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Hammurabi: the story on HearLore | HearLore
Hammurabi
Hammurabi ascended to the throne of Babylon in 1792 BC as the ruler of a minor city-state that was barely a footnote in the annals of ancient Mesopotamia. At the time of his accession, Babylon was overshadowed by powerful neighbors such as Elam, Assyria, Larsa, and Eshnunna, which controlled the fertile plains and trade routes that defined the region's economy. His father, Sin-Muballit, had begun to consolidate a small territory, but Hammurabi inherited a kingdom that was geographically insignificant and politically vulnerable. The geopolitical landscape was a volatile patchwork of warring city-states, each vying for control of the Tigris and Euphrates river valleys. Hammurabi's early years were marked by peace, yet this tranquility was a fragile veneer over a region teetering on the brink of total war. He spent the first few years of his reign strengthening Babylon's defenses by heightening its city walls and expanding its temples, preparing for the inevitable conflicts that would define his legacy. The silence of these early years was deceptive, for it masked the gathering storm of imperial ambition that would soon engulf the entire region.
The War of Conquest
The first major test of Hammurabi's strategic genius came when the powerful kingdom of Elam invaded the Mesopotamian plain, destroying the city of Eshnunna and imposing its rule on portions of the region. Elam attempted to manipulate the situation by instigating a war between Babylon and Larsa, but Hammurabi and the king of Larsa discovered the duplicity and formed an alliance to crush the Elamites. Although Larsa contributed little to the military effort, Hammurabi's anger at their failure to support him led him to turn on his former ally, conquering Larsa and gaining control of the entire lower Mesopotamian plain by 1762 BC. The war did not end there; Hammurabi turned his attention northward, quelling unrest and destroying Eshnunna, before conquering the remaining northern states, including Mari, which may have surrendered without a fight. The final phase of his military campaigns was a protracted war with Ishme-Dagan I of Assyria, where both kings formed alliances with minor states to gain the upper hand. Hammurabi eventually prevailed, ousting Ishme-Dagan I just before his own death and forcing his successor, Mut-Ashkur, to pay tribute. In just a few years, Hammurabi succeeded in uniting all of Mesopotamia under his rule, leaving only Aleppo and Qatna in the Levant independent.
The Divine Lawgiver
Hammurabi was honored above all other kings of the second millennium BC, receiving the unique distinction of being declared a god within his own lifetime. The personal name Hammurabi-ili, meaning Hammurabi is my god, became common during and after his reign, reflecting the deification of the king by his subjects. A stele from Ur glorifies him in his own voice as a mighty ruler who forces evil into submission and compels all peoples to worship Marduk, the national god of the Babylonians. The stele declares: The people of Elam, Gutium, Subartu, and Tukrish, whose mountains are distant and whose languages are obscure, I placed into [Marduk's] hand. I myself continued to put straight their confused minds. A later hymn written in Hammurabi's own voice extols him as a powerful, supernatural force for Marduk, describing himself as the king, the brace that grasps wrongdoers, that makes people of one mind, and the great dragon among kings. This hymn culminates in the declaration: I am Hammurabi, the king of justice. The combination of military might and divine authority created a figure who was both feared and revered, setting a precedent for the sacralization of kingship in the ancient world.
Common questions
When did Hammurabi ascend to the throne of Babylon?
Hammurabi ascended to the throne of Babylon in 1792 BC. He inherited a kingdom that was geographically insignificant and politically vulnerable at the time of his accession.
What year did Hammurabi conquer Larsa and control the lower Mesopotamian plain?
Hammurabi conquered Larsa and gained control of the entire lower Mesopotamian plain by 1762 BC. This military campaign followed an alliance with the king of Larsa to crush the Elamites before Hammurabi turned on his former ally.
How many laws are in the Code of Hammurabi and what language was it written in?
The Code of Hammurabi is a collection of 282 laws inscribed on a stele and written in Akkadian. Akkadian was the daily language of Babylon and replaced Sumerian during Hammurabi's language reforms.
When was the stele containing the Code of Hammurabi rediscovered and where is it located now?
The stele was rediscovered in 1901 in Iran and is now in the Louvre Museum in Paris. It was originally removed to the Elamite capital of Susa after being plundered by the Elamite king Shutruk-Nahhunte I.
Who was the German Assyriologist that argued the Mosaic Laws were copied from the Code of Hammurabi in 1902?
Friedrich Delitzsch was the German Assyriologist who gave a lecture at the Sing-Akademie zu Berlin in January 1902 arguing that the Mosaic Laws of the Old Testament were directly copied off the Code of Hammurabi.
The Code of Hammurabi was a collection of 282 laws inscribed on a stele and placed in a public place so that all could see it, although it is thought that few were literate. Unlike earlier Sumerian law codes, which focused on compensating the victim of crime, the Code of Hammurabi placed greater emphasis on physically punishing the perpetrator. It prescribed specific penalties for each crime and is among the first codes to establish the presumption of innocence, suggesting that the accused and accuser have the opportunity to provide evidence. The structure of the code is very specific, with each offense receiving a specified punishment, and many offenses resulted in death, disfigurement, or the use of the Lex Talionis philosophy, known as eye for eye, tooth for tooth. The code was written in Akkadian, the daily language of Babylon, and could therefore be read by any literate person in the city. At this time, Akkadian replaced Sumerian, and Hammurabi began language reforms that would make Akkadian the most common language at this time. A carving at the top of the stele portrays Hammurabi receiving the laws from Shamash, the Babylonian god of justice, and the preface states that Hammurabi was chosen by Shamash to bring the laws to the people.
The Empire's Collapse
Under the rule of Hammurabi's successor Samsu-iluna, the short-lived Babylonian Empire began to collapse. In northern Mesopotamia, both the Amorites and Babylonians were driven from Assyria by Puzur-Sin, a native Akkadian-speaking ruler, and around the same time, native Akkadian speakers threw off Amorite Babylonian rule in the far south of Mesopotamia, creating the Sealand Dynasty. Hammurabi's ineffectual successors met with further defeats and loss of territory at the hands of Assyrian kings such as Adasi and Bel-ibni, as well as to the Sealand Dynasty to the south, Elam to the east, and to the Kassites from the northeast. Thus was Babylon quickly reduced to the small and minor state it had once been upon its founding. The coup de grace for the Hammurabi's Amorite Dynasty occurred in 1595 BC, when Babylon was sacked and conquered by the powerful Hittite Empire, thereby ending all Amorite political presence in Mesopotamia. However, the Indo-European-speaking Hittites did not remain, turning over Babylon to their Kassite allies, a people speaking a language isolate, from the Zagros mountains region. This Kassite Dynasty ruled Babylon for over 400 years and adopted many aspects of the Babylonian culture, including Hammurabi's code of laws.
The Enduring Legacy
Even after the fall of the Amorite Dynasty, Hammurabi was still remembered and revered. When the Elamite king Shutruk-Nahhunte I raided Babylon in 1158 BC and carried off many stone monuments, he had most of the inscriptions on these monuments erased and new inscriptions carved into them. On the stele containing Hammurabi's laws, however, only four or five columns were wiped out and no new inscription was ever added. Over a thousand years after Hammurabi's death, the kings of Suhu, a land along the Euphrates river, just northwest of Babylon, claimed him as their ancestor. A Neo-Babylonian royal inscription, which was intended for display on a stele, commemorates a royal grant of tax exemptions to nine Babylonian cities and presents the royal protagonist as a second Hammurabi. Hammurabi's reign became the point of reference for all events in the distant past, and his laws continued to be copied by scribes as part of their writing exercises and were even partially translated into Sumerian. The stele was later plundered by the Elamites and removed to their capital, Susa, where it was rediscovered in 1901 in Iran and is now in the Louvre Museum in Paris.
The Biblical Connection
In the late nineteenth century, the Code of Hammurabi became a major center of debate in the heated Babel und Bibel controversy in Germany over the relationship between the Bible and ancient Babylonian texts. In January 1902, the German Assyriologist Friedrich Delitzsch gave a lecture at the Sing-Akademie zu Berlin in front of the Kaiser and his wife, in which he argued that the Mosaic Laws of the Old Testament were directly copied off the Code of Hammurabi. Delitzsch's lecture was so controversial that, by September 1903, he had managed to collect 1,350 short articles from newspapers and journals, over 300 longer ones, and twenty-eight pamphlets, all written in response to this lecture. The Kaiser distanced himself from Delitzsch and his radical views, and in fall of 1904, Delitzsch was forced to give his third lecture in Cologne and Frankfurt am Main rather than in Berlin. The putative relationship between the Mosaic Law and the Code of Hammurabi later became a major part of Delitzsch's argument in his 1920, 21 book Die große Täuschung that the Hebrew Bible was irredeemably contaminated by Babylonian influence. In the early twentieth century, many scholars believed that Hammurabi was Amraphel, the King of Shinar in the Book of Genesis 14:1. This view has now been largely rejected, and Amraphel's existence is not attested in any writings from outside the Bible. Nonetheless, fragments of previous law codes have been found and it is unlikely that the Mosaic laws were directly inspired by the Code of Hammurabi, though some scholars dispute this.