The Urantia Book Fellowship

Study Timeline For Part III of
The Urantia Book
With Related Historical Information

David Kantor

This timeline is intended to serve as an index for further study, to be used with Google, Wikipedia, or other web-based search and/or research services.  Words and phrases in the timeline are intended to be used as keywords for searches in other resources.

Number references such as 23:4.6 refer to Paper, Section, and Paragraph of the Uversa Press edition of The Urantia Book.  There may be conflicting information in this timeline; many dates are matters of ongoing controversy.  Urantia Book dates are used for calibration.  This is a work in progress and subject to change and revision.  

 

Years BC

  • 2,000,000
    • “Pleistocene” epoch of planetary evolution has begun
    • First North American glaciation
  • 1,500,000
    • Second period of glaciation
  • 1,000,000
    • Urantia registered as inhabited planet
    • Birth of Andon and Fonta; Migrated north to get away from inferior simian tribes; routes east blocked by Tibetan land elevation, south and west blocked by Mediterranean Sea which extended eastward to the Indian Ocean  62:0.1-2
    • Life Carriers relinquish planetary sovereignty
    • Third glacial advance
  • 990,000
    • Continuing dispersion of Andonites
  • 983,323
    • Onagar and the development of the first high spiritual civilization on the planet
  • 950,000
    • Scattering of Foxhall descendants of Andon and Fonta 64:1.6
  • 900,000
    • Foxhall tribes settled in England and southern France. 64:2.3
    • Emergence of the Heidelberg race
    • Badonan tribes
  • 850,000
    • Appearance of Neanderthal races as a result of Badonan near extermination of inferior stocks. The Neanderthal races dominated the world until the times of the migration of the Sangik races. 64:3.5;  64:4.1; 64:4.10-11
  • 750,000
    • Fourth glacial advance 61:7.2; 64:4.4
  • 700,000
    • Fourth glacier (greatest of all in Europe) retreating; reforestation of northern regions in process.
  • 650,000
    • Mild interglacial period 64:4.8
  • 600,000 
    • Ice begins fifth excursion
  • 500,000
    • Appearance of the Sangik races 64:5.1-3; 61:7.4
    • Fifth glacial advance
    • Arrival of Planetary Prince
    • Origin of Primary Midwayers 66:4.10; 77:1.5
    • Population of planet approx 500,000,000
      61:7.4; 66:0.1-2; 66:3.1; 66:7.9-16; 92:4.5
    • First evidence of habitation in Egypt – Abu Simbel area
  • 350,000
    • Fantad and the cultural zenith of the green race
  • 300,000
    • Yellow race established in China
    • Earliest Mousterian tools found in European Neanderthal sites
  • 298,000
    • Headquarters of Orange race at Megiddo
  • 250,000
    • Sixth and last period of glaciation begins; period of greatest snow deposition on the northern ice fields. 61:7.6
  • 200,000
    • Outbreak of Lucifer rebellion
    • Van and Amadon near Lake Van
    • Appearance of the pre-Sumerian Nodites
    • During the “seven crucial years” following outbreak of rebellion, loyalist dwellings guarded by midwayers; loyal cherubim and seraphim, with the aid of three faithful midwayers, assumed custody of the tree of life. 
    • After the fall of Dalamatia, disloyal staff migrated to the north and the east.  Their descendants were known known as the Nodites, and their dwelling place as “the land of Nod.”
    • Followers of Van early withdrew to the highlands west of India. Van created 10 commissions; 144 loyal Amadonites joined Van and Amadon.  These were Andonite supporters of the Prince’s staff – some modified, some not – who reproduced and furnished leadership for the world down through the long, dark postrebellion era.  Van scattered leadership groups abroad in the world – outposts of civilization consisting of Andonite admixed with the Sangik races – especially the blue men, and with the Nodites.
  • 199,838
    • Tidal wave destroys Dalamatia 67:5.4; possibilities: catastrophic failure at strait of Hormuz, typhoon, tsunami
  • 199,500
    • European Old Stone Age (Paleolithic)
  • 190,000
    • Practically all the gains of the Prince's administration have been effaced. Only among the Nodites and the Amadonites is there persistence of the traditions of Dalamatia and the culture of the Planetary Prince. The pure-line Nodites are a magnificent race, but they gradually mingle with the evolutionary peoples of earth, and before long great deterioration has occurred. 73:1.2; 77:2.9
  • 150,000
    • Maximum incursion of sixth glaciation; global sea levels approximately 120 meters lower than today; exposed continental shelves world-wide.
    • 67:7.3:  "By fifty thousand years after the collapse of the planetary administration, earthly affairs were so disorganized and retarded that the human race had gained very little over the general evolutionary status existing at the time of Caligastia's arrival three hundred and fifty thousand years previously. In certain respects progress had been made; in other directions much ground had been lost."
    • Approximate time of first attempt to build the tower of Babel. 77:3
    • Four great Nodite centers. 77:4
  • 100,000
    • Begin formation of polar ice caps
    • Extinction of orange race
    • Singlangton
  • 90,000
    • Artifacts from Blombos Cave, South Africa
    • Oldest indication of habitation in the Hrazdan gorge northeast of Lake Van
  • 85,000
    • Occupation of Jebel Faya, United Arab Emirates
  • 83,000
    • Bering land bridge connects Asia and North America
  • 80,000
    • Andonite migrations west across Greenland
    • Ordos culture in Asia
  • 70,000
    • Shanidar cave, Zagros Mountains, Neanderthal skeletons—possibly indicating the southernmost Neanderthal migration. Approximate time of Toba volcanic eruption on Sumatra; 192 cubic miles of ash injected into atmosphere, global temperature drop of 20 degrees F., regeneration of retreating ice fields.
  • 78,000
    • Early civilizations taking root in Mexico, Central America and South America
  • 64,000
    • Onamonalonton in California
  • 50,000
    • Fauresmithian culture in Africa
    • Jabroudian culture in Middle East
    • Ngandong culture in Asia
  • 44,000
    • Climatic oscillations extending to at least 25,000 BC. Pollen samples from the Northeast Aegean Sea show a series of high frequency vegetation changes; intervals of steppe vegetation are interspersed with phases of forest-steppe and sometimes steppe-forest vegetation.  Precipitation levels oscillated leading to phases of high lake levels and contraction of arboreal populations.
  • 43,000
    • A period of relatively stable and low sea levels supported coastal expansion of modern humans throughout much of Southeast Asia, enabling them to reach the coasts of northeast Russia and Japan by 36,000 BC.
  • 38,000
    • Eastern Nodites have become largely Sangik but are maintaining a superior civilization in Iran; continue for some 10,000 years. 77:4.4
  • 34,000
    • Ksar Akil in Lebanon
  • 35,914
    • Arrival of Adam and Eve
    • Search: " M9 Genetic Marker"; also, "Y-DNA haplogroup K."  The M9 mutation can be traced back to a single male located somewhere in western Asia about 35,000 years ago. 
  • 35,800
    • Serapatatia assumes leadership of western Nodite confederation; see Robert Bedosian's article
  • 35,797
    • Collapse of Edenic regime and migration of Adam and Eve to Mesopotamia -- Second Garden; functioned as "cradle of civilization" for almost 30,000 years, up until approximately 5,800 BC;
    • The culture of the second garden persisted on down until about 15,000 BC, but it experienced a steady decline until the regeneration of the Sethite priesthood and the leadership of Amosad inaugurated a brilliant era. The massive waves of civilization which later spread over Eurasia immediately followed the great renaissance of the Garden consequent upon the extensive union of the Adamites with the surrounding mixed Nodites to form the Andites who emerged circa 27,000 BC.
  • 35,794
    • Adamson migrates north to the southern Caspian region.  The Adamsonites maintained a high culture for almost 7,000 years from the times of Adamson and Ratta. Later on they became admixed with the neighboring Nodites and Andonites and are also included among the "mighty men of old." And some of the advances of that age persisted to become a latent part of the cultural potential which later blossomed into European civilization. 77:5.9
  • 35,785
    • Birth of Seth and subsequent development of Sethite priesthood  76:3.4
  • 35,518
    • Death of Adamson 77:5.7
  • 35,403
    • Death of Eve
  • 35,384
    • Death of Adam
  • 35,000
    • The Urantia Book notes this time as the "termination of the great ice age" and the approximate beginning of the Holocene or postglacial period.  61:7.18
    • Adamson founds his center of civilization at one of the easternmost of the old Vanite settlements. 77:4.13
  • 33,000
    • Blue race pervades the European continent, but there are many other racial types present. 80:3.2 Search: Cro-Magnon
    • Chatelperronian culture, central and south western France and northern Spain; included both Neanderthal and modern types until 27,000 BC
  • 32,000
    • Submergence of the first Garden of Eden site. 73:7.1
    • Aurignacian culture in Europe and south-west Asia until 21,000 BC
  • 30,000 to 10,000
    • Epoch-making racial mixtures taking place throughout southwestern Asia. The highland inhabitants of Turkestan are a virile and vigorous people. To the northwest of India much of the culture of the days of Van persists. Still to the north of these settlements the best of the early Andonites have been preserved. And both of these superior races of culture and character were absorbed by the northward-moving Adamites. 78:3.4
    • Szeletian culture, central and eastern Europe
    • Aterian culture in Africa
    • Stillbavan culture in Africa
    • Emirian culture in west Asia
    • Sen-Doki culture in south east Asia
  • 28,000
    • Extinction of Fandors 66:5.6
    • Decline of the Adamsonite culture 77:5.9
  • 27,000 to 2,000
    • Appearance of the Andites; See Paper 78, section 4; Papers 79, 80.
    • For over 25,000 years, on down to nearly 2000 BC, the heart of Eurasia was predominantly, though diminishingly, Andite. In the lowlands of Turkestan the Andites make the westward turning around the inland lakes into Europe, while from the highlands of this region they infiltrated eastward. Eastern Turkestan (Sinkiang) and, to a lesser extent, Tibet, are the ancient gateways through which these peoples of Mesopotamia penetrated the mountains to the northern lands of the yellow men. The Andite infiltration of India proceeded from the Turkestan highlands into the Punjab and from the Iranian grazing lands through Baluchistan. 79:1.1
  • 26,000
    • Gravettian culture primarily in France but with evidence of Gravettian products across central Europe and Russia; until 20,000 BC
  • 25,000 to 15,000
    • Beginning of primary Adamite migrations; Racial distributions, associated with extensive climatic changes, set the world stage for the inauguration of the Andite era of civilization. 78:3.9
    • Chief center of Adamite culture was the second garden, located in the triangle of the Tigris and Euphrates—the cradle of Occidental and Indian civilizations.
    • Secondary or northern center of the violet race was the Adamsonite headquarters, situated east of the southern shore of the Caspian Sea near the Kopet mountains.
    • Pre-Sumerians and other Nodites in Mesopotamia near the mouth of the rivers who maintained cultural elements from the ancient days of Dalamatia; they eventually became thoroughly admixed with the Adamites to the north, but they never entirely lost their Nodite traditions.
    • Andonites maintained five or six representative settlements to the north and east of the Adamson headquarters; also scattered throughout Turkestan with isolated islands throughout Eurasia, especially in the mountainous regions.  They still held the northlands of the Eurasian continent but no longer the European plains or Asian river valleys. 78:1.5
    • Pre-Dravidian India represented a completely mixed racial stock maintained civilization at a bit higher level than surrounding areas. 78:1.9
    • The Saharan civilization consisted of the most progressive settlements  of the indigo race in what is now the great Sahara desert.
    • In the Mediterranean basin lived the most highly blended race outside of India; blue men from the north and Saharans from the south met and mingled with Nodites and Adamites from the east. 78:1.11
  • 23,000
    • As the purer elements of the Adamites penetrated northward, they became less and less Adamic until, by the times of their occupation of Turkestan, they became thoroughly admixed with the other races, particularly the Nodites. Very few of the pure-line violet peoples ever penetrated far into Europe or Asia. 78:3.3
    • The earliest Andite peoples took origin in the regions adjacent to Mesopotamia and consisted of a blend of the Adamites and Nodites. 78:4.2
    • Between the rivers of Mesopotamia in southwestern Asia there existed the potential of a great civilization, the possibility of the spread to the world of the ideas and ideals which were salvaged from the days of Dalamatia and the times of Eden. 78:1.12
    • For almost 20,000 years the Andonites have been pushed farther and farther to the north of central Asia by the Andites. 80:9.6
    • Karain Cave, Anatolia
  • 22,000
    • Date mentioned in the Taiteriya Samhita, most ancient of the Vedic hymns; dated by the calculation of vernal equinox cycles provided in the hymn.
  • 20,000
    • The population of western India has already become tinged with the Adamic blood, and never in the history of Urantia did any one people combine so many different races. As it developed, the red race is destroying himself in the Americas, the blue race is disporting himself in Europe, and the early descendants of Adam (and most of the later ones) exhibited little desire to admix with the darker colored peoples, whether in India, Africa, or elsewhere.  79:2.3
    • Pavlovian culture, central and eastern Europe
  • 19,500
    • Sea levels approximately 120 meters lower than today; period of maximum global cooling associated with the last glaciation.
  • 19,000
    • The Adamites are a real nation numbering 4,500,000 and already they have poured forth millions of their progeny into the surrounding peoples. 78:2.5
    • Solutrean culture in eastern France, Spain and England
  • 18,000
    • Yellow River and Yangtze River cultures thriving
  • 16,000
    • Sethite priests enter India 79:3.4
    • Magdalenian culture from Portugal north to Poland, until 8,000 BC
  • 15,000 
    • Period of early Adamite migrations ends; Andite migrations begin 78:3.9, 78:3.5
    • Increasing population pressure throughout Turkestan and Iran provoke the first really extensive Andite movement toward India. For over fifteen centuries Andites poured in through the highlands of Baluchistan, spreading out over the valleys of the Indus (Sarasvati) and Ganges and slowly moving southward into the Deccan. 79:2.4
    • The Chinese are aggressive militarists; they have not been weakened by an overreverence for the past, and numbering less than 12,000,000, they formed a compact body speaking a common language. 79:6.9
    • As the period of the early Adamic migrations ends, there are already more descendants of Adam in Europe and central Asia than anywhere else in the world, even than in Mesopotamia. The European blue races have been largely infiltrated. Russia and Turkestan are occupied throughout their southern stretches by a great reservoir of the Adamites mixed with Nodites, Andonites, and red and yellow Sangiks. Southern Europe and the Mediterranean fringe are occupied by a mixed race of Andonite and Sangik peoples—orange, green, and indigo—with a sprinkling of the Adamite stock.  Asia Minor and the central-eastern European lands are held by tribes that are predominantly Andonite. 78:3.5
    • A blended colored race, about this time greatly reinforced by arrivals from Mesopotamia held forth in Egypt and prepared to take over the disappearing culture of the Euphrates valley.  The Saharan civilization had been disrupted by drought and that of the Mediterranean basin by flood. The peoples of India lay stagnant. 78:3.6
    • It is the great climatic and geologic changes in northern Africa and western Asia that terminate the early migrations of the Adamites, barring them from Europe by the expanded Mediterranean and diverting the stream of migration north and east into Turkestan. (Mediterranean, Black Sea, and Caspian Sea connected; Mediterranean and Red Sea connected) By the time of the completion of these land elevations and associated climatic changes civilization has settled down to a world-wide stalemate except for the cultural ferments and biologic reserves of the Andites still confined by mountains to the east in Asia and by the expanding forests in Europe to the west. 81:1.2.
    • Continuing rise in sea levels world-wide until 4,000 BC along with rising land masses as the weight of the ice diminishes; water levels in the Caspian Sea were as much as 50 m above present levels with fresh water overflowing into the Black Sea. 
  • 13,000
    • The Andites traversing the pass of Ti Tao and spreading out over the upper valley of the Yellow River among the Chinese settlements of Kansu. They penetrated eastward to Honan where the most progressive settlements were situated.  79:7.1
    • The Alpine forests spread extensively. The European hunters driven to the river valleys and to the seashores by climatic changes turning world's hunting grounds into dry and barren deserts. These great and relatively sudden climatic modifications drove the races of Europe to change from open-space hunters to herders, and in some measure to fishers and tillers of the soil.  80:3.8
    • Further biologic retrogression. During the previous hunting era the superior tribes intermarried with the higher types of war captives and unvaryingly destroyed those deemed inferior. As they establish settlements and engaged in agriculture and commerce, they begin to save many of the mediocre captives as slaves. The progeny of these slaves subsequently greatly deteriorate the whole Cro-Magnon type. This retrogression of culture continued until it received a fresh impetus from the east when the final and en masse invasion of the Mesopotamians swept over Europe, quickly absorbing the Cro-Magnon type and culture and initiating the civilization of the white races about 10,000 B.C. 80:3.9
  • 12,500
    • Rapid warming and moistening of climates; the Persian Gulf today has an average depth of only 40 m.  Much of the Persian Gulf today would have been dry land 20,000 years ago with a marshy Tigris/Euphrates river emptying into the Indian ocean at the Strait of Hormuz
  • 12,000
    • The ancestors of the Japanese people are driven off the mainland, dislodged by a powerful southern-coastwise thrust of the northern Chinese tribes. Their final exodus is not so much due to population pressure as to the initiative of a chieftain whom they came to regard as a divine personage. 79:6.3
    • The climatic destruction of the rich, open grassland hunting and grazing grounds of Turkestan compels the men of those regions to resort to new forms of industry and crude manufacturing. Some turn to the cultivation of domesticated flocks, others became agriculturists or collectors of water-borne food, but the higher type of Andite intellects chose to engage in trade and manufacture. It even becomes the custom for entire tribes to dedicate themselves to the development of a single industry. From the valley of the Nile to the Hindu Kush and from the Ganges to the Yellow River, the chief business of the superior tribes is the cultivation of the soil, with commerce as a side line. 81:3.1;
    • Three quarters of the Andite stock of the world is resident in northern and eastern Europe, and when the later and final exodus from Mesopotamia takes place, 65 per cent of these last waves of emigration enter Europe. 78:5.4
    • A “brilliant” tribe of Andites migrates to Crete. This is the only island settled so early by such a superior group, and it is almost 2,000 years before the descendants of these mariners spread to the neighboring isles. This group is the narrow-headed, smaller-statured Andites who have intermarried with the Vanite division of the northern Nodites. They are all under 6 feet in height and have been literally driven off the mainland by their larger though inferior fellows. These emigrants to Crete are highly skilled in textiles, metals, pottery, plumbing, and the use of stone for building material. They engage in writing and carry on as herders and agriculturists. 80:7.2
  • 11,500
    • Climates at least as warm and moist as today.
  • 11,000
    • Deterioration of Sethite teachings in India
    • Climate: “Older Dryas” cold phase lasting several hundred before a partial return to warmer conditions.
    • Ahrensburg culture, central and eastern Europe
  • 10,000
    • Descendants of Adamson settle in Greece 80:7.3
    • Earliest identified sites in north-eastern Caspian region
    • Dawn of the era of independent cities; cities were surrounded by zones of agriculture and cattle raising.
    • The widespread use of metals a feature of this era of the early industrial and trading cities. You have already found a bronze culture in Turkestan dating before 9,000 B.C., and the Andites early learned to work in iron, gold, and copper, as well. There were no distinct periods, such as the Stone, Bronze, and Iron Ages; all three existed at the same time in different localities. The discovery of mixing copper and tin to make bronze was made by one of the Adamsonites of Turkestan whose highland copper mine happened to be located alongside a tin deposit. 81:3.3
    • The Andite stock has been absorbed. 79:2.6
    • Civilization of the white races initiated 80:3.9
    • Second attempt to build the tower of Babel by the mixed races of the Andites (Nodites and Adamites)
    • The blending of the Andite conquerors of India with the native stock eventually results in that mixed people called Dravidian. The earlier and purer Dravidians possessed a great capacity for cultural achievement, which is continuously weakened as their Andite inheritance becomes progressively attenuated. This composite stock immediately produced the most versatile civilization then on earth. 79:3.1
    • The Chinese people begin to build cities and engage in manufacture subsequent to the climatic changes in Turkestan and the arrival of the later Andite immigrants. The infusion of this new blood did not add so much to the civilization of the yellow race as it stimulated the further and rapid development of the latent tendencies of the superior Chinese people. 79:7.5
    • Begin rapid rise in sea levels from -94 to-75 meters below present; begin reflooding of the Persian Gulf with continuation of rising global sea level.
    • Europe north of the Mediterranean largely covered by tundra-steppe and boreal forests. The late Glacial record of vegetation and climate suggests that major changes in hunter-gatherer population density might have occurred across Europe and Asia as a result of extreme climate fluctuations. 
    • Sea levels in Aegean and Ionian Seas approximately 60 meters less than today.
    • Epigravettian culture in Europe
    • Ibero-maurusian and Sebilian cultures in Africa
    • Lupembian culture in Africa
    • Kebarian and Athlitian cultures in the Middle East
  • 9,600
    • Plato’s dialogs indicate a catastrophic failure of the Strait of Gibraltar in an earthquake approximately this date.  This coincides with sedimentation studies that would place the event circa 10,000 BC.
  • 9,500
    • Oldest identified walls at Jericho
    • Projected time frame for origin of Indo-European language family (within Anatolian farming communities).  The main competing theory to the Anatolian farmer theory is that these languages originated 6000 years ago among nomadic Kurgan horsemen sweeping down from the Russian Steppes.
    • Search: "Did Indo-European Languages Spread Before Farming?"
    • Gobekli Tepe in Turkey
  • 9,000
    • Period of climatic changes in Turkestan region; rate of sea level rise slows with possible temporary continental ice accumulation; stepwise onset of cold, dry “Younger Dryas.”
    • The widespread use of metals is a feature of this era of the early industrial and trading cities. [81:3.4]
    • Development of towns based on smelting and mining in the south-western Caucasus valley
    • Evidence of settlement at Jericho; Ein as-Sultan spring settlement
    • Magosian culture in Africa
    • Khandivili culture in Asia
  • 8,000-6,000
    • The last three waves of Andites poured out of Mesopotamia. These three great waves of culture are forced out of Mesopotamia by the pressure of the hill tribes to the east and the harassment of the plainsmen of the west. The migratory conquests of the Andites continue on down to their final dispersions. As they poured out of Mesopotamia, they continuously deplete the biologic reserves of their homelands while markedly strengthening the surrounding peoples. And to every nation to which they journeyed, they contributed humor, art, adventure, music, and manufacture They are skillful domesticators of animals and expert agriculturists. Their presence usually improves the religious beliefs and moral practices of the older races. And so the culture of Mesopotamia quietly spread out over Europe, India, China, northern Africa, and the Pacific Islands. 78:6.1; 78:5.8
    • These migrating peoples carried with them plants and domesticated animals precipitating the Neolithic agricultural revolution, westward into Europe, and eastward into the regions which are now Iran and India.
    • Soon after 8,000 BC sedentary communities and domestic plants and animals began to appear in many areas of South-west Asia. These domesticates and allied agricultural economies were to prove both successful and adaptable to the extent that within centuries of their first appearance they had spread far outside the Fertile Crescent. By 7,000 BC farmers in Greek Thessaly were subsisting on cultivated emmerwheat and barley as well as domestic cattle and pigs from this region.
    • The slowly increasing aridity of the highland regions of central Asia begin to drive the Andites to the river bottoms and the seashores. This increasing drought not only drove them to the valleys of the Nile, Euphrates, Indus and Yellow Rivers, but it produced a new development, a new class of men, the traders. 79:1.3
    • Early Egyptians (evidence at Nabta Playa) imported goats and sheep from southwest Asia by the end of the 7th millenium.
    • Sea levels continue to rise
  • 79:1.4
    • Climatic changes drove Andites from hunting into Urban development
    • Massive inland floods in northern hemisphere resulting from continuing warming
    • Capsian culture in Africa
  • 7,500
    • Earliest evidence of habitation at Çatal Höyük, Turkey
    • Carahunge observatory near Lake Van (This is minimum age; there are viable estimates of a much older age.)
  • 7,250
    • Cayonu,  eastern Anatolia; domesticated sheep, goats, dogs; mother goddess figurines.  Hallan Cemi, Nevali; Çatal Höyük the largest settlement in the near east.
  • 7,040
    • Hacilar, southern Anatolia; evidence of domesticated wheat, barley, and lentils.
  • 7,000
    • Climates warmer and often moister than today, 7,000 BC – 6,200 BC.
    • Dominant vegetation in Europe north of the Mediterranean has changed to mixed deciduous forests.
    • Ganjdareh, Zagros mountains
    • Mehrgarh, Balochistan (Some studies date initial settling of Mehrgarh at 9,000 BC)
    • Neolithic farming begins to spread across Europe from the Near East, primarily northwestward along the Danube-Rhine axis.
    • Breakthrough of Littorina Sea to the North Sea, inundating many coastal lowlands and Mesolithic sites at the mouths of rivers and bays.
    • Wiltonian culture in Africa
    • Jomon culture in Asia
  • 7,000 to 6,000
    • Ancestors to the Nordic races: The whole inhabited world, outside of china and the Euphrates region, had made very limited cultural progress for 10,000 years when the hard-riding Andite horsemen made their appearance in the sixth and seventh millenniums before Christ. As they moved westward across the Russian plains, absorbing the best of the blue race and exterminating the worst, they became blended into one people. These are the ancestors of the so-called Nordic races, the forefathers of the Scandinavian, German, and Anglo-Saxon peoples. 80:4.5
    • The Dravidians are among the earliest peoples to build cities and to engage in an extensive export and import business, both by land and sea. Camel trains make regular trips to distant Mesopotamia; Dravidian shipping is pushing coastwise across the Arabian Sea to the Sumerian cities of the Persian Gulf and is venturing on the waters of the Bay of Bengal as far as the East Indies. An alphabet, together with the art of writing, is imported from Sumeria by these seafarers and merchants. 79:3.7
  • 6,500
    • Spiritual decline of Andites
    • Çatal Höyük mother goddess shrine
    • Halaf, northern Syria
    • Re-flooding of English Channel
  • 6,300
    • Samarra pottery dated to 6,300 found in central Mesopotamia
  • 6,200
    • Sudden cool and dry phase lasting about 200 years, about half-way as severe as the “Younger Dryas.”
    • Djeitun culture, Kopet Dagh
  • 6,000
    • Most of the glacial melt has been completed; Sea levels roughly the same as today but extensive silting from rivers has placed many ancient settlements a few to tens of kilometers inland.  Ireland separated from the British Isles.  This is the warmest period of the past 125,000 years.
    • Increasing desiccation of the Sahara; West African tropical monsoon belt shifts southwards.
    • Earliest detected habitation at Ugarit
    • Origin of the Sumerians: The pressure of Akkadian and Assyrian invasions from the north drove the inhabitants out of Mesopotamia.  When this last Andite dispersion broke the biologic backbone of Mesopotamian civilization, a small minority of this superior race remained in their homeland near the mouths of the rivers. These were the Sumerians. They were largely Andite in extraction, though their culture was more exclusively Nodite in character, and they clung to the ancient traditions of Dalamatia. The Sumerians of the coastal regions were the last of the Andites in Mesopotamia. 78:8.1; 77:4.7
    • Earliest known habitation of Tehran, Iran; Search: Rhages; nearby mountain named after the goddess of fertility, Anahita.
    • The last dispersion of Andites in the Occident was rapid and gave them dominance because of their use of horses. 80:4.4
    • Hamoukar, northern Syria
    • Hassuna, northern Mesopotamia; mother goddess figurines, domesticated sheep, goats, pigs chipped stone hoes, grinding stones, domesticated grains.
    • Catal Huyuk, Anatolia; The best preserved Neolithic village so far uncovered.  The large, 32-acre site, first occupied shortly before 6000 B.C., contains some of the most advanced features of Neolithic culture: pottery, woven textiles, mud brick houses, shrines honoring a mother goddess, and plastered walls decorated with murals and carved reliefs.
    • Human occupation of Mesopotamia seems to reach back farthest in time in the north (Assyria), where the earliest settlers built their small villages some time around 6000 bc. The prehistoric cultural stages of Hassuna-Samarra and Halaf (named after the sites of archaeological excavations) succeeded each other here before there is evidence of settlement in the south (the area that was later called Sumer). There, the earliest settlements, such as Eridu, appear to have been founded around 5000 BC, in the late Halaf period. From then on the cultures of the north and south move through a succession of major archaeological periods that in their southern forms are known as Ubaid, Warka, and Protoliterate (during which writing was invented), at the end of which—shortly after 3000 BC—recorded history begins. The historical periods of the 3rd millennium are, in order: Early Dynastic, Akkad, Gutium, 3rd Dynasty of Ur; those of the 2nd millennium: Isin-Larsa, Old Babylonian, Kassite, and Middle Babylonian; and those of the 1st millennium: Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, Achaemenian, Seleucid, and Parthian. (Encyclopedia Britannica)
    • Politically, an early division of the country into small independent city-states, loosely organized in a league with the centre in Nippur, was followed by a unification by force under King Lugalzagesi (c. 2375–2350 bc) of Uruk, just before the Akkadian period. The unification was maintained by his successors, the kings of Akkad, who built it into an empire, and—after a brief interruption by Gutian invaders—by Utu-hegal (c. 2116–c. 2110 bc) of Uruk and the rulers of the 3rd Dynasty of Ur (c. 2112–c. 2004 bc). When Ur fell, around 2000 bc, the country again divided into smaller units, with the cities Isin and Larsa vying for hegemony. Eventually Babylon established a lasting national state in the south, while Ashur dominated a similar rival state, Assyria, in the north. From the 1st millennium bc onward, Assyria built an empire comprising, for a short time, all of the ancient Middle East. This political and administrative achievement remained essentially intact under the following Neo-Babylonian and Persian kings down to Alexander’s conquest (331 bc).
    • Neolithic sites in Egypt have been dated to this time. (Faiyum A culture)
    • Megarth settlement, Indus Valley
    • Aiteriya Brahmana, Vedic hymn; dated according to celestial cycles described in the hymn
    • Climate: Climates generally slightly warmer and moister than today, 6,000 BC – 2,500 BC.
    • First settlements at Nineveh
  • 5,800
    • Ertebolle culture in Denmark and southern Sweden; Search also Altrasket
  • 5,600
    • Continuing rise in sea levels results in overflow from the Aegean Sea into the Black Sea basin, raising it more than 20 m to present levels. 
  • 5,500
    • Tartaria tablets – Romania; Vinca culture in Serbia; these tablets contain inscriptions which predate the earliest known Sumerian script, Minoan writing, and Egyptian hieroglyphs.
    • Samarra, upper Mesopotamia; The Samarran culture was the precursor to the Mesopotamian culture of the Ubaid period. Samarra is now one of  the largest archaeological sites in the world.
    • Pre-historic Ubaid culture; In the period 5500–4000 B.C., much of Mesopotamia shared a common culture, called Ubaid after the site where evidence for it was first found.
    • Pre-dynastic Chalcolithic period in Egypt; domesticated animals, cereal grains.
    • Begin desertification of north Africa with migration of Saharan peoples into southern Egypt.
  • 5,400
    • Founding of Eridu.  Eridu is the earliest known city in southern Mesopotamia, founded circa 5,400 BCE. Located seven miles (12 km) southwest of Ur, Eridu was the southernmost of a conglomeration of Sumerian cities that grew about temples, almost in sight of one another. In Sumerian mythology, Eridu was founded by the Sumerian deity Enki, later known by the Akkadians as Ea. Soundings of temple complex at Eridu indicate at least 18 layers of construction.
    • Babylonian texts also talk of the creation of Eridu by the god Marduk as the first city, "the holy city, the dwelling of their [the other gods] delight".  The Urantia Book coorelates Marduk with Adam.  
    • Tell (mound) of Ubaid near Ur in southern Iraq has given its name to the prehistoric culture which represents the earliest settlement on the alluvial plain of south Mesopotamia. The Ubaid culture has a long duration beginning before 5000 BC and lasting until the beginning of the Uruk Period. In the mid 5th millennium BC the Ubaid culture spread into northern Mesopotamia replacing the Halaf Culture. The Ubaid culture is characterized by large village settlements and the appearance of the first temples in Mesopotamia.
  • 5,300
    • Hasunna-Samarra period, 5,300 BC – 5,020BC, middle Tigris/Euphrates region in northern Iraq; also Halaf culture
    • Begin Ubaid (Eridu) period in Mesopotamia—last remnant of Mesopotamian Andite culture; high water tables in southern Iraq; Eridu on shores of Persian Gulf of those times. Connection with Samarran culture in the north; inhabitants pioneered the growing of grains in extreme conditions of aridity. An understanding of the rise of complex cultures in southwest Asia should begin with the Ubaid Period which falls chronologically between the origins of agriculture and the rise of urbanism. During the Ubaid a new social order was evolving in southern Mesopotamia and the Susiana Plain (Elam) of SW Iran out of which emerged complex societies with a centralized state structure. During the fifth millennium BC Ubaid culture spread northward up the Tigris-Euphrates drainage as far west as Cilicia and the Amuq. This foreshadows a similar expansion of what has been interpreted as Uruk trading colonies or enclaves established to obtain essential raw materials lacking in the alluvial plain. 
  • 5,000 to 3,000
    • Period of severe flooding in Mesopotamia.; highest average global temperatures of the post-glacial period 1 to 2 degrees Celsius more than today. The Nile river had three times the volume of the present-day river.
    • For thousands of years after the submergence of the first Eden the mountains about the eastern coast of the Mediterranean and those to the northwest and northeast of Mesopotamia continued to rise. The elevation of the highlands was greatly accelerated and this, together with greatly increased snowfall on the northern mountains, caused unprecedented floods each spring throughout the Euphrates valley. These spring floods grew increasingly worse so that eventually the inhabitants of the river regions were driven to the eastern highlands. For almost 1,000 years scores of cities were practically deserted because of these extensive deluges. With the later diminution of these floods, Ur became the center of the pottery industry. Ur was on the Persian Gulf, the river deposits having since built up the land to its present limits. 78:7.2; 78:8.2
    • Alacahoyuk, Alisar, Canhasan, and Beyesultan rise as main settlements in Anatolia
  • 5,000
    • Anau culture, Turkmenistan; evidence of west-to-east migrations through the region.
    • Evolving white races dominant throughout all of northern Europe including northern Germany, northern France and the British Isles.  Central Europe is controlled by the blue race and the round-headed Andonites. [80:5.8; 80:9.1]
    • The three purest strains of Adam's descendants are in Sumeria, northern Europe, and Greece. The whole of Mesopotamia is being slowly deteriorated by the stream of mixed and darker races which filtered in from Arabia. And the coming of these inferior peoples contributed further to the scattering abroad of the biologic and cultural residue of the Andites. 80:7.9
    • A host of progressive Mesopotamians moved out of the Euphrates valley and settled upon the island of Cyprus; this civilization was wiped out about 2,000 years later by barbarian hordes from the north. 80:7.10
    • Begin Merimde cultural period in Egypt; primary site at the edge of the western delta; clear signs of links to Palestine. Also El Omari and Maadi cultures in lower Egypt.  In upper Egypt Tasian, Badarian, Amratian, and Gerzean cultures developed. There are clear contacts between Badarian and Syrian cultures.  Gerzean culture evolved into the foundations for dynastic Egypt.  Gerzean culture was a further development of Amratian.  There are clear links to Mesopotamia in the Gerzean. Distinctly foreign objects and art forms entered Egypt during this period, indicating contacts with several parts of Asia, Mesopotamia, and Asia Minor.  In addition, Egyptian objects are created which clearly mimic Mesopotamian forms, although not slavishly. Cylinder seals appear in Egypt, as well as recessed paneling architecture, the Egyptian reliefs on cosmetic palettes are clearly made in the same style as the contemporary Mesopotamian Uruk culture, and the ceremonial mace heads which turn up from the late Gerzean and early Semainean are crafted in the Mesopotamian "pear-shaped" style, instead of the Egyptian native style.
    • Archaeoastronomical stone megalith in Nabta Playa, world's earliest known astronomy.
    • The Andites of Turkestan are the first peoples to extensively domesticate the horse and this is another reason why their culture is for so long predominant.  Mesopotamian, Turkestan, and Chinese farmers begin the raising of sheep, goats, cows, camels, horses, fowls, and elephants. They employed as beasts of burden the ox, camel, horse, and yak. 81:2.8
    • Peoples raising horses also developed wagons and chariots used in commerce and war. 81:3.6
    • The reckoning of time by the 28 day month persisted long after the days of Adam. The Egyptians undertook to reform the calendar with great accuracy, introducing the year of 365 days. 77:2.12
    • Extensive trade contacts; Saharan dwellers had imported domesticated animals from Asia between 6,000 and 4,000 BC.
    • Conjectured earliest phase of occupation at Eridu
    • Nippur; for thousands of years the religious center of Mesopotamia, where Enlil, the supreme god of the Sumerian pantheon, created mankind. Although never a capital city, Nippur had great political importance because royal rule over Mesopotamia was not considered legitimate without recognition in its temples. Thus, Nippur was the focus of pilgrimage and building programs by dozens of kings including Hammurabi of Babylon and Ashurbanipal of Assyria. Despite the history of wars between various parts of Mesopotamia, the religious nature of Nippur prevented it from suffering most of the destructions that befell sites like Ur, Nineveh, and Babylon. The site thus preserves an unparalleled archaeological record spanning more than 6,000 years -- from 5,000 BC until about 800 AD in the Islamic era. The city, with its many temples, government buildings, and important family businesses, was probably more literate than other towns, and the scribes have left thousands of Sumerian and Akkadian documents written on clay tablets. Included among this extraordinary body of texts are the oldest versions of literary works, such as the Gilgamesh Epic and the Creation Story.
    • Continental shorelines similar to today; maximum post-glacial marine incursion inland followed by subsequent siltation of river valleys and deltas.
  • 4,800
    • Ubaidians established settlements in the region to be known later as Sumer; these settlements gradually developed into the chief Sumerian cities, namely Adab, Eridu, Isin, Kish, Kullab, Lagash, Larsa, Nippur, Babylon, Erech, and Ur. Several centuries later, as the Ubaidian settlers prospered, Semites from Syrian and Arabian deserts began to infiltrate, both as peaceful immigrants and as raiders in quest of booty. After about 3250 BC, another people migrated from its homeland, located probably northeast of Mesopotamia, and began to intermarry with the native population. The newcomers, who became known as Sumerians, spoke an agglutinative language unrelated apparently to any other known language.   Search: Al-Ubaid
    • “Middle Ubaid” period; extensive canal networks
    • Namazga sequence; largest known prehistoric site on the Kopet Dagh
  • 4,500
    • Settlements in the Anau delta, Kopet Dagh; herders of domesticated animals, farming. (Search: Anau North)
    • Holocene thermal optimum
    • Classic Ubaid period; intense and rapid urbanization with Ubaid culture spreading into northern Mesopotamia replacing the Halaf culture.
    • Tel Hamoukar, urban center in northern Mesopotamia
  • 4,000
    • Transition from Ubaidain culture to culture of Uruk;  Uruk is important in the study of early Sumerian civilization.  It is the likely region and time  in which much agricultural domestication took place. Oldest mention of Dilmun is in clay tablets recovered at Uruk in the temple of Inanna. (Early Uruk Period until 3,500 BC)
    • Earliest known use of cuneiform script in Mesopotamia, evolved from earlier pictograms; over time used by Akkadians, Eblaites, Elamites, Hattic, Hittite, Hurrian, Luwian, Sumerian, and Urartian peoples to record their varying spoken languages.
    • Earliest known use of papyrus in Egypt
    • Sippar; ancient Sumerian city with two halves; one half dedicated to the Sun God (Utu in Sumerian, Shamash in Akkadian), and one half to the goddess Anunit. (Adam and Eve)
    • Reference to Saraswati (Eve) in the Golden Radiance Sutra; in the Vedic system, Saraswati is the goddess of knowledge, music, and the arts.  She is considered the consort of Brahma, the god of creation.  Saraswati's children are the Vedas, which are the oldest sacred texts of Hinduism.  She is also referred to as Shonapunya, a Sanskrit word meaning ‘one purified of blood’.  In Bhurma, where she is still worshipped today, she is known as Thuyathadi, the patroness of literature, books, libraries and students. She is traditionally represented sitting on the back of Hintha, a mythical sacred bird, and with a pile of books in her hands.
    • Conjectured founding of Susa, one of the oldest known settlements in Mesopotamia
    • Mesopotamian trade contacts with Syria, Arabia
    • Kura-araxes culture, Caucasus, eastern Anatolia
    • Pre-dynastic Amratian period in Egypt; Nakada I
  • 3,900
    • Climate: Sudden and short-lived cold phase with continuing climatic deterioration in western Europe and the Sahara
    • Transition to agriculture in southern Scandinavia and southern Baltic coast region
  • 3,500
    • Complex city-states emerging in northern Mesopotamia; (Late Uruk Period until 3,200 BC)
    • First evidence of a potter’s wheel being used, Sumer
    • Earliest occupation of Ebla in Syria
    • Begin pre-Dynastic period in Egypt; Nakada II; Gerzean; note that this period is not continuous with the Amratian; these were different peoples and during this period their cultural practices somewhat merged, forming the foundations of the later dynastic periods.
    • Nomadic Yamna culture in Ukraine
  • 3,200
    • Kot Diji culture, Balochistan
    • Kestel tin mine, Taurus mountains, Anatolia
    • Mesopotamian trade contacts with Egypt (Jemdet Nasr Period)
  • 3,100
    • Gilal Refiam, Golan Heights
    • End of pre-dynastic Egypt; Unification of upper and lower Egypt under Narmer, begin Pharaonic period; 1st Egyptian dynasty until 2,890 BC; hieroglyphic writing system fairly well developed.
    • Advanced drainage systems constructed in the Indus valley.
  • 3,000 to 2,000
    • Cooling trend in global temperatures with significant drops in sea levels.
  • 3,000
    • For almost 20,000 years the Andonites had been pushed farther and farther to the north of central Asia by the Andites.  By 3,000 BC increasing aridity drove the Andonites back into Turkestan. This Andonite push southward continued for over 1,000 years and, splitting around the Caspian and Black seas, penetrated Europe by way of both the Balkans and the Ukraine. 80:9.6
    • Melchizedek receivers petition Most Highs of Edentia for help
    • First mention of Dilmun in Sumerian cuneiform tablets, found in the temple of the goddess Innana in the city of Uruk.  Dilmun is also described in the epic story of Enki and Ninhursag as the site at which the Creation occurred. Ninlil, the Sumerian goddess of air and south wind had her home in Dilmun. It is also featured in the Epic of Gilgamesh, and has been speculated to be the true location of the Garden of Eden. To date (2008) archaeology has failed to find a site in existence from 3300 B.C.(Uruk IV) to 556 B.C.(Neo-Babylonian Era) when Dilmun (Telmun) appears in texts.
    • Sumer and Akkad, early dynastic period at Uruk; 3,000 BC – 2340 BC
    • Troy I Culture, 3,000 to 2,500 BC
    • Early Minoan I
    • Gonur Depe, Turkmenistan
    • First indications of a cult of Osiris in Gerzean culture in Egypt.  (Greek language, also Usiris; the Egyptian language name is variously transliterated Asar, Aser, Ausar, Ausir, Wesir, Usir, Usire,or Ausare).
    • Silk route between Egypt and China connects a growing international trade network.
    • In India, Amari peoples from Sind migrate to northern Kachchh area; possible precursors of later Harappan culture.
    • Oldest evidence of ship building in Egypt.
    • Altyn-Depe, Turkmenistan near Asgabat.
  • 2,900
    • Severe flooding at Shuruppak, with sediments in southern Iraq extending as far north as Kish and as far south as Uruk; return of heavy rains to Nineveh area; Karun river changes course to run into the Tigris.
    • Likely beginning of the first dynasty at Kish following extensive local flooding in Mesopotamia. (Early Dynastic Period of Sumerian civilization until 2,334 BC)
    • Uruk largest city in the world, 50,000 to 80,000 residents. 
  • 2,890
    • 2nd Egyptian dynasty until 2,686 BC
  • 2,800
    • Stonehenge
    • Rujm El-hiri
    • Period of European Megalith sites
    • First Sumerian ruler of historical record, Etana, king of Kish
    • Early historic phase of "Indus Valley Civilization" -- Harappan culture; artifacts indicate trade between Indus Valley and Egypt.
    • Catacomb culture in Ukraine replaces earlier nomadic Yamna culture
  • 2,700
    • Rule of Gilgamesh (Bilgames) in Uruk; he became the central character in the Epic of Gilgamesh which sas that his mother was Ninsun (Rimat Ninsun), a goddess.  Gilgamesh is described as two-thirds god and one-third human. He and his son are credited with rebuilding the sanctuary of the goddess Ninlil, located in a sacred quarter of her city, Nippur.  He is credited with having been a demigod of superhuman strength who built a great city wall to defend his people from external threats. Oldest known version of subsequent Gilgamesh Epic is circa 2050 BC.
    • Minoan culture was flourishing and continued to do so until 1,450 BC
    • Construction of the Temple of Enlil in Nippur. Search: Enlil, Tablets of Destiny
  • 2,686
    • Begin 3rd dynasty in Egypt, until 2,613 BC (Begin “Old Kingdom” until 2,181 BC)
  • 2,613
    • Begin 4th dynasty in Egypt, until 2,494 BC
  • 2,600
    • Indus Valley Civilization flourishing with urban centers at Harappa, Ganeriwala, Mohenjo-daro (in Pakistan) and Dholavira, Kalibangan, Rakhigarhi, Rupar, and Lothal (in India). Search: Indus Valley Civilization; Search also: Indus-Saraswati Civilization
    • Construction of advanced sewage systems at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro in the Indus valley.
  • 2,650
    • Fourth Egyptian Dynasty
  • 2,600
    • Great pyramid built in Egypt
  • 2,500
    • Final absorption of the Andites; the second Andite penetration of India was the Aryan invasion during a period of almost five hundred years in the middle of the third millennium before Christ. This migration marked the terminal exodus of the Andites from their homelands in Turkestan. 79:4.1
    • Sahara fully desiccated
    • Troy II, 2,500 to 2,000 BC
    • Namazga-depe and Altyn-depe; two cities of the central Kopet Dagh
    • First Dynasty of Ur
    • Fifth Dynasty in Egypt
    • Rise of Indus (Saraswati) River civilization
    • Development of compound bow and chariot warfare techniques in Asia Minor
    • By the time of the establishment of the rule of Hammurabi the Sumerians had become absorbed into the ranks of the northern Semites and the Mesopotamian Andites passed from the pages of history. 78:8.10
    • The westward thrust of the Andonites reached Europe. And this overrunning of all Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, and the Danube basin by the barbarians of the hills of Turkestan constituted the most serious and lasting of all cultural setbacks up to that time. These invaders definitely Andonized the character of the central European races, which have ever since remained characteristically Alpine. The Mediterranean coastlands did not become permeated by the Andites until the times of these great nomadic invasions. Land traffic and trade were nearly suspended during these centuries when the nomads invaded the eastern Mediterranean districts. This interference with land travel brought about the great expansion of sea traffic and trade; Mediterranean sea-borne commerce was in full swing. And this development of marine traffic resulted in the sudden expansion of the descendants of the Andites throughout the entire coastal territory of the Mediterranean basin.  80:9.7; 80:9.9
    • Hattian civilization emerges in Turkestan; for some 1,500 years Anatolia was known as "the land of Hatti." (Akurgal, Hattian and Hittite Civilizations, pg 4). The Hittite god Telipinu and his wife Hatepinush came from the Hattians, as well as the Hittite legends of Illuyankas and Telipinu.  See "The Myth of the Moon God Who Fell From the Sky."
    • First written mention of Isis in Egypt; ancient Egyptians believed that the Nile River flooded every year because of her tears of sorrow for her dead husband, Osiris. This occurrence of his death and rebirth was relived each year through rituals. Fifth dynasty.
  • 2,494
    • Begin 5th dynasty in Egypt until 2,345 BC
  • 2,400
    • Civilization in Europe, the Levant and China under assault by barbarian horsemen from the Eurasian Steppes
    • Hurrians move south, expanding from the foothills of the Caucasus; cultural ancestors of the Mittanians
    • Harbor at Lothal, India constructed; oldest known seafaring harbor in the world.
  • 2,350
    • Sargon the Great unifies Sumerian City-states; Sargon founded a new capital, called Agade, in the far north of Sumer and made it the richest and most powerful city in the world. The people of northern Sumer and the conquering invaders, fusing gradually, became known ethnically and linguistically as Akkadians. The land of Sumer acquired the composite name Sumer and Akkad.
    • Akkadian domination of Mesopotamia; Akkad dynasty, Sargonic Period, 2,350 to 2,150
  • 2,345
    • Begin 6th dynasty in Egypt until 2,181 BC
  • 2,255
    • During the reign of Sargon’s grandson, Naram-Sin (about 2255-2218 BC), the Gutians, a belligerent people from the Zagros Mountains, sacked and destroyed the city of Agade. They then subjugated and laid waste the whole of Sumer. After several generations the Sumerians threw off the Gutian yoke. The city of Lagash again achieved prominence, particularly during the reign of Gudea (circa 2144-2124 BC), an extraordinarily pious and capable governor. Because numerous statues of Gudea have been recovered, he has become the Sumerian best known to the modern world. The Sumerians achieved complete independence from the Gutians when Utuhegal, king of Erech (reigned about 2120-2112 BC), won a decisive victory later celebrated in Sumerian literature.
  • 2,200
    • Troy III - V; 2,200 BC to 1,800 BC
    • Bactria-Margiana complex in Turkestan; in the Avesta, Margiana is mentioned as one of Ahuramazda’s special creations and called ‘the strong, holy Mouru.  In Hindu, Parsi, and Arab traditions, Margiana is identified with an ancient Paradise.
    • The tribes belonging to the Indo-European language group which we now call the Hittites began to arrive in Anatolia between 2,200 and 2,000 BC.  The Nessians were Indo-European peoples who became the Hittites after taking over the Hattian culture in central Anatolia.  Between 2,000 and 1,700 BC, having lived sometimes in peace and sometimes at war with the native principalities such as the Hattians, the Hurrians, and the Kadka folk, they founded the state that we term the Old Hittite Kingdom at the beginning of the 16th century BC.  The cuneiform of the Hittites is of a type older than that used by the Assyrians in Anatolia during the same time period.  From a typological standpoint the cuneiform of the Hittites is derived from a variety of script that must belong to the 3rd Dynasty of Ur preceding Old Babylon (2150 to 2050 BC). For this reason it is disputed whether the Hittites acquired their cuneiform before coming to Anatolia or afterwards. 
    • Begin period of severe drought in northern Africa and southwest Asia lasting until 2,150 BC.  In Egypt this drought likely contributed to the collapse of the Old Kingdom as well as the Akkadian empire in Mesopotamia.
  • 2,181
    • Begin 7th and 8th dynasties in Egypt until 2,173 BC (Begin First Intermediate Period until 2,040 BC)
  • 2,160
    • Begin 9th and 10th dynasties in Egypt until 2,133 BC; pharaohs in Herakleopolis Magna consolidated lower Egypt; rival line at Thebes reunited upper Egypt; 2,055 BC Theban forces defeated the Heracleopolitan pharaohs, reuniting the two regions.
  • 2,154
    • “Guti Interregnum” in Mesopotamia
  • 2,133
    • Begin 11th dynasty in Egypt until 1,991 BC
  • 2,120
    • Liberation of Sumer [by whom?]
  • 2,112
    • Begin 3rd dynasty of Ur until 2,004 BC
  • 2,100
    • Deterioration of culture in Egypt
    • Increasing use of bronze for tools of war in Mesopotamia
    • Hattian-Hittite Fuedal Period in Turkestan, 2,100-1,700
    • Indo-European tribes begin raids into central Anatolia
  • 2,083
    • Conquest of Akkad by the Gutians from the Zagros mountains; begin "dark age" in Mesopotamia until circa 2050
  • 2,050
    • Earliest version of Gilgamesh Epic
    • Beginning of Middle Kingdom in Egypt until 1,786 BC
    • Beginning of neo-Sumerian period in Mesopotamia
  • 2,040
    • Begin “Middle Kingdom” period in Egypt during 11th dynasty
  • 2,025
    • First Babylonian Empire; 2,025 BC – 1,887 BC, Isin-Larsa Period, Dynasty of Larsa (Amorite) until 1,863 BC; Dynasty of Isin (Sumero-Akkadian) until 1,887 BC
    • Amorites found Old Assyrian Kingdom; until 1,365 BC.
  • 2,000 to 1,500
    • Short warming trend in global temperatures followed by another cooling period.
  • 2,004
    • Ur, weakened by Amorite invasions, falls to the Elamites
  • 2,000
    • Suites and Guites assault Mesopotamia
    • Marked decline in population centers and material cultural development in the Kopet Dagh. Namazga-depe and Altyn-depe abandoned.
    • Lower Murghab agricultural development based on improvements in irrigation technology. There is evidence that until the second millennium BC many of the groups in southern Turkestan developed a more sophisticated cultural tradition, based on hunting and fishing, cereal grain gathering and the simple herding of domesticates, than that of the groups from farther north.
    • Decline in trade over the Silk Route due to climate changes and nomadic invasions from the north.
    • Final disappearance of the Violet race from the Second Garden homeland in Mesopotamia. 78:0.2
    • Trojan culture at Troy
    • Saraswati River in the Indus valley begins to dry up; desertification of the Thar region begins.
    • Emergence of Hurrians, Canannites, Assyrians, Kassites and Elamites in northern Mesopotamian border regions
    • Assyrian accounts describe about 60 different tribes and small kingdoms and about 100 cities in the area around Lake Van, referred to as “People of the Nairi” 
    • Mt. Sinai is intermittently active as a volcano, occasional eruptions occurring as late as the time of the sojourn of the Israelites in this region. 96:1.11
    • Seismic activity between 2,000 BC and 1,700 BC causes the source of the Saraswati river—the “river of the Vedas”--to change course; major population shift from the river valley into the Ganges basin.
  • 1,998
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from lower Mesopotamia region, June 1
  • 1,996
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from Jericho, October 4
  • 1,994
    • Begin Old Babylonian Period, Dynasty 1 of the Amorites
  • 1,991
    • Begin 12th dynasty in Egypt until 1,786 BC
  • 1,988
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from upper Nile and lower Mesopotamia
  • 1,973
    • Arrival of Machiventa Melchizedek
    • Covenant with Abraham
    • Hittites carry Melchizedek teachings to descendants of Adamson near Lake Van
  • 1,949
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from lower Mesopotamia
  • 1,900
    • Assyrian trade colonies in Anatolia; Gold and Silver were bases of exchange. Gold was 8 times more valuable than silver. 70 kilos of copper were the equivalent of 1 kilo of silver. 1 kilo of iron was worth 40 kilos of silver, or 5 kilos of gold. 
  • 1,883
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible in central Mesopotamia region, September 15
  • 1,879
    • Departure of Machiventa Melchizedek
  • 1,858
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible in eastern Mediterranean, May 15
  • 1,800
    • Epic of Gilgamesh and Epic of Creation written
    • Hittite imperial state in Anatolia
  • 1,792
    • Hammurabi, 1,792 BC to 1,750 BC
  • 1,786
    • Begin 13th  through 17th dynasties in Egypt (about 70 kings during this period --  “Second Intermediate” period until 1,539 BC)
  • 1,750
    • Conquest of Assyria; Hammurabi of Babylon reunites Sumerian city-states; Begin Old Babylonian Kingdom
    • Hattusas built as Hittite capitol.
  • 1,715
    • Assyrian independence
  • 1,700
    • Hyksos domination of Egypt; capital at Memphis; upper Egypt still under control of Theban-based rulers.
    • Continuing barbarian invasions of Europe and the Levant
    • Rig Veda compiled; It is one of the oldest extant texts of any Indo-European language. Philological and linguistic evidence indicate that a widely scattered collection of Vedic hymns was compiled in the north-western region of the Indian subcontinent, roughly between 1700–1100 BC (the early Vedic period). There are strong linguistic and cultural similarities with the early Iranian Avesta, deriving from the Proto-Indo-Iranian times, often associated with the early Andronovo (Sintashta-Petrovka) culture of ca. 2200-1600 BC.  Historian N.J. Rajaram places their conversion to written form circa 3,500 BC or 4,000 BC. 
    • Enuma Elish 
  • 1,630 to 1,600
    • Reign of Hittite King Mursilis I; destroying Babylon, he caused the end of the dynasty of Hammurabi. Hittite kingdom becomes the leading power in the near east.
    • Beginning of Mycenaean period in Greece
    • Beginning of Mitannian state in Levant, founded by the Hurrians; Mitanni gradually grew from the region around Khabur valley and became the most powerful kingdom of the Near East in c.1450-1350 BC. By the thirteenth century BC all of the Hurrian states had been vanquished by other peoples. The heart of the Hurrian lands, the Khabur river valley, became an Assyrian province. It is not clear what happened to the Hurrian people at the end of the Bronze Age. Some scholars have suggested Hurrians lived on in the country of Subartu north of Assyria during the early Iron Age. The Hurrian population of Syria in the following centuries seems to have given up their language in favor of the Assyrian dialect of Akkadian or, more likely, Aramaic. This was around the same time that an aristocracy speaking Urartian, similar to old Hurrian, seems to have first imposed itself on the population around Lake Van, and formed the Kingdom of Urartu.
    • The question of Indo-Aryan cultural influences, or even a ruling aristocracy, among the Hurrians is an ambiguous issue. Early scholars (Belardi, Burrow, Kammenhuber, Lesný) were convinced the Hurrians were dominated by an elite of foreign rulers. These foreigners spoke an Indo-Iranian language from Central Asia related to Avestan and even more closely related to Vedic Sanskrit (for example, the word for "one" in this language was aika, similar to Sanskrit eka vs. Avestan aeva). They introduced the cremation of their dead, and introduced the use of the horse and chariot in the battlefield — a situation that has obvious similarities to the events in northern India at about the same time. While this foreign aristocracy eventually abandoned their language in favor of that of their Hurrian subjects, they retained Indo-Iranian names, they invoked Vedic gods in some of their treaties, and some words from their Indo-Iranian language survived as loanwords in Hurrian, particularly technical terms related to horses and their training. The state of Mitanni, itself believed to be an Indo-Aryan word, was connected with the Indo-Aryan culture. Most rulers of Mitanni seem to have had Indo-Aryan names, and the ruling aristocracy was called maryanni, meaning "young warrior" in Sanskrit marya.
    • Hittite "Old Kingdom" period, 1660-1460
    • Kassite dynasty; 1,600 BC – 1,100 BC; Agarguf
  • 1,620
    • Approximate time of eruption of Thera in the Aegean sea; a resulting 100 meter high tsunami devasted the north coast of Crete.
  • 1,595
    • Hittites sack Babylon
  • 1,570
    • Period of Kassite dominance in Babylon until 1,225 BC
  • 1,550
    • Phoenician maritime trading culture develops and spreads across the Mediterranean; Phoenicians used a city-state form of political organization.
  • 1,539
    • Begin “New Kingdom” period in Egypt, 18th dynasty; Ahmose I completed the conquest and expulsion of the Hyksos and reunited the country, expanding Egyptian power to Canaan and Nubia.
  • 1,500 to 750
    • Continued temporary cool period causing renewed ice growth in continental and alpine glaciers with a sea level drop of 2 to 3 meters below today’s levels.
  • 1,500
    • The greatest power in the Middle East after Egypt was the Hurrian state of Mitanni; shortly replaced by the Great Kingdom of the Hittites.
    • Mitanni conquest of Mesopotamia
    • During this time period the western coast of India submerged some 40 feet into the Arabian sea.  In the 1980s the city of Dwarka, thought to date back at least to 3,000 BC -- mentioned in the Mahabharata as the birth place of Lord Krishna -- was discovered in its present submerged state. 
    • Earliest examples of the pre-Classical form of Sanskrit, Vedic Sanskrit, with the language of the Rigveda being the oldest and most archaic stage preserved, its oldest core dating back to as early as 1500 BCE.  Rigvedic Sanskrit is one of the oldest attestation of any Indo-Iranian language, and one of the earliest attested members of the Indo-European language family.
    • Andronovo cultural complex; increased domestication of animals and exploitation of crop domestication.
    • Confederation between the kingdoms of Hayasa and Azzi near Lake Van
  • 1,490
    • Tuthmosis III in Egypt
  • 1,475
    • Hittite kingdom develops in Anatolia; Hittite "Great Kingdom" period, 1460-1190
  • 1,465
    • Growth of major cities in Egypt -- Memphis and Thebes
  • 1,450
    • Decline of Minoan civilization
  • 1,400
    • Ugarit palace archives -- tablets discovered containing epic cycles dealing with gods, kings and heroes which echo earlier Mesopotamian myths
  • 1,380
    • Ikhnaton (Amenhotep IV) in Egypt
    • Suppiluliumas I in Anatolia; Suppiluliumas was the most powerful commander of the Hittite Empire and its most successful statesman. Pursuing a rational policy, he bound to Hattusha (the Hittite capitol) with ties of friendship, Mitanni in the Hurrian region and the kingdom of Amurru in southern Syria.  In his reign the Hittite Empire shared control of the Near East with Egypt and Babylon. 
  • 1,375
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from Ugarit
  • 1,350
    • Assyrian period – 1,350 BC – 612 BC; Assur, Nimroud, Nineveh, Khorsabad
    • Shilda sanctuary, eastern Transcaucasus
  • 1,290
    • 19th dynasty in Egypt until 1,185 BC
  • 1,285
    • Battle of Kadesh; peace treaty between Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses II and Hittite king Hattusilis III signed in 1,270 BC
  • 1,280
    • Conjectured date of exodus from Egypt under Moses
    • Egypt under increasing assault by the "Sea Peoples"
  • 1,274
    • Assyrian absorption of Mitanni
  • 1,250
    • Fall of Troy; the Trojan war – fought with Achaeans (Greece) for control of trade passing through the Dardanelles
  • 1,250
    • Conquest of Canaan under Joshua.
  • 1,225
    • Assyrian conquest of Babylon and domination of Mesopotamia
  • 1,206
    • Evidence of major droughts in eastern Mediterranean affecting Hittite and Ugaritic cultures; general Late Bronze Age collapse in the region.
    • General abandonment of peasant subsistence agriculture in favor of nomadic pastoralism in central Anatolia, Syria, and northern Mesopotamia.
  • 1,200
    • Destruction of Ugarit and the Hittite Empire
    • Increasing use of iron and development of steel for tools of war amongst Andite descendants
    • Mesopotamia overrun by northern barbarians
    • Begin the period of the Judges in Israel
    • Phrygian kingdom at Gordion, Turkey
    • Anatolian civilizations destroyed by the “Sea People”
  • 1,190
    • Philistines settle coastal regions of Palestine
  • 1,186
    • Babylonian independence
  • 1,185
    • Begin 20th dynasty in Egypt until 1,070 BC
  • 1,157
    • Elamite conquest
  • 1,156
    • Babylonian dynasties 4 through 9 until 689 BC
  • 1,150
    • Deborah, Gideon in Israel
  • 1,100
    • End of Egyptian Empire
    • Tiglath-Pileser I of Assyria
    • Samuel
    • Increasing migration of Greeks to Aegean coast of Anatolia; Miletus first Greek colony.
  • 1,070
    • Begin 3rd “Intermediate Period” in Egypt until 664 BC; 21st through 25th dynasties.
  • 1,036
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from Mesopotamia, 31 July.
  • 1,013
    • David makes Jerusalem the capital of the United Kingdom of Israel
  • 1,006
    • Begin first temple period in Israel
  • 1,000
    • Avesta; The texts of the Avesta — which are all in the Avestan language — were collated over several hundred years. The most important portion, the Gathas, in Gathic Avestan, are the hymns thought to have been composed by Zarathushtra (Zoroaster) himself, and date linguistically to around 1000 BCE. The Avesta itself represents a collection of writings reflecting an earlier oral tradition which may have been used by Zoroaster in his attempts at religious revitalization.
    • Sogdian culture, north of Bactria; thought by some to be the source of the earliest Avesta texts.
  • 973
    • Solomon builds the first temple
  • 928
    • United Kingdom splits into Judah and Israel
  • 900
    • The Hebrews had no written language in general usage long after they reached Palestine. They learned the use of an alphabet from the neighboring Philistines, who were political refugees from the higher civilization of Crete. Having no written language until such a late date, they had several different stories of creation in circulation, but after the Babylonian captivity they inclined more toward accepting a modified Mesopotamian version.  74:8.9
    • Phrygia becomes the main power in central Anatolia; Lydian, Lycian, and Carian cultures develop along the Aegean and Mediterranean.
    • Urartian culture in eastern Anatolia
  • 883
    • Ashurnasirpal II at Nimrud
  • 876
    • King Omri founds Samaria
  • 859
    • Shalmaneser III in Assyria
  • 763
    • Total eclipse of the sun visible from Nineveh
  • 750 to 150
    • General warming trend in global temperatures. During the time of Roman Empire (150 BC - 300 AD) a cooling began that lasted until about 900 AD. At its height, the cooling caused the Nile River (829 AD) and the Black Sea (800-801 AD) to freeze.
  • 745
    • Tiglath-Pileser III founds Neo-Assyrian Empire
  • 728 to 559
    • Empire of Medes; This was the first Persian Empire formed by defeating the Assyrians with the help of the Babylonians.
  • 722
    • Fall of Samaria; captives taken to Assyria
  • 721
    • Sargon II
  • 717
    • Assyrian conquest of the Hittites
  • 715
    • Hezekiah builds tunnel from Gihon spring
  • 714
    • Cimmerians invade kingdom of Urartu
  • 705
    • King Sennacherib establishes Nineveh as the new capital of the Assyrian Empire
  • 689
    • Neo-Assyrian Sennacherib sacks Babylon
  • 671
    • Neo-Assyrian conquest of Egypt
  • 668
    • Creation of Ashurbanipal’s library; Ashurbanipal of Assyria established the royal library; a collection of thousands of clay tablets and fragments containing texts of all kinds from the 7th century BC. 
  • 664
    • Begin “Late Dynastic Period” in Egypt until 332 BC; 26th through 31st dynasties.
  • 640
    • King Josiah institutes religious reforms in Judah
  • 625
    • Late Babylonian period – 625 BC – 538 BC in Mesopotamia
  • 612
    • Nineveh was destroyed in 612 BC by a coalition of Babylonians, Sythians and Medes, an ancient Iranian people. It is believed that during the burning of the palace, a great fire ravaged the library of Ashurbanipal.
    • Assyrian empire destroyed
    • Chaldeans
  • 605
    • Battle of Carchemish
  • 605 to 562
    • Reign of Nebuchadnezzar “the great”; Babylon, Chaldean Dynasty
  • 600
    • Cyrus the Great, the first Zoroastrian Persian Emperor; founded the Persian Empire under the Achaemenid dynasty.
    • Climate: Relatively wet/cold event of unknown duration in many areas.
    • Ionia developing as the leading area of Greek science and Philosophy
  • 587
    • Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon conquers Jerusalem, destroys temple and exiles Jews to Babylon
  • 560
    • Massive editing of Old Testament texts by Hebrew priests in Babylon
  • 556 to 539
    • Reign of Nabonidus, last King of Babylon; launched desperate attempt to excavate ancient temple sites in quest of lost secrets; collects statues of the Gods from the major Mesopotamian cult centers and brings them to Babylon for care.
    • Search: Nabonidus Cylinder
  • 550
    • The Achaemenid Persian Empire (550–330 BC) was the largest empire of the ancient world and it reached its greatest extent under Darius the Great and Xerxes the Great — famous in antiquity as the foe of the classical Greek states (Search: Greco-Persian Wars). 
  • 547
    • Cyrus of Persia invades and conquers most of Anatolia; conquest of Troy
  • 546
    • Persian conquest of Ionia
  • 536
    • Cyrus of Persia conquers Babylon and allows Jews to return to Jerusalem -- unites Middle Eastern national and imperial states
    • Begin second temple period in Israel
  • 530
    • Death of Cyrus
  • 525
    • First Persian conquest of Egypt
  • 522
    • Begin rule of Darius I (the Great) in Persia until 486
  • 515
    • Completion of second temple in Jerusalem
  • 500
    • The sixth century before Christ, one of the greatest centuries of religious awakening ever witnessed on Urantia. Gautama, Confucius, Lao-tse, Zoroaster, and the Jainist teachers; Zoroaster. 92:5.10
  • 500 to 330
    • Achaemenid Empire; the Achaemenids protected the trans-continental trade routes, encouraging contact between India, Mesopotamia, and the Mediterranean. The Persian Royal Road extended some 2,857 kilometers from Susa on the lower Tigris to Smyrna on the Aegean Sea.
  • 515
    • Earliest dated materials from Persepolis
  • 499
    • Ionian revolt in Greece
  • 492
    • Persian conquest of Macedonia
  • 486
    • Begin rule of Xerxes in Persia until 465
  • 482
    • Persians sack Babylon
  • 450
    • Completion of Persepolis by Darius
  • 400
    • Asoka makes Buddhism the dominant religion of one-half the world in one generation
    • Oldest Dead Sea Scrolls
  • 332 to 167
    • Alexander’s conquest of Egypt; Macedonian kings in Egypt until 323
  • 331
    • Fall of Babylon to Alexander; looting and burning of Persepolis by Alexander
  • 323
    • Begin Ptolemaic dynasty in Egypt until 30 BC.
    • Death of Alexander at Babylon
  • 305
    • Rise of the Seleucid dynasty (Alexander’s generals)
  • 300
    • Oldest Pentateuch manuscript – the Samaritan Pentateuch
  • 279
    • Celts (Gauls) invade and establish the kingdom of Galatia in Anatolia
  • 250
    • Rise of the kingdom of Pergamum in Anatolia under the Attalid dynasty
    • Greek translation of the Septuagint completed for the Alexandria library
  • 208
    • Rise of the Sassanian Dynasty in Persia
  • 200
    • Conquest of Palestine by Seleucids of Syria
  • 169
    • Antiochus IV Epiphanes, Seleucid king, plunders the Temple at Jerusalem, forbids practice of Judaism
    • Nabateans
  • 167 to 141
    • Maccabean war of liberation
    • Rise of the Hasmonean Kingdom
  • 163
    • Rise of Parthian Dynasty in Persia
  • 131
    • Seige of Jerusalem by Antiochus VII
  • 126
    • Fall of Babylon to the Parthians
  • 63 BC to AD 324
    • Roman imperial period; Roman conquest of Babylon
  • 63
    • Pompey conquers Jerusalem and destroys temple
  • 37 to 4
    • Reign of Herod the Great
    • Temple rebuilt 
  • 7 BC-30 AD
    • Jesus of Nazareth