One of Hammurabi’s concerns was to ensure that the rule of law and justice was observed throughout his lands. To this end, he devised a collection of laws and edicts, which is now known as the Code of Hammurabi.
Although Ur-Nammu, king of Ur, had introduced what appears to be the first code of law in Mesopotamia some three centuries earlier, Hammurabi’s code is the earliest known complete legal classification. Hammurabi claimed that his code was divinely inspired, but it
Has now been established that it was rooted in an ancient Mesopotamian legal tradition that dated back to the time of the Sumerians.
The code was discovered in the winter of 1901-1902 CE by a French archaeological expedition that was excavating the ruins of Susa in southwest Iran (ancient Elam). The team unearthed three pieces of stone, which had obviously once made up a single block, engraved in cuneiform script. When restored, the stone blocks formed a stele carved out of black diorite and standing 7 feet 4 inches (2.2 m) high. It appears that the stele was stolen fTom Babylon by a king of Elam in 1158 BCE.
At the top of the stele is a relief that shows the sun god Shamash (who was associated with justice) handing Hammurabi a staff and ring, the emblems of his power to administer the law. Below the relief are 16 horizontal columns of cuneiform text in Akkadian, the Semitic language spoken in Mesopotamia at that time. On the reverse side, there are 28 further columns of text. The code consists of a prologue, a middle section containing the laws, and an epilogue.
World History
