a goddess, his
father a mortal king of Uruk

9. The Sumerian King List
Gilgamesh 126 year reign ca. 2600 B.C.

10. The Epic of Gilgamesh (12 Tablets)

11. Discovery of the Tablets
• Discovered during
the heroic age of
excavation in the
mid-19th century
• Tablets brought back
to British Museum
• Value of discovery
not realized till later
Austin Henry Layard

12. Discovery of the Tablets
• Deciphering and
translation process
• Took about 20 years
to fully translate and
realize significance
• Translation work
continues today

13. Tablet XI
• The so-called “Flood
Tablet” - recounts a
story of the Great Flood
from c. 2500 BC
• Opened new field of
biblical studies and
ancient history
• Arguments about the
authority, authenticity,
and adaptation

14. City-State of Uruk
• Largest settlement in
Babylonia
• Urbanization and
population growth
• Social, political, and
economic complexity
• “The first city in world
history”
• First evidence of writing

15. Urban Infrastructure

17. –Lewis Mumford, The City in History: Its Origins, its Transformations,
and its Prospects (1961)
“Through its monuments, written records, and orderly
habits of association, the city enlarged the scope of all
human activities, extending them backwards and
forwards in time. By means of its storage facilities
(buildings, vaults, archives, monuments, tablets, books),
the city became capable of transmitting a complex
culture from generation to generation, for it marshaled
together not only the physical means but the human
agents needed to pass on and enlarge this heritage.
That remains the greatest of the city’s gifts.”
The City as Media

18. Our
Digital
Temples

19. Digital Immortality

20. The Origin of Writing

21. Stories and Narrative
Data and Information
What is the function of early writing?

22. Before 2700 B.C.E.…writing is only accounting. To
recall what comes in the temple or the palace, and
what comes out. So-and-so much gold, so-and-so
many sheep, so-and-so many bushels of grain. It’s
only numbers and the thing counted. And then, at
some point, the name of who it belongs to. That’s it.
- Interview with Denise Schmandt-Besserat
“

23. Prewriting: Clay Tokens
• Clay Tokens: the
first bookkeeping
system, 3400 B.C.
• Plain tokens vs.
complex tokens
• Tokens begin to
decline, decrease,
disappear around
3100 to 3000 B.C.

24. Clay Envelopes

25. Bulla-envelope
with 17 plain
tokens inside.
ca. 3700-3200 BC

26. From Bulla to Tablet:
The Birth of Abstract
Numerals

27. Early tablet recording the allocation of beer,
3100-3000 B.C.E

28. Pictographic Writing: c. 4000 BCE

29. Cuneiform
Sumer c. 3000 BCE

30. What is Cuneiform Writing?
At first, images were
drawn with the pointed
end of a reed or wood
stylus
Cuneiform images are
created by impressing
the edge of the stylus
into the clay
Cuneiform, after the Latin term for wedge, cuneus

31. Cuneiform
• No headings or marks
to indicate paragraphs,
direct speech,
questions, or emphasis
• Occasional line across
a column to indicate a
change of speaker or
episode
• Looks as though a
chicken had walked
across clay

32. Sumerian School Tablets

34. The Evolution of the Writing Tablet

35. Evolution of Cuneiform

36. Categories of Signs in Early Writing
• Pictographs: signs
convey meaning
through pictorial
resemblance
• Logograms: signs
represent words
• Phonograms or
syllabograms: signs
represent syllables

37. Sumerian Pictograph

38. Pictographs
Japanese Emoji
“picture” + “character”

40. Gilgamesh:
The Story

41. Origin of the Bromance

42. Journey to
the Cedar Forest

43. Humbaba
Mighty guard of the Great
Cedar Forest

44. – Tablet IV, Lines 11-16
Enkidu prepared a sleeping place for him for
the night;
a violent wind passed through so he attached
a covering.
He made him lie down, and... in a circle.
they... like grain from the mountain...
While Gilgamesh rested his chin on his knees,
sleep that pours over mankind overtook him.”
On the Road:
Repetition, Friendship, and Intimacy

45. In the middle of the night his sleep
came to an end,
so he got up and said to his friend:
"My friend, did you not call out to
me? Why did I wake up?
Did you not touch me? Why am I
so disturbed?
Did a god pass by? Why are my
muscles trembling?
Enkidu, my friend, I have had a
dream--
and the dream I had was deeply
disturbing(?)
The Intimacy of Dreams

46. – Tablet VII, Lines 32-38; 43-46
Enkidu raised his eyes,…
and spoke to the door as if it were human:
“You stupid wooden door,
with no ability to understand... !
Already at 10 leagues I selected the wood for
until I saw the towering Cedar ...
Your wood was without compare in my eyes.
…
Had I known, O door, that this would he your gratitude
and this your gratitude...,
I would have taken an axe and chopped you up,
and lashed your planks into a raft!”
Cursing the Cedar Door

47. “Six days and seven nights [Gilgamesh] mourned over [Enkidu]
and would not allow him to be buried until a maggot fell out of his nose.
…
[Gilgamesh]: How can I stay silent, how can I be still?
My friend whom I love has turned to clay.
Am I not like him? Will I lie down, never to get up again?”
(Tablet X, Lines 63-65; 72-74)

48. – Roland Barthes
“Each of us has his own
rhythm of suffering.”

49. “Hear me, O Elders of Uruk, hear me, O men!
I mourn for Enkidu, my friend,
I shriek in anguish like a mourner…
I had the people of Uruk mourn and moan for you,
I filled happy people with woe over you,
and after you (died) I let a filthy mat of hair grow
over my body,
and donned the skin of a lion and roamed the
wilderness.”
(Tablet, VIII, Lines 81-88)
Expressions of Mourning

50. For how long do we build a household?
For how long do we seal a document?
For how long do brothers share the inheritance?
For how long is there to be jealousy in the land(?)?
…
The image of Death cannot be depicted.
(Tablet X, Lines 295-97; 303)
Time and Mortality

51. The Flood Tablet
"I will reveal to you,
Gilgamesh, a thing that
is hidden, a secret of
the gods I will tell you!”
(Tablet XI, Lines 9-10). 2500 B.C.E

52. Story of Noah, Old Testament
Dates c. 1000 - 800 BCE

53. “I sent forth a dove and
released it.
The dove went off, but
came back to me…
I sent forth a swallow
and released it.
The swallow went off,
but came back to me…
I sent forth a raven and
released it.
The raven went off, and
saw the waters slither
back.”
(Tablet XI, Lines 146-153)

54. “A snake smelled the fragrance of the plant,
Silently came up and carried off the plant.
While going back it sloughed off its casing.
At that point Gilgamesh sat down, weeping,
his tears streaming over the side of his nose.
(Tablet XI, Lines 71).

55. “What can I find (to serve) as a marker for me?
I will turn back (from the journey by sea)
and leave the boat by the shore!”
(Tablet XI, Lines 307-308)

56. Return to Uruk
The Promise of Human Culture

57. “They arrived in Uruk-Haven.
Gilgamesh said to Urshanabi, the ferryman:
“Go up, Urshanabi, onto the wall of Uruk and walk around.
Examine its foundation, inspect its brickwork thoroughly –
Is not even the core of the brick structure of kiln-fired bricks,
And did not the Seven Sages themselves lay out its plan?
One league city, one league palm gardens, one league lowlands, the
open area of the Ishtar temple,
Three leagues and the open area of Uruk it encloses” (71).
The Writing in the Walls

58. Broken Tablets

59. This slideshow by Craig Carey is licensed under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License