Nemo Censetur Ignorare Legem (No One Is Considered to Be Ignorant of the Law)
Secret Treasures of the Richelieu Wing
Code of Hammurabi
1792 – 1750 BC
Drawing close to this great basalt stele, we see thousands of characters inscribed on its surface. It is one of the most important testimonies of the political and social history of Mesopotamia: this is one of the oldest legal texts, far earlier than the laws of the Bible.
Hammurabi, King of Babylon, had several similar steles carved for distribution throughout his realm. All could read (or have read to them) the 300-odd articles of law inscribed in cuneiform writing and the Akkadian language.
It is, in fact, a list of examples of judgments establishing the sanctions applied to a great variety of crimes and misdemeanours, in domains as varied as the family, agriculture, commerce and administration.
The text concludes with a vow to transmit these words down through the ages. A vow fulfilled!
Lex talionis
‘If a man … gouges out the eye of a freeman, his eye shall be gouged out. If someone breaks the tooth of a freeman, one of his teeth shall be broken.’ This is the same lex talionis found later in the Bible: ‘An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.’