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Achilles and Gilgamesh: Epic Heroes, Loss, and Mortality

Recent studies have begun to see the Homeric epics in the light

of other epic traditions, notably epics from Mesopotamia, and have

begun to look at striking similarities. There is a supposed lineage that

can be seen connecting the Homeric epics most directly with the world

of Akkadian epics (Gresseth 2). The connections run from similarities in

methods of transmission, namely the oral traditions, to themes,

characters and formal structural components. The epic of Gilgamesh,

the king of Uruk, and the Iliad, with its focus on the menis of Achilles,

provide a look at heroic life and its relationship with death and

immortality. The hero Gilgamesh is occupied with fear of death

throughout the epic (George XIII). Achilles likewise is concerned with

his metaphoric immortality, which can only exist after the death of his

mortal heroic self. Both of the main heroes share many similar

characteristics, including a dynamic outlook on life and death centered

on the death of their heroic comrades, Patroclus and Enkidu,

respectively. The two semi-divine heroes have many corresponding

life-events and characteristics, and are also both very concerned with

their own mortalities, but not quite in the same way. Their comrades,

Enkidu and Patroclus are outwardly similar, but the critical differences

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between Achilles’ and Gilgamesh’s view of mortality may ultimately lie

in the finer details distinguishing the two sidemen.

Comparisons between various characters abound in near-eastern

Mesopotamian epic and Homeric epics. Many scholars see Gilgamesh

as similar to both Odysseus and Achilles (Gresseth 5). He is a character

who in some of the earliest epics is involved in martial settings as well

as wanderings throughout the mythological worlds and to semi-divine

mortals. The events in the character’s life do indeed cover a broad

range of heroic epic encounters; however it is the character and

psychological or emotional development of Gilgamesh that can lend

light most on ancient heroic perspectives of death and mortality,

especially when compared with Achilles. The hero Gilgamesh has

existed throughout several phases of Mesopotamian civilization,

although he generally has many of the same attributes. The earliest

Gilgamesh stories seem to come from Sumerian texts which most

likely reflect the crystallization of earlier epic traditions, and was

probably one of the most well-known and influential poems available

(West 65). The stories concerning Gilgamesh in Sumerian are short and

episodic and present no unifying theme, but in the Akkadian versions it

appears that the poet has unified these traditional stories into one

larger eleven or twelve tablet epic with more unified themes (West 65,

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Noegel 240). This unified epic, where the several episodes are linked

together, provides a picture of a heroic king who undergoes

development and comes to some sort of understanding of the world

where he lives. It is the Standard, or Old Babylonian, version of the

hero Gilgamesh to whom the character of Achilles may best be

compared. Wolff has noted, by looking at the development of

characters in Gilgamesh, that where Gilgamesh changes and his nature

is affected by the presence and loss of his comrade Enkidu, Enkidu’s

nature is static (Wolff 1). The nature of Achilles follows a similar

pattern based around the presence and loss of his comrade Patroclus.

To begin, Achilles and Gilgamesh have some very basic

similarities of their positions in life. Each is the son of a goddess and a

mortal man, a king, who happens to be far away from the action in the

epic. Gilgamesh is described as two-thirds god and one-third human,

which marks him out as a special kind of character who exists in

relationship with both the divine world and the mortal world

(Gilgamesh 1.145) The king of Uruk is not apparently present in the

story of Gilgamesh, and Peleus is far away from Troy at Phthia. Achilles

as the son of Thetis has a special relationship which allows him to

communicate with the gods by way of Thetis’s favor in the eyes of

Zeus (Il. 1.490) Both characters are headstrong warriors; the epics do

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relate their preeminence in battle. Neither man is concerned with

family life nor with romantic relationships with women, such things

have no place in the epic hero’s life. The major relationships in each

hero’s life are with their mother, to whom they look for advice and

protection, and with their heroic partner. It is from these relationships

they gain the most wisdom and development.

The characters Enkidu and Patroclus are outwardly similar, static

sidemen, although they perish in different ways, it is primarily their

deaths that mold the lasting character and fame of their leader. Enkidu

does develop more than Patroclus, and this may mean that he is a

more complex character, or it may mean that the background and

character of Patroclus was simply well-known in the epic tradition and

the necessity to explicitly develop him in the Iliad which is extant did

not exist. What we know about Enkidu is more satisfying. Enkidu was

created by the gods as a rival to Gilgamesh, and is therefore younger.

Gilgamesh was terrifying his subjects and the gods created Enkidu to

“be a match for the storm of his heart…so Uruk may be rested”

(Gilgamesh 1.98-100). Enkidu lives in the wild, uncivilized, and runs

with the beasts. On the other hand, Patroclus comes to Phthia with his

father Menoetius after accidentally killing a friend in a game of dice in

order to find refuge and escape persecution (Il. 23.100). Both

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characters then are in their early life are violent, although they are not

necessarily at fault for that violence, but it will shape their lives. They

are also in a sense uncivilized, Enkidu literally, and Patroclus because

he has killed another human being for no reason and then fled that

particular civilization’s jurisdiction to escape the consequences of his

action. Both characters are also lower in rank than their leaders, who

are both kings and semi-divine.

Through the observations of the Sumerian and Babylonian epic

heroes’ lives, a basic understanding of the “definition of man” can be

suggested (Wolff 394). It is through the outline of the heroes’ lives,

their relationships to their heroic partner, the gods, animals, and mere

humans, and their reactions to death that Wolff supposes provide this

basic definition of man and that the epic medium’s pervasiveness in a

culture that provides the validity of that definition seems implicit in

such a hypothesis. It would not be unreasonable therefore to look at

the Homeric epic the same way, since it contains some of the same

interactions, developments and events, but produces a different

outcome and “definition of man” from those developments.

The basic outline of the epics is dissimilar; however, the

similarity lies in the impact of certain turning points on various

characters. Gilgamesh begins by outwardly stating that Gilgamesh

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travels far and sees all, and that his adventures are set down on a

tablet of stone, which implies a sort of immortality right from the

outset. It is in this paean to Gilgamesh at the very opening of the epic

which would seem to summarize all that comes after and set his

seemingly uninteresting and un-heroic end in a perspective, which

many commentators seem to overlook. Gilgamesh’s overbearing

strength and power terrorize the people and the gods feel the need to

give Uruk a break from the king, so they design a foil for him, Enkidu

the man of the wild. Enkidu undergoes a process of civilizing when he

sleeps with the woman Shamhat, and is then disturbed by Gilgamesh’s

right at weddings to be the first to sleep with the new wife.

Immediately this represents a change in the character of Enkidu, who

moves from a wild animal to a human concerned with other humans.

Gilgamesh and Enkidu do battle and Enkidu yields; the result is their

friendship and the setting of their status. Enkidu becomes the

protector and hero subservient to Gilgamesh, and Gilgamesh gains a

friend whom he loves like a brother.

We do not find the introduction to the friendship of Patroclus and

Achilles similar, in fact the most we can understand about their

relationship is not contained in events, but simply in the way they

relate to each other, because the events are so few. Achilles and

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Patroclus both come from Phthia and are close friends. In book I,

Patroclus is shown to be obedient to Achilles (Il. 1.408), but slightly

before that Achilles refers to him as diogenes, which is an obvious sign

of respect. So both epics share a similarly semi-divine central hero who

is preeminent in battle who has a subservient comrade in arms whom

he respects and loves dearly.

In the story of Gilgamesh and Enkidu, the characters have a

series of adventures in which we further watch the development of

their relationship. The first event involves a journey to the mythical

cedar forest to defeat the monstrous Humbaba, who is described by

Ninsun as a wild thing, repugnant to the god Shamash (Gilgamesh

3.54). Humbaba, with his supernatural powers, represents a challenge

to the semi-divine hero and an opponent of the gods; by defeating this

creature Gilgamesh would seemingly be cast positively in the eyes of

Shamash. His mother prays to Shamash for his protection, to be

enacted primarily through the agency of Enkidu, who is knowledgeable

about such wild creatures. The gods do not intervene directly, but

Enkidu, who is their creation, fulfills his task of protecting Gilgamesh by

interpreting his dreams and also by urging him to deal the killing

blows. Gilgamesh also reveals an important aspect of his personality

in his reactions to these dreams, and Enkidu serves to put them in a

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practical perspective for Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh’s recurrent

interpretation of his dreams seems to be defeat and death at the

hands of Humbaba, his greatest fear and greatest challenge yet.

After defeating Humbaba Gilgamesh offends Ishtar with his

arrogant recounting of her various loves and his refusal to join them.

All the creatures whom Ishtar had loved suffered some kind of

unfortunate or ignoble fate, which Gilgamesh refuses to suffer. Ishtar

retreats to heaven and lodges her complaint with Anu, who agrees to

send the bull of heaven against Gilgamesh for his effrontery. As a side

note, this episode has some parallels in the Iliad. Diomedes injures

Aphrodite, who is analogous to Ishtar; both wounded love-goddesses

complain to their father Anu/Zeus and their mother Antu/Dione, who

are both generic words for “Mr. God” and “Mrs. God”. A second

instance of parallelism occurs when Achilles battles with the river

Scamander, personified as a god. We will see later, however, that

these events though outwardly similar, are used differently by each

epic, because they occur at different stages of heroic development.

In Gilgamesh, after the heroes attack and kill the second

mythical opponent, the bull of heaven, a turning point arises. The gods

hold a council (albeit in a dream of Enkidu, but still valid since he holds

shamanistic dream-interpretation powers) debating which of the two

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heroes’ lives to end, deciding at the suggestion of Enlil that Gilgamesh

must not die. The death of one of the two main characters in the epic

impels Gilgamesh to change his views on mortality and also at the

same time presents us with a picture of his current views on mortality

by means of the way he reacts to the death of Enkidu, as well as

Enkidu’s views on death and heroism, which we may take to be in line

with Gilgamesh’s views because of their closeness. At his impending

doom Enkidu first curses various people who had “civilized” him and

paved the way for the fate which he was suffering, but then shortly

after cursing them he blesses them after Shamash tells him about the

magnificent mourning and honor which will be paid to him by

Gilgamesh and the people. Near the end of the tablet, when Enkidu

falls sick in bed he laments that his death will not be like that of a

warrior “who falls in the midst of combat…and makes his name”

(Gilgamesh 7.264-6). These are the last words of Enkidu, the tablet

ends here. Before moving to the mourning for the dead hero, it will be

important to look at his death. The gods apparently have chosen the

more mortal of the two heroes to die. Gilgamesh may still be under the

protection of the gods due to his mother Ninsun’s prayers and the fact

that she is a god. It is very interesting that the hero does not die in

battle, but as a result of the gods damning him he becomes ill and

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dies. The insults which the gods cite are the slaying of Humbaba and

the bull of heaven and the insults to Ishtar, all of which were incited by

Gilgamesh.

Gilgamesh mourns Enkidu lavishly and makes mourning his

death into nearly a state ritual. After begging all the people in Uruk

individually to mourn Enkidu, Gilgamesh then tells how he will mourn

his friend: like a hired woman mourner, like an eagle, like a lioness

(Gilgamesh 8.45-60). He then defiles himself ritually by pulling his hair

and his clothes. Gilgamesh also devotes various gifts to his friend in

order that Ereshkigal the queen of the underworld may welcome him

(Gilgamesh, 8.144-6). Never once in the mourning scene however does

Gilgamesh acknowledge his participation in the insults against the

gods and his responsibility for his friend’s death. This will be a

difference from the responsibility Achilles feels at the death of

Patroclus and the heroic outlook on death and responsibility

altogether.

In returning to the Iliad again differences arise in this outwardly

similar story. From the outset, the anger of Achilles has prevented him

from participating in society, which is similar to the terrorizing of Uruk

by Gilgamesh. The main difference in these uncivilized behaviors is

that it is possible to ascribe more cause to Achilles and allow him to

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feel justified in what amounts to inflicting harm on his comrades, by his

lack of participation in the battle. In book nine, the Greeks have come

to such a point that they desperately need Achilles to fight for them,

and this is really the next time when we see Achilles. Achilles shows

here that he has transitioned in his thoughts about death and mortality

from book one, where he was certain that his life would be short but

honored highly by Zeus (Il. 1.418-20). This is exactly what Odysseus

promises the hero in his diplomatic mission, that the men “will honor

you like a god” (Il. 9.366-7). But now Achilles has decided that the

honor is not worth his death, and rebuts Odysseus with his new

philosophy on life: fighters and lazy men, the man who works hard and

the man who hangs back all go down to Hades (Il. 9.485-7). Achilles

appears fairly unshakable in his sense of mortality, which we can only

suppose he has been developing since book one when he was insulted.

Although now Zeus has done what Achilles initially prayed, namely that

the Greeks be pressed hard and remember how they need Achilles, he

no longer appears to want the honor which he sought from them.

Patroclus, however, does not share Achilles’ opinions as closely.

He still feels pain at the death of the Greek comrades, and since his

honor was not insulted, he does not feel as strongly the battling

emotions that Achilles does. Patroclus prays that he never feel as

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strongly as Achilles, a meaningless prayer since Achilles anger stems

from the insult to his semi-divinity. He even dares call Achilles a

coward, wondering if he is avoiding the fight because he knows of the

short-lived doom he faces if he battles. Achilles gives him, in his

exhortation to win glory, the warning not to fight beyond warding the

Trojans away from the ships, because he says it will diminish Achilles’

glory. We see Achilles’ fight for glory returning at the same time as his

rationality that once a man has died, there is nothing left of him. This

is a contradiction confusing the mind of the great hero, which will

require the upcoming tragic event to untangle.

Patroclus, with the reluctant approval of Achilles, goes to battle

and forgetting his friend’s warning continues fighting, dying at the

hands of Hector. In the middle of the battle we get a message from the

gods about mortality and fate, essentially that it is unchangeable, even

by the gods, but that the living will pay honors to the dead (Il. 16.544).

Zeus then instigates the death of Patroclus by causing him to disobey

the direct orders from Achilles. Zeus causes the Trojans to retreat,

after whom the emboldened Patroclus charges. The will of Zeus is the

enforcer of fate, and it is unchangeable. As soon as the helmet of

Achilles is lost, the Trojans realize that it is Patroclus and not the great

son of Thetis, and they move in for the kill.

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This event is one of the few which Achilles does not know about

in advance from his mother, and it is because of this it affects him so

strongly: Achilles was not prepared for the death of his comrade the

way he seemed to be prepared to meet his own death (Il 17.474-5). He

knew that one, the best of the Myrmidons, would die with him still

alive, and he now gains the insight that the prophecy was about

Patroclus. Achilles reacts to the death of his friend by defiling himself,

and his followers clutched his hands for fear that he might kill himself.

Achilles refers to Patroclus in his mourning as the man he loved

beyond all others, even as much as his own life. He wishes he had

never been born, and then quickly moves on to what can remedy his

life, which he sees as being purposeless without Patroclus. Achilles

seeks the death of Hector, knowing that his death will follow quickly.

Achilles has gone from being civilized to uncivilized, seeking death

because of his comrade’s death, the only person that made living the

mortal life worth living. Patroclus on the other hand thinks of his glory

that he might achieve if he kills the Trojans and Hector, he goes from

his concern for the other Greeks at the beginning of book sixteen to

concern for himself only, ignoring the commands of his dearest

comrade. A combination of the battle, the lust for glory, and the fate

caused by Zeus cause the degradation of his civility and heighten his

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quest for glory and death. Achilles, being bereft of his comrade seeks

death and also becomes uncivilized, even sacrilegious. As Achilles and

Hector battle, Achilles is aided by the goddess Athena, who tricks

Hector, but at the same time he is behaving like an animal, threatening

to eat Hector’s entrails. At the funeral of Patroclus he sacrifices Trojan

boys. His savagery increases to this point, but then begins to recede

when he returns the body of Hector to Priam.

Gilgamesh similarly becomes uncivilized after the death of

Enkidu, wandering the wilds in tablet 9. The death of Enkidu causes

Gilgamesh’s concern with his own mortality, but as something to be

feared and avoided rather than sought out. He decides to seek out Uta-

Napishtim the distant, who has gained immortality from the gods, in

hopes that he too might not have to die and become like Enkidu. He

goes on a killing spree in the wild, as the poet says, enjoying life. Upon

coming to the scorpion-men, they remark on his uniqueness and semi-

divinity, singling him out from other mortals. After crossing the waters

of death with Ur-Shanabi he comes to Uta-Napisthim, whom he asks

about immortality. Uta-Napishtim first tells Gilgamesh about the duties

of kings and the lot of fools. He asks Gilgamesh what he gained for all

his toil, struggling hard to achieve immortality, and then says that

death comes to everyone; there is no way to forestall it or predict it.

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Mammitum, the maker of destiny has fixed for every man their fate,

unavoidable and secret (Gilgamesh 10.319-20). Uta-Napishtim tells

Gilgamesh about the flood and ensuing council of the gods, which

results in his immortality. But Gilgamesh has no way to assemble a

council of the gods, and immediately fails Uta-Napishtim’s test of

forgoing sleep for six days and seven nights. The hero and Ur-Shanabi

prepare to return to Uruk, after cleaning up and making Gilgamesh

appear more kingly. As they are leaving, Uta-Napishtim tells Gilgamesh

the secret of the plant of heartbeat, which will restore youth.

Gilgamesh plans to test it by feeding part of it to an elder of Uruk, but

a snake steals the plant and eats it, sloughing off its skin. At this point

he and Ur-Shanabi return to Uruk and admire the walls and buildings,

the lasting monument that Gilgamesh will leave behind after having

been forced to accept his mortality by his failures in the mythical lands

beyond the Waters of Death.

Achilles undergoes revelations induced by the gods after his

uncivilized period following the death of his comrade. Patroclus comes

as ghost to Achilles reminding him of their oath that their ashes be

placed in the same urn so that they may reside together after death.

This begins the process of bringing Achilles back into the civilized

world by reminding him of the actuality of his mortality. Thetis gives

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him a command handed over by Zeus that he must return the body of

Hector for a ransom, a command that cannot be denied. His encounter

with the dead continues at the actual ransoming, when he promises a

fitting portion of the ransom to Patroclus. It is at the ransoming of

Hector where Achilles completes his education about mortality and

immortality. Priam urges Achilles to think about his own father, who is

“old past the threshold of deadly age” (Il. 24.570). Priam also urges

Achilles to pay attention to the gods and accept the ransom, because it

would be against the will of Zeus to leave a body unburied. Achilles

thinks about his dead friend and his living father, the two men who

seem to have been his two models or options throughout life, and

seems to realize that he has chosen to follow Patroclus. He reflects

that though his father was mortal, he was granted the divine honor of

an immortal wife and a blessed happy life, whereas Achilles will have a

short life of pain. He does at this point come back into line with the

reality of his mortal existence, by acknowledging the respect due to

the gods and following what is concerned correct behavior: he accepts

the ransom for Hector so that Hector may be buried appropriately. In

doing this he accepts his own death as a certainty.

In both epics two pairs of heroes, one semi-divine and one

mortal, go through their heroic lives seeking glory in battle and some

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sort of everlasting life. Their views differ, though they are brought

about by similar patterns and events. Gilgamesh and Achilles both

start out our stories in an uncivilized manner, without regard for their

people. Both are accompanied by a comrade whom they cherish

beyond all others, and both are protected by a divine mother. Both

heroes become responsible for the death of that comrade, although

only through the agency of Fate and the gods. One of the major

differences between Gilgamesh and Achilles is that Gilgamesh does not

think or reflect about mortality until the death of Enkidu, where

Achilles does realize that glory can be fleeting and so can be taken

away, depriving the dead of their hoped-for immortality. After the

death of his comrade, Gilgamesh seeks desperately not to join him in

death, where he will no longer be able to achieve heroic deeds.

Achilles, on the other hand believes that he has choice in his fate, that

oft-proposed long undistinguished life versus the short heroic life, and

strives to shorten his life as much as possible. His concern, however, is

not for the glory but the death. After some divine intervention,

however, both heroes come to an understanding that fate is

unchangeable and that death will come to all. Both heroes however

have achieved a form of immortality in their glory, though at points in

their life they sought to deny that immortality. Gilgamesh has the

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stone mentioned at the beginning of the epic (Gilgamesh 1.10) and the

walls of Uruk, his renown as a warrior and his life as a king, and

Achilles has the honor of being the best of the Achaeans. Not all epics

deal with death on such a profound level, and so it falls to these two to

show that ancient civilizations all had some way of dealing with the

blind terror most people feel upon the realization of their own

mortality. They illustrate that one can run from it, run toward it, try and

achieve literal and metaphorical immortality, but death comes to all at

a time which cannot be determined, regardless of affiliations with

gods. Epic heroes provide examples of how man interacts in his world

with the sub-human animals and the super-human divine, as well as

with abstract concepts. Gilgamesh and Achilles provide models for

humans to deal with their own mortality and the deaths of their

friends. They begin each epic as a hero-figure, but by the end of each

epic have become in some sense more human, which allows the

audience to relate to their pain and reasoning.

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Bibliography

Homer. The Iliad. Translated by Robert Fagles. New York: Penguin

Books,

1990.

Gresseth, Gerald K. "The Gilgamesh Epic and Homer." The Classical

Association for the Midwest and South 70.4 (1975): 1-18

The Epic of Gilgamesh. Translated by Andrew George. New York:

Penguin

Books, 1999.

Scott B. Noegel. “Mesopotamian Epic.” A Companion to Ancient Epic.

Ed.

John Miles Foley. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2005.

West, M. L. The East Face of Helicon. Oxford: Clarendon, 1997

Hope Nash Wolff. “Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Heroic Life.” Journal of

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the American Oriental Society. Vol. 89, No. 2 (1969): 392-398.

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