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Key Details
Type
CityMythology
Mesopotamian Pantheon
Coordinates
31.3242°N, 45.6367°E
About This Location
Gilgamesh's walls
Uruk is Inanna/Ishtar's city and Gilgamesh's. The epic opens and closes on the walls he built; Tablet I tells you to inspect the brickwork. Eanna is the temple precinct of Anu and Inanna. This is among the earliest urban names in any literature. The king is two-thirds god, restless, then grieving. Cult of Inanna at Uruk is archaeological fact; the cedar raid is story. Read the city as a measured circuit of baked brick.
Primary Sources
“See the wall of Uruk, which no later king could copy. Climb Uruk's wall and walk back and forth.”
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