Hammurabis Code Essay Example for Free

Hammurabis Code Essay I am going to discuss the source of Hammurabi’s Code from our book, Sources of World Societies. During this time, there were a lot of different social classes, and the rich were definitely favored more than the poor. The Code contemplates the whole population as falling into three classes, the amelu, the muskinu and the ardu. The amelu was a patrician, the man of family, whose birth, marriage and death were registered, of ancestral estates and full civil rights . In the book, Sources of World Societies, Hammurabi’s code was not the first known law code, but it is the earliest one to survive largely intact . The code deals with the family, commercial activities, and agricultural life. The laws stated in the book dealt with medical practices, explaining the phrase an â€Å"eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth,† the most common law, meaning that a person who has injured another person receives the same injury in compensation. The example used for that is Law 196, â€Å"If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out . Hammurabi’s Code was very to the point, meaning that there was most likely a law for everything possible in a wrongdoing. For example, Law 218 states, â€Å"If a physician performed a major operation on a freeman with a bronze lancet and has caused the freeman’s death, or he opened up the eye-socket of a freeman and has destroyed the freeman’s eye, they shall cut off his hand . † I understand that the physician did mess up a crucial surgery, but I do think it’s a little outrageous to cut off his whole hand! Perhaps it would be better if he just got punished for the mistake. I do think it’s unfair that if he messed up a slave’s surgery, he received shekels of silver. Law 217 states, â€Å"If it was a freeman’s slave, the owner of the slave shall give two shekels of silver to the physician . † How messed up is that? Slaves were killed for almost every minor offense. Hammurabi’s Code consisted of around 282 Laws. Hammurabi’s Code was established around 1780 B. C . Hammurabi was the ruler who chiefly established the greatness of Babylon, the worlds first metropolis . Hammurabi had many accomplishments other than the law code. He unified Mesopotamia under Babylonian rule, and established the supremacy of the Babylonian god Marduk . Hammurabi’s Code was arranged in orderly groups, so that all men might read and know what was required of them. The code was carved upon a black stone monument, eight feet high, and clearly intended to be reared in public view. This noted stone was found in the year 1901, in a city of the Persian mountains. It begins and ends with addresses to the gods . The Code clearly stated the rules of marriage, having children, and what they were able to do with their children. For example, if a married couple got a divorce, and the woman was a â€Å"bad wife,† the Code allowed him to send her away while he got to keep the children and her dowry, or he could degrade her to the position of a slave in his own house . Women seemed to be treated poorly during this time, and men seemed to always be in charge. For example, Law 110 states, â€Å"If a sister of a god open a tavern, or enter a tavern to drink, then shall this woman be burned to death . Honestly, this one kind of shocked me a bit. Women go to taverns all the time, and if it was this day and age, it would be considered a huge crime if a woman got put to death from going to a tavern. The most common penalty was a fine, but many resulted in death. For instance, Law 2 states, â€Å"If any one bring an accusation against a man, and the accused go to the river and leap into the river, if he sink in the river his accuser shall take possession of his house. But if the river prove that the accused is not guilty, and he escape unhurt, then he who had brought the accusation shall be put to death, while he who leaped into the river shall take possession of the house that had belonged to his accuser . † This law actually makes a lot of sense. If a man is wrongly accused, then the accuser should get punished. Why should the accuser go without getting a penalty, but he should just get a fine, and not be put to death. It does seem a little weird that their letting the river determine their fate. It seemed like they had a lot of beliefs in nature, and let nature decide their fate. I have read these Code laws over and over multiple times and a few of them has made me chuckle a bit. I just think to myself, what were these people thinking?! Law 25 says, â€Å"If fire break out in a house, and some one who comes to put it out cast his eye upon the property of the owner of the house, and take the property of the master of the house, he shall be thrown into that self-same fire . † This law confused me a bit, does it mean that if the person coming to put out the fire looks at the property of where the fire is at, he must be thrown into the fire? If so, that definitely doesn’t make any sense. Law 132 states, â€Å"If the finger is pointed at a mans wife about another man, but she is not caught sleeping with the other man, she shall jump into the river for her husband . † I understand that cheating a a very wrong thing to do, but if she was not caught why should she have to jump into the river? What is she going to learn about doing such a thing. Jumping in the river probably was a big penalty back then. In conclusion, after I looked and went over Hammurabi’s Code, I have learned quite a bit about how life was lived back then. Just thinking that all of our ancestors had to go through that, and how many lives were lost for doing certain crimes that we would consider minor offenses nowadays. If our ancestors lived in the world we lived in today, they would probably think it’s so easy, when we think it’s super hard. The laws were taken very seriously and hardly went unseen. We think these laws are very outrageous and uncalled for, when in reality, they probably weren’t that big of a deal back then. I chose this source because it seemed really interesting to get to know about how the law was made back in 1800 B. C. E. It is important to understand this period of history to see how laws were even made or thought of. Every law that we have is most likely a revised version of one of Hammurabi’s Code Laws. Hammurabi’s Code informed me that early World History is very different than what it is today. This is my first time ever hearing about Hammurabi’s Code, and even learning about 1800 B. C. E. I have really enjoyed learning more about this topic.