In the Epic of Atrahasis, Atrahasis is the flood survivor often compared with Noah. The Old Babylonian poem presents him as a wise human who is warned about a catastrophic flood and instructed to build a boat.
The poem is one of the important Mesopotamian flood traditions preserved on cuneiform tablets. Its surviving text discusses the creation of humans, divine concerns about human population and noise, and a flood sent by the gods. Atrahasis follows the warning and survives with living creatures.
Atrahasis is sometimes confused with Utnapishtim, the flood survivor in the Epic of Gilgamesh. They are different names in different literary traditions, although the Gilgamesh flood episode draws on earlier Mesopotamian material and contains related motifs.