The Code of Hammurabi

The Code of Hammurabi is not, as often thought, the world’s oldest law code. Fragments of older texts exist, some of which Hammurabi clearly borrowed from. Even before the first written code, many of these laws must have existed as customs in Mesopotamia. The significance of Hammurabi’s Code is that it is the oldest law code in the world that we have in near complete form. As such, it teaches us a great deal about history's oldest known civilization, Mesopotamia. The Code was compiled during the reign of Hammurabi, the king of the Old Babylonian Empire around 1700 BC. It originally had 282 laws, but several were erased by invaders. The following is a selection of laws, not every law that still exist.

If a man has accused another of laying a spell upon him, but has not proved it, the accused shall go to the sacred river and plunge in. If the sacred river shall conquer him, he that accused him shall take possession of his house. If the sacred river shall show his innocence, and he is saved, his accuser shall be put to death. The accused shall appropriate the house of him that accused him.

If a man has borne false witness in a trial, or has not established the statement that he made, if the case be a capital trial, that man shall be put to death.

If he has borne false witness in a civil case, he shall pay the damages in that suit.

If a man has stole goods from a temple, or house, he shall be put to death; and he that has received the stolen property from him shall be put to death.

8. If a patrician has stolen ox, sheep, as, pig, or ship, he shall pay thirtyfold. If he be a

plebian, he shall return tenfold. If the thief cannot pay, he shall be put to death.

14. If a man has stolen a child, he shall be put to death.

17. If a man has caught either a male or female runaway slave in the open field and has brought him back to his owner, the owner of the slave shall give him two shekels of silver.

19. If the captor has secreted that slave in his house and afterward that slave has been caught in his possession, he shall be put to death.

21. If a man has broken into a house he shall be killed before the breach and buried there.

22. If a man has been caught committing highway robbery, he shall be put to death.

23. If the highwayman has not been caught, the man that has been robbed shall state an oath what he has lost and the city or district governor in whose territory the robbery took place shall restore to him what he has lost.

25. If a fire has broken out in a man’s house and one who has come to put it out has coveted the property of the householder and taken any of it, that man shall be cast into the same fire.

27. If a man has been assigned to garrison duty, and in his absence his field and garden have been given to another who has carried on his duty, when the absentee has returned and regained his city, his field and garden shall be given back to him.

30. If an official has neglected the care of his field or house, and if another has taken it in his absence, and carried on the duty for three years, if the absentee has returned and would cultivate his field, it shall not be given him; he who has carried on the duty shall continue.

32. If an official has been assigned to the king’s service and captured by an enemy and has been ransomed, if he has the means in his house to pay his ransom, he himself shall do so. If he has not had means of his own, he shall be ransomed by the temple treasury, or it shall be paid by the state. His field, garden, or house shall not be given for his ransom.

42. If a man has hired a field to cultivate and has caused no corn to grow on the field, he shall be held responsible for not doing the work on the field and shall pay an average rent.

48. If a man has incurred a debt and a storm has flooded his field or carried away the crop, or the corn has not grown because of drought, in that year he shall not pay his creditor. Further, he shall post-date his bond and shall not pay interest for that year.

53. If a man has neglected to strengthen his dike and a breach has broken out in it, and the waters have flooded the meadow, the man in whose dike the breach has broken out shall restore the corn he has caused to be lost.

54. If he be not able to restore the corn, he and his goods shall be sold, and the owners of the meadow whose corn the water has carried away shall share the money.

57. If a shepherd has allowed his sheep to eat the crop of another without consent, the shepherd shall give the owner of the field twenty GUR of corn for every GAN of land.

108. If the mistress of a beer-shop has made the measure of beer less than the measure of corn, that beer-seller shall be prosecuted and drowned.

110. If a votary (“nun”), who is not living in the convent, open a beer-shop or enter a beer-shop for drink, that woman shall be put to death

117. If a man owes a debt, and he has given his wife, son, daughter, servant, etc. to pay off the debt, the hostage shall do the work of the creditor;but in the fourth year they shall be free.

127. If a man has caused the finger to be pointed at a votary, or a man’s wife, and has not justified himself, that man shall be brought before the judges and have his forehead branded.

129. If a man’s wife be caught lying with another, they shall be strangled and cast into the water. If the wife’s husband would save his wife, the king can save the man.

130. If a man has ravished another’s betrothed wife, who is a virgin, and has been caught in the act, that man shall be put to death; the woman shall go free.

131. If a man’s wife has been accused by her husband, but has not been caught lying with another, she shall swear her innocence, and return to her house.

132. If a man’s wife has the finger pointed at her on account of another, but has not been caught lying with him, for her husband’s sake she shall plunge into the sacred river.

133. If a man has been taken captive, and there was maintenance in his house, but his wife has left and entered into another man’s house; because that woman has not preserved her body, she shall be prosecuted and drowned.

134. If a man has been taken captive, but there was not maintenance in his house, and his wife has entered into the house of another, that woman has no blame.

135. If this woman has borne the second husband a child, and the first husband returns and regains his city, this woman shall return to her first husband, but the children shall follow their own father.

137. If a man has determined to divorce a concubine who has borne him children, he shall return to that woman her marriage-portion, and shall give her the usufruct of field to bring up her children. After he children have grown up, out of whatever is given to her children, they shall give her one son’s share, and the husband of her choice she shall marry.

141. If a man’s wife has persisted in going out, has acted the fool, has wasted her house, has belittled her husband, he shall prosecute her. If the husband says “I divorce her”, she shall go her way and he gives her nothing. If he says “I will not divorce her”, he may take another wife, and the first wife shall live as his slave.

142. If a woman says to her husband “You shall not possess me,” her past shall be inquired into. If she has been discreet, and has no vice, and her husband has gone out, and has belittled her, that woman has no blame, she shall take her marriage portion and go off to her father’s house.

143. If she has not been discreet, has gone out, has ruined her house, belittled her husband, she shall be drowned.

148. If a man has married a wife and a disease has seized her, if he is determined to marry a second wife, he shall. He shall not divorce the wife whom the disease has seized. In the home they made together she shall dwell, and he shall maintain her as long as she lives.

162. If a man has married a wife, and she has borne him children, and that woman has gone to her fate, her father shall lay no claim to her marriage-portion. It belongs to her children.

166. If a man has taken wives for his sons, but not for his youngest, after the father has gone to his fate, they shall set aside for him, the amount above his share needed for a bride-price.

168. If a man has determined to disinherit his son, the judge shall inquire into his past, and if the son has not committed a grave misdemeanor, the father shall not disinherit his son.

169. If he has committed a grave crime against his father, for the first offence he shall

pardon him. For a second offence, the father shall cut off his son from sonship.

170. If a man has had children borne to him by his wife, and also by a maid, if the father has said “My sons” to the children the maid bore him, then after the father has gone to his fate, the children of the wife and of the maid shall share equally.

171. If the father has not said “My sons” the children of the maid shall not share with children of the wife. The maid and her children, however, shall obtain freedom. The wife shall take her portion and dwell in her husband’s house. After her death it is her children’s.

195. If a son strikes his father, his hands shall be cut off.

196 (200). If a patrician has knocked out the eye (tooth) of a man that is his equal, his eye (tooth) shall be knocked out.

198 (201) If he has knocked out the eye (tooth) of a plebian, he shall pay one mina of silver (one-third of a mina of silver).

199. If he has knocked out the eye of a patrician’s servant, or broken the limb of a patrician’s servant, he shall pay half his value.

202. If a man has smitten the privates of a man, higher in rank than he, he shall be scourged with sixty blows of an ox-hide whip in the assembly.

203. If a man has smitten the privates of another patrician, he shall pay one mina of silver.

209. If a man struck a free woman causing her to drop what’s in her, he shall pay ten shekels.

210. If that woman die, his daughter shall be killed.

212. If it be the daughter of a plebian, he shall pay half a mina of silver.

218. If a surgeon has operated on a patrician, and has caused death, his hands shall be cut off.

219. If the surgeon caused a slave to die he shall give the owner one of his slaves.

229. If a builder has built a house for a man, and the house he built has fallen, and caused the death of its owner, that builder shall be put to death.

230. If it is the owner’s son that is killed, the builder’s son shall be put to death.

232. If he has caused the loss of goods, he shall render back whatever he has destroyed. Moreover, since he did not make sound the house he built, at his own cost he shall rebuild it.

278. If a man has bought a slave and the slave hasn’t fulfilled his month, but the bennu disease has fallen on him, he shall return the slave to the seller and take back the money paid.

282. If a slave has said to his master, “You are not my master,” he shall be brought to account as his slave, and his master shall cut off his ear.