THE CHRONOLOGY OF ANCIENT KINGDOMS AMENDED.

To which is Prefix'd, A SHORT CHRONICLE from the First Memory of Things in Europe, to the Conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great.

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By Sir ISAAC NEWTON.

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LONDON:

Printed for J. TONSON in the Strand, and J. OSBORN and T. LONGMAN in Pater-noster Row.

MDCCXXVIII.

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TO THE

QUEEN.

MADAM,

As I could never hope to write any thing my self, worthy to be laid before YOUR MAJESTY; I think it a very great happiness, that it should be my lot to usher into the world, under Your Sacred Name, the last work of as great a Genius as any Age ever produced: an Offering of such value in its self, as to be in no danger of suffering from the meanness of the hand that presents it.

The impartial and universal encouragement which YOUR MAJESTY has always given to Arts and Sciences, entitles You to the best returns the learned world is able to make: And the many extraordinary Honours YOUR MAJESTY vouchsafed the Author of the following sheets, give You a just right to his Productions. These, above the rest, lay the most particular claim to Your Royal Protection; For the Chronology had never appeared in its present Form without YOUR MAJESTY's Influence; and the Short Chronicle, which precedes it, is entirely owing to the Commands with which You were pleased to honour him, out of your singular Care for the education of the Royal Issue, and earnest desire to form their minds betimes, and lead them early into the knowledge of Truth.

The Author has himself acquainted the Publick, that the following Treatise was the fruit of his vacant hours, and the relief he sometimes had recourse to, when tired with his other studies. What an Idea does it raise of His abilities, to find that a Work of such labour and learning, as would have been a sufficient employment and glory for the whole life of another, was to him diversion only, and amusement! The Subject is in its nature incapable of that demonstration upon which his other writings are founded, but his usual accuracy and judiciousness are here no less observable; And at the same time that he supports his suggestions, with all the authorities and proofs that the whole compass of Science can furnish, he offers them with the greatest caution; And by a Modesty, that was natural to Him and always accompanies such superior talents, sets a becoming example to others, not to be too presumptuous in matters so remote and dark. Tho' the Subject be only Chronology, yet, as the mind of the Author abounded with the most extensive variety of Knowledge, he frequently intersperses Observations of a different kind; and occasionally instills principles of Virtue and Humanity, which seem to have been always uppermost in his heart, and, as they were the Constant Rule of his actions, appear Remarkably in all his writings.

Here YOUR MAJESTY will see Astronomy, and a just Observation on the course of Nature, assisting other parts of Learning to illustrate Antiquity; and a Penetration and Sagacity peculiar to the great Author, dispelling that Mist, with which Fable and Error had darkened it; and will with pleasure contemplate the first dawnings of Your favourite Arts and Sciences, the noblest and most beneficial of which He alone carried farther in a few years, than all the most Learned who went before him, had been able to do in many Ages. Here too, MADAM, You will observe, that an Abhorrence of Idolatry and Persecution (the very essence and foundation of that Religion, which makes so bright a part of YOUR MAJESTY's character) was one of the earliest Laws of the Divine Legislator, the Morality of the first Ages, and the primitive Religion of both Jews and Christians; and, as the Author adds, ought to be the standing Religion of all Nations; it being for the honour of God, and good of Mankind. Nor will YOUR MAJESTY be displeased to find his sentiments so agreeable to Your own, whilst he condemns all oppression; and every kind of cruelty, even to brute beasts; and, with so much warmth, inculcates Mercy, Charity, and the indispensable duty of doing good, and promoting the general welfare of mankind: Those great ends, for which Government was first instituted, and to which alone it is administred in this happy Nation, under a KING, who distinguished himself early in opposition to the Tyranny which threatned Europe, and chuses to reign in the hearts of his subjects; Who, by his innate Benevolence, and Paternal Affection to his People, establishes and confirms all their Liberties; and, by his Valour and Magnanimity, guards and defends them.

That Sincerity and Openness of mind, which is the darling quality of this Nation, is become more conspicuous, by being placed upon the Throne; And we see, with Pride, OUR SOVEREIGN the most eminent for a Virtue, by which our country is so desirous to be distinguished. A Prince, whose views and heart are above all the mean arts of Disguise, is far out of the reach of any temptation to Introduce Blindness and Ignorance. And, as HIS MAJESTY is, by his incessant personal cares, dispensing Happiness at home, and Peace abroad; You, MADAM, lead us on by Your great Example to the most noble use of that Quiet and Ease, which we enjoy under His Administration, whilst all Your hours of leisure are employed in cultivating in Your Self That Learning, which You so warmly patronize in Others.

YOUR MAJESTY does not think the instructive Pursuit, an entertainment below Your exalted Station; and are Your Self a proof, that the abstruser parts of it are not beyond the reach of Your Sex. Nor does this Study end in barren speculation; It discovers itself in a steady attachment to true Religion; in Liberality, Beneficence, and all those amiable Virtues, which increase and heighten the Felicities of a Throne, at the same time that they bless All around it. Thus, MADAM, to enjoy, together with the highest state of publick Splendor and Dignity all the retired Pleasures and domestick Blessings of private life; is the perfection of human Wisdom, as well as Happiness.

The good Effects of this Love of knowledge, will not stop with the present Age; It will diffuse its Influence with advantage to late Posterity: And what may we not anticipate in our minds for the Generations to come under a Royal Progeny, so descended, so educated, and formed by such Patterns!

The glorious Prospect gives us abundant reason to hope, that Liberty and Learning will be perpetuated together; and that the bright Examples of Virtue and Wisdom, set in this Reign by the Royal Patrons of Both, will be transmitted with the Scepter to their Posterity, till this and the other Works of Sir ISAAC NEWTON shall be forgot, and Time it self be no more: Which is the most sincere and ardent wish of

MADAM,

May it please YOUR MAJESTY,

YOUR MAJESTY's most obedient and most dutiful subject and servant,

John Conduitt.

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THE CONTENTS.

A Short Chronicle from the first Memory of Things in page 1 Europe, to the Conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great.

The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms amended.

Chap. I. Of the Chronology of the First Ages of the p. 43 Greeks.

Chap. II. Of the Empire of Egypt. p. 191

Chap. III. Of the Assyrian Empire. p. 265

Chap. IV. Of the two Contemporary Empires of the p. 294 Babylonians and Medes.

Chap. V. A Description of the Temple of Solomon. p. 332

Chap. VI. Of the Empire of the Persians. p. 347

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Advertisement.

Tho' The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms amended, was writ by the Author many years since; yet he lately revis'd it, and was actually preparing it for the Press at the time of his death. But The Short Chronicle was never intended to be made public, and therefore was not so lately corrected by him. To this the Reader must impute it, if he shall find any places where the Short Chronicle does not accurately agree with the Dates assigned in the larger Piece. The Sixth Chapter was not copied out with the other Five, which makes it doubtful whether he intended to print it: but being found among his Papers, and evidently appearing to be a Continuation of the same Work, and (as such) abridg'd in the Short Chronicle; it was thought proper to be added.

Had the Great Author himself liv'd to publish this Work, there would have been no occasion for this Advertisement; But as it is, the Reader is desired to allow for such imperfections as are inseparable from Posthumous Pieces; and, in so great a number of proper names, to excuse some errors of the Press that have escaped.

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A SHORT

CHRONICLE

FROM THE First Memory of Things in Europe, TO THE Conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great.

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The INTRODUCTION.

The Greek Antiquities are full of Poetical Fictions, because the Greeks wrote nothing in Prose, before the Conquest of Asia by Cyrus the Persian. Then Pherecydes Scyrius and Cadmus Milesius introduced the writing in Prose. Pherecydes Atheniensis, about the end of the Reign of Darius Hystaspis, wrote of Antiquities, and digested his work by Genealogies, and was reckoned one of the best Genealogers. Epimenides the Historian proceeded also by Genealogies; and Hellanicus, who was twelve years older than Herodotus, digested his History by the Ages or Successions of the Priestesses of Juno Argiva. Others digested theirs by the Kings of the Lacedaemonians, or Archons of Athens. Hippias the Elean, about thirty years before the fall of the Persian Empire, published a breviary or list of the Olympic Victors; and about ten years before the fall thereof, Ephorus the disciple of Isocrates formed a Chronological History of Greece, beginning with the return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus, and ending with the siege of Perinthus, in the twentieth year of Philip the father of Alexander the great: But he digested things by Generations, and the reckoning by Olympiads was not yet in use, nor doth it appear that the Reigns of Kings were yet set down by numbers of years. The Arundelian marbles were composed sixty years after the death of Alexander the great (An. 4. Olymp. 128.) and yet mention not the Olympiads: But in the next Olympiad, Timaeus Siculus published an history in several books down to his own times, according to the Olympiads, comparing the Ephori, the Kings of Sparta, the Archons of Athens, and the Priestesses of Argos, with the Olympic Victors, so as to make the Olympiads, and the Genealogies and Successions of Kings, Archons, and Priestesses, and poetical histories suit with one another, according to the best of his judgment. And where he left off, Polybius began and carried on the history.

So then a little after the death of Alexander the great, they began to set down the Generations, Reigns and Successions, in numbers of years, and by putting Reigns and Successions equipollent to Generations, and three Generations to an hundred or an hundred and twenty years (as appears by their Chronology) they have made the Antiquities of Greece three or four hundred years older than the truth. And this was the original of the Technical Chronology of the Greeks. Eratosthenes wrote about an hundred years after the death of Alexander the great: He was followed by Apollodorus, and these two have been followed ever since by Chronologers.

But how uncertain their Chronology is, and how doubtful it was reputed by the Greeks of those times, may be understood by these passages of Plutarch. Some reckon, saith he, [1] Lycurgus contemporary to Iphitus, and to have been his companion in ordering the Olympic festivals: amongst whom was Aristotle the Philosopher, arguing from the Olympic Disc, which had the name of Lycurgus upon it. Others supputing the times by the succession of the Kings of the Lacedaemonians, as Eratosthenes and Apollodorus, affirm that he was not a few years older than the first Olympiad. First Aristotle and some others made him as old as the first Olympiad; then Eratosthenes, Apollodorus, and some others made him above an hundred years older: and in another place Plutarch [2] tells us: The congress of Solon with Croesus, some think they can confute by Chronology. But an history so illustrious, and verified by so many witnesses, and (which is more) so agreeable to the manners of Solon, and so worthy of the greatness of his mind and of his wisdom, I cannot persuade my self to reject because of some Chronological Canons, as they call them: which hundreds of authors correcting, have not yet been able to constitute any thing certain, in which they could agree among themselves, about repugnancies. It seems the Chronologers had made the Legislature of Solon too ancient to consist with that Congress.

For reconciling such repugnancies, Chronologers have sometimes doubled the persons of men. So when the Poets had changed Io the daughter of Inachus into the Egyptian Isis, Chronologers made her husband Osiris or Bacchus and his mistress Ariadne as old as Io, and so feigned that there were two Ariadnes, one the mistress of Bacchus, and the other the mistress of Theseus, and two Minos's their fathers, and a younger Io the daughter of Jasus, writing Jasus corruptly for Inachus. And so they have made two Pandions, and two Erechtheus's, giving the name of Erechthonius to the first; Homer calls the first, Erechtheus: and by such corruptions they have exceedingly perplexed Ancient History.

And as for the Chronology of the Latines, that is still more uncertain. Plutarch represents great uncertainties in the Originals of Rome: and so doth Servius. The old records of the Latines were burnt by the Gauls, sixty and four years before the death of Alexander the great; and Quintus Fabius Pictor, the oldest historian of the Latines, lived an hundred years later than that King.

In Sacred History, the Assyrian Empire began with Pul and Tiglathpilaser, and lasted about 170 years. And accordingly Herodotus hath made Semiramis only five generations, or about 166 years older than Nitocris, the mother of the last King of Babylon. But Ctesias hath made Semiramis 1500 years older than Nitocris, and feigned a long series of Kings of Assyria, whose names are not Assyrian, nor have any affinity with the Assyrian names in Scripture.

The Priests of Egypt told Herodotus, that Menes built Memphis and the sumptuous temple of Vulcan, in that City: and that Rhampsinitus, Moeris, Asychis and Psammiticus added magnificent porticos to that temple. And it is not likely that Memphis could be famous, before Homer's days who doth not mention it, or that a temple could be above two or three hundred years in building. The Reign of Psammiticus began about 655 years before Christ, and I place the founding of this temple by Menes about 257 years earlier: but the Priests of Egypt had so magnified their Antiquities before the days of Herodotus, as to tell him that from Menes to Moeris (who reigned 200 years before Psammiticus) there were 330 Kings, whose Reigns took up as many Ages, that is eleven thousand years, and had filled up the interval with feigned Kings, who had done nothing. And before the days of Diodorus Siculus they had raised their Antiquities so much higher, as to place six, eight, or ten new Reigns of Kings between those Kings, whom they had represented to Herodotus to succeed one another immediately.

In the Kingdom of Sicyon, Chronologers have split Apis Epaphus or Epopeus into two Kings, whom they call Apis and Epopeus, and between them have inserted eleven or twelve feigned names of Kings who did nothing, and thereby they have made its Founder AEgialeus, three hundred years older than his brother Phoroneus. Some have made the Kings of Germany as old as the Flood: and yet before the use of letters, the names and actions of men could scarce be remembred above eighty or an hundred years after their deaths: and therefore I admit no Chronology of things done in Europe, above eighty years before Cadmus brought letters into Europe; none, of things done in Germany, before the rise of the Roman Empire.

Now since Eratosthenes and Apollodorus computed the times by the Reigns of the Kings of Sparta, and (as appears by their Chronology still followed) have made the seventeen Reigns of these Kings in both Races, between the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus and the Battel of Thermopylae, take up 622 years, which is after the rate of 361/2 years to a Reign, and yet a Race of seventeen Kings of that length is no where to be met with in all true History, and Kings at a moderate reckoning Reign but 18 or 20 years a-piece one with another: I have stated the time of the return of the Heraclides by the last way of reckoning, placing it about 340 years before the Battel of Thermopylae. And making the Taking of Troy eighty years older than that Return, according to Thucydides, and the Argonautic Expedition a Generation older than the Trojan War, and the Wars of Sesostris in Thrace and death of Ino the daughter of Cadmus a Generation older than that Expedition: I have drawn up the following Chronological Table, so as to make Chronology suit with the Course of Nature, with Astronomy, with Sacred History, with Herodotus the Father of History, and with it self; without the many repugnancies complained of by Plutarch. I do not pretend to be exact to a year: there may be Errors of five or ten years, and sometimes twenty, and not much above.

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A SHORT

CHRONICLE

FROM THE First Memory of things in Europe to the Conquest of Persia by Alexander the great.

The Times are set down in years before Christ.

The Canaanites who fled from Joshua, retired in great numbers into Egypt, and there conquered Timaus, Thamus, or Thammuz King of the lower Egypt, and reigned there under their Kings Salatis, Boeon, Apachnas, Apophis, Janias, Assis, &c. untill the days of Eli and Samuel. They fed on flesh, and sacrificed men after the manner of the Phoenicians, and were called Shepherds by the Egyptians, who lived only on the fruits of the earth, and abominated flesh-eaters. The upper parts of Egypt were in those days under many Kings, Reigning at Coptos, Thebes, This, Elephantis, and other Places, which by conquering one another grew by degrees into one Kingdom, over which Misphragmuthosis Reigned in the days of Eli.

In the year before Christ 1125 Mephres Reigned over the upper Egypt from Syene to Heliopolis, and his Successor Misphragmuthosis made a lasting war upon the Shepherds soon after, and caused many of them to fly into Palestine, Idumaea, Syria, and Libya; and under Lelex, AEzeus, Inachus, Pelasgus, AEolus the first, Cecrops, and other Captains, into Greece. Before those days Greece and all Europe was peopled by wandring Cimmerians, and Scythians from the backside of the Euxine Sea, who lived a rambling wild sort of life, like the Tartars in the northern parts of Asia. Of their Race was Ogyges, in whose days these Egyptian strangers came into Greece. The rest of the Shepherds were shut up by Misphragmuthosis, in a part of the lower Egypt called Abaris or Pelusium.

In the year 1100 the Philistims, strengthned by the access of the Shepherds, conquer Israel, and take the Ark. Samuel judges Israel.

1085. Haemon the son of Pelasgus Reigns in Thessaly.

1080. Lycaon the son of Pelasgus builds Lycosura; Phoroneus the son of Inachus, Phoronicum, afterwards called Argos; AEgialeus the brother of Phoroneus and son of Inachus, AEgialeum, afterwards called Sicyon: and these were the oldest towns in Peloponnesus. 'Till then they built only single houses scattered up and down in the fields. About the same time Cecrops built Cecropia in Attica, afterwards called Athens; and Eleusine, the son of Ogyges, built Eleusis. And these towns gave a beginning to the Kingdoms of the Arcadians, Argives, Sicyons, Athenians, Eleusinians, &c. Deucalion flourishes.

1070. Amosis, or Tethmosis, the successor of Misphragmuthosis, abolishes the Phoenician custom in Heliopolis of sacrificing men, and drives the Shepherds out of Abaris. By their access the Philistims become so numerous, as to bring into the field against Saul 30000 chariots, 6000 horsemen, and people as the sand on the sea shore for multitude. Abas, the father of Acrisius and Proetus, comes from Egypt.

1069. Saul is made King of Israel, and by the hand of Jonathan gets a great victory over the Philistims. Eurotas the son of Lelex, and Lacedaemon who married Sparta the daughter of Eurotas, Reign in Laconia, and build Sparta.

1060. Samuel dies.

1059. David made King.

1048. The Edomites are conquered and dispersed by David, and some of them fly into Egypt with their young King Hadad. Others fly to the Persian Gulph with their Commander Oannes; and others from the Red Sea to the coast of the Mediterranean, and fortify Azoth against David, and take Zidon; and the Zidonians who fled from them build Tyre and Aradus, and make Abibalus King of Tyre. These Edomites carry to all places their Arts and Sciences; amongst which were their Navigation, Astronomy, and Letters; for in Idumaea they had Constellations and Letters before the days of Job, who mentions them: and there Moses learnt to write the Law in a book. These Edomites who fled to the Mediterranean, translating the word Erythraea into that of Phoenicia, give the name of Phoenicians to themselves, and that of Phoenicia to all the sea-coasts of Palestine from Azoth to Zidon. And hence came the tradition of the Persians, and of the Phoenicians themselves, mentioned by Herodotus, that the Phoenicians came originally from the Red Sea, and presently undertook long voyages on the Mediterranean.

1047. Acrisius marries Eurydice, the daughter of Lacedaemon and Sparta. The Phoenician mariners who fled from the Red Sea, being used to long voyages for the sake of traffic, begin the like voyages on the Mediterranean from Zidon; and sailing as far as Greece, carry away Io the daughter of Inachus, who with other Grecian women came to their ships to buy their merchandize. The Greek Seas begin to be infested with Pyrates.

1046. The Syrians of Zobah and Damascus are conquered by David. Nyctimus, the son of Lycaon, reigns in Arcadia. Deucalion still alive.

1045. Many of the Phoenicians and Syrians fleeing from Zidon and from David, come under the conduct of Cadmus, Cilix, Phoenix, Membliarius, Nycteus, Thasus, Atymnus, and other Captains, into Asia minor, Crete, Greece, and Libya; and introduce Letters, Music, Poetry, the Octaeteris, Metals and their Fabrication, and other Arts, Sciences and Customs of the Phoenicians. At this time Cranaus the successor of Cecrops Reigned in Attica, and in his Reign and the beginning of the Reign of Nyctimus, the Greeks place the flood of Deucalion. This flood was succeeded by four Ages or Generations of men, in the first of which Chiron the son of Saturn and Philyra was born, and the last of which according to Hesiod ended with the Trojan War; and so places the Destruction of Troy four Generations or about 140 years later than that flood, and the coming of Cadmus, reckoning with the ancients three Generations to an hundred years. With these Phoenicians came a sort of men skilled in the Religious Mysteries, Arts, and Sciences of Phoenicia, and settled in several places under the names of Curetes, Corybantes, Telchines, and Idaei Dactyli.

1043. Hellen, the son of Deucalion, and father of AEolus, Xuthus, and Dorus, flourishes.

1035. Erectheus Reigns in Attica. AEthlius, the grandson of Deucalion and father of Endymion, builds Elis. The Idaei Dactyli find out Iron in mount Ida in Crete, and work it into armour and iron tools, and thereby give a beginning to the trades of smiths and armourers in Europe; and by singing and dancing in their armour, and keeping time by striking upon one another's armour with their swords, they bring in Music and Poetry; and at the same time they nurse up the Cretan Jupiter in a cave of the same mountain, dancing about him in their armour.

1034. Ammon Reigns in Egypt. He conquered Libya, and reduced that people from a wandering savage life to a civil one, and taught them to lay up the fruits of the earth; and from him Libya and the desert above it were anciently called Ammonia. He was the first that built long and tall ships with sails, and had a fleet of such ships on the Red Sea, and another on the Mediterranean at Irasa in Libya. 'Till then they used small and round vessels of burden, invented on the Red Sea, and kept within sight of the shore. For enabling them to cross the seas without seeing the shore, the Egyptians began in his days to observe the Stars: and from this beginning Astronomy and Sailing had their rise. Hitherto the Lunisolar year had been in use: but this year being of an uncertain length, and so, unfit for Astronomy, in his days and in the days of his sons and grandsons, by observing the Heliacal Risings and Setting of the Stars, they found the length of the Solar year, and made it consist of five days more than the twelve calendar months of the old Lunisolar year. Creusa the daughter of Erechtheus marries Xuthus the son of Hellen. Erechtheus having first celebrated the Panathenaea joins horses to a chariot. AEgina, the daughter of Asopus, and mother of AEacus, born.

1030. Ceres a woman of Sicily, in seeking her daughter who was stolen, comes into Attica, and there teaches the Greeks to sow corn; for which Benefaction she was Deified after death. She first taught the Art to Triptolemus the young son of Celeus King of Eleusis.

1028. Oenotrus the youngest son of Lycaon, the Janus of the Latines, led the first Colony of Greeks into Italy, and there taught them to build houses. Perseus born.

1020. Arcas, the son of Callisto and grandson of Lycaon, and Eumelus the first King of Achaia, receive bread-corn from Triptolemus.

1019. Solomon Reigns, and marries the daughter of Ammon, and by means of this affinity is supplied with horses from Egypt; and his merchants also bring horses from thence for all the Kings of the Hittites and Syrians: for horses came originally from Libya; and thence Neptune was called Equestris. Tantalus King of Phrygia steals Ganimede the son of Tros King of Troas.

1017. Solomon by the assistance of the Tyrians and Aradians, who had mariners among them acquainted with the Red Sea, sets out a fleet upon that sea. Those assistants build new cities in the Persian Gulph, called Tyre and Aradus.

1015. The Temple of Solomon is founded. Minos Reigns in Crete expelling his father Asterius, who flees into Italy, and becomes the Saturn of the Latines. Ammon takes Gezer from the Canaanites, and gives it to his daughter, Solomon's wife.

1014. Ammon places Cepheus at Joppa.

1010. Sesac in the Reign of his father Ammon invades Arabia Foelix, and sets up pillars at the mouth of the Red Sea. Apis, Epaphus or Epopeus, the son of Phroroneus, and Nycteus King of Boeotia, slain. Lycus inherits the Kingdom of his brother Nycteus. AEtolus the son of Endymion flies into the Country of the Curetes in Achaia, and calls it AEtolia; and of Pronoe the daughter of Phorbas begets Pleuron and Calydon, who built cities in AEtolia called by their own names. Antiopa the daughter of Nycteus is sent home to Lycus by Lamedon the successor of Apis, and in the way brings forth Amphion and Zethus.

1008. Sesac, in the Reign of his father Ammon, invades Afric and Spain, and sets up pillars in all his conquests, and particularly at the mouth of the Mediterranean, and returns home by the coast of Gaul and Italy.

1007. Ceres being dead Eumolpus institutes her Mysteries in Eleusine. The Mysteries of Rhea are instituted in Phrygia, in the city Cybele. About this time Temples begin to be built in Greece. Hyagnis the Phrygian invents the pipe. After the example of the common-council of the five Lords of the Philistims, the Greeks set up the Amphictyonic Council, first at Thermopylae, by the influence of Amphictyon the son of Deucalion; and a few years after at Delphi by the influence of Acrisius. Among the cites, whose deputies met at Thermopylae, I do not find Athens, and therefore doubt whether Amphictyon was King of that city. If he was the son of Deucalion and brother of Hellen, he and Cranaus might Reign together in several parts of Attica. But I meet with a later Amphictyon who entertained the great Bacchus. This Council worshipped Ceres, and therefore was instituted after her death.

1006. Minos prepares a fleet, clears the Greek seas of Pyrates, and sends Colonies to the Islands of the Greeks, some of which were not inhabited before. Cecrops II. Reigns in Attica. Caucon teaches the Mysteries of Ceres in Messene.

1005. Andromeda carried away from Joppa by Perseus. Pandion the brother of Cecrops II. Reigns in Attica. Car, the son of Phoroneus, builds a Temple to Ceres.

1002. Sesac Reigns in Egypt and adorns Thebes, dedicating it to his father Ammon by the name of No-Ammon or Ammon-No, that is the people or city of Ammon: whence the Greeks called it Diospolis, the city of Jupiter. Sesac also erected Temples and Oracles to his father in Thebes, Ammonia, and Ethiopia, and thereby caused his father to be worshipped as a God in those countries, and I think also in Arabia Foelix: and this was the original of the worship of Jupiter Ammon, and the first mention of Oracles that I meet with in Prophane History. War between Pandion and Labdacus the grandson of Cadmus.

994. AEgeus Reigns in Attica.

993. Pelops the son of Tantalus comes into Peloponnesus, marries Hippodamia the granddaughter of Acrisius, takes AEtolia from AEtolus the son of Endymion, and by his riches grows potent.

990. Amphion and Zethus slay Lycus, put Laius the son of Labdacus to flight, and Reign in Thebes, and wall the city about.

989. Daedalus and his nephew Talus invent the saw, the turning-lath, the wimble, the chip-ax, and other instruments of Carpenters and Joyners, and thereby give a beginning to those Arts in Europe. Daedalus also invented the making of Statues with their feet asunder, as if they walked.

988. Minos makes war upon the Athenians, for killing his son Androgeus. AEacus flourishes.

987. Daedalus kills his nephew Talus, and flies to Minos. A Priestess of Jupiter Ammon, being brought by Phoenician merchants into Greece, sets up the Oracle of Jupiter at Dodona. This gives a beginning to Oracles in Greece: and by their dictates, the Worship of the Dead is every where introduced.

983. Sisyphus, the son of AEolus and grandson of Hellen, Reigns in Corinth, and some say that he built that city.

980. Laius recovers the Kingdom of Thebes. Athamas, the brother of Sisyphus and father of Phrixus and Helle, marries Ino the daughter of Cadmus.

979. Rehoboam Reigns. Thoas is sent from Crete to Lemnos, Reigns there in the city Hephoestia, and works in copper and iron.

978. Alcmena born of Electryo the son of Perseus and Andromeda, and of Lysidice the daughter of Pelops.

974. Sesac spoils the Temple, and invades Syria and Persia, setting up pillars in many places. Jeroboam, becoming subject to Sesac, sets up the worship of the Egyptian Gods in Israel.

971. Sesac invades India, and returns with triumph the next year but one: whence Trieterica Bacchi. He sets up pillars on two mountains at the mouth of the river Ganges.

968. Theseus Reigns, having overcome the Minotaur, and soon after unites the twelve cities of Attica under one government. Sesac, having carried on his victories to Mount Caucasus, leaves his nephew Prometheus there, and AEetes in Colchis.

967. Sesac, passing over the Hellespont conquers Thrace, kills Lycurgus King thereof, and gives his Kingdom and one of his singing-women to Oeagrus the father of Orpheus. Sesac had in his army Ethiopians commanded by Pan, and Libyan women commanded by Myrina or Minerva. It was the custom of the Ethiopians to dance when they were entring into a battel, and from their skipping they were painted with goats feet in the form of Satyrs.

966. Thoas, being made King of Cyprus by Sesac, goes thither with his wife Calycopis, and leaves his daughter Hypsipyle in Lemnos.

965. Sesac is baffled by the Greeks and Scythians, loses many of his women with their Queen Minerva, composes the war, is received by Amphiction at a feast, buries Ariadne, goes back through Asia and Syria into Egypt, with innumerable captives, among whom was Tithonus, the son of Laomedon King of Troy; and leaves his Libyan Amazons, under Marthesia and Lampeto, the successors of Minerva, at the river Thermodon. He left also in Colchos Geographical Tables of all his conquests: And thence Geography had its rise. His singing-women were celebrated in Thrace by the name of the Muses. And the daughters of Pierus a Thracian, imitating them, were celebrated by the same name.

964. Minos, making war upon Cocalus King of Sicily, is slain by him. He was eminent for his Dominion, his Laws and his Justice: upon his sepulchre visited by Pythagoras, was this inscription, [Greek: TOU DIOS] the Sepulchre of Jupiter. Danaus with his daughters flying from his brother Egyptus (that is from Sesac) comes into Greece. Sesac using the advice of his Secretary Thoth, distributes Egypt into xxxvi Nomes, and in every Nome erects a Temple, and appoints the several Gods, Festivals and Religions of the several Nomes. The Temples were the sepulchres of his great men, where they were to be buried and worshipped after death, each in his own Temple, with ceremonies and festivals appointed by him; while He and his Queen, by the names of Osiris and Isis, were to be worshipped in all Egypt. These were the Temples seen and described by Lucian eleven hundred years after, to be of one and the same age: and this was the original of the several Nomes of Egypt, and of the several Gods and several Religions of those Nomes. Sesac divided also the land of Egypt by measure amongst his soldiers, and thence Geometry had its rise. Hercules and Eurystheus born.

963. Amphictyon brings the twelve Gods of Egypt into Greece, and these are the Dii magni majorum gentium, to whom the Earth and Planets and Elements are dedicated.

962. Phryxus and Helle fly from their stepmother Ino the daughter of Cadmus. Helle is drowned in the Hellespont, so named from her, but Phryxus arrived at Colchos.

960. The war between the Lapithae and the people of Thessaly called Centaurs.

958. Oedipus kills his father Laius. Sthenelus the son of Perseus Reigns in Mycene.

956. Sesac is slain by his brother Japetus, who after death was deified in Afric by the name of Neptune, and called Typhon by the Egyptians. Orus Reigns and routs the Libyans, who under the conduct of Japetus, and his Son Antaeus or Atlas, invaded Egypt. Sesac from his making the river Nile useful, by cutting channels from it to all the cities of Egypt, was called by its names, Sihor or Siris, Nilus and Egyptus. The Greeks hearing the Egyptians lament, O Siris and Bou Siris, called him Osiris and Busiris. The Arabians from his great acts called him Bacchus, that is, the Great. The Phrygians called him Ma-fors or Mavors, the valiant, and by contraction Mars. Because he set up pillars in all his conquests, and his army in his father's Reign fought against the Africans with clubs, he is painted with pillars and a club: and this is that Hercules who, according to Cicero, was born upon the Nile, and according to Eudoxus, was slain by Typhon; and according to Diodorus, was an Egyptian, and went over a great part of the world, and set up the pillars in Afric. He seems to be also the Belus who, according to Diodorus, led a Colony of Egyptians to Babylon, and there instituted Priests called Chaldeans, who were free from taxes, and observed the stars, as in Egypt. Hitherto Judah and Israel laboured under great vexations, but henceforward Asa King of Judah had peace ten years.

947. The Ethiopians invade Egypt, and drown Orus in the Nile. Thereupon Bubaste the sister of Orus kills herself, by falling from the top of an house, and their mother Isis or Astraea goes mad: and thus ended the Reign of the Gods of Egypt.

946. Zerah the Ethiopian is overthrown by Asa. The people of the lower Egypt make Osarsiphus their King, and call in two hundred thousand Jews and Phoenicians against the Ethiopians. Menes or Amenophis the young son of Zerah and Cissia Reigns.

944. The Ethiopians, under Amenophis, retire from the lower Egypt and fortify Memphis against Osarsiphus. And by these wars and the Argonautic expedition, the great Empire of Egypt breaks in pieces. Eurystheus the son of Sthenelus Reigns in Mycenae.

943. Evander and his mother Carmenta carry Letters into Italy.

942. Orpheus Deifies the son of Semele by the name of Bacchus, and appoints his Ceremonies.

940. The great men of Greece, hearing of the civil wars and distractions of Egypt, resolve to send an embassy to the nations, upon the Euxine and Mediterranean Seas, subject to that Empire, and for that end order the building of the ship Argo.

939. The ship Argo is built after the pattern of the long ship in which Danaus came into Greece: and this was the first long ship built by the Greeks. Chiron, who was born in the Golden Age, forms the Constellations for the use of the Argonauts; and places the Solstitial and Equinoctial Points in the fifteenth degrees or middles of the Constellations of Cancer, Chelae, Capricorn, and Aries. Meton in the year of Nabonassar 316, observed the Summer Solstice in the eighth degree of Cancer, and therefore the Solstice had then gone back seven degrees. It goes back one degree in about seventytwo years, and seven degrees in about 504 years. Count these years back from the year of Nabonassar 316, and they will place the Argonautic expedition about 936 years before Christ. Gingris the son of Thoas slain, and Deified by the name of Adonis.

938. Theseus, being fifty years old, steals Helena then seven years old. Pirithous the son of Ixion, endeavouring to steal Persephone the daughter of Orcus King of the Molossians, is slain by the Dog of Orcus; and his companion Theseus is taken and imprisoned. Helena is set at liberty by her brothers.

937. The Argonautic expedition. Prometheus leaves Mount Caucasus, being set at liberty by Hercules. Laomedon King of Troy is slain by Hercules. Priam succeeds him. Talus a brazen man, of the Brazen Age, the son of Minos, is slain by the Argonauts. AEsculapius and Hercules were Argonauts, and Hippocrates was the eighteenth from AEsculapius by the father's side, and the nineteenth from Hercules by the mother's side; and because these generations, being noted in history, were most probably by the chief of the family, and for the most part by the eldest sons; we may reckon 28 or at the most 30 years to a generation: and thus the seventeen intervals by the father's side and eighteen by the mother's, will at a middle reckoning amount unto about 507 years; which being counted backwards from the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, at which time Hippocrates began to flourish, will reach up to the time where we have placed the Argonautic expedition.

936. Theseus is set at liberty by Hercules.

934. The hunting of the Calydonian boar slain by Meleager.

930. Amenophis, with an army out of Ethiopia and Thebais, invades the lower Egypt, conquers Osarsiphus, and drives out the Jews and Canaanites: and this is reckoned the second expulsion of the Shepherds. Calycopis dies, and is Deified by Thoas with Temples at Paphos and Amathus in Cyprus, and at Byblus in Syria, and with Priests and sacred Rites, and becomes the Venus of the ancients, and the Dea Cypria and Dea Syria. And from these and other places where Temples were erected to her, she was also called Paphia, Amathusia, Byblia, Cytherea, Salaminia, Cnidia, Erycina, Idalia, &c. And her three waiting-women became the three Graces.

928. The war of the seven Captains against Thebes.

927. Hercules and AEsculapius are Deified. Eurystheus drives the Heraclides out of Peloponnesus. He is slain by Hyllus the son of Hercules. Atreus the son of Pelops succeeds him in the Kingdom of Mycenae. Menestheus, the great grandson of Erechtheus, Reigns at Athens.

925. Theseus is slain, being cast down from a rock.

924. Hyllus invading Peloponnesus is slain by Echemus.

919. Atreus dies. Agamemnon Reigns. In the absence of Menelaus, who went to look after what his father Atreus had left to him, Paris steals Helena.

918. The second war against Thebes.

912. Thoas, King of Cyprus and part of Phoenicia dies; and for making armour for the Kings of Egypt; is Deified with a sumptuous Temple at Memphis by the name of Baal Canaan, Vulcan. This Temple was said to be built by Menes, the first King of Egypt who reigned next after the Gods, that is, by Menoph or Amenophis who reigned next after the death of Osiris, Isis, Orus, Bubaste and Thoth. The city, Memphis was also said to be built by Menes; he began to build it when he fortified it against Osarsiphus. And from him it was called Menoph, Moph, Noph, &c; and is to this day called Menuf by the Arabians. And therefore Menes who built the city and temple Was Menoph or Amenophis. The Priests of Egypt at length made this temple above a thousand years older then Amenophis, and some of them five or ten thousand years older: but it could not be above two or three hundred years older than the Reign of Psammiticus who finished it, and died 614 years before Christ. When Menoph or Menes built the city, he built a bridge there over the Nile: a work too great to be older than the Monarchy of Egypt.

909. Amenophis, called Memnon by the Greeks, built the Memnonia at Susa, whilst Egypt was under the government of Proteus his Viceroy.

904. Troy taken. Amenophis was still at Susa; the Greeks feigning that he came from thence to the Trojan war.

903. Demophoon, the son of Theseus by Phoedra the daughter of Minos, Reigns at Athens.

901. Amenophis builds small Pyramids in Cochome.

896. Ulysses leaves Calypso in the Island Ogygie (perhaps Cadis or Cales.) She was the daughter of Atlas, according to Homer. The ancients at length feigned that this Island, (which from Atlas they called Atlantis) had been as big as all Europe, Africa and Asia, but was sunk into the Sea.

895. Teucer builds Salamis in Cyprus. Hadad or Benhadad King of Syria dies, and is Deified at Damascus with a Temple and Ceremonies.

887. Amenophis dies, and is succeeded by his son Ramesses or Rhampsinitus, who builds the western Portico of the Temple of Vulcan. The Egyptians dedicated to Osiris, Isis, Orus senior, Typhon, and Nephthe the sister and wife of Typhon, the five days added by the Egyptians to the twelve Calendar months of the old Luni-solar year, and said that they were added when these five Princes were born. They were therefore added in the Reign of Ammon the father of these five Princes: but this year was scarce brought into common use before the Reign of Amenophis: for in his Temple or Sepulchre at Abydus, they placed a Circle of 365 cubits in compass, covered on the upper side with a plate of gold, and divided into 365 equal parts, to represent all the days of the year; every part having the day of the year, and the Heliacal Risings and Settings of the Stars on that day, noted upon it. And this Circle remained there 'till Cambyses spoiled the temples of Egypt: and from this monument I collect that it was Amenophis who established this year, fixing the beginning thereof to one of the four Cardinal Points of the heavens. For had not the beginning thereof been now fixed, the Heliacal Risings and Settings of the Stars could not have been noted upon the days thereof. The Priests of Egypt therefore in the Reign of Amenophis continued to observe the Heliacal Risings and Settings of the Stars upon every day. And when by the Sun's Meridional Altitudes they had found the Solstices and Equinoxes according to the Sun's mean motion, his Equation being not yet known, they fixed the beginning of this year to the Vernal Equinox, and in memory thereof erected this monument. Now this year being carried into Chaldaea, the Chaldaeans began their year of Nabonassar on the same Thoth with the Egyptians, and made it of the same length. And the Thoth of the first year of Nabonassar fell upon the 26th day of February: which was 33 days and five hours before the Vernal Equinox, according to the Sun's mean motion. And the Thoth of this year moves backwards 33 days and five hours in 137 years, and therefore fell upon the Vernal Equinox 137 years before the AEra of Nabonassar began; that is, 884 years before Christ. And if it began upon the day next after the Vernal Equinox, it might begin three or four years earlier; and there we may place the death of this King. The Greeks feigned that he was the Son of Tithonus, and therefore he was born after the return of Sesac into Egypt, with Tithonus and other captives, and so might be about 70 or 75 years old at his death.

883. Dido builds Carthage, and the Phoenicians begin presently after to sail as far as to the Straights Mouth, and beyond. AEneas was still alive, according to Virgil.

870. Hesiod flourishes. He hath told us himself that he lived in the age next after the wars of Thebes and Troy, and that this age should end when the men then living grew hoary and dropt into the grave; and therefore it was but of an ordinary length: and Herodotus has told us that Hesiod and Homer were but 400 years older than himself. Whence it follows that the destruction of Troy was not older than we have represented it.

860. Moeris Reigns in Egypt. He adorned Memphis, and translated the seat of his Empire thither from Thebes. There he built the famous Labyrinth, and the northern portico of the Temple of Vulcan, and dug the great Lake called the Lake of Moeris, and upon the bottom of it built two great Pyramids of brick: and these things being not mentioned by Homer or Hesiod, were unknown to them, and done after their days. Moeris wrote also a book of Geometry.

852. Hazael the successor of Hadad at Damascus dies and is Deified, as was Hadad before: and these Gods, together with Arathes the wife of Hadad, were worshipt in their Sepulchres or Temples, 'till the days of Josephus the Jew; and the Syrians boasted their antiquity, not knowing, saith Josephus, that they were novel.

844. The AEolic Migration. Boeotia, formerly called Cadmeis, is seized by the Boeotians.

838. Cheops Reigns in Egypt. He built the greatest Pyramid for his sepulchre, and forbad the worship of the former Kings; intending to have been worshipped himself.

825. The Heraclides, after three Generations, or an hundred years, reckoned from their former expedition, return into Peloponnesus. Henceforward, to the end of the first Messenian war, reigned ten Kings of Sparta by one Race, and nine by another; ten of Messene, and nine of Arcadia: which, by reckoning (according to the ordinary course of nature) about twenty years to a Reign, one Reign with another, will take up about 190 years. And the seven Reigns more in one of the two Races of the Kings of Sparta, and eight in the other, to the battle at Thermopylae; may take up 150 years more: and so place the return of the Heraclides, about 820 years before Christ.

824. Cephren Reigns in Egypt, and builds another great Pyramid.

808. Mycerinus Reigns there, and begins the third great Pyramid. He shut up the body of his daughter in a hollow ox, and caused her to be worshipped daily with odours.

804. The war, between the Athenians and Spartans, in which Codrus, King of the Athenians, is slain.

801. Nitocris, the sister of Mycerinus, succeeds him, and finishes the third great Pyramid.

794. The Ionic Migration, under the conduct of the sons of Codrus.

790. Pul founds the Assyrian Empire.

788. Asychis Reigns in Egypt, and builds the eastern Portico of the Temple of Vulcan very splendidly; and a large Pyramid of brick, made of mud dug out of the Lake of Moeris. Egypt breaks into several Kingdoms. Gnephactus and Bocchoris Reign successively in the upper Egypt; Stephanathis; Necepsos and Nechus, at Sais; Anysis or Amosis, at Anysis or Hanes; and Tacellotis, at Bubaste.

776. Iphitus restores the Olympiads. And from this AEra the Olympiads are now reckoned. Gnephactus Reigns at Memphis.

772. Necepsos and Petosiris invent Astrology in Egypt.

760. Semiramis begins to flourish; Sanchoniatho writes.

751. Sabacon the Ethiopian, invades Egypt, now divided into various Kingdoms, burns Bocchoris, slays Nechus, and makes Anysis fly.

747. Pul, King of Assyria, dies, and is succeeded at Nineveh by Tiglathpilasser, and at Babylon by Nabonassar. The Egyptians, who fled from Sabacon, carry their Astrology and Astronomy to Babylon, and found the AEra of Nabonassar in Egyptian years.

740. Tiglathpilasser, King of Assyria, takes Damascus, and captivates the Syrians.

729. Tiglathpilasser is succeeded by Salmanasser.

721. Salmanasser, King of Assyria, carries the Ten Tribes into captivity.

719. Sennacherib Reigns over Assyria. Archias the son of Evagetus, of the stock of Hercules, leads a Colony from Corinth into Sicily, and builds Syracuse.

717. Tirhakah Reigns in Ethiopia.

714. Sennacherib is put to flight by the Ethiopians and Egyptians, with great slaughter.

711. The Medes revolt from the Assyrians. Sennacherib slain. Asserhadon succeeds him. This is that Asserhadon-Pul, or Sardanapalus, the son of Anacyndaraxis, or Sennacherib, who built Tarsus and Anchiale in one day.

710. Lycurgus, brings the poems of Homer out of Asia into Greece.

708. Lycurgus, becomes tutor to Charillus or Charilaus, the young King of Sparta. Aristotle makes Lycurgus as old as Iphitus, because his name was upon the Olympic Disc. But the Disc was one of the five games called the Quinquertium, and the Quinquertium was first instituted upon the eighteenth Olympiad. Socrates and Thucydides made the institutions of Lycurgus about 300 years older than the end of the Peloponnesian war, that is, 705 years before Christ.

701. Sabacon, after a Reign of 50 years, relinquishes Egypt to his son Sevechus or Sethon, who becomes Priest of Vulcan, and neglects military affairs.

698. Manasseh Reigns.

697. The Corinthians begin first of any men to build ships with three orders of oars, called Triremes. Hitherto the Greeks had used long vessels of fifty oars.

687. Tirhakah Reigns in Egypt.

681. Asserhadon invades Babylon.

673. The Jews conquered by Asserhadon, and Manasseh carried captive to Babylon.

671. Asserbadon invades Egypt. The government of Egypt committed to twelve princes.

668. The western nations of Syria, Phoenicia and Egypt, revolt from the Assyrians. Asserhadon dies, and is succeeded by Saosduchinus. Manasseh returns from Captivity.

658. Phraortes Reigns in Media. The Prytanes Reign in Corinth, expelling their Kings.

657. The Corinthians overcome the Corcyreans at sea: and this was the oldest sea fight.

655. Psammiticus becomes King of all Egypt, by conquering the other eleven Kings with whom he had already reigned fifteen years: he reigned about 39 years more. Henceforward the Ionians had access into Egypt; and thence came the Ionian Philosophy, Astronomy and Geometry.

652. The first Messenian war begins: it lasted twenty years.

647. Charops, the first decennial Archon of the Athenians. Some of these Archons might dye before the end of the ten years, and the remainder of the ten years be supplied by a new Archon. And hence the seven decennial Archons might not take up above forty or fifty years. Saosduchinus King of Assyria dies, and is succeeded by Chyniladon.

640. Josiah Reigns in Judaea.

636. Phraortes> King of the Medes, is slain in a war against the Assyrians. Astyages succeeds him.

635. The Scythians invade the Medes and Assyrians.

633. Battus builds Cyrene, where Irasa, the city of Antaeus, had stood.

627. Rome is built.

625. Nabopolassar revolts from the King of Assyria, and Reigns over Babylon. Phalantus leads the Parthenians into Italy, and builds Tarentum.

617. Psammiticus dies. Nechaoh reigns in Egypt.

611. Cyaxeres Reigns over the Medes.

610. The Princes of the Scythians slain in a feast by Cyaxeres.

609. Josiah slain. Cyaxeres and Nebuchadnezzar overthrow Nineveh, and, by sharing the Assyrian Empire, grow great.

607. Creon the first annual Archon of the Athenians. The second Messenian war begins. Cyaxeres makes the Scythians retire beyond Colchos and Iberia, and seizes the Assyrian Provinces of Armenia, Pontus and Cappadocia.

606. Nebuchadnezzar invades Syria and Judaea.

604. Nabopolassar dies, and is succeeded by his Son Nebuchadnezzar, who had already Reigned two years with his father.

600. Darius the Mede, the son of Cyaxeres, is born.

599. Cyrus is born of Mandane, the Sister of Cyaxeres, and daughter of Astyages.

596. Susiana and Elam conquered by Nebuchadnezzar. Caranus and Perdiccas fly from Phidon, and found the Kingdom of Macedon. Phidon introduces Weights and Measures, and the Coining of Silver Money.

590. Cyaxeres makes war upon Alyattes King of Lydia.

588. The Temple of Solomon is burnt by Nebuchadnezzar. The Messenians being conquered, fly into Sicily, and build Messana.

585. In the sixth year of the Lydian war, a total Eclipse of the Sun, predicted by Thales, May the 28th, puts an end to a Battel between the Medes and Lydians: Whereupon they make Peace, and ratify it by a marriage between Darius Medus the son of Cyaxeres, and Ariene the daughter of Alyattes.

584. Phidon presides in the 49th Olympiad.

580. Phidon is overthrown. Two men chosen by lot, out of the city Elis, to preside in the Olympic Games.

572. Draco is Archon of the Athenians, and makes laws for them.

568. The Amphictions make war upon the Cirrheans, by the advice of Solon, and take Cirrha. Clisthenes, Alcmaeon and Eurolicus commanded the forces of the Amphictions, and were contemporary to Phidon. For Leocides the son of Phidon, and Megacles the son of Alcmaeon, at one and the same time, courted Agarista the daughter of Clisthenes.

569. Nebuchadnezzar invades Egypt. Darius the Mede Reigns.

562. Solon, being Archon of the Athenians, makes laws for them.

557. Periander dies, and Corinth becomes free from Tyrants.

555. Nabonadius Reigns at Babylon. His Mother Nitocris adorns and fortifies that City.

550. Pisistratus becomes Tyrant at Athens. The Conference between Croesus and Solon.

549. Solon dies, Hegestratus being Archon of Athens.

544. Sardes is taken by Cyrus. Darius the Mede recoins the Lydian money into Darics.

538. Babylon is taken by Cyrus.

536. Cyrus overcomes Darius the Mede, and translates the Empire to the Persians. The Jews return from Captivity, and found the second Temple.

529. Cyrus dies. Cambyses Reigns,

521. Darius the son of Hystaspes Reigns. The Magi are slain. The various Religions of the several Nations of Persia, which consisted in the worship of their ancient Kings, are abolished; and by the influence of Hystaspes and Zoroaster, the worship of One God, at Altars, without Temples is set up in all Persia.

520. The second Temple is built at Jerusalem by the command of Darius.

515. The second Temple is finished and dedicated.

513. Harmodius and Aristogiton, slay Hipparchus the son of Pisistratus, Tyrant of the Athenians.

508. The Kings of the Romans expelled, and Consuls erected.

491. The Battle of Marathon.

485. Xerxes Reigns.

480. The Passage of Xerxes over the Hellespont into Greece, and Battles of Thermopylae and Salamis.

464. Artaxerxes Longimanus Reigns.

457. Ezra returns into Judaea. Johanan the father of Jaddua was now grown up, having a chamber in the Temple.

444. Nehemiah returns into Judaea. Herodotus writes.

431. The Peloponnesian war begins.

428. Nehemiah drives away Manasseh the brother of Jaddua, because he had married Nicaso the daughter of Sanballat.

424. Darius Nothus Reigns.

422. Sanballat builds a Temple in Mount Gerizim and makes his son-in-law Manasseh the first High-Priest thereof.

412. Hitherto the Priests and Levites were numbered, and written in the Chronicles of the Jews, before the death of Nehemiah: at which time either Johanan or Jaddua was High-Priest, And here Ends the Sacred History of the Jews.

405. Artaxerxes Mnemon Reigns. The end of the Peloponnesian war.

359. Artaxerxes Ochus Reigns.

338. Arogus Reigns.

336. Darius Codomannus Reigns.

332. The Persian Empire conquered by Alexander the great.

331. Darius Codomannus, the last King of Persia, slain.

* * * * *

THE

CHRONOLOGY

OF ANCIENT KINGDOMS AMENDED.

* * * * *

CHAP. I.

Of the Chronology of the First Ages of the Greeks.

All Nations, before they began to keep exact accounts of Time, have been prone to raise their Antiquities; and this humour has been promoted, by the Contentions between Nations about their Originals. Herodotus [3] tells us, that the Priests of Egypt reckoned from the Reign of Menes to that of Sethon, who put Sennacherib to flight, three hundred forty and one Generations of men, and as many Priests of Vulcan, and as many Kings of Egypt: and that three hundred Generations make ten thousand years; for, saith he, three Generations of men make an hundred years: and the remaining forty and one Generations make 1340 years: and so the whole time from the Reign of Menes to that of Sethon was 11340 years. And by this way of reckoning, and allotting longer Reigns to the Gods of Egypt than to the Kings which followed them, Herodotus tells us from the Priests of Egypt, that from Pan to Amosis were 15000 years, and from Hercules to Amosis 17000 years. So also the Chaldaeans boasted of their Antiquity; for Callisthenes, the Disciple of Aristotle, sent Astronomical Observations from Babylon to Greece, said to be of 1903 years standing before the times of Alexander the great. And the Chaldaeans boasted further, that they had observed the Stars 473000 years; and there were others who made the Kingdoms of Assyria, Media and Damascus, much older than the truth.

Some of the Greeks called the times before the Reign of Ogyges, Unknown, because they had No History of them; those between his flood and the beginning of the Olympiads, Fabulous, because their History was much mixed with Poetical Fables: and those after the beginning of the Olympiads, Historical, because their History was free from such Fables. The fabulous Ages wanted a good Chronology, and so also did the Historical, for the first 60 or 70 Olympiads.

The Europeans, had no Chronology before the times of the Persian Empire: and whatsoever Chronology they now have of ancienter times, hath been framed since, by reasoning and conjecture. In the beginning of that Monarchy, Acusilaus made Phoroneus as old as Ogyges and his flood, and that flood 1020 years older than the first Olympiad; which is above 680 years older than the truth: and to make out this reckoning his followers have encreased the Reigns of Kings in length and number. Plutarch [4] tells us that the Philosophers anciently delivered their Opinions in Verse, as Orpheus, Hesiod, Parmenides, Xenophanes, Empedocles, Thales; but afterwards left off the use of Verses; and that Aristarchus, Timocharis, Aristillus, Hipparchus, did not make Astronomy the more contemptible by describing it in Prose; after Eudoxus, Hesiod, and Thales had wrote of it in Verse. Solon wrote [5] in Verse, and all the Seven Wise Men were addicted to Poetry, as Anaximenes [6] affirmed. 'Till those days the Greeks wrote only in Verse, and while they did so there could be no Chronology, nor any other History, than such as was mixed with poetical fancies. Pliny, [7] in reckoning up the Inventors of things, tells us, that Pherecydes Syrius taught to compose discourses in Prose in the Reign of Cyrus, and Cadmus Milesius to write History. And in [8] another place he saith that Cadmus Milesius was the first that wrote in Prose. Josephus tells us [9] that Cadmus Milesius and Acusilaus were but a little before the expedition of the Persians against the Greeks: and Suidas [10] calls Acusilaus a most ancient Historian, and saith that he wrote Genealogies out of tables of brass, which his father, as was reported, found in a corner of his house. Who hid them there may be doubted: For the Greeks [11] had no publick table or inscription older than the Laws of Draco. Pherecydes Atheniensis, in the Reign of Darius Hystaspis, or soon after, wrote of the Antiquities and ancient Genealogies of the Athenians, in ten books; and was one of the first European writers of this kind, and one of the best; whence he had the name of Genealogus; and by Dionysius [12] Halicarnassensis is said to be second to none of the Genealogers. Epimenides, not the Philosopher, but an Historian, wrote also of the ancient Genealogies: and Hellanicus, who was twelve years older than Herodotus, digested his History by the Ages or Successions of the Priestesses of Juno Argiva. Others digested theirs by those of the Archons of Athens, or Kings of the Lacedaemonians. Hippias the Elean published a Breviary of the Olympiads, supported by no certain arguments, as Plutarch [13] tells us: he lived in the 105th Olympiad, and was derided by Plato for his Ignorance. This Breviary seems to have contained nothing more than a short account of the Victors in every Olympiad. Then [14] Ephorus, the disciple of Isocrates, formed a Chronological History of Greece, beginning with the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus, and ending with the Siege of Perinthus, in the twentieth year of Philip the father of Alexander the great, that is, eleven years before the fall of the Persian Empire: but [15] he digested things by Generations, and the reckoning by the Olympiads, or by any other AEra, was not yet in use among the Greeks. The Arundelian Marbles were composed sixty years after the death of Alexander the great (An. 4. Olymp. 128.) and yet mention not the Olympiads, nor any other standing AEra, but reckon backwards from the time then present. But Chronology was now reduced to a reckoning by Years; and in the next Olympiad Timaeus Siculus improved it: for he wrote a History in Several books, down to his own times, according to the Olympiads; comparing the Ephori, the Kings of Sparta, the Archons of Athens, and the Priestesses of Argos with the Olympic Victors, so as to make the Olympiads, and the Genealogies and Successions of Kings and Priestesses, and the Poetical Histories suit with one another, according to the best of his judgment: and where he left off, Polybius began, and carried on the History. Eratosthenes wrote above an hundred years after the death of Alexander the great: He was followed by Apollodorus; and these two have been followed ever since by Chronologers.

But how uncertain their Chronology is, and how doubtful it was reputed by the _Greeks_ of those times, may be understood by these passages of _Plutarch_. _Some reckon _Lycurgus_, saith he, [16] _contemporary to _Iphitus_, and to have been his companion in ordering the Olympic festivals, amongst whom was _Aristotle_ the Philosopher; arguing from the Olympic Disc, which had the name of _Lycurgus_ upon it. Others supputing the times by the Kings of _Lacedaemon_, as _Eratosthenes_ and _Apollodorus_, affirm that he was not a few years older than the first Olympiad._ He began to flourish in the 17th or 18th Olympiad, and at length _Aristotle_ made him as old as the first Olympiad; and so did _Epaminondas_, as he is cited by _AElian_ and _Plutarch_: and then _Eratosthenes_, _Apollodorus_, and their followers, made him above an hundred years older.

And in another place Plutarch [17] tells us: The Congress of Solon with Croesus, some think they can confute by Chronology. But a History so illustrious, and verified by so many witnesses, and which is more, so agreeable to the manners of Solon, and worthy of the greatness of his mind, and of his wisdom, I cannot persuade my self to reject because of some Chronological Canons, as they call them, which hundreds of authors correcting, have not yet been able to constitute any thing certain, in which they could agree amongst themselves, about repugnancies.

As for the Chronology of the Latines, that is still more uncertain. Plutarch [18] represents great uncertainties in the Originals of Rome, and so doth Servius [19]. The old Records of the Latines were burnt [20] by the Gauls, an hundred and twenty years after the Regifuge, and sixty-four years before the death of Alexander the great: and Quintus Fabius Pictor, [21] the oldest Historian of the Latines, lived an hundred years later than that King, and took almost all things from Diocles Peparethius, a Greek. The Chronologers of Gallia, Spain, Germany, Scythia, Swedeland, Britain and Ireland are of a date still later; for Scythia beyond the Danube had no letters, 'till Ulphilas their Bishop formed them; which was about six hundred years after the death of Alexander the great: and Germany had none 'till it received them, from the western Empire of the Latines, above seven hundred years after the death of that King. The Hunns, had none in the days of Procopius, who flourished 850 years after the death of that King: and Sweden and Norway received them still later. And things said to be done above one or two hundred years before the use of letters, are of little credit.

Diodorus, [22] in the beginning of his History tells us, that he did not define by any certain space the times preceding the Trojan War, because he had no certain foundation to rely upon: but from the Trojan war, according to the reckoning of Apollodorus, whom he followed, there were eighty years to the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus; and that from that Period to the first Olympiad, there were three hundred and twenty eight years, computing the times from the Kings of the Lacedaemonians. Apollodorus followed Eratosthenes, and both of them followed Thucydides, in reckoning eighty years from the Trojan war to the Return of the Heraclides: but in reckoning 328 years from that Return to the first Olympiad, Diodorus tells us, that the times were computed from the Kings of the Lacedaemonians; and Plutarch [23] tells us, that Apollodorus, Eratosthenes and others followed that computation: and since this reckoning is still received by Chronologers, and was gathered by computing the times from the Kings of the Lacedaemonians, that is from their number, let us re-examin that Computation.

The Egyptians reckoned the Reigns of Kings equipollent to Generations of men, and three Generations to an hundred years, as above; and so did the Greeks and Latines: and accordingly they have made their Kings Reign one with another thirty and three years a-piece, and above. For they make the seven Kings of Rome who preceded the Consuls to have Reigned 244 years, which is 35 years a-piece: and the first twelve Kings of Sicyon, AEgialeus, Europs, &c. to have Reigned 529 years, which is 44 years a-piece: and the first eight Kings of Argos, Inachus, Phoroneus, &c. to have Reigned 371 years, which is above 46 years a-piece: and between the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus, and the end of the first Messenian war, the ten Kings of Sparta in one Race; Eurysthenes, Agis, Echestratus, Labotas, Doryagus, Agesilaus, Archelaus, Teleclus, Alcamenes, and Polydorus: the nine in the other Race; Procles, Sous, Eurypon, Prytanis, Eunomus, Polydectes, Charilaus, Nicander, Theopompus: the ten Kings of Messene; Cresphontes, Epytus, Glaucus, Isthmius, Dotadas, Sibotas, Phintas, Antiochus, Euphaes, Aristodemus: and the nine of Arcadia; Cypselus, Olaeas, Buchalion, Phialus, Simus, Pompus, AEgineta, Polymnestor, AEchmis, according to Chronologers, took up 379 years: which is 38 years a-piece to the ten Kings, and 42 years a-piece to the nine. And the five Kings of the Race of Eurysthenes, between the end of the first Messenian war, and the beginning of the Reign of Darius Hystaspis; Eurycrates, Anaxander, Eurycrates II, Leon, Anaxandrides, Reigned 202 years, which is above 40 years a-piece.

Thus the Greek Chronologers, who follow Timaeus and Eratosthenes, have made the Kings of their several Cities, who lived before the times of the Persian Empire, to Reign about 35 or 40 years a-piece, one with another; which is a length so much beyond the course of nature, as is not to be credited. For by the ordinary course of nature Kings Reign, one with another, about eighteen or twenty years a-piece: and if in some instances they Reign, one with another, five or six years longer, in others they Reign as much shorter: eighteen or twenty years is a medium. So the eighteen Kings of Judah who succeeded Solomon, Reigned 390 years, which is one with another 22 years a-piece. The fifteen Kings of Israel after Solomon, Reigned 259 years, which is 171/4 years a-piece. The eighteen Kings of Babylon, Nabonassar &c. Reigned 209 years, which is 11-2/3 years a-piece. The ten Kings of Persia; Cyrus, Cambyses, &c. Reigned 208 years, which is almost 21 years a piece. The sixteen Successors of Alexander the great, and of his brother and son in Syria; Seleucus, Antiochus Soter, &c. Reigned 244 years, after the breaking of that Monarchy into various Kingdoms, which is 151/4 years a-piece. The eleven Kings of Egypt; Ptolomaeus Lagi, &c. Reigned 277 years, counted from the same Period, which is 25 years a-piece. The eight in Macedonia; Cassander, &c. Reigned 138 years, which is 171/4 years a-piece. The thirty Kings of England; William the Conqueror, William Rufus, &c. Reigned 648 years, which is 211/2 years a-piece. The first twenty four Kings of France; Pharamundus, &c. Reigned 458 years, which is 19 years a-piece: the next twenty four Kings of France; Ludovicus Balbus, &c. 451 years, which is 183/4 years a-piece: the next fifteen, Philip Valesius, &c. 315 years, which is 21 years a-piece: and all the sixty three Kings of France, 1224 years, which is 191/2 years a-piece. Generations from father to son, may be reckoned one with another at about 33 or 34 years a-piece, or about three Generations to an hundred years: but if the reckoning proceed by the eldest sons, they are shorter, so that three of them may be reckoned at about 75 or 80 years: and the Reigns of Kings are still shorter, because Kings are succeeded not only by their eldest sons, but sometimes by their brothers, and sometimes they are slain or deposed; and succeeded by others of an equal or greater age, especially in elective or turbulent Kingdoms. In the later Ages, since Chronology hath been exact, there is scarce an instance to be found of ten Kings Reigning any where in continual Succession above 260 years: but Timaeus and his followers, and I think also some of his Predecessors, after the example of the Egyptians, have taken the Reigns of Kings for Generations, and reckoned three Generations to an hundred, and sometimes to an hundred and twenty years; and founded the Technical Chronology of the Greeks upon this way of reckoning. Let the reckoning be reduced to the course of nature, by putting the Reigns of Kings one with another, at about eighteen or twenty years a-piece: and the ten Kings of Sparta by one Race, the nine by another Race, the ten Kings of Messene, and the nine of Arcadia, above mentioned, between the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus, and the end of the first Messenian war, will scarce take up above 180 or 190 years: whereas according to Chronologers they took up 379 years.

For confirming this reckoning, I may add another argument. Euryleon the son of AEgeus, [24] commanded the main body of the Messenians in the fifth year of the first Messenian war, and was in the fifth Generation from Oiolicus the son Theras, the brother-in-law of Aristodemus, and tutor to his sons Eurysthenes and Procles, as Pausanias [25] relates: and by consequence, from the return of the Heraclides, which was in the days of Theras, to the battle which was in the fifth year of this war, there were six Generations, which, as I conceive, being for the most part by the eldest sons, will scarce exceed thirty years to a Generation; and so may amount unto 170 or 180 years. That war lasted 19 or 20 years: add the last 15 years, and there will be about 190 years to the end of that war: whereas the followers of Timaeus make it about 379 years, which is above sixty years to a Generation.

By these arguments, Chronologers have lengthned the time, between the return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus and the first Messenian war, adding to it about 190 years: and they have also lengthned the time, between that war and the rise of the Persian Empire. For in the Race of the Spartan Kings, descended from Eurysthenes; after Polydorus, reigned [26] these Kings, Eurycrates, Anaxander, Eurycratides, Leon, Anaxandrides, Clomenes, Leonidas, &c. And in the other Race descended from Procles; after Theopompus, reigned [27] these, Anaxandrides, Archidemus, Anaxileus, Leutychides, Hippocratides, Ariston, Demaratus, Leutychides II. &c. according to Herodotus. These Kings reigned 'till the sixth year of Xerxes, in which Leonidas was slain by the Persians at Thermopylae; and Leutychides II. soon after, flying from Sparta to Tegea, died there. The seven Reigns of the Kings of Sparta, which follow Polydorus, being added to the ten Reigns above mentioned, which began with that of Eurysthenes; make up seventeen Reigns of Kings, between the return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus and the sixth year of Xerxes: and the eight Reigns following Theopompus, being added to the nine Reigns above mentioned, which began with that of Procles, make up also seventeen Reigns: and these seventeen Reigns, at twenty years a-piece one with another, amount unto three hundred and forty years. Count these 340 years upwards from the sixth year of Xerxes, and one or two years more for the war of the Heraclides, and Reign of Aristodemus, the father of Eurysthenes and Procles; and they will place the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus, 159 years after the death of Solomon, and 46 years before the first Olympiad, in which Coraebus was victor. But the followers of Timaeus have placed this Return two hundred and eighty years earlier. Now this being the computation upon which the Greeks, as you have heard from Diodorus and Plutarch, have founded the Chronology of their Kingdoms, which were ancienter than the Persian Empire; that Chronology is to be rectified, by shortening the times which preceded the death of Cyrus, in the proportion of almost two to one; for the times which follow the death of Cyrus are not much amiss.

The Artificial Chronologers, have made Lycurgus, the legislator, as old as Iphitus, the restorer of the Olympiads; and Iphitus, an hundred and twelve years, older than the first Olympiad: and, to help out the Hypothesis, they have feigned twenty eight Olympiads older than the first Olympiad, wherein Coraebus was victor. But these things were feigned, after the days of Thucydides and Plato: for Socrates died three years after the end of the Peloponnesian war, and Plato [28] introduceth him saying, that the institutions of Lycurgus were but of three hundred years standing, or not much more. And [29] Thucydides, in the reading followed by Stephanus, saith, that the Lacedaemonians, had from ancient times used good laws, and been free from tyranny; and that from the time that they had used one and the same administration of their commonwealth, to the end of the Peloponnesian war, there were three hundred years and a few more. Count three hundred years back from the end of the Peloponnesian war, and they will place the Legislature of Lycurgus upon the 19th Olympiad. And, according to Socrates, it might be upon the 22d or 23d. Athenaeus [30] tells us out of ancient authors (Hellanicus, Sosimus and Hieronymus) that Lycurgus the Legislator, was contemporary to Terpander the Musician; and that Terpander was the first man who got the victory in the Carnea, in a solemnity of music instituted in those festivals in the 26th Olympiad. He overcame four times in those Pythic games, and therefore lived at least 'till the 29th Olympiad: and beginning to flourish in the days of Lycurgus, it is not likely that Lycurgus began to flourish, much before the 18th Olympiad. The name of Lycurgus being on the Olympic Disc, Aristotle concluded thence, that Lycurgus was the companion of Iphitus, in restoring the Olympic games: and this argument might be the ground of the opinion of Chronologers, that Lycurgus and Iphitus were contemporary. But Iphitus did not restore all the Olympic games. He [31] restored indeed the Racing in the first Olympiad, Coraebus being victor. In the 14th Olympiad, the double stadium was added, Hypaenus being victor. And in the 18th Olympiad the Quinquertium and Wrestling were added, Lampus and Eurybatus, two Spartans, being victors: And the Disc was one of the games of the Quinquertium. [32] Pausanias tells us that there were three Discs kept in the Olympic treasury at Altis: these therefore having the name of Lycurgus upon them, shew that they were given by him, at the institution of the Quinquertium, in the 18th Olympiad. Now Polydectes King of Sparta, being slain before the birth of his son Charillus or Charilaus, left the Kingdom to Lycurgus his brother; and Lycurgus, upon the birth of Charillus, became tutor to the child; and after about eight months travelled into Crete and Asia, till the child grew up, and brought back with him the poems of Homer; and soon after published his laws, suppose upon the 22d or 23d Olympiad; for he was then growing old: and Terpander was a Lyric Poet, and began to flourish about this time; for [33] he imitated Orpheus and Homer, and sung Homer's verses and his own, and wrote the laws of Lycurgus in verse, and was victor in the Pythic games in the 26th Olympiad, as above. He was the first who distinguished the modes of Lyric music by several names. Ardalus and Clonas soon after did the like for wind music: and from henceforward, by the encouragement of the Pythic games, now instituted, several eminent Musicians and Poets flourished in Greece: as Archilochus, Eumelus Corinthius, Polymnestus, Thaletas, Xenodemus, Xenocritus, Sacadas, Tyrtaeus, Tlesilla, Rhianus, Alcman, Arion, Stesichorus, Mimnermnus, Alcaeus, Sappho, Theognis, Anacreon, Ibycus, Simonides, AEschylus, Pindar, by whom the Music and Poetry of the Greeks were brought to perfection.

Lycurgus, published his laws in the Reign of Agesilaus, the son and successor of Doryagus, in the Race of the Kings of Sparta descended from Eurysthenes. From the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus, to the end of the Reign of Agesilaus, there were six Reigns: and from the same Return to the end of the Reign of Polydectes, in the Race of the Spartan Kings descended from Procles, there were also six Reigns: and these Reigns, at twenty years a-piece one with another, amount unto 120 years; besides the short Reign of Aristodemus, the father of Eurysthenes and Procles, which might amount to a year or two: for Aristodemus came to the crown, as [34] Herodotus and the Lacedaemonians themselves affirmed. The times of the deaths of Agesilaus and Polydectes are not certainly known: but it may be presumed that Lycurgus did not meddle with the Olympic games before he came to the Kingdom; and therefore Polydectes died in the beginning of the 18th Olympiad, or but a very little before. If it may be supposed that the 20th Olympiad was in, or very near to the middle time between the deaths of the two Kings Polydectes and Agesilaus, and from thence be counted upwards the aforesaid 120 years, and one year more for the Reign of Aristodemus; the reckoning will place the Return of the Heraclides, about 45 years before the beginning of the Olympiads.

Iphitus, who restored the Olympic games, [35] was descended from Oxylus, the son of Haemon, the son of Thoas, the son of Andraemon: Hercules and Andraemon married two sisters: Thoas warred at Troy: Oxylus returned into Peloponnesus with the Heraclides. In this return he commanded the body of the AEtolians, and recovered Elea; [36] from whence his ancestor AEtolus, the son of Endymion, the son of Aethlius, had been driven by Salmoneus the grandson of Hellen. By the friendship of the Heraclides, Oxylus had the care of the Olympic Temple committed to him: and the Heraclides, for his service done them, granted further upon oath that the country of the Eleans should be free from invasions, and be defended by them from all armed force: And when the Eleans were thus consecrated, Oxylus restored the Olympic games: and after they had been again intermitted, Iphitus their King [37] restored them, and made them quadrennial. Iphitus is by some reckoned the son of Haemon, by others the son of Praxonidas, the son of Haemon: but Haemon being the father of Oxylus, I would reckon Iphitus the son of Praxonidas, the son of Oxylus, the son of Haemon. And by this reckoning the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus will be two Generations by the eldest sons, or about 52 years, before the Olympiads.

Pausanias [38] represents that Melas the son of Antissus, of the posterity of Gonussa the daughter of Sicyon, was not above six Generations older than Cypselus King of Corinth; and that he was contemporary to Aletes, who returned with the Heraclides into Peloponnesus. The Reign of Cypselus began An. 2, Olymp. 31, according to Chronologers; and six Generations, at about 30 years to a Generation, amount unto 180 years. Count those years backwards from An. 2, Olymp. 31, and they will place the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus 58 years before the first Olympiad. But it might not be so early, if the Reign of Cypselus began three or four Olympiads later; for he reigned before the Persian Empire began.

Hercules the Argonaut was the father of Hyllus; the father of Cleodius; the father of Aristomachus; the father of Temenus, Cresphontes, and Aristodemus, who led the Heraclides into Peloponnesus and Eurystheus, who was of the same age with Hercules, was slain in the first attempt of the Heraclides to return: Hyllus was slain in the second attempt, Cleodius in the third attempt, Aristomachus in the fourth attempt, and Aristodemus died as soon as they were returned, and left the Kingdom of Sparta to his sons Eurysthenes and Procles. Whence their Return was four Generations later than the Argonautic expedition: And these Generations were short ones, being by the chief of the family, and suit with the reckoning of Thucydides and the Ancients, that the taking of Troy was about 75 or eighty years before the return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus; and the Argonautic expedition one Generation earlier than the taking of Troy. Count therefore eighty years backward from the Return of the Heraclides into Peloponnesus to the Trojan war, and the taking of Troy will be about 76 years after the death of Solomon: And the Argonautic expedition, which was one Generation earlier, will be about 43 years after it. From the taking of Troy to the Return of the Heraclides, could scarce be more than eighty years, because Orestes the son of Agamemnon was a youth at the taking of Troy, and his sons Penthilus and Tisamenus lived till the Return of the Heraclides.

AEsculapius and Hercules were Argonauts, and Hippocrates was the eighteenth inclusively by the father's side from AEsculapius, and the nineteenth from Hercules by the mother's side: and because these Generations, being taken notice of by writers, were most probably by the principal of the family, and so for the most part by the eldest sons; we may reckon about 28 or at the most about 30 years to a Generation. And thus the seventeen intervals by the father's side, and eighteen by the mother's, will at a middle reckoning amount unto about 507 years: which counted backwards from the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, at which time Hippocrates began to flourish, will reach up to the 43d year after the death of Solomon, and there place the Argonautic expedition.

When the Romans conquered the Carthaginians, the Archives of Carthage came into their hands: And thence Appian, in his history of the Punic wars, tells in round numbers that Carthage stood seven hundred years: and [39] Solinus adds the odd number of years in these words: Adrymeto atque Carthagini author est a Tyro populus. Urbem istam, ut Cato in Oratione Senatoria autumat; cum rex Hiarbas rerum in Libya potiretur, Elissa mulier extruxit, domo Phoenix & Carthadam dixit, quod Phoenicum ore exprimit civitatem novam; mox sermone verso Carthago dicta est, quae post annos septingentos triginta septem exciditur quam fuerat extructa. Elissa was Dido, and Carthage was destroyed in the Consulship of Lentulus and Mummius, in the year of the Julian Period 4568; from whence count backwards 737 years, and the Encaenia or Dedication of the City, will fall upon the 16th year of Pygmalion, the brother of Dido, and King of Tyre. She fled in the seventh year of Pygmalion, but the AEra of the City began with its Encaenia. Now Virgil, and his Scholiast Servius, who might have some things from the archives of Tyre and Cyprus, as well as from those of Carthage, relate that Teucer came from the war of Troy to Cyprus, in the days of Dido, a little before the Reign of her brother Pygmalion; and, in conjunction with her father, seized Cyprus, and ejected Cinyras: and the Marbles say that Teucer came to Cyprus seven years after the destruction of Troy, and built Salamis; and Apollodorus, that Cinyras married Metharme the daughter of Pygmalion, and built Paphos. Therefore, if the Romans, in the days of Augustus, followed not altogether the artificial Chronology of Eratosthenes, but had these things from the records of Carthage, Cyprus, or Tyre; the arrival of Teucer at Cyprus will be in the Reign of the predecessor of Pygmalion: and by consequence the destruction of Troy, about 76 years later than the death of Solomon.

Dionysius Halicarnassensis [40] tells us, that in the time of the Trojan war, Latinus was King of the Aborigines in Italy, and that in the sixteenth Age after that war, Romulus built Rome. By Ages he means Reigns of Kings: for after Latinus he names sixteen Kings of the Latines, the last of which was Numitor, in whose days Romulus built Rome: for Romulus was contemporary to Numitor, and after him Dionysius and others reckon six Kings more over Rome, to the beginning of the Consuls. Now these twenty and two Reigns, at about 18 years to a Reign one with another, for many of these Kings were slain, took up 396 years; which counted back from the consulship of Junius Brutus and Valerius Publicola, the two first Consuls, place the Trojan war about 78 years after the death of Solomon.

The expedition of Sesostris was one Generation earlier than the Argonautic expedition: for in his return back into Egypt he left AEetes in Colchis, and AEetes reigned there 'till the Argonautic expedition; and Prometheus was left by Sesostris with a body of men at Mount Caucasus, to guard that pass, and after thirty years was released by Hercules the Argonaut: and Phlyas and Eumedon, the sons of the great Bacchus, so the Poets call Sesostris, and of Ariadne the daughter of Minos, were Argonauts. At the return of Sesostris into Egypt, his brother Danaus fled from him into Greece with his fifty daughters, in a long ship; after the pattern of which the ship Argo was built: and Argus, the son of Danaus, was the master-builder thereof. Nauplius the Argonaut was born in Greece, of Amymone, one of the daughters of Danaus, and of Neptune, the brother and admiral of Sesostris: And two others of the daughters of Danaus married Archander and Archilites, the sons of Achaeus, the son of Creusa, the daughter of Erechtheus King of Athens: and therefore the daughters of Danaus were three Generations younger than Erechtheus; and by consequence contemporary to Theseus the son of AEgeus, the adopted son of Pandion, the son of Erechtheus. Theseus, in the time of the Argonautic expedition, was of about 50 years of age, and so was born about the 33d year of Solomon: for he stole Helena [41] just before that expedition, being then 50 years old, and she but seven, or as some say ten. Pirithous the son of Ixion helped Theseus to steal Helena, and then [42] Theseus went with Pirithous to steal Persephone, the daughter of Aidoneus, or Orcus, King of the Molossians, and was taken in the action: and whilst he lay in prison, Castor and Pollux returning from the Argonautic expedition, released their sister Helena, and captivated AEthra the mother of Theseus. Now the daughters of Danaus being contemporary to Theseus, and some of their sons being Argonauts, Danaus with his daughters fled from his brother Sesostris into Greece about one Generation before the Argonautic expedition; and therefore Sesostris returned into Egypt in the Reign of Rehoboam. He came out of Egypt in the fifth year of Rehoboam, [43] and spent nine years in that expedition, against the Eastern Nations and Greece; and therefore returned back into Egypt, in the fourteenth year of Rehoboam. Sesac and Sesostris were therefore Kings of all Egypt, at one and the same time: and they agree not only in the time, but also in their actions and conquests. God gave Sesac [Hebrew: mmlkvt h'rtsvt] the Kingdoms of the lands, 2 Chron. xii. Where Herodotus describes the expedition of Sesostris, Josephus [44] tells us that he described the expedition of Sesac, and attributed his actions to Sesostris, erring only in the name of the King. Corruptions of names are frequent in history; Sesostris was otherwise called Sesochris, Sesochis, Sesoosis, Sethosis, Sesonchis, Sesonchosis. Take away the Greek termination, and the names become Sesost, Sesoch, Sesoos, Sethos, Sesonch: which names differ very little from Sesach. Sesonchis and Sesach differ no more than Memphis and Moph, two names of the same city. Josephus [45] tells us also, from Manetho, that Sethosis was the brother of Armais, and that these brothers were otherwise called AEgyptus and Danaus; and that upon the return of Sethosis or AEgyptus, from his great conquests into Egypt, Armais or Danaus fled from him into Greece.

Egypt was at first divided into many small Kingdoms, like other nations; and grew into one monarchy by degrees: and the father of Solomon's Queen, was the first King of Egypt, who came into Phoenicia with an Army: but he only took Gezir, and gave it to his daughter. Sesac, the next King, came out of Egypt with an army of Libyans, Troglodites and Ethiopians, 2 Chron. xii. 3. and therefore was then King of all those countries; and we do not read in Scripture, that any former King of Egypt; who Reigned over all those nations, came out of Egypt with a great army to conquer other countries. The sacred history of the Israelites, from the days of Abraham to the days of Solomon, admits of no such conqueror. Sesostris reigned over all the same nations of the Libyans, Troglodites and Ethiopians, and came out of Egypt with a great army to conquer other Kingdoms. The Shepherds reigned long in the lower part of Egypt, and were expelled thence, just before the building of Jerusalem and the Temple; according to Manetho; and whilst they Reigned in the lower part of Egypt, the upper part thereof was under other Kings: and while Egypt was divided into several Kingdoms, there was no room for any such King of all Egypt as Sesostris; and no historian makes him later than Sesac: and therefore he was one and the same King of Egypt with Sesac. This is no new opinion: Josephus discovered it when he affirmed that Herodotus erred, in ascribing the actions of Sesac to Sesostris, and that the error was only in the name of the King: for this is as much as to say, that the true name of him who did those things described by Herodotus, was Sesac; and that Herodotus erred only in calling him Sesostris; or that he was called Sesostris by a corruption of his name. Our great Chronologer, Sir John Marsham, was also of opinion that Sesostris was Sesac: and if this be granted, it is then most certain, that Sesostris came out of Egypt in the fifth year of Rehoboam to invade the nations, and returned back into Egypt in the 14th year of that King; and that Danaus then flying from his brother, came into Greece within a year or two after: and the Argonautic expedition being one Generation later than that invasion, and than the coming of Danaus into Greece, was certainly about 40 or 45 years later than the death of Solomon. Prometheus stay'd on Mount Caucasus [46] thirty years, and then was released by Hercules: and therefore the Argonautic expedition was thirty years after Prometheus had been left on Mount Caucasus by Sesostris, that is, about 44 years after the death of Solomon.

All nations, before the just length of the Solar year was known, reckoned months by the course of the moon; and years by the [47] returns of winter and summer, spring and autumn: and in making Calendars for their Festivals, reckoned thirty days to a Lunar month, and twelve Lunar months to a year; taking the nearest round numbers: whence came the division of the Ecliptic into 360 degrees. So in the time of _Noah_'s flood, when the Moon could not be seen, _Noah_ reckoned thirty days to a month: but if the Moon appeared a day or two before the end of the month, [48] they began the next month with the first day of her appearing: and this was done generally, 'till the _Egyptians_ of _Thebais_ found the length of the Solar year. So [49] _Diodorus_ tells us that _the _Egyptians_ of _Thebais_ use no intercalary months, nor subduct any days_ [from the month] _as is done by most of the _Greeks_. And [50] _Cicero_, _est consuetudo Siculorum caeterorumque Graecorum, quod suos dies mensesque congruere volunt cum Solis Lunaeque ratione, ut nonnumquam siquid discrepet, eximant unum aliquem diem aut summum biduum ex mense_ [civili dierum triginta] _quos illi_ [Greek: exairesimous] _dies nominant_. And _Proclus_, upon _Hesiod_'s [Greek: triakas] mentions the same thing. And [51] _Geminus_: [Greek: Prothesis gar en tois archaiois, tous men menas agein kata selenen, tous de eniautous kath' helion. To gar hypo ton nomon, kai ton chresmon parangellomenon, to thyein kata g', egoun ta patria, menas, hemeras, eniautous: touto dielabon apantes hoi Hellenes toi tous men heniautous symphonos agein toi helioi; tas de hemeras kai tous menas tei selene. esti de to men kath' helion agein tous eniautous, to peri tas autas horas tou eniautou tas autas thysias tois theois epiteleithai, kai ten men earinen thysian dia pantos kata to ear synteleithai; ten de therinen, kata to theros; homoios de kai kata tous loipous kairous tou etous tas autas thysias piptein. Touto gar hypelabon prosenes, kai kecharismenon einai tois theois. Touto d' allos ouk an dynaito genesthai, ei me hai tropai, kai hai isemeriai peri tous autous topous gignointo. To de kata selenen agein tas hemeras, toiouton esti; to akolouthos tois tes selenes photismois tas prosegorias ton hemeron ginesthai. apo gar ton tes selenes photismon hai prosegoriai ton hemeron katonomasthesan. En hei men gar hemerai nea he selene phainetai, kata synaloiphen neomenia prosegoreuthe; en hei de hemerai ten deuteran phasin poieitai, deuteran prosegoreusan; ten de kata meson tou menos ginomenen phasin tes selenes, apo autou tou symbainontos dichomenian ekalesan. kai katholou de pasas tas hemeras apo ton tes selenes photismaton prosonomasan. hothen kai ten triakosten tou menos hemeran eschaten ousan apo autou tou symbainontos triakada ekalesan.] _Propositum enim fuit veteribus, menses quidem agere secundum Lunam, annos vero secundum Solem. Quod enim a legibus & Oraculis praecipiebatur, ut sacrificarent secundum tria, videlicet patria, menses, dies, annos; hoc ita distincte faciebant universi Graeci, ut annos agerent congruenter cum Sole, dies vero & menses cum Luna. Porro secundum Solem annos agere, est circa easdem tempestates anni eadem sacrificia Diis perfici, & vernum sacrificium semper in vere consummari, aestivum autem in aestate: similiter & in reliquis anni temporibus eadem sacrificia cadere. Hoc enim putabant acceptum & gratum esse Diis. Hoc autem aliter fieri non posset nisi conversiones solstitiales & aequinoctia in iisdem Zodiaci locis fierent. Secundum Lunam vero dies agere est tale ut congruant cum Lunae illuminationibus appellationes dierum. Nam a Lunae illuminationibus appellationes dierum sunt denominatae. In qua enim die Luna apparet nova, ea per Synaloephen, seu compositionem [Greek: neomenia] id est, Novilunium appellatur. In qua vero die secundam facit apparitionem, eam secundam Lunam vocarunt. Apparitionem Lunae quae circa medium mensis fit, ab ipso eventu [Greek: dichomenian], id est medietatem mensis nominarunt. Ac summatim, omnes dies a Lunae illuminationibus denominarunt. Unde etiam tricesimam mensis diem, cum ultima sit, ab ipso eventu [Greek: triakada] vocarunt_.