318 GEOLOGIES AND DELUGES 



a mythical hero named Izdubar or Gizdubar, perhaps the 

 same as Nimrod, that "mighty hunter before the Lord" 

 of biblical story, and plainly the prototype of the Greek 

 Heracles. 



The first tablet, containing the first chapter, is incom- 

 plete. So far as can be made out, it sets forth the 

 misfortunes of the city of Erech, probably under the 

 oppression of its Elamite enemies, who were so terrible 

 in battle that poor Ishtar, its protecting goddess, " could 

 not lift up her head against the foe." 



The second and third introduce Gizdubar (Fig. 97), 



FIG. 97. Gizdubar and Eabani fight the Bull of Ishtar; Gizdu- 

 bar fights Eabani's Lion (Babylonian Cylinder). From 

 " Chaldea," Story of the Nations. After Smith. 



already famous as a hunter, as the hero, who was looked 

 for to deliver the city. His rivals induce Ururu, the mother 

 of the gods, to fashion a strange being, Eabani, half man 

 and half bull, to fight with Gizdubar. This monster 

 comes to Erech, bringing with him a powerful lion, 

 desert-bred, to fight Gizdubar ; but the hero succeeds in 

 slaying the lion, and so wins the friendship and esteem 

 of Eabani (Fig. 97). 



In the fourth and fifth tablets the friends encounter 

 and overcome the terrible tyrant Humbaba, whose voice 

 was as " the roaring of the storm, his mouth wickedness, 



