and reigned:--Sondi, who is classed in the II dynasty, received a
continuous worship toward the end of the III dynasty. But did all those
who preceded him, and those who followed him, exist as he did? And if
they existed, do the order and relation agree with actual truth? The
different lists do not contain the same names in the same position;
certain Pharaohs are added or suppressed without appreciable reason.
Where Manetho inscribes Kenkenes and Ouenephes, the tables of the time
of Seti I give us Ati and Ata; Manetho reckons nine kings to the II
dynasty, while they register only five. The monuments, indeed, show us
that Egypt in the past obeyed princes whom her annalists were unable to
classify: for instance, they associated with Sondi a Pirsenu, who is not
mentioned in the annals. We must, therefore, take the record of all this
opening period of history for what it is--namely, a system invented at a
much later date, by means of various artifices and combinations--to be
partially accepted in default of a better, but without, according to it,
that excessive confidence which it has hitherto received. The two
Thinite dynasties, in direct descent from the fabulous Menes, furnish,
like this hero himself, only a tissue of romantic tales and miraculous
legends in the place of history. A double-headed stork, which had
appeared in the first year of Teti, son of Menes, had foreshadowed to
Egypt a long prosperity, but a famine under Ouenephes, and a terrible
plague under Semempses, had depopulated the country; the laws had been
relaxed, great crimes had been committed, and revolts had broken out.
During the reign of the Boethos a gulf had opened near Bubastis, and
swallowed up many people, then the Nile had flowed with honey for
fifteen days in the time of Nephercheres, and Sesochris was supposed to
have been a giant in stature. A few details about royal edifices were
mixed up with these prodigies. Teti had laid the foundation of the great
palace of Memphis, Ouenephes had built the pyramids of Ko-kome near
Saqqara. Several of the ancient Pharaohs had published books on
theology, or had written treatises on anatomy and medicine; several had
made laws called Kakôû, the male of males, or the bull of bulls. They
explained his name by the statement that he had concerned himself about
the sacred animals; he had proclaimed as gods, Hapis of Memphis, Mnevis
of Heliopolis, and the goat of Mendes.
After him, Binothris had conferred the right of succession upon all
women of the blood-royal. The accession of the III dynasty, a Memphite
one according to Manetho, did not at first change the miraculous
character of this history. The Libyans had revolted against Necherophes,
and the two armies were encamped before each other, when one night the
disk of the moon became immeasurably enlarged, to the great alarm of the
rebels, who recognized in this phenomenon a sign of the anger of heaven,
and yielded without fighting. Tosorthros, the successor of Necherophes,
brought the hieroglyphs and the art of stone-cutting to perfection. He
composed, as Teti did, books of medicine, a fact which caused him to be
identified with the healing god Imhotpu. The priests related these
things seriously, and the Greek writers took them down from their lips
with the respect which they offered to everything emanating from the
wise men of Egypt.
What they related of the human kings was not more detailed, as we see,
than their accounts of the gods. Whether the legends dealt with deities
or kings, all that we know took its origin, not in popular imagination,
but in sacerdotal dogma: they were invented long after the times they
dealt with, in the recesses of the temples, with an intention and a
method of which we are enabled to detect flagrant instances on the
monuments.
Toward the middle of the third century before our era the Greek troops
stationed on the southern frontier, in the forts at the first cataract,
developed a particular veneration for Isis of Philæ. Their devotion
spread to the superior officers who came to inspect them, then to the
whole population of the Thebaid, and finally reached the court of the
Macedonian kings. The latter, carried away by force of example, gave
every encouragement to a movement which attracted worshippers to a
common sanctuary, and united in one cult two races over which they
ruled. They pulled down the meagre building of the Saite period, which
had hitherto sufficed for the worship of Isis, constructed at great cost
the temple which still remains almost intact, and assigned to it
considerable possessions in Nubia, which, in addition to gifts from
private individuals, made the goddess the richest land-owner in Southern
Egypt. Knumu and his two wives, Anukit and Satit, who, before Isis, had
been the undisputed suzerains of the cataract, perceived with jealousy
their neighbor's prosperity: the civil wars and invasions of the
centuries immediately preceding had ruined their temples, and their
poverty contrasted painfully with the riches of the new-comer.
The priests resolved to lay this sad state of affairs before King
Ptolemy, to represent to him the services which they had rendered and
still continued to render to Egypt, and above all to remind him of the
generosity of the ancient Pharaohs, whose example, owing to the poverty
of the times, the recent Pharaohs had been unable to follow. Doubtless
authentic documents were wanting in their archives to support their
pretensions: they therefore inscribed upon a rock, in the island of
Sehel, a long inscription which they attributed to Zosiri of the III
dynasty. This sovereign had left behind him a vague reputation for
greatness. As early as the XII dynasty Usirtasen III had claimed him as
"his father"--his ancestor--and had erected a statue to him; the priests
knew that, by invoking him, they had a chance of obtaining a hearing.
The inscription which they fabricated set forth that in the eighteenth
year of Zosiri's reign he had sent to Madir, lord of Elephantine, a
message couched in these terms: "I am overcome with sorrow for the
throne, and for those who reside in the palace, and my heart is
afflicted and suffers greatly because the Nile has not risen in my time,
for the space of eight years. Corn is scarce, there is a lack of
herbage, and nothing is left to eat: when any one calls upon his
neighbors for help, they take pains not to go. The child weeps, the
young man is uneasy, the hearts of the old men are in despair, their
limbs are bent, they crouch on the earth, they fold their hands; the
courtiers have no further resources; the shops formerly furnished with
rich wares are now filled only with air, all that was within them has
disappeared. My spirit also, mindful of the beginning of things, seeks
to call upon the savior who was here where I am, during the centuries of
the gods, upon Thot-Ibis, that great wise one, upon Imhotpu, son of
Phtah of Memphis. Where is the place in which the Nile is born? Who is
the god or goddess concealed there? What is his likeness?"
The lord of Elephantine brought his reply in person. He described to
the king, who was evidently ignorant of it, the situation of the island
and the rocks of the cataract, the phenomena of the inundation, the gods
who presided over it, and who alone could relieve Egypt from her
disastrous plight.
Zosiri repaired to the temple of the principality and offered the
prescribed sacrifices; the god arose, opened his eyes, panted, and cried
aloud, "I am Khnumu who created thee!" and promised him a speedy return
of a high Nile and the cessation of the famine.
Pharaoh was touched by the benevolence which his divine father had shown
him; he forthwith made a decree by which he ceded to the temple all his
rights of suzerainty over the neighboring nomes within a radius of
twenty miles.
Henceforward the entire population, tillers and vinedressers, fishermen
and hunters, had to yield the tithe of their income to the priests; the
quarries could not be worked without the consent of Khnumu, and the
payment of a suitable indemnity into his coffers; finally, metals and
precious woods, shipped thence for Egypt, had to submit to a toll on
behalf of the temple.
Did the Ptolemies admit the claims which the local priests attempted to
deduce from this romantic tale? and did the god regain possession of the
domains and dues which they declared had been his right? The stele shows
us with what ease the scribes could forge official documents when the
exigencies of daily life forced the necessity upon them; it teaches us
at the same time how that fabulous chronicle was elaborated, whose
remains have been preserved for us by classical writers. Every prodigy,
every fact related by Manetho, was taken from some document analogous to
the supposed inscription of Zosiri.
The real history of the early centuries, therefore, eludes our
researches, and no contemporary record traces for us those vicissitudes
which Egypt passed through before being consolidated into a single
kingdom, under the rule of one man. Many names, apparently of powerful
and illustrious princes, had survived in the memory of the people; these
were collected, classified, and grouped in a regular manner into
dynasties, but the people were ignorant of any exact facts connected
with the names, and the historians, on their own account, were reduced
to collect apocryphal traditions for their sacred archives.
The monuments of these remote ages, however, cannot have entirely
disappeared: they existed in places where we have not as yet thought of
applying the pick, and chance excavations will some day most certainly
bring them to light. The few which we do possess barely go back beyond
the III dynasty: namely, the hypogeum of Shiri, priest of Sondi and
Pirsenu; possibly the tomb of Khuithotpu at Saqqara; the Great Sphinx of
Gizeh; a short inscription on the rocks of Wady Maghara, which
represents Zosiri (the same king of whom the priests of Khnumu in the
Greek period made a precedent) working the turquoise or copper mines of
Sinai; and finally the step pyramid where this Pharaoh rests. It forms a
rectangular mass, incorrectly oriented, with a variation from the true
north of 4° 35', 393 ft., 8 in. long from east to west, and 352 ft.
deep, with a height of 159 ft. 9 in. It is composed of six cubes, with
sloping sides, each being about 13 ft. less in width than the one below
it; that nearest to the ground measures 37 ft. 8 in. in height, and the
uppermost one 29 ft. 2 in.
It was entirely constructed of limestone from neighboring mountains. The
blocks are small and badly cut, the stone courses being concave, to
offer a better resistance to downward thrust and to shocks of
earthquake. When breaches in the masonry are examined, it can be seen
that the external surface of the steps has, as it were, a double stone
facing, each facing being carefully dressed. The body of the pyramid is
solid, the chambers being cut in the rock beneath. These chambers have
often been enlarged, restored, and reworked in the course of centuries,
and the passages which connect them form a perfect labyrinth into which
it is dangerous to venture without a guide. The columned porch, the
galleries and halls, all lead to a sort of enormous shaft, at the bottom
of which the architect had contrived a hiding-place, destined, no doubt,
to contain the more precious objects of the funerary furniture. Until
the beginning of this century the vault had preserved its original
lining of glazed pottery. Three quarters of the wall surface was covered
with green tiles, oblong and lightly convex on the outer side, but flat
on the inner: a square projection pierced with a hole served to fix them
at the back in a horizontal line by means of flexible wooden rods. Three
bands which frame one of the doors are inscribed with the titles of the
Pharaoh. The hieroglyphs are raised in either blue, red, green, or
yellow, on a fawn-colored ground.
The towns, palaces, temples, all the buildings which princes and kings
had constructed to be witnesses of their power or piety to future
generations, have disappeared in the course of ages, under the feet and
before the triumphal blasts of many invading hosts: the pyramid alone
has survived, and the most ancient of the historic monuments of Egypt is
a tomb.
COMPILATION OF THE EARLIEST CODE
B.C. 2250
HAMMURABI
The foundation of all law-making in Babylonia from about the middle
of the twenty-third century B.C. to the fall of the empire was the
code of Hammurabi, the first king of all Babylonia. He expelled
invaders from his dominions, cemented the union of north and south
Babylonia, made Babylon the capital, and thus consolidated an
empire which endured for almost twenty centuries. The code which he
compiled is the oldest known in history, older by nearly a thousand
years than the Mosaic, and of earlier date than the so-called Laws
of Manu. It is one of the most important historical landmarks in
existence, a document which gives us knowledge not otherwise
furnished of the country and people, the civilization and life of a
great centre of human action hitherto almost hidden in obscurity.
Hammurabi, who is supposed to be identical with Amraphel, a
contemporary of Abraham, is regarded as having certainly
contributed through his laws to the Hebrew traditions. The
discovery of this code has, therefore, a special value in relation
to biblical studies, upon which so many other important side-lights
have recently been thrown.
The discovery was made at Susa, Persia, in December and January,
1901-2, by M. de Morgan's French excavating expedition. The
monument on which the laws are inscribed, a stele of black diorite
nearly eight feet high, has been fully described by Assyriologists,
and the inscription transcribed. It has been completely translated
by Dr. Hugo Winckler, whose translation (in _Die Gesetze
Hammurabis_, Band IV, Heft 4, of _Der Alte Orient_) furnishes the
basis of the version herewith presented. Following an
autobiographic preface, the text of the code contains two hundred
and eighty edicts and an epilogue. To readers of the code who are
familiar with the Hebrew Scriptures many biblical parallels will
occur.
When Anu the Sublime, king of the Anunaki, and Bel [god of the earth],
the Lord of Heaven and earth, who decreed the fate of the land, assigned
to Marduk [or Merodach, the great god of Babylon] the over-ruling son of
Ea [god of the waters], God of righteousness, dominion over earthly man,
and made him great among the Igigi, they called Babylon by his
illustrious name, made it great on earth, and founded an everlasting
kingdom in it [Babylon], whose foundations are laid so solidly as those
of heaven and earth; then Anu and Bel called by name me, Hammurabi, the
exalted prince, who feared God, to bring about the rule of righteousness
in the land, to destroy the wicked and the evil-doers; so that the
strong should not harm the weak; so that I should rule over the
black-headed people like Shamash [the sun-god], and enlighten the land,
to further the well-being of mankind.
Hammurabi, the prince, called of Bel am I, making riches and increase,
enriching Nippur and Dur-ilu beyond compare, sublime patron of E-kur
[temple of Bel in Nippur, the seat of Bel's worship]; who reëstablished
Eridu and purified the worship of E-apsu [temple of Ea, at Eridu, the
chief seat of Ea's worship]; who conquered the four quarters of the
world, made great the name of Babylon, rejoiced the heart of Marduk, his
lord who daily pays his devotions in Saggil [Marduk's temple in
Babylon]; the royal scion whom Sin made; who enriched Ur [Abraham's
birthplace, the seat of the worship of Sin, the moon-god]; the humble,
the reverent, who brings wealth to Gish-shir-gal; the white king, heard
of Shamash, the mighty, who again laid the foundations of Sippana [seat
of worship of Shamash and his wife, Malkat]; who clothed the gravestones
of Malkat with green [symbolizing the resurrection of nature]; who made
E-babbar [temple of the sun in Sippara] great, which is like the
heavens; the warrior who guarded Larsa and renewed E-babbar [temple of
the sun in Larsa, biblical Elassar, in Southern Babylonia], with Shamash
as his helper; the lord who granted new life to Uruk [biblical Erech],
who brought plenteous water to its inhabitants, raised the head of
E-anna [temple of Ishtar-Nana at Uruk], and perfected the beauty of Anu
and Nana; shield of the land, who reunited the scattered inhabitants of
Isin; who richly endowed E-gal-mach [temple of Isin]; the protecting
king of the city, brother of the god Zamama [god of Kish]; who firmly
founded the farms of Kish, crowned E-me-te-ursag [sister city of Kish]
with glory, redoubled the great holy treasures of Nana, managed the
temple of Harsag-kalama [temple of Nergal at Cuthah]; the grave of the
enemy, whose help brought about the victory; who increased the power of
Cuthah; made all glorious in E-shidlam [a temple], the black steer
[title of Marduk] who gored the enemy; beloved of the god Nebo, who
rejoiced the inhabitants of Borsippa, the Sublime; who is indefatigable
for E-zida [temple of Nebo in Babylon]; the divine king of the city; the
White, Wise; who broadened the fields of Dilbat, who heaped up the
harvests for Urash; the Mighty, the lord to whom come sceptre and crown,
with which he clothes himself; the Elect of Ma-ma; who fixed the temple
bounds of Kesh, who made rich the holy feasts of Nin-tu [goddess of
Kesh]; the provident, solicitous, who provided food and drink for Lagash
and Girsu, who provided large sacrificial offerings for the temple of
Ningirsu [at Lagash]; who captured the enemy, the Elect of the oracle
who fulfilled the prediction of Hallab, who rejoiced the heart of Anunit
[whose oracle had predicted victory]; the pure prince, whose prayer is
accepted by Adad [god of Hallab, with goddess Anunit]; who satisfied the
heart of Adad, the warrior, in Karkar, who restored the vessels for
worship in E-ud-gal-gal; the king who granted life to the city of Adab;
the guide of E-mach; the princely king of the city, the irresistible
warrior, who granted life to the inhabitants of Mashkanshabri, and
brought abundance to the temple of Shid-lam; the White, Potent, who
penetrated the secret cave of the bandits, saved the inhabitants of
Malka from misfortune, and fixed their home fast in wealth; who
established pure sacrificial gifts for Ea and Dam-gal-nun-na, who made
his kingdom everlastingly great; the princely king of the city, who
subjected the districts on the Ud-kib-nun-na Canal [Euphrates?] to the
sway of Dagon, his Creator; who spared the inhabitants of Mera and
Tutul; the sublime prince, who makes the face of Ninni shine; who
presents holy meals to the divinity of Nin-a-zu, who cared for its
inhabitants in their need, provided a portion for them in Babylon in
peace; the shepherd of the oppressed and of the slaves; whose deeds find
favor before Anunit, who provided for Anunit in the temple of Dumash in
the suburb of Agade; who recognizes the right, who rules by law; who
gave back to the city of Assur its protecting god; who let the name of
Istar of Nineveh remain in E-mish-mish; the Sublime, who humbles himself
before the great gods; successor of Sumula-il; the mighty son of
Sin-muballit; the royal scion of Eternity; the mighty monarch, the sun
of Babylon, whose rays shed light over the land of Sumer and Akkad; the
king, obeyed by the four quarters of the world; Beloved of Ninni, am I.
When Marduk sent me to rule over men, to give the protection of right to
the land, I did right and righteousness in..., and brought about the
well-being of the oppressed.
CODE OF LAWS
1. If any one ensnare another, putting a ban upon him, but he cannot
prove it, then he that ensnared him shall be put to death.
2. If any one bring an accusation against a man, and the accused go to
the river and leap into the river, if he sink in the river his accuser
shall take possession of his house. But if the river prove that the
accused is not guilty, and he escape unhurt, then he who had brought the
accusation shall be put to death, while he who leaped into the river
shall take possession of the house that had belonged to his accuser.
3. If any one bring an accusation of any crime before the elders, and
does not prove what he has charged, he shall, if it be a capital offence
charged, be put to death.
4. If he satisfy the elders to impose a fine of grain or money, he shall
receive the fine that the action produces.
5. If a judge try a case, reach a decision and present his judgment in
writing; if later error shall appear in his decision, and it be through
his own fault, then he shall pay twelve times the fine set by him in the
case, and he shall be publicly removed from the judge's bench, and never
again shall he sit there to render judgment.
6. If any one steal the property of a temple or of the court, he shall
be put to death, and also the one who receives the stolen thing from him
shall be put to death.
7. If any one buy from the son or the slave of another man, without
witnesses or a contract, silver or gold, a male or female slave, an ox
or a sheep, an ass or anything, or if he take it in charge, he is
considered a thief and shall be put to death.
8. If any one steal cattle or sheep, or an ass, or a pig or a goat, if
it belong to a god or to the court, the thief shall pay thirtyfold
therefor; if they belonged to a freed man [of the king] he shall pay
tenfold; if the thief has nothing with which to pay he shall be put to
death.
9. If any one lose an article, and find it in the possession of another:
if the person in whose possession the thing is found say "A merchant
sold it to me, I paid for it before witnesses," and if the owner of the
thing say "I will bring witnesses who know my property," then shall the
purchaser bring the merchant who sold it to him, and the witnesses
before whom he bought it, and the owner shall bring witnesses who can
identify his property. The judge shall examine their testimony--both of
the witnesses before whom the price was paid, and of the witnesses who
identify the lost article on oath. The merchant is then proven to be a
thief and shall be put to death. The owner of the lost article receives
his property, and he who bought it receives the money he paid from the
estate of the merchant.
10. If the purchaser does not bring the merchant and the witnesses
before whom he bought the article, but its owner bring witnesses who
identify it, then the buyer is the thief and shall be put to death, and
the owner receives the lost article.
11. If the owner do not bring witnesses to identify the lost article, he
is an evil-doer, he has traduced, and shall be put to death.
12. If the witnesses be not at hand, then shall the judge set a limit,
at the expiration of six months. If his witnesses have not appeared
within the six months, he is an evil-doer, and shall bear the fine of
the pending case.
14. If any one steal the minor son of another, he shall be put to death.
15. If any one take a male or female slave of the court, or a male or
female slave of a freed man, outside the city gates, he shall be put to
death.
16. If any one receive into his house a runaway male or female slave of
the court, or of a freedman, and does not bring it out at the public
proclamation of the major domus, the master of the house shall be put to
death.
17. If any one find a runaway male or female slave in the open country
and bring them to their masters, the master of the slaves shall pay him
two shekels of silver.
18. If the slave will not give the name of the master, the finder shall
bring him to the palace; a further investigation must follow and the
slave shall be returned to his master.
19. If he hold the slaves in his house, and they are caught there, he
shall be put to death.
20. If the slave that he caught run away from him, then shall he swear
to the owners of the slave, and he is free of all blame.
21. If any one break a hole into a house [break in to steal], he shall
be put to death before that hole and be buried.
22. If any one is committing a robbery and is caught, then he shall be
put to death.
23. If the robber is not caught, then shall he who was robbed claim
under oath the amount of his loss; then shall the community, and ... on
whose ground and territory and in whose domain it was compensate him for
the goods stolen.
24. If persons are stolen, then shall the community and ... pay one mina
of silver to their relatives.
25. If fire break out in a house, and some one who comes to put it out,
cast his eye upon the property of the owner of the house, and take the
property of the master of the house, he shall be thrown into that
self-same fire.
26. If a chieftain or a man [common soldier], who has been ordered to go
upon the king's highway [for war] does not go, but hires a mercenary, if
he withholds the compensation, then shall this officer or man be put to
death, and he who represented him shall take possession of his house.