ABSTRACT
The arduousness of Gilgamesh's journey to the otherworld is characteristic of the journey to the underworld, and there are some parallels with the latter, particularly the crossing of a body of water with the help of a boatman. A brief medieval English lyric, despite naming a specific place, gives the impression of being an invitation to an otherworld. The nature of the upper world may be conceptualized as heaven, or it may be a place of peril or unhappiness, such as the star-world, the land of the moon, or the land of the sun. Access to the lower world can be through a door or gate, a pit, hole, spring, or cavern, a mountain, cave, well, or path. There are also folktales in which the upper world is clearly the Christian Heaven, for example, The Smith and the Devil, The Tailor in Heaven, and Master Pfriem.
