The Story Of the Flood

Gilgamesh

[To Noah] I have been looking at you, but you look like me! I resolved not to fight you. How is it that you stand in the Assembly of the Gods, and have found life!"

Noah:

I will tell you a secret of the gods. The old city Shuruppak is on the banks of the Euphrates. It had gods inside it. The hearts of the Great Gods were moved to inflict the Flood.

Their Father Anu uttered the oath of secrecy:

• Valiant Enlil was their Adviser
• Ninurta was their Chamberlain
• Ennugi was their Minister of Canals.
• Enki the Clever Prince, was under oath with them and said:

Men of Shuruppak, son of Ubartutu, Tear down the house and build a boat! Abandon wealth and seek living beings! Spurn possessions and keep alive living beings!

Make all living beings go up into the boat which you are to build. Its dimensions must measure equal to each other.

Its length must correspond to its width. Roof it over like the Apsu.

I understood and replied to Enki:

Noah

My lord, I shall do it. But what shall I tell my city?

Enki

Tell them that Enlil is rejecting you so you cannot stay in the city nor set foot on Enlil’s earth. So I will go down to the Apsu to live with my lord Enki.

That stated time had arrived.

[Meteorites] showered down in the morning and evening. The weather was frightful to behold!

I went into the boat and sealed the entry.

Just as dawn began there arose from the horizon a black cloud. Adad rumbled inside of it. Before him went Shullat and Hanish, heralds going over mountain and land.

Erragal pulled out the mooring poles.

Just then Enlil arrived. He saw the boat and became furious at the Igigi gods:

Enlil

Where did a living being escape? No man was to survive the annihilation!

Ninurta

Ninurta spoke to Valiant Enlil, saying: ‘Only Enki could devise such a thing. He knows every machination!’

Enki

It is yours, O Valiant One. I only made a dream appear to Atlantis and thus, he heard the secret of the gods. The deliberation should be about Atlantis

Enlil went up to his ship and grabbed my hand to go up with him.

He made my wife go up with him by my side. He stood between us, touched our forehead and blessed us.

Enki

Previously, Noah was human. Now he and his wife will be like us. Let him live far away at the Mouth of the Rivers.

So they took us to live at the Mouth of the Rivers.

Noah

[To his own wife]: “Mankind is deceptive, and will deceive you. Come, bake loaves for him and keep setting them by his head. Draw on the wall each day that he lay down.”

She did so.

Gilgamesh

[To Noah] “The very moment I was sleeping deeply you touched me and awakened me.”

Noah

Look here, count your loaves! Be aware of what is marked on the wall. Your first loaf was dessicated, the second stale, the third moist(?), the fourth turned white, the fifth sprouted gray mold. The 6th is still fresh. The 7th ‐at that instant you awoke!

Gilgamesh

“What shall I do? Where shall I go?”