REFLECTION QUESTIONS: What issues do territorial states, such as...

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:

1. What issues do territorial states, such as those of Babylon, New Kingdom

Egypt, and Shang China, attempt to legislate? What sorts of issues appear to
matter to the nomadic Hebrews and Vedic peoples?
2. What can you generalize about the concerns in a settled territorial state as
compared with those of a more nomadic group?
3. What sorts of social distinctions (class, gender, occupation) are evident in the
codes?
4. What seems to be the source of authority for each law code? What is the range
of punishments? Who is responsible for enforcement? What do these
variations suggest about the source of power at the heart of these societies?

READING MATERIAL:
Law Codes of Territorial States and Pastoral Nomads
Pages 114-117

In addition to charismatic monarchs and huge bureaucracies, territorial states used precise
codes of law to bring order to the vast areas under their rule. These could range from
complex legal systems like Hammurapi's to more general guidelines for rulers on how to
administer justice. Pastoral nomadic groups such as the Hebrews and Vedic peoples
produced law codes as well, particularly as they settled down. Some legal codes followed a
"if/then" formula (if a given crime is committed, then a certain punishment is to be meted
out), while others established clear and powerful norms for proper behavior, and yet others
considered process and punishment. Some legal systems directly reference gods, while
others appear to be more concerned with human interactions and appeals to earthly power.
Many territorial state law codes make disparities based on class, occupation, and gender.

A collection of early legal codes is shown here. Hammurapi's Code, which dates from the
18th century BCE and contains 282 regulations covering everything from land ownership to
marriage, comes from a Babylonian territorial kingdom in Mesopotamia. There are no
comprehensive law codes from the Middle or New Kingdoms of Egypt, but a series of
instructions to Rekhmire, a pharaoh's vizier (chief minister), dating from circa 1450 BCE,
gives a good idea of how Egyptian court decisions were decided. The priestly Levitical
codes of Hebrew scripture comprise hundreds of laws; The Ten Commandments, on the
other hand, are possibly the clearest and most plain statement of the precepts that connect
this nomadic people to their god and to one another. The Code of Manu, the fourth
document, is supposed to contain some of the first regulations of the South Asian nomadic
Vedic peoples. The almost 2,700 verses of the code were written down in Sanskrit
sometime after 200 BCE, although the laws regarding social interactions in the sample
below could be far older. The Chinese literature featured here dates from the sixth century
BCE, and it demonstrates that while Shang kings did not publish a penal code, they did
establish a distinct system of punishments.
Primary Source 3.1
The Code of Hammurapi (ca. 18th century bce)

1. If a man bring an accusation against a man, and charge him with a (capital) crime, but
cannot prove it, he, the accuser, shall be put to death.

2. If a man charge a man with sorcery, and cannot prove it, he who is charged with sorcery
shall go to the river, into the river he shall throw himself and if the river overcome him, his
accuser shall take to himself his house (estate). If the river show that man to be innocent
and he come forth unharmed, he who charged him with sorcery shall be put to death. He
who threw himself into the river shall take to himself the house of his accuser.

3. If a man, in a case (pending judgment), bear false (threatening) witness, or do not

establish the testimony that he has given, if that case be a case involving life, that man shall
be put to death.

•••

6. If a man steal the property of a god (temple) or palace, that man shall be put to death;
and he who receives from his hand the stolen (property) shall also be put to death.

7. If a man purchase silver or gold, manservant or maid servant, ox, sheep or ass, or
anything else from a man's son, or from a man's servant without witnesses or contracts, or if
he receive (the same) in trust, that man shall be put to death as a thief.

8. If a man steal ox or sheep, ass or pig, or boat—if it be from a god (temple) or a palace,
he shall restore thirtyfold; if it be from a freeman, he shall render tenfold. If the thief have
nothing wherewith to pay he shall be put to death.

•••

45. If a man rent his field to a tenant for crop-rent and receive the crop-rent of his field and
later Adad (i.e., the Storm God) inundate the field and carry away the produce, the loss
(falls on) the tenant.

46. If he have not received the rent of his field and he have rented the field for either one-
half or one-third (of the crop), the tenant and the owner of the field shall divide the grain
which is in the field according to agreement.

•••

128. If a man take a wife and do not arrange with her the (proper) contracts, that woman is
not a (legal) wife.

129. If the wife of a man be taken in lying with another man, they shall bind them and throw
them into the water. If the husband of the woman would save his wife, or if the king would
save his male servant (he may).
130. If a man force the (betrothed) wife of another who has not known a male and is living in
her father's house, and he lie in her bosom and they take him, that man shall be put to
death and that woman shall go free.

•••

138. If a man would put away his wife who has not borne him children, he shall give her
money to the amount of her marriage settlement and he shall make good to her the dowry
which she brought from her father's house and then he may put her away.

139. If there were no marriage settlement, he shall give to her one mana of silver for a
divorce.

140. If he be a freeman, he shall give her one-third mana of silver.

141. If the wife of a man who is living in his house, set her face to go out and play the part
of a fool, neglect her house, belittle her husband, they shall call her to account; if her
husband say: "I have put her away," he shall let her go. On her departure nothing shall be
given to her for her divorce. If her husband say: "I have not put her away," her husband may
take another woman. The first woman shall dwell in the house of her husband as a maid
servant.

142. If a woman hate her husband, and say: "Thou shalt not have me," they shall inquire
into her antecedents for her defects; and if she have been a careful mistress and be without
reproach and her husband have been going about and greatly belittling her, that woman has
no blame. She shall receive her dowry and go to her father's house.

SOURCE: The Code of Hammurabi, King of Babylon, About 2250 b.c, 2nd edition, trans.
Robert Francis Harper (Union, New Jersey: The University of Chicago Lawbook Exchange,
Ltd., 1999): 11, 13, 27, 45, 49, 51.

Primary Source 3.2

Instruction to Vizier Rekhmire (ca. 15th century bce)

[L]et one be afraid of thee, (for) a prince is a prince of whom one is afraid. . . . Be not known
to the people; and they shall not say: "He is (only) a man." . . . As for every act of this
official, the vizier while hearing in the hall of the vizier, he shall sit upon a chair, with a rug
upon the floor, and a dais upon it, a cushion under his back, a cushion under his feet, . . .
and a baton at his hand. . . . Then the magnates of the South (shall stand) in the two aisles
before him, while the master of the privy chamber is on his right, the [receiver of income] on
his left, the scribes of the vizier at his (either) hand; one [corresponding] to another, with
each man at his proper place. One shall be heard after another, without allowing one who is
behind to be heard before one who is in front. . . . Let not any official be empowered to
judge [against a superior] in his hall. . . . It is the vizier who shall punish him, in order to
expiate his fault. Let not any official have power to punish in his hall. . . . It is he who
dispatches the official staff, to attend to the water-supply in the whole land. It is he who
dispatches the mayors and village sheiks to plow for harvest time. It is he who [appoints] the
overseers of hundreds in the hall of the king's-house. It is he who [arranges] the hearing of
the mayors and village sheiks who go forth in his name, of South and North. Every matter is
reported to him; there are reported to him the affairs of the southern fortress . . . . It is he
who takes every deposition; it is he who hears [it]. It is he who dispatches the [district]
soldiers and scribes to carry out the [administration] of the king. The records of the nome
are in his hall. . . . It is he who makes the boundary of every nome . . . all divine offerings
and every contract. . . . It is he who appoints every appointee to the hall of judgment, when
any litigant comes to him from the king's-house. It is he who hears every edict.

SOURCE: Ancient Records of Egypt: Historical Documents from the Earliest Times to the
Persian Conquest, Volume 2, trans. James Henry Breasted (Chicago, Ill.: The University of
Chicago Press, 1906): 269-70, 273, 275, 279.

Primary Source 3.3

The Ten Commandments, Exodus 20:1-17 from The Bible
Exodus 20: 1Then God spoke all these words, saying, 2"I am the Lord your God, who
brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. 3you shall have no other
gods before me. 4You shall not make for yourself an idol whether in the form of anything
that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the
earth; 5you shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the Lord your God am a
jealous God . . . 6but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep
my commandments. 7You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain; for the Lord
will not acquit anyone who takes his name in vain. 8Remember the sabbath day, to keep it
holy. 9Six days you shall labor and do all your work. 10But the seventh day is a sabbath to
the Lord your God; you shall not do any work—you, or your son, or your daughter, your
male or female slave, your cattle, or the alien within your towns; 11for in six days the Lord
made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; . . .
12Honor your father and your mother so that your days may be long in the land which the
Lord your God gives you. 13You shall not kill. 14You shall not commit adultery. 15You shall
not steal. 16You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. 17You shall not covet
your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or male or female slave, or
ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."

SOURCE: The New Oxford Annotated Bible: New Revised Standard Version with The
Apocrypha, Fully Revised Fourth Edition. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 110-1.

Primary Source 3.4

The Code of Manu (ca. 200 BCE)

CHAPTER I. 1. The great sages approached Manu, who was seated with a collected mind,
and, having duly worshipped him, spoke as follows: 2. 'Deign, divine one, to declare to us
precisely and in due order the sacred laws of each of the (four chief) castes (varna) and of
the intermediate ones. 3. 'For thou, O Lord, alone knows the purport, (i.e.) the rites, and the
knowledge of the soul, (taught) in this whole ordinance . . . which is unknowable and
unfathomable.' 4. He [Manu], whose power is measureless, being thus asked by the high-
minded great sages, duly honored them, and answered, 'Listen!'. . .
CHAPTER IX. 1. I [Manu] will now propound the eternal laws for a husband and his wife
who keep to the path of duty, whether they be united or separated. 2. Day and night women
must be kept in dependence by the males (of) their (families). . . 3. Her father protects (her)
in childhood, her husband protects (her) in youth, and her sons protect (her) in old age; a
woman is never fit for independence. 4. Reprehensible is the father who gives not (his
daughter in marriage) at the proper time; reprehensible is the husband who approaches not
(his wife in due season), and reprehensible is the son who does not protect his mother after
her husband has died. 5. Women must particularly be guarded against evil inclinations,
however trifling (they may appear); for, if they are not guarded, they will bring sorrow on two
families. 6. Considering that the highest duty of all castes, even weak husbands (must)
strive to guard their wives. 7. He who carefully guards his wife, preserves (the purity of) his
offspring, virtuous conduct, his family, himself, and his (means of acquiring) merit. . . . 10.
No man can completely guard women by force; but they can be guarded by the employment
of the (following) expedients: 11. Let the (husband) employ his (wife) in the collection and
expenditure of his wealth, in keeping (everything) clean, in (the fulfilment of) religious duties,
in the preparation of his food, and in looking after the household utensils. 12. Women,
confined in the house under trustworthy and obedient servants, are not (well) guarded; but
those who of their own accord keep guard over themselves, are well guarded. 13. Drinking
(spirituous liquor), associating with wicked people, separation from the husband, rambling
abroad, sleeping (at unseasonable hours), and dwelling in other men's houses, are the six
causes of the ruin of women.

SOURCE: The Laws of Manu, Translated with Extracts from Seven Commentaries, trans.
Georg Bühler (Oxford at the Clarendon Press, 1886): 1, 2, 327-9.

Primary Source 3.5

Advisor Zichan of Zheng's Compilation of Laws (ca. 6th century BCE)

In the third month, the people of Zheng cast a penal text. Shu Xiang dispatched to Zichan a
text. It stated, "Formerly, I had hope for you, but have now given it up. In the past, former
kings consulted on affairs to decide them but did not make penal compilations, for they
feared that the people would grow litigious. Still unable to control them, they restrained them
with rightness, bound them with [good] governance, and raised them with humanness. They
institutionalized emoluments and ranks to encourage their obedience and determined strict
punishments so as to overawe their perversity. Fearing that that was not enough, they
taught them of loyalty, rewarded good conduct, instructed them in their duties, deployed
them with harmony, supervised them respectfully, supervised them with might, and
adjudged them with firmness. Still they sought sagacious and erudite superiors, intelligent
and astute officials, loyal and trustworthy elders, and kind and beneficent masters. It was
only under such conditions that the people could be employed without disaster or disorder
resulting. When the people are aware of a legal compilation, they will have no wariness of
their superiors. All become contentious, appealing to the texts, and achieve their goals
through lucky conniving. They cannot be governed. When the Xia had a disorderly
government, they composed the Punishments of Yu. When the Shang had disorderly
administration, they composed the Punishments of Tang. When the Zhou had disorderly
administration, they composed the Nine Punishments. All three of these penal compilations
arose in terminal ages. Now as advisor to the kingdom of Zheng you have rectified fields
and ditches, established a reviled administration, instituted the tripartite compilation, and
cast the penal text [in bronze], in order to calm the populace. Is this not difficult?"