I N T R O D U C T I O N:
The Epic of Gilgamesh is ultimately the story of the evolution and development of humanity. The story of a wild man who, through the power of a woman, goes from wild animal to man. And a powerful king who is not satisfied by his vast wealth and power. They become brothers after fighting each other, go on a quest, and slay a beast. A powerful goddess sees Gilgamesh and wants him for her own. And as in all humans, when she is rejected, she is hurt, but and she chooses to lash out, resulting in the unfortunate end of Enkidu, the best friend. The king is plunged into grief and tries to flee his mortality. The new outlook he develops along the journey allows him to understand the fundamental basis of life and what is truly important.
Although humanity’s physical evolution had come to a stop, the cultural and intellectual evolution began to grow exponentially. This lead to the birth of ancient Mesopotamia, which was made up of a collection of cities. Although it was never a unified civilization, it was a well-established society with a developed culture and social hierarchy. Written language was first invented in this culture, and quickly, the written record was popularized. This resulted in the recording of stories that had until then only been oral tradition. The Epic of Gilgamesh was one such story. The Epic of Gilgamesh personified the evolution of modern man, bringing to light to the development of humankind it took to reach Mesopotamia and the way of life within the civilization. While simultaneously displaying a deep understanding of the parts of humanity that will forever remain untamed.
Fig. 1. Photo: Ruins of the Ziggurat of the Eanna Temple of Uruk
W I L D M A N:
Reading from the “NK Sanders” Translation of the epic, Nancy Katherine Sanders was a British archaeologist, prehistorian, and independent scholar. Although she never attended a formal university, she has written many historical books and worked for the British Museum. As in her translation, the epic begins with Gilgamesh, the king of Uruk. He had built strong, high walls to protect his people, and grand temples to house his gods [Fig. 1]. He was a demigod who personified the virtues of his people. Gilgamesh had a dream about a beast, made by the gods from a pinch of clay to be his equal, Enkidu the beast, began his life as a hairy wanderer of the field, grazing with the gazelles and playing with other animals at the watering hole. Sanders, in her translation, describes Enkidu as covered from head to toe in matted hair with long “woman-like” hair on his head (Sandars, 3). Described as heavy-bodied and brawny, he stands a remnant of the beginnings of human life.
Enkidu’s origins were an acknowledgment of the power of our ancestors and a manifestation of the power of knowing your roots. He was a continuation of the stories that first began when previous evolutions of humans walked the earth alongside modern man [Fig. 2.1]. In the early days, humans shared the planet with Homo Neanderthalensis, who, according to Keely Clinton in the research summary that she completed with the W. Montague Cobb Research Laboratory, also used tools, made art, and may have spoken.
Fig. 2.1 Illustration of five species of human evolution.
They had a smaller area in their brains for social cognition due to the massive amount of space allotted in their brains for vision and body control (Clinton,2015). This would certainly explain Enkidu’s enormous physical prowess and difficulty interacting with humans at the beginning of his story. Modern humans also walked this earth with Homo Erectus, who thrived for nearly two million years. A relatively tall predecessor to humans, Adam Van Arsdale of the department of Anthropology at Wellesley College, observes in his research paper just how tall Homo Erectus got in comparison to the first of modern man. Homo Erectus usually ranged in height from 5’ -6’ far taller then evolutions before them, they didn’t have quite the capacity of language but still lived in small groups. The fossil record shows that these groups were quite organized with a division of labor, groups of people gathering, hunting, and de-boning fish, or preparing animals to eat. It is still a mystery how they managed to spread all over the world, covering Africa, Europe, and Asia (Van Arsdale, 2013). Having lived in the times where you might come across one of these beings in your everyday life seems to be a very intimidating prospect. All with varying levels of social skills and language, it must have lead to many stories as groups of humans, Neanderthals, and Homo Erectus interacted. We know that they did as neanderthal DNA is still found in the genes of humans today [Fig. 2.2]. It is unknown why these species died out specifically, but the significant theories right now are that the earth warming, as well as their very small group dynamics, kept from them flourishing as humans have. The major shift in temperature caused the extinction of dominant animal species and shifting landscape, which may have lead to their ultimate demise. There are also unfortunate theories involving mass genocide and significant battles fought, but these are all speculation.
Fig. 2.2 Ancient cave paintings in Argentina’s Cueva de las Manos, thought to be the hand prints of both humans and neanderthals.
In these times before Mesopotamia and the invention of writing, stories were passed from generation to generation as part of oral tradition. There must have been many stories about living in a world with a lot of people and animals that kind of look like you. Something that modern humans still do today! Throughout history, people have been fascinated with the idea of half-beast creatures. N.S Gill, who has been interviewed by National Geographic for her expertise, observed that stories of these sorts of creatures are found in the legends of almost every culture on earth [Fig. 2.3](Gill,2019).
Fig. 2.3 Sandro Botticelli. Pallas and the Centaur, early 1480s Painting of the goddess Athena grabbing the hair of a centaur.
These stories live on to modern-day, from mermaids reimagined in the 1984 movie Splash, to the story of Sleeping Beauty, a story with a horned villain who is herself part dragon, part human. The lasting power of these stories is evidence of their power, as well as the internal battle we all fight between the cool intellect and logic that has come with our continued evolution, and the wild animal we still have within all of us. All these previous evolutions had varying levels of intelligence and ways of interacting with each other. Although they all died out many years before The Epic of Gilgamesh was written down, there must have been many stories passed down from that time. And since it is described that he still retains many of his feral qualities when he joins the human world, It would make sense for him to be an earlier evolution then homo sapiens sapiens.
T H E T A M I N G O F M A N:
No matter what social status, Mesopotamians enjoyed singing, music, and telling stories and legends after dinner for entertainment. A tradition that carried on from their hunter-gatherer time spent around the fire together and continues in the consumption of television and music today. Many of these tales were written as songs and were used to pass on values through tales of old and stories of their gods. Wealthy people would have slaves sing and play music for them during and after dinner, and lower-class families would play music for each other after their meals, singing, and playing instruments if they could afford them. Their cultural love of music was so great they made leaps and bounds in instrumental development, furthering the evolution made possible by living a settled agricultural lifestyle [Fig. 3.1]. They created percussion, wind, and string instruments remarkably like the ones we have today. Music was so important to their culture that one queen took a step farther and had her royal musicians poisoned and buried alongside her in her tomb, a taste of things to come, such as the Viking and Egyptian burial ceremonies. Music was incredibly important to Mesopotamian life, carved in many artworks and written about extensively in the clay tablet records that have been discovered.
Fig. 3.1 The Queen’s lyre from the Royal Cemetery at Ur, The British Museum, London. Old wooden stringed instrument
There were some fierce women in this story, Illustrating the reduced inequality between men and women in this culture. Shamhat was the “harlot” hired to play a central role in the Taming of Enkidu. According to Andrew George, Professor of Babylonian at the University of London, a job as a prostitute was a very high-level position in ancient Mesopotamia (BBC,2016). She was hired by the shepherds to “domesticated him” by having sex with him for six days and seven nights, after which the animals all rejected him, and he no longer terrorized them (the shepherds), much like Delilah was used to tame the mighty Samson. She taught him how to drink beer and eat bread, which made him so happy he bathed, anointed himself with oil, and ‘became a human.’ Then he put on clothes and ‘Became a warrior.’ He took up his weapon and protected the sheep (Sandars, 8). The complete transformation of Enkidu from a beast to a warrior through a hearty meal made of cereal grains frames the transformation of modern humans from hunter-gatherers to civilization-dwelling farmers perfectly, as they also went from hunting animals to protecting them as their own. New stone tooling techniques made the domestication of plants and livestock feasible as a way of life. Once humans were no longer dependent on hunting, fishing, and gathering, the cultivations of cereal grain enabled people to build permanent homes and villages after a period of semi-nomadic living. Cristian Violatti, a key contributor and editor for the online Ancient History Encyclopedia, anthropologist, and philosopher, illustrated that pre-agricultural societies would live in a network of campsites, moving depending upon the season to exploit seasonal resources. The group might adopt one primary site as a “basecamp,” hunting and gathering activities being performed part of the year, and farming during the rest, much like the shepherds that captured Enkidu who would herd their sheep across the land (Violatti, 2019). This gradual process involved the taming of animals like sheep, but also of the progressive domestication of the wild parts of humanity.
Fig. 3.2 Model of Sumerian plowing technology
According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, farming began in steps, starting with barley, wheat, sheep, and goats, then later, including cattle and pigs. These innovations began in the middle east and spread across Egypt and The act of breaking ground was symbolic, too, as plots of farmland were created by utilizing slash and burn techniques, using stone tools to till the soil, turning the dirt, and preparing it for seeding [Fig. 3.2] (Britannica, 2019). As for Mesopotamia specifically, their chief grain was barley, so naturally, they were the first to invent beer [Fig. 3.3]! They had a goddess of beer, and they would sing a hymn to her.
Fig. 3.3 Clay tablet imprinted with information for beer rations
The lyrics were composed of the first recipe for beer. They ate barley porridge and bread supplemented with farmed and hunted animal meat. At first, archaeologists thought that their food options were very limited till a bunch of recipes were uncovered, showing that they had a great variety of foods and types of food that they ate, and they had recorded the recipes! This level of settlement is the foundation that enabled Mesopotamia to develop.
T H E T A M E D M A N:
As soon as writing was invented, it became a critical part of society, reinventing education and record-keeping, creating evidence that enables us to know-how their communities functioned. As Joshua Mark, Co-Founder of The Ancient History Encyclopedia put it, “The scribes seemed almost obsessed with writing everything down” (Mark,2019). In the detail of these records, we know a lot more than just the rulers and what was bought and sold, we know the names of individual people, and what daily life looked like. Because of these records, we have a relatively clear understanding of how people lived and worked, and archaeologists uncover more of these clay tablets every year, making for an even clearer picture of life in ancient Mesopotamia. Their relationship with life, death, and legacy is shockingly modern, and we have the privilege of knowing all of this, the epic itself, due to the records kept. It is fascinating to see what things were considered necessary, we have artifacts, but this story exposes more then we could have ever gotten from studying ancient runes [Fig. 4.1]. We are first introduced to Gilgamesh through learning about the dreams he was telling his mother, Lady Wildcow Ninsun. His mom was a minor goddess known for her wisdom, and she immediately knows that the ax in his dreams is representative of a man that Gilgamesh would love, which turns out to be about Enkidu, the beast-man. The ax is briefly mentioned a few other times in a practical way until Enkidu dies. Gilgamesh then wandered until he found a purpose to live in a tavern. He then drew his ax to continue his journey. It’s mentioned when he heads towards his new objective as if the ax itself is Enkidu, back from the dead, and by his side once again.
Fig. 4.1 Mesopotamian ruins in the town of Ur, Iraq
The choice of this weapon is extremely relevant to the development of humans so far. As written in the Encyclopedia Britannica, the first tools ever developed were “Hammer Stones,” they were denser stones that early man would use to chip other rocks into sharp edges for cutting blades, which later became spears and handaxes. As the history progressed, tools become more diverse in different parts of the world, and various groups sought different materials and techniques to make tools, they went from using just stone to bone and antler before discovering all that metal had to offer (Richard, n.d). When humans moved into the copper age, so did their weapons, but stone tools, particularly axes, were still widely used due to their superior strength, accessibility, and durability. These axes are what enabled people to begin clearing the land and breaking up the soil to first plant crops. With regard to ancient Mesopotamian clothing, garments were not as significant as they would grow to be in ancient Egypt but were still an incredibly important symbolic piece in Gilgamesh and Enkidu’s transformations from men to beasts. Enkidu is clothed as a significant part of his change from animal to man, and when Ishtar sees Gilgamesh in his royal robes, she found him so attractive she proposed marriage, offering him garments as part of her proposal. And last but not least, the transformation of Gilgamesh from a King, crowned and battling the Holy Bull, to a husk of a man, roaming the countryside for a cure to mortality wearing a lion’s skin.
Fig. 4.2 Stone carving showing Mesopotamian farmers at work In Ancient Mesopotamia, they wore clothes made of linen, skin, and wool. The garments varied based on age and occupation. Women’s clothes are depicted as being a long multi-colored tunics made out of either wool or linen. Depending on socio-economic status, they were ornamented and included different patterns. Men’s clothes were varied based on age and occupation. The base garments were either long tunics made of linen [Fig. 4.2] or wool, or pleated skirts made from goats skin. The main factor that changed was the length; younger men tended to wear shorter garments. And as for patterns and color, most men’s garments were monotone with only kings, soldiers, or scribes dressing in color. Usually, embroidered and tasseled capes and shawls were worn in bad weather. And for footwear, everyone wore relatively simple sandals; women’s were often decorated with beads and other ornaments. Girls dressed like their mothers and boys dressed like their fathers, and there was intense practicality at the core of these designs.
Fig. 4.3 Beautiful pieces of colorful Mesopotamian jewelry Humans had evolved past wearing animal skins in the way displayed by Gilgamesh and the lion skin, and understanding what was considered the standard allows the audience to understand the lion skin as a representation of the degradation of Gilgamesh from all-powerful demi-god/King, to a simple beast of the land, the mirror of his brother Enkidu. Gilgamesh fails to find the path to eternal life, but, as Frances Reynolds says, he sees the city of Uruk before him and realizes, “that while every mortal individual will die, the human race will be eternal, and the city stands as an expression of humanity” (BBC, 2016). The city, as the expression of humanity, is a genuinely fascinating parallel; it begs the question of what defines humanity? A word that simultaneously stands for humankind and the goodness we are capable of it is such a beautiful thought, even though they were at the very beginning of human evolution, Gilgamesh was able to see how far humans had come already. What had begun as a pack of wild animals and had, over time, developed into a community of people living in harmony within the walls Gilgamesh had built. The purpose of his entire adventure had just been so that he could appreciate what he already had built. He had to understand how it was to be a caveman again before he could understand the power of Uruk.
U N T A M A B L E M A N:
Fig. 5.1 Terracotta plaque of Humbaba from the Louvre
Our two heroes battled Humbaba, a fierce demon tasked with guarding the “Cedar Forest,” [Fig. 5.1] which was a dense forest full of sacred trees forbidden to humanity. His clothes made in a way that paralyzed his enemies with fear. The forest was used to prove a point, as ancient Mesopotamia was in the middle of a desert, any trees or tropical forest large enough to be considered a forest would be incredibly far away. The paralyzing clothing meant to draw on an understanding of the instinctual fight or flight reflex within all beings. Introduced in the BBC4 podcast “In Our Time” by Andrew George, Professor of Babylonian Studies at the University of London, once they got into the forest, their ears were filled with music. Birds and bugs were singing, all making music for Humbaba, as they make a point of saying that he can hear over vast distances (BBC, 2015). This is a nod to the cultural love of music that humans had since their evolution, as well as an acknowledgment that all beings, no matter how wild, could appreciate music. After the great fight between the three men, Gilgamesh and Enkidu savagely cut out Humbaba’s organs and teeth, which alludes to the beast being elephant-like, expressing the importance of the ivory trade, and the perceived value of that material (BBC, 2016). Another nod to the history of human development, ivory has been a critical carving and decorative medium since the first humans. The Venus of Hohle Fels [Fig. 5.2] is the first depiction of a human, carved in ivory; it was named after the cave it was found in, Anthropologists at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand published a study arguing that Rubenesque figurines symbolized hope for a well-nourished community. These sorts of figures were found all over the world, some of them carved, others with traces of pigment signifying that these may have been further embellished with paint or inlaid with precious metals. The common themes were the rounded belly and feminine form, an understanding of the wild need to reproduce. To humans, the female form has always been powerful, carvings of women were put on the fronts of ships to protect them from the tumultuous, unpredictable seas. Some women are millionaires for taking pictures in clothes, and the releasing of a sex tape is enough to launch an entire family into fame and fortune.
Fig. 5.2 Very small figure of a woman carved out of ivory
In contrast to this delicate piece of history, Humbaba was personified using natural disasters to explain his power. “Humbaba’s roar is a Flood, his mouth is fire, and his breath is death” (Sandars,10)! Strong weather spelled death for these people, as natural disasters still do today; this makes these comparisons to Humbaba’s power all the more powerful. One example of the devastation of relatively minor weather. Wealthier people would live in homes of sunbaked brick [Fig. 5.3], painting their doorways red for protection, as it was common for these homes to collapse in the rainy season. As a solution to how common it was for these homes to collapse, there was a law that it was the builder’s responsibility if the house collapsed. It the collapse killed a member of the household, the builder would be put to death. If it killed the son of the householder, they would kill the son of the builder. Those working on the home would pray to specific gods before and after construction, praying for guidance, for strong homes and safety, trying to take control over something in which they had none. Less fortunate people would live in sturdy houses made out of a system of woven reeds. These homes were built by creating columns out of tightly wrapped bundles of grasses that would be put into the ground and attached at the top; then, the gaps would be filled in using mats of woven reeds although they were cheaper to build the consequences of rain was more uncomfortable and soggy then devastating. The primary purpose of a house in southern Iraq was to provide shelter from the twelve hours of unrelenting heat in the summer and accommodation during the rainy season. They would burn palm to heat the home during the rainy season, poor homes using a shallow pit, lined with clay to contain the flame, while wealthier households had decorated metal braziers for burning things safely (Joshua, 2019). Although we have come far, humans are all still trying to huddle away from the weather in their caves; the caves have just become more advanced.
Fig. 5.3 Example of the sun baked brick used for building
When Gilgamesh was washing after the battle with Humbaba, donning his royal garments and crown, the goddess Ishtar, who dwelt in the temple built for her in Uruk, laid her eyes upon him. In her impulsive lust, she proposed marriage, offering him beautiful garments, strength, and speed. Offered him things that were typical for a man to provide a woman at the time: wealth, comfort, and prosperity. She, as the goddess of love and war, was an incredibly passionate but violent and vengeful woman. Gilgamesh turns her down with the utmost disrespect, listing many of her past relationships and their endings one of these stories being:
“You loved the Shepherd, the Master Herder, who continually presented you with bread baked in embers, and who daily slaughtered for you a kid. Yet you struck him, and turned him into a wolf, so his own shepherds now chase him and his own dogs snap at his shins (Sandars,23).”
She then goes to her parents, demanding the Bull of Heaven, threatening to smash down the gates of the Netherworld and unleash the dead to devour the living should she not get her way. She receives it in exchange for seven years of famine for the people. The Bull of Heaven was a magical bull, the ultimate sign of masculinity, demonstrating once again their cultural appreciation of dreams and the perceived foresight of their king, Gilgamesh. As he had a vision earlier in the story when he sees a bull splitting the ground by stomping his hoof, and it comes to fruition at the beginning of their battle, the ground swallowing hundreds of their young men, an act that when reenacted by world wars has proved to be equally devastating even today. Ishtar commanded the bull to fight Gilgamesh, and when the beast was defeated, Enkidu threw the leg at her, displaying a human’s natural tendency to need to have the last word, and ultimately cursing Enkidu to his ultimate death. According to Frances Reynolds Shillito, Fellow in Assyriology at the Oriental Institute, the end of this battle as the justification for the constellation of Taurus. Enkidu’s last rebellious act, being what kills him, is incredibly powerful. He had gone from beast to man, battled a creature beyond anyone’s worst nightmares, trekked incredible distances with Gilgamesh, and what killed him was his own Hubris. This section of the story stands as a parable of knowing when to quit, and I wonder if it was regarded as highly as the biblical parables encouraging specific values.
Fig. 5.4 Terracotta wall sculpture of Gilgamesh slaying the bull of heaven
Fables are an incredibly powerful tool to teach lessons and remain essential today. If the monkeys jumping on the bed had died when they fell off and bumped their head, I doubt the rest of them would have continued to jump on the bed.
C O N C L U S I O N:
Deep understanding of the Epic of Gilgamesh and knowledge of the first major civilization of humankind is incredibly powerful. This subject is the core of understanding human desires and behavior. Ancient Mesopotamia was the first time humans settled enough to form a deep and lasting culture and way of life. The understanding of which allows me to fully grasp our privilege from living where we do in time. There was a day when people’s knowledge of different parts of the world was just stories and artwork if they were privileged enough to have access to it. Today we can look at a scattering of bones and debris in the dirt and figure out who these people were! How they lived, what they loved, and how they died and treated death. This knowledge gives us the tools to reflect on our place in history, the simultaneous progression, and regression of society. Our vast collective knowledge is powerful, and I want to understand how to wield it. Education is the greatest and most genuinely awesome tool we have at our disposal, and to it, I consider myself to be a scribe like those of Mesopotamia. I am never going to stop learning. Some believe education is a piece of paper in a dusty frame, but to me, knowledge is both a living breathing thing and an unquenchable thirst. Living a life of the mind is a life that is well and deeply spent. Our little lizard brains want us to be clocking in and out, running on treadmills and only seeing as far as the newest trends, but that is not enough. Humanity went from basic flight to landing on the moon in 60 years. We completely eradicated smallpox, a disease that killed many and left its survivors disfigured, no longer exists because of human accomplishment. We have achieved so much, and we are capable of so much more than mundanity. We are all scribes making our unique mark on history, they may all be small, but it took many strikes to carve Michelangelo’s David. All you get to control is the shape your hit on the chisel is going to make. To keep these stories alive is to understand the roots of humanity. And to understand your roots is to understand yourself, all the time, blood, sweat, and tears it took to get to you. You are the culmination of all of the people that came before you. And are uniquely privileged by all of the innovation and discovery that people before you have made. But at the core, we have not changed. You can close your eyes and imagine the Epic of Gilgamesh being told to sleepy children after dinner in the grass hut just as people read Goodnight Moon and Harry Potter to sleepy children today. There is power and fulfillment in knowledge that can’t be achieved in any other way, whether it is working towards the future or understanding the past, we must never stop learning for what’s to come, and we must always remember where we came from.
T H A N K Y O U!
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A N N O T A T I O N S:
BBC Radio 4. “Epic of Gilgamesh.” In our Time, Apple Podcasts, Nov 3 2016, https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/in-our-time/id73330895?i=1000377455099
Clinton, Keely. “Average Cranium/ Brain Size of Homo Neanderthalensis vs. Homo Sapiens.” W. Montague Cobb Research Laboratory, W. Montague Cobb Research Laboratory, 24 Dec. 2015, www.cobbresearchlab.com/issue-2-1/2015/12/24/average-cranium-brain-size-of-homo-neanderthalensis-vs-homo-sapiens.
Mark, Joshua J. “Daily Life in Ancient Mesopotamia.” Ancient History Encyclopedia, Ancient History Encyclopedia, 5 Oct. 2019, www.ancient.eu/article/680/daily-life-in-ancient-mesopotamia/.
Collon, Dr Dominique. “History - Ancient History in Depth: Mesopotamia.” BBC, BBC, 1 July 2011, www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/cultures/mesopotamia_gallery_01.shtml.
Sandars, N. K., trans. The Epic of Gilgamesh. London: Penguin, 1972.
Pittioni, Richard, et al. “Stone Age.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., www.britannica.com/event/Stone-Age.
McGeough, Joseph A., and Richard S. Hartenberg. “Hand Tool.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., www.britannica.com/technology/hand-tool#ref424372.
BBC Radio 4. “Epic of Gilgamesh.” In our Time, Apple Podcasts, Nov 3 2016, https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/in-our-time/id73330895?i=1000377455099
Van Arsdale, Adam. “Homo Erectus - A Bigger, Smarter, Faster Hominin Lineage.” Nature News, Nature Publishing Group, 2013, www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/homo-erectus-a-bigger-smarter-97879043/?utm_source=commission_junction&utm_medium=affiliate.
Violatti, Cristian. “Neolithic Period.” Ancient History Encyclopedia, Ancient History Encyclopedia, 3 Nov. 2019, www.ancient.eu/Neolithic/.
Gill, N.S. “Minotaur to Hell Boy: Half Human, Half Animal Creatures from Mythology.” ThoughtCo, ThoughtCo, 24 Oct. 2019, www.thoughtco.com/name-of-half-man-half-beast-120536.
P H O T O S:
Cover BBC Radio 4. “Epic of Gilgamesh.” In our Time, Apple Podcasts, Nov 3 2016, https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/in-our-time/id73330895?i=1000377455099 Fig. 1.1 “Ancient Mesopotamia.” Ancient Mesopotamian History, http://ancientneareast.tripod.com/Mesopotamia.html. Fig. 2.1 Tuttle, Russell Howard. “Human Evolution.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 1 Nov. 2019, https://www.britannica.com/science/human-evolution. Fig. 2.2 Hamrick, Patty. “The World’s Oldest Cave Paintings Were Probably Made by Neanderthals.” Massive Science, 13 Dec. 2018, https://massivesci.com/articles/cave-art-neanderthal-painting/. Fig. 2.3 Gill, N.S. “Minotaur to Hell Boy: Half Human, Half Animal Creatures from Mythology.” ThoughtCo, ThoughtCo, 24 Oct. 2019, www.thoughtco.com/name-of-half-man-half-beast-120536. Fig. 3.1 Klimczak, Natalia. “Bask in the Beauty and Melody of the Ancient Mesopotamian Lyres of Ur.” Ancient Origins, Ancient Origins, 18 Dec. 2016, https://www.ancient-origins.net/artifacts-other-artifacts/bask-beauty-and-melody-ancient-mesopotamian-lyres-ur-007214. Figure 3.2 + 4.3 https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-middle-east/mesopotamia#&gid=ci024d5f5040032443&pid=sumerian-gettyimages-55857024
Figure 3.3 Amin, Osama Shukir Muhammed. “Mesopotamian Beer Rations Tablet.” Ancient History Encyclopedia, Ancient History Encyclopedia, https://www.ancient.eu/image/4849/mesopotamian-beer-rations-tablet/. Figure 4.1 Crabbean, Jan Van Derr. “Ruins of Ur.” Ancient History Encyclopedia, Ancient History Encyclopedia, https://www.ancient.eu/image/347/ruins-of-ur/. Figure 4.2 History.com Editors. “Mesopotamia.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 30 Nov. 2017, https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-middle-east/mesopotamia#&gid=ci024d5f5040032443&pid=sumerian-gettyimages-122220137. Figure 4.3 Fernandez, Raul, et al. “Mesopotamian Jewelry .” Nammu, 20 Feb. 2018, https://nammu.com/eng/mesopotamian-jewelry/. Figure 5.1 “Humbaba.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 30 Oct. 2019, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humbaba. Figure 5.2 Curry, Andrew. “The Cave Art Debate.” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 1 Mar. 2012, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-cave-art-debate-100617099/. Figure 5.3 History.com Editors. “Mesopotamia.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 30 Nov. 2017, https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-middle-east/mesopotamia#&gid=ci024d5f5040032443&pid=sumerian-gettyimages-952586152. Figure 5.4 “Bull of Heaven.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 6 Nov. 2019, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bull_of_Heaven.