When you read an article about events in the ancient Middle East and the author assigned dates to those events, have you ever wondered how they determined those dates and how accurate they are? Scholars have linked some of the first millennium BCE historical dates to dependable astronomical records. When such records are unambiguous or when a collection of them provides a unique pattern that fits the timeline, the (Julian calendar) dates that researchers have assigned are usually correct.
Nevertheless, they use this method only for first-millennium BCE events but not those of the second millennium BCE. This statement raises two critical questions: 1) Why not? 2) How do they assign dates to historical events in that earlier era? The answers to these questions are interrelated.
Researchers generally do not use ancient astronomical records to establish the second millennium BCE Middle Eastern chronology because they believe those records are unreliable or ambiguous. So, how do they date events in that earlier period? Unbelievably, the primary method researchers use is to count backward in time from the first millennium BCE using the Assyrian King List (AKL). A Middle Assyrian king corresponded with an Egyptian pharaoh, and two of the Assyrian’s cuneiform communications are extant in the Amarna letters. (EA [El Amarna] 15 & 16) Based on this reconstructed timeline and this synchronism, scholars have a hypothetical chronological anchor for those Egyptian Eighteenth Dynasty pharaohs’ ruling periods.
Using this method, they supposedly can accurately determine the nearly absolute timing of that dynastic period. Then, they think that Egypt’s synchronisms with other peoples can help them accurately determine the chronologies of those other nations.
Do you see a problem with this approach? What if the Assyrian King List has gaps in it? Do other methods verify the assumption that this king list does not skip any years, for example, when their nation was under foreign domination?
Researchers use two other methods that supposedly verify that the AKL’s figures between the Middle Assyrian and Neo-Assyrian periods are complete. Unfortunately, all three methods fail under intense scrutiny. (See Chapter 1 of The Six Pillars of Second Millennium BCE Middle Eastern Chronology, which we will post online within a few months.) In contrast, multiple lines of evidence prove that the AKL is missing a substantial part of the interim timeline. This AKL reconstruction model does indicate the latest possible dates for the Amarna Assyrian-Egyptian synchronism. Nevertheless, this method does not provide a reliable approximate estimate of when the Amarna period occurred.
The first question posed above is, ‘Why have scholars not used astronomical dates to establish chronologies for this earlier period?’ The short answer is due to adherence to tradition. Some astronomical dates, such as those recorded in the “Venus Tablet,” are too ambiguous to use independently because of the many changes and mistakes that later astrologers and copyists made. However, some ancient celestial records are specific and reliable. Scholars reject them because the recorded observations and dates contradict the conventional model.
Nevertheless, suppose we combine the available astronomical data from the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians, and the Hittites with all the other relevant archaeological, historical, and scientific information. In that case, we would indeed have a comprehensive and accurate “astronomical chronological system.” Only one model can make all the pieces fit together coherently. The Six Pillars detail that model.
