TURKIYE – LEGENDS AND MYTHS

Shahmaran

In the most frequently told version of the legend, Shahmaran has a female head. Camsab, theson of a poor family, and his friends find a well filled with honey in the forest, and the youngman goes down to the well to extract the honey. But his friends, out of greed, leave Camsabin the well after all the honey comes out. After a while, Camsab digs the spot where the lighthe sees in the soil is and finds himself in a garden as the soil collapses. The owner of thegarden is Shahmaran, the king of snakes. Listening to Camsab’s story, Şahmaran allowsCamsab to live in the garden for years after talking about human ingratitude. But after awhile, the young man says he wants to leave because he misses his family. Şahmaran lets himgo but has 2 conditions. Camsab will not tell anyone about Şahmaran’s location and willnever enter the bath.Having agreed with Şahmaran, the young man returns home and continues to live with hisfamily. But one day the ruler of the country fell ill and the vizier said that the only cure forthe disease was to eat Shahmaran meat. Then he orders everyone to be brought to the bath.Camsab’s secret is revealed here, his body is covered with scales. Unable to endure the tortureafterward, Camsab tells him where Şahmaran is. Shahmaran, who saw Camsab when he wascaught, also says the same thing he said about people’s ingratitude years ago, this time for theyoung man, and then he is killed.

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Gilgamesh

Gilgamesh, the two-thirds god and one-third human king of Uruk, a magnificent city-state, is a cruel and tyrannical king. The God of Gods listens to the people’s pleas and tells the Goddess Aruru to create a human who can deal with Gilgamesh. Aruru creates Enkidu. The naked Enkidu. He is friendly with animals, lives with them, does not let hunters near them. Hunters complain of Enkidu. The cunning Gilgamesh sends a young woman, she falls in love with him, persuades Enkidu to fight Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh and Enkidu meet, and at the end of a fierce battle, Gilgamesh is defeated.This creates a great friendship between the two. Together, they kill Hunbaba, the keeper of the cedar forests, whose gaze turns people to stone, and they take the sacred cedar tree and bring it to Uruk. The goddess Ishtar is attracted to Gilgamesh, but she does not accept Ishtar’s offer of love. He gets very angry, and asks the God of Heaven for Ishtar and the Storm Bull. He releases the animal on Uruk. The two friends defeat him as well, which angers the gods even more, and Enkidu begins to dream, seeing his death. He falls on the bed and dies. He will be devastated, Gilgamesh. Fear of death grips his heart, and he crosses the sea of death to find Utanapishti, whom he knows to be immortal, with the help of his boatman. He reaches Utanapişti’s side, he will attain immortality with the immortal herb given by him. However, before Gilgamesh has a chance to eat the herb of immortality, he is lost to a snake and returns to Uruk empty-handed.

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Lokman Hekim

Lokman Hekim was the master of all physicians according to Anatolian belief. He knew theproperties of a thousand and one kinds of flowers and herbs, made medicines, and found acure for his troubles. He did not stay in one place, he always wandered around, benefitingpeople wherever he went with his knowledge, bringing healing. According to the rumor, hearrived in Çukurova one day and was amazed by the abundance and beauty of the plain. Hestarted to heal all the patients around him. From time to time, the creek went flat, hewandered step by step, he examined the herbs all over the place one by one, but in fact hewas always looking for the herb that would be against the medicine of immortality.One night, he got tired of walking around and fell asleep under a great plane tree. He hearda voice in his sleep:“Oh Lokman, end your search now, I am the remnant of immortal life. From now on there isno death to humans or animals.” Lokman Hekim, running next to the grass that called out tohim, learned how to make the medicine from the grass and wrote it in his notebook.Witnessing everything that happened, God asked Gabriel: “Yetish Gabriel, what will happento these people if Lokman finds a cure for immortality?” said.Thereupon, Gabriel, disguised as a mortal, appeared in the direction of Lokman. They cameface to face on the bridge that is rumored to be Misis Bridge. After greeting Lokman, Gabrielwanted to look at the notebook in his hand. Just as Lokman was about to humbly bow downand hand the notebook in his hand to Gabriel, a strong wind came up and threw thenotebook into the Ceyhan river. After the notebook, Lokman immediately jumped into thewater; but no matter what he did, he couldn’t find it. When the summer came and the watersreceded, he continued his search along the river. Finally, he found the sheet of the notebooktossed into a nearby barley field with the writings erased. Thus, the recipe for immortalitywas mixed with the wind before it reached the hands of humanity.