In the Epic of Gilgamesh, the flood narrative appears on Tablet XI.
During Tablet XI, Gilgamesh meets Utnapishtim, the survivor who was granted immortality after enduring a devastating flood. Utnapishtim recounts how the god Ea warned him to build a huge boat, preserve life and wait out the waters.
The episode is one of the best-known sections of the poem because it closely parallels the flood story in the Akkadian Atrahasis tradition. It also resembles later flood accounts, including the story of Noah in the Hebrew Bible, although the Mesopotamian versions are older.
Tablet XI is not simply a separate flood myth inserted without purpose. Utnapishtim’s story answers Gilgamesh’s search for immortality by showing that his own exceptional fate cannot be repeated. Tablet XII, by contrast, contains a separate and partly unusual episode involving Enkidu’s spirit.