One aspect of early Babylonian society that emerges in Hammurabi's code is the way that it was characterized by class divisions. These divisions were enshrined in the legal systems established by Hammurabi's code. For example, law 202 stipulates that "...if any one strike the body of a man higher in rank than he, he shall receive sixty blows with an ox-whip in public." Additionally, the famous "eye for an eye" principle did not apply across classes. According to law 200, if "a man knock out the teeth of his equal, his teeth shall be knocked out." However, if he knocked out the teeth of a freed man, he was required only to pay a small fine.
Hammurabi's code also reveals a society that revolved around agriculture, and agricultural labor. Slaves were everywhere in the code, and there are many laws that governed the economic transactions upon which an agricultural society was based. There are laws governing renting oxen, for example, laws regulating dam and irrigation canal construction, and many other aspects of a river valley civilization.
Hammurabi's code also reveals gender distinctions. Women had, in short, fewer rights than men, and were to a large extent treated as property. Moreover, many laws governing inheritance indicate clearly that Hammurabi's society was a patriarchal one. That each household was meant to be governed by the father is established by law 195, which reads: "If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn off." These are just a few things that Hammurabi's code of laws reveals about early Babylonian society, which is one reason why these laws continue to be studied.
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/ancient/hamframe.asp
Sunday, March 22, 2015
(please cite evidences from the Code of Hammurabi to support thesis) Use evidence from the code of Hammurabi to analyze the socio-economic structure of early Babylonia. What sorts of economic activity and what social categories are attested in the code?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
What is the theme of the chapter Lead?
Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...
-
The statement "Development policy needs to be about poor people, not just poor countries," carries a lot of baggage. Let's dis...
-
"Mistaken Identity" is an amusing anecdote recounted by the famous author Mark Twain about an experience he once had while traveli...
-
Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...
-
De Gouges's Declaration of the Rights of Woman was enormously influential. We can see its influences on early English feminist Mary Woll...
-
As if Hamlet were not obsessed enough with death, his uncovering of the skull of Yorick, the court jester from his youth, really sets him of...
-
In both "Volar" and "A Wall of Fire Rising," the characters are impacted by their environments, and this is indeed refle...
No comments:
Post a Comment