Leave the speculating to the experts. Hammuirbi's code dates from the late 1700's so it hadn't been developed when these hands were cut off.

Sorry to burst your bubble Allen but Hammuirbis code date back to 1700 BC, this site is around 1600 BC the code was created 100 years before.

"thieves"

whose to say they all didn't just fall off at the same time ????? .....very humid day or strong winds maybe

I don't quite understand what you mean to say as your use of " there" makes the whole sentence entirely unclear to me.

"There" refers to s specific place...over there!
"Their" indicates ownership...Lets go over to their house to visit!
"They're" refers to a contraction of "they are"...They're at home, alright, the lights are on."

I think a whole generation of people missed out on English 101.

As for thievery, this is from a long time before Islam and they might have used the laws of Hammurabi or whoever else was kicking around back then. Whatever.

@ Suzy... You mentioned "thieves" but missed out on "more THAN"...another error. But at least I understood that well enough.

Well look at it this way! If he was still alive after the chopping off of the right hand, he could still hold his wine cooler with the left.