Hittite laws

The Hittite Laws are a group of collections of more than 200 judgments (or articles) compiled on several clay tablets found in 1906-1907 in Hattusa, the ancient capital of the Hittite kingdom. The oldest compilation dates from around 1500 BC. J.-C., and the most recent modifications can date from 1200 av. J.-C., therefore of the last times of the kingdom.

Organization and development

The Hittite laws are known from several fragments which were the subject of a first modern edition by Bedřich Hrozný in 1922, which originally constituted two cuneiform tablets of over 100 sentenceseach, named by their incipit: “If a man” (articles 1 to 100) and “If a vineyard” (articles 101 to 200). A third tablet, now missing, may have existed. These tablets are divided into sorts of paragraphs which have been considered by modern researchers as sentences or articles, even if it happens that some of them actually group together two or three. There was probably no rigid division of the text in antiquity. As with other legal collections from the ancient Near East (the most famous of which is the Code of Hammurabi), the term “law” is not necessarily to be understood in the modern sense of the term; in the absence of texts of legal practice in Hittite countries, it is not known to what extent they were actually applied.takku in Hittite, TUKUMBI in Sumerian and ŠUMMA in Akkadian) which states the problem; and a second part (apodose) which brings its resolution. This form is that of technical texts, making legal collections a kind of technical manual for judges.

The corpus of Hittite laws is composite, revealing several drafting phases, four according to the study by Viktor Korošec which is based above all on the prescribed penalties and which is criticized by S. Jauß:

• an older layer in which the penalties are harsher (numerous corporal punishments, death sentences, heavy fines);
• a second layer in which the penalties are often expiatory offerings;
• a third phase which favors pecuniary penalties (monetary fines);
• finally a fourth phase which softens the older law by recasting the old provisions; it probably dates to the reign of Telipinu (c. 1525-1495 BC), which perhaps sees the first compilation of the articles to form the earliest version of the Hittite Laws;
• we can add a fifth phase, the "parallel version" of the text KbO IV 4, which proceeds to further revisions at the time of the New Kingdom (end of the 13th century BC).

The oldest Hittite laws therefore undoubtedly date back to the beginnings of the Hittite kingdom (17th century BC).), as revealed by the fact that several of them evoke the existence of rules according to the different regions, such as the Pala, which seems subject to special rules, but no longer appears in the texts of the middle period and recent in Hittite history. The effort of compiling and reworking the text concerns above all the period of the New Kingdom. The absence of a legislative tradition associated with a king, apart from the case of Telipinu, makes it impossible to know to whom the initiative for this collection of laws can be attributed, assuming that it should be attributed to a monarch. Indeed, the Hittite Laws are not a "Code" like that of Hammurabi or Ur-Nammu, which have an introduction (and sometimes an epilogue) in the form of

Topics covered

The Hittite laws, like the other legal collections of the ancient Near East, do not cover all the legal themes, far from it. They are interested in certain important subjects, in particular criminal law, agricultural disputes and cases of ritual impurity. A logic of organization could be identified, especially for the first tablet, less for the second, which has gaps. If we follow the breakdown proposed by R. Haase, we have:

• Tablet 1 (“If a man”)
  • Homicide (§ 1–6)
  • Assault and wounds (§ 7–18)
  • Abduction (§ 19–21)
  • Fugitive slaves (§ 22–24)
  • Contamination of dishes (?) (§ 25)
  • Family (§ 26–36)
  • Justified murder (§ 37, 38)
  • Feudal service and tenures (§ 39–42)
  • Accidental death (§ 43–44b)
  • Loss of property (§ 45, 71)
  • Feudal service and tenures (§ 46–56)
  • Pet disputes (§ 57–92)
  • Robbery (§ 93–97)
  • Voluntary fires (§ 98–100)
• Tablet 2 (“If a Vine”)
  • Crop Disputes (§ 101–9)
  • Theft of clay products (?) (§ 110)
  • Witchcraft (§ 111)
  • Awards for prisoners of war (?) (§ 112)
  • Damage in vineyards (§ 113)
  • (break in the tablet)
  • Theft (§ 119–143)
  • Sale (§ 144–149)
  • Salaries (§ 150–161)
  • Irrigation (§ 162)
  • Negligence related to a ritual act (§ 163)
  • Sacred Law (§ 164–170)
  • Miscellaneous (§ 171–178a)
  • Price (§ 178b–188)
  • Sexual offenses (§ 188–200a)
  • Apprenticeship (§ 200b)

Extracts

1 If anyone kills a man or a woman as a result of a quarrel, he brings back the body and he gives four people, male or female, and he pays for his house.

2 If someone kills a slave following a quarrel, he brings back the body and he gives two people, men or women, and he acquits himself for his house.

3 If someone strikes a free man or woman and the victim dies - his hand is guilty of a crime - he brings back the body and he gives two people and he acquits himself for his house.

9 If someone wounds a person in the head, it used to be the custom to give six shekels of silver in the old days: the wounded man took three shekels of silver, it was customary to take three shekels of silver for the palace; and now the king has done away with the palace share and only the wounded takes three shekels of silver.

10 If anyone hurts a person and cripples him, he heals him and in his place he gives a man; this one does not stop working in the house of the wounded man until this one recovers; but when he is cured, then the culprit gives him six shekels of silver, and to the doctor he also gives honorarium.

20 If a Hittite kidnaps a Hittite slave away from the Luvite country and takes him to the Hatti country, and if his master recognizes him as his, then the culprit gives him twelve shekels of silver and he pays for his house.

22 If a slave flees and someone brings him back, if he apprehends him in the vicinity, then the master gives him shoes; if he apprehends him on this side of the river, the master gives him two shekels of silver; if it is on the other side of the river, then he gives three silver shekels.

27 If a man takes his wife and brings her to his house, he takes her dowry; if the wife dies there, the husband's property is burned and the husband takes his wife's dowry for himself; if she dies in her father's house and there are children, the husband does not take the dowry.

28a If a maiden is promised to a man, and if another takes her away, as soon as he takes her away, all that the first man gave, he I restore to him, and the father and mother do not restore it;

28b If the father and the mother give it to another man, the father and the mother restore what was given; if the father and mother refuse to make restitution, they separate her from him.

38 If people are arrested for a trial and if someone helps them and if, then the adversaries come to argue and if he strikes the helper and if the helper dies, there is no 'compensation.

42 If someone hires a man and if he goes on a military campaign and if he dies, if the salary is paid, he does not give compensation; if his wages are not given, he gives a person, and as wages he gives twelve shekels of silver, and as wages of a woman he gives six shekels of silver.

43 If a man used to carry his ox across the river, and someone else pushed him aside and grabbed the ox's tail and crossed the river, and the river carried away the owner of the ox, then one grasps himself.

58 If someone steals a purebred horse, if he is weaned, it is not a purebred horse; if it is a one-year-old horse, it is not a purebred horse; if it is a two-year-old animal, it is a purebred horse; formerly he used to give thirty horses, and now the culprit gives fifteen horses: five two-year-old horses, five one-year-old horses, five weaned horses, he gives them and he pays for his household.

59 If someone steals a purebred sheep, in the past it was customary to give thirty sheep and now the culprit gives fifteen sheep: five ewes, five rams, five lambs he gives them and he pays for his house.

93 If a free man is seized on the threshold and has not yet entered the interior of the house, he gives twelve shekels of silver; if a slave is seized on the threshold and if he has not yet entered the interior of the house, he gives six shekels of silver.

98 If a free man sets fire to a house, he rebuilds the house and what in the house is lost - be it a person, an ox or a sheep - he does not pay them back as precious things.

99 If a slave sets fire to a house and his master compensates for him, the slave's nose and ears are usually mutilated and returned to his master; but if the latter does not indemnify, he also drives him away.

100 If someone sets fire to a shed, he continues to feed the oxen of its owner until the following spring, and he returns the shed; if there is no straw in it, then it rebuilds <only> the shed.

106 (Eng 6) If someone sets fire to his field and lets it go onto a fruit field and sets the field on fire, he who sets it on fire takes the burnt field for himself but gives the owner of the field an intact field and he harvests it for himself.

107 (Eng 7) If a man lets <enter> sheep in cultivated vineyards and if he damages <them>, if they are in fruit, for one IKU he gives ten shekels of silver and he pays for his house, but if they are empty, he gives three shekels of silver.

108 (Eng 8) If anyone steals vines from an enclosed vineyard, if it is a hundred trees, he gives six shekels of silver and pays for his house; but if there is no fence and if he steals a vine, he gives three shekels of silver.

109 (Eng 9) If someone isolates an orchard from the canal, if it is a hundred trees, he gives six shekels of silver.

111 (Eng 11) If someone fashions clay for a figurine, it is witchcraft and it belongs to the court of the king.

119 (Eng 16) If someone steals a trained pond bird or a trained partridge, formerly used to give a mine of silver and now the culprit gives twelve shekels of silver and he acquits for his home.

146 (Fr 35) If someone puts up a house or a village, a garden or a pasture for sale and if another comes and breaks the market and makes a deal on the deal, the culprit gives a mine of money and buys the good from the man at precisely the first purchase price.

147 (Fr 36) If someone puts an unqualified person up for sale and another breaks the deal, the culprit gives five (?) shekels of silver.

158 (FR 43) If a man places himself as an employee, if he binds sheaves, if he takes <them> <on> a cart, if he closes <them> <in> the straw, if he sweeps the threshing floor, for three months his wages <is> thirty measures of corn; if a woman places herself as an employee during the harvest, for two months, he gives twelve measures of wheat.

159 (Fr 44) If anyone harnesses a yoke of oxen, his wages are <>half a measure of corn.

160a (FR 45) If a blacksmith makes a pipe of one and a half mines, his salary <is> one and a half measures of wheat.

160b (FR 45) <If> he makes an ax weighing two minas, his salary <is>one measure of spelled.

164 (Eng 49) If someone comes to seize and causes a quarrel, and breaks either a large loaf or a vessel of wine,

165 (Fr 50) then he gives a sheep, ten loaves, a pitcher of fine beer and he purifies his house again until the following year; then he regards him with benevolence in his house.

166 (Eng 51) If someone sheds seed on seed, one puts his neck on a plow and harnesses a pair of oxen; one directs the face of one to one side and the face of the other to the other side; the man dies and the oxen die and the one who sowed the field before already takes it for himself; in the past it was customary to proceed in this way;

167 (Fr 52) and now we shoot a sheep instead of the man and we shoot two sheep instead of the oxen; the culprit gives thirty loaves, three jugs of fine beer and purifies again; he who sowed the field before is already reaping it for him.

179 (Eng 64) If <it is> a sheep, its price <is>one shekel of silver, the price of three goats <is> two shekels of silver, the price of two lambs <is '>one shekel of silver, and the price of two kids is <>half a shekel of silver.

180 (Fr 65) If <it is> a draft horse, its price <is> twenty shekels of silver, the price of a mule <is> a mine of silver, the price of a horse <is> fourteen shekels of silver, the price of a one-year-old stallion <is> ten shekels of silver, the price of a one-year-old draft mare <is> fifteen shekels of 'silver.

188 (Fr 74) If a man sins with a sheep, <it is> an abomination, it is death for him, he is led to the king's door, but the king can kill him and the king can keep him alive, but he can no longer appear before the king.

189 (Fr 75) If a man transgresses with his own mother, it is an abomination; if a man transgresses with his daughter, it is an abomination; if a man transgresses with his son, it is an abomination.

191 (Fr 77) If a free man has sexual intercourse with free co-uterine sisters and their mother, this one <being> in one country and that one in another country, there is no reason to punishment; if both are in one place and if he knows it, <it is> an abomination and there is no need for punishment.

192 (Fr 78) If a woman's husband dies, his wife takes her share [... ], there is no need for punishment.

193 (Fr 79) If a man has a woman <for his wife> and if the man dies, his brother takes his wife, then his father takes her; if then his father dies and if his brother's son takes the wife he had, there is no need for punishment.

194 (Fr 80) If a free man has sexual intercourse with co-uterine slaves and their mother, there is no cause for punishment; if brothers sleep with a free woman, there is no reason for punishment; if a father and son sleep with a slave or a prostitute, there is no need for punishment.

200a (Fr 86a) If a man fouls with a horse or a mule, there is no need for punishment; he can no longer appear before the king and does not become a priest; if someone sleeps with a deportee and with his mother [... ], there is no reason for punishment; 200b (Fr 86b) if someone gives a son to be instructed either as a carpenter, or as a blacksmith, as a weaver, as a shoemaker, as a fuller, he gives six shekels of silver <as wages> for the instruction; if he does not instruct him, then he gives a person.