Pandemoniac Pages

Friday, April 3, 2015

HUMBABA

 HUMBABA
"The dog was a bit on the small side, but it was a definite improvement on Doug and his girlfriend's first try - a week back, when they'd actually tried to fob me off with some store-bought puppy. Through long and clever argument, however, I'd finally gotten them to cave in: If you're looking to evoke a deity who speaks through a face made of guts - one who goes by the slightly risible name of Humbaba, to be exact - you'd probably better make sure his mouth is big enough to tell you what you want to hear."
Gemma Files, The Narrow World

Huwawa (Humbaba) was a monster who guarded the pine forest. His face resembled coiled intestines, and he possessed killer rays." 
Stephanie Dalley, Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, The Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others

"Humbaba, whose shout is the flood-weapon, Whose utterance is Fire and whose breath is Death, Can hear for up to sixty leagues the sounds of his forest."
Gilgamesh, Tablet III

"He had the paws of a lion and a body covered in horny scales; his feet had the claws of a vulture, and on his head were the horns of a wild bull; his tail and phallus each ended in a snake's head." 
Georg Burckhardt translation of Gilgamesh, Tablet III

"Gilgamesh proposes an expedition to the Cedar Forest and is not put off by Enkidu’s first-hand knowledge of its terrible guardian, the ogre Humbaba." 
A.R. George, The Epic Of Gilgamesh

"Humbaba is the name of a monstrous giant guardian in the mythology of ancient Mesopotamia. Humbaba, also known as Huwawa and Kumbaba, is the guardian of the cedar forests and may originally have been a deity of nature. It was described as having a vast humanoid body with scale plates all over it, with the legs of a lion ending in vulture's talons' on its head were horns like those of a bull; the tail was long and had a snake's head at the end."
Carol Rose, Giants, Monsters and Dragons



2 comments:

  1. What-wha-why?!?!?!! Were the Sumerians even high on ergot when writing down Gilgamesh??

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yes , the Older Brother to Pazuzu....
    and guardian of the sacred ceder forest of the Gods....

    ReplyDelete