7.2.4 Repayment
About half the documents have repayment clauses. Agricultural loans
were payable “after the harvest” or “at the threshing floor”; com-
mercial loans after the trading journey (kaskal). Other terms included
payment on notice (ki-lu-ti-im-ba).^117 Some relief from payment could
apparently be expected if natural disaster had destroyed the farmer’s
crops (cf. Laws of Hammurabi 48), as we learn from an exclusion
clause in temple loans: “He (debtor) shall not say to the king or
priest ‘My field is flooded; my field is destroyed by a storm’” (NRVN
179, 180; TuM n.F. 1/2 69).
Upon repayment, the creditor had to return the debt tablet to the
debtor.^1187.2.5 Penalties
A contractual penalty for default was to pay in barley a loan given
in silver or some other commodity (NATN 72, 102, 266). Effectively,
this raised the interest from 25 percent to 40 percent.^119 A harsher
penalty was double the loan (e.g., BE 3/1 13); possibly it applied to
more extreme situations, like loans already in arrears (cf. NATN
493).^120 Even harsher were the penalties of being declared a crimi-
nal (“er 7 -da: AUCT 2 138), of imprisonment (en-nu: MVN 18 181,
505) or even of death (gaz).^121 Such penalties were normally secured
by a separate oath. A promise by the debtor to provide his son as
a slave on default is more likely to have been a penalty than a
hypothecary pledge.^1227.2.6 Special Terms
Two contracts have a term excluding recourse by the debtor to lit-
igation or appeal to the grand vizier (MVN 2 1; NATN 322/334).
The second is certainly a commercial loan; it may therefore have
been an arrangement among merchants. In NATN 368, the debtor
swears not to leave town without paying his debt.(^117) NRVN 96; Kraus, “... ana itti“u.”
(^118) See NATN 403 and Steinkeller, Sale.. ., 88.
(^119) See e.g. ZA53, no. 24 = Steinkeller, “Ur III.. .,” app. 1.
(^120) Limet, “La clause du double.. .”; Lutzmann, Schuldurkunden..., 70–72.
(^121) Owen, “Death for Default...” Lieberman’s interpretation of this verb as
breaking the tablet is improbable (“Death.. .”); cf. MVN 16 1243:7.
(^122) ZA53, no. 22; contra Lutzmann, Schuldurkunden.. ., 27.
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