King Hammurabi Dbq

King Hammurabi ruled the city state of Babylon from 1792 and 1750(BC ) . He was the sixth king of the Amorite First Dynasty of Babylon, having taken over the throne from his father. The Amorites were a Semitic people who were originally from western Mesopotamia. Hammurabi is credited for expanding the Kingdom of Babylon and civilization along the Euphrates River, eventually conquering and uniting all of Mesopotamia. Although King Hammurabi is ruthless in war and swift to crush any rebellion, a main guiding tenant of his reign of 43 years, was to improve the lives of his people and to provide for all the people he ruled over. During his reign, he is known as “builder of the land”, due to his numerous public works building projects and construction of canal systems.
Babylonia was a patriarchal society, having no equality between men and women. With laws restricting women to money, work, and marriage, they had little to no rights at all. Women’s role in society consisted of taking care of their children and the house. Women were mostly inferior to men when it came to marriage rules. A women at that time was property to her husband, meanwhile the husband controlled every aspect of the marriage, and could do whatever he pleased.(Mary Deering, Study.com) An example of this in Hammurabi's code is rule number 129; “. If a man's wife be surprised (in flagrante delicto) with another man, both shall be tied and thrown into the water, but the husband may pardon his wife and the king his slaves.” But on the other hand, rule number 138 states a man can leave his wife freely without getting throwing into any water, “if a man wishes to separate from his wife who has borne him no children, he shall give her the amount of her purchase money and the dowry which she brought from her father's house, and let her go.” The inequality between men and women are clear and defined by Hammurabi’s