As a young god-king in the poem, Gilgamesh’s arrogant practices trouble the populace until Enkidu, a wildman created by a goddess, challenges the monarch’s power. Based on the actual Assyrian king, Gilgamesh confronts many of the themes that Homer will tackle in his epic poetry: the human/deity divide, mortality, seduction, legacy. It is not surprising that even the oldest known work of literature in the world is an epic poem written on the grandest of scales. Here is a list of 20 of the greatest Epic poems in the tradition: Many will feature the might of armies in long digressions featuring weaponry and war games.There are grand battle-scenes punctuated by extended similes, ambitious analogies that stretch the imagination but strive for literary glory.There are many journeys into the underworld.Many of these begin in medias res, in the middle of the story, and may digress into the past later on in the poem.These poets plea to the gods at the very beginning to grant them the power to tell these stories with a certain forcefulness, though some admittedly pretend to do so to claim they are divinely empowered. Here are a few recurring patterns to keep in mind when considering these texts: By combining elevated language with war, betrayal, romance, adventure, and a whole lot of reflection, these twenty lengthy tomes have captured the essence of whole peoples in single (albeit gigantic) works, ranging from semi-fictional accounts of war to satirical mockeries of misguided heroism.Įpic poetry–or heroic poetry, as some of the medieval poets have called it–follows a certain time-tested formula to portray such grand representations of heroes and their followers. Get yours todayįew have better expressed the tumultuous rise and fall of civilizations better than the great Epic poets of ancient and modern times.