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On the seventh tablet is the first eye-witness account of a space trip, told by Enkidu. He flew for four hours held in the brazen talons of an eagle. This is how his story goes literally: you?" And the land was like a mountain and the sea was like a lake. And again he flew for four hours and said to me: "Look down at the land. What does it look like? Look at the sea. How does it seem to you?" And the earth was like a garden and the sea like the water channel of a gardener. And he flew higher yet another four hours and spake: "Look down at the land. What does it look like? Look at the sea. How does it seem to you?" And the land looked like porridge and the sea like a water-trough.' In this case some living creature must have seen the earth from a great height. The account is too accurate to have been the product of pure imagination. Who could have possibly said that the land looked like porridge and the sea like a water-trough, if some conception of the globe from above had not existed? Because the earth actually does look like a jig-saw puzzle of porridge and water-troughs When the same tablet tells us that a door spoke like a living person, we unhesitatingly identify this strange phenomenon as a loudspeaker. And on the eighth tablet this same Enkidu, who must have seen the earth from a considerable height, dies of a mysterious disease, so mysterious that Gilgamesh asks whether he may not have been smitten by the poisonous breath of a heavenly beast. But where did Gilgamesh get the idea that the poisonous breath of a heavenly beast could cause a fatal and incurable disease? The ninth tablet describes how Gilgamesh mourns for the death of his friend Enkidu and decides to undertake a long journey to the gods, because he is obsessed by the idea that he might die of the same disease as Enkidu. The narrative says that Gilgamesh came to two mountains which supported the heavens and that between those two mountains arched the gate of the sun. At the gate of the sun he met two giants and after a lengthy discussion they let him pass, because he was two-thirds god himself. Finally Gilgamesh found the garden of the gods, beyond which stretched the endless sea. While Gilgamesh was on his way, the gods warned him twice: ‘Gilgamesh, whither are thou hurrying? Thou shalt not find the life that thou seekest. When the gods created man, they allotted him to death, but life they retained in their own keeping.' Gilgamesh would not be warned; he wanted to reach Utnapishtim, the father of men, no matter what the dangers. But Utnapishtim lived on the far side of the great sea; no road led to him and no ship flew across it except the sun god's. Braving all kinds of perils Gilgamesh crossed the sea. Then follows his reached it. The arrows and missiles which the cautious wanderers rained on the guards rebounded harmlessly. And as they reached the precincts of the 'gods', a voice roared at them: ‘Turn back! No mortal comes to the holy mountain where the gods dwell; he who looks the gods in the face must die.' Thou canst not see my face, for there shall no man see me and live ...', it says in Exodus. 'He said to me: "Look down at the land. What does it look like? Look at the sea. How does it seem to from a great height.