Events, Verisoph

c. 10000 BCE Agriculture and the Neolithic Revolution 0 cit. People began farming crops like wheat and barley and herding animals instead of only foraging. Farming led to permanent settlements, food surpluses, population growth and the rise of cities. economy / technology ●●●●●

c. 10000 BCE Barter and the limits of direct exchange 0 cit. Before money, people swapped goods and services directly, but barter required a double coincidence of wants where each side had to want what the other offered. This friction pushed communities toward widely accepted goods that could stand in for value. economy / society ●●●●

c. 9000 BCE Cattle as an early store of value 0 cit. Herding societies used cattle and other livestock as a measure of wealth and a means of payment. The Latin word for money, pecunia, derives from pecus, meaning cattle. economy / society ●●●

c. 8001 BCE San rock art tradition begins 0 cit. San hunter-gatherers began producing rock paintings and engravings across the region that is now South Africa, a tradition that continued for thousands of years. The art depicts animals, hunting scenes, and trance rituals tied to San spiritual beliefs. The Drakensberg and Cederberg mountains hold some of the richest concentrations of this art. culture ●●

c. 8001 BCE Clay tokens and the birth of accounting in Sumer 0 cit. Farmers and temple officials in the Fertile Crescent used small shaped clay tokens to count sheep, grain, and jars of oil. Over thousands of years the tokens were sealed in clay envelopes and then pressed as marks on the surface, a path that led toward written numbers and writing itself. Counting goods, not doing pure mathematics, drove the first number records. economy / society ●●●

c. 8001 BCE Clay tokens count the first surpluses 0 cit. Long before writing, farmers and temple stores in the ancient Near East tracked grain, oil, and livestock with small shaped clay tokens, one token standing for one unit of goods. The archaeologist Denise Schmandt-Besserat argued this token system was the direct ancestor of writing and numbers, a reading that is widely cited but also contested by some scholars. economy / society ●●

c. 4500 BCE The ard plough 0 cit. Farmers used a simple scratch plough pulled by animals to break soil for planting. The plough raised crop yields and let fewer people feed more. economy / technology ●●●

c. 4004 BCE The Creation 0 cit. Ussher's chronology dates the creation of the world to 4004 BC, beginning on the evening before 23 October. This date stood in the margins of King James Bibles for two centuries. religion ●●●●●

c. 4004 BCE The Fall of Adam and Eve 0 cit. In the traditional chronology Adam and Eve eat the forbidden fruit and are expelled from Eden in the year of creation, 4004 BC. Ussher placed the Fall only days after the creation itself. religion ●●●●

c. 3874 BCE Birth of Seth 0 cit. Seth, third son of Adam, is born in 3874 BC in Ussher's reckoning, when Adam was 130 years old. Through Seth the tradition traces the line of patriarchs down to Noah. religion ●●

c. 3500 BCE The wheel 0 cit. The wheel and axle appeared first for pottery and then for wheeled carts. It transformed transport, trade and machinery. technology ●●●●●

c. 3500 BCE First Sumerian city-states rise in Mesopotamia 0 cit. The world's first cities such as Uruk formed independent city-states, each ruled by a king who claimed authority on behalf of the city's god. This linked political power to religious duty from the start. politics / society ●●●●●

c. 3301 BCE Writing is born from a bill of goods 0 cit. Accountants in Sumer sealed clay tokens inside hollow clay balls called bullae, then pressed the token shapes onto the outside so the contents could be read without breaking the ball. Marking the surface soon replaced the tokens entirely, and these impressed signs became early cuneiform. On this account the first writing was invented not for poetry or law but to record who owed what. culture / economy / technology ●●●

c. 3300 BCE Bronze metallurgy 0 cit. Smiths learned to alloy copper with tin to make bronze, a harder metal than either alone. Bronze tools and weapons defined an age and drove long distance trade in metals. technology ●●●●

c. 3201 BCE Invention of writing 0 cit. Scribes in Sumer develop cuneiform, the first full writing system, letting societies record law, trade, and memory beyond a single lifetime. Recorded history begins here. culture / technology ●●●●●

c. 3200 BCE Writing and cuneiform 0 cit. Sumerians pressed wedge shaped marks into clay tablets to record trade, laws and stories. Writing let knowledge outlast memory and is the foundation of recorded history. technology ●●●●●

c. 3200 BCE Temple and palace accounting economies 0 cit. Early Mesopotamian temples and palaces tracked stores of grain, livestock, and labor on clay tablets, one of the first uses of writing. These ledgers recorded credit and debt long before coins existed. economy / technology ●●●●

c. 3100 BCE The sail 0 cit. Boats fitted with sails used wind power to travel rivers and seas. Sailing opened long distance trade and exploration by water. technology ●●●

c. 3100 BCE Grain as a unit of account in Mesopotamia 0 cit. Sumerian temple and palace economies measured debts, wages, and rents in fixed quantities of barley. Grain served as a standard of value alongside weighed silver. economy / society ●●●

c. 3100 BCE Unification of Egypt under Narmer 0 cit. Narmer, also identified with Menes, is credited with unifying Upper and Lower Egypt into a single kingdom. This event marks the start of the First Dynasty and the pharaonic state. politics ●●●●

c. 3100 BCE Egyptian divine kingship under the first pharaohs 0 cit. With the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt, the pharaoh was treated as a living god and the sole link between the people and the divine order called maat. Royal power and religion became one system. politics / religion ●●●●●

c. 3017 BCE Translation of Enoch 0 cit. In Ussher's chronology Enoch is taken up by God in 3017 BC at the age of 365, without dying. Genesis records that he walked with God and was not, for God took him. religion ●●

c. 3001 BCE The Eye of Horus (Wadjet) is used in ancient Egypt as a protective symbol legendary 0 cit. Ancient Egyptians use the Eye of Horus, or Wadjet, a stylized human-falcon eye referencing the myth of Horus's eye lost and restored in battle with Set, as an amulet of protection, health, and royal power, commonly placed in tombs and worn as jewelry. culture / religion ●●

c. 3001 BCE Early herders spread through the northern drylands contested 5 cit. Pastoral Neolithic herders keeping cattle, sheep, and goats spread around Lake Turkana and the Rift from roughly five thousand years ago, well before the camel arrived. Linguists tie the earliest of these herders to Southern Cushitic speakers, which would make them the first Cushitic presence in the region. The herding sites are firmly dated, but the Cushitic label rests on language reconstruction and stays debated. economy / society ●●

c. 3001 BCE The First Herders Reach Lake Turkana 6 cit. The earliest domesticated animals in this part of Africa show up around Lake Turkana at the start of the Pastoral Neolithic. The people who brought cattle, sheep and goats also built the stone-pillar cemeteries that still stand near the lake. Archaeology dates the arrival of herding here to roughly 5,000 years ago, and later ancient-DNA work tied it to a population with northeast African, Afroasiatic-related ancestry. This is the physical trace of the first of the migration streams that oral history and language already described. science / society ●●●

c. 3001 BCE Kansyore ware and the limits of pots equal people contested 0 cit. Kansyore ware is the oldest pottery of the Lake Victoria basin, made over a long span by hunter-fisher-gatherers who did not farm. It is a plain warning against the shortcut that a new pottery style must mean a new farming people. Potting, herding, and language do not always travel together, so a ceramic tradition alone cannot prove a migration. Reading pots as ethnic markers stays a contested move. science / society ●●

c. 3000 BCE The Mesopotamian shekel and silver by weight 0 cit. The shekel began as a unit of weight, roughly eight grams of barley or silver, and became a standard for pricing goods and settling debts. Payments were made in weighed silver rather than in stamped coins. economy / society ●●●●

c. 2948 BCE Birth of Noah 0 cit. Noah is born in 2948 BC in the traditional chronology, 600 years before the Flood. He is the last of the ten patriarchs listed from Adam before the deluge. religion ●●

c. 2686 BCE Rise of the Old Kingdom of Egypt 0 cit. The Old Kingdom began with the Third Dynasty and centralized royal power at Memphis. It is known as the age of pyramid building, including the Great Pyramid of Giza. politics ●●●●

c. 2601 BCE Caral and the Norte Chico civilization 0 cit. In the coastal valleys north of present-day Lima, the Norte Chico or Caral-Supe society builds monumental platform mounds and sunken plazas. It is one of the oldest known civilizations anywhere and the oldest in the Americas, and it appears to have grown without pottery or clear signs of warfare, trading cotton and fish. Dates rest on radiocarbon work at Caral and remain approximate. culture / society ●●

c. 2501 BCE The Sumerians worship An, the sky father, head of the earliest pantheon 0 cit. Sumerian religion, among the oldest documented, placed An (later Akkadian Anu) as the sky god and ancestor of the gods. His name was written with the sign that also meant heaven and divinity itself. religion / society ●●●

c. 2501 BCE Enlil, lord of wind and storm, rules the Mesopotamian cosmos 0 cit. Enlil held the tablets of destiny and acted as the chief active god of the Sumerian and later Babylonian pantheon. His main temple, the Ekur at Nippur, was one of Mesopotamia's holiest sites. religion / society ●●

c. 2501 BCE Enki, god of water and wisdom, shapes humanity in Mesopotamian myth 0 cit. Enki, known to the Akkadians as Ea, governed fresh water, crafts, and cunning, and repeatedly rescued humankind in myth. He warns the flood hero in the Mesopotamian deluge stories. religion / society ●●

c. 2501 BCE Inanna, later Ishtar, is the goddess of love and war 0 cit. The Sumerian Inanna and her Akkadian counterpart Ishtar embodied both sexual love and battle, linked to the planet Venus. Her worship spread widely and influenced later Near Eastern and Greek goddess figures. religion / war ●●●

c. 2501 BCE Egyptian scribes audit the royal storehouses 0 cit. The pharaonic state ran on written inventories of grain, cattle, and labor kept by a trained class of scribes who counted goods in and out of royal and temple storehouses. Their work was checked by overseers, an early form of audit, and scribes held high status precisely because they controlled the records of wealth. economy / politics / society ●●

c. 2500 BCE Hacksilver and payment by weighed metal 0 cit. Traders cut silver objects and ingots into pieces and weighed them out to make payments. This use of bullion by weight bridged commodity money and later stamped coinage. economy ●●●

c. 2500 BCE Mesopotamian scribal schools (edubba) 0 cit. Sumerian temple and palace cities ran edubba, or tablet houses, where students learned cuneiform writing and arithmetic. These are among the earliest known formal schools, training scribes for administration and record keeping. culture / society ●●●

c. 2401 BCE Ra, the sun god, sails across the Egyptian sky 0 cit. Ra was the Egyptian sun god who traveled the heavens by day and the underworld by night. From the Old Kingdom on, pharaohs styled themselves sons of Ra, and the god merged with Amun as Amun-Ra. religion / society ●●●

c. 2401 BCE Horus, the falcon god, embodies Egyptian kingship 0 cit. Horus, son of Osiris and Isis, was depicted as a falcon or falcon-headed man and identified with the living pharaoh. His mythic struggle against Seth avenged his father and secured the throne. politics / religion ●●

c. 2401 BCE Egyptian obelisks are erected as solar monuments 0 cit. Ancient Egyptians erect tall, tapering, single-stone obelisks, typically in pairs before temple pylons, dedicated to the sun god Ra and inscribed with royal and religious texts. They were understood as petrified rays of sunlight and markers of divine kingship. culture / religion ●●

c. 2351 BCE Osiris rules the Egyptian underworld and judges the dead 0 cit. Osiris, god of the dead and rebirth, presided over the judgment of souls in the Egyptian afterlife. His green skin symbolized regeneration and the yearly return of vegetation. religion / society ●●●

c. 2351 BCE Isis, mother goddess and healer, gathers the Egyptian myths of magic 0 cit. Isis, wife of Osiris and mother of Horus, was revered for magic, healing, and devotion. Her image nursing the infant Horus became one of the most enduring in ancient art. culture / religion ●●●

c. 2351 BCE The Osiris death-and-resurrection cycle shapes Egyptian religion 0 cit. In the central Egyptian myth, Osiris is murdered by Seth, revived by Isis, and reborn to rule the dead while his son Horus takes the throne. The cycle tied kingship, farming seasons, and hope for an afterlife together. culture / religion ●●●

c. 2348 BCE Death of Methuselah 0 cit. Methuselah, the longest-lived patriarch at 969 years, dies in 2348 BC in Ussher's reckoning, the same year the Flood begins. The genealogy of Genesis 5 places his death in the flood year. religion ●●

c. 2348 BCE The Flood 0 cit. In Ussher's chronology the flood of Noah begins in 2348 BC and the ark comes to rest on the mountains of Ararat. The tradition records that Noah, his family, and the animals aboard the ark survive. environment / religion ●●●●

c. 2335 BCE Sargon of Akkad's standing army 0 cit. Sargon of Akkad built one of the earliest known standing professional armies, said to number 5,400 soldiers who ate at his table year-round rather than returning to farms between campaigns. This let him campaign continuously and hold together the first known empire spanning Mesopotamia. The exact figure comes from later Akkadian inscriptions and cannot be independently verified. politics / war ●●

c. 2334 BCE Founding of the Akkadian Empire 0 cit. Sargon of Akkad conquered the Sumerian city-states and built one of the earliest known empires in Mesopotamia. It united much of the region under a single ruler for the first time. politics ●●●●●

c. 2301 BCE Circumcision, ancient in northeast Africa 0 cit. Circumcision is very old in northeast Africa. A relief in the tomb of Ankhmahor at Saqqara, from around 2300 BCE, shows the operation being performed in Egypt. Scholars trace a long spread of the practice through the region, which places both the African initiation rite and the Hebrew covenant within one wide and ancient tradition rather than making either the source of the other. culture / religion ●●

c. 2247 BCE Tower of Babel 0 cit. The traditional chronology places the building of the tower of Babel and the confusion of tongues about 2247 BC, in the plain of Shinar. Genesis presents this as the origin of the world's languages and the scattering of the nations. religion / society ●●●

c. 2070 BCE Legendary founding of the Xia dynasty legendary 0 cit. Chinese tradition holds that Yu the Great founded the Xia around 2070 BCE, making it the first hereditary dynasty. No contemporary written records confirm it, so its existence remains debated. politics / society ●●●●

c. 2055 BCE Rise of the Middle Kingdom of Egypt 0 cit. Mentuhotep II reunified Egypt after the First Intermediate Period, founding the Middle Kingdom. The era saw expansion into Nubia and a flourishing of literature and art. politics ●●●

c. 2001 BCE The dying-and-rising god pattern recurs across the ancient world 0 cit. Several ancient religions told of a god who dies and returns, tied to the cycle of the seasons and crops. Osiris, Tammuz, and Dionysus are the most cited examples in comparative study. culture / religion ●●●

c. 2001 BCE Tammuz descends to the underworld and returns each year 0 cit. The Sumerian shepherd god Dumuzi, called Tammuz in Akkadian, spends part of the year in the underworld while Inanna mourns him. His return was linked to the seasonal revival of life. culture / religion ●●

c. 2001 BCE San rock art tradition at Twyfelfontein 0 cit. San hunter-gatherers produced thousands of rock engravings and paintings at Twyfelfontein in the Kunene region, a tradition spanning several thousand years. The San are the oldest known inhabitants of the region now called Namibia. The site remains one of the largest concentrations of rock art in Africa. culture ●●

c. 2000 BCE The spring equinox and the festivals of rebirth 0 cit. Across the ancient world the spring equinox brought festivals of renewal, fertility, and the return of life after winter. Easter sits within this long human pattern of marking spring, though the idea that it was simply borrowed whole from one pagan cult is usually overstated. culture / religion ●●

c. 1996 BCE Birth of Abraham 0 cit. Abraham is born in 1996 BC in Ussher's chronology, in Ur of the Chaldees in Mesopotamia. He becomes the ancestral figure of the covenant line in the biblical account. religion ●●●

c. 1921 BCE The Call of Abraham 0 cit. In Ussher's chronology Abraham leaves Haran for Canaan in 1921 BC at God's call, at the age of 75. Ussher counted 430 years from this call to the Exodus. religion ●●●●

c. 1901 BCE Inanna's descent maps the journey to the underworld 0 cit. The Sumerian poem of Inanna's descent tells how the goddess passes through seven gates into the land of the dead and is stripped of her powers, then returns. It is one of the oldest recorded underworld journeys. culture / religion ●●

c. 1900 BCE Erlitou Bronze Age culture unproven 0 cit. The Erlitou site shows a large urban settlement with palaces, bronze workshops, and social hierarchy. Some scholars link it to the Xia, though the connection is unproven. culture / society ●●●

c. 1897 BCE Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah 0 cit. The traditional chronology places the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in 1897 BC. Genesis records that Lot escapes the cities before fire falls on the plain. religion ●●●

c. 1896 BCE Birth of Isaac 0 cit. Isaac, the promised son of Abraham and Sarah, is born in 1896 BC in Ussher's reckoning, when Abraham was 100 years old. religion ●●●

c. 1894 BCE Babylon rises under the Amorite dynasty 0 cit. An Amorite dynasty makes the small town of Babylon on the Euphrates the seat of a kingdom. Over the next centuries it becomes the political and religious center of Mesopotamia and a name that would echo for millennia. politics / society ●●●

c. 1872 BCE The Offering of Isaac 0 cit. The tradition places Abraham's testing on Mount Moriah about 1872 BC, when he is commanded to offer Isaac and a ram is provided in his place. Later tradition identified Moriah with the temple mount in Jerusalem. religion ●●●

c. 1836 BCE Birth of Jacob and Esau 0 cit. The twins Jacob and Esau are born to Isaac and Rebekah in 1836 BC in Ussher's chronology. Jacob, later renamed Israel, becomes the father of the twelve tribes in the biblical account. religion ●●●

c. 1801 BCE Abraham and the patriarchal tradition 0 cit. The Hebrew Bible traces the Jewish people to the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to a covenant in which God promises Abraham descendants and the land of Canaan. These accounts are religious tradition rather than events established by outside evidence, and scholars debate whether the patriarchs were historical figures. The stories remain foundational to Jewish identity. culture / religion ●●

c. 1801 BCE Babylonian base-60 and the first place-value system 0 cit. Babylonian scribes wrote numbers in base 60 using just two cuneiform marks, and the value of a mark depended on its position, the first true place-value system. This is why an hour still has 60 minutes and a circle 360 degrees. Their early system had no symbol for zero, so a gap was left where a zero digit belonged, which could be ambiguous. economy / science ●●●

c. 1801 BCE Plimpton 322, a Babylonian table of number triples 0 cit. A cracked clay tablet lists rows of numbers that form what we call Pythagorean triples, sides of right triangles, more than a thousand years before Pythagoras. Scholars still argue over its purpose, whether it was a teaching aid, a table for surveying, or an early study of ratios. It shows the theorem's relationships were known and used long before any Greek proof. science ●●

c. 1800 BCE The alphabet 0 cit. Proto Sinaitic script reduced writing to a small set of signs for sounds rather than hundreds of symbols. This simple alphabet made literacy far easier to learn. technology ●●●●

c. 1800 BCE Babylonian base-60 math gives us the hour and the circle 0 cit. Old Babylonian mathematicians, inheriting Sumerian practice, count in base 60 (sexagesimal). This is the hidden root of the 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, and 360 degrees in a circle that the modern world still uses every day. culture / science ●●●●

c. 1760 BCE Jacob's Dream at Bethel 0 cit. In the traditional chronology Jacob flees to Haran about 1760 BC and dreams at Bethel of a ladder reaching to heaven. There the covenant promises are renewed to him. religion ●●

c. 1754 BCE The Code of Hammurabi sets prices in silver 0 cit. Hammurabi's law code fixed wages, fees, and penalties in weighed silver and grain. It shows a society using standardized value measures to regulate trade and debt. economy / politics ●●●

c. 1754 BCE Code of Hammurabi sets law under a king 0 cit. King Hammurabi of Babylon issued one of the earliest written law codes, presenting himself as chosen by the gods to bring justice. It tied the king's authority to the enforcement of written law. politics / society ●●●●

c. 1751 BCE Marduk rises to head the Babylonian pantheon 0 cit. As Babylon grew powerful under Hammurabi and after, its city god Marduk was elevated above the older Sumerian gods. He was credited with ordering the cosmos and holding the tablets of destiny. politics / religion ●●●

c. 1745 BCE Birth of Joseph 0 cit. Joseph, the eleventh son of Jacob, is born in 1745 BC in Ussher's reckoning, while Jacob served Laban in Padan-aram. religion ●●

c. 1729 BCE Joseph Sold into Egypt 0 cit. In the traditional chronology Joseph's brothers sell him to traders at Dothan about 1729 BC, at the age of 17. He is carried down to Egypt and sold as a servant. religion ●●●

c. 1715 BCE Joseph Governor of Egypt 0 cit. Ussher's chronology places Joseph's rise to power in Egypt in 1715 BC, after he interprets Pharaoh's dreams of seven years of plenty and seven of famine. He is set over the storehouses of the land. politics / religion ●●●

c. 1706 BCE Jacob's Descent into Egypt 0 cit. In Ussher's chronology Jacob and his household, seventy persons, go down into Egypt in 1706 BC during the famine. The Israelites remain in Egypt until the Exodus in the biblical account. religion ●●●

c. 1689 BCE Death of Jacob 0 cit. Jacob dies in Egypt in 1689 BC in the traditional chronology, at the age of 147, after blessing his twelve sons. His body is carried back to Canaan for burial at Machpelah. religion ●●

c. 1651 BCE Egyptian practical geometry and the Rhind Papyrus 0 cit. The scribe Ahmes copied an older text of 84 problems on fractions, areas, and the sharing of bread and beer, our main window into Egyptian mathematics. Egyptian geometry was practical, built for surveying flooded fields and raising pyramids rather than for abstract proof. Their approximation for the area of a circle implied a value of pi near 3.16. economy / science ●●●

c. 1650 BCE Rise of the Hittite Empire 0 cit. Hattusili I consolidated the Hittite state in central Anatolia with its capital at Hattusa. The Hittites became a major power rivaling Egypt and Babylon. politics ●●●●

c. 1645 BCE The Venus Tablet: the oldest planetary record 0 cit. Under King Ammisaduqa, Babylonian scribes record the risings and settings of Venus over 21 years. It is the earliest surviving record of systematic planetary observation, the seed of a science that would run for two thousand years. religion / science ●●●

c. 1635 BCE Death of Joseph 0 cit. Joseph dies in Egypt in 1635 BC in Ussher's reckoning, at the age of 110. Genesis closes with his request that his bones be carried up out of Egypt. religion ●●

c. 1601 BCE Egyptian medicine and the Edwin Smith papyrus 0 cit. The surviving papyrus, copied from a much older text, treats injuries by observation and prognosis rather than by magic alone. It shows early empirical medicine sitting side by side with spells and ritual. Historians caution against reading it as fully rational science; healing in Egypt mixed careful observation with religion. religion / science ●

c. 1600 BCE Founding of the Shang dynasty 0 cit. The Shang dynasty is the first Chinese dynasty confirmed by archaeological and written evidence, beginning around 1600 BCE. It was ruled by a line of kings across the North China Plain. politics / society ●●●●

1595 BCE The Hittites sack Babylon 0 cit. The Hittite king Mursili I raids down the Euphrates and sacks Babylon, ending the dynasty of Hammurabi. The Kassites later take the city and rule it for centuries. politics / war ●●

c. 1595 BCE The Enuma Anu Enlil: reading fate in the sky 0 cit. Babylonian priests compile the Enuma Anu Enlil, a vast series of celestial omens linking events in the heavens to the fate of kings and nations. It is the founding document of astrology, the belief that the sky foretells events on earth. religion / science ●●●●

c. 1571 BCE Birth of Moses 0 cit. Moses is born in Egypt in 1571 BC in Ussher's chronology, during the oppression of the Israelites. The tradition records that he is hidden in an ark of bulrushes and raised in Pharaoh's household. religion ●●●

c. 1551 BCE The Egyptian Book of the Dead guides souls through the afterlife 0 cit. The collection of spells known today as the Book of the Dead was written on papyri buried with the dead in the New Kingdom. It includes the weighing of the heart against the feather of Maat before Osiris. culture / religion ●●●

c. 1550 BCE Rise of the New Kingdom of Egypt 0 cit. Ahmose I expelled the Hyksos and founded the Eighteenth Dynasty, beginning Egypt's imperial age. The New Kingdom extended Egyptian power into the Levant and deep into Nubia. politics ●●●●

c. 1501 BCE The Vedic peoples worship Indra and the early Indo-Aryan gods 0 cit. The Rigveda praises gods such as the warrior Indra, the fire god Agni, and the sky god Dyaus, whose name shares a root with Zeus and Jupiter. These hymns record one of the oldest living religious traditions. culture / religion ●●●

c. 1501 BCE Creation myths across cultures order the world from chaos 0 cit. Many ancient cultures told creation stories in which order arises from a watery or formless chaos, as in the Babylonian Enuma Elish and the opening of Genesis. Scholars study these shared patterns in comparative mythology. culture / religion ●●

c. 1500 BCE to c. 500 BCE Vedic period begins 0 cit. Indo-Aryan peoples compose the Vedas, the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, beginning with the Rigveda. The rituals, hymns, and social order of this era form the deepest layer of Hindu tradition. culture / religion ●●●●

c. 1500 BCE Cowrie shells used as currency 0 cit. Cowrie shells circulated as money across parts of Asia, Africa, and the Pacific for millennia because they were durable, hard to counterfeit, and easy to count. Shang dynasty China used them widely, and the shells remained in use in some regions into the twentieth century. culture / economy ●●●

c. 1491 BCE The Exodus 0 cit. In Ussher's chronology the Israelites leave Egypt in 1491 BC after the ten plagues, crossing the Red Sea under Moses. This date stood in KJV margins as the traditional year of the Exodus. religion ●●●●●

c. 1491 BCE The Law Given at Sinai 0 cit. In the traditional chronology Moses receives the Ten Commandments and the Law at Mount Sinai in 1491 BC, in the third month after leaving Egypt. The covenant between God and Israel is sealed there in the biblical account. religion ●●●●

c. 1490 BCE The Tabernacle Erected 0 cit. The tabernacle, the portable sanctuary described in Exodus, is set up at Sinai in 1490 BC in Ussher's reckoning, one year after the departure from Egypt. religion ●●

c. 1490 BCE The Spies and the Forty Years 0 cit. In the traditional chronology twelve spies are sent into Canaan from Kadesh-barnea in 1490 BC. After their evil report Israel is sentenced to wander forty years in the wilderness. religion ●●

c. 1451 BCE Death of Moses 0 cit. Moses dies in the land of Moab in 1451 BC in Ussher's chronology, at the age of 120, after viewing Canaan from Mount Nebo. Joshua succeeds him as leader of Israel. religion ●●●

c. 1451 BCE Israel Enters Canaan 0 cit. In Ussher's chronology Israel crosses the Jordan under Joshua in 1451 BC and the walls of Jericho fall. The conquest of Canaan begins in the biblical account. religion / war ●●●●

c. 1426 BCE Death of Joshua 0 cit. Joshua dies about 1426 BC in the traditional chronology, at the age of 110, after dividing the land among the tribes. His death closes the conquest era in the biblical narrative. religion ●●