mmencement of our
era. The evidence upon a particular point may be very full at one period
and almost entirely lacking at another. The Code forms the backbone of the
skeleton sketch which is here reconstructed. The fragments of it which have
been recovered from Assur-bani-pal's library at Nineveh and later
Babylonian copies show that it was studied, divided into chapters entitled
_Ninu ilu [s.]irum_ from its opening words, and recopied for fifteen
hundred years or more. The greater part of it remained in force, even
through the Persian, Greek and Parthian conquests, which affected private
life in Babylonia very little, and it survived to influence Syro-Roman and
later Mahommedan law in Mesopotamia. The law and custom which preceded the
Code we shall call "early," that of the New Babylonian empire (as well as
the Persian, Greek, &c.) "late." The law in Assyria was derived from
Babylonia but conserved early features long after they had disappeared
elsewhere.

When the Semitic tribes settled in the cities of Babylonia, their tribal
custom passed over into city law. The early history of the country is the
story of a struggle for supremacy between the cities. A metropolis demanded
tribute and military support from its subject cities but left their local
cults and customs unaffected. The city rights and usages were respected by
kings and conquerors alike.

As late as the accession of Assur-bani-pal and Samas-sum-yukin we find the
Babylonians appealing to their city laws that groups of aliens to the
number of twenty at a time were free to enter the city, that foreign women
once married to Babylonian husbands could not be enslaved and that not even
a dog that entered the city could be put to death untried.

The population of Babylonia was of many races from early times and
intercommunication between the cities was incessant. Every city had a large
number of resident aliens. This freedom of intercourse must have tended to
assimilate custom. It was, however, reserved for the genius of Khammurabi
to make Babylon his metropolis and weld together his vast empire by a
uniform system of law.

[Sidenote: Code of Khammurabi.]

Almost all trace of tribal custom has already disappeared from the law of
the Code. It is state-law; alike self-help, blood-feud, marriage by
capture, are absent; though family solidarity, district responsibility,
ordeal, the _lex talionis_, are primitive features that remain. The king is
a benevolent autocra