The Rules of War before Henry Dunant1

By Michel Deyra

At the origin of humanity, war was characterized by the absence of any rule other than the law
of the strongest and/or the most disloyal. Vae victis, win or die without remission. But all
societies or civilizations very quickly felt the need for humanity which, at the beginning,
corresponded to the benevolence and compassion that one has towards one's "fellow man", one
that is recognized as part of humanity.

The opening up of spaces and the interweaving of cultures allowed for a slow evolution towards
a shared desire to limit the rights of combatants and protect those of non-combatants.

In Antiquity: with the premises of the Code of Hammurabi in Babylon (1730 BC); in Greece,
with Homer, Polybius, Plato, Aristotle; in Rome with Cicero; in China with Lao-Tseu and
Confucius; in Persia with Zoroastrianism; in India with the Mahâbhârata and the laws of Manou
(200 B.C.).
In the Muslim world, Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, the first caliph (7th century) laid down his ten
recommendations for the battlefield, which were taken up in the Viqâyet (13th century),
codifying the conduct of hostilities and the protection of civilians and the defeated, even if the
objectives were often more economic than humanitarian.
In Africa, Maasai warriors wore armbands to distinguish themselves from the civilian
population; the Fulani spared the vulnerable (women, children, the elderly), cared for wounded
enemy soldiers and respected sacred sites (tombs and mosques); the Ashanti beat a drum to
announce battle, calling out to warriors while warning civilians of danger.
In the Middle Ages, the precepts of chivalry and, above all, Christianity limited the violence of
feudal wars. The Peace of God proclaimed the inviolability of certain goods (churches,
monasteries) and recommended sparing clerics, merchants, pilgrims, the poor and farmers; the
Truce of God prohibited fighting during certain periods of the liturgical calendar (Advent,
Christmas, Lent and Easter). The penalty was excommunication, but with the emergence of the
concept of “just war”, the humanitarian aims of these rules were neither exclusive nor
predominant.
In Europe, from the 16th to the 19th century, the first pioneers of humanitarian action appeared.
They were doctors and clergymen who went to the battlefields to alleviate the suffering of
soldiers: Ambroise Paré, Jean-Dominique Larrey, Jonathan Letterman, Florence Nightingale
and others. But it was the Age of Enlightenment that saw the development of a humanist
doctrine clearly affirming that war should be limited to the military and spare the civilian
population. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract, 1762) and Emeric de Vattel (Droit

1
This text has been written for the Preparation to the Jean-Pictet Competition training.
des Gens, 1758) were the main architects of this doctrine, which put an end to the thesis of just
war.
Finally, on the American continent, Francis Lieber, a professor at Columbia College in New
York, wrote Instructions for the American Army between 1860 and 1863, during the American
Civil War. Paradoxically, it was during an internal conflict that his Code laid down the first
rules of law in warfare.
It was Henry Dunant's book A Memory of Solferino (1862) that finally led to the creation of the
Red Cross and the adoption on August 22, 1864 of the Convention for the Amelioration of the
Condition of the Wounded in the Armies in the Field. It is no longer just "fellow human beings"
sharing the same value system who are protected, but humanity understood in a universal way,
regardless of any unfavorable criteria.