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The Relationship Between Gilgamesh and Enkidu: It’s Aspects and Dimensions

In different literary works, noteworthy changes in a character get to be striking as the narrative unfolds. This is delineated in ‘Epic of Gilgamesh,’ with the main character of the story, Gilgamesh. In this story, told as a sonnet, the reader gets sneak previews of Gilgamesh’s personality and his motivations and objectives. Gilgamesh is seen as acting in various distinctive ways. The account illustrates him as a tyrannical ruler who is loathed by his subjects; a robust and gutsy warrior; a depressed man deflated and toward the end of everything; and an individual who has all the earmarks of being happy with his life achievements. All through the progressions, the account demonstrates to the reader how Gilgamesh's disposition towards life changes. The objectives that he has made for himself likewise vary significantly, and from similar objectives, the reader witnesses Gilgamesh's change from savagery and shallow leadership to being contemplative and the man of substance. After Enkidu heard of Gilgamesh’s legacy, he realizes that he needed Gilgamesh to be his friend, but before that, he needed to give a beat-down, to prove to him that he was indeed, not the most superior being (“Frenemies”). This, in essence, brings about their friendship which changes Gilgamesh from an abusive and bossy person to a friendly, wise and responsible person.

At the beginning of the narrative, the inhabitants of Uruk portray Gilgamesh to be an excessively forceful ruler. "The young men of Uruk he carries without warrant, Gilgamesh lets no son go free to his father; by day and by night his tyranny grows harsher; it is he who is the shepherd of Uruk, the sheepfold but Gilgamesh lets no daughter go free to her mother'"(Page 3, Line 67-72). The residents have high regards for him, yet they despise his sexual and physical hostility, so they pray to the divine beings to mitigate part of their problems. The divine beings make plans to create an equivalent for Gilgamesh, Enkidu so as to correct him.

After the god, Anu, caused the creation of Enkidu, he was placed in the woods and lived among the animals. On Gilgamesh’s advice, Shamhat, a sanctuary prostitute lures him to have sex with her. Enkidu goes through an earth shattering experience with Shamhat, and for reasons that are never clarified. When Enkidu has completed his epic seven-day love session with Shamhat, he realizes that he cannot keep up with animals anymore. He feels that has lost something physically, yet he has picked up something rationally: "Enkidu was weakened, he could not run as before. But now he was with reason, and rational understanding" (Page 8, Line 201-202). Also, a portion of this expanding brain is that he needs a companion. This demonstrates an improvement far from his solitary existence as he builds up the requirement for human fellowship, furthermore advancement toward masculinity. Alongside his other human characteristics, Enkidu additionally picked up a sound dosage of testosterone-implanted arrogance. He is therefore offended by what he finds out about Gilgamesh's doings, so he decides to go to Uruk and take on Gilgamesh, "I will challenge him for my strength is mighty, I will vaunt myself in Uruk saying: 'I am the mightiest!' there I shall change the way things are ordered; one born in the wilds mighty, the strength he possesses"(Page 9, Line 220-223).

When Enkidu arrives at Uruk, Gilgamesh is going to compel his way into a ladies’ wedding chamber. Enkidu ventures into the entryway and hinders his passage. The two men wrestle savagely for quite a while and Gilgamesh at last wins. "They seized each other at the door of the wedding house; in the street, they joined combat, in the square of the land. The door jambs shook, the wall did shudder"(Page 16, lines 113-115). As Gilgamesh’s equivalent, Enkidu, in a split second immediately impacts on Gilgamesh and makes him new. Meeting his equivalent makes Gilgamesh respect the other man. They create a massive disruption with the fight, but they wind up without enmity towards one another. This way, he challenges Gilgamesh to a duel; Gilgamesh’s very first step towards being human begins here after meeting an equal who is the first to threaten his authority. Through this person, he starts to see all the things that he could be and yet is not at the moment, and after that, the two get to be companions and begin searching for an experience to share.

It is this friendship that prompts to the following stride in Gilgamesh's transition. Gilgamesh and Enkidu choose to steal trees from a far off cedar forest which is illegal to mortals. An alarming devil named Humbaba, the dedicated servant of Enlil, the lord of earth, the wind, and air, protects it. The two friends make the dangerous trip to the timberland, and, standing next to each other, battle with the creature. “Humbaba his voice is the Deluge, His speech is fire, and his breath is death” (Page 18, line 110-111). With help from Shamash, the sun god, they execute him. At that point, they chop down the taboo trees, make the tallest into a huge gate, make the rest into a pontoon, and buoy on it back to Uruk. Upon their arrival, Ishtar, the goddess of affection, is overcome with sexual desire for Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh rejects her. Angry, the goddess asks her dad, Anu, the divine force of the sky, to send the Bull of Heaven to rebuff him. The bull descends from the sky, carrying with him seven years of starvation. Gilgamesh and Enkidu overpower the bull and slaughter it. The divine beings meet in council and concur that one of the two companions must be punished for their mistakes, and they conclude that Enkidu should die. He is taken sick, suffers tremendously, and shares his dreams of the underworld with Gilgamesh. When he at last dies, Gilgamesh is devastated by the loss of his friend. The resolve to murder Humbaba, a creature, and hireling of the divine beings, was Gilgamesh’s. "....Ferocious Humbaba...let us slay him, so his power is no more" (Page 18, line 97-98), he tells Enkidu. Gilgamesh has never fizzled at anything before and does not by any stretch of the imagination know the significance of fear, or death. Notwithstanding Enkidu's warnings and requests for him to alter his opinion, Gilgamesh remains protective of Enkidu through the fight which is a sign of a strong bond.

Gilgamesh mourns deeply over his dead companion and he laments to himself and to the city’s elders remembering how together with Enkidu they have overthrown Humbaba and killed the heavenly bulls among other adventures. He promises himself that he will make all his followers to join him in mourning his friend. He wandered all over his land uttering lamentations, “For his friend Enkidu, Gilgamesh did bitterly weep as he wandered the wild. I shall die, and shall not then be then as Enkidu sorrow has entered my heart "(Page 70, line 1-4). All along, he has attached to his friend's body and keeps it until it stinks. He only gives up Enkidu's body to the earth when maggots start consuming the body. He has a desire to evade death, and he remembers that an ancestor of his was immortal. He sets out on a journey to find out from his ancestor the key to immortality. His ancestor tells him not to be so interested in immortality because men were not meant to live forever. Gilgamesh is, however, surprised that his ancestor looks like a normal man as opposed to his expectations of him finding a hero look alike preparing for battle. Utanapishti, who is the ancestor, tells him off and gives him a test of staying a week without sleep, but Gilgamesh does not pass the test. He instructs his ferryman to dress Gilgamesh like a king and transport him back to the land of Uruk. He is given the plant of immortality, but in his carelessness loses it and regrets having looked for his ancestor in vain. Gilgamesh is distraught and goes back to Uruk a changed man even in his leadership methods. His rule is just coming from inspiration from the friendship he had with Enkidu until he meet his death.

Enkidu becomes tamed with the same mannerisms of Gilgamesh. He is angry when he hears of Gilgamesh’s doings and calls for the fight. Despite the previously sworn dislike for each other which eventually matured into a great friendship between the two equals after their great fight, the issues with divine beings and challenges against the beasts were consistently solved together keeping in mind the end goal to hear one another out and get the best choice. Enkidu, being compared with a shield and protector for Gilgamesh, and to an ax as a partner, was the person who satisfied the life of Gilgamesh. Even as the great king, he genuinely suffered from Enkidu's demise which demonstrates that these two could be legitimately called perfect partners. Gilgamesh says "What became of my friend Enkidu was too much to bear” (Page 78, Line 65), as though he lost a precious individual in his life. Despite the fact that Gilgamesh endures and feels irate, he recognizes destiny and his defenselessness. He feels a massive void inside; he lost an equivalent to himself, an accomplice, a sibling. Nothing can fill this place in his heart. Gilgamesh is left to ponder through whatever remains of his life being melancholy and lonely.

Works Cited

George, A. T. The Epic of Gilgamesh.