Ancient Egyptian law, courting as far again as 3000 BC, was based mostly on the idea of Ma’at and characterised by custom, rhetorical speech, social equality and impartiality. By the 22nd century BC, the ancient Sumerian ruler Ur-Nammu had formulated the first law code, which consisted of casuistic statements (“if … then …”). Around 1760 BC, King Hammurabi further developed Babylonian law, by codifying and inscribing it in stone. Hammurabi placed a quantity of copies of his law code all through the dominion of Babylon as stelae, for the entire public to see; this became known as the Codex Hammurabi. The most intact copy of those stelae was found in the 19th century by British Assyriologists, and has since been totally transliterated and translated into varied languages, together with English, Italian, German, and French. Irish Legal News is the only daily news service for legal professionals north and south of …