The first laws

Laws are part of human life. The oldest legal text belongs to Ur-Nammu, a king of the Mesopotamian city of Ur, 2100 B.C. It says about compensation for bodily injuries, penalties for witchcraft and punishment of runaway slaves.

The oldest law code belongs to Hammurabi, a king of Babylonia, 1758 B.C. It is written on a great stone in a temple to the Babylonian god Marduk. This stone is now in the Louvre museum in Paris. The laws in this code say about crime, divorce and marriage, the rights of slave owners and slaves, debts, inheritance and property contracts. The code gives cruel punishment for crimes. Murderers and thieves get death penalty.

Hammurabi’s laws are progressive because according to them the penalty can’t be harder than the crime.

XI. Переведите следующие словосочетания с русского языка на английский:

юридический; компенсация за телесные повреждения; наказание, ----; беглые рабы; принадлежать; камень, храм, развод и брак; владельцы рабов; долги; наследование; имущественные контракты; суровое наказание; убийцы и воры; смертная казнь; в соответствии с, более суровый, чем….

XII. Найдите в тексте “В” предложения, отвечающие на следующие вопросы:

1.Как называется самый ранний из известных юридических текстов?

2.Что представляет собой кодекс Хаммурапи?

XIII. Подготовьте пересказ текста “B” на английском языке.

XIV. Прочтите и перескажите своим друзьям английские шутки:

Murder is always a mistake... One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner.

Oscar Wilde

* * *

It is the end of the 18^th century. The last day of the criminal condemned to death comes. The guard wakes him up and asks him what he’d like to have for breakfast. The guard says that the criminal can have anything he wants.

“Well,” the criminal says, “I think I’d like to have some peaches and strawberries.”

“You know it is winter now and there are no peaches or strawberries.”

“Never mind,” says the criminal. “I can wait.”

_____________

a criminal condemned to death – преступник, приговоренный к казни

peaches and strawberries – персики и клубника

Never mind! – Ничего страшного!

* * *

Believe it or not, but…

… in Texas, USA, it is illegal to swear near a corpse.

… in the town of New Ark, New Jersey, USA, it is illegal to buy ice-cream after 6 p.m. without written permission from your doctor.

… there is a law in Michigan, USA, which says that the husband is the owner of his wife’s hair.

…the last will and testament of the great French writer Francois Rabelais (ca. 1490-1553) reads as follows: “I have nothing. I owe much. The rest I leave to the poor.”

______________

it is illegal – это незаконно

to swear – 1) (зд.) ругаться, богохульствовать; 2) клясться

a corpse - труп

written permission – письменное разрешение

an owner - владелец

а will – завещание, воля

testament – (зд.) завещание

to owe – быть должным (кому-либо)

the rest – остаток, остальное, все прочее

UNIT 2