Timeline 1300BCE - 500BCE
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1300BC Late Helladic III. An
archeological period of ancient Greece.
(LSA., Fall 1995, p.6)
c1300BC China introduced books around this time.
(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R55)
1300BC The oldest know shipwreck dates to about this
time, the era of the fall of Troy and reign of King Tut. It was found
off the southern coast of Turkey at Uluburun (Big Nose/Cape) by Dr.
George Bass in 1984. [see 4431BC]
(MT, 3/96, p.2)
1300BC A 50-foot boat was discovered in 1992 at
Dover, England.
(AM, Jul/Aug '97 p.13)
1300BC-1200 A sprawling Assyrian administrative
center was discovered by Dutch archeologists in 1997 in Rakka, 340
miles north of Damascus. The site included a 15-foot high 2-story
building with 2 bathrooms, 2 toilets and a tiled floor.
(SFC,12/9/97, p.B3)
1300BC-1100BC From the late Shang Dynasty (13th
to the 11th century BC), a pair of 33-inch-tall ting tripod vessels,
will be part of the traveling exhibit from the National Palace Museum,
Taipei. [see 1600BC-1100]
(WSJ, 12/29/95, p.A-11)
1300BC-1100BC A 9-foot-tall bronze standing figure
from this time was found in 1986 at a 'sacrificial pit" at Sanxingdui
in Sichuan province.
(SFC, 6/15/00, p.E1)
1300BC-612BC The Assyrians, a Semitic people,
established an empire that spread out from Assur in northern
Mesopotamia.
(eawc, p.4)
1300BC-300BC The Omani Iron Age.
(AM, May/Jun 97 p.49)
1295BC-1294BC Ramesses I ruled during Egypt’s 19th
Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty18e.html)
1294BC-1279BC Sethi I (Seti I), son of Rammeses I and
the father of Rammeses II, ruled during Egypt’s 19th Dynasty. He
restored the ancient gods of Egypt, such as Amun-Re, Ptah, Seth, and
Osiris. At Abydos he built a splendid temple to Osiris. Sethi claims to
have inflicted a victory against the Hittite king, Mursillis II, the
successor to Suppililiumas, at the towns of Yenoam and Bethshael. Seti
overran Palestine, made peace with the Hittites in Syria, opened mines
and quarries, and enlarged the Temple of Amun-Re at Karnak. His tomb
was discovered in 1817.
(NG, 9/98, p.17,19)(AM, 7/01,
p.56)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty18e.html)
1295-1272BC The Hittite king Muwatalli II signed a
treaty with Alaksandu, ruler of the Arzawa land known as Wilusa
(northwest Turkey), which became Wilios in Bronze Age Greece and then
slurred to Ilios for Homer’s Iliad.
(Arch, 5/04, p.40)
1292 Horemheb, the last pharaoh of
Egypt’s 18th Dynasty, died about this time and was buried in the Valley
of the Kings.
(Arch, 9/02,
p.61)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horemheb)
1292BC An Egyptian scribe documented that a couple of
construction worker twins went off a beer binge. They left their wives
at home to chase available women and didn't show up for work. Their
brother-in-law was the chief engineer on the job and did not fire them.
(SFEC, 4/20/97, Z1 p.5)
1280BC-1200BC Moses lived about this time. We cannot
be certain when Moses lived except that it was obviously before the
Jews settled in Palestine, when they were still wanderers. The general
opinion seems to be that it was at some time within the period of
Ramesses and his son. The father-in-law of Moses was a Midianite. Moses
reportedly died at Mount Nebo.
(L.C.-W.P.p.123)(MT, Spg. '97, p.11)(WSJ, 5/11/00,
p.A24)
1279BC-1213BC Ramesses II (the Great) ruled during
Egypt’s 19th Dynasty. Seti I named him co-ruler early in his life. His
capital city was Qantir, 75 miles north of Cairo. A detailed map of the
city was created in 1998. His colossal statue, removed from Memphis,
now greets the visitor when he leaves Cairo's main railway station.
There are huge statues of Ramesses in the Luxor temple... and most
gigantic of all, the seated colossi at Abu Simbel. He enlarged the
Karnak temple on a scale which makes human beings... look and feel like
ants. The tomb of Queen Nefertari, wife of Ramses II, Pharaoh of the
19th dynasty, was discovered in 1904.
(L.C.-W.P.p.104,113)(V. Sun, 11/3/95,
p.A-20)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty19.html)
c1274BC Battle of Kadesh, in the fifth year of
his reign Ramesses moved to meet and destroy the forces of the Hittite
king, Muwatallis, grandson of Suppililiumas. Here some 70,000BC-100,000
armed men clashed in fury... The battle lasted two days... and was
decisive in that the Hittite advanced no further. The Hittites fought
off the invading Egyptians. This reflected the power gained from
trading metals abundant in Turkey. Ramesses left his mark on a cliff
face by the Nahr al Kalb (Dog River) when he marched north from Egypt
to battle the Hittites.
(L.C.-W.P.p.116-119)(eawc, p.5)(NG, Aug., 1974,
p.157)
1275-1240BC The Trojan War is usually dated to this
period.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.49)
1270BC At Abu Simbel, Egypt, Ramses II constructed
The Great Temple in his own honor and the Small Temple in honor of his
wife Nefertari. Engulfed by sand over the centuries, the temples lay
hidden until discovered by a Swiss traveler in 1813. The temples are
moved under a 4 year UNESCO project when in 1964 the rising waters
behind the Aswan High Dam threaten to drown them.
(NG, May 1985, p.591)
c1260BC A pottery fragment from this time was found
in 2004 near Natadola in western Fiji. It was believed to have been
made by the Lapita people, who populated Polynesia.
(Arch, 1/05, p.11)
1267-1237 King Hattusili III ruled the Hittites. He
wrote a letter to the king of Ahhiyawa (thought to be Mycenaean Greeks)
and mentioned that Wilusa was once a bone of contention.
(Arch, 5/04, p.40)
1250BC By this time the Assyrians committed
themselves to conquering the Kassite Empire to the south.
(eawc, p.4)
1250BC Some scholars believe that the Mycenaeans
waged a successful war with the Trojans of western Asia Minor.
(eawc, p.5)
c1250BC-1200BC Under the direction of Moses the
Hebrew people returned to Canaan from Egypt after wandering for several
years in the Sinai desert and began the conquest of Canaan. The
conquest took some hundred years and after victory they parceled the
land of Canaan into tribal territories under a government known as an
amphictyony.
(eawc, p.5)
1250BC-1150BC This time frame is referred to as the
Initial Olmec Period of southern Mexico.
(Arch, 1/06, p.42)
1250BC-1000BC Troy VIIa, another discernible era on
the site of the Trojan War. Evidence shows that Troy V was destroyed by
fire and that Troy VI saw the establishment of an entirely new
principality. An earthquake hit the thriving city of 5-6 thousand
people, but after the crisis, the same people returned and repaired the
city. The renovated Troy VIIa lasted some seventy years and was then
destroyed by a conflagration.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.49-50)
1225BC The Assyrian ruler, Tukulti-Ninurta, captured
Babylon and the region of southern Mesopotamia, but their control did
not last long.
(eawc, p.5)
1225 BC Earliest known Illyrian king, Hyllus, died.
(www, Albania, 1998)
1225-1175 Earthquakes during this period toppled some
city-states and centers of trade and scholarship in the Middle East.
Jericho, Jerusalem, Knossos and Troy were all hit.
(SFC,12/9/97, p.A8)(SSFC, 12/17/00, p.A19)
1213BC Ramesses II (the Great) Pharaoh during Egypt’s
19th Dynasty, died. In 1976 his mummy was shipped to Paris, where it
was treated with radiation and chemicals for protection against
bacteriological damage.
(NG, 9/98,
p.16,22,32)(www.ancient-egypt.org/history/18_20/19.html)
1213BC-1203BC Maremptah (Merenptah), the 13th
son of Rammeses, ruled during Egypt’s 19th Dynasty. He is mainly
attested to by three great inscriptions, including 80 lines on a wall
in the Temple of Amun at Karnak, a large stele with 35 readable lines
from Athribis in the Delta and the great Victory Stele from his ruined
mortuary temple at Thebes, with 28 lines.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty19a.html)
1203BC-1200BC Amenmesse (Ammenemes) about this time
led Egypt as the 5th ruler of the 19th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty19a.html)
1200BC Afghanistan, near Sheberghan at Tillya Tepe, a
temple for the worship of fire was built.
(NG, March 1990,V.I. Sarainidi p.62)
1200BC The first outbreak of human plague may have
been the scourge that struck the Philistines in the 12th century BC.
The Old Testament account mentions "mice that mar the land."
(NG, 5/88, p.678)
1200BC The tradition of the Mokaya people at coastal
Chiapas and Guatemala came to a sudden end about this time. This
appeared to coincide with the rise of the Olmec people.
(Arch, 1/06, p.43)
1200BC The end of Mycenaean civilization.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.73)
1200BC Indian ink became increasingly popular. Other
cultures developed inks from berries, plants and minerals.
(SFC, 7/26/04, p.F4)
1200BC-1194BC The period of the 19th Dynasty under
Seti II.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty19a.html)
1200BC-1020BC The Israelites were ruled by the Judges
in a period of relative stability until a Philistine invasion in 1050.
(eawc, p.5)
1200BC-1000BC The archeological evidence later
confirmed that a collection of small settlements appeared in the
eastern parts of the highlands of Palestine later known as the West
Bank.
(AM, 9/01, p.30)
1200BC-400BC The Olmecs built impressive cities and
established trade routes throughout Mesoamerica, that included
settlements at La Venta and Tres Zapotes.
(SFEC, 5/17/98, p.T12)
c1200BC-300BC In Peru a pre-Columbian culture
flourished over this time in the Andes site of Chavin de Huantar.
(SFC, 12/21/00, p.A20)
1200BC-300BC The Olmec people ruled southern Mexico
and northern Central America.
(WSJ, 7/2/96, p.A12)
1194BC-1188BC The period of the 19th Dynasty under
Siptah.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty19a.html)
1187BC-1185BC Queen Tawosret (Taweseret) ruled during
Egypt’s 19th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty19b.html)
1186BC-1184BC The period of the 20th Dynasty under
Sethnakhte (Setnakht).
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1184BC-1153BC The period of the 20th Dynasty under
Ramses III. After Ramessu III ascended the throne of Egypt, he fought
back two major attacks from the northern countries. Ramses III defended
his kingdom from foreign invasion in three separate wars, reorganized
Egyptian society into classes based on occupation and built a funerary
temple based on the Ramesseum. Ramses, son of Setnakht, twice defended
Egypt against invasions from Libyan tribes and in his 8th year from a
coalition of migrants referred to in records as the "Sea Peoples." The
great Battle against the Sea Peoples was captured in a magnificent
picture which Ramesses III caused to be sculpted on the walls of his
great temple at Medinet Habu in Thebes.
(L.C.-W.P.p.104,126)(R.M.-P.H.C.p.21)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1184 BC Jun 11, Greeks finally captured Troy. This
corresponds to excavation levels VIi or VIIa at the site of Hisarlik,
Turkey. [see 1150BC]
(SC, 6/11/02)(Arch, 5/04, p.37)
c1182BC Ramessu III beat back a more formidable
attack by northern countries. An inscription describing this war was
engraved on the second pylon of the temple of Medinet Habu. The
inscription describes how the northerners were disturbed, and proceeded
to move eastward and southward, swamping in turn the land of the
Hittites, Carchemish, Arvad, Cyprus, Syria, and other places of the
same region. The Hittites and North Syrians had been so crippled by
them that Ramessu took the opportunity to extend the frontier of
Egyptian territory northward... the twofold ravaging of Syria left it
weakened and opened the door for the colonization of its coast-lands by
the beaten remnant of the invading army.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.23)
c1179BC Ramessu III beat back a Libyan invasion in
his fifth year, this invasion was accompanied by war galleys from the
northern countries.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.22)
1178BC Apr 16, In 2008 researchers suggested that
this was the date that Odysseus struck with arrows, swords and spears,
killing those who sought to replace him, as he returned from the Trojan
War.
(AP, 6/23/08)
c1176BC "Peoples of the sea" arrived to the Lebanese
coast (c1200-1182). They came probably from the Aegean. They toppled
the Hittites, destroyed Ugarit on the Syrian coast and swept south to
Egypt where Ramesses III stopped them.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.174)
1175BC Rameses III built his temple palace at Medinet
Habu.
(eawc, p.5)
1153BC Ramesses III of Egypt died, and was succeeded
by a series of weak ghost-kings.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1153BC-1147BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses IV, son of Ramesses III.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1150BC Troy fell about this time. Estimated date for
the beginning of the Aeneid. [see 1275-1240BC] After King Agamemnon,
leader of the Greeks, returned home to Mycenae he was killed by his
wife Clytemnestra and her lover. In 2006 Cathy Gere authored “The Tomb
of Agamemnon.”
(V.D.-H.K.p.60)(Econ, 3/11/06, p.78)
1150BC-1000BC This time frame is referred to as the
Early Olmec Period of southern Mexico.
(Arch, 1/06, p.42)
1147BC-1143BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses V, son of Ramesses IV and Queen Ta-Opet. His mummy
indicates that he died of smallpox at about age 35.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1143BC-1136BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses VI.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1136BC-1129BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses VII.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1129BC-1126BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses VIII.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1126BC-1108BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses IX.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
c1116BC In China an imperial decree stated that it
was a requirement of the heavenly powers that people regularly take a
moderate amount of alcoholic drink.
(SFEC, 8/9/98, Z1 p.8)
1114-1076 Tiglath-Pileser I ruled the Assyrian empire.
(eawc, p.5)
1111-255BC Chou dynasty in China.
(V.D.-H.K. p.7)
1108BC-1099BC The period of Egypt’s 20th Dynasty
under Ramses X. During his reign workers went on strike for wages not
paid.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1100BC The Phoenician alphabet containing only
consonants was in use.
(V.D.-H.K.p.25)
1100BC By this time the Mycenaeans were overtaken by
Dorian invaders who used iron weapons. Greek culture then entered unto
a "Dark Age" period characterized by the disappearance of writing and a
decline in architecture that lasted to about 800BC.
(eawc, p.5)
c1100BC-1000BC The first Greek tribes settled on
Crete around the 11th century BC.
(WSJ, 3/20/97, p.A17)
c1100BC-1000BC In Britain Stonehenge Phase IV the
path across the henge ditch was extended into the fields and over the
hill to the River Avon.
(HT, 3/97, p.22)
1100BC-700BC The Phoenicians traded around the
Mediterranean.
(WH, 1994, p.13)
1100BC-265BC The Zhou period in China. [see 1027-771]
(WSJ, 2/19/98, p.A20)
1094BC-1064BC The period of Egypt under Ramses XI. He
was the last king of the 20th Dynasty and the New Kingdom. Upon his
death Hrihor and Smendes divided Egypt between themselves. Hrihor, the
high priest of Amon ultimately usurped the sovereignty and become
founder of the Twenty-first Dynasty. In Lower Egypt, the Tanite noble
Nesubenebded, in Greek Smendes controlled the Delta.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.29)(Arch, 5/05, p.21)
1085BC After 1085 BC, Egypt split between a northern
21st dynasty claiming national recognition reigning from Tanis and a
line of Theban generals and high priests of Amun who actually
controlled the south from Thebes. Relations between the two authorities
were peaceful. The Tanites were driven from power by Libyan warriors
who established their own 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty20.html)
1080BC-945BC High priests ruled Egypt from the
capital of Thebes.
(www.ancientroute.com/IndexPharCh.htm)
1075BCE Wenamun, a priest of Amun, moved from Egypt
to Byblos during the rule of Ramesses XI. This was recorded in the
Golenischeff papyrus found in 1891CE at El Khibeh in Upper Egypt. It is
the personal report of the adventures of an Egyptian messenger to
Lebanon. Zakar-Baal was governor of Byblos.
(www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Luxor)
1069BC-945BC This is the period of Egypt’s 21st
Dynasty. The capital moved from Tanis to Libyan, to Nubia, to Thebes,
to SAIS, and then back to Nubia and Thebes.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
1069BC-664BCE A black-bronze statue of the
falcon-faced god Horus, now in the French Louvre, dates to this time.
(WSJ, 1/29/98, p.A16)
1064BC-1038BC Smendes ruled as the 1st king of
Egypt’s 21st Dynasty.
(Arch, 5/05, p.21)
1050BC The Philistines invaded Israel from the North.
Facing annihilation the Israelites instituted governmental reform and
asked Samuel, the last of the Judges, to select a king.
(eawc, p.5)
1045BC The Zhou King Wu subdued the Shang. [see
1027BC]
(Arch, 9/00, p.37)
1034BC-981BC Psusennes I was the 2nd king of Egypt’s 21st Dynasty.
(Arch, 5/05, p.21)
1031BC The Centennial Stump, a giant sequoia, started
its growth, and was cut down in 1874CE.
(K.I.-365D, p.146)
1027BC In China the last Shang ruler, Chou Hsin, was
conquered by Wu-wang, and the Chou Dynasty began. It lasted to 221BC
and is typically divided into three periods.
(eawc, p.5)
1020BC In Israel Samuel selected Saul to be king and
unified the tribes into a nation. Saul faced many losses against the
Philistines and eventually committed suicide. David in his campaigns
against the Philistines proved victorious.
(eawc, p.6)
1027-771BC In China this was the Western Chou period.
(eawc, p.5)
c1010BC-970 King David, the 2nd King of Israel,
ruled. He had succeeded Saul.
(WUD, 1994, p.369)
1005BC King David's conquest of Jerusalem. In 1995
Israel launched a 17 month celebration of the event.
(WSJ, 9/25/95, P. A-1)
1004BC David became the king of Israel. He ruled from
Hebron before moving his capital to Jerusalem. He began to build a
centralized government based in Jerusalem and implemented forced labor,
a census and a mechanism for collecting taxes. In 2000 Jonathan Kirsch
authored "King David: The Real Life of the Man Who ruled Israel."
According to the Bible the census under David was followed by a plague
that left some 70,000 Israelites dead.
(SFC, 9/15/00, p.A4)(SFC, 12/31/00, BR p.8)(Econ,
12/22/07, p.97)(SFC, 12/4/08, p.A27)
c1000BC Irrigation canals were made in the Tucson
basin of the American Southwest.
(SFEC, 4/18/99, Z1 p.2)
c1000BC A Bronze Age salt mine of this time in
Hallstatt, Austria, had a pine and spruce staircase that survived into
the 21st century.
(Arch, 1/05, p.10)
c1000BC The British Bronze Age site Flag Fen,
estimated to about this time, was accidentally discovered in 1982
by archaeologist Francis Pryor. Flag Fen is the site of some of the
most recent and unusual discoveries of ancient British culture. In 1982
archaeologist Francis Pryor tripped over a piece of wood while walking
along a dyke in the Fenlands near Peterborough. Noticing that the wood
showed signs of deliberate shaping, he poked around in the peaty, wet
soil and soon discovered a series of posts. The wood was set deeper
into the ground than the surface of a nearby Roman road, so Pryor knew
the wood had to have been placed into the ground well before the Roman
engineers arrived on the scene.
(HNQ, 5/12/01)
c1000BC An Indo-European group of people moved east
to live in what later became Xinjiang province of western China. They
left well-preserved Caucasian mummies of this age and 1,300 year old
texts written in an unknown Indo European tongue. Some evidence showed
that they had come from the steppes north of the Black and Caspian seas
as the area filled with Iranian immigrants. They settled in the Tarim
Basin on the edges of the Taklimakan Desert. They area has also been
named Inner Asia, Chinese Turkistan and East Turkistan. The Uighers of
Xinjiang sometimes show physical features that reflects Tocharian blood.
(SFC, 2/27/98, p.A2)
c1000BC In China's southwest one of the world's
great cities flourished, and then inexplicably vanished, leaving no
trace behind in the historical records. In 2001 excavations at Jinsha
village began to uncover extensive artifacts.
(AFP, 7/10/05)
1000BC The Chinese invented kites about this time
that could carry scouts on reconnaissance missions.
(NPub, 2002, p.2)
c1000BC The fertile bottom land of the Copan River
valley attracted agriculturists to the region more than 3,000 years ago.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.29)
c1000BC The Phoenicians and other Semites of Syria
and Palestine began using graphic signs representing letters. Aleph
meaning ox was the sign that represented a sound such as that heard in
the pronunciation of the o in bottle, known as a glottal stop.
(AHD, 1971, p.1)
1000BC Ahiram, king of Byblos, had inscribed on his
sarcophagus: "His abode in eternity."
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.154)
1000BC Chaldians traced their origins to about this
time in Babylon.
(SFC, 9/30/00, p.A12)
c1000BCE A brightly colored papyrus of this time
depicting a Theban housewife's life after death was found by Herbert
Winlock at Thebes in 1912.
(WSJ, 12/27/95, p. A-8)
1000BCE Bone lesions in the mummified body of the
priest of Ammon from a tomb of the Egyptian 21st dynasty, have been
recognized as probably caused by tubercle bacilli.
(WP, 1951, p.5)
1000BCE About this time Kush became independent from
Egypt.
(Enc. of Africa, 1976, p.167)
1000BC Israel became a kingdom.
(WH, 1994, p.13)
c1000BC Three-thousand-year-old archives were found
in Jerusalem on Mar 13, 1935, confirming biblical history.
(HN, 3/13/98)
c1000BC The Samaritans broke away from the mainstream
of Judaism about this time. They believed that God chose Mount Gerizim
as the site for the Jews to build their temple.
(SFC, 2/14/98, p.A21)
c1000BC The Garamantes, a tribal people descended
from Berbers and Saharan pastoralists, inhabited the area of the Fazzan
in southern Libya.
(AM, 3/04, p.24)
c1000BC The first typical Baltic culture of brushed
pottery formed at the turn of the last millennium BC in eastern
Lithuania. It was the time when the first hill forts and barrows
appeared and the cremation of the dead was introduced.
(DrEE, 10/12/96, p.2)(TB-Com, 10/11/00)
c1000BC In India the Rig Veda, the first Vedic
literature was written.
(eawc, p.6)
c1000 The original Hindu calendar
in India was based on a lunar cycle and dated back to this time.
(SFC, 1/1/00, p.A18)
1000BC The Sushruta Samhita, an early text of
Ayurvedic medicine, was compiled by Sushrut, the primary pupil of
Dhanvantri, about this time. In 2003 India moved to assess the
country’s herbs systematically in a program called the Golden Triangle
Partnership.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayurveda)(www.ccras.nic.in/gtp.htm)
1000BC The Illyrians were Indo-European tribesmen who
appeared in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula about 1000 BC.
Albanians derive their name from an Illyrian tribe called the Arber, or
Arbereshë, and later Albanoi, that lived near Durrës.
(http://ancienthistory.about.com/od/illyria/)
c1000BC In Kyrgyzstan the capital city of Bishkek was
founded.
(MT, Spg. '99, p.4)
1000BC The great Olmec Ceremonial Center, in Tabasco,
Mexico, was built about this time. It continued to be used till about
600BC.
(RFH-MDHP, p.241)
1000BC The Olmec kings are thought by some to be
responsible for the invention of the ancient Mayan ballgame that often
left the loser dead.
(Hem, Dec. 94, p.125)
1000BC The settlement at Canton Corralito on the
southern Mexico-Guatemala border covered at least 60 acres by this time
and was believed to be a colony of the Gulf Olmec people.
(Arch, 1/06, p.44)
c1000BC In Pakistan some of the monuments at the Uch
Monument Complex in the Punjab date to this time.
(SFEC, 8/28/98, p.T4)
1000BC In Thailand Ban Prasat pottery from the site
at Prasat Hin Phanom Wan dates to this time.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.H)
c1000BC A major earthquake struck along the
Carmel-Gilboa fault system about this time. The Hebrew city of Har
Megiddo, located at the strategic Nahal Iron Pass - the only route
where chariots could speed between Egypt and Syria, was destroyed in
the quake. This event is likely one described by John of Patmos in the
Book of Revelations, where a great quake takes place at Armageddon.
(SFC,12/9/97, p.A8)
c1000BC In Peru the tomb of a Huayakuntur Indian of
this time was found in Ayabaca province in 1999.
(SFC, 11/13/99, p.A12)
1000BC The Phoenicians inhabited Sardinia.
(SFEC, 1/30/00, p.T4)
1000BC Bronze age nomads erected mysterious megaliths
throughout regions of Mongolia and southern Siberia about this time.
Some scholars believed them to be the work of Iron Age peoples who
appeared by 700BC.
(Arch, 1/06, p.17)
c1000BC Troy at Hissarlik in northwest Turkey was
destroyed by fire and abandoned.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.50)
1000BC A cemetery containing the remains of 25 Lapita
people in Teouma, Vanuatu, dated to about this time.
(Arch, 1/06, p.11)
1000BC-975BC In 2008 Israeli archeologists found a
Hebrew inscription in proto-Canaanite script on a pottery fragment at a
site believed to the biblical city of Sha’arayim (Two Gates). The city
was located on a hill above the Valley of Elah, where the bible says
David slew Goliath.
(SFC, 11/17/08, p.A10)
1000BC-900BC The search for the 10 lost tribes of
Israel, who were dispersed in the tenth century BC when the Assyrians
conquered part of the Holy Land, is depicted on a CD titled The Myth of
the 10 Lost Tribes, by Creative Multimedia Corp.
(New Media, 2/95, p.84)
1000BC-900BC Archeologists in 2005 reported that 2
lines of an alphabet had been found inscribed in a stone in Israel,
offering what some scholars say is the most solid evidence yet that the
ancient Israelites were literate as early as the 10th century B.C. The
stone was found in July, on the final day of a five-week dig at Tel
Zayit, about 30 miles south of Tel Aviv.
(AP, 11/10/05)
c1000BC-800 The kingdom of Habushkia was likely
centered on the headwaters of the Great Zap River in western Turkey.
(AM, 7/00, p.50)
1000BC-600BC This was the late Vedic period in India.
The Aryans were integrated into Indian culture and the caste system
emerged.
(eawc, p.6)
1000BC-500BC Oct 31, The Celts of Ireland, Great
Britain and northern France celebrated Oct. 31 to Nov 2 as their New
Year which they called Samhain. The Druid harvest event incorporated
masks to ward off evil ones, as dead relatives were believed to visit
families on the first evening. The Catholic holiday of All Hallows' Day
(aka All Saints' Day) was instituted around 700 CE to supplant the
pagan event and Pope Gregory III made the Nov 1 date
official. In the 9th century Nov 2, the last day of Samhain, became All
Souls' Day. Halloween was transplanted to the US in the 1840s.
(WSJ, 10/28/99, p.A24)(WSJ, 10/29/99, p.W17)
1000BC-300 Middle preclassic period of the Maya.
(AM, May/Jun 97 suppl. p.B)
1000BC-1BC In Thailand a cemetery at the Noen U-Loke
site has revealed jewelry, bronze and iron tools and pottery.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.G)
c1000BC-1000CE A civilization in Amazonia, called
Patiti or Enin by archeologists, dug channels for an elaborate crop
irrigation system.
(SFEC, 12/6/98, p.T12)
993BC-984BC Amenope was the 4th king of Egypt’s 21st Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
984BC-978BC Osochor was the 5th king of Egypt’s 21st Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
978BC-959BC Siamun was the 6th king of Egypt’s 21st Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
970BCE King David of Israel died about this time. In
2000 Robert Alter authored "The David Story: A Translation with
Commentary of 1 and 2 Samuel." In 2005 Robert Pinsky authored “The Life
of David.”
(WUD, 1994, p.369)(SFEC, 4/30/00, BR p.10)(SSFC,
10/23/05, p.M1)
965BC Solomon became king of
Israel. He was intent on completing the plans of David to make
Jerusalem stand out and to affirm the religious commitment of the
people. He undertook expensive building projects that included the
building of the temple in Jerusalem and raised taxes with increased
forced labor to his ends.
(eawc, p.6)
959BC-945BC Psusennes II was the 7th and last king of Egypt’s 21st
Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
955BC-587BC The Ark of the
Covenant, the sacred chest built by Moses containing the Ten
Commandments, disappeared from Jerusalem during this period. Legend in
Ethiopia holds that the Ark was stolen by Menelik I, son of Solomon and
the Queen of Sheba, and taken to Aksum where Orthodox Christian monks
have watched over it ever since.
(SFC, 1/31/98, p.A18)
950BC Hiram I, king of Tyre,
joined two islands and built an impregnable city in the sea. He sent to
David, king of Israel, and later to Solomon, the materials to build
palaces and the first great temple of Jerusalem. The building of
Solomon's temple is described in the First Book of Kings in the Bible.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.163)(WH, 1994, p.13)
c950BC The Queen of Sheba lived about this time.
Local legends from Ethiopia name her Makeda and claim that she was from
there. Archeologists have found inscriptions from the ancient Sabean
kingdom but no mention of Makeda or Bilqis, the local name for Sheba in
Yemen. The Koran claims she ruled from Yemen.
(WSJ, 5/2/97, p.A1)
c950BC The Kebra Negast, a 14th cent. Ethiopian text,
claims that the Queen of Sheba came from Ethiopia to see Solomon and
that he tricked her into sleeping with him and bearing him a son.
(WSJ, 5/2/97, p.A6)
950BC Peanuts have been traced
back to this time in Brazil and Peru.
(SFEC, 1/10/99, Z1 p.8)
948BC-927BC The Egyptian Pharaoh
Shishak (Sheshonq) founded Egypt’s 22nd Dynasty. He destroyed many
Israelite cities, including Rehov, Megiddo and Hazor. Sheshonq I
supported Jeroboam against King Solomon's son, Rehoboam.
(WSJ, 12/31/97, p.A4)(SFC, 4/11/03, p.A9)(Arch,
5/05, p.21)
945-712BCE Period of Egypt’s twenty-second dynasty.
It is often referred to as the Libyan Bubastite Dynasty. Manetho lists
the kings of this Dynasty as being from Bubastis which is located in
the eastern delta
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
c938BC Israel’s King Solomon died about this time.
The northerners, unwilling to subsidize the financial difficulties of
Jerusalem and the national court, separated from the southern people.
This created Israel to the north with its capital in Samaria, and Judah
to the south with its capital in Jerusalem. Solomon’s son Rehoboam
ruled in the south. Only the tribes of Juda and Benjamin remaining
faithful to Rehoboam. Jeroboam, the son of Nathan an Ephraimite, ruled
10 tribes in the north.
(eawc, p.6)(www.newadvent.org/cathen/08340a.htm)
930BC Sheshonq I, ruler of Egypt,
campaigned in Palestine about this time laying tribute upon the king of
Judah.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
924BC-909BC Osorkon I ruled Egypt
as the 2nd king of the 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
909BC-894BC Takelot I ruled Egypt
as the 3rd king of the 22nd Dynasty. His reign saw the beginning of
another fragmentation into 2 power bases.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
c900BC Trade between East Africans and Arabs probably
began about this time.
(ATC, p.141)
900BC The Maya site named Blackman
Eddy in Belize was occupied from this time to about 1000CE.
(AM, May/Jun 97 suppl. p.B)
c900BC In Honduras archeologists in 1997 discovered
burial caves that date to this time. A cave from the same period was
discovered in 1994 near the Talgua River, known as the Cave of the
Glowing Skulls. The new cave was called the Cave of the Spiders.
(USAT, 2/12/97, p.9D)
c900BC A group of people in northern Nigeria produced
distinct statuettes in baked clay. Their culture is called the Nok
culture after a village where the first statuette was found in 1931.
The culture may have lasted to about 900CE.
(Enc. of Africa, 1976, p.168)
c900BC Anuradhapura (Sri Lanka) was founded about
this time. It served as the capital from the 3rd century BC to the 11th
century AD.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.D)(Arch, 7/02, p.32)
c900BC The Fossum panel was carved on a rock
outcropping in Sweden about this time and depicted 2 Bronze Age figures
with raised axes.
(NH, Jul, p.32)
900BC-840BC The Assyrians expanded
their empire to the west. By 840 they conquered Syria and Turkey,
territory that had formerly belonged to the Hittites.
(eawc, p.6)
c900BC-800BC Ahab was king of Israel. Pottery, a
4-entry gate at Megiddo, and other structures at Hazor and Gezer are
similar to others in the time of Ahab. This kind of data has prompted
"the Finkelstein correction," which pushes archeological evidence
attributed to David and Solomon more to the time of Ahab and Jezebel,
his wife from Phoenicia.
(WSJ, 12/31/97, p.A4)
c900BC-800BC Joash was King of Judah in the 9th
century. Joash and Ashyahu are common variations of the same name. The
temple priest Zechariah was a contemporary to Joash and was put to
death by Joash after a dispute. In 1997 a 13 word pottery fragment was
dated to this time with the words: "Pursuant to the order to you of
Ashyahu the King to give by the hand of Zecharyahu silver of Tarshish
to the House of Yahweh. Three shekels."
(SFC,11/4/97, p.A8)
900BC-800BC Sican and Siculian
farmers settled the valleys of central Sicily.
(WSJ, 6/9/99, p.A24)
900BC-750BC Villanovan cultures in
Italy. From their hamlets Etruscan cities grew. The name comes from
Villanova, a site near Bologna where the culture's artifacts were first
unearthed more than a century ago.
(NG, 6/1988, p.710, 719)
900BC-700BC In 2008 archeologists found pottery
in Tyre, Lebanon, that was used by Phoenicians during this period.
(AP, 11/12/08)
900BC-500BC This time frame is
referred to as the Late Olmec Period of southern Mexico.
(Arch, 1/06, p.42)
900BC-400BC The Etruscan period of
Italian prehistory. For about 500 years the Etruscans dominated most of
the country from Rome to the Po Valley. Apa means father in Etruscan.
It means exactly the same in Hungarian.
(NG, 6/1988, p.705)(NG, 10/1988, member's forum)
894BC-883BC Shoshenq II ruled
Egypt during the 22nd Dynasty. He is though to have co-regent during
the period between Osorkon I and Takelot I.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
883BC-885BC Osorkon II ruled Egypt
as the 5th king of the 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
883-859 Ashurnasirpal II. This Assyrian ruler
established the new capital city of Kalhu (Nimrud).
(AM, 7/00, p.50)
880BC There was a very high
inundation of the Nile in the 3rd year of the reign of Osorkon II.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
858-824 Shalmaneser II, Assyrian ruler.
(AM, 7/00, p.50)
845BC During the 15th year of the
reign of Egypt’s Takelot II there was warfare in the north and south
and great convulsion broke out in the land.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
841BC In China a Zhou king died.
(SFC, 11/10/00, p.D4)
841BC-815BC Takelot II ruled Egypt
as the 6th king of the 22nd Dynasty.
(Arch, 5/05, p.21)
835BC-783BC Shoshenq III ruled
Egypt as the 7th king of the 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
814BC Carthage was founded by
Phoenician traders.
(SFEC, 4/12/98, p.T5)
814-813BC Elissa-Dido, Princess of Tyre, Jezebel's
grandniece, fled to North Africa after her brother, King Pygmalion,
murdered her husband, Tyre's high priest. She was said to have
then founded Carthage on a hilltop now called Byrsa. Byrsa means Oxhide
and it was said that Elissa could have as much ground as could be
covered by the hide of an ox. She cut the hide into narrow strips and
so claimed the whole hill.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.174)(SSFC, 12/10/00,
p.T8)
812-783BC Hada-Nirari III, Assyrian king enumerated
the Philistines among the Palestinian states conquered by him.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.63)
810BC-805 Sammuramat ruled Assyria as Queen.
(eawc, p.6)
803BC Hadad-Nirari, Assyrian king,
conquered the Palestinian states including the Philistines.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.63)
c800BC Large villages with dome-shaped "pit houses"
were constructed in the American Southwest and the inhabitants made
plainware pottery bowls.
(SFEC, 4/18/99, Z1 p.2)
800BC Nimrud, capital of Assyria,
500 miles east of Byblos, sample of ivory carving from a piece of
furniture depicting a woman in a window wearing an Egyptian wig.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.171)
c800BC The Zhou of China were driven east by nomads.
(Arch, 9/00, p.37)
c800BC In Greece increased trade and governmental
defense fortifications allowed for the emergence of city-states to
emerge from tribal communities. These grew up among market places and
included Athens, Thebes and Megara on the mainland.
(eawc, p.6)
c800BC The Jewish city of Sepphoris was founded about
this time.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.64)
800BC Kingdom of Kush in northern
Sudan near present day Karima; its monarchs ruled all of Egypt as the
pharaohs of the XXV Dynasty.
(NG, May 1985, R. Caputo, p.607)
800BC The twenty-fifth dynasty, as
noted by Manetho, consisted of three Ethiopic kings. The seat of the
empire was originally at Gebel Barkal, or Napata. They subsequently
conquered the whole of Egypt. The first monarch of this line was called
Sabaco by the Greek writers; the second Sebechos, or Suechos, his son;
the third was Tarkos or Taracus.
(RFH-MDHP, A. Layard, 1853, p.62)
c800BC A great change in climate overcame Europe
around this time.
(SFEC, 5/2/99, p.T4)
800BC-750BC The Iliad epic was set
down by Homer in about the first half of the 8th century, some five
centuries after the war it purportedly reports.
(Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.44)
c800BC-700BC The period of Homer, reputed author of
"The Iliad" and "The Odyssey."
(WUD, 1994, p.679)
800BC-700BC The time of Hesiod,
the first Greek poet to name himself. His work included "The Theogony"
and "Works and Days."
(WUD, 1994, p.666)(eawc, p.7)
c800BC-700BC The Greeks and the Etruscans occupied
different regions of the Italian peninsula during the 8th century.
(eawc, p.2)
800BC-700BC Bubastis was the
capital of 8th century BC Egypt.
(AM, 7/04, p.12)
800BC-700BC The Languedoc
region of France has produced wine since this time. Langue d'oc refers
to the language of Occitan spoken in the region. Greeks began planting
vineyards in Languedoc around 600BC.
(WSJ, 2/09/99, p.A20)(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.T10)(WSJ,
5/30/03, p.A3)
800BC-600BC In India the Brahmans,
a priestly caste, began to emerge.
(eawc, p.7)
800BC-500BC In India the
Upanishadic philosophy began with the writing of the Upanishads.
Doctrines of rebirth and the transmigration of souls began to appear.
(eawc, p.7)
800BC-500BC The Archaic period of
Greece. It was marked by developments in literature, the arts,
politics, philosophy and science. The Peloponnesian city of Corinth,
Sparta and cities along the coast of the Aegean flourished. Most of the
cities were similar in their political evolution except for the elite
dictatorship in Sparta. Most of the cities began as monarchies, evolved
to oligarchies, were overthrown during the age of tyrants and
eventually established democracies.
(eawc, p.6)
800BC-500BC The Celtic Hallstatt
Culture spread across Europe. It was an early iron-using culture named
after an Austrian burial site found in the mid-19th century.
(NGM, 5/77)
800BC-500BC Zazacatla in central
Mexico covered less than one square mile between during this period.
Inhabitants of Zazacatla adopted Olmec styles when they changed from a
simple, egalitarian society to a more complex, hierarchical one. Much
of it was later covered by housing and commercial development extending
from Cuernavaca.
(AP, 1/25/07)
800BC-500BC Texts called Southwest
Script dating to this period were later discovered in Portugal. Most
experts have concluded they were authored by a people called
Tartessians, a tribe of Mediterranean traders who mined for metal but
disappeared after a few centuries. Some scientists have proposed that
the composers were other pre-Roman tribes, such as the Conii or
Cynetes, or maybe even Celts who roamed this far south.
(AP, 2/28/09)
800BC-300BC Scythians dominated
the vast lands stretching from Siberia to the Black Sea. Those who
roamed what later became Kazakstan and southern Siberia were known as
the Saka.
(AM, 5/01, p.32)
c800BC-200CE The Mayan city of Takalik Abaj, in
later day Guatemala, served as one of the most important economic and
cultural centers of pre-Columbian times.
(NG, May, 04, p.70)
c800BC-200CE Saba culture (Yemen) was a major
economic player in the trade routes from India to the Mediterranean
during this period.
(Arch, 1/05, p.56)
783BC-773BC Pami (Pemay) ruled
Egypt as the 8th king of the 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
782BC Urartian king Argishti the
First founded Erebuni, the military and administrative center of the
state of Urartu, situated in the location of present-day Yerevan,
Armenia.
(www.anahit.am/regions/yerevan/)(SSFC, 10/17/04,
p.D8)
776BC In Olympia Greece the
Olympic Games were born after Iphitos, king of Elis, asked the Delphic
Oracle how to save Greece from civil war and plagues. The answer was to
revive the Olympics from their mythological roots. Together with
Lycourgos of Sparta and Kleosthenes of Pisa a sacred truce was
concluded and the games declared at Olympia. The historian Pausanias
(c150CE) wrote: "The Olympic victor must not win with money but the
fleetness of foot and the strength of body." In the Pankration, a
combination of wrestling and boxing, biting and eye-gouging were
forbidden. Adult women were discouraged from attending the games under
the penalty of being hurled from the cliffs of Mount Typaion, opposite
the stadium
(SFC, 7/14/96, p.T1)(WSJ, 7/19/96, p.R16)
773BC-735BC Shoshenq IV ruled Kush
as the 9th king of Egypt’s 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
771BC In China the Chou Dynasty
faced difficulty when King Yu alienated the noble class who refused to
answer his call for help against invading barbarians. King Yu was
killed and the nobles installed a new leader. The capital was moved
eastward to Loyang and the "Western Chou" period ended.
(eawc, p.7)
771-471BC The Spring and Autumn Period. Jingzhou was
the capital of the Chu Kingdom.
(AMNHDT, 5/98)
771-221 The Eastern Zhou period. The power of the
Zhou court waned and frequent state wars took place.
(AM, 7/01, p.62)
753BC Apr 21, Rome was founded.
The traditional date for founding by Romulus as a refuge for runaway
slaves and murderers who captured the neighboring Sabine women for
wives. Archeological evidence indicates that the founders of Rome were
Italic people who occupied the area south of the Tiber River.
(HFA, '96, p.28)(V.D.-H.K.p.61)(eawc, p.7)(HN,
4/21/98)
750BC Greeks invent symbols for
vowels.
(V.D.-H.K.-p.25)
750BC The era of the Greek poet
Homer.
(MT, 10/95, p.10-11)
c750BC Two Phoenician ships from Tyre carrying
amphorae filled with wine sank some 30 miles off the coast of Israel.
In 1999 a team led by Robert Ballard discovered the ships at a depth of
about 1,500 feet.
(SFC, 6/24/99, p.A14)
750BC-719BC Piye (Piankhy) ruled
Kush (Nubia). In 722 he extended his rule to Egypt. Kashta, ruler of
Kush, had begun a campaign against Egypt. With the help of his son,
Piankhy, he was successful and Piankhy became pharaoh of Egypt. The
Nubian King Piye conquered the weakened and disunited Egypt and became
the first of several Nubian Pharaohs who ruled a unified Egyptian and
Nubian state for the next century.
(eawc, p.7)(MT, 10/95,
p.10-11)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
c750BC-700BC The long-running Lelantine War between
Chalkis and Eretria, the 2 largest cities on the island of Euboia, was
named after the name of the plain that both cities claimed. The two
cities had jointly founded Cumae in Italy (c750). When they fell out,
the war between them split the Greek world in two.
(Arch, 1/05,
p.34)(www.britannica.com/eb/article?tocId=9047711)
c750BC-700BC Greeks adopted hoplite gear and the
phalanx for warfare over this period.
(Arch, 1/05, p.33)
750BC-600BC Greek colonies exert
strong influence over newly urbanized Etruscans.
(NG, 6/1988, p.710)
750BC-117 In 2005 Robin Lane Fox covered this period
in his book “The Classical World: An Epic History from Homer to
Hadrian.”
(Econ, 11/5/05, p.91)
747BC Feb 26, Origin of Era of
Nabonassar.
(SC, 2/26/02)
745BC-727BC Tiglath-Pileser III
ruled as the Assyrian king.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.63)
742BC The time of the Hebrew
prophet Isaiah.
(MofB, A&E TV, 9/7/96)
740BC-725BC Pedubaste I was the
1st king of Egypt’s 23rd Dynasty. Egypt’s rule in this period is not
very clear.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
738BC Mittinti, king of Ashkelon
revolted, trusting to the support of Rezon of Syria. But the death of
Rezon so terrified the king that he fell sick and died. His son
Rukipti, who reigned in his stead, hastened to make submission.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.63)
735BC-712BC Osorkon IV ruled Egypt
as the 10th and final king of the 22nd Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
c734BC Rezon of Syria, and Pekah of Samaria were in
league, whereas Ahaz of Jerusalem had become a vassal of the king of
Assyria. The Philistines had attached them selves to the Syrian league,
so that Tiglath-Pileser came up with the special purpose of sacking
Gaza.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.63)
732BC Tiglath-pileser III, an
Assyrian, took Damascus and killed Rezin. He then captured many cities
of northern Israel and took the people to Assyria. The Egyptian troops
had at one time joined forces with Damascus, Israel and some other
states to resist Shalmaneser III at Qarqar.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
729BC Greek colonists settled in
Catania, Sicily.
(SFC, 6/2/03, p.A11)
725BC-720BC Tefnakhte I, a prince
of western Egypt, ruled as the 1st king of the 24th Dynasty, known as
the Sais Dynasty. He attempted to stop an invasion by organizing other
Northern Kings with him against invaders from the south. This southern
force was comprised of Piankhi’s Nubian forces that wanted to gain
control of all of Egypt. The four northern armies under Tefnakht,
Osorkon IV of Tanis, Peftjauabastet of Hernopolis, Nimlot, and Input of
Leontopolis all enjoyed a relatively easy time in their conquering of
the people down to the south, but Piankhi was actually drawing them
down. When Tefnakht's forces finally reached Memphis they were
massacred and Tefnakht conceded to Piankhi. Tefnakht and the four other
leaders were allowed to remain governors of their territories under the
new Pharaoh Piankhi.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
722BC Hoshea, the king of Israel,
sent messengers to Osorkon in Egypt. He was requesting help against
Assyria’s Shalmaneser V. No help was sent. Samaria was captured and the
Israelites were taken away to Assyria. The Assyrians conquered Israel
and left nothing behind. The Hebrew kingdom of Judah managed to
survive. Descendants of the Israelites not exiled by the Assyrians were
later known as the Samaritans.
(eawc, p.7)(WSJ, 10/13/00,
p.W15)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
722BC Piye (Piankhy) marched north
from Nubia and began his conquest of Egypt where he founded the 25th
Dynasty. He consolidated his rule over Egypt and Kush and became the
1st king of the 25th Dynasty. It has been suggested that he revived
pyramid building for royals in Egypt, a tradition that had gone extinct
for over eight centuries.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)(Arch, 9/02,
p.55)
722-481BC In China the Ch'un Ch'iu period began. It
was characterized by a deterioration of the feudal system and a
collapse of central authority.
(eawc, p.5,7)
721BC About this time as the
northern Israelite kingdom failed, Hebron remained the capital of the
southern Israelite kingdom of Judah.
(SFC, 12/4/08, p.A27)
721-705BC Sargon II ruled as king of Assyria.
(AM, 7/01, p.33)
c720BC Some Jewish tribes went missing after being
sent into exile by the Assyrians under Tiglath-Pilesar III. In 2002
Hillel Halkin authored "Across the Sabbath River: In Search of a Lost
Tribe of Israel," an account of the search for the lost tribes that
included the Gadites, Reubenites and tribe of Manasseh (Menashe) and
its possible relationship to the Kuki-Chin-Mizo people of Burma.
(WSJ, 8/8/02, p.D10)(SSFC, 8/11/02, p.M2)
720BC-715BC Wahkare Bakenranef ruled in Egypt as the
2nd king of the 24th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
715-642 Judah absorbed refugees from the Assyrian
conquest an achieved the attributes of a state.
(AM, 9/01, p.32)
713BC Azuri, king of the
Philistine city of Ashdod, refused to pay tribute and endeavored to
stir up the neighboring princes to revolt. Sargon [of Assyria] came
down and expelled Azuri, and established in his stead Azuri's brother,
Ahimiti.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.64)
712BC-698BC Shebaka of Nubia ruled in Egypt. Some
consider him the 1st king of the 25th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
710BC Hanunu of Gaza was in the
revolt against the king of Assyria which led to the battle of Raphia,
the first struggle between Egypt and Assyria. Hanunu, the king of Gaza,
fled to Sebako (Shebaka), king of Egypt; but returned and, having made
submission, was received with favor.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.71)
708BC Lampis of Sparta won the
pentathlon becoming the 1st Olympic winner in the long jump.
(NH, 6/03, p.12)
705BC-681BC Sennacherib, Assyrian
king, also had trouble with the Philistines. Mitinti's son, Rukipti,
had been succeeded by his son Sarludari, but it seems as though this
ruler had been deposed, and a person called Zidka reigned in his stead.
Sennacherib found conspiracy in Zidka, and brought the gods of his
father's house, himself, and his family into exile to Assyria,
restoring Sarludari to his former throne.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.64)
705-681BC At the same time the Ekronites had revolted
against the Assyrian. Their king, Padi, had remained a loyal vassal to
his overlord, but his turbulent subjects had put him in fetters and
sent him to Hezekiah, king of Judah, who cast him into prison. The
Ekronites summoned assistance from North Arabia and Egypt, and met
Sennacherib at El-Tekeh. Here they were defeated, and Sennacherib
marched against Ekron, slaying and impaling the chief officers. Padi
was rescued from Jerusalem... Sennacherib then cut of some of the
territory of Judah and divided it among his vassals...
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.64)
705-681BC Sennacherib ruled the Assyrians and built a
new capital in Ninevah where he began to form a library of Sumerian and
Babylonian tablets. He managed to subdue the entire region of western
Asia.
(eawc, p.7)
701BC The Assyrian King
Sennacherib laid siege to Jerusalem.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.16)
700BC Homer's time. [see 800BC-700]
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.172)
c700BC The White Horse of Uffington, England, a
365-foot long and 130-foot high image scratched into a chalk hillside,
was dated to this time from pottery at the site. The shape is typical
of the La Tene art style that spread across Western Europe between the
5th and 1st centuries BC.
(AM, 9/01, p.40,43)
700BC A three foot tall bust of
Pharaoh Shabako of Egypt was on loan from Cairo at St. Petersburg,
Florida.
(WSJ, 1/16/96, p. A-16)
c700BC In what later became Iraq, the huge bearded
head of a large winged-bull dating from this time was made.
(SFC, 1/31/98, p.A9)
700BC Twenty-seven hundred years
ago Tarquinia was the cultural capital of the Etruscans. Around 700BC,
only half a century after the Greeks rediscovered writing, literacy
burst across Etruria. The Etruscans had no g sound, so they made it a
c. That's why we have abc rather than alpha, beta, gamma.
(NG, 6/1988, p.708,726)
700BC Arabs made earth bricks
later know as adobe as early as this time. The word adobe comes from
the Arab word "at-tub."
(SFC, 8/21/96, p.A8)
700BC King Hezekiah, about this
time, constructed a 1,750-foot tunnel to bring water into Jerusalem.
Archeologists in 2003 dated plant fragments in the tunnel's plaster to
this time +/- 100 years. In 1880 a tablet known as the Siloam
inscription was found in the tunnel. It had been installed to celebrate
the moment the two construction teams met underground. The tablet was
taken by the Holy Land's Ottoman rulers to Istanbul. It was later
placed in the collection of the Istanbul Archaeology Museum. In 2007
Jerusalem's mayor asked the Turkish government to return the tablet.
(SFC, 9/11/03, p.A6)(AP, 7/13/07)
c700BC Nomadic Kimmerians attacked Phrygia. Strabo
later reported that Midas committed suicide at the time of the
Kimmerian invasion.
(AM, 7/01, p.33)
c700BC A Phrygian king, possibly Midas, ruled into
his 60s and was buried in what came to be called the Tumulus Midas
Mound at Gordion (later central Turkey). Midas was linked with the
worship of the goddess Matar.
(AM, 7/01, p.27)
700BC-600BC A migration of the Cimmerians and
Scythians took place in the seventh century BC. These were nomadic
tribes from the Russian steppes, who made their way round the eastern
end of the Caucasus, burst through into the Moghan plains and the basin
of Lake Urmia, and terrorized Western Asia for several generations,
till they were broken by the power of the Medes and absorbed in the
native population. It was they who made an end of the Kingdom of
Urartu, and the language they brought with them was probably an
Indo-European dialect answering to the basic element in modern Armenian.
(http://tinyurl.com/btq4l)
700BC-600BC The Armenians, an
Indo-European people, migrate from the west to mingle with the people
of URARTU. It was ruled by kings of the Orontid dynasty as a satrapy of
the Persian empire until the defeat of Persia by Alexander the Great.
(CO Enc. / Armenia)
700BC-600BC The earliest Chinese
records of divination using the I Ching date from this period.
(NH, 9/97, p.12)
700BC-600BC The search for the 10
lost tribes of Israel, who were dispersed in the tenth century BC when
the Assyrians conquered part of the Holy Land, is depicted on a CD
titled The Myth of the 10 Lost Tribes, by Creative Multimedia
Corp.
(New Media, 2/95, p.84)
698BC-690BC Shebitku, nephew of Shebaka, ruled in
Egypt as the 2nd king of the 25th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)
690BC The underground burial
chamber of a warrior prince in the Etruscan town of Veio dated to about
this time. It was decorated with roaring lions and migratory birds.
(AP, 6/16/06)
690BC-664BC The Nubian Pharaoh
Taharqa, brother of Shebitku, ruled over the upper Nile Nubian-Egyptian
state. He is mentioned in the Bible as a pyramid builder. A sculpture
of the Kushite king was discovered in the basement of "God's House
Tower," an archeological museum, in England in 2000.
(MT, 10/95, p.10-11)(SFC, 2/16/00,
p.A8)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty21.html)(Arch, 9/02, p.55)
689BC Sennacherib of Assyria
destroyed Babylon, but his son rebuilt it.
(eawc, p.7)
687BC The Lyrid meteor shower was
recorded for the first time in Chinese records. It averages about 10-15
shooting stars per hour and occurs on 4/22 in 1994.
(PacDis, Spring/'94, p. 40)
681BC-668BC Esarhaddon, son of
Sennacherib became monarch of Assyria after his father was
assassinated. "I had monuments made of bronze, lapis lazuli,
alabaster... and white limestone... and inscriptions of baked clay... I
deposited them in the foundations and left them for future times."
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.65)(MofE, 1978, p.1)
c680BC Inhabitants of Paros island (Greece) colonized
the northern Aegean island of Thasos, seizing its abundant timber and
gold mines. Soldier-poet Archilochus of Paros took part in the
colonization of Thasos as well as in conflicts with Naxos.
(Arch, 1/05, p.30,34)
671BC Esarhaddon [of Assyria]
recorded a victory over lower Egypt at the cliff face of the Nahr al
Kalb (Dog River), between Beirut and Byblos.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.157)
668-627BC Ashurbanipal succeeded Sennacherib as ruler
over Assyria. He continued to develop the library and by the time he
finished, there were more than 22,000 clay tablets collected.
(R.M.-P.H.C.p.65)(eawc, p.7)
664BC-610BC Psammetichus ruled in
Egypt as the 1st king of the 26th Dynasty. He did not gain control of
Egypt until his 9th year of rule.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
c662BC The Assyrian Empire collapsed and Egypt
enjoyed about a century of independence.
(eawc, p.7)
c660BC Governor Ment (Mentuemhet) served as governor
of Upper Egypt, mayor of Thebes, and 4th prophet of Amun.
(SFC, 5/4/05, p.E5)
660BC This is the mythical date of
the ascension of Japan's first emperor, Jimmu Tenno. He is said to have
been descended from Amaterasu, the sun goddess, who came from the eye
of the god Izanagi.
(HN, 2/11/97)(Jap. Enc., BLDM, p. 214)(Econ, 9/9/06,
p.42)
657BC A 2nd influx of Phoenicians
surged into Carthage about this time.
(NG, 8/04, p.46)
657BC-525BC Period of Egypt’s
Dynasty 26.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
655BC Psammetichus, 26th Dynasty
king, gained control of Egypt in his 9th year of rule.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
654BC-657BC Tantamani (Tanwetamani) ruled in Egypt
as last Cushite king and the last of the king of the 25th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty25.html)
650BC Babylon by this time was
again prosperous following its destruction in 689 by Sennacherib of
Assyria.
(eawc, p.7)
650BC The Transylvanian Dacians
are first known from their contacts with the Greeks about this time.
(WSJ, 6/18/97, p.A20)
c650BC The time of Archilochus, Greek poet.
(WUD, 1994, p.78)
c650BC Greece began using the drachma for currency.
(SSFC, 11/11/01, p.F4)
650BC The Chinese licensed lady
lovers. This is considered as the 1st example of legalized prostitution.
(SFC, 11/4/00, p.B3)
650BC-500BC In Greece it was the
age of the tyrants.
(eawc, p.6)
650BC-550BC Graves from the
Umbrian city of Terni, north of Rome, were dated to this period. The
people were known as the Umbri-Nartes and had lived in the region from
the Bronze Age up to the Roman conquest.
(AM, Jul/Aug '97 p.18)
648BC Ashurbanipal destroyed the
newly rebuilt city of Babylon.
(eawc, p.7)
642BC The first horse race on
record was in the Olympic Games of Greece and the first prize was a
"woman of well-rounded domestic skills."
(SFEC, 8/2/98, Z1 p.8)
642BC Invading Arabs established a
military settlement on what later would become Cairo, Egypt.
(NG, May 1985, p.584)
640BC In Egypt a burial chamber at
the necropolis of Saqqara dating back to this time was uncovered in
2009. The chamber contained 8 sarcophagi.
(WSJ, 2/12/09, p.A9)
640BC In Greece the Spartan form
of government, adapted from the Dorians, was heavily influenced by
militarism. The Messenian wars initiated Sparta's fear of change. They
remained isolated by banning trade and discouraging travel outside
their territory. Alcaeus, Greek lyric poet, was born in Mytilene on the
island of Lesbos. His lyrics expounded on contemporary politics, love,
hymns to Apollo and Hermes, and some drinking songs.
(eawc, p.8)
c640BC The 1st coins were minted in Lydia (later part
of Turkey), and featured face to face heads of a bull and lion.
(SSFC, 12/3/00, WB p.2)
639BC-609BC King Josiah reigned in
Israel. The biblical account of Israel's origin was possibly drafted
during this time. The leadership reinstituted the exclusive worship of
the god of the Israelites centered on the Temple in Jerusalem.
(AM, 9/01, p.30,31)
631BC The city of Cyrene, in what
later became Libya, was first developed by the Greeks. It was later
settled by the Romans and destroyed in the earthquake of 365.
(SFC, 9/11/07, p.A16)
626BC The time of the Jewish
prophet Jeremiah. He was the last political prophet and went to Egypt
at the end of his life.
(MofB, A&E TV, 9/7/96)
625BC Thales born in Miletus,
(west coast of Anatolia, today Turkey) considered to be the first
philosopher and scientist (of Greece). Said to have predicted eclipse
of 585BC. Thales proposed a single universal principle of the material
universe. Two remarkable ideas: a)he did not resort to animistic
explanations for what happens in the world
b)he assumed that the world was a thing whose
workings the human mind could understand. He maintained as a first
principle that the external world and the internal mind must have much
that is in common, how else could that external world be intelligible
to the internal mind. The name of this commonality was reason.
(V.D.-H.K.p.31, 33, 216)
625BC The first Greek coins were
stamped with the likeness of a wheat head to show that wheat had been
used for money before the use of coins.
(SFC, 7/6/96, p.E4)
620BC Ostia was founded about this
time at the mouth of the Tiber River. Nearby salt flats provided a
valuable source of salt for preserving meat. Around 400BC it was
conquered by Rome and turned into a naval base.
(SSFC, 5/11/08, p.E8)
616BC Tarquinius Priscus became
the first Etruscan to rule Rome. Legend has it that he was followed by
Servius Tullius and Tarquinius Superbus.
(NG, 6/1988, p.710,735)
614BC The Babylonians
(particularly, the Chaldeans) with the help of the Medes, who occupied
what is today Iran, began a campaign to destroy the Assyrians.
(eawc, p.8)
612BC Ninevah (Mesopotamia), the
cradle of Assyrian kings for 2,500 years, fell to the Babylonians and
Medes. The Chaldeans, a Semitic people, then ruled the entire region
thereby issuing in the New Babylonian period that lasted to 539BC.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.174)(SSFC, 2/11/01, p.C1)(SFC,
3/31/03, p.W5)
612BC Sappho, Greek lyric poet of
Lesbos, was born. She is the most famous female poet of the ancient
world and is inscribed in the "Palatine Anthology" among the Muses,
rather than among the great lyric poets, in the 2nd century BCE. Her
poetry explored female sexuality and love in a male dominated society.
(eawc, p.8)
610BC-595BC Nekau II (Necho), son
of Psammetichus I, ruled in Egypt as king of the 26th Dynasty. Under
his rule Palestine became an Egyptian possession.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
609BC The biblical king Josiah of
Judah was slain on Har (Mt.) Megiddo (root of Armageddon) about this
time when he was betrayed by Pharaoh Necho, whom he had approached to
stop from going to war on the side of the Assyrians against the
Babylonians.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.180)(WSJ, 4/17/97,
p.A20)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
606BC In Cairo the Ben Ezra
Synagogue was established.
(WSJ, 3/15/00, p.A1)
605BC-562BC Nebuchadnezzar II ruled in Babylon. He
undertook some monumental building projects that included the Hanging
Gardens. The New Babylonian Revival used glazed bricks for building
thereby creating a colorful city. The king was fond of spinach.
(SFC, 12/25/98, p.B5)(SFC, 3/24/00, p.B3)
c604BC-531BC Lao-tzu (Laozi), Chinese philosopher,
author of the "Tao Te Ching" (Tao-te-jing) and founder of Taoism
(Daoism) lived about this time. He encouraged people to live simply and
according to nature. Taoism is one of the three major "spiritual ways"
of China and has influenced Chinese thought--in religion, politics, the
social system and the arts and sciences--for more than 2,000 years. The
other two "spiritual ways" of China are Buddhism and Confucianism. "To
lead the people, walk behind them." "The greater the number of laws and
enactments, the more thieves and robbers there will be." "Quarrel with
a friend -- and you are both wrong."
(SFEC, 2/22/98, Z1 p.8)(AP, 5/4/98)(WSJ,
12/26/00, p.A9)(AM, 7/01, p.62)(HNQ, 11/5/01)
c600BC Aesop said: "We hang the petty thieves, but
appoint the great ones to public office."
(SFEC, 3/15/98, Z1 p.8)
c600BC Turquoise was first mined in the American
southwest about this time and began to show up in Mesoamerica.
(Arch, 1/05, p.27)
c600BC The Etruscans, believed to be natives of Asia
Minor, established cities that stretched from northern to central
Italy. They developed the arch and the vault, gladiatorial combat for
entertainment, and the study of animals to predict future events.
(eawc, p.8)
c600BC The Greeks established city-states along the
southern coast of Italy and the island of Sicily. They contributed
letters to the Roman alphabet, religious concepts and artistic talent
as well as mythology.
(eawc, p.8)
600BC The great Olmec Ceremonial
Center in Tabasco, Mexico, was abandoned about this time.
(RFH-MDHP, p.241)
c600BC The Zapotec city of Monte Alban was founded in
the Oaxaca valley.
(SFEC, 10/3/99, p.A24)
c600BC From about this time the Maya gradually
sculpted the land to channel water to a growing population.
(AM, May/Jun 97 suppl. p.A)
c600BC Analysis of pottery from this time indicated
that Mayans made cocoa drinks as early as this time.
(SFC, 7/22/02, p.A4)
600BC Cyrus I, king of Anshan, was
succeeded by his son Cambyses I who reigned until 559 BC.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambyses_I)
600BC The first polo game was recorded in north
Persia about this time.
(Hem., 7/95, p.87)
c600BC Zoroaster introduced a new religion in
Bactria (Balkh), also known as ancient Afghanistan. Zoroastrianism is a
Monotheistic religion. [see 1500BC-1200BC]
(www.afghan, 5/25/98)
600BC Phoenicians in the pay of Pharaoh Necho II
circled Africa, according to Herodotus.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.160)
c600BC-500BC Epimenides, Cretan philosopher, is said
to have originated the Liar paradox, by proclaiming that “All Cretans
are liars.”
(Econ, 10/4/03, p.77)
600BC-500BC The first democratic
governments were established in a few Greek city-states during the
sixth and fifth centuries BC.
(V.D.-H.K.p.299)
600BC-500BC Rome by this time was
the dominant power in its surrounding area. The conservative government
consisted of a kingship, that resembled the traditional values of the
patriarchal family; an assembly, composed of male citizens of military
age; and a Senate, comprised of elders who served as the heads of
different community sects. The Palatine is one of the seven hills of
Rome
(eawc, p.7)(SFC,12/26/97, p.C22)
600BC-500BC The nomadic Scythians
bordered the Hallstatt Culture in the East. They introduced to the
Celts the custom of wearing trousers.
(NGM, 5/77)
600BC-290BC The Samnites, an
Oscan-speaking people, controlled the area of south central Italy
during this period.
(AM, 3/04, p.36)
600BC-200BC The Sarmatians were a
nomadic tribe that occupied a homeland that stretched from Russia's Don
and Volga rivers east to the Ural mountain foothills. The held a
sun-worshipping belief system and buried useful objects with their dead
for the journey in the unknown afterlife.
(SFC, 1/28/97, p.A5)
600BC-600CE In 1999 Arthur Cotrell published "From
Aristotle to Zoroaster," an A to Z companion to the classical world
over this period.
(SFEC, 1/17/99, Par p.6)
595BC-589BC Psammetichus II
(Psamtik II), son of Nacho II, ruled in Egypt as a 26th Dynasty king.
Psamtik II built the temple of Hibis in the al-Khargah oasis, 310 miles
south of Cairo. It was built to worship Amun and contained statues of
Amun's wife, Mut.
(SFC, 7/16/99,
p.D3)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
595-339BC In Greece 4 Sacred Wars were fought for the
control of Delphi over this period.
(SSFC, 8/8/04, p.D7)
594BC In Greece Solon, the great
elegiac poet, was appointed chief magistrate of Athens. His reforms
included political and economic adjustments which led to
dissatisfaction in the upper and lower classes.
(eawc, p.8)
593BC The time of the prophet
Ezekial. He prophesied the return to the promised land after the
destruction of the temple and exile to Babylon.
(MofB, A&E TV, 9/7/96)
593BC The Nubians were defeated by
a resurgent Egyptian dynasty after which they moved their capital from
Napata to Meroe.
(Arch, 9/02, p.56)
589BC-570BC Apries, son of Psamtik
II, ruled in Egypt as a 26th Dynasty king.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
587BC King Nebuchadnezzar sacked
Jerusalem.
(SFC, 1/31/98, p.A18)
c587BC Ezra the scribe and Nehemiah, the
Persian-appointed governor of Jerusalem, arrived from Babylon.
(SFC, 9/6/04, p.A4)
586BC Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon,
ruler of Mesopotamia, destroyed Jerusalem and recorded his deeds at the
Nahr al Kalb (Dog River) cliff face between Beirut and Byblos. He
destroyed the first Temple, built by Solomon and took the Jewish people
into captivity.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.157)(SFC, 12/31/96, p.A11)(Econ,
12/20/03, p.26)
586BC Ezekial, in exile at
Babylon, described Tyre as it was before Nebuchadnezzar's attack in the
Bible: (Ezekial 27:1-25). This time is known as the "Babylonian
Captivity."
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.162)(eawc, p.8)
c586BC The Menashe tribe was lost following the
Jewish exile in this year. Jews dispersed across Europe and North
Africa. In the 1990s members of Shinglung community from the province
of Mizuru in India claimed to be the children of Menashe and began
returning to Israel.
(SFC, 1/12/00, p.A10)(SFC, 5/10/00, p.A13)
585BC May 25, The first known
prediction of a solar eclipse was made [by Thales]. A historically
registered eclipse occurred during the savage war between the Lydians
and the Medians. The event caused both sides to stop military action
and sign for peace. The date of the eclipse coincides with the date in
Oppolzer's tables published in 1887.
(SCTS, p.27)(HN, 5/25/98)
585BC May 28, A solar eclipse,
predicted by Thales of Miletus, interrupted a battle [a Persian-Lydian
battle] outside of Sardis in western Turkey between the Medes and
Lydians. The battle ended in a draw. [see May 25]
(HN, 5/28/98)(HN, 5/28/99)
585BC In Miletus, Greece, the
founding city of philosophy, Thales predicted a total eclipse of the
sun. He was the founder of the Milesian school, and taught that all
things are composed of moisture. He was the first to propose a rational
explanation of the cosmos. By the end of the 6th century, philosophers
began to inquire into the nature of being, the metaphysical nature of
the cosmos, the meaning of truth, and the relationship between the
divine and the physical world.
(eawc, p.8)
c585BC The Greeks settled in the area of Varna, later
part of Bulgaria, on the Black Sea and were followed by the Romans,
Byzantines and Turks.
(SFEC, 2/1/98, p.T3)
585-572Bc Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon began his 13 year
siege of Tyre.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.157)
580BC-500BC Pythagoras was born on
Samos. He journeyed to S. Italy, and was driven out of Croton to the
Bay of Taranto where he starved himself to death. He believed in the
transmigration of souls, and is said to have discovered the
mathematical ratios in musical harmonics.
(V.D.-H.K.p.34)
574BC-570BC Apries, 26th Dynasty
king Egyptian ruler, conducted campaigns against Cyprus and Phoenicia.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
573BC Nemea, 70 miles from Athens,
became the site for the Olympic games.
(SFC, 9/25/00, p.A6)
570BC Feb, General Amasis (Ahmose
II), proclaimed Pharoah of Egypt by his soldiers, defeated Apries and
his Aegean mercenaries and forced his retreat.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
570BC Oct, General Amasis (Ahmose
II) defeated King Apries a 2nd time and took control of a united Egypt.
Apries sought refuge abroad and later turned up at the court of
Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
570BC-526BC Amasis (Ahmose II),
proclaimed Pharoah by his soldiers, ruled Egypt as the 5th king of the
26th Dynasty. Amasis consolidated Greek merchants to the area of
Naukratis. This made for easier control, and created a lucrative income
for the crown in the form of taxes.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
567BC Apries, former ruler of
Egypt, marched on Egypt at the head of a Babylonian army, but once
again, Amasis defeated him, this time capturing the former king.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
c566BC-c468BC Simonides, a Greek poet, was also
called Simonides of Ceos. He created one of the first information
spaces with his "memory palaces."
(WUD, 1994, p.1328)(Wired, 2/98, p.101)
565BC-545BC The island of Cyprus
was under Egyptian control.
(AM, May/Jun 97 p.20)
563BC Apr 8, Buddha (d.483BC),
Siddhartha Gautama, was born in Northern India. [Nepal] Raja
Suddhodana, king of the Sakyas in the 6th century BC, is best known as
the father of Buddha. The kingdom of the Sakyas was on what is now the
border of Nepal and India. Buddha was born in about 563 BC. The
birthplace of the Indian prince Siddartha, who became the monk Buddha,
was believed to have been discovered by archeologists in 1996. Lumbini,
Nepal, birthplace of Buddha, was designated a UNESCO World Heritage
Site in 1997. [see May 15]
(http://eawc.evansville.edu,
p.9)(V.D.-H.K.p.21)(WSJ, 2/6/96, p.A-1)(SFC, 9/1/96, DB
p.30)(SFC,12/5/97, p.B2)(HN, 4/8/98)(HNQ, 3/30/99)
563BC May 15, Wesak Day, also
known as Buddha's birthday. [see Apr 8]
(SFC, 5/15/03, p.A3)
560BC-546BC The rule of Croesus in
Lydia. The first coins were produced in Lydia under Croesus. It was a
kingdom in western Turkey. Croesus made a treaty with the Spartans and
attacked Persia and was defeated.
(SFEC, 1/19/96, Parade p.5)(WUD, 1994, p.345)(WSJ,
11/11/99, p.A24)
559BC Cyrus the Great (d.530BC),
the son of Cambyses I, began his rule Persia. Cyrus II established his
capital at Pasargadae.
(Arch, 5/05,
p.12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus_the_Great)
551BC Confucius (d.479BC), K'ung
Fu-tzu [K'ung Fu-tse], Chinese philosopher, was born in Chufu, China.
His followers transcribed his conversations in 20 books called the
"Analects" following his death. He was an accountant and later taught
the importance of centralized authority and filial piety. Like
Aristotle, he believed the state to be a natural institution. He was
the 11th child of a 70-year-old soldier. "All eminence should be based
entirely on merit." "The way of a superior man is three-fold; virtuous,
he is free from anxieties; wise, he is free from perplexities; bold, he
is free from fear." "To see the right and not do it is cowardice."
"Shall I teach you what knowledge is? When you know a thing, to hold
that you know it; and when you don't know a thing, to allow that you
don't know it. This is knowledge."
(SFC, 8/10/96, p.E4)(http://eawc.evansville.edu,
p.9)(SFC, 3/28/98, p.D3)(AP, 6/17/98)(SFEC, 2/27/00, Z1
p.2)(SFEC, 7/9/00, Z1 p.2)(SFC, 1/2/04, p.D8)
c550 Emperor Justinian built the
St. Catherine monastery in the Sinai Desert to honor St. Catherine, an
Alexandrian martyr who was tortured to death for converting to
Christianity. The site was thought to be the place where Moses saw the
Miracle of the Burning Bush.
(SFEC, 8/28/98, p.T6)
550BC Cities were founded in the
Po Valley and expansion followed into Campania (by the Etruscans).
(NG, 6/1988, p.710)
548BC The Greek Temple of Apollo
was destroyed. Amasis, ruler of Egypt, is said to have financed its
rebuilding.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
546BC In Greece the first of the
Athenian tyrants, Peisistratus, replaced Solon as the ruler.
(eawc, p.9)
546BC The Persians destroyed
Egypt’s alliance with the Chaldeans, Lydia and Sparta by first
capturing Lydia then the Chaldaeans.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
543BC Colonists from northern
India subdued the indigenous Vaddahs (Veddah) of Sri Lanka, known in
the ancient world as Taprobane and later called Serendip. Descendants
of those colonists, the Buddhist Sinhalese, form most of the population.
(SFC, 6/20/96, p.A8)(SFC, 9/22/97, p.A10)
543BC-1815CE The Mahavamsa (600BC-400CE), Great
Chronicle, describes the history of the Sinhalese people (Sri Lanka)
over this period. The 1st part, from King Mahasena, which dates back to
the legendary 5th century BC King Vijaya, was written by King
Dhatusena's brother, the venerable thera Mahanama in the 6th century CE.
(Arch, 7/02,
p.31)(www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/mahavamsa/)
540BC The population of Xanthos in
Lycia (later Turkey) committed mass suicide rather than face slavery
under invading armies.
(SFEC, 1/17/99, p.T5)
540BC-486BC In India Mahavira, the
founder of Jainism, lived. [see 480BC]
(eawc, p.9)
c540BC-470BC The Greek philosopher Heraclitus, "the
obscure," of Ephesus (486BC) lived about this time. For him reality is
flux which originated out of fire (as opposed to the "stable reality"
of Parmenides). Plato credits him with saying "One cannot step into the
same river twice."
(WUD, 1994, p.662)(eawc, p.10)
539BC Babylon, under Chaldean rule
since 612BC, fell to the Persians. Cyrus the Persian captured Babylon
after the New Babylonian leader, Belshazaar, failed to read "the
handwriting on the wall." The Persian Empire under Cyrus lasted to
331BC, when it was conquered by Alexander the Great. Cyrus returned
some of the exiled Jews to Palestine, while other Jews preferred to
stay and establish a 2nd Jewish center, the first being in Jerusalem.
(NG, Aug., 1974, p.174)(eawc, p.8,9)
c539BC Cyrus the Great founded Persia’s Achaemenian
Empire which he expanded into India, Libya and Egypt. Pasargadae was
his first capital.
(SFEC, 7/5/98, p.T4)
537BC Cyrus the Persian campaigned
west of the Indus River.
(eawc, p.9)
535BC Control of Corsica heralded
the greatest extent of Etruscan influence.
(NG, 6/1988, p.710)
533-330BC The Achaemenid dynasty ruled over Persia.
It stretched from the time of Cyrus the Great to the death of Darius
III.
(AHD, 1971, p.10)
532BC Polycrates became tyrant of
the isle Samos, an Ionian city-state near Miletus.
(V.D.-H.K.p.34)
530BC Dec, Cyrus the Great, ruler
of Persia, died in battle, fighting the Scythians along the Syr Darya.
He was succeeded by his son, Cambyses II, who managed to add to the
empire by conquering Egypt, Nubia, and Cyrenaica during his short rule.
{Persia}
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrus_the_Great)
530BC In Greece Pythagoras,
mathematician and philosopher, and his followers founded the city of
Croton and combined philosophy and literature with political activity
as the foundation of their community. He is credited with the
Pythagorean theorem and the Pythagorean table of opposites, the
"dualism" that underlies Greek thought. In 2008 Kitty Ferguson authored
“The Music of Pythagoras,” which surveyed the ideas that have been
thought of as Pythagorean.
(eawc, p.9)(WSJ, 5/17/08, p.W8)
528BC May 25, Buddha overcame
Mara, and attained the Awakening.
(V.D.-H.K.p.22)
528BC May, Buddha (563-483) sat
cross-legged under the great Bo tree. The Great Truth consists of the
Four Noble Truths:
1)man's existence is full of conflict, sorrow, and
suffering.
2)All difficulty and pain is caused by man's selfish
desire.
3)There can be found emancipation and
freedom-NIRVANA.
4)The Noble Eightfold Path is the way to liberation:
The middle way, known as the Eightfold Path: right view, right thought,
right speech, right action, right mode of living, right endeavor, right
mindfulness, and right of concentration...
(V.D.-H.K.p.22)
526BC-525BC Psammetichus III ruled
for a short time as the last king of Egypt’s 26th Dynasty.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty26.html)
525BC Cambyses, king of Persia,
met and defeated the Egyptians in front of their city at Pelusium just
a few weeks after the death of Pharaoh Amasis. This marked the
beginning of Egypt’s 27th Dynasty. Psammetichus III tried to revolt
against Cambyses and was killed.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
525BC On the island of Samos,
Greece, castles were built. Samos was the site of the Temple of Hera,
one of the 7 ancient Wonders of the World.
(SFEC, 7/20/97, p.T10)
c525BC Acroliths, or partial statues, of Olympian
deities were later found in Morgantina in central Sicily that were made
by Greeks and dated to this time.
(SFC, 4/4/98, p.A13)
525BC Greek drama grew out of the
Dionysian festivals.
(eawc, p.9)
525BC-522BC Cambyses II, son of
Cyrus and ruler of Persia, served as the 1st ruler of Egypt’s 27th
Dynasty. Cambyses added to his Persian empire by conquering Egypt.
During his rule an army sent to Siwa Oasis was overcome by sandstorm
and buried. Herodotus said the army numbered 50,000 men. A Jewish
document from 407 BC known as 'The Demotic Chronicle' speaks of the
Cambyses destroying all the temples of the Egyptian gods. Herodotus
informs us that Cambyses II was a monster of cruelty and impiety.
(eawc.edu, p.9)(Arch, 9/00,
p.18)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
524BC-456BC Aeschylus, Greek poet and dramatist,
lived about this time: "Everyone's quick to blame the alien."
(AP, 10/12/98)
525BC-465BC Aeschylus is credited
with being the inventor of drama and for introducing a second actor
into the plays held every year in Athens in honor of Dionysus. His
plays are considered to be the beginning of tragic drama. His stories
were drawn from conflicts between the individual and the cosmos. Late
in his career he wrote his plays in groups of three. These included the
"Oresteia," "Prometheus Bound" and the "Danaides." In the Danaides only
the first play, "The Suppliant Women," has survived. It was about 50
sisters who fled 50 cousins they were supposed to marry.
(V.D.-H.K.p.51)(WSJ, 7/10/97, p.A13)(eawc, p.9)(WSJ,
12/5/01, p.A18)
522 Mar, Bardiya (Smerdis),
another son of Cyrus and pretender to the throne, seized power in
Persia as Cambyses was returning home.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
522BC Aug, Cambyses II, son of
Cyrus of Persia and the 1st ruler of Egypt’s 27th Dynasty, died from a
dagger wound in Syrian Ecbatana.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
c522BC Sep 4, Pindar (d.~443), Greek poet, was born.
(WUD, 1994 p.1094)(MC, 9/4/01)
522BC Sep, Darius hastened to
Media, Persia, and with the help of six Persian nobles, killed Bardiya
(Smerdis), another son of Cyrus, who had usurped the throne. Darius
defended this deed and his own assumption of kingship on the grounds
that the usurper was actually Gaumata, a Magian, who had impersonated
Bardiya after Bardiya had been murdered secretly by Cambyses.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
522BC A revolt broke out in Egypt
following the death of Cambyses, but it was put down by a Persian
general named Darius, who succeeded Cambyses.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
522BCE Darius the Great (558-486), son of Hystaspes,
succeeded Cambyses as emperor of Persia. He engaged in many large
building programs including a system of roads and instituted the first
postal system.
(WUD, 1994, p.367)(eawc.edu, p.9)(ON, 4/04, p.9)
522BC The Greek Temple of Apollo
was begun on the island of Naxos on the orders of the tyrant Lygdamis.
It was never completed.
(SFEC,12/21/97, p.T6)
c522BC Zoroaster died during a nomadic invasion near
Balkh [ancient Afghanistan].
(www.afghan, 5/25/98)
522BC-486BC Darius the Great expanded the Achaemenid
(Persian) empire to its peak, when it took most of Afghanistan,
including Aria (Herat), Bactriana (Balk, and present-day
Mazar-i-Shariff), Margiana (Merv), Gandhara (Kabul, Jalalabad and
Peshawar), Sattagydia (Ghazni to the Indus river), Arachosia (Kandahar,
and Quetta), and Drangiana (Sistan). The Persian empire was plagued by
constant bitter and bloody tribal revolts from Afghans living in
Arachosia (Kandahar, and Quetta).
(www.afghan, 5/25/98)
521BC Darius of Persia made Susa his administrative
capital. He restored the fortifications and built an audience hall
(apadana) and a residential palace.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
521 BC The name Armenian was mentioned for the
first time in the Behistan (Behistun) inscription of the Mede (Persian)
Emperor Darius from this year: "I defeated the Armenians."
(http://www.atmg.org/ArmenianFAQ.html#q6)(ON, 4/04,
p.7)
521-486 The Persians under Darius fought the
Scythians in a series of battles.
(AM, 5/01, p.33)
520BC-519BC Darius of Persia authorized the Jews to
rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem, in accordance with an earlier decree
of Cyrus. The Hebrew’s began to rebuild Solomon’s Temple destroyed in
the sack of 586BCE. The Second Temple in Jerusalem was begun. It was
remodeled many times and destroyed in 70CE.
(SFC, 5/23/95, p.A-10)(eawc,
p.10)(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
520BC-486BC Darius, ruler of
Persia, occupied Egypt and is considered the 2nd ruler of the 27th
Dynasty. During his rule a canal from the Nile River to the Red Sea,
probably begun by Necho I in the 7th century BC, was repaired and
completed.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
519BC Darius put down a third
rising in Susiana, Persia, and established his authority in the east.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
519BC Darius of Persia attacked the Scythians east
of the Caspian Sea and a few years later conquered the Indus Valley.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
518BC Pindar (d.438BC), considered
by some as the greatest Greek lyric poet, was born in Cynoscephalae,
Boeotia. His odes celebrated the games held at religious festivals.
Athletic victory served as the ground for his poetic fancy and
religious, moral and aesthetic insights.
(eawc, p.10)
518BC Darius visited Egypt and put
to death its satrap, Aryandes.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
518BC Persian leader Darius the
Great founded Persepolis as his ceremonial capital.
(SSFC, 11/27/05, p.A26)
517-509BC Darius the Persian conquered the Indus
Valley region.
(eawc, p.10)
516BC Trilingual texts were
chiseled on the cliffs at Behistun by Darius.
515BC Mar 10, The building of the
great Jewish temple in Jerusalem was completed.
(HN, 3/10/98)
515BC Parmenides of Elea was born.
He founded the Eleatic school in the Phocaean colony in southern Italy.
He was the first to focus attention on the central problem of Greek
metaphysics: the nature of being. For Parmenides the laws governing the
universe are stable and change is merely an illusion.
(eawc, p.10)
513BC Darius, after subduing
eastern Thrace and the Getae, crossed the Danube River into European
Scythia, but the Scythian nomads devastated the country as they
retreated from him, and he was forced, for lack of supplies, to abandon
the campaign.
(www.crystalinks.com/dynasty27.html)
510BC In Greece Hippias, the son
of Peisistratus, succeeded his father and was overthrown by a group of
nobles with the help of Sparta.
(eawc, p.10)
510BC-490BC In Egypt the temple of
Hibis was rebuilt during the reign of Darius.
(SFC, 7/16/99, p.D3)
509BC The Romans overthrew King
Lucius Tarquinius and established a republic with rule by the senate
and the people of Rome (SPQR - Senatus Populusque Romanus).
(V.D.-H.K.p.61)(http://eawc.evansville.edu,
p.10)(Econ, 11/6/04, p.85)
509BC The Fall of the Tarquin
dynasty in Rome marked the beginning of Etruscan Decline.
(NG, 6/1988, p.711)
508BC In Greece Cleisthenes, the
father of Athenian democracy, ruled Athens. His reforms granted full
rights to all free men of Athens.
(eawc, p.10)
c504BC The Philistine city of Ekron burned to the
ground. Archeologists in 1996 discovered a stone block inscribed with
the city's name and its kings. The city is referred to in the biblical
book of I Samuel, which tells of the Philistine capture of the Ark of
the Covenant and transport to Ekron. A plague later afflicted the city
and the ark was sent back to Judea.
(SFC, 7/11/96, p.A10)
c500BC The El Pilar Maya site in Belize was founded
about this time.
(AM, May/Jun 97 suppl. p.D)
500BC Confucius composed the
Analects about this time. 5 things constitute perfect virtue: gravity,
magnanimity, earnestness, sincerity, kindness.
(PC Comp. 12/94, p.278)
500BC The game of Go was devised
in China about this time.
(Econ, 12/18/04, p.128)
500BC The Chinese learned to
ferment soybean around this time. The fermentation removed toxins and
made soy easier to digest. It had already been used for thousands of
years as fertilizer.
(SSCM, 8/13/06, p.6)
c500BC In 2004 Egyptian archeologists uncovered the
limestone sarcophagus of Badi-Herkhib, the elder brother of a governor
of Bahariya, who lived around 500 B.C.
(AP, 12/12/04)
c500BC The use of characters for writing spread to
Greece where vowels were added and the basis for all Western alphabets
was established. The Greeks invented a reed pen.
(I&I, Penzias, p.45)(SFC, 7/26/04, p.F4)
c500BC The height of Greek sculpture began with the
work of Phideas. His masterpieces include the statue of Athena in the
Parthenon, the Parthenon reliefs, and the statue of Zeus in the Temple
of Olympian Zeus. The 2nd most important sculptor, Myron, is renowned
for his statue of the discus thrower.
(eawc, p.10)
c500BC In India the city of Varanasi was also known
as Kashi and Benares and has been a center of civilization for 2,500
years. It is the home of the Hindu god Shiva.
(SFEC,11/23/97, p.T4)
c500BC Lars Porsena ruled as the Etruscan king in
central Italy. His capital, Clusium, was later believed to lie under
the rubble of the Tuscan city of Chiusi.
(Econ, 11/6/04, p.85)
c500BC The Garamantes of southern Libya began
constructing underground tunnels to link shafts to sandstone aquifers.
(AM, 3/04, p.27)
c500BC Phoenicians founded Tripoli about this time.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.D12)
c500BC The Persians developed a mail system that was
later described by Herodotus for its efficiency.
(ATC, p.34)
c500BC Monumental ceremonial centers on the Peruvian
coast were abandoned about this time. The period was later found to
correspond with an increase in el Nino frequency,
(AM, 9/01, p.18)
c500BC Copper concentrations in the Greenland ice
core indicate that twice the normal level was produced at this time.
(PacDis, Fall/'96, p.48)
c500BC North African people settled in present-day
Nigeria and began making iron tools.
(ATC, p.2)
c500BC The Charsadda site (aka Bala Hisar) in
northern Pakistan was initially occupied during the Achaemenid period.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.C)
c500BC The city of Hund in northern Pakistan was
founded about this time on the banks of the Indus River.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.C)
500BC The Carthaginians inhabited
Sardinia.
(SFEC, 1/30/00, p.T4)
500BC In Thailand black Phimai
pottery and bracelets indicate that the site of Prasat Hin Phanom Wan
was occupied at this time.
(AM, Mar/Apr 97 p.G)
c500BC Camels from Asia began showing up in North
Africa.
(SFEC, 5/17/98, Z1 p.8)
c500BC A major earthquake occurred in the Middle East.
(SFC,12/9/97, p.A9)
c500BC-400BC Before the rise of Rome, the Etruscans
had the most powerful nation in ancient Italy. The Etruscans (who
called themselves the Rasenna) inhabited central Italy and greatly
influenced the Romans in terms of language, architecture and even
fashion (evidence points to the toga as an Etruscan invention).
Unfortunately, no Etruscan literary works survive, so most
documentation comes from Greek and Roman literary sources as well as
archaeological evidence. Their military and political power was eroded
over the course of the 5th century BC with Rome rising as the dominant
power on the peninsula in the 4th century BC.
(HNQ, 2/8/01)
500BC-400BC A Byzantine shopping
mall was uncovered in 1998 in Jerusalem at the site of a new mall. One
inscription read "For the victory of the Blues" in Greek. It was a
reference to the competing factions of Blues and Greens at horse races.
(SFC, 7/7/98, p.A8)
c500BC-400BC In China the first stretch of the
north-south Grand Canal was built.
(WSJ, 10/25/99, p.A50)
500BC-400BC The Tairona
civilization established a city (Teyuna) later known as Ciudad Perdida
(lost city) east of Santa Maria, Colombia, about this time. Its ruins
were only rediscovered in 1975.
(AM, 11/04, p.19)
500BC-300BC Small groups of Nok
people began to search for new land to settle to the south and east of
present day Nigeria.
(ATC, p.136)
500BC-300BC Cival, about 25 miles
east of the much better known city of Tikal, was discovered in 1984. It
was abandoned about 100 CE. Artifacts at the site dated to this time.
(LAT, 5/5/04)
c500BC-200BC In India the Mahabharata, of which the
Bhagavad-Gita is a part, was put into its final form.
(PC Comp. 12/94, p.278)(eawc, p.10)
500BC-50BC The Celtic La Tene culture was named after
a Swiss site on Lake Neuchatel where a cache of richly ornamented
artifacts were discovered.
(NGM, 5/77)
c500BC-100CE Qataban flourished in the 5th-1st
centuries BC in what is now southern Yemen. Qataban had a democratic
form of government and gained rule over a large area, but its influence
and dominions shrank with the emergence of the Himyarites late in the
2nd century BC. Qataban was conquered by Saba' in the early centuries
CE.
(HNQ, 7/20/00)
500BC-200CE The Nok people lived
in the area of present day Nigeria and used iron tools. Evidence
indicates that the Nok were making iron as early as 450BC. Their
language became the root of the 300 distinct languages spoken in
central and southern Africa. The legendary "Dinya Head" is a life sized
terra cotta of a woman with plaited hair.
(ATC, p.110,136)(WSJ, 6/14/96, p.A12)
c500BC-500CE A Tequesta burial site, discovered in
Florida in 1998 and known as the Miami Circle, dated to this time.
(AM, 9/01, p.18)
500BC-800CE The bulk of the
material at the Plain of Jars in northern Laos dated to this period.
Jars up to 9 feet tall were later found to contain tools and human
remains.
(AM, 7/05, p.31)
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