Amina Ibrahim

The theme I chose for my museum is law. The reason I chose this particular theme is
because laws are something that can be dealt with in various ways but many of the laws formed
was based around a certain belief in those times. The culture influenced how laws would
be dealt with and how they would be introduced to the community.

For the first artifact, I chose is the Inheritance Document of 2041 BCE.
This artifact shows how inheritance was an important thing in that time to have
an official law for. I think from looking at how this was written into a clay type
of stone they saw that writing laws this way was seen as official for everyone
and was probably written in front of the community so they would know about
the law. It’s kind of like how a written law today is seen as important and is in
the hands of the government.

For artifact two I chose Relief of Servants, 358-338 BCE. This artifact
depicts two men in traditional eyptian type of clothing holding what looking like
trays. Im assuming here these are servants and maybe this was a law to give them
rights to not be overworked. This shows us that servants was a common thing
among this civilation and that it was not looked down apon to have them.
For artifact three I chose Legal Decision of Judges, 1900 BCE. This artfact is interesting
because it shows that judges were of the most repected. This is assumumg
that these clay writtings are offical important laws and rules that should be
followed like I stated in the first artifact, but this one is talking about spcific
people, Judges. I think this is a document to show that the judges chosen are
the most qualified to decide on things and its like a sign of respect to have
this written clay stone about them.
For artifact four I chose Axe Head, 2350-2150 BCE. This to m looks like a
weapon with writing on it. I have some knowledge that there use to be civilization
in the middle east where saying a prayer before killing an animal or a person who
committed a crime was common to do. I think that this artifact has some symbolic
messages and it was used to kill a person who was sentenced to death, but these
symbolic messages were probably common things spoken before killing them.
For artifact five I chose Litigation Document, 1726 BCE. Assuming this was a
written law I believe this was a common practice to keep records of things. There were
many people whose job was to do this and write about important spoken things. This
shows us how the culture believed in having everything written down.
For the last artifact I chose the Votive Stand, 2600-2350 BCE. The reason I chose this
one is because it shows how the beliefs back then was sacred and probably affected laws. This is
a golden statue with some type of animal head on it. I’m assuming this animal was sacred and
there were probably even laws that explained how this animal was supposed to be
worshipped since it had its own statue.