The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of GilgameshAdventurers, explorers, kings, gods, and goddesses come to life in this riveting story of the first great epic--lost to the world for 2,000 years, and rediscovered in the nineteenth century Composed by a poet and priest in Middle Babylonia around 1200 bce, The Epic of Gilgamesh foreshadowed later stories that would become as fundamental as any in human history, The Odyssey and the Bible. But in 600 bce, the clay tablets that bore the story were lost--buried beneath ashes and ruins when the library of the wild king Ashurbanipal was sacked in a raid. The Buried Book begins with the rediscovery of the epic and its deciphering in 1872 by George Smith, a brilliant self-taught linguist who created a sensation when he discovered Gilgamesh among the thousands of tablets in the British Museum's collection. From there the story goes backward in time, all the way to Gilgamesh himself. Damrosch reveals the story as a literary bridge between East and West: a document lost in Babylonia, discovered by an Iraqi, decoded by an Englishman, and appropriated in novels by both Philip Roth and Saddam Hussein. This is an illuminating, fast-paced tale of history as it was written, stolen, lost, and--after 2,000 years, countless battles, fevered digs, conspiracies, and revelations--finally found. |
Contents
WHEN HISTORIES COLLIDE | 1 |
EARLY FAME AND SUDDEN DEATH | 51 |
THE LOST LIBRARY | 81 |
THE FORTRESS AND THE MUSEUM | 115 |
AFTER ASHURBANIPAL THE DELUGE | 151 |
AT THE LIMITS OF CULTURE | 198 |
THE VANISHING POINT | 236 |
SADDAMS GILGAMESH | 254 |
Notes | 273 |
Sources | 295 |
Other editions - View all
The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh David Damrosch Limited preview - 2007 |
The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh David Damrosch No preview available - 2007 |
Common terms and phrases
Abyssinia Akkadian Aleppo ancient antiquities Arab archaeological Ashurbanipal Ashurbanipal's Asshur Assyrian Assyrian and Babylonian Assyrian Discoveries Assyrian king Assyriology Babylon Baghdad began biblical British Museum brother Budge's Cedar century Chaldean Account culture cuneiform death Deluge divine E. A. Wallis Budge early East Eastern empire England English Enkidu Epic of Gilgamesh epic's Esarhaddon excavations expedition father Flood story gamesh George Smith goddess gods Henry Layard Hormuzd Rassam Humbaba Ibid inscriptions Iraq Ishtar king's Kouyunjik Kudurru Land of Nimrod language Letters from Assyrian literary literature lord the king Magdala Mesopotamia Mosul mounds Nabu never Nineveh novel omens Ottoman palace Parpola Progress of Assyriology Rassam to Layard Rawlinson royal ruins Scholars scribes Sennacherib Shamash Shamhat Shulgi Sin-leqe-unninni tablets texts Theodore Theodore's thousand tion took translation underworld Uruk Uruk's Uta-napishtim Wallis Budge writing wrote Zabibah
Popular passages
Page 305 - Nineveh and its Palaces. The Discoveries of Botta and Layard applied to the Elucidation of Holy Writ.