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BABYLONIAN CIVILIZATION
Location and Sources

• The splendid city of Babylon, located
between the Euphrates and the Tigris
some 95 km south of Baghdad
...

• Later excavations, undertaken by the
German archaeologist Robert
Koldewey in the late 19th and early
20th centuries, established that the
city had been built and rebuilt
several times
...

• The site of Babylon was first identified
in the 1800s in what is now Iraq
...

• The splendid city of Babylon, located
between the Euphrates and the Tigris
some 95 km south of Baghdad
...


• Later excavations, undertaken by the
German archaeologist Robert
Koldewey in the late 19th and early
20th centuries, established that the
city had been built and rebuilt
several times
...

• Amorite dynasty (c
...
16th century BC
- 1595 BC)
• Elamite dynasty (c
...

▪ A god of a city who was the principal
ruler
...

▪ The king ruled as the representative
of the God
...

▪ Sometimes the king proclaimed
himself a deity, such as Hammurabi
...

▪ The queens and princes
separate palaces, property
slaves
...


▪ Although the Old Babylonians were
an alien nation, they had lived long
enough in close contact with the
Sumerians
to
be
influenced
profoundly by them
...

➢ Following the disintegration of the
Akkadian Empire, the Sumerians
rose up with the Third Dynasty of Ur
in the late 22nd century BCE
...

➢ Conflicts between the Amorites
(Western Semitic nomads) and the
Assyrians continued until Sargon I
(1920-1881 BCE) succeeded as king
in Assyria
...

➢ Under the rule of the Amorites,
which lasted until about 1600 BCE,
Babylon became the political and
commercial centre of the TigrisEuphrates area
...

➢ One of these Amorite dynasties
founded the city-state of Babylon
circa 1894 BCE, which would
ultimately take over the others and

form the short-lived first Babylonian
empire, also called the Old
Babylonian Period
...

➢ Sumu-abum appears never to have
been given the title of King, however
...
1792–
1750 BCE), the sixth king of the
Old dynasty of Babylon, who forged
coalitions between the separate citystates, promoted science and
scholarship, and promulgated his
famous code of law
...

➢ The earliest mention of the city of
Babylon can be found in a clay tablet
from the reign of Sargon of
Akkad (2334–2279 BC), dating back
to the 23rd century BC
...

➢ In between, in descending order,
were
the nobles,
the free
citizens and those in military and
civil service
...

There were three main social classes
distinguished in the Babylonia law
codes:
Awilu/ आमेलू: The nobility or a free
person of the upper class
...

Wardu/वारद:ु Slaves
...

➢ Like the rest of Mesopotamia, it was
subject to the Akkadian Empire which
united all the Akkadian and Sumerian
speakers under one rule
...


✓ Only a person from wealth and high
position does not come in this class

▪ The rules enforced the "Right to
rule" type attitude
...


✓ Its member was severely punished

Slave

minister,

MUSHENKU
▪ Mushkenu, a free person of low
estate, who ranked legally between
the awilu and the wardu
...
Similar to the
Awilu
...

▪ Yet they were the ones who also did
not give any contribution to go to a
higher class of social standings
...

▪ Their contributions were doing the
things and working for the Upper
classes and the Kings specifically
only for them
...


▪ Slavery in Babylonia was a part of
the society
...

▪ Many times, slaves were adopted by
their owners and thus became free
citizens
...

▪ The second consisted of serfs
who were attached to the land
and would be transferred
with it if the land was sold,
and
▪ The third consisted of temple
slaves who were dedicated to
the god or goddess of that
temple
...


▪ The law made it clear that even
though the slave was property, the
masters could not beat, injure, or
kill them at will
...

▪ The slave could not hold a public
office, but once he or she acquired
freedom, they could attain high
office like any other citizen
...

▪ Often, they used the wealth to buy
their freedom
...

▪ He could get rid of slavery by fulfilling
certain conditions
...

▪

▪ It was a custom to mark the slaves
...

▪ An attempt was made to improve the
condition of slaves in the law code of
Hammurabi
...

▪

The wages for the slaves’ work for
other people were paid to their
owner
...

▪ Slaves could acquire property and
create businesses for themselves
...

▪ There is evidence regarding some
slaves who became so wealthy

Slave had the right to marry an
independent woman and the children
born from it were considered
independent
...

▪ The debt slave had the possibility of
paying his debts and regaining his
freedom
...

▪ He could get rid of slavery by fulfilling
certain conditions
...

▪

Slave had the right to marry an
independent woman and the children
born from it were considered
independent
...


▪ The debt slave had the possibility of
paying his debts and regaining his
freedom
...

▪ For example, the penalties assessed
for personal injury varied depending on
the class of both the person committing
the assault and the victim someone
having to pay more money in
reparations upon injuring a noble than
injuring an artisan reparations to the
owner for injuring a slave depended
on the monetary value of the slave
...

▪ Although by twenty-first century
standards the law code may seem
barbaric and unfair in the way it
discriminates by social class
...

Women
▪ The basic units in Babylonian society
were the family and tribe
...


▪ The family relationship was governed
by the Law Code itself
...
were
made
...

▪ The ceremony often was concluded
with a contract inscribed on a clay
tablet
...

▪ In order to give legal form to the
marriage, written agreement with
the presence and signature(seal)
of the witnesses was necessary
...

▪ The Babylonian woman had certain
important legal rights
...

▪ The husband, however, could
divorce her on relatively light
grounds, or, if she had borne him no
children, he could marry a second
wife
...

▪ The Babylonian woman had certain
important legal rights
...

▪ The husband, however, could
divorce her on relatively light
grounds, or, if she had borne him no
children, he could marry a second
wife
...

▪ A man could sell
discharge a debt
...

▪ If a woman died, her dowry would
go back to her father, to her
brothers, or to her sons
...

▪ Women were afforded some
protections
in
the
society,
particularly if they were mothers
...

▪

Children were under the absolute
authority of their parents, who could
disinherit them or could sell them into
slavery
...

▪ Devadasis (married to god) were
respected in the Babylonian society
...

▪ After becoming a devadasi, the girl
was spending money received
from her father as personal
property
...

▪ She had to live separately from her
husband when she became a
Devadasi
...

▪ The
economy
of Babylonia was
based, like that of Sumer, on
agriculture
...


▪ The money was in the form of bars of
precious metals—silver, copper, or
gold
...


▪ The Babylonians even had banks to
manage their money
...


Agriculture
▪ Babylonian economy was based on
agriculture
...

▪ The temples still had very large
jagirs
...

▪ But as the power of the emperor
grew, the importance of the temple
system decreased
...

▪ The Babylonian kings by their laws
began to interfere in almost every
area of the country's economic life
...

▪ If the crops were destroyed due to
floods or storms, the loss would
have to be suffered by both the
farmer and the landlord equally,
not by the farmer alone
...

▪ Babylonian farmers used plough in
agricultural work
...

▪ A seeder plough, an implement with
a vertical funnel above the
ploughshare, so arranged that seed
could be dropped straight into the
bottom of the furrow
...


▪ Babylonian economy was based on
agriculture because the land of
Babylonia was very fertile
...


▪ The land in ancient Babylonian was
mostly under the authority of kings,
temples, feudatories and wealthy
merchants and tribes collectively
...


▪ On taking land on lease, the farmer
had to pay one third or half of the
produce
...


▪ In return they had the right to catch
the fish from the canal
...


▪ It is clear from the records that
instrument was used to irrigation
water to the higher agricultural
lands
...


▪ Animals were also used to run
some instruments
...


▪ Textile industry, metal industry,
wood industry etc
...

▪ Developed industries encouraged
modes of transport and internal
and foreign trades
...


Similarly, farmers of one place had
the same drain which was
protected by the farmers near the
field
...


▪ Due to his negligence, he used to
get punished for damaging the
cultivation of nearby land
...


▪

▪ Animal husbandry was an important
source of Babylonian national income
after agriculture
...

▪ Animal
husbandry
was
also
practiced by temples on which the
state used to tax
...

▪ The chief herdsmen were required
to send details of their actions to the
king from time to time
...


▪ Some of their cities were useful
industrial centres
...
developed
greatly
...

▪ The sheep and goats were, of
course, valuable not only as a source
of food and as sacrificial animals
for the temples, but also for their
hair and skin
...


▪ The wool went out from the stores
to be spun and woven in the villages
and
towns
which
was
a
predominantly female occupation
...

▪ The woollen cloth produced
covered a wide range of qualitysuited for king and slave
...

There is frequent mention of leatherworkers
...

▪ One of the most important aspects of
ancient Babylonian industry was its
metal technology
...

▪ After this, the general use of bronze
began
...


▪ Another very ancient craft was that
of the potter, to whom we possibly
owe the invention of the wheel
...

▪ Many objects made of ivory and
precious woods have found from
many cities which would have an
important craft
...

▪ The canals were also used for
traffic and transportation
...

▪ The use of big boats and small
ships is also mentioned in
Hammurabi's law code and
Command letters
...

▪ Probably a special officer was
appointed by the state to manage
water traffic
...


▪ Several objects of bronze, such as
vases, swords and axes, occur in
the Royal Tombs of Ur
...


▪ Iron was not-used to any extent in
Mesopotamia
...


▪ It had to be paid in monthly
instalments
...

▪ It was good for trade when there were
large stable empires
...

▪ Not only were traders taking exports
out and bringing imports in, but also
merchants were carrying goods from
places such as India, Europe,
Persia, Anatolia and Egypt up the
rivers
...


yet

have

a

▪ Fixed pieces of silver were used in
the exchange of goods
...

▪ Deities that had been venerated by
the Sumerians were now neglected
and new ones exalted in their stead
...

▪ Like Sumerians, religion of Babylon
was fundamentally materialistic
...

o It was identified with Marduk,
the god of the Semites
...


▪ This is known as Barter system
...

▪ The rate of interest was 20 percent
per annum
...

o Marduk was the primary god of
the Babylonians and had
Babylon as his main
city
...

o He was sometimes pictured
with his pet dragon
...

▪ Anu, Enlil, and Ea, were patron
deities of the oldest Sumerian
cities and were each given a share of
the Universe as their dominion
...

o Enlil of Nippur was God of
the earth
...

▪ The Babylonian trinity of Anu, Bel,
and Ea is the result of later
speculation, dividing the divine power
into that which rule in heaven, that
which rules the earth, and that
which rules under the earth
...
Bel was originally the chief
spirit (in Sumerian En-lil, the older
designation of Bel) of Nippur
...

▪ List of some of the more important
Babylonian gods
▪ Anu: the god of the highest heaven
Marduk: national god of the
Babylonians
Tiamat:
dragon
goddess
Qingsu:
husband
of
Tiamat
Enlil: God of weather and storms

Nabu: God of the scribal arts
Ishtar:
goddess
of
love
Ea:
God
of
wisdom
Enurta:
God
of
war
Anshar:
father
of
heaven
Shamash: God of the sun and of
justice
Kishar: father of earth
Epic of Enuma- Elish
▪ The story, one of the oldest, concerns
the birth of the gods and the creation
of the universe and human beings
...

▪ Out of this swirl, the waters divided
into sweet, fresh water, known as
the god Apsu (male), and salty bitter
water, the goddess Tiamat (female)
...

▪ These young gods, however, were
extremely loud, troubling the sleep of
Apsu at night and distracting him
from his work by day
...

▪ Tiamat, hearing of their plan, warns
her eldest son, Enki (sometimes Ea)
and he puts Apsu to sleep and kills
him
...

Epic of Enuma- Elish

▪ The story, one of the oldest, concerns
the birth of the gods and the creation
of the universe and human beings
...


▪ In the beginning, there was only
undifferentiated water swirling in
chaos
...


▪ Out of this swirl, the waters divided
into sweet, fresh water, known as
the god Apsu (male), and salty bitter
water, the goddess Tiamat (female)
...

▪ These young gods, however, were
extremely loud, troubling the sleep of
Apsu at night and distracting him
from his work by day
...

▪ Tiamat, hearing of their plan, warns
her eldest son, Enki (sometimes Ea)
and he puts Apsu to sleep and kills
him
...

▪ Tiamat, once the supporter of the
younger gods, now is enraged that
they have killed her mate
...

▪ Ea, Enki, and the younger gods
fight against Tiamat futilely until,
from among them, emerges Marduk
who swears he will defeat Tiamat
...

▪ Finally, Marduk was exalted and
installed in his temple in Babylon
...
Elaborate rituals
requiring the participation and
support of numbers of temple
personnel evolved around the daily
presentation
of
offerings,
the cleaning of the divine statues'
garments, and the purification of the
temples
...

▪ The temple personnel consumed the
offerings
...

▪ New Year's Festival of the god
Marduk
at
Babylon
...

Failure to celebrate the festival
because of political turmoil or other
causes was a grave matter and,
whenever this happened, it was
recorded with great concern in the
native histories
...


Mashmash - Pleasing the gods to drive
away demons and diseases
...

▪ He performed sacrifices and
determined the religious life of his
subjects
...

▪ Each temple would have a high
priest, appointed by the king, and a
number of lesser priests, known as
Shangu, who were also responsible
to the king
...
Buru/Baru, 2
...
Rakmu/ Pashishu
▪ Buru priests-the task of divination,
the interpreting of dreams, and
otherwise determining the will of the
gods, was entrusted to the
...

▪ At the time of sacrifice, a god
was thought to take hold of the
victim, and the god's thoughts
were presumed to enter the
animal's liver
...

▪ The
Babylonian
people
used
materials available to them to make
art,
including
baked
clay tempered (made stronger and
more durable) with binding materials
like straw
...

▪ Other clay tablets and reliefs told the
epic of Gilgamesh, an ancient cultural
hero and a character everyone at the
time would have known
...
It dates from
around 1800 BC and is done in high
relief
...


▪ Shamash dressed in robes draped in
tiers
...
With its
height and imagery, and covered in
cuneiform, it would have been
imposing to anyone who viewed it
...


▪ walls articulated by pilasters and rec
esses,
sometimes faced with burnt and glaz
ed brick;

▪ At the stele's top, a relief sculpture
(raised from the surface but attached
in the back) depicts the king receiving
the laws from the seated Shamash,
one of the powerful gods of the
ancient world
...

▪ Babylonian temples are massive
structures of crude brick, supported

by buttresses, the rain being carried
off by drains
...

▪ The use of brick led to the early
development of the pilaster and
column,
and
of
frescoes and
enamelled tiles
...

▪ Painted terracotta cones were also
embedded in the plaster
...


Babylonian

▪ One of the most important aspects of
Babylonian religion and tradition, and
probably the best known, is the
ziggurat
...


huge

"stepped"

▪ This Temple would have been to the
city god
...

▪ The ziggurats were built on an
immense scale, in the time of
Hammurabi, they would sometimes
reach the height of 150 feet
...

Among the textual sources on
building construction and associated
rituals
...

▪ Man and woman, Old-Babylonian
fired clay plaque
▪ Stele of Hammurabi
Ishtar Gate
▪ The main entrance to the inner city of
Babylon was called the Ishtar Gate
...

Ziggurats

▪ The Ishtar Gate gave way to the city’s
great Processional Way, a half-mile

decorated corridor used in religious
ritual to celebrate the New Year
...


▪ The Venus tablet which lists the first
and last visible risings of Venus and
is the earliest evidence that the
phenomena of a planet were
recognized as periodic
...
1100BC
...

Calendar
▪ The observations of the astrologers
led to accurate predictions of various
astronomical phenomena and the
correct calculation of the solar and
lunar year
...

Science

▪ They were the first people after the
Sumerians to have a calendar
...


Astronomy
▪ Clay Tablets dating back to the Old
Babylonian period document the
application of mathematics to the
variation in the length of daylight over
a solar year
...


▪ There were twelve lunar months in
the year but as the months were
shorter than our months often an
extra month would have to be added
...

▪ The day was divided into six parts
each of two hours duration
...

▪ The Babylonians measured time
...

▪ The Babylonians, by the time of
Hammurabi had names for each
month
...

▪ In Babylonian medicine incantations
appeared alongside recipes within
the medical corpus, and diseases
were often thought to have been
brought on by various gods and
demons
...
Babylonian scholars
grounded much of their scientific
knowledge in an ancient belief
system incorporating magic, in which
illnesses were ultimately caused by
demons or angry gods
...

▪ Hundreds of
Babylonian
...

▪ Hammurabi’s laws for medical
practioners:

▪ Article 215: If a physician make a
large
incision
with
an
operating knife and cure it,
he shall receive ten shekels in
money
...

▪ Article 221: If a physician heals the
broken bone or
diseased soft part of a man,
the patient shall
pay the
physician five shekels in money
...

▪ Babylonian mathematics is a range of
numeric
and
more
advanced
mathematical practices in the ancient
Near East, written on clay tablets
in cuneiform script
...

▪ The
Babylonian
system
of
mathematics was sexagesimal or
a base 60 numeral system
...

▪ The
number
60
has
many divisors (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12,
15, 20, and 30), making calculations
easier
...

▪ Among
the
Babylonians'
mathematical accomplishments were
the determination of the square
root of two correctly to seven
places
...
1900 BC
...

▪ The Babylonians might have been
familiar with the general rules for
measuring the areas
...

▪ The volume of a cylinder was taken
as the product of the base and the
height
...
125
...

▪ The Babylonians used also space
time graphs to calculate the
velocity of Jupiter

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