The Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended. Isaac Newton

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СКАЧАТЬ twelve feigned names of Kings who did nothing, and thereby they have made its Founder Ægialeus, 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 Thermopylæ, take up 622 years, which is after the rate of 36½ 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 Thermopylæ. 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.

A SHORT

       Table of Contents

CHRONICLE

       Table of Contents

      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, Bœon, Apachnas, Apophis, Janias, Assis, &c. untill the days of Eli and Samuel. They fed on flesh, and sacrificed men after the manner of the Phœnicians, 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, Idumæa, Syria, and Libya; and under Lelex, Æzeus, Inachus, Pelasgus, Æolus 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. Hæmon the son of Pelasgus Reigns in Thessaly.

      1080. Lycaon the son of Pelasgus builds Lycosura; Phoroneus the son of Inachus, Phoronicum, afterwards called Argos; Ægialeus the brother of Phoroneus and son of Inachus, Ægialeum, 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 Phœnician 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 Prœtus, 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 Lacedæmon 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 Idumæa 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 Erythræa into that of Phœnicia, give the name of Phœnicians to themselves, and that of Phœnicia to all the sea-coasts of Palestine from Azoth to Zidon. And hence came the tradition of the Persians, and of the Phœnicians themselves, mentioned by Herodotus, that the Phœnicians came originally from the Red Sea, and presently undertook long voyages on the Mediterranean.

      1047. Acrisius marries Eurydice, the daughter of Lacedæmon and Sparta. The Phœnician 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 Phœnicians and Syrians СКАЧАТЬ