The Long Tradition of Debt Cancellation in Mesopotamia and Egypt from 3000 to 1000 BC

by Eric Toussaint

Hammurabi, king of Babylon, and debt cancellation

The Hammurabi Code is in the Louvre Museum, in Paris. The term “code” is inappropriate, because what Hammurabi left us is a set of rules and judgements on relations between public authorities and citizens. Hammurabi began his 42-year reign as “king” of Babylon (located in present-day Iraq), in 1792 BC. What most history books fail to mention is that, like other governors of the City-State of Mesopotamia, Hammurabi proclaimed the official cancellation of citizens’ debts owed to the government, high-ranking officials, and dignitaries. The so-called Hammurabi Code is thought to date back to 1762 BC. Its epilogue proclaims that “the powerful may not oppress the weak; the law must protect widows and orphans (…) in order to bring justice to the oppressed”. The many ancient documents deciphered from cuneiform script have enabled historians to establish beyond any doubt that four general cancellations took place during Hammurabi’s reign, in 1792, 1780, 1771, and 1762 BC.

In Hammurabi’s time, economic, political, and social life were organised around the Temple and the Palace. Those two closely enmeshed institutions, with their numerous artisans, workers, and, of course, scribes, constituted the apparatus of the State, not so very different from today’s governments. The Temple and the Palace provided their employees with board and lodge: they thus received food rations sufficient for two full meals a day. The peasantry was provided with land (which they rented), tools, draught animals, livestock, and water for irrigation, so that they could grow food for the workers and dignitaries. Thus, the peasants produced barley (their staple grain), oil, fruit, and vegetables, a portion of which, when harvested, they had to pay to the State as rent. As well as the land they cultivated for the Palace and the Temple, the peasants owned their own land, home, livestock, and tools. When the harvest was poor, they accumulated debts. They also incurred debt through loans granted privately by high-ranking officials and dignitaries eager to get rich and to seize the peasants’ property in case of default. If peasants were unable to pay off their debts, they could also find themselves reduced to the condition of serfs or slaves; indebtedness could also lead to members of their family being made slaves. In order to ensure social peace and stability, and especially to prevent peasants’ living conditions from deteriorating, the authorities periodically cancelled all debt |1| and restored peasants’ rights.

How the Rosetta Stone Works

by Candace Keener

Ancient Egypt conjures up ima­ges of bearded ­pharaohs, mighty pyramids and gold-laden tombs. Centuries ago, before archaeology became a legitimate field of science, explorers raided Egyptian ruins, seizing priceless artifacts. Collectors knew that t­hese items were valuable, but they had no way of understanding just how much they were worth. Because the civilization's historical records and monuments were inscribed with hieroglyphics, a language no one -- Egyptian or foreigner -- could read, the secrets of Egypt's past were hopelessly lost. That is, until the Rosetta Stone was discovered.

The Rosetta Stone is a fragment of a stela, a free-standing stone inscribed with Egyptian governmental or religious records. It's made of black basalt and weighs about three-quarters of a ton (0.680 metric tons). The stone is 118 cm (46.5 in.) high, 77 cm. (30 in.) wide and 30 cm. (12 in.) deep -- roughly the size of a medium-screen LCD television or a heavy coffee table [source BBC]. But what's inscribed on the Rosetta Stone is far more significant than its composition. It features three columns of inscriptions, each relaying the same message but in three different languages: Greek, hieroglyphics and Demotic. Scholars used the Greek and Demotic inscriptions to make sense of the hieroglyphic alphabet. By using the Rosetta Stone as a translation device, scholars revealed more than 1,400 years of ancient Egyptian secrets [source: Cleveland MOA].

The discovery and translation of the Rosetta Stone are as fascinating as the translations that resulted from the stone. Controversial from the start, it was unearthed as a result of warfare and Europe's quest for world domination. Its translation continued to cause strife between nations, and even today, scholars debate who should be credited with the triumph of solving the hieroglyphic code. Even the stone's current location is a matter of debate. This artifact has long held a powerful grip over history and politics.

Since 1802, the Rosetta Stone has occupied a space in London's British Museum. While most visitors acknowledge the stone as an important piece of history, others are drawn to it like a religious relic. The stone is now enclosed in a case, but in the past, visitors could touch it and trace the mysterious hieroglyphics with their fingers.

In this article, we'll learn how the world came to regard this piece of stone as a harbinger of Egypt's secrets. We'll also discuss its history and the circumstances surrounding its discovery, as well as the long and difficult task of deciphering the Rosetta Stone's inscriptions. Last, we'll examine the field of Egyptology and how it evolved from the Rosetta Stone.

What the Sphinx Said

By DAVID STUART

On Sept. 14, 1822, as legend tells the tale, Jean-François Champollion burst into his brother's Paris office at the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres, flung a bundle of drawings upon the desk and cried, "Je tiens mon affaire!" ("I've done it!"). Champollion promptly fainted before he could utter news of the great intellectual feat for which he is still celebrated: the decipherment of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs. The story of the young, frail, hotheaded scholar and his volatile time, full of upheavals political and scientific, is a remarkable tale, wonderfully told in Andrew Robinson's "Cracking the Egyptian Code: The Revolutionary Life of Jean-François Champollion."

The founding father of Egyptology started young and lived a relatively short life. Born in 1790 in southwest France, Champollion became fascinated by Oriental history and languages not long after he was sent to school in Grenoble at age 10, having exhausted local teachers. France was still basking in the exotic glow of Napoleon's Egypt campaign (1798-1801), when scientists as well as soldiers helped introduce the wonders of ancient Egypt into Western consciousness. Images and accounts of pyramids, temples and mysterious hieroglyphs—including those on the recently discovered Rosetta Stone—enchanted the young Jean-François, who soon set his sights on learning the Coptic language of old Egypt.

A hundred years old, and beautiful as ever

As the world celebrates the centennial of its discovery, Nevine El-Aref asks who actually owns the iconic bust of Queen Nefertiti?

It seems that there is no foreseeable resolution to the long conflict between Germany and Egypt over ownership of the 3,400-year-old bust of Queen Nefertiti, wife of the monotheistic pharaoh Akhenaten. Now, a century after its discovery, the dispute over ownership is stepping from one level to another, and with no concrete solution in sight it has become one of the best-known international cases of stolen antiquities that Egypt wants back.

The magnificent painted stucco and limestone bust of Nefertiti was discovered in 1912 by an archaeological team led by German Egyptologist Ludwig Borchardt and sponsored by the German Oriental Society (DOG), the treasurer of which was the German Jewish wholesale merchant James Simon. The bust was unearthed while the German team was excavating the workshop of the ancient Egyptian court sculptor Tuthmosis in Akhenaten's capital city of Al-Amarna. Along with it were other unfinished artefacts, including a polychrome bust of the queen and plaster casts representing other members of Akhenaten's family and entourage. It meant that bust, as well as the other objects, never went on display and was damaged during its creation or was used as a model and was never indented for view.

Soon after its discovery, the bust was held as one of the most iconic images of ancient Egyptian art. It depicts Queen Nefertiti, whose name means "the beautiful has arrived", with full red lips, a graceful, elongated neck decorated with the vibrant colours of a necklace, and a tall, blue flat-topped crown which contrasts with the sepia tone of her smooth skin. Although one of the bust's inlaid crystal eyes is missing ,both eyelids and brows are outlined in black.

Egypt and the Birth of Egyptology

video credits:
Ohlone College Art 103A
Professor Kenney Mencher
(Art History Stone Age Technology through the Early Renaissance)
www.kenney-mencher.com

Egyptology

September 10, 2011 By Alfred Jones

Once I was asked, “Why is it referred to as Egyptology, indicating that it is to be studies along with scientific subjects?” To answer this question, we must go back to the year l798 when Napoleon attempted to invade Egypt. His expedition, ill advised as it was from the military standpoint, had the long range effect of politically awaking Egypt and setting in motion a scientific examination of its antiquities that continued to this day. He had taken one hundred and seventy five scholars to study and record every aspect of Egypt that could be brought under the microscope of those who wanted to know more about it in as great a depth as possible.

Not only did he bring some of France’s greatest authorities on such subjects as astronomy, mathematics, chemistry, hierology, history, various technicians, painters, poets and a copy of every book he could find in France that contained information about the Nile Valley. He brought crates of scientific apparatus and measuring instruments.

Long after Napoleon gave up his military interest in Egypt and returned to France, the army of scholars remained in Egypt and continued to study, to measure and to record their findings. He was able to create a world wide interest in Egypt and after the other Europeans became interested in Egypt, there was a host of adventurers as well as scholars who descended upon Egypt and remain there to this day.