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.
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