Although it is not a true code of law, it is far from exhaustive; Some say that they were also not introduced by your-Nammu, but by his son Shulgi, code or not, although we only have fragments, they are enough to show that the laws covered both civil and criminal cases. Among the penal provisions, it determines which capital crimes should be: murder, robbery, expulsion of the virgin wife of another man and adultery if committed by a woman. For other offences, the penalty was a monetary fine. [your-Nammus codex stands] contrasts with the more famous laws of Hammurabi, written some three centuries later, with their savage «an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth» disposition. 148-149 The stele was packed and shipped to the Louvre in Paris, and in less than a year it was translated and widely published as the first example of a written code of law – one that was older but had striking parallels with the laws of the Hebrew Old Testament. The 282 edicts are all written in si-then form. For example, if a man steals an ox, he has to pay back 30 times its value. Edicts range from family law to professional contracts to administrative law and often describe different standards of justice for the three classes of Babylonian society – the propertied class, freedmen, and slaves. The most detailed legal code of all civilizations was that of the Romans. This was first written in 450 BC.

J.-C. by the magistrates and called the Twelve Tablets. All Roman citizens had to know the Twelve Tablets, which contained laws such as: The Code of Hammurabi was understood as the oldest Code of Law in the world until 1947, when the Codex of Lipit-Ishtar was discovered, then, in 1948, the tablet of the Codex of your-Nammu was excavated in Iraq. This was translated by Kramer in 1952 and unearthed the oldest legal code in the world. Kramer comments: Although the laws were enacted under the king`s name, it is possible that they were published by his son Shulgi after your-Nammu`s death. The code was developed by Shulgi`s successors and influenced the form and underlying vision of later codes such as the laws of Eshnunna (c. 1930 BC) and the laws enacted during the reign of Lipit-Ishtar (c. 1870 to c. 1860 BC). These codes, in turn, served as a model for the Code of Hammurabi, which would influence the laws of other civilizations, especially the creation of the Mosaic Law of the Bible.

According to Hammurabi`s code, if you knocked out someone else`s eye, you paid with one of your own and also with a tooth. The rule of your over the Neo-Sumerian Empire was consolidated with the famous Code of your-Nammu, probably the first such code of law for Mesopotamia since that of Urukagina of Lagash centuries earlier. As kings were considered the guardians of law and order, they often issued legal reforms, debt discharges and decrees, which were recorded in writing and are often referred to as legal texts, although there is no evidence that the courts ever referred to such edicts. (105) Use your phone`s camera – scan the code below and download the Kindle app. How long will your-Nammu maintain his place as the world`s leading legislator? Maybe not for much longer. There is evidence that there were legislators in Sumer long before your-Nammu was born. Sooner or later, a lucky «digger» will find a copy of a code of law that predates your-Nammu`s by a century or more. (55) The only aspect that the two codes had in common, besides the standard conditional formula (if-this-then-that), was the assertion that they were received by the gods. This feature appeared in later legal texts such as those of the Assyrians and the Mosaic Law of the Bible. Just as your-Nammu Shamash attributed the authorship of his code, Moses is portrayed as having received his own from Yahweh.

«Laws are organized in the casuistic form of if-(crime), then – (punishment)-a pattern to be followed in almost all subsequent codes. For the oldest known code of laws in history, it is considered remarkably progressive because it provides for fines for bodily injury, in contrast to the later principle of lex talionis («an eye for an eye») of Babylonian law; However, the capital crimes of murder, theft, adultery and rape are punishable by death. In all likelihood, I would have completely missed Nammu`s original tablet if it hadn`t been for a favorable letter from F. R. Kraus, now professor of cuneiform studies at Leiden University in Holland. His letter states that a few years ago, as part of his duties as curator at the Istanbul Museum, he came across two fragments of a panel bearing Sumerian laws, «connected» the two pieces and catalogued the resulting panel as number 3191 of the museum`s Nippur collection. As Sumerian tablets of the law are extremely rare, I immediately got No. 3191 in my office. There it was, a sun-baked tablet, light brown, 20 by 10 centimeters. More than half of the writing was destroyed, and what was left seemed hopelessly incomprehensible at first. But after a few days of concentrated study, its contents began to become clear and take shape, and I realized with great excitement that what I was holding in my hand was a copy of the oldest code of law known to mankind. According to Roman law, people were presumed innocent until proven guilty.

The lawyers would present their case to a jury of 32 men who would decide on the sentence to be imposed. Over the centuries, many changes and additions were made to the laws as the Romans extended their dominion to the lands they had conquered. Eventually, a uniform legal code was introduced for the entire Roman Empire. It became the model for the first modern code; many of our laws are based on those of ancient Rome. He recognized the power of religious beliefs to influence personal behavior and presented his laws as if they had been received by the gods. He seems to have made sure that people understood that the king was only the steward and not the author of the code, and if someone broke the law, he rebelled against God`s will. Kriwaczek comments: «The first copy of the code, in two fragments found at Nippur, was translated by Samuel Kramer in 1952; Due to its partial preservation, only the prologue and 5 of the laws were recognizable. Other tablets were found in your and translated in 1965, so that about 40 of the 57 laws could be reconstructed. Another copy found in Sippar contains slight variations. However, there were a number of steps between the Ur-Nammu codex and that of Hammurabi and good reasons why your-Nammu`s rather benevolent code of law needed to be changed.

The subjects of the Third Dynasty of your were more or less a homogeneous population of Sumerians, but at the time of the last monarch, Ibbi-Sin (r. 1963-1940 BC), the population was more diverse. This trend continued with the founding of the Isin dynasty by Ishbi-Erra around 1953/1940. Ishbi-Erra defeated the Amorites and Elamites, who had tried to fill the power vacuum after the fall of the Gutians, and some of these people now lived and worked among the Sumerians in greater numbers than before. Did you know? The Code of Hammurabi contains many severe punishments that sometimes require the removal of the offender`s tongue, hands, breasts, eyes or ear. But the Code is also one of the earliest examples of the presumption of innocence of an accused until proven guilty. The oldest written body of law we know of is the Code of Hammurabi. He was king of Babylon between 1792 and 1758 BC. Hammurabi is said to have received these laws from Shamash, the god of justice. The laws were carved on huge stone slabs and placed throughout the city for people to know. Judges have been appointed to ensure that they are respected. The Ur-Nammu Codex is the oldest known legal code preserved today.

It originated in Mesopotamia and is written on tablets in the Sumerian language around 2100-2050 BC. J.-C. Although other written Mesopotamian laws discovered later, including the Sumerian «Lipit-Ishtar» and «your-Nammu,» are hundreds of years older than Hammurabi`s legislator, Hammurabi`s reputation remains that of a pioneering legislator who, in the words of his monument, worked to «prevent the strong from oppressing the weak and to ensure that justice is done to widows and orphans.» Whenever people had legal problems, they sought advice from lawyers who studied the laws.