ilgames.

** The name of this hero is composed of three signs, which
Smith provisionally rendered Isdubar--a reading which,
modified into Gishdhubar, Gistubar, is still retained by
many Assyriologists. There have been proposed one after
another the renderings Dhubar, Namrudu, Anamarutu, Numarad,
Namrasit, all of which exhibit in the name of the hero that
of Nimrod. Pinches discovered, in 1890, what appears to be
the true signification of the three signs,Gilgamesh,
Gilgames; Sayce and Oppert have compared this name with that
of Gilgamos, a Babylonian hero, of whom. AElian has preserved
the memory. A. Jeremias continued to reject both the reading
and the identification.

Several copies of a poem, in which an unknown scribe had celebrated his
exploits, existed about the middle of the VIIth century before our era
in the Royal Library at Nineveh; they had been transcribed by order of
Assur-banipal from a more ancient copy, and the fragments of them which
have come down to us, in spite of their lacunae, enable us to restore
the original text, if not in its entirety, at least in regard to
the succession of events. They were divided into twelve episodes
corresponding with the twelve divisions of the year, and the ancient
Babylonian author was guided in his choice of these divisions by
something more than mere chance. Gilgames, at first an ordinary mortal
under the patronage of the gods, had himself become a god and son of the
goddess Aruru: "he had seen the abyss, he had learned everything that
is kept secret and hidden, he had even made known to men what had taken
place before the deluge." The sun, who had protected him in his human
condition, had placed him beside himself on the judgment-seat, and
delegated to him authority to pronounce decisions from which there was
no appeal: he was, as it were, a sun on a small scale, before whom the
kings, princes, and great ones of the earth humbly bowed their heads.*
The scribes had, therefore, some authority for treating the events of
his life after the model of the year, and for expressing them in twelve
chants, which answered to the annual course of the sun through the
twelve months.

* The identity of Gilgames with the Accadian fire-god, or
rather with the sun, was recognized from the first by H.
Rawlinson, and has been accepted since by almost all
Assyriologists. A tablet brought back by G. Smith, c