Editing Code of Hammurabi (section)

===Law report===
[[File:Library of Ashurbanipal.jpg|thumb|alt=Photograph. Refer to caption|A [[British Museum]] display of tablets from the [[Library of Ashurbanipal]]. The Library lists a copy of the "judgments of Hammurabi" over a millennium after Hammurabi's death.]]

A second theory is that the Code is a sort of law report, and as such contains records of past cases and judgments, albeit phrased abstractly. This would provide one explanation for the casuistic format of the "laws"; indeed, [[Jean Bottéro]] believed he had found a record of a case that inspired one.{{sfnp|Bottéro|1992|pp=171–172}} However, such finds are inconclusive and very rare, despite the scale of the Mesopotamian legal corpus.{{sfnp|Bottéro|1992|pp=163–164}} Furthermore, legal judgments were frequently recorded in Mesopotamia, and they recount the facts of the case without generalising them.{{sfnmp|1a1=Roth|1y=2001|2a1=Klein|2y=2007}} These judgments were concerned almost exclusively with points of fact, prompting Martha Roth to comment: "I know of only one case out of thousands extant that might be said to revolve around a point of law".{{sfnp|Roth|2001|p=255}}