lecture 1 gilgamesh and imagination

GilgameshSocial

Imaginationand you

Edw. Mitchell, HUM 101 September 21, 2012

Gilgamesh, the historical person:

•King of the city of Uruk about 2800 BC

Gilgamesh, the legend:

•represented in mesopotamian art

•the hero of epic poems – story poems

Gilgamesh in Mesopotamian art Gilgamesh kills the Bull of Heaven [ = drought]

Enkidu and Gilgamesh kill the Bull of Heaven

clay tableta fragment from Gilgamesh: the Great Flood

SUMERIA AND URUK

Sumeria:– the first “city” societies > the first “civilization”, beginning

4000-3000 BC

– follows the neo-lithic [ new stone-age] revolution > the agricultural revolution in Mesopotamia 9000-5000 BCagriculturedomestication of animalssettled societies (permanent villages and towns)

Before this agricultural revolution, human societies lived as “hunters and gatherers”

Major cities of the Sumerian and Babylonian era

URUK: divided into three parts and sacred center

houses

gardens

fields

temples

The Sumerian city: a representation of totality

Inside the walls: life, agriculture, labor, authority > order > civilization

Outside the walls?Outside the circle: ???

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UN-HUMAN

HUMBABA

What’s new about Sumeria?

New technologies in– war

– agriculture

– labor

Especially, storage technology.

Storage of necessities until the next harvest – essential for agricultural societies and civilization

History of Civilization: “objectified” in objects of storage technology

Writing – a key storage technology

But what is really new about Sumeria?

a new social form:

hierarchy

For the first time in human history: society is divided into classes

Hier-archy [original meaning: rule by the high priest]

organization by class or status.

high status rules low status.

The higher class has the power to command. The higher class has political authority. This conception of authority begins with Sumeria.

authority

author = [the one who is the origin of something]

> > writer

the one who writes the law = authority

the one who speaks has the power to command

Sumerian ziggurat – monument to hierarchy

Hierarchy – Sumeria and after

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Hierarchy:Iso-morphs of imaginary order

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patriarchal family

cosmos / gods

knowledge

representations like this one

The real Sumerian heritage:

commands come from the top and go down

taxes and resources come from the bottom and go up

Property stone: the king gives land to his warriors. The warriors collect taxes from the peasants on that land.

The real Sumerian heritage:

commands come from the top and go down

taxes and resources come from the bottom and go up

Palace of the Soviets, Moscow -1930’s (never completed)

Sacramento, California

Since 4000 BC the basic elements of every well organized society exist:

Priests, slaves, police, and prostitutes.

And we do not know how or why this occurred.

-- Cornelius Castoriadis

Hunter – Gatherers in the Amazon(the anti-sumerians)

Among hunter-gatherers:

• The chief must give gifts to the others. For this reason he works harder than others.

• The chief must give speeches everyday.

• But the chief has no power to command. No authority.

• When the chief speaks, the others do not listen. Or they pretend not to listen.

The City is the place and symbol of the state -- of hierarchy

houses

gardens

fields

temples

order

disorder = chaos

order

Sumer-think 101: • Everyone, everything has an identity

• Every identity has a function

• Every function has its place

Symbolic-Identitary Operations

identity means sameness: the same as, identical to

A = A A is identical to A

A ≠ -A A is not identical to not A

this = this

this ≠ that

This cannot be this and that.

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Our hunter-gatherers say: In truth, we are this and we are that. It is language that prevents us from being this and that.

• Everyone, everything has an identity

• Every identity has a function

• Every function has its place

This symbolic order of identity is represented in the pre-modern city: “like goes with like”

artisans

warriors

priestsshopkeepe

rs merchants

Political Theory of pre-modern civilizations

The imaginary order is made visible in the ancient City

•identity -- function -- proper place

• each identity group dresses (by law) in the proper manner.

The “city” is both the place and the visible symbol of pre-modern rule/order

In Uruk he built walls, a great rampart and temples for blessed Eanna and for Ishtar. Look at it still today...

Climb upon the wall of Uruk; walk along it, I say; regard the foundation and examine the masonry.

Is it not burnt brick and good?