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Hammurabi, the ruler of Babylon, is best known for developing a code of laws known as the Code of Hammurabi, which was used to regulate Mesopotamian society.
Hammurabi’s Code: 282 Laws Punishments for crimes depended on rank in society. In most cases, nobles paid fines while commoners faced death, physical abuse, or physical mutilation.
Who Was Hammurabi
Who Was Hammurabi
Hammurabi was born circa 1810 BCE in Babylon, now modern-day Iraq. He transformed an unstable collection of city-states into a strong empire spanned ancient Mesopotamia. Hammurabi's lasting contribution to western society was his set of laws written on twelve stones and displayed publicly for all to see, the most common being, "Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth." The laws are generally known as the Code of Hammurabi.
Code of Hammurabi Summary
In approximately 1771 BCE, Hammurabi, king of the Babylonian Empire, decreed laws for every city-state to better govern his growing empire. Known today as the Code of Hammurabi, the 282 laws are one of the earliest and more complete written legal codes from ancient times. The codes have served as a model for establishing justice in other cultures and are believed to have influenced laws established by Hebrew scribes, including those in the Book of Exodus. The codes were carved into a massive monolith of black diorite, eight feet high. Lost for centuries after the fall of Babylon in 1595 BCE, the pillar was rediscovered in the ruins of the Elamite city of Susa in 1901
The Hammurabi Code is not a complete set of laws, but more a series of enactments addressing specific cases and subjects such as slavery, debt, commercial regulations, marriage, and inheritance. There are many codes that prescribe varying degrees of punishment for crimes, compensation for specific injuries, and fees for surgeons, barbers, and veterinarians. a few examples are.
# 18. If the slave will not give the name of the master, the finder shall bring him to the palace; a further investigation must follow, and the slave shall be returned to his master.
# 48. If anyone owes a debt for a loan, and a storm prostrates the grain, or the harvest fails, or the grain does not grow for lack of water; in that year he need not give his creditor any grain, he washes his debt tablet in water and pays no rent for this year.
# 50. If he gives a cultivated corn field or a cultivated sesame field, the corn or sesame in the field shall belong to the owner of the field, and he shall return the money to the merchant as rent.
#161 - If a man marries a woman, and she bears sons to him; if then this woman dies, then shall her father have no claim on her dowry; this belongs to her sons.
# 196. If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out.
#209. If a man strikes a free-born woman so that she loses her unborn child, he shall pay ten shekels for her loss.
# 221. If a physician heals the broken bone or diseased soft part of a man, the patient shall pay the physician five shekels in money.
#224. If a veterinary surgeon performs a serious operation on an ass or an ox and cures it, the owner shall pay the surgeon one-sixth of a shekel as a fee.
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