THE LAWS OP THE BABYLONIANS. 



247 



where it was first placed, injury or destruction at the hands of 

 Sennacherib and his ruthless soldiers might have deprived 

 posterity of one of the finest and most remarkable monuments 

 which have come down to us of that great empire within whose 

 centre the germs of civilization, if they did not have their birth 

 there, were at least fostered, and encouraged to grow into that 

 healtliy tree which now overshadows the earth. 



The knowledge of Hammurabi's code of laws was not confined 

 to Babylonia. Though we did not know it, fragments of a copy 

 of it have been in the British Museum for from twenty to fifty- 

 five years, and notwithstanding that one of the fragments bore 

 the colophon stating that it was the " Laws of Hammurabi " — 

 Di'ddni IJammurahi — it was not recomized, and is even 

 described in the Catalogue as a " Legend " of that king. This, 

 however, shows that other copies of the document existed at 

 Babylon, from which these Assyrian transcripts were made. It 

 must have served, as many of the contract-tablets show, as the 

 basis of the law of both countries for many hundred years, and 

 if ever supeiseded — which is uncertain — must have formed the 

 basis of any further enactments which were made. 



Discussion. 



The Secretary (Professor Hull, M.A., etc.). — Mr. Chairman, 

 ladies and gentlemen, I wish, on behalf of the Council, to express 

 our deep gratitude to Dr. Pinches for the production of these two 

 papers, but especially for the latter. He had promised, some time 

 ago, to give us an account of the proceedings at the Congress of 

 Orientalists, which he has done; but -when this wonderful and 

 interesting monument of ancient Babylonian art and history was 

 found and became recognized and described in the Times and various 

 other papers, the Council thought that some account of it from such 

 an eminent Assyriologist as Dr. Pinches, would be very acceptable 

 to the Listitute. So he very kindly agreed to somewhat curtail the 

 first paper in order to give time for the second, and I am sure we all 

 feel deeply grateful to him for what he has brought forward this 

 evening, and the paper gains special interest from the fact — as 

 stated by Dr. Pinches himself — that the Babylonian king is the 



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