The Battle with Humbaba

Inside the forest the two heroes hesitate. The cedars are immense; the silence is religious; somewhere in the green Humbaba is waiting. Gilgamesh sets the first stroke. The axe rings, and the sound carries. Humbaba comes down through the trees in fury. He is one of the great monsters of early literature: the face of intestines, the roar of a flood, the breath of fire, the sweat of poison. The two heroes are nearly undone on the first encounter. Their knees go. They falter.

Then Shamash sends help. Thirteen winds — the south wind, the north wind, the gale, the whirlwind, the simoom, the frost wind, the storm, the bad wind, and others — fall on Humbaba one after another. They pin him in place. They tear at his eyes. They wrap his arms. He cannot move. Gilgamesh closes with him and raises the great bronze axe. Humbaba, helpless, begs. Spare my life, he says, and I will be your gardener; I will give you all the cedars in the forest; I will be your servant before the king.

Gilgamesh wavers. The mercy in him stirs. Enkidu — newly civilized, newly fierce, perhaps overcompensating — argues against it. Kill him quickly, before Enlil hears; kill him before the great gods can intervene; this is our one chance. Gilgamesh strikes. Humbaba's head comes off. With his last breath he curses the two of them: may Enkidu die before his time; may Gilgamesh wander the world unconsoled. The curse settles into the air. They do not know yet what it will do. They cut down the largest cedar in the forest, lash the great timbers into a raft, and float them down the Euphrates back toward Uruk. The first half of the poem is over. They have won.