Early Israel and the Surrounding Nations

by A. H. Sayce

Collections of letters, partly royal, partly private, were also to be found in the libraries. The autograph letters of Khammurabi, the Amraphel of Genesis, have come down to us, and we even have letters of his time from a lover to his mistress, and from a tenant to his landlord, whom he begs to reduce his rent. Boys went to school early, and learning the cuneiform syllabary was a task that demanded no small amount of time and application, especially when it is remembered that in the case of the Semitic Babylonian this involved also acquiring a knowledge of the dead language of Sumer. One of the exercises of the Sumerian schoolboy bids him "rise like the dawn, if he would excel in the school of the scribes."

Purely literary texts were numerous, especially poems, though nothing corresponding to the Egyptian novel has been met with. The epic of Gilgames, composed by Sin-liqi-unnini, has already been referred to. Its twelve books answered to the twelve signs of the Zodiac, and the eleventh accordingly contains the episode of the Deluge. Gilgames was the son of a royal mother, whose son was fated to slay his grandfather, and who was consequently confined in a tower. But an eagle carried him to a place of safety, and when he grew up he delivered Erech from its foes, and made it the seat of his kingdom. He slew the tyrant Khumbaba in the forest of cedars, and by means of a stratagem tempted the satyr Ea-bant to leave the woods and become his counsellor and friend. Istar wooed him, but he scorned her offers, and taunted her with her misdeeds to the hapless lovers who had been caught in her toils. In revenge the goddess persuaded her father Anu to create a winged bull, which should work havoc in the country of the Babylonians. But Gilgames destroyed the bull, an achievement, however, for which he was punished by Heaven. Ea-bani died of the bite of a gadfly, and his spirit mounted to the skies, while Gilgames himself was smitten by a sore disease. To heal it he sailed beyond the mouth of the Euphrates and the river of death, leaving behind him the deserts of Arabia and the twin-mountain where men in the shape of huge scorpions guard the gateways of the sun. At last he found Xisuthros, the hero of the Deluge, and learned from him how he had escaped death. Cured of his malady, he returned homeward with a leaf of the tree of life. But as he rested at a fountain by the way it was stolen by a serpent, and man lost the gift of immortality.

In Babylonia, and to a lesser extent in Assyria, women were practically on a footing of equality with the men. They could trade in their own names, could make wills, could appear as witnesses or plaintiffs in court. We hear of a father transferring his property to his daughter, reserving only the use of it during his life. Polygamy was not common; indeed, we find it stipulated in one instance that in the case of a second marriage on the part of the husband the dowry of the first wife should be returned to her, and that she should be free to go where she would. Of course these rules did not apply to concubines, who were often purchased. Adoptions were frequent, and slaves could be adopted into the family of a freeman.

The large number of slaves caused the wages of the free labourer to be low. But the slaves were treated with humanity. From early times it was a law that if a slave were hired to another, the hirer should pay a penalty to his master whenever he was incapable of work, thus preventing "sweating" or overwork. Similarly, injuries to a slave were punished by a fine. The slave could trade and acquire property for himself, could receive wages for his work when hired to another, could give evidence in a court of law, and might obtain his freedom either by manumission, by purchase, by adoption, or by impressment into the royal service.

Farms were usually held on a sort of métayer system, half the produce going to the landlord as rent. Sometimes, however, the tenant received only a third, a fourth, or even a tenth part of the produce, two-thirds of the annual crop of dates being also assigned to the owner of the land. The tenant had to keep the farm-buildings in order, and to build any that were required. House-property seems to have been even more valuable than farm-land. The deeds for the lease or sale of it enter into the most minute particulars, and carefully define the limits of the estate. The house was let for a term of years, the rent being paid either twice or three times a year. At the expiration of the lease, the property had to be returned in the state in which the tenant had found it, and any infringement of the legal stipulations was punished with a heavy fine. Agents were frequently employed in the sale or letting of estates.

The cities were busy centres of trade. Commercial intercourse was carried on with all parts of the known world. Wheat was exported in large quantities, as well as dates and date-wine. The staple of Babylonian industry, however, was the manufacture of cloths and carpets. Vast flocks of sheep were kept on the western bank of the Euphrates, and placed under the charge of Bedâwin from Arabia. Their wool was made into curtains and rugs, and dyed or embroidered fabrics of various kinds. Even Belshazzar, the heir-apparent of Nabonidos, did not disdain to be a wool-merchant, and we find him lending twenty manehs, the proceeds of the sale of some of it, and taking as security for the repayment of the debt certain house-property in Babylon. It was "a goodly Babylonish garment," secreted by Achan from among the spoil of Jericho, that brought destruction upon himself and his family.

Money-lending naturally occupied a prominent place in the transaction of business. The ordinary rate of interest was 20 per cent, paid in monthly instalments; in the time of Nebuchadrezzar, however, it tended to be lower, and we find loans made at 13-1/2 per cent. The penalty was severe if the capital were not repaid at the specified date. The payment was occasionally in kind, but money was the usual medium of exchange. It consisted of rings or tongue-like bars of gold, silver, and copper, representing manehs and shekels. The maneh was divided into sixty shekels, and the standard used in later Babylonia had been fixed by Dungi, king of Ur. One of the standard maneh-weights of stone, from the mint of Nebuchadrezzar, is now in the British Museum. In the time of the Second Babylonian empire stamped or coined money was introduced, as well as pieces of five or more shekels. This was the period when the great banking firm of Egibi flourished, which anticipated the Rothschilds in making loans to the State.

The Babylonian cemetery adjoined the cities of the living, and was laid out in imitation of the latter. The tombs were built of crude bricks, and were separated from one another by streets, through which flowed streams of "living water." Gardens were planted by the side of some of the tombs, which resembled the houses of the living, and in front of which offerings were made to the dead. After a burial, brushwood was heaped round the walls of the tomb and set on fire, partially cremating the body and the objects that were interred with it within. Sanitary reasons made this partial cremation necessary, while want of space in the populous plain of Babylonia caused the brick tombs to be built, like the houses of the towns, one on the top of the other.

Babylonia and Assyria were both administered by a bureaucracy, but whereas in Assyria the bureaucracy was military, in Babylonia it was theocratic. The high-priest was the equal and the director of the king, and the king himself was a priest, and the adopted child of Bel. In Assyria, on the contrary, the arbitrary power of the monarch was practically unchecked. Under him was the Turtannu or Tartan, the commander-in-chief, who commanded the army in the absence of the king. The Rab-saki, Rab-shakeh, or vizier, who ranked a little below him, was the head of the civil officials; besides him we hear of the Rab-sa-resi or Rabsaris, "the chief of the princes," the Rab-mugi or Rab-Mag, "the court physician," and an endless number of other officers. The governors of provinces were selected from among the higher aristocracy, who alone had the privilege of sharing with the king the office of limmu, or eponymous archon after whom the year was named. Most of these officers seem to have been confined to Assyria; we do not hear of them in the southern kingdom of Babylonia. There, however, from an early period royal judges had been appointed, who went on circuit and sat under a president. Sometimes as many as four or six of them sat on a case, and subscribed their names to the verdict.

The main attention of the Assyrian government was devoted to the army, which was kept in the highest possible state of efficiency. It was recruited from the free peasantry of the country—a fact which, while it explains the excellence of the Assyrian veterans, also shows why it was that the empire fell as soon as constant wars had exhausted the native population. Improvements were made in it from time to time; thus, cavalry came to supersede the use of chariots, and the weapons and armour of the troops were changed and improved. Engineers and sappers accompanied it, cutting down the forests and making roads as it marched, and the commissariat was carefully attended to. The royal tent was arranged like a house, and one of its rooms was fitted up as a kitchen, where the food was prepared as in the palace of Nineveh. In Babylonia it was the fleet rather than the army which was the object of concern, though under Nebuchadrezzar and his successors the army also became an important engine of war. But, unlike the Assyrians, the Babylonians had been from the first a water-faring people, and the ship of war floated on the Euphrates by the side of the merchant vessel and the state barge of the king.