Carved on the stone pillar rules: the laws of King Hammurabi

Archeology at all times has revealed to mankind the secrets of a past life. One of the most valuable finds, made in the early 20th century on the territory of the ancient city of Susa, were the rules carved on the stone pillar, which were later called the laws of Hammurabi. What is this peculiar code, and who was its creator? We will tell about this right now.

Who is Hammurabi: a short biography?

Little is known about Hammurabi, the king of the ancient Babylonian state, before ascension to the throne. In 1793 BC he became the sole ruler of his until a small empire. Almost immediately he began to prepare for an aggressive war against the surrounding city-states: Larsa, Isina, Malgium, Rapikuma and Uruk. His plans were realized by the end of 1781 but AD, as a result of which Hammurabi united the lands of Lower Mesopotamia into a powerful empire that did not know the defeats.

The assertion of royal power and the enormous influence of his empire on the economy and commodity-money relations in the region further strengthened his individual power. However, not by these aggressive campaigns the king became famous.

The real achievement of that time was the creation of a kind of constitution - the laws of Hammurabi. Carved on the stone pillar, according to which at that time lived Babylon, became not only a historical monument, but also a good source of information about the structure of the state and secular life in that era.

The appearance of the stone pillar with the laws

The laws of Hammurabi are written in Sumerian, the alphabet of which most closely resembles cuneiform writing. The rules hewn on the stone pillar were perfectly preserved, which allowed to thoroughly study all the subtleties of the legal and state structure of Babylon during the rule of the creator of the laws, and also for many centuries after his death.

The pillar itself is made of basalt, a fairly solid stone. Its upper facial part is crowned with a bas-relief image of Hammurabi, which receives from the sun god Shamash those same laws.

The rest of the surface is covered with letters stating how a person should live in the state, what to do when making any transactions, concluding or dissolving the marriage, and also indicate the main penalties for misconduct. The text is divided into three conditional parts: introduction, 282 rules and conclusion. It is worth noting that the rules hewn on the stone pillar were not completely preserved: 35 of them were erased. However, they were restored with the help of documents preserved in the library of the Tsar Assyria Ashurbanipal.

Laws of King Hammurabi: what spheres of life governed the rules

Hammurabi, judging from the rules set out on the basalt column, tried to settle virtually all spheres of life in his state. Laws contain many items in the field of trade relations, in particular the seller's responsibility for selling a substandard product, including jewelry, fabric and even ships. The rules hewn on the stone pillar explain in sufficient detail the consequences of any criminal acts, whether it is theft, deliberate or accidental killing or sorcery. In addition, they provide for liability for perjury. A lot of laws are devoted to the institution of marriage and family law, as well as property relations.

The historical value of the laws of Hammurabi

The historical value of Hammurabi's laws can only be judged by the fact that this is the only well-preserved source that allowed us to learn not only about the ancient Babylonian, but also about the ancient East right in general. The scholars came to the conclusion that the king of the Babylonian state took as the basis of its laws those rules that prevailed in the society at that time, but not always were compulsory in execution. Also, the laws of Hammurabi allowed to understand many aspects of the life of the population in Mesopotamia in the 2nd millennium BC.