Code of Ur-Nammu | Sumerian Laws (slave codes) | Oldest Laws on EARTH

 You may not be aware the slavery and enslavement is as old as the planet... and add torture... these are pure EVIL and invented...

Code of Ur-Nammu (SLAVE CODE, by the way)
The first known version of the code in its current location
Createdc. 2100 BC–2050 BC
LocationIstanbul Archaeology Museums (Ni.3191) (originally Nippur, Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq))
Author(s)Ur-Nammu
PurposeLegal code

The Code of Ur-Nammu is the oldest known law code surviving today. It is from Mesopotamia and is written on tablets, in the Sumerian language c. 2100–2050 BCE. It contains strong statements of royal power like "I eliminated enmity, violence, and cries for justice."[1]

Discovery

The first copy of the code, in two fragments found at Nippur, in what is now Iraq, was translated by Samuel Kramer in 1952. These fragments are held at the Istanbul Archaeological Museums. Owing to its partial preservation, only the prologue and five of the laws were discernible.[2] Kramer noted that luck was involved in the discovery:[2]

In all probability I would have missed the Ur-Nammu tablet altogether had it not been for an opportune letter from F. R. Kraus, now Professor of Cuneiform Studies at the University of Leiden in Holland ... His letter said that some years ago, in the course of his duties as curator in the Istanbul Museum, he had come upon two fragments of a tablet inscribed with Sumerian laws, had made a "join" of the two pieces, and had catalogued the resulting tablet as No. 3191 of the Nippur collection of the Museum ... Since Sumerian law tablets are extremely rare, I had No. 3191 brought to my working table at once. There it lay, a sun-baked tablet, light brown in color, 20 by 10 centimeters in size. More than half of the writing was destroyed, and what was preserved seemed at first hopelessly unintelligible. But after several days of concentrated study, its contents began to become clear and take shape, and I realized with no little excitement that what I held in my hand was a copy of the oldest law code as yet known to man.

Further tablets were found in Ur and translated in 1965, allowing some 30 of the 57 laws to be reconstructed.[3] Another copy found in Sippar contains slight variants.[4]

Background

The Sumerian King Ur-Nammu (seated), the creator of the Code of Ur-Nammu, bestows governorship on Ḫašḫamer, ensi of Iškun-Sin (cylinder seal impression, c. 2100 BC).

The preface directly credits the laws to king Ur-Nammu of Ur (2112–2095 BC). The author who had the laws written onto cuneiform tablets is still somewhat under dispute. Some scholars have attributed it to Ur-Nammu's son Shulgi.[5]

Although it is known that earlier law-codes existed, such as the Code of Urukagina, this represents the earliest extant legal text. It is three centuries older than the Code of Hammurabi. The laws are arranged in casuistic form of IF (crime) THEN (punishment)—a pattern followed in nearly all later codes. It institutes fines of monetary compensation for bodily damage as opposed to the later lex talionis ('eye for an eye') principle of Babylonian law. However, murder, robbery, adultery and rape were capital offenses.

FREE PERSON or SLAVE?

The code reveals a glimpse at societal structure during Ur's Third Dynasty. Beneath the lugal ("great man" or king), all members of society belonged to one of two basic strata: the lu or free person, or the slave (male, arad; female geme). The son of a lu was called a dumu-nita until he married, becoming a "young man" (gurus). A woman (munus) went from being a daughter (dumu-mi) to a wife (dam), then if she outlived her husband, a widow (nu-ma-su), who could remarry.

The prologue, typical of Mesopotamian law codes, invokes the deities for Ur-Nammu's kingship, Nanna and Utu, and decrees "equity in the land".

... After An and Enlil had turned over the Kingship of Ur to Nanna, at that time did Ur-Nammu, son born of Ninsun, for his beloved mother who bore him, in accordance with his principles of equity and truth ... Then did Ur-Nammu the mighty warrior, king of Ur, king of Sumer and Akkad, by the might of Nanna, lord of the city, and in accordance with the true word of Utu, establish equity in the land; he banished malediction, violence and strife, and set the monthly Temple expenses at 90 gur of barley, 30 sheep, and 30 sila of butter. He fashioned the bronze sila-measure, standardized the one-mina weight, and standardized the stone weight of a shekel of silver in relation to one mina ... The orphan was not delivered up to the rich man; the widow was not delivered up to the mighty man; the man of one shekel was not delivered up to the man of one mina.

One mina (1⁄60 of a talent) was made equal to 60 shekels (1 shekel = 8.3 grams, or 0.3 oz).

Surviving laws

Among the surviving laws are these:[6]

  1. If a man commits a murder, that man must be killed.
  2. If a man commits a robbery, he will be killed.
  3. If a man commits a kidnapping, he is to be imprisoned and pay 15 shekels of silver.
  4. If a slave marries a slave, and that slave is set free, he does not leave the household.[1]
  5. If a slave marries a native [i.e. free] person, he/she is to hand the firstborn son over to his owner.
  6. If a man violates the right of another and deflowers the virgin wife of a young man, they shall kill that male.
  7. If the wife of a man followed after another man and he slept with her, they shall slay that woman, but that male shall be set free. [§4 in some translations]
  8. If a man proceeded by force, and deflowered the virgin female slave of another man, that man must pay five shekels of silver. (5)
  9. If a man divorces his first-time wife, he shall pay (her) one mina of silver. (6)
  10. If it is a (former) widow whom he divorces, he shall pay (her) half a mina of silver. (7)
  11. If the man had slept with the widow without there having been any marriage contract, he need not pay any silver. (8)
  12. If a man is accused of sorcery [translation disputed], he must undergo ordeal by water; if he is proven innocent, his accuser must pay 3 shekels. (10)[7][8]
  13. If a man accused the wife of a man of adultery, and the river ordeal proved her innocent, then the man who had accused her must pay one-third of a mina of silver. (11)
  14. If a prospective son-in-law enters the house of his prospective father-in-law, but his father-in-law later gives his daughter to another man, the father-in-law shall return to the rejected son-in-law twofold the amount of bridal presents he had brought. (12)
  15. If [text destroyed], he shall weigh and deliver to him 2 shekels of silver.
  16. If a slave escapes from the city limits, and someone returns him, the owner shall pay two shekels to the one who returned him. (14)
  17. If a man knocks out the eye of another man, he shall weigh out half a mina of silver. (15)
  18. If a man has cut off another man's foot, he is to pay ten shekels. (16)
  19. If a man, in the course of a scuffle, smashed the limb of another man with a club, he shall pay one mina of silver. (17)
  20. If someone severed the nose of another man with a copper knife, he must pay two-thirds of a mina of silver. (18)
  21. If a man knocks out a tooth of another man, he shall pay two shekels of silver. (19)
  22. [text destroyed] If he does not have a slave, he is to pay 10 shekels of silver. If he does not have silver, he is to give another thing that belongs to him. (21)[2]
  23. If a man's slave-woman, comparing herself to her mistress, speaks insolently to her, her mouth shall be scoured with 1 quart of salt. (22)
  24. If a slave woman strikes someone acting with the authority of her mistress, [text destroyed]
  25. If a man appeared as a witness, and was shown to be a perjurer, he must pay fifteen shekels of silver. (25)
  26. If a man appears as a witness, but withdraws his oath, he must make payment, to the extent of the value in litigation of the case. (26)
  27. If a man stealthily cultivates the field of another man and he raises a complaint, this is however to be rejected, and this man will lose his expenses. (27)
  28. If a man flooded the field of a man with water, he shall measure out three kur of barley per iku of field. (28)
  29. If a man had let an arable field to a(nother) man for cultivation, but he did not cultivate it, turning it into wasteland, he shall measure out three kur of barley per iku of field. (29)
*
 Trial by ordeal was an ancient judicial practice by which the guilt or innocence of the accused was determined by subjecting them to a painful, or at least an unpleasant, usually dangerous experience.  In medieval Europe, like trial by combat, trial by ordeal, such as cruentation, was sometimes considered a "judgement of God" (Latin: jūdicium Deī, Old English: Godes dōm): a procedure based on the premise that God would help the innocent by performing a miracle on their behalf. The practice has much earlier roots, attested to as far back as the Code of Hammurabi and the Code of Ur-Nammu. 

By fire

After being accused of adultery Cunigunde of Luxembourg proved her innocence by walking over red-hot plowshares.

Ordeal by fire was one form of torture. The ordeal of fire typically required that the accused walk a certain distance, usually 9 feet (2.7 metres) or a certain number of paces, usually three, over red-hot plowshares or holding a red-hot iron. Innocence was sometimes established by a complete lack of injury, but it was more common for the wound to be bandaged and re-examined three days later by a priest, who would pronounce that God had intervened to heal it, or that it was merely festering—in which case the suspect would be exiled or put to death. One famous story about the ordeal of plowshares concerns the English King Edward the Confessor's mother, Emma of Normandy. According to legend, she was accused of adultery with Bishop Ælfwine of Winchester but proved her innocence by walking barefoot unharmed over red-hot plowshares.

Peter Bartholomew undergoing the ordeal of fire, by Gustave Doré.

During the First Crusade, the French mystic Peter Bartholomew allegedly went through the ordeal by fire in 1099 by his own choice to disprove a charge that his claimed discovery of the Holy Lance was fraudulent. He died as a result of his injuries.[2]

Trial by ordeal was adopted in the 13th century by the Byzantine successor states the Empire of Nicaea and the Despotate of Epirus; Michael Angold speculates this legal innovation was most likely through "the numerous western mercenaries in Byzantine service both before and after 1204."[3] It was used to prove the innocence of the accused in cases of treason and use of magic to affect the health of the emperor. The most famous case where this was employed was when Michael Palaiologos was accused of treason: he avoided enduring the red-iron by saying he would only hold it if the Metropolitan Phokas of Philadelphia could take the iron from the altar with his own hands and hand it to him.[4]  However, the Byzantines viewed trial by ordeal with disgust and considered it a barbarian innovation at odds with Byzantine law and ecclesiastical canons.  Angold notes, "Its abolition by Michael Palaiologos was universally acclaimed."[5]

In 1498, Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola, the leader of a reform movement in Florence who claimed apocalyptic prophetic visions, attempted to prove the divine sanction of his mission by undergoing a trial by fire. The first of its kind in over 400 years, the trial was a fiasco for Savonarola, since a sudden rain doused the flames, canceling the event and taken by onlookers as a sign from God against him. The Inquisition arrested him shortly thereafter, with Savonarola convicted of heresy and hanged at the Piazza della Signoria in Florence.

Ordeal by fire (Persian: ور) was also used for judiciary purposes in ancient Iran.   Persons accused of cheating in contracts or lying might be asked to prove their innocence by ordeal of fire as an ultimate test.  Two examples of such an ordeal include the accused having to pass through fire, or having molten metal poured on their chest.  There were about 30 of these kinds of fiery tests in all.  If the accused died, they were held to have been guilty; if survived, they were innocent, having been protected by Mithra and the other gods. The most simple form of such ordeals required the accused to take an oath, then drink a potion of sulfur (Avestan: saokant, lit. 'sulfur', Middle Persian: sōgand, lit. 'oath', Persian: سوگند, romanized: sowgand, lit. 'oath'). It was believed that fire had an association with truth and hence with asha.[6]

Sita in an agnipariksha, Yuddha Kanda

In ancient India, the trial by fire was known as agnipariksha, in which Agni, the Fire God, would be invoked by a priest using mantras. After the invocation, a pyre would be built and lit, and the accused would be asked to sit on it.  According to Hindu mythology, the Fire God would preserve the accused if they were innocent, if not, they would be burned to ashes.[7][8]

By boiling oil

Trial by boiling oil has been practiced in villages in certain parts of West Africa, such as Togo.[9] There are two primary versions of this trial. In one, the accused parties are ordered to retrieve an item from a container of boiling oil, with those who refuse the task being found guilty.[10] In the other, both the accused and the accuser have to retrieve an item from boiling oil, with the person or persons whose hand remains unscathed being declared innocent.[9]

By water

There were different types of trials by water: trial by hot water and trial by cold water. 

Cold water

The ordeal of cold water has a precedent in the 13th law of the Code of Ur-Nammu[16] (the oldest known surviving code of laws) and the second law of the Code of Hammurabi.[17]  Under the Code of Ur-Nammu, a man who was accused of what some scholars have translated as "sorcery" was to undergo ordeal by water.  If the man were proven innocent through this ordeal, the accuser was obligated to pay three shekels to the man who underwent judgment.[16] The Code of Hammurabi dictated that, if a man was accused of a matter by another, the accused was to leap into a river.  If the accused man survived this ordeal, the accused was to be acquitted.  If the accused was found innocent by this ordeal, the accuser was to be put to death and the accused man was to take possession of the then-deceased accuser's house.[17]

An ordeal by cold water is mentioned in the Vishnu Smrti,[18] which is one of the texts of the Dharmaśāstra.[18]

The practice was also set out in Salic law but was abolished by Emperor Louis the Pious in 829. The practice reappeared in the Late Middle Ages: in the Dreieicher Wildbann of 1338, a man accused of poaching was to be submerged in a barrel three times and to be considered innocent if he sank, and guilty if he floated. 

*

XII.

1. Now follows the (rule regarding the ordeal by) water.

2. (The defendant must enter) water which is free from mud, aquatic plants, (crabs and other) vicious animals, (porpoises or other) large rapacious animals living in water, fish, leeches, and other (animals or plants),

3. The water having been addressed with the Mantras (mentioned hereafter), he must enter it, seizing the knees of another man, who must be free from friendship or hatred, and must dive into the water up to his navel.

4. At the same time another man must discharge an arrow from a bow, which must neither be too strong nor too weak.

5. That arrow must be fetched quickly by another man.

6. He who is not seen above the water in the mean time is proclaimed innocent. But in the contrary case he is (declared) guilty, even though one limb of his only has become visible.

7. 'Thou, O water, dwellest in the interior of all creatures, like a witness. O water, thou knowest what mortals do not comprehend.

[XII. 3-6. Y. II, 108, 109.] p. 60

8. 'This man being arraigned in a cause, desires to be cleared from guilt. Therefore mayest thou deliver him, lawfully from this perplexity.'

 

 

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CONTROLLERS

“Whether in actual fact the policy of the boot-on-the-face can go on indefinitely seems doubtful. My own belief is that the ruling oligarchy will find less arduous and wasteful ways of governing and of satisfying its lust for power, and these ways will resemble those which I described in Brave New World. Within the next generation I believe that the world’s rulers will discover that infant conditioning and narco-hypnosis are more efficient, as instruments of government, than clubs and prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging and kicking them into obedience.” – Aldous Huxley – Letter to George Orwell about 1984 in 1949

OVER AND OVER

THE ELITE NEVER, EVER GET MASSACRED OR WIPED OUT with their wealth. They just move. They move all down through the ages. They bring on catastrophes to an empire when they've used up that empire and they’ve already created another one to move into and then they flatten the old one and move on. This has been the system for thousands and thousands and thousands of years at least. - Alan Watt
Artificial messages coming from the environment and through controlled dark portal organizations and mind-controlled people feels; metallic, abrasive, acidic, energetically burdensome, and sharp knife or blade like. Sometimes it can make you feel suddenly physically ill with headaches, nausea, or body parts with stabbing pains, and even diarrhea when you come into contact with it. AI feels sickening to the Cosmic Christ Consciousness. [https://rielpolitik.com/2022/08/16/archons-overlords-magick-black-suns-lisa-renee-globalists-standing-at-the-ready/]
“There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological method of making people love their servitude, and producing dictatorship without tears, so to speak, producing a kind of painless concentration camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have their liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it, because they will be distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing, or brainwashing enhanced by pharmacological methods. And this seems to be the final revolution” ― Aldous Huxley

Watchers?

Watcherism is the worldwide religion of the ruling class, make no mistake about it. Forget about nationality, forget about ethnicity, forget about inherited religious tradition. None of that matters - not one single bit - at the elite level.  This is the religion they all share, and they tell you so over and over and over and over again. Thankfully, I think that message is sinking through to all but the most myopic and obstinate. - Christopher Knowles, Secret Sun blog

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