zombiefreak.com

[source University of Western Ontario]

I was reading the zombie entry at Wikipedia and noticed this:

The Epic of Gilgamesh of ancient Sumer includes a mention of zombies. Ishtar, in the fury of vengeance says:

Father give me the Bull of Heaven,
So he can kill Gilgamesh in his dwelling.
If you do not give me the Bull of Heaven,
I will knock down the Gates of the Netherworld,
I will smash the doorposts, and leave the doors flat down,
and will let the dead go up to eat the living!
And the dead will outnumber the living!
It will be awful!

The Epic of Gilgamesh is believed to have been written between 2750 and 2500 BC! I didn’t realize the whole concept of zombies rising up to devour the living was as old as possibly the most ancient written text on Earth. The idea was chilling 4500 years ago and is no less disturbing today. If it was written then, it is most likely even older than that. One can only speculate.

What does this tell us? Zombies as a story device are not going away any time soon.

I can’t say I’m disappointed. This is zombiefreak.com after all.

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