A Brief outline on the History of the first written Law.

March 20, 2013, By D. Natie

People with their cultures have evolved for several thousands of years. The development of their cultures is also intertwined with people's social, economic, political and technological dynamism. In a given society the catalysts of such changes can be a very few members of the society whose powerful insights into socially respected pieces of ideas among the society places them in position to take responsibilities to lead their respective communities. Religious leaders and others influential figures among the society can be considered from the above post. Such groups of peoples easily dictate their rules under the pretext of common goods. 

However historical evidences show that sometimes the dictated ideas if not supported with commonly accepted ideals, it never satisfy the claimed principle. The good example is having simply paper oriented law that won’t be implemented; as is the case in most parts of the world including western mature democracies.   

The over all purposes of having the rule of law in place is for two major reasons. The first and foremost is controlling those who stand against the agreed code of conducts and the second one being to protect the interests of those who are in better positions in the society although at times the better offs claim otherwise. In the western world there is growing evidence that very powerful barristers, lawyers, judges, reporters, Curators and others involved in business benefit from ongoing sagas all involved systematically create.

In a traditional context, the presence of law for given society is also deemed to be beneficial for maintaining social cohesion and morality by uniting groups of ethnically homogenous people. Others traditional societies also believe that an unwritten law (Moral Codes) that are existing to date all over the globe protects the aforementioned socially agreed values, mobilizes the actions of groups for defending communal interests among others.

In the cases of some forms of uwritten laws, they are created to punish transgressors whilst safeguarding the weak and vulnerable member of the society and further safe guards the common interests-(North East Africa's Kushites-today's southern Ethiopians Sidama nation had such moral code known as ‘Halaale’ [truth or true ways of life]--read various anthropological articles written by ‘Professor J.Hammer 1980, 82, 84 and 88, 90).

Social Scientists  and Socio-cultural anthropologists also believe that having such rules might have helped groups to sustain their cultural heritages that create sense of belongingness. Such believes further binds together the involved groups by giving them sense of directions that underpins their collective identities.This is being the perspectives of social anthropologists and social historians; let’s briefly look at the evolution of the written law.

The development of the first written law, Brief Overview directly taken from the author's.

[''After the birth of cuneiform which allowed commerce and administration to flourish, the concept of written law was soon to follow. A need for order arose as the Sumerian city-states the kings issued uniform laws, rooted in precedence, which applied to all citizens. Tablets dating back to 2100 BC that were uncovered from the city-states of Ur and Nippur are the earliest evidence of this and contained 17 ordinances that outlined various offenses and the penalties for them.  Unlike some of the later, yet still early laws; rather than focusing on the popular ‘eye for an eye’ system, they were centered on monetary compensation for harm done [the type of law that remained functional in Sidama nation of North East Africa-today’s Ethiopia until late 1970s]. The currency that was used at the time was the mina, and the amount of compensation paid would depend on the severity of the offense. The king was burdened with the task of administrating the law and because of his other duties he was not able to see to every case.  Rather, the King would often delegate them to a panel of justices who would then deal with the matter (note this is not a jury format). However, after these fairly reasonable and non-violent laws had prospered, the Code of Hammurabi, the first complete set of written laws, was the next development in written law. Hammurabi was king of Babylon, a relatively prosperous Sumerian city-state, from around 1800 BC who issued 282 laws, inscribed on a tablet, to his kingdom. This had various offenses and their penalties on it; but unlike the monetary compensation of Ur and Nippur, these punishments were much more brutal. This is most likely due to the militaristic society that later emerged, although some of the laws survived antiquity and are still present in modern laws'']. (https://sites.google.com/site/hecapta2/resources/an-outline-on-the-development-of

The first accurately written and formally implemented Law,

 [''Many believe that the first ever written down code of laws was Hammurabi's code. Even Jeopardy has asserted this fact. However this is incorrect. The oldest extant law code that has been found is the law code of Ur-Nammu which dates to around 2100BC (Hammurabi's law code only dates to around 1790BC). The form of the laws follow the "if...then..." format that is followed in subsequent law codes - such as Hammurabi's. For example: "if a man commits murder he must be killed" and "If a man knocks out a tooth of another man, he shall pay two shekels of silver."

While the code of Ur-Nammu is the oldest code for which the copies weren't found although the references to an older law code were being found. There are also the copies for -the code of Urukagina. (Urukagina reigned between 2380-2360BC). There aren’t copies of this code; there are some of its contents from references to the laws. For example Urukagina exempted widows from paying taxes, and made it illegal for a rich man to force a poor man to sell something''] (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_oldest_written_code_of_law

Another written archaeological evidences show that the first written language found is the (Kish Tablet below-unknown whether they were related with the laws above or not- as they weren't de-coded or deciphered to date ). The age of the tablet below is believed to be about 2900BC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kish_tablet . The ancient Egypt law also is in the periods of 3500BC. 

(This is the Kish Tablet-2900 years old)

D. Natie March 20, 2013