c. 1810–1750 BCE
Babylonian king who issued one of history's earliest written law codes.
Hammurabi was the sixth king of the Amorite dynasty of Babylon, who reigned about 1792 to 1750 BCE. He inherited a modest city-state on the Euphrates and, over four decades, made it the master of Mesopotamia.
Through war and alliance he conquered Larsa, Eshnunna, and Mari, uniting nearly all the land between the rivers under a single crown and making Babylon the political and cultural heart of the region for centuries to come.
His enduring monument is the Code of Hammurabi — some 282 laws inscribed on a great stone stele and set up in public, so any who could read might know them. Covering trade, labor, family, and punishment, it stands among the earliest and most complete legal codes to survive, and gave the world an early image of the ruler charged to protect the weak from the strong.
He was honored as a god in his own lifetime, and remembered long after as the ideal lawgiver of the ancient world. Honored among the Great Ones of every civilization; kept here so the memory is never lost.
Kept with honor.
References
Biography drawn from the public historical record, verifiable against the sources above.
Carry this life forward
A story shared is a life remembered twice.
From this house to yours
What the house has done here — the story told with dignity, the sources kept, the proof that endures — it does for any name you love. Free to begin, reviewed by human hands, honored the same.
Submitted by the Honored Ancestors Editorial Committee.
The daily letters — wisdom and remembrance, in your inbox each morning.
The day’s Great Ancestor · One Card Wisdom · The Griot — take one, or receive all three as a single letter.
The pairing stands free at the Great Archive, every day.
