Sunday, October 2, 2016

THE PUKKU AND MIKKU OF GILGAMESH



In the famous Mesopotamian Gilgamesh poem, one of the earliest known heroic epics, we are introduced to two mysterious objects of extreme importance to the protagonist: a pukku and a mikku.  Scholars have been trying for some time to figure out what these objects might be.  While a fairly clear identification has finally been made, no one has ventured so far as to try to determine what the pukku and mikku might symbolize.

For the story “Gilgamesh, Enkidu and the Netherworld”, which provides the backstory, so to speak, on these sacred objects, we might consult firstly the classic translation by Samuel Noah Kramer:


The older rendering of this tale should be supplemented by a more modern translation, such as the one that has been made accessible via the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature:


I should also cite the new work by Alhena Gadotti on the poem in question:


The best recent discussion of the pukku and mikku is to be found in A.R. George’s The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts, Volume 2.


Here is the relevant section from George’s book:





mallet. It would seem that the game was a sort of piggyback golf or solo polo. Klein reached a similar conclusion independently. 

Now, while it would seem fairly certain that the mikku is a stick and the pukku the ball, as these two objects obviously had profound religious significance can we possibly ascertain what they represented?

In “Gilgamesh, Enkidu and the Netherworld”, there are two observations we need to make.  First, the poet seems to have intentionally drawn a parallel between the god Enki’s boat and the huluppu or haleb tree.  Both are assaulted by the storm-wind, the South Wind, in particular, which throughout Mesopotamian literature is the direction from which violent storms come.  Enki’s boat is also struck by small and large hailstones.  Gilgamesh wields his great bronze axe against the tree in a fashion reminiscent of the violence perpetuated upon it earlier by the South Wind.

The denizens of the tree, once it has been planted in the goddess Inanna’s garden, are also important for us to consider. The Anzu or Imdugud-bird in the branches or crown of the tree is a stormcloud monster.  He was closely associated with the South Wind, as was his adversary, the storm god Ninurta (earlier Ninhursag).  Lilitu, who took up residence in the trunk of the tree, is related to the word lil, ‘wind, breeze’, with a secondary meaning of ‘ghost.’  We know her principally from later Jewish tradition as Lilith.  She here stands for the sky/air between the earth and the stormcloud.  The snake at the roots of the tree is probably the Euphrates river, which had carried off the huluppu tree prior to its being taken to Inanna’s garden.  If so, then we are dealing with a cosmic tree, with the stormcloud in its branches, the region of wind and rain in its trunk and the river at its root.  In other words, we have here a marvelous cosmogram that nicely depicts the water cycle in Nature. 

The mikku or stick is made from the crown of the tree, i.e. from the branches where the Imdugud-bird of the South Wind was nesting.  The pukku or ball is made from the root of the tree, where the snake/river resided.  We will recall that Enki’s boat is being assailed by the storm and the flood-tide, and this action is attended by the bombardment of hailstones.

As hailstones are round like balls, can be quite large, dangerous and destructive, and would be perceived as being batted or driven forth by the storm of the South Wind, I would identify the pukku/ball as a symbolic hailstone.  The mikku/stick is, of course, the propelling force of the South Wind.  There is no evidence in the poems that the stick could stand for the lightning, which is a notion I originally entertained.  And once again, Gilgamesh’s great axe mimics the action of the South Wind.  No reference to lightning occurs in any of the episodes involving the mikku.  

[Image: Ninurta slaying the Anzu/Imdugud-bird.] 

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