Hammurabi's Law: Text, Translation and Glossary (Biblical Seminar) [Hardcover]

M. E. J. Richardson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 2000 | Series: Biblical Seminar (Book 73)

Richardson supplies a new translation and transcription (which incorporates the most important manuscript variants) of the most famous of all ancient Mesopotamian texts. He also provides a complete lexical analysis of every word that is used in it. The edition covers the prologue and epilogue as well as the laws themselves. Students of the Bible, ancient Near Eastern law and general Semitics are now provided with an indispensable reference tool in a convenient form. The detailed information in the glossary, where the full context of every quotation is given, will also be a tremendous help to those who want to learn or revisit Akkadian.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 400 pages
• Publisher: Sheffield Academic Press (September 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 184127030X
• ISBN-13: 978-1841270302
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,365,384 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Superb Tool for Anyone Learning Akkadian, January 5, 2007

By 

John O. Freed (New Jersey) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Hammurabi's Laws: Text, Translation and Glossary (Academic Paperback) (Paperback)

This book contains the complete text of Hammurabi's Law code in transliteration and in translation, with the transliteration on the left page and the translation on the opposite page. There is also an excellent (and I mean excellent) dictionary in the back of the book. It was uncanny how many times I would be having trouble translating a law and would look up a word in the dictionary, only to find the exact passage I was struggling with quoted and explained in detail. This shows that the author put a lot of thought into the examples included in the dictionary. A list of roots and verbal forms are included also, and these two sections are very useful when you are trying to translate one of Akkadian's notoriously difficult weak verb forms.

This book is not beginner's grammer, in fact it is not a grammer at all. For someone who wants to learn Akkadian, I cannot recomend John Huehnergard's "A Grammer of Akkadian" enough. Once you have learned the basics of Akkadian you can then work through this book by translating the Akkadian transliterations of the laws and comparing your translation to those of the Dr. Richardson. I found this to be a great way to "take the next step" when I was learning Akkadian.