Babylonian Empire (Old Babylonian Period) / Dynasty I
The small Amorite kingdom which was centred on the city of Babylon was probably founded about a century after the collapse of Sumerin circa 2004 BC. Lying in the region of Akkad, it was known as Babil by the Sumerians and Bab-ilim by the Akkadians, and had existed as little more than a village since at least 2700 BC.
In circa 1897 BC, an Amorite prince called Sumu-Abum took advantage of the period of anarchy in Mesopotamia following the collapse of Ur, and settled in Babil. So as not to draw attention to himself, he continued the worship of a small local god; a secondary divinity of the family of Enki named Marduk (or Amar UTU), the servant of the protective god Shamash, son of Sippar. Marduk was soon going to replace the great god Enlil, and become the god of power, war, sex and domination, ideal for a city that, within little over a century, would dominate all of Mesopotamia.
Babylon played its own part in the flowering of knowledge in the eighteenth and seventeenth centuries BC. The Code of Hammurabi was one of the most important documents in Babylon's history. It was a series of laws which emphasised the pursuit of justice, especially in relation to business transactions, and it set the form for later law codes.
All dates for this period are approximate until the eighth century BC. This list follows the (until recently) most generally accepted middle chronology for dating rulers, although there are three other competing models. The newly in-favour short chronology dates the Old Babylonians to sixty-four years later than is shown here.
With the fall of the Ur III Dynasty after to an Elamite invasion in 2004 BC, Babylonia fell under foreign (Amorite) influence.
Hammurabi
(c. 1810 BC - 1750 BC) was the sixth king of the First Babylonian Dynasty, reigning from 1792 BC to 1750 BC (according to theMiddle Chronology). He was preceded by his father, Sin-Muballit, who abdicated due to failing health. He extended Babylon's control throughoutMesopotamia through military campaigns.[2] Hammurabi is known for theCode of Hammurabi, one of the earliest surviving codes of law in recorded history. The name Hammurabi derives from the Amorite term ʻAmmurāpi("the kinsman is a healer"), itself from ʻAmmu ("paternal kinsman") andRāpi ("healer").
Sumerian Culture and Hammurabi at Babylon..
With passing generations the Amorites adopted Sumerian culture, and Sumerians were vanishing as an identifiable ethnicity, absorbed by Mesopotamia's other peoples. The Amorites fought off new waves of migrating peoples, and they increased their skills in the art of combat.
The Amorites spread through more of Mesopotamia. They joined in the trade that remained among Mesopotamian cities, and they extended their trade into Asia Minor, exchanging woolen cloth and tin for gold, silver and copper. Amorite merchants created colonies in parts of southern Asia Minor. The center of the new Armorite empire was the city of Ashur, and Ashur was the center of a kingdom that was to become known as Assyria.
In the 1790s BCE an Amorite king at Babylon, Hammurabi, sent his armies out and conquered other kingdoms, cutting down his enemies, as he put it, "like dolls of clay." Hammurabi overran Assyria and conquered Ashur. He established his authority from the Persian Gulf to the city of Haran. Like Sargon, he built a new network of roads. He created a postal system, and he delegated power to governors, who were to rule conquered territories in his name.
Babylon was a city where trade routes crossed. Under Hammurabi it became a bronze-age city of commerce and agriculture. It was a city with skilled artisans, architects, bricklayers and businessmen, with an efficient secular administration and a chain of command. The city was at the hub of an intricate network of canals. It was surrounded by great fields of barley, melons, fruit trees and the wheat the Babylonians used in making unleavened, pancake-like bread. From their barley, the Babylonians made beer. They sheared wool from their flocks of sheep. And they imported wood from Lebanon and metals from Persia.
Like other emperors, Hammurabi operated a protection racket, offering towns he captured the security of his superior military might in exchange for their obedience and tribute (payment of taxes). He believed that where he had conquered he had put an end to war, and he wanted to protect his subjects from the terror of nomads.
Hammurabi wished to promote what he saw as welfare and justice for his subjects. He saw that contracts between people had to be witnessed and ratified, that deeds of partnership had to be maintained, that properties had to be registered and wills written. Hammurabi established laws that protected landholders from the landless. He regulated the treatment of women and slaves. A law made a doctor liable if the doctor made his patient worse, and an architect might be executed if his negligence resulted in the collapse of a house he had designed.
Like other rulers among the civilized, Hammurabi saw some people as more worthy than others. His laws divided his subjects into three classes: the nobles; merchants and ordinary farmers; and slaves. All classes were to be protected from what he believed was unnecessary abuse, but punishments were to differ according to one's class. If a noble destroyed the eye of another noble he might have his own eye put out, or if he broke the bone of another noble he had one of his own bones broken. But if he broke the bone of a common person or destroyed that person's eye, he only had to pay a fine.
Hammurabi claimed that he received his laws from Babylon's sun god and god the of justice, Shamash. According to Hammurabi's scribes, the people of Babylon saw events as directed by the gods, and they saw Hammurabi as wise and as having created a world of order and justice under Shamash.
Babylonian Empire Hammurabi Babylonian empire hammurabI
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