Gilgamesh as an Epic Hero â€“ Enkidu as the Epic-Hero Foundation and Inspiration

Preamble

The topic of the discussion that follows is, ostensibly, the epic-heroic nature of Gilgamesh.
Two questions immediately come to the fore: why just â€˜ostensiblyâ€™? And, besides, what is it for a character (or person, for that matter) to be, not just a hero, but an epic hero?

An intellectually honest assessment of the latter, one would think, has to conclude that a brief discussionâ€”such as the present oneâ€”isnâ€™t conducive to an exhaustive examination;
however, I think, productive, albeit concise, elucidation is possible. So, why â€˜epicâ€™?

What distinguishes the epic hero from the not-so-qualified â€˜genericâ€™? I would hazard a guess in terms of story.
The sweep of Gilgameshâ€™s storyâ€”in terms of plot lines, characters, mythology, themes, origin and denouement, and ambitionâ€”is perhaps definitional (if not out-rightly tautological) of its epic nature.

But, I think it is possible to go further. Iâ€™d like to suggest that a story that is epic is so greatly due to the balance and completeness of its structure, rather than just the content of the tale it tells.
My suggestionâ€”and the main idea of this paperâ€”is that the central structure of the story is the friendship between Gilgamesh and Enkidu.

The story-structure of the relationshipâ€”its balance and completenessâ€”is what generates and emanates the balance and completeness of the story as a whole.
And in that the balanced, complete structure of the storyâ€™s sweep is what makes the story epic, my suggestion is that it is the balanced, complete nature of Gilgameshâ€™s relationship with Enkidu that makes Gilgamesh an epic hero.

It is, thus, that we come back to why the epic-heroic nature of Gilgamesh is perhaps just ostensibly the topic of this discussion; it is the nature of Enkidu and his

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