Enheduana of Sumer from Outrageous Women of Ancient Times

Leon, Vicki. "Enheduana of Sumer." Outrageous Women of Ancient Times: 49-53. Print.

4,300 years ago lived beautiful Enheduana, the daughter of the greatest of all Akkadian kings, Sargon.

 Sargon ruled from 2334-2279 B.C. Enheduana had two twin brother Rimush and Manishtusu, all four lived in a new palace in the city-state of Akkad in Sumer(Where Bagdad is today). Sargon was the son of a family and farmers, but he had drive and talent to be king. He started out as a cup bearer and went to the top to be king. Enheduana, much like her father(Sargon) she had drive and talent much like her father and unlike like her brothers, since her brothers did not have the talent Sargon assigned her as high priestess of Nanna giving her the ability as royalty to learn how to write and read. 

Enheduana to lots of pride in her writing, she had written a set of 42 poems and other stories and writings. She put a lot of her religious beliefs into her writings. Enheduana didn't write on paper like we do today instead she wrote on clay tablets. She was also the only known writer to include her own name in her writings. Enheduana was the bestseller of her time, when i say best seller i don't mean people bought her writings. In this time writings weren't bought they were just copied down. Archaeologist now this because they had found over 50 copied writings of hers by other writers.  Her writings were special because they gave us a lot of information of her time period and herself. 

After her father died her brother Rimishu went into power and then her other brother Midishu. Both brothers were very ignorant and loved bloodshed so they were killed by enemies who had a lot of hatred for them. Since the two were dead a nephew of Enheduana came into power, the evil nephew kicked Enheduana out of her potion and awarded it to his own daughter and possibly threw Enheduana to the treacherous desert. Enheduana in the end in my opinion won the fight between her and him, because nobody remembers her bull headed nephew while Enheduana will be remembered for centuries due to her amazing writings.

Reflection on Cuneiform

Reflection on Cuneiform Writing Activity:

When we had first started the activity thought that writing cuneiform would be a piece of cake, i was wrong. Cuneiform for me at least was a bit difficult to write , especially getting the shapes and length of the triangles write. Like the English language the shape of the letter can change what people interpret the letter to be, so the shape obviously matters to get your message across. One thing that interested me is that all of the letters are arrangements of triangles unlike our language, all of the letters are different shapes so it is easy distinguish when there is a new word.

The Cuneiform triangles pointed in different directions ,were different lengths and sometimes were the same length and direction but just had a different amount of triangles symbolizing a different letter. For example a and n. A was 2 small triangles pointing to the right  like this >> except with ends to each of the triangles while N was 3 small triangles like this >>>. The same triangles just 1 more in the letter N symbolizing totally different letters. I paired up with Alex L. to switch our writings. Cuneiform is extremely confusing to read because of the shapes. Alex had written in cuneiform “ Sumerians created these weird symbols”, I didn't even get close i came up with “ Sumerians creater the je symbols”. It was very challenging some of the triangles were perceived to be pointing one way but actually they were pointing the other or there were supposed to be 2 triangles but it looked like one large one.

Hammurabi's Babylonia From the Babylonians By Elaine Landau

Landau, Elaine. "Hammurabi's Babylonia." The Babylonians: 39-44. Print. 

Hammurabi was the sixth king of the Mesopotamian city state of Babylonia from 

1792 B.C- 1750 B.C. Hamurrabi became the first king of the Babylonian empire when

the first Babylonian  empire evolved. Hammurrabi is known for his creation of the

"Legal Code". This code is simply a bunch of laws that the Babylonians had to 

follow. The complete "Legal code had 280

sections that consisted of laws for herdsmen, farm laborers, stealing or 

destroying property and rates for renting boats, wagons or a farm animal. 

Some sections of the legal code had laws covering marriage, divorce, adoption, 

inheritance and assault.

Other parts were about treatment and sale of slaves as well as unsatisfactory 

services. 

When i read through some of the laws that the article had exemplified I noticed 

that if something was done wrong or poorly someone would have to pay for their 

actions by being assaulted, meaning that they were punished with death of them or

their children, a broken limb, torture, or even a loss of an eye or ear. But in 

contrast I found some of the rules very reasonable and fair.

For example If a flood or drought occurs resulting in crop failure, and someone 

is unable to pay interest debt, he is excused of having to pay that years interest

debt that year. I thought this was very reasonable and fair because a natural 

disaster is not the persons fault and there is nothing he can do about this. So I 

am totally in favor of this law. Another example is that if two people engage in 

a fair fight and one is injured the other who cause the injury may have to pay for 

medical treatment but the one causing the injury cannot be punished any further 

for causing the injury. This is such a smart and fair rule, each one has to 

serve their payment for fighting.

A example for unfair laws is that if someone is helping to steal something from a 

premises that individual may be thrown into the fire. I think this is a little to

harsh but i totally agree that if you caused a crime or help cause a crime you 

should be punished for your doing but i do not think it should result in death. 

I believe that they should only be locked up or do extra work or any other punish

ment that doesn't kill them or intentionally hurt them like cutting body part or 

others. Many of the laws result in an intentional injury or death, most of these 

I disagree with but some do make sense. In cases where a person committed murder 

of higher arc hey i do believe death should be the penalty. 

One rule that i really like is that the women had some right for example is that 

women were allowed to have their own property and their own money. This is nothing

compared to what we have now but back then I believe that this is great privilege

for women.

All in all I think that Hammurabi's legal code does have some fantastic and fair

rules and some that  truly dislike and do not favor in.