Gilgamesh
Mesopotamian Mythology
The Babylonians
The Babylonians
Code of Hammurabi
Babylonian Civilization
The Downfall of Babylon
Babylon
• The Old Babylonian
Period
• High point was reign of
King Hammurabi (17921750 B.C.) united all of
Mesopotamia through
conquest
• During reign
government controlled
economy and passed
comprehensive laws
called the Hammurabi
Code
Hammurabi Code
• Code reinforced “An
eye for an eye”
mentality
• Laws focused on
property rights,
slaves, children and
women’s rights,
murder, theft and
marriage
• Punishment differed
based on a person’s
social class
Hammurabi Code
• Laws were introduced
for two main reasons
• To establish order in a
land in constant
conflict
• To represent a king’s
beliefs of justice
• Several laws were
written to protect the
poor and powerless
from abuse
Hammurabi Code
• 5. If a judge try a case, reach a decision, and present
his judgment in writing; if later error shall appear in his
decision, and it be through his own fault, then he shall
pay twelve times the fine set by him in the case, and he
shall be publicly removed from the judge's bench, and
never again shall he sit there to render judgement.
• 6. If any one steal the property of a temple or of the
court, he shall be put to death, and also the one who
receives the stolen thing from him shall be put to death.
• 14. If any one steal the minor son of another, he shall
be put to death.
• 22. If any one is committing a robbery and is caught,
then he shall be put to death.
• 195. If a son strike his father, his hands shall be hewn
off.
• 197. If he break another man's bone, his bone shall be
broken.
• 202. 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.
• 218. If a physician make a large incision with the
operating knife, and kill him, or open a tumor with the
operating knife, and cut out the eye, his...