SATURN TABLET ASSESSMENT UPDATE:
Now that it is apparent the Saturn tablet is a mere updated revision, it shows how extensively the revisions were made during the Seleucid Period to align the new chronology and timeline. Ptolemy merely had access to these revised records and helped to preserve these revisions. Modern chronologists and scholars, finding something "specific" presumed these were legitimate references and took it from there.
But from a Biblical chronology challenge point of view, since these were "copies" some 200-300 years after the fact with a critical absence of any of the original texts to cross-check with for this period, dating in these texts are automatically presumed to be revised; why else would they be copying these texts at such a late period. This would especially be the presumption if there were other indications of revisionism, such as contradiction with other timelines, such as from the Bible.
Of course, we know enough about the two-phase revisionism to confirm that the final dating and timeline was not established until the time of Xenophon who made the final revisions by 358 BCE. That is, 30 years were added to the reign of Darius I compensated by 26-years removed from the Neo-Babylonian Period. This meant Darius survived his own death at Marathon but Herodotus links him to that event by a cryptic reference about a soldier with a huge beard that covered his shield present at Marathon, clearly a reference to Darius. But Herodotus also notes an eclipse that occurred in the spring 10 years later when Xerxes invaded Greece. That eclipse occurs in 424 BCE, which proves Herodotus' history reflected the first-phase revision only, with chronology back in sync again by 424 BCE. But once a detailed history of the Peloponnesian War was published by Thucydides, with references to when the war occurred in relation to Persian historical events, it was clear that Artaxerxes' rule of 41 years overlapped that of Xerxes. This would not have occurred had Artaxerxes, who ruled first 21 years as "Xerxes" had limited his rulership to just 20 years for "Artaxerxes" and 21 years for "Xerxes". But Artaxerxes claimed his full 41 years following a separate 21-year rule for Xerxes. Therefore, the Jewish-advised Persians needed to do something about Thucydides' history. They had enough money to buy up all the handwritten copies, of course, and suppress the work, but apparently hired Greek proto-Persian writer-historian Thucydides to expand the Greek Period to accommodate the Persian expansion. He was able to do this by only revising the last 7 years of the history of Thucydides, which of course, vanished in all later copies. As far as the timeline goes, he added an extra 30 years between the Persian and Peloponnesian Wars, creating a 50-year gap there. A famous eclipse event that occurred during the first year of the war but also the first year of Olympic cycle found a substitute in 431 BCE, so the beginning of the war was moved back 28 years from 403 BCE to 431 BCE. This created some loose ends, however. For instance, part of the folklore of Plato was that he was consulted during the first year of the war to try to solve a mathematical problem presented at Delos to try to double the size of a cube in order to stop the spread of the plague that had broken out. (Google "The Delian Problem") Of course, Plato was 25 years old in 403 BCE but not born yet in 431 BCE, the new date of the war.
The Olympic cycle forced some adjustment as well. The 28-year solar eclipse manipulation combined with the 30-year expansion between the Persian and PPW amounted to a gross 58-year adjustment. Problem is, 50 is not divisible by 4. It was so well established that the Battle of Salamis occurred during an Olympic year that it forced an adjustment of 2 years. That is, 50 + 432 BCE dates Xerxes' invasion and the Battle of Salamis to 482 BCE, which is not an Olympic year. So that got adjusted down to 480 BCE. So even though the PPW is dated to 431 BCE and it is stated that there is a 50-year interval between the two wars, it really is only 48 years (48 + 432 = 480 BCE). This is also why you have that 2-year problem with the dating for the 1st of Cyrus (539 vs 537 BCE).
Needless to say, these 58 years were unadjusted by the NB records and so the entire timeline got pushed back by 58 years from the time of Cyrus all the way back to the time of the Exodus. But since the revised NB timeline combined the events of what happened during the accession year of Nebuchadnezzar with his 1st year, the actual events were a year off. That's why some records show, for instance, Jerusalem falling in year 19 and others in year 18. Even Josephus reflects that discrepancy. But that meant the mean adjustment for the time of Nebuchadnezzar was only 57 years. Since 57 years is divisible by 19, the length of the lunisolar cycle, just by coincidence the lunar positions for the reign of Nebuchadnezzar in both the revised and original chronologies were quite similar, with lunar positions within a day or two of each other. That's what gave the revisionists recopying old astronomy references with the new timeline applied the idea of hiding original lunar positions in a text otherwise representing the revised date. Thus the VAT4956 contains already noted "errors" in lines 3 and 14 that do not match 568 BCE for year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar, but they do match lunar positions 57 years later from the original dating in 511 BCE. Of course, 511 BCE for year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar agrees with the Biblical absolute dating for the 1st of Cyrus falling in 455 BCE. Hardly a coincidence! Thanks to the VAT4956, therefore, and also the Saturn text, we know how extensively and meticulously these revised astronomical texts were being pursued to help "legitimize" the revisions made by Xenophon, which is quite ingenius. At this point, of course, it likely was a political decision or a financial decision. Whomever had the most money and power could control the history. Further, since Xerxes/Artaxerxes was such a favorite king for the Jews, the Jews aggressively helped protect Artaxerxes' old identity and this farce against the Greeks by re-writing their own history for the period in the form of the apocryphal Book of Esdras, which removes the history of Nehemiah in connection with Artaxerxes and only relates that part of the history of Nehemiah and Ezra when they first returned from Babylon. That's because with the additional years for the Persian Period, Nehemiah would have been over 143 years old to live down into the reign of Darius II if he were at least 30 years of age at the time he returned from Babylon. When these extra years are removed, Nehemiah survives Xerxes (who died at age 59) at 89 years rather than 140+ years.
We also got a lucky break in the chronology because of the varying methods of beginning the new year. It is now seems confirmed from the records that while there was a general practice at times to consistently begin the new year after the spring equinox, this was not always the practice. The revision offset by the beginning of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II was now 56 years. A critical eclipse event mentioned in the Assyrian eponym, a solar eclipse occurring in month 3, and originally dated to 709 BCE, found an alternative in 763 BCE, 54 years earlier. That meant only a 2-year adjustment which was negligible. The 763 BCE eclipse and the 709 BCE eclipse fall in the exeligmos pattern of eclipses that occur every 54 years and 1 month later in the same region (approximately 11-13 latitudinal degrees more northerly each cycle). Here is the predictable eclipse pattern for that series.
The three eclipses in the series that would have occurred in Assyria would have been 817 (50% lower) 763 (100% mid) and 709 (50% upper). Because the eclipses recur in a regular interval by location it meant you could predict the location and time of the next eclipse in the series if you experienced the total lunar eclipse track (about 93 miles wide). That points to the 709 BCE eclipse as the ones the Assyrians would have focussed on as a predictable event since the 763 BCE eclipse was total in their region. This would explain why an astronomical event spilled over into the narrative history of the eponym since a predictable solar eclipse, perhaps the very first one, would have been a major social event. At any rate, the 709 BCE eclipse for month 3 began at the customary time where the year began after the vernal equinox. The previous eclipse in the series dated to month 2 (763 BCE) could also be dated to month 3 if the alternative method of beginning the new year prior to the equinox was employed. So, therefore, there was no need to remove this astronomical reference. It was an original reference that could be left in place even though there was a 56-year distortion in the timeline from the NB Period. So it is of NOTE that either 709 BCE or 763 BCE fit this eclipse occurring in month 3; however, the 763 BCE follows the less customary practice of beginning the new year early, whereas 709 BCE follows the more traditional dating pattern. Furthermore, the 709 BCE eclipse could have been easily predicted based upon the 763 BCE eclipse where astronomers in Assyria experienced the precise location of totality. That would explain why this eclipse was even mentioned in the eponym. So that's two circumstantial reasons to prefer the 709BCE eclipse for dating the Assyrian Period than the substitute dating now used of 763 BCE. It's not entirely accurate to quote from Wikipedia, but it has already been noticed that the 763 BCE doesn't follow what has been considered as the usual customary dating:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/760s_BC
"June 15, 763 BC - A solar eclipse at this date (in month Sivan) is used to fix the chronology of the Ancient Near East. However, it should be noted that it requires Nisan 1 to fall on March 20, 763 BC, which was 8 to 9 days before the vernal equinox (March 28/29 at that time) and Babylonians never started their calendar year before the spring equinox. Main article: Assyrian eclipse"
The statement above is not accurate, since we know sometimes the Babylonian years did, indeed, at one period begin the year earlier than the spring equinox. However, it is not clear this practice occurred in Assyria during the time of the 709 and 763 BCE eclipses. One source claimed that the early dating didn't show up until late in the Assyrian Period and the practice of beginning the year after the equinox was consistent practice in earlier times. If this can be confirmed then the 763 BCE eclipse would be considered a misdated event; which, of course, we know it is per the Biblical timeline.
Also, though, we get a break from RC14 dating at Rehov which contradicts the revised timeline. That scientific dating, which is fairly independent, it just gives us the best scientific age for grains burned at the time of Shishak's invasion, matches dates that are 54 years earlier and contradicts the 54-year distortion for this event based upon the Greco-Persian Period revisions:
http://www.geocities.com/ed_maruyama/rehov872.html
So finally, there is some type of totally independent scientific dating available that if it had contradicted the Bible, would have been used against the Bible. In fact, generally the archaeological dating for the time of David and Solomon are used to claim these kings were myths. Problem is, that works with the general dating. But Rehov's dating is so specific it shows up the contradiction to not just the Solomonic dating but contradicts the Assyrian dates upon which the Solomon dates are based, all based on the misdated 763 BCE eclipse. But if you use the 709 BCE eclipse, then the scientific dating and astro-dating completely agree. That is, the RC14 dating points to 871 BCE for Shishak's invasion as the mid-point of the RC14 range (917-823BCE). That is precisely the date for that event when 455 BCE falls in the 1st of Cyrus. But the revised dating based upon the 763 BCE eclipse dates Shishak's invasion 54 years earlier to 925 BCE, and it falls outside the peak RC14 dating range as noted in the chart below. Note the RED markers are mine. (See above for the original, unedited chart).
FINALLY, the fact that it is clear such meticulous efforts were made to create voluminous astrotext documents representing the revised chronology, it makes it reasonable to assume any other texts that might have exposed the revisions would have been either destroyed or better yet revised. That includes some of the business documents that reflect the revised chronology like the Egibi documents put forth by CO Jonsson. Any documents reflecting the revised timeline currently in place had to be revised during the Seleucid Period or late Persian Period during the rule of Artaxerxes II, who, incidentally got an extension of his reign of 30 years from 17, making him the longest ruling Persian king at 47 years, and not a thing is really known about him for all that rule. That's because it was fabricated. Artaxerxes II was behind the revisions by Xenophon so it would seem Xenophon threw him a bone (or was it a "boner"?) by making him the longest ruling Persian king. All these revised documents from the wrong period, therefore, are no challenge to the Bible's timeline which has to use 455 BCE for the 1st of Cyrus as a pivotal date, supplemented now, fortunately, by the VAT4956 evidence of the original chronology for year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar in 511 BCE. The straightforward nature of the Saturn tablet for dating the rule of Kandalanu shows how extensively the revisions were pursued, even though, given the choice to simply destroy all these ancient texts or revise them, revising them made more sense when it was practical.
THANKS to all for the specific references! It's always better not to guess or presume when there is an opportunity to be specific based upon actual records.
JCanon
