About the Code of Hammurabi (Babylonian Law):

Penologoy began with the 'lex talionis', or law of equivalent retaliation...

If a house collapsed and killed the purchaser, the architect or builder must die.

If the accident killed the buyer's son, the son of the architect or builder must die.

If a man struck a girl and killed her not he but his daughter must suffer the penalty if death...

A man who struck his father had his hand cut off.

A physician whose patient died, or lost an eye, as the result of an operation, had his fingers cut off.

Gradually these punishments in kind were replaced by awards of damages. A payment of money was permitted as an alternative to the physical retaliation. Later the fine became the sole punishment.

Private property in land and goods was taken for granted by the code.