The meaning and status of the rîdtsâbê was discussed by S. Daiches, Zur Erklärung des Hammurabi-Codex, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, 1904-1905, pp. 202-22. Many useful hints will be found in Semitica: Sprach-und rechtsvergleichende Studien, in the Sitzungsberichte der philosophisch-historischen Klasse der kaiserlichen Akademie in Wien, 1906, cols. 1-88 (Wien, A. Hölder).
The exact way in which the Semitic people of the Hammurabi period exploited the stores of legal knowledge acquired by the Sumerians is still much discussed. So by M. Schorr in his Die altbabylonische Rechtspraxis, published in Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, vol. xxiv, pp. 431-61, and again in the Revue Sémitique, 1912, pp. 378-97, Zur Frage der semitischen und sumerischen Elemente im altbabylonischen Rechte. See also Das Sumerische in den Rechtsurkunden der Hammurabi-Periode, by M. Schorr, in the Hilprecht Anniversary Volume, pp. 20-32.
The question whether the Sumerian phrases in the contemporary contracts were read as Semitic or Sumerian has been discussed by A. Poebel in the Orientalistische Litteraturzeitung, 1911, cols. 241-7, under the title Zur Aussprache der sumerischen Phrasen in den altbabylonischen Rechtsurkunden, and in cols. 373-4 A. Ungnad wrote, under the same title, Eine Berichtigung. M. Schorr replied, cols. 559-61.
The question how far the Hammurabi Code was operative was soon raised. The existence of a very large number of legal documents relating to all manner of transactions seemed likely to afford a ready answer. In 1905 Br. Meissner wrote his Theorie und Praxis im altbabylonischen Recht for the Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, pp. 257-303. The need of a more extended examination made the promise of Kohler and Peiser’s Hammurabi-Gesetz so welcome, see p. [67]. Kohler and Ungnad have now fulfilled this by publishing in Heft III-V the whole available material as Übersetzte Urkunden with most valuable Erläuterungen (Leipzig, Hinrichs, 1909-1911). A similar enterprise was undertaken by M. Schorr in Kodeks Hammurabiego a owezesna praktyka prawna, Das Gesetzbuch Hammurabis und die zeitgenössische Rechtspraxis, in the Bulletin de l’Académie des Sciences de Cracovie, followed by Altbabylonische Rechtsurkunden aus der Zeit der I. babylonischen Dynastie in the Sitzungsberichte der kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien, philosophisch-historische Klasse, 155. Band, 2. Abhandlung, 1907, 160. Band, 5. Abhandlung, 1909, and 165. Band, 2. Abhandlung, 1910 (Vienna, A. Hölder), with transcription, translation, and commentary. Together with Ungnad’s work this should enable any scholar to form a well-founded and independent judgement.
It is natural to inquire what were the laws of that earlier people in Babylonia who preceded the Semites and are now called Sumerians. The Semites took over their legal phrases, see above, and probably with them some of their laws. The Semitic scribes drew up long lists of these Sumerian phrases, many of which they still used in drawing up their legal documents, just as Latin phrases or Norman-French lingered on in our law-books. These phrases they translated, in parallel columns with the Sumerian. Such books of phrases were issued in long series. One such series, usually called Ana Ittishu, was discussed by Br. Meissner in the Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes, iv, pp. 301 ff. A great deal of it is published by P. Haupt in vol. i of the Assyriologische Bibliothek; by F. Hommel in his Sumerische Lesestücke; by Fr. Delitzsch in his Assyrische Lesestücke, 3rd edition, 1900, pp. 130-2; and by Meissner in the Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, 1892, vii, pp. 16-32. Pinches gives an account of it in the Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, iv, p. 256, 1910, where he calls it the Ulutinabishu Series. Not much law can be made out of this scrappy source; but one tablet records a set of regulations which seem to be extracted from a code. They are usually referred to as The Sumerian Family Laws,and are dealt with by T. G. Pinches in the Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, iv, p. 257, 1910, and by Jeremias in the same work, v, p. 447. A full treatment by P. Haupt is Die sumerischen Familiengesetze in Keilschrift, Transcription und Übersetzung (Leipzig, 1879). Winckler, Cook, Peiser, Ungnad, and most of the writers on the comparative side have quoted them in their above-named works.
It may be doubted whether the so-called Warnings to Kings against Injustice, see T. G. Pinches in his Encyclopaedia article, iv, p. 261, note 1, are so early, or really preserve part of a code. References to legal reforms may be seen in the inscriptions of Urukagina, see L. W. King’s History of Sumer and Akkad, pp. 178-84 and the references, but here again we cannot reconstruct much of the Sumerian law in question.
We have noted the discussion, p. 75, of the way in which Semitic scribes regarded the Sumerian phrases they used.
The conclusion that Hammurabi codified the earlier legislation was natural, and similarities in form suggested that he adopted much of the Sumerian law which was previously in force.
A. T. Clay in the Orientalistische Litteraturzeitung, xvii, January, 1914 (Leipzig, Hinrichs), writing on A Sumerian Prototype of the Hammurabi Code, has made it clear that some of the laws existed in a Sumerian dress. Hammurabi, as we have already contended, modified the previously existing Sumerian laws, and taking some over bodily, changed others to suit the peculiar prejudices of his subjects and the circumstances of his time. We may soon be able to judge whether Clay’s Sumerian Code, as we may call it, was really early, or only the dress in which Hammurabi’s law appeared in his Sumerian provinces.