Who Faced Greater Challenges, Achilles Or Gilgamesh Essay, Research Paper

The Epic of Gilgamesh is an important Middle Eastern literary work, written in cuneiform on 12 clay tablets about 2000BC. This heroic poem is named for its hero, Gilgamesh, a tyrannical Babylonian king who ruled the city of Uruk. Achilles, in The Iliad, is the greatest of the Greek warriors in the Trojan War . Both of these great warriors have one sole purpose in life: to die heroically in battle. These people lived with the Heroic or Warrior Code; they were very literal, very practical people. The way they thought is: you are going to die, that’s a given; there are two ways to die, one is to die of old age or illness, but this is dying in shame as we have seen Enkidu depict to us. The other way to die is gloriously, as a hero; the only way to die a hero is to do something heroic, for that you need a war; so war is not only a fact of life, it’s a necessity. Perhaps the idea of heroism comes from making a virtue of a necessity; their motto is we have to fight, so let’s make the best of it; let’s die like heroes. Before you die, they way you know you’re doing a good job as a hero is from the respect of your peers; this respect is very literally, it comes in the form of treasure, like what Briseis means to Achilles, and Chryseis to Agamemnon. The Greeks would not have been happy with a slap on the back and a “Well done.” No, treasure was the measure of your success as a hero until you died, of course, and then the mark of your heroism was to become the subject of legends and songs. Of course, these heroes would not be around hearing the stories of how great they were when Humbaba was slayed, but before they died, they could fantasize about how great their stories would be told.

Achilles is a tragic figure who believes strongly in social order, but questions the idea of fighting for glory. When Aias and Odysseus are sent by Agamemnon to plead with Achilles’ to fight for the Greeks, Achilles denies them, saying “There was no gratitude given for fighting incessantly forever against your enemies. Fate is the same for the man who holds back, the same if he fights hard” (9:316). This statement shows that Achilles is an individual, and does not conform to the ideas of the others. Achilles is portrayed as a fatalist, believing that there is no point in fighting, because the end is the same for everyone. In book nine, when Agamemnon admits he is wrong and offers gifts, Achilles still refuses to join his army in battle. He does not see Agamemnon’s gifts as a reconciliation attempt, but rather as an insult. Achilles believes that Agamemnon’s offerings are selfish and boastful, and he denies them to in order to show Agamemnon that his loyalty cannot be bought. Later in the poem, Achilles revenges Patroklos’ death by killing Hector. It is customary and proper to return a dead body to its home so it can be given a proper burial, and it is against the code of honor to perform acts of excessive cruelty. Achilles is so distraught by his friends’ death that he contradicts both of these conditions. First, he refuses to return Hector’s body to the Trojans, and then proceeds to drag it behind his carriage by the ankles. Achilles’ deliberate mutilation of Hector’s body shows the reader that he does not hold the code of honor in high regard.