This is a quick disclaimer. There are some adult themes in this episode.

As usual, there's nothing explicit, and you can check out the post on mythpigcast.com

for more info. This week, on the Myths and Legends podcast, we're starting the epic of Gilgamesh,

a story from ancient Mesopotamia, and if you think your job is rough,

hopefully you don't have a hairy naked man leaping majestically through your office,

with his gazelle friends. Then, on the creature of the week, it's a creature that lives in the

dark forest, who can kill you with a look, and he's probably the nicest guy you'll never meet.

This is the Myths and Legends podcast, episode 54a. Did we just become best friends?

This is a podcast where I tell stories from folklore. Some are incredibly popular stories you

think you know, but with surprising origins. Other stories you might not have heard, but really should.

This is Far and Away, the oldest story we've talked about on this podcast. It's set in the third

millennia B.C. It's over 4000 years ago. For some frame of reference, The Trojan War,

which we're just getting to in the Greek stories, is set around the 13th or 12th century B.C.,

making The Trojan War about 1000 years more recent than today's story. Today's story is set in

Mesopotamia, often called the cradle of civilization. Mesopotamia is in the Middle East, but more specifically,

in modern day Iraq and Kuwait, Mesopotamia literally means between two rivers, due to it largely being

between the Tigris and the Euphrates. The story today was relatively unknown for years and years in

the West. In fact, it wasn't until the 1800s when it was found carved in stone tablets. The Sumerians,

and ancient Mesopotamia, are suspected to be the first literate culture in the area, but it's so far

back that we just don't really know. The story is probably older than 4000 years, from an oral

history that might have predated the Sumerians, but we just don't know because they didn't leave

written records. The epic famously refers to the Great Flood, something a lot of ancient world texts

...