Neo-Babylonian Court Procedure

Book excerpt: Even though scholars have known of Neo-Babylonian legal texts almost since Assyriology's very beginnings, no comprehensive study of court procedure has been undertaken. This lack is particularly glaring in light of studies of court procedure in earlier periods of Mesopotamian history. With these studies as a model, this book begins by presenting a comprehensive classification of the text-types that made up the "tablet trail" of records of the adjudication of legal disputes in the Neo-Babylonian period. In presenting this text-typology, it considers the texts' legal function within the adjudicatory process. Based on this, the book describes the adjudicatory process as it is attested in private records as well as in records from the Eanna at Uruk.