In the Epic of Gilgamesh, Utnapishtim is the boat builder who survives a great flood.
Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh that the god Ea warned him to build a boat and preserve living things from a divinely sent flood. He follows the instructions, brings aboard his family, craftsmen, animals, and possessions, and survives when the storm overwhelms the land. After the waters recede, he releases birds to determine whether the ground is dry.
The episode is one of the best-known ancient flood traditions associated with the Noah story, but Utnapishtim is not Noah. The two figures belong to different literary traditions and have different names, settings, divine characters, and narrative details. The flood account appears in the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, especially Tablet XI, and has close parallels with the older Mesopotamian Atrahasis tradition. Comparative study identifies shared motifs, while the texts remain distinct works.