Where Ḫumbaba walked, striding high (?),
The roads prepared, the way made good.
They saw the mountain of the cedar, the dwelling of the gods, the shrine of the god Irnini,
Before the mountain the cedar raised its luxuriance—
Good was its shade, full of delight.”
They had still a long way to go, however, and many things, seemingly, to overcome, before they should reach the abode of the dreaded Elamite ruler, but unfortunately, the details of their adventures are so very fragmentary that no connected sense whatever is to be made out. The last line of the tablet referring to this section, mentioning, as it does, the head of Ḫumbaba, leads the reader to guess the conclusion of the story, whatever the details may have been.
It is with the sixth tablet that we meet, for the first time, almost, with something really satisfactory in the matter of completeness, though even here one is sometimes pulled up sharp by a defective or doubtful passage.
Apparently, Gilgameš had become, at the time to which this tablet refers, very prosperous, and that, combined with his other attractions, evidently drew upon him the attention of the goddess Ištar—
“Come, Gilgameš, be thou the bridegroom,
Give thy substance to me as a gift,