Tuesday, November 3, 2026 · 天火 · tianmu.org
Epics
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Texts
An Old Babylonian Version of the Gilgamesh Epic — Morris Jastrow Jr. and Albert T. ClayMorris Jastrow Jr. and Albert T. Clay’s 1920 Yale Oriental Series edition of two Old Babylonian tablets of the Gilgamesh Epic, the Pennsylvania and Yale tablets, with transliteration, translation, line-by-line commentary and a long introduction on the meeting of Gilgamesh and Enkidu and their expedition against Ḫuwawa of the cedar forest.Erra and IshumTablet I of the Babylonian poem of divine plague and devastation. The god Erra, goaded by his Seven warrior attendants, rises from sloth to fury, confronts Marduk in Esagil, and deceives the king of the gods into vacating Babylon. Standard Babylonian Akkadian, ca. 8th century BCE. Good Works Translation from the Akkadian.The AtrahasisThe Babylonian creation and flood epic — humanity made from clay and divine blood, the wrath of Enlil, and the survival of Atrahasis through the great flood. Good Works Translation from Akkadian, ca. 1700 BCE.The Enuma ElishThe Babylonian creation epic — seven cuneiform tablets telling how Marduk slew chaos and shaped the world from her body.The Epic of GilgameshThe oldest epic poem in human history — a Sumerian king's quest for immortality, rendered from cuneiform tablets in the British Museum.The Seven Tablets of Creation — L.W. KingL.W. King's authoritative 1902 edition of the Enuma Elish, the Babylonian creation myth, with introduction and related texts from cuneiform tablets in the British Museum.