At the beginning of the 20th century, the French archaeologist Jacques de Morgan managed to convince the Persian Shah to grant the French a monopoly on excavations within Iran. He agreed after long negotiations. From that moment on, historians got access to one of the secrets, which has not yet been revealed and investigated to the end.
The stone book of King Hammurabi
Really existing and legendary at the same time, King Hammurabi ruled in the 18th century BC. He was the most famous and illustrious king of Babylonia, or rather, the Old Babylonian kingdom located in the territory of modern Iran. For a long time, science did not distinguish him from a number of other prominent figures of Babylonian-Assyrian history, although Hammurabi was one of the four eastern kings who, during a happy raid on Palestine, captured Lot, Abraham's nephew.
For a long time there was very little historical information about Hammurabi, only hymns, about ten small inscriptions on material monuments and about 50 letters from the king to his vassal (or governor) were reported about his personality and the time of his reign. Yes, and these historical evidences show us a tsar who has already matured, with a fully developed character, a ruler who has fully mastered the political tasks of his time and resolutely began to implement them. Having overthrown the foreign yoke and uniting the scattered forces of Babylonia, he decided to expand the territory of his kingdom at the expense of neighboring states.
As a result of military campaigns, Hammurabi united in his sovereign hands most of the then civilized world (extended his influence to almost the entire territory of Mesopotamia and Elam, to Assyria and even Syria). A well-thought-out system of political alliances helped him defeat opponents, and often by proxy. In the end, Hammurabi dealt with his main ally, the king of the northern state of Mari. In addition to a successful foreign policy, Hammurabi also succeeded in the field of internal government of Babylonia. It was for this activity that he became most famous.
The code of laws that praised King Hammurabi was discovered by a French scientific expedition, which in 1897 began excavations in the place where Susa, the capital of Ancient Elam, once stood. The members of the expedition, led by the already mentioned Jacques de Morgan, had a number of valuable finds on their account, when suddenly in December 1901 they first came across a large fragment of diorite, and a few days later they dug up two more fragments. Diorite in Ancient Egypt and Ancient Mesopotamia was used as a sculptural material. When all three fragments were attached to each other, a stele 2.25 meters high was made of them, and its width was equal from 1.65 meters at the top to 1.9 meters below.
When the stele was brought to Paris and exhibited in the Louvre, the scientist-Assyrologist Sheil was engaged in its study. For the first researcher, this was not easy; Sheil (and later other scientists) had to deal with difficulties of a legal and philological nature, but the result of their research was the deciphering, translation and publication of the code of laws of the Babylonian king.
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Hammurabi Code of Laws
On the front side of the stele there is an artistically carved relief image of the god Shamash, sitting on a high throne, and King Hammurabi standing in front of him. The god sitting on the throne is dressed in the usual Babylonian clothes, trimmed with frills, on his head is a high four-tiered crown. With his right hand majestically stretched forward, the god Shamash gives the Babylonian king a scroll with a code of laws. Hammurabi stands before God in the usual prayer pose, wearing a long tunic tied with a belt and a cap with a rim.
The part of the stele following the bas-relief and its entire reverse side are covered with carefully carved, close-fitting and graceful wedge-shaped text in Babylonian-Semitic language. The text consists of a series of short columns running from right to left, with wedge-shaped characters read from top to bottom. Almost 10 columns of the inscription Hammurabi devoted to listing his titles, glorifying the gods who patronized him and his own greatness, his concern for his subjects, the story of the spread of his power.
“I, Hammurabi, am the shepherd chosen by Enlil, who poured out wealth and abundance, who provided everyone with Nippur, the link between heaven and earth, the glorious patron of E-Kur, the mighty king who restored Eris, purified E-Ansu, the conqueror of the four countries of the Universe, who magnified the name of Babylon, who rejoiced the heart of Marduk, his ruler, who all his days went to worship in E-Sagil, a royal offspring … who enriched Ur, a humble devotee who supplied Kishshirgal with abundance … A wise king, obedient servant of Shamash, strong, fortified the foundation of Sippar, clothed the green of the graves of Aya, who exalted Babbar like a heavenly dwelling, a warrior who had mercy on Larsa, a lord, a king of kings, an eternal royal offspring, a powerful king … who gave life to Erech, who supplied his inhabitants in abundance with water …
When Marduk called me to rule the people and bring prosperity to the country, I granted the right and laws in the language of the country, thus creating the welfare of the people …
So that the strong would not offend the weak, so that justice would be shown to an orphan and a widow, I inscribed in Babylon … to establish law in the country, to resolve litigations in the country, to render justice to the oppressed, my precious words on my monument and put before the image of me, the king-legislator … The oppressed, involved in litigation, let him come to the image of me, the king-legislator, and make him read my inscription on the monument. He will hear my precious words, and my monument will explain the matter to him. He will find his right, let his heart breathe freely and say: "Truly Hammurabi is the ruler who for his people is like a father in the flesh … brought prosperity to the people forever, ruled the country justly."
Further, the cuneiform text tells that the Babylonian king invokes a blessing on the admirers and executors of the new legislation and curses on its violators.
“If this person does not observe my words, which I have written on my monument, does not pay attention to my curse, is not afraid of the curse of the gods, repeals the legislation I have given, distorts my words, changes my style … then whether it will be a king or a nobleman, or a governor, or a commoner, or another person, whatever name he is called, - may the great Anu, the father of the gods, who called me to reign, deprive him of royal greatness, break his rod, curse his fate. Enlil, the ruler who determines the fate … may raise unsuppressed troubles against him in his house, leading to his death, may appoint him as a fate a miserable reign, few days of life, years of high prices, hopeless darkness, sudden death …"
The rest of the inscription (except for 7 scraped out columns) is occupied by 247 articles of legislation. This stele was a kind of solemn declaration of Hammurabi to his subjects about the entry into force of the laws inscribed on it. After the "edition" and publication in the temple of Esagile, the original was reproduced in many copies, which were sent to all parts of the vast empire of the Babylonian king.
The copy that has come down to us is one of such copies, which was exhibited in Sippar. During one of the raids on Babylon by the Elamites, this stele with the code of laws was dug up and taken to Susa as a trophy of war. Most likely, the victorious Elamite commander ordered seven columns of text to be scraped out, in order to then knock out his name in this place (according to the custom of that time) in memory of his own victories. The texts of the scraped-out columns were partially replaced by inscriptions on clay tablets that were found in the palace of King Ashurbanipal.
According to its composition, the Babylonian code of laws is divided into three parts - the introduction, the articles of laws themselves and the conclusion. The introduction, which we talked about above, is very important for scholars because of the abundance of reported historical allusions and geographical indications-names.
The legislation itself begins with five provisions on violation of the order of the trial: two articles on the accuser-slander, two on false witnesses and one on violation of justice by the judge himself.
“If a judge delivers a verdict, makes a decision, prepares a document, and then changes his verdict, then, after he is convicted of changing the verdict, this judge must pay twelve times the claim brought in this court case; and must also be publicly removed from his judicial chair and never sit down again with judges for trial."
The following articles deal with crimes against private property - theft, sale and purchase of stolen goods, kidnapping, escape and withdrawal of slaves, night burglary, robbery, etc. For example, here are some articles of the laws of King Hammurabi.
“If someone steals temple or palace property, he must be put to death; whoever accepts what is stolen from his hands must be put to death; if someone steals another's young son, he must be put to death.
If someone, having sheltered in his house a fugitive slave belonging to a palace or a freedman, does not hand him over to demand a nagir, then this householder must be put to death.
If someone, having caught a runaway slave or a slave woman in the field, delivers it to the owner, the owner must pay him two shekels of silver.
If someone makes a breach in the house, they kill him and bury him before this breach.
If anyone commits robbery and is caught, then he must be put to death.
If a fire breaks out in someone's house, and someone, having come to extinguish it, turns his gaze on something from the property of the householder and appropriates something from the property of the householder, then this person is thrown into the same fire.
If someone, having taken a field for cultivation, does not grow grain on it, then, when he is exposed in this, he must give the owner of the field the bread, in accordance with the increase from the neighbor.
If someone, opening his reservoir for irrigation, negligently admits that a neighboring field will be flooded with water, then he is obliged to measure out the bread, in accordance with the increase in his neighbor.
If someone chops down a tree in someone's garden without the permission of the owner of the garden, he must pay half a minute in silver.
If criminals gather in the house of the inn, and she does not detain these criminals and give them over to the palace, then this inn should be put to death.
If someone, stretching out a finger against God's sister or someone's wife, turns out to be wrong, then this person should be thrown in front of the judges and cut off his hair.
If someone's wife is caught lying with another man, then having tied them up, throw them into the water. If the husband spares the life of his wife, then the king will spare the life of his slave.
If someone's wife kills her husband because of another man, she must be impaled.
If the son hits his father, then his hands must be cut off.
If someone strikes the cheek of a person of superior standing, he must publicly hit him sixty times with a cowhide lash.
If the doctor, removing the eyesore from the patient's eyes with a bronze knife, injures the eye, he must pay half of its cost in money."
The code of laws of King Hammurabi is a codification of cases from judicial practice taken from ancient Babylonian criminal and civil law. Maybe not in all spheres of life the Babylonian king was able to put things in order, but he was the first ruler of antiquity who proportioned the power of the law with the power of the king and recognized the right of his subjects to take care of their own lives.
Hammurabi decreed that the punishment for the culprit should be determined not by the victim himself or his relative, but by a state body named after the ruler. Having introduced civil law for the first time in legal proceedings, Hammurabi erected a monument to himself as eternal as the diorite slab on which he commanded to depict himself next to the god of the sun and justice.