Gilgamesh the King

  “And what is that?” I asked.

  “Come with me.”

  In truth I felt so bleak that I had little yearning for any gift of the Ziusudra’s; I wanted only to get myself away from that place and take myself swiftly back to Uruk. But I knew it would be mannerless and uncivil to refuse. So I accompanied the priest to a far part of the isle where the land stretched into the sea in a long narrow point with the shape of a knife-blade. On the edge of that point I saw a great mound of thousands of gray seashells of a strange shape, all gnarled and rough on one side, smooth and gleaming on the other. Near them lay the sort of stones that divers use as weights when they go down into the sea, and some ropes to attach them to their legs.

  “Do you wonder why we have come here?” Lu-Ninmarka said. He grinned. I think he meant it to be pleasant, but to me it was like the grinning of a skull, so lean and fleshless was his sharp-featured face. He picked up one of the gray shells, rested it a moment on the palm of his hand with its smooth side downward, and tossed it to the ground. Then he pointed out to sea. “This is the place where the plant known as Grow-Young-Again is found: there, at the bottom of the sea.”

  Frowning, I said, “Grow-Young-Again? What plant is that?”

  He looked at me in surprise. “Don’t you know it? It is the wonder of wonders, that plant. From it we make a medicine to cure the most implacable of illnesses: I mean the ravages of age. It is a medicine that restores a man to his former strength, that takes the lines from his face, that makes his hair grow dark once more. And the plant from which it comes lies in these waters. Do you see the shells here? They are its leaves. We dive for the plant, we bring it up, we extract its power, and we discard the rest. From its fruit we make the potion that preserves us from age. This is the Ziusudra’s parting gift to you: I am to let you have the fruit of Grow-Young-Again to take with you on your journey.”

  “Is it so?” I said, astounded.

  “We would not jest with you, Gilgamesh.”

  Awe and amazement silenced me a moment. When I could speak again I said in a hushed way, “How am I to obtain this miraculous stuff?”

  Lu-Ninmarka waved his hand towards the divers’ stones, the ropes, the sea. He indicated that I should put off my clothing and go down into the water. I hesitated only a moment. The sea is Enki’s domain, and I had never felt much at ease with that god. It would be a new thing for me to enter the sea. Well, I thought, in my passage to Dilmun Enki had done me no harm; and as a boy I had dived into the river often enough. What was there to fear? The plant Grow-Young-Again waited for me in that water. I cast my cloak aside; I tied the heavy stones to my feet; I went stumbling forward to the edge of the sea.

  How clear the water was, how warm, how gentle! It lapped at the pink sand of the shore and took on a pink flush itself. I looked toward Lu-Ninmarka, who urged me onward. It was slow going, with those stones. The water was shallow; I waded knee-deep for an endless time. But then at last I came to a place where the sunken shelf of the land dropped away and what seemed to be the maw of the great abyss loomed before me. Again I looked back; again Lu-Ninmarka signaled me onward. I filled my chest with air and cast myself forward, and the stones drew me down.

  Ah, what joy it was to tumble into those depths! It was like flying, effortless and serene, but a flying downward, a pure sweet descent. I was altogether without fear. The color of the sea deepened about me: it was a rich sapphire now, shot through with strands of sparkling light from above. As I descended, the fishes came to me and studied me with great goggling eyes. They were of every hue, yellow banded with black, scarlet, azure, topaz, emerald, turquoise; they were of colors I had never seen before, and mixtures of colors that I would not have believed possible. I could have touched them, they were so close. They danced beside me with unimaginable grace.

  Down, down, down. I held my arms high above my head and gave myself up freely to the pull of the abyss. My hair streamed far out about me; a bubbling flow came from my lips; there was a thunderous pounding in my breast. My heart was joyous: through my entire body there flowed the keenest of delights. I could not say how long it had been since I had known such joy. Not since Enkidu had gone from me, surely. Ah, Enkidu, Enkidu, if you could have been there beside me as I made my way into the abyss!

  The water was much cooler here. The shimmering light, far above, was pale, blue, remote, like moonlight made scant by heavy clouds. I felt firmness suddenly beneath my feet: I had reached the floor of this sunken realm. Soft sand below, dark jagged rocks before me. Where was the plant? Where was Grow-Young-Again? Ah, here, here! I saw a multitude of it: stony gray leaves clinging to the rocks. I touched several of them lightly, in wonder, thinking, Is this the one that will do the magic? Is this the one that will turn back the years? I pulled one plant loose. That cost me no little pain. The outer surface of it was sharp and thorny, as though covered with tiny blades, and it pricked my hands like a rose. I saw a crimson cloud of my blood rise along my arms. But I had the plant of life and breath; I clutched it tight; I raised it jubilantly, and I would have cried out in triumph, if such a thing could have been done in that silent world. Grow-Young-Again! Yes! Perhaps eternal life could not be mine, but I would at least have some way of shielding myself against the bite of time’s tooth.

  Rise, now, Gilgamesh! Get you to the sea’s surface! My errand was achieved; and I realized now for the first time that my breath was all but exhausted.

  I cut myself free of the stones that were tied to my feet and rose like an arrow through the water, scattering the startled fishes. Brightness enfolded me. I burst through into the air and felt the blessed warmth of the sun. Laughing, splashing, lurching about, I flung myself onto the bosom of the sea and it sped me toward the shore. In moments I reached a place where the water was shallow enough for me to stand; and I went running onward until I was on dry land once again.

  I held out my hand toward Lu-Ninmarka, showing him the gray uncouth thing I held. Blood still ran from the cuts it had made in my flesh and I felt the salt of the sea stinging in them; but that did not matter. “Is this it?” I cried. “Is this the right one?”

  “Let me see,” he murmured. “Give me your knife.”

  He took it from me and deftly slipped the blade of the knife between the two stony leaves. With a strength I did not think he had the old priest split the leaves apart and turned them back. Within I beheld something strange, a pulsing pink furrowed thing as soft and intricate and mysterious as a woman’s most secret inner place. But that was of no concern to Lu-Ninmarka; he prowled with his fingers in its folds and crevices and after a moment cried out and pulled forth something round and smooth and gleaming, the pearl that is the fruit of the plant Grow-Young-Again.

  “This is what we seek,” he said. Carelessly he tossed aside the stony leaves and the pinkness they contained; a bird swooped down at once to feed on that tender meat. But he held the pearl cradled in the palm of his hand, beaming at it as though it were the dearest child of his bosom. In the warm sunlight it seemed to glow with an inner radiance; and its color was rich and fine, with a blush of blue mingled with the creamy pink. He touched it lightly with the tip of his finger, rolling it about, taking the greatest of delight in it. Then after a few moments he placed it in my hand and folded my bloodied fingers about it. “Put it in your pouch,” he said, “and keep it as you would the greatest of your treasures. Carry it with you to Uruk of the high ramparts, and store it in your strongbox. And when you feel your years weighing heavy upon you, Gilgamesh, take it out, grind it to fine powder, mix it with good strong wine, drink it down in a single draught. That is all. Your eyes will grow clear again, your breath will come in deep gusts, your strength will be the strength of the slayer of lions you once had been. That is our gift to you, Gilgamesh of Uruk.”

  I stared at the pearl with wide eyes. “I could have asked for nothing finer.”

  “Come, now. The boatman awaits you.”

  38

  SOUR AND SULLEN AND SILENT as always, Su
rsunabu the boatman took me across in the afternoon to the greater island nearby. Once more I found lodgings in the main city of Dilmun for a few days, until I could buy passage aboard a ship bound for the Land. Idly I wandered about the steep streets, past the open-fronted shops of brick and timber where the craftsmen in gold and copper and precious stones plied their skills, and looked down toward the beach and its ships, and past it to the broad blue sheet of the sea and the little sandy island. I thought of the Ziusudra who was not Ziusudra, and of the priests and priestesses who served him in the mysteries of their cult, and of the true tale they had told of the coming of the Flood, so different from what is told in the Land; and I thought also of the stony fruit of the plant Grow-Young-Again which swung in a little pouch about my neck and blazed against my breastbone like a sphere of flame. So at last my quest was ending. I was going home; and if I had not found what I had come seeking, I had at least attained some part of it, some means of fending off the fate I abhorred.

  So be it. Now to Uruk!

  There was a trading-ship of Meluhha in the port, nearly done with its business. It would go northward now as far as Eridu and Ur to sell its goods for the merchandise of the Land; and then when it was laden it would make its way back down into the Sea of the Rising Sun and sail off to the distant and mysterious place in the east from which it had come. This I learned from a merchant of Lagash who stayed at my hostelry.

  I went down into the port and found the master of the Meluhhan ship. He was a small and delicate-looking man with skin dark as ebony and fine proud sharp features; he understood my language well enough, and said he would carry me as a passenger. I told him to name his price, and he named it: I judge it was half what his whole ship was worth. He stared up at me with eyes like polished onyx and smiled. Was he expecting me to bargain with him? How could I do that? I am king of Uruk; I cannot bargain. Perhaps he knew that and took advantage of me. Or perhaps he thought I was just a great hulking fool, with more silver than wit about me. Well, it was a steep price; he took from me nearly all my remaining silver. But it was no great matter. I had been away from the Land far too long; I would pay that much and more with a glad heart, if only he would carry me toward my home.

  We made our departure, then. On a day when the sky was as flat and hot as an anvil the little dark-skinned men of Meluhha hoisted their sail and leaped to their oars and we headed out northward into the sea.

  The cargo was timber of several kinds from their own land, which they stored in bundles on the deck, and chests that held gold ingots, ivory combs and figurines, carnelian and lapis lazuli. The captain said he had made his voyage fifty times and meant to make it fifty more before he died. I asked him to tell me about the countries that lie between Meluhha and the Land. I wanted to know the shape of the coasts, the color of the air, the scent of the blossoms, and a thousand other things; but he only shrugged and said, “Why is that of interest? The world is much the same everywhere.” I had great pity for him, hearing that.

  Among these Meluhhans I felt like a colossus. I have long been accustomed to the way I tower over the men of the Land, head and shoulders and breast; but on this voyage my shipmates came scarcely more than belly-high to me, and scampered about almost as if they were little apes. By Enlil, I must have seemed a monstrous thing to them! Yet they showed no fear of me nor any awe; to them I was merely a barbaric curiosity, I suppose, something that they would weave into their mariners’ tales when they reached their homeland. “Believe it if you will, we had a passenger between Dilmun and Eridu, and his stature was like that of an elephant! As stupid as an elephant, too, and as heavy-footed—we took good care to keep out of his way, or he might have trampled us flat without so much as noticing we were there!” In truth, they made me feel like an oaf, so little and agile were they; but in my defense I will say that the ship was crafted to fit men of a smaller size than mine. It was hardly my fault I had to go about in a crouch with my arms at my side, barely able to move without knocking into something.

  The sun was white-hot and the cloudless sky was merciless. There was little wind; but so cunning were these seamen that they kept their vessel moving forward under the merest of breezes. I watched them in admiration. They worked as if they had a single mind; each carried out his role in the enterprise without need of command, laboring quickly and silently in the sweltering heat. If they had asked me to do some task I would have done it, but they left me by myself. Did they know I was a king? Did they care? They are an incurious race, I think; but they work very hard.

  At dusk, when they gathered for their meal, they shyly invited me to join them. What they ate each night was a stew of meat or fish so fiery in its flavor that I thought it would burn my lips, and a sort of porridge that tasted of soured milk. After eating they sang, a strange music indeed, the voices roaming and twining to fashion eerie twanging melodies that coiled like serpents. And so the voyage went. I was glad to be apart from them, alone inside myself, for I was weary and had much on my mind. Now and again I touched the pearl of Grow-Young-Again that hung about my throat; and I thought often of Uruk and what awaited me there.

  At last I saw the welcome shores of the Land dark against the horizon. We entered the wide mouth of the joined rivers and went onward, on and on to the place where the rivers divide. Then there was the Idigna, making its course off to the right; and there was the Buranunu, our own great river, branching to the left. I gave thanks to Enlil. I was not yet home; but the wind that reached my nostrils was a wind that had blown yesterday through my native city, and that alone was enough greatly to gladden me.

  Not long afterward we docked at the quay of holy Eridu. There I bade the Meluhhan captain farewell and went ashore by myself. It would not have been wise to go on further with that ship, for its next port of call would be Ur; and that was no place now for me to go in the guise of a solitary traveler. They would know me in Ur. If I set foot there without any army at my back I knew I would never see Uruk again.

  They knew me also in Eridu. I had not been off the ship three minutes before I saw eyes flickering and fingers pointing, and heard them whispering in awe and wonder, “Gilgamesh! Gilgamesh!” It was to be expected. I had been to Eridu many times for the autumn rites that follow in the wake of the Sacred Marriage. But this was not autumn, and I had come without my retinue. Little wonder they pointed and whispered.

  It is the oldest city in the world, Eridu. We say that it was the first of the five cities that existed before the Flood. Perhaps it was, though I no longer have as much faith in those old tales as I had before my visit to the Ziusudra. Enki is the prime god of the place, he who has power over the sweet waters that flow beneath the earth: his great temple is there, and his chief dwelling place lies beneath it, so they say. I believe it must be so: you can dig anywhere in the low-lying ground about Eridu and discover fresh water.

  Eridu lies somewhat off the Buranunu but is connected to the river by lagoons and good waterways, and it is as much a port as the river cities themselves. Its site is difficult, though, for the desert comes right down to the edges of the city and I think some day the dunes may sweep right over it. They must think so too, for they have put not only the temple but the entire city atop a great raised platform. There is much stone around Eridu, and the city’s builders have used it well. The retaining wall of the platform is a massive thing faced with sandstone, and the stairs of the temple are great marble slabs. It is a thing to be envied, to have stone close by your city, and not to be compelled as we are to build only of mud.

  The merchants of Uruk have long maintained a commercial house in Eridu, close by Enki’s temple: a place held in common, where they can extend credit to one another and put their books in balance and exchange rumors of the marketplace and do whatever else it is that merchants do. It was there I went from the quay, moving unconcerned through an ever larger crowd of whisperers and pointers: “Gilgamesh! Gilgamesh!” all the way. When I entered the trading-hall I found three men of my city working at their scribe-work
with stylus and tablet; they sprang to their feet at the first sight of me, gasping and turning pale as though Enlil himself had come striding into their midst. Then they fell to their knees and set up a frantic making of the royal signs; wiggling their arms and waving their heads about like frenzied madmen. It was a while before they were calm enough to make sense.

  “You are not dead, majesty!” they blurted.

  “Evidently not,” I said. “Who was it that gave that story forth?”

  They looked warily at one another. At length the oldest and shrewdest-looking of them replied, “It was said at the temple, I think. That you had gone into the wilderness out of mourning for Enkidu your brother, and you had been devoured by lions—”

  “No, that you had been carried off by demons—” put in another. “By demons, yes, that came out of a whirlwind—”

  “The Imdugud-bird was seen in the rooftops, crying evil omens, five nights running—” the third declared.

  “A two-headed calf was found in the pastures—they sacrificed it at the Ubshukkinakku—”

  “And at the Sanctuary of Destinies, they—”

  “Yes, and there was green mist around the moon, which—”

  I broke into all this babble with a loud cry: “Wait! Tell me this: at which temple was it that I was given forth as dead?”

  “Why, the temple of the goddess, majesty!”

  I smiled. That was no great surprise.

  Quietly I said, “Ah. Ah, I see: of course. It was Inanna herself who uttered the doleful news, eh?”

  They nodded. They looked more troubled with each passing moment.

  I thought of Inanna and her hatred for me, and her hunger for power, and how she had coolly put the king Dumuzi aside long ago when he had ceased to serve her needs; and I knew that my leaving Uruk must have seemed to her like a gift from the gods; and I told myself that I had done the most foolish of foolish things, running off in my madness and pain in search of eternal life, when I had the duties of this life to carry out. How she must have laughed, when she was told I had gone from the city by stealth! How she must have relished it when the days went by and I did not return, and no one knew where I was!