Angelina Tran - Gilgamesh and Enkidu: Fighters to Friends

 In the epic of Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh has a male friend named Enkidu. Through Gilgamesh and Enkidu’s time together there were often translations that could be interpreted as homosexual bonding rather than just male friends. This is an interesting topic to discuss as the connotations of bonding between different genders continues to this day. It is still seen today, by some people, as an odd thing for male friends to be quite physically close with hugging and arm locking yet normal for female friends. However, it would be viewed as more “normal” for male friends to be sparring just like Gilgamesh and Enkidu did. Gilgamesh and Enkidu fought each other and then became friends after realizing each other’s strength. Their tale was basically an Enemies to Lovers/Friends trope! Anyways, it is interesting to note how it is common for females to be very caring towards each other but odd if female friends started fighting each other yet vice versa for male friends. These viewpoints likely tie into the tropes of masculinity, being all rough, and femininity, all caring, which have been breaking down in recent years. Another note is how it seems to be common to respect someone more after a good fight yet despite long fought wars, the countries do not always have respect for each other after. In recent years, it seems the countries hold grudges and continue to fight even more which contradicts many of the tropes of respecting an enemy after. These were just some thoughts on the fight and friendship between Gilgamesh and Enkidu but I could not but question how similar tales play out in real life.


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