The Code of Hammurabi: Sundry Enactments Chapter Two
If a son strike his father, they shall cut
off his fingers.
If a man destroy the eye of another man, they shall
destroy his eye.
If one break a man's bone, they shall break his bone.
If one destroy the eye of a freeman or break the bone
of a treeman, he shall pay one mana of silver.
If one destroy the eye of a man's slave or break
bone of a man's slave he shall pay one-half his price.
If a man knock out a tooth of a man of his own rank,
they shall knock out his tooth.
If one knock out a tooth of a freeman, he shall pay
one-third mana of silver.
If a man strike the person of a man ... who is his
superior, he shall receive sixty strokes with an ox-tail
whip in public.
If a man strike another man of his own rank, he shall
pay one mana of silver....
If a man strike another man in a quarrel and wound
him, he shall swear: "I struck him without intent," and
he shall be responsible for the physician. ...
If a physician operate on a man for a severe wound
. . . with a bronze lancet and save the man's life; or if
he open an abscess ... of a man with a bronze lancet
and save that man's eye, he shall receive ten shekels of
silver. ...
If he be a freeman, he shall receive five shekels.
If it be a man's slave, the owner of the slave shall
give two shekels of silver to the physician.
If a physician operate on a man for a severe wound
with a bronze lancet and cause the man's death; or open
an abscess ... of a man with a bronze lancet and de-
stroy the man's eye, they shall cut off his fingers.
If a physician operate on a slave of a freeman for a
severe wound with a bronze lancet and cause his death.
he shall restore a slave of equal value....
If a builder build a house for a man and do not make
its construction firm and the house which he has built
collapse and cause the death of the owner of the house,
that builder shall be put to death.
If you would like to read the rest of the Code of Hammurabi, The Avalon Project at Yale has the full text with great definitions.
RESOURCE: World Civilizations
http://www.wwnorton.com/college/history/ralph/workbook/ralprs2.htm
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Last revised July 4, 1997
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