http://hbar.phys.msu.ru/gorm/fomenko/inewton.htm
A short chronicle From the First Memory of things in Europe to the Conquest of Persia by Alexander the great
By Sir Isaac Newton
The introduction
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 Generation so 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. Eratosphenes 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.
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 (in the life of Solon) Plutarch 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 myself 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 lo the daughter of Inachus into the Egyptian Isis, Chronologers made her husband Osiris or Bacchus and his mistress Ariadne as old as lo, and so feigned that there were two Ariadnes, one the mistress of Bacchus, and the other the mistress of Theseus, and two Minors their fathers, and a younger lo the daughter of Jass, 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 Eabius Pictor, the oldest historian of the Latines, lived an hundred years later than that King.
In Sacred History, the Adrian 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 Ctestas 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 Rhampstnitus, Maeris, Asychis and Psammiticus added magnificent porticos to that temple. And it is not likely that Memphis could be famous, before Homers 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 Maeris (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 to 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 Epopees 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 36 1/2 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.
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 fort of life, like the Tartars in the nothern 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, stregthened 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 brothe of Phoroneus and son of Inachus, Aegialeum, afterward 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, abolishe the Phoenician custom in Heliopolis of sacrificing men, and drives the Shepherds out of Abaris. By their acccess 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, Reigns in Laconia, and build Sparta.
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.
1045. Many of the Phoenicians and Syrians fleeing from Zidon and from David, come under the conduct of Cadmus, Cilix, Phoenix, Membliarius, Nycteus, Thases, 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 Attics 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.
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.
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.
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 licence 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 ashstanis 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 Latinos. Ammon takes Gezer from the Canaanites, and gives it to his daughter, Solomon's wife.
1007. Ceres being dead Eumolpus institutes her Mysteries in Eleusine. The Mysteries of Rhea are instituted in Phrygia, in the city Cybcle. 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.
989. Daedalus and his nephew Talus invent the saw, the turning-lath, the wimble, the chipax, 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.
983. Sisyphus, the son of Aeolus and grandson of Hellen, Reigns in Corinth, and some say that he built that city.
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 Caucases, 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 finging-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.
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-woman 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.
64. 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, TOY DIOC, the Sepulchre of Jupiter. Danaus with his daughters flying from his brother Egyptus (that is from Sesac) corner 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 Osris 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 fame 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 Diimagni majorum gentium, to whom the Earth and Planets and Elements are dedicated.
960. The war between the Lapithae and the people of Thessaly called Centaurs.
943. Evander and his mother Carmenta carry Letters into Italy.
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 middies 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 Nabonassae 316, and they will place the Argonautic expedition about 936 years before Christ. Gingris the son of Thoas slain, and Deified by the 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 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 Peloponnesiean 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.
904. Troy taken. Amenophis was still at Susa; the Greeks feigning that he came from thence to the Trojan war.
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.
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.
804. The war, between the Athenians and Spartans, in which Codrus, King of the Athenians, is slain.
794. The Ionic Migration, under the conduct of the sons of Codrus.
790. Pul founds the Assyrian Empire. 788. Alychis 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 Pelosiris invent Astrology in Egypt.
760. Semiramis begins to flourish. Sanchoniatho writes.
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.
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 Peloponnesin war, that is, 705 years before Christ.
697. The Corinthians begin firtst of any men to build ships with three orders of oars, called Triremes. Hitherto the Greeks had used long vessels of fifty oars.
673. The Jews conquered by Asserhadon, and Manasseh carried captive to Babylon.
635. The Scythians invade the Medes and Assyrians.
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.
611. Cyaxeres Reigns over the Medes.
610. The Princes of the Scythians slain in a feast by Cyaxeres.
607. Creon the first annual Archon of the Athenians. The second Messian war begins. Cyaxeres makes the Scythians retire beyond Colchos and Iberia, and seizes the Assyrian Provinces of Armenia, Pontus and Cappadocia.
600. Darius the Mede, the son of Cyaxeres, is born.
599. Cyrus is born of Mandane, the Sister of Cyaxeres, and daughter of Astyages.
588. The Temple of Solomon is burnt by Nebuchadnezzar. The Messenians being conquired, fly into Sicily, and build Messana.
572 Draco is Archon of the Athenians, and makes laws for them.
569. Nebuchadnezzar invades Egypt. Darius the Mede Reigns.
562. Solon, being Archon of the Athenians, makes laws for them.
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 Jeruselem, by the command of Darius.
515. The second Temple is finished and dedicated.
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.
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.
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.
336. Darius Codomannus Reigns.
332. The Persian Empire conquered by Alexander the great.
331. Darius Codomannus, the last King of Persia, slain.
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