Civilization in Mesopotamia

Here are some notes from today's class. We began with talking about wandering nomads who drove their herds around some land. In Sumer nomads had drove their cattle down south towards Arabia. In 2350 BC the Akkadians conquered Sumer. The Akkadians brought new gods to take the place of the previous gods that had been worshiped.  The citizens were then forced to worship the new gods brought upon them. King Hammurabi of Babylon came up with his new series of laws called Hammurabi's Code. One of the major laws was "an eye for an eye". Other laws were focused on regulations for marriages, divorce and punishments for crimes. These laws are crazy to me and they seem extremely harsh. I cannot imagine seeing these punishments take place for the criminals. I understand the points behind some of these laws, but I do think many of these are extreme. I am just wondering what happened to bring some of the laws into action since most of them end with death.