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As the first Babylonian Empire politically united several regions, Babylon's sixth ruler, Hammurabi, called for a systematic codification of existing legal practices. Hammurabi's Code is the most extensive and comprehensive set of laws to survive from ancient times.
Hammurabi's Code covers a broad spectrum of moral, social, and commercial obligations. Its civil and criminal statutes specify penalties for murder, theft, incest, adultery, kidnapping, assault and battery, and many other crimes. It also documents the fact that under Babylonian law, individuals were not regarded as equals. Human worth was defined in terms of a person's wealth and status in society. Further clauses in the Code reveal how women were treated. They were considered intellectually and physically inferior to men, were regarded as the personal property of the male head of the household, and were expected to bear children (clause 138). However, they also enjoyed commercial freedom (clause 109) and considerable legal protection (clauses 134, 138, 209, and 210).
Written law represented a landmark advance in the development of human rights in that it protected the individual from the capricious decisions of monarchs. Although written law necessarily restricted individual freedom, it safeguarded the basic values of the community.
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