Epic Poetry: Did you mean...?

This is the 11th tablet of the Epic of Gilgamesh. The cuneiform text on this tablet is startlingly similar to the Biblical story of Noah and his ark in the Book of Genesis. When George Smith, an assistant in the British Museum first read...

Mesopotamian clay tablet with the episodes of the epic of creation. It narrates how the god Anshar summons the gods together for a banquet. They celebrate Marduk's appointment as champion; Marduk defeated Tiamat in the primeval chaos. From...

A newly discovered partially broken tablet V of the Epic of Gilgamesh: "the episode of the journey of Gilgamesh and Enkidu." According to Professor Farouk Al-Rawi (of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London), this...

This is the reverse side of the newly discovered tablet V of the Epic of Gilgamesh. Old-Babylonian Period, 2003-1595 BCE. From Southern Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq. Currently housed in the Sulaymaniyah Museum, Iraqi Kurdistan.

The Deluge Tablet of the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh written in Akkadian (1300 - 1000 BCE)

The Roman love poet Catullus wrote passionate poems about his tempestuous relationship with 'Lesbia', as well as obscene diatribes about high profile contemporaries like Julius Caesar. In this vodcast Dr Rhiannon Evans and Dr Sonya Wurster...

A beautiful reminder to us that everything we do is absolutely sacred and wondrous. I was inspired to create this to remind us of the divine spark that is within all of us. Can you remember? Poem by Hafiz Photography by Cecilia Villalon...

Marcus Annaeus Lucanus (39-65 CE), grandson of Seneca the Elder and nephew of Seneca the Younger, was a Roman statesman and Latin poet. Born in Corduba, he came to Rome as an infant and later held the positions of quaestor and augur. Lucan's...

Sculpture from the Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul in Rosheim, France, 12th century.

Homer's Iliad describes the final year of the Trojan War, a legendary conflict between an alliance of Greek cities and the city of Troy in Anatolia. It was probably written in the 8th century BCE after a long oral tradition. The Greeks themselves...