Lugalbanda
? · Uruk
Lugalbanda is a hero of Uruk's legendary age, the subject of two Sumerian poems. In the first he falls gravely ill on a campaign against Aratta and is left behind in a mountain cave, where prayer and offerings restore him; in the second he wins the gratitude of the great Anzud bird, which grants him supernatural speed, and he races back to save the stalled army. He appears in the Sumerian King List as a king of Uruk and in tradition as a forebear of Gilgameš.
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Uruk
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Known through legend. The Sumerian King List and the Lugalbanda poems place him among the early kings of Uruk; tradition makes him the father of Gilgameš.
About Uruk
One of the oldest cities of Sumer (modern Warka, southern Iraq), sacred to Inanna and Anu, where some of the earliest known writing was found (c. 3300-3000 BCE). The Sumerian King List and later epics name Enmerkar, Lugalbanda and Gilgamesh among its early kings; these figures are known through legend and later tradition. Uruk remained a temple city into the Seleucid period, and many late scholarly tablets were excavated here; for a tablet, the pin marks where it was found.
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