The Oldest Code of Laws in the World | Page 4

shall be put to death.
section 16. If a man has harboured in his house a manservant or a
maidservant, fugitive from the palace, or a poor man, and has not
produced them at the demand of the commandant, the owner of that
house shall be put to death.
section 17. If a man has captured either a manservant or a maidservant,
a fugitive, in the open country and has driven him back to his master,
the owner of the slave shall pay him two shekels of silver.
section 18. If that slave will not name his owner he shall drive him to
the palace, and one shall enquire into his past, and cause him to return

to his owner.
section 19. If he confine that slave in his house, and afterwards the
slave has been seized in his hand, that man shall be put to death.
section 20. If the slave has fled from the hand of his captor, that man
shall swear by the name of God, to the owner of the slave, and shall go
free.
section 21. If a man has broken into a house, one shall kill him before
the breach and bury him in it (?).
section 22. If a man has carried on brigandage, and has been captured,
that man shall be put to death.
section 23. If the brigand has not been caught, the man who has been
despoiled shall recount before God what he has lost, and the city and
governor in whose land and district the brigandage took place shall
render back to him whatever of his was lost.
section 24. If it was a life, the city and governor shall pay one mina of
silver to his people.
section 25. If in a man's house a fire has been kindled, and a man who
has come to extinguish the fire has lifted up his eyes to the property of
the owner of the house, and has taken the property of the owner of the
house, that man shall be thrown into that fire.
section 26. If either a ganger or a constable, whose going on an errand
of the king has been ordered, goes not, or hires a hireling and sends him
in place of himself, that ganger or constable shall be put to death; his
hireling shall take to himself his house.
section 27. If a ganger or a constable, who is diverted to the fortresses
of the king, and after him one has given his field and his garden to
another, and he has carried on his business, if he returns and regains his
city, one shall return to him his field and his garden, and he shall carry
on his business himself.

section 28. If a ganger or a constable who is diverted to the fortresses of
the king, his son be able to carry on the business, one shall give him
field and garden and he shall carry on his father's business.
section 29. If his son is young and is not able to carry on his father's
business, one-third of the field and garden shall be given to his mother,
and his mother shall rear him.
section 30. If a ganger or a constable has left alone his field, or his
garden, or his house, from the beginning of his business, and has
caused it to be waste, a second after him has taken his field, his garden,
or his house, and has gone about his business for three years, if he
returns and regains his city, and would cultivate his field, his garden,
and his house, one shall not give them to him; he who has taken them
and carried on his business shall carry it on.
section 31. If it is one year only and he had let it go waste, and he shall
return, one shall give his field, his garden, and his house, and he shall
carry on his business.
section 32. If a ganger or a constable who is diverted on an errand of
the king's, a merchant has ransomed him and caused him to regain his
city, if in his house there is means for his ransom, he shall ransom his
own self; if in his house there is no means for his ransom, he shall be
ransomed from the temple of his city; if in the temple of his city there
is not means for his ransom, the palace shall ransom him. His field, his
garden, and his house shall not be given for his ransom.
section 33. If either a governor or a magistrate has taken to himself the
men of the levy, or has accepted and sent on the king's errand a hired
substitute, that governor or magistrate shall be put to death.
section 34. If either