Atrahasis is the Babylonian flood hero instructed to build a boat in the Atrahasis Epic.
The Atrahasis Epic is an Old Babylonian literary work written in Akkadian. In its flood narrative, the god Enki, also known as Ea, warns Atrahasis about a coming flood and tells him to construct a boat to preserve himself, his family, and living creatures.
The story is one of several ancient Mesopotamian flood traditions that can be compared with Genesis and the flood account in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Similar motifs include divine warning, a specially built vessel, preservation of life, and the use of birds after the flood.
The traditions remain distinct. Atrahasis is the central human figure in this epic, while Utnapishtim fills the flood-survivor role in the Epic of Gilgamesh and Noah fills it in Genesis. Treating the three names as interchangeable obscures their separate texts and cultural settings.