FURTHER READING
Ilias Arnaoutoglou, Ancient Greek Laws (London: Routledge,
1998).
George B. N. Ayittey, Indigenous African Institutions (Ardsley-on-
Hudson, N.Y.: Transnational, 1991).
Richard A. Bauman, Crime and Punishment in Ancient Rome (Lon-
don: Routledge, 1996).
R. S. Betai, Evolution of Law and Crimes in Ancient India (New Del-
hi, India: Bharatiya Kala Prakashan, 2003).
James Henry Breasted, trans. and ed., Ancient Records of Egypt, vol.
1, Th e First through the Seventeenth Dynasties (Urbana: Uni-
versity of Illinois Press, 2001).
John A. Crook, Law and Life of Rome (London: Th ames and Hud-
son, 1967).
Israel Drapkin and Th orsten Sellin, Crime and Punishment in the
Ancient World (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1989).
M. Rama Jois, Ancient Indian Law: Eternal Values in Manu Smriti
(New Delhi, India: Universal Law, 2002).be drowned. Any woman who murders her husband,
preceptor, or off spring, sets fi re to another’s property,
poisons a man, or cuts off any of the bodily joints of
another shall be torn apart by bulls, no matter whether
or not she is big with child, or has not passed a month
after giving birth to a child....
Any person who insults the king, betrays the king’s
council, makes evil attempts against the king, or
disregards the sanctity of the kitchens of Brahmansshall have his tongue cut off. When a man other than a
soldier steals weapons or armor, he shall be shot down
by arrows; if he is a soldier, he shall pay the highest
amercement. He who castrates a man shall have his
generative organ cut off. He who hurts the tongue or
nose of another shall have his fi ngers cut off....
From: Kautilya, Kautilya’s Arthashastra,
2nd ed., trans. R. Shamasastry (Mysore:
Wesleyan Mission Press, 1923).TABLE VIII.
- If one has maimed a limb and does not compromise
with the injured person, let there be retaliation. If one
has broken a bone of a freeman with his hand or with
a cudgel, let him pay a penalty of three hundred coins
If he has broken the bone of a slave, let him have one
hundred and fi fty coins. If one is guilty of insult, the
penalty shall be twenty-fi ve coins. - If one is slain while committing theft by night, he is
rightly slain. - If a patron shall have devised any deceit against his
client, let him be accursed. - If one shall permit himself to be summoned as a
witness, or has been a weigher, if he does not give his
testimony, let him be noted as dishonest and incapable
of acting again as witness. - Any person who destroys by burning any building
or heap of corn deposited alongside a house shall
be bound, scourged, and put to death by burning at
the stake provided that he has committed the said
misdeed with malice aforethought; but if he shall have
committed it by accident, that is, by negligence, it is
ordained that he repair the damage or, if he be too poor
to be competent for such punishment, he shall receive a
lighter punishment.
12. If the theft has been done by night, if the owner kills
the thief, the thief shall be held to be lawfully killed.
13. It is unlawful for a thief to be killed by day....unless
he defends himself with a weapon; even though he has
come with a weapon, unless he shall use the weapon and
fi ght back, you shall not kill him. And even if he resists,
fi rst call out so that someone may hear and come up.
23. A person who had been found guilty of giving false
witness shall be hurled down from the Tarpeian Rock.
26. No person shall hold meetings by night in the city.
TABLE IX.
- Th e penalty shall be capital for a judge or arbiter
legally appointed who has been found guilty of receiving
a bribe for giving a decision. - Treason: he who shall have roused up a public enemy
or handed over a citizen to a public enemy must suff er
capital punishment. - Putting to death of any man, whosoever he might be
unconvicted is forbidden.
From: Oliver J. Th atcher, ed., Th e Library
of Original Sources. Vol. 3: Th e Roman
World (Milwaukee: University Research
Extension Co., 1901): pp. 9–11.
Th e Twelve Tables, ca. 450 b.c.e., excerpt
Romecrime and punishment: primary source documents 307