Attempts to Embrace the Dead (Gilgamesh, Iliad, Odyssey, Aeneid)
I. Gilgamesh Tablet 12. Gilgamesh and the shade of Enkidu.
[At the request of the God Ea, the underworld god Nergal] freed Enkidu to speak once to kin and showed Gilgamesh how to descend halfway to Hell through the bowels of earth. Enkidu’s shadow rose slowly toward the living and the brothers, tearful and weak,
tried to hug, tried to speak, tried and failed to do anything but sob.
“Speak to me please, dear brother,” whispered Gilgamesh.
110. “Tell me of death and where you are.” “Not willingly do I speak of death,” said Enkidu in slow reply. “But if you wish to sit for a brief time, I will describe where I do stay.”
II. Odyssey 11. 204 ff (Lombardo) Odysseus and his mother’s shade:
So she spoke, and my heart yearned
To embrace the ghost of my dead mother.
Three times I rushed forward to hug her,
And three times she drifted out of my arms
Like a shadow or a dream. The pain
That pierced my heart grew even sharper…
III. Iliad 23. 100ff (Lombardo) Achilles and Patroclus’ shade:
“But come closer. Let us give in to grief,
However briefly, in each other’s arms.”
Saying this, Achilles reached out with his hands
But could not touch him. His spirit vanished like smoke,
Gone under the earth, with a last, shrill cry...
IV. Virgil Aeneid 2.790-794 Aeneas tries to embrace the shade of his dead wife Creusa (Translation by H. R. Fairclough, revised G. P. Goold)
When thus she had spoken, she left me weeping and eager to tell her much, and drew back into thin air. Thrice there I strove to throw my arms around her neck, thrice the form, vainly clasped fled from my hands, even as light winds, and most like a winged dream.
V. Virgil, Aeneid 6.695-702 (H. Rushton Fairclouh translation). Aeneas tries to embrace the shade of his father in Hades.
But he (Aeneas): “Thy shade, father (Anchises) , thy sad shade, meeting me so oft, drove me to seek these portals.
My ships ride the Tuscan sea. Grant me to clasp thy hand, grant me, O father, and withdraw thee not from my embrace!”
So he spoke, his face wet with flooding tears.
Thrice thee he strove to throw his arms about his neck;
Thrice the form, vainly clasped, fled from his hands, even as light winds, and most like a winged dream.
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