is a very different concept from the occasional retrospective forgiveness of debts. The theoretical basis is evidently that three years' work of the family member is regarded as amortizing the debt. Amortization of diis sort would not have been compatible with an antichretic pledge.28

Paragraph 21 of the Edict presents a case where the creditor's security is shielded from the effects of the royal decree:29

If the male or female house-born slave [of]30 a son (= citizen) of Numhia, Emutbal, Idamaraz, etc. or (of) a son of the land for the [full] price is sold 01־ bound in penal servitude 01־ left in pledge, his restoration shall not be established.

Here the restoration of the slave would be to his previous status as slave of the debtor. Where the pledge is equal in value to the debt, however, as we have seen with redemption, the bargain was not considered oppressive, and would be allowed to stand. A house-born slave was apparently not enough of a member of the family for this principle to be overriden.

2. Hypothecary Pledges

Hypothecary pledges are less well attested. They tend to be associated with more complex transactions. C T 33 29 in our translation reads:

X has given Y 6 shekels of silver to take possession of land (ana qaqqarim sabātim). If Y does not pay X the silver, X will stand on the land (eli

qaqqarim izzaz)·

The transaction is in our interpretation a loan for the acquisition of land.31 It is unlikely that the first clause refers to the creditor taking the land as pledge, as it would make the second clause superfluous.32

Samsu-iluna (§ 3') and in a fragment, NBC 8618, which may be from the latter

31Contra Kienast 1978: 74 n. 317: "gegen 'Packen' eines Grundstückes . . .", and Skaist 1994: 215-17.

32Cf. CAD sabātu vol. 16, p. 14 mng. 3d.

Failure to describe the location of the land suggests that it has not yet been acquired. A loan for purchase (or for some other payment necessary to acquisition) is an obvious occasion for a hypothecary pledge.

the land.,י Default on a hypothecary pledge could, however, lead directly to ownership. The outcome depended on the individual contract, as is shown by two contrasting documents from Kisurra, both demonstrating the role of the hypothecary pledge as a secondary security.

In Kienast Kisurra 203, a fragmentary text, it appears that the debtor has given a person in antichretic pledge. Should that person die or run away, the debtor must compensate the creditor for the loss of income with a fixed rent supplied from a field given in hypothecary pledge. At most then, the creditor could take physical possession of the pledge, pending default on the principal. In Kienast Kisurra 92, on the other hand, flight of the debtor, who has apparently pledged himself, allows the creditor to succeed (iredde) to his

A further clause states that if two named persons claim the land, they must pay the debt. Kienast (1978: 91) assumes that these are

these are potential heirs of the debtor, who would naturally seek to contest the succession to his estate with his creditor. What the clause does indicate is that the pledge was not intended as a substitute payment for the debt. As successor in title to the land, the creditor may have been able to resist any claim to reimbursement of the difference in value between the debt and the pledge as long as he held the land (indeed, this may have been the purpose of the "succession" clause). Ultimately, however, he could not disregard the rights of the debtor's successors in title, which once exercised would reduce his

158:16־ records that X and Υ borrowed 10 shekels of silver from

Z.G "took the hands" of X and Y from Z.37

2.2.The surety was said to "hold the head" of the debtor (qaqqadam kullum).38

Both these expressions apply to suretyship assumed together with the granting of the loan. Malul has interpreted them as referring to the

2.3. The impersonal expression "the hand of X is removed" [qāti X nashat) is applied to many different situations, among which is suretyship.40 Landsberger (1937: 119) explained the word qātum in this context as involvement (.Beteiligtsein) in the widest sense with a matter, claim, etc. The full phrase thus means to sever such involvement. It can be used for the rejection of a plaintiff's claim by the court, or for the termination of a creditor's claim, whether by set-

or agrees to pay it within a short time. PBS 8/2 207 states:

Regarding 15 shekels of silver that X borrowed from [Υ], Ζ acted as surety (šu.du8.a <ilqi>) and paid the 15 shekels of silver to Y. The hand of Y is removed from X and Z.

taken over the debt but not yet paid it, it is only the debtor's hand that is removed (e.g. YOS 13 273). The same phrase can equally well refer to the situation from the creditor's perspective, as in PBS