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Section B of a huge collection of disordered fragmentary drafts on ancient history in which Newton correlates Jewish, Greek and Egyptian chronology. Much of the historical material later found its way into the posthumous 'Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms Amended' (1728). These papers also contain a draft interpretation of the visions of Daniel.
Bought at the Sotheby sale by Gabriel Wells for £90 and presumably acquired by Yahuda not long afterwards.
The who prophesied just before the
Olympiads began, thenIsraelites
had lately befallen other kingdoms.vi. 2Pass ye, saith he, to Calneh & see, & from thence go down to Hamath the great, then go down to Gath of the Philistims. Be they better then those kingdoms? Amos 6. 2. These kingdoms were not yet conquered
For about seven years after the captivity of the captivity
of the ten Tribes, when Sennacherib warred in Syria chth Olympiad.)
message to the king of Iudah. xix.11Behold thou hast heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands by destroying them utterly, & shalt thou be delivered? Have the Gods of the nations delivered whom my fathers have destroyed, as Gozan & Haran & Rezeph & the children of Eden which were in
i Chron. v.26
2 King. xvi.9, & xvii.6.
2 King. xvii.24
Ezra iv.9.
In these conquests are involved on the west & south side of
Assyria the kingdoms of Mesopotamia whose royal seats were
Haran or Carrhæ & Carchemish or Circusium, & Sepharvaim a
SippharaPtolomy Berosus Abydenus & Polyhistor, & Sipphara
by Ptolomy, & the kingdoms of Syria seated at Samaria, Damas
cus, Gath, Hamath, Arpad & Rezeph a city placed by Ptolomy
neare Thapsacus. On the south & Southeast were Babylon &
Calneh or Calno a city which was built by Nimrod where Bagdad
now stands & gave the name of Chalonitis to a large region
under its government; & Thalassar or Talatha a city
by Ptolomy in Babylonia upon the common stream of Tigris
& Euphrates, chdivided into four heads, Tigris & Euphrates ch
& Pison & Gihon ch
built by Nimrod on the east side of Pasitigris between
Apamia & the Persian gulph, & the Susanchites at Cuth or
Susa the metropolis of Susiana. On the east were Elymais
& some cities of the Medes & Kir a city & large region of
Media between Elymais & Assyria (Isa xxii.6) called Kirene
by the Chalde Paraphrast & Latin Interpreter & Carine
by Ptolomy. On the north-east were Habor or Chaboras
a mountanous region between Assyria & Media & the
Apharsachites or men of Arraphachitis a region origi
nally peopled by Arphaxad & placed by Ptolomy at
the bottom of that mountain next Assyria. And on the
north between Assyria & the Gordiæan mountains was
Halah or Chalach the Metropolis of Calachene. And
beyond these upon the Caspian sea was Gozan called
Gauzamia by Ptolomy. Thus did these new conquests
extend every way towards the borders &
well might the king of Assyria boast how his armies
had destroyed all lands. All these nations axvii.29,
30, 31, & xviii.33,
34, 35. 2 Chron xxxii.15.
their several Gods & each accounted his God the God
of his own land & the defender thereof against
the Gods of the neighbouring countries, & particu
larly against that of Assyria, & therefore they
were never till now united under the Assyrian
Monarchy: but being small kingdoms, the king of
Assyria now easily overflowed them.
17.Know ye not,
saith Sennacherib to the Iews, what I & my fathers have done unto all the people of other lands? – – –
Between the reigns of Ieroboam II & his son Zecharias
there was an interregnum of about 10 or twelve years. And v.13 & x.6, 14.
after, mentions the King of Assyria by the name of Iarib. And & another conqueror by the name of Salman. And perhaps
perhaps
Salman might be the first part of the name of Salmonasser
& Iarib
But whoever these Princes were it appears not that they
reigned before Salmanasser. Pul Baal) Belus)
carried on his conquests beyond the boun Province of Assyria.
He conquered Calneh with its territories in the reign of Ie
roboam (Amos. 1.1 & 6.2 & Isa. 10.8, 9) &invaded Israel in the
reign of Menahem (2 King. 15.19) but stayed not in the
land, being bought off by Menahem for a thousand talents
of silver. In his reign therefore the kingdom of Assyria
was advanced on this side Tigris. For he was a great
warrior & seems to have conquered Haran & Carchemish
& Reseph & Calneh & Thalasser & all Caldea ed
or enlarged the city Babylon. & left
For the Æra of Nabonasser (the first of those kings
in the Canon) began soon after the reign of Pul; and
Isaiah who lived & prophesied in the days of Pul & his
successors, thus describes the founding of Babylon. Behold,
saith he, the land of the Chaldeans; this people was not till the Assyrian founded it for them that dwell in the wilderness [that is, for the Arabians,]
The ancient city Babylon built by the Tyrian Belus: that is
by the Syrian or Assyrian Belus; the words Tyrian, Syrian Assy
rian Belus being all of them derived from Tzór the Phenician
name of the city Tyre. Herennius
the son of Belus; & this son might be
quest of Calnah, Thalassar & Sipparæ, the father might
begin to build Babylon & leave it to
son might erect the Temple of Iupiter Belus to his
father. For all the kings of Babylon in the Canon of
Ptolomy are called Assyrians, & Nabonassar is the first
of them & the building of Babylon is ascribed to the Assyrians by Isaiah.But the originals of Babylon are obscure And Nebu
chadnezzar recconed himself descended from Belus, that is from Pul. Belus And the building
of Babylon is ascribed to the Assyrians by Isaiah
Babylon to Belus himself, that is to Pul. So CurtiusSemiramis eam condiderat, vel ut pleri.
ch
reigned, were built by the Assyrian in the days of Isaiah or
not long before; that is, in or soon after the days of Pul.
to extend the dominion of the Assyria southward, and
thereby enabled the Assyrian to found the kingdom of
Babylon for them that dwell in the wilderness. And Semi
ramis might reign there after him. But her story
as told by the Greeks, is full of fables
one of the kings of Babylon & govern during the minority of
her son: but her story is full of fables.t
of the first ten kings who succeeded her & Nabonassar
it probable that they were but deputy Princes put in &
out at the pleasure of the king of Assyria: those who
succeeded Asserhadon seem by their long reigns to have
been kings for life.
Tiglathpileser warred in Phœnicia & captivated Galilee
with the two Tribes & an half in the days of Pekah King
of Israel, & placed them in Halath & Habor & Hara &
at the river Gozan, places lying on the western borders
of Media between Assyria & the Caspian sea (2 King. XV.
29. & 1 Chron V.26.) & about the fift or sixt year of
Nabonassar, he came to the assistance of the king of
Iudah against the kings of Israel & Syria, & overthrew
the kingdom of Syria which had been seated at Damascus
ever since the days of king David, & carried away the Ass
placed other nations in the regions of Damascus (2 King
XV.37 & XVI.5, 9. Amos. 1.5. Ioseph Antiq. l. 9. c. 13.)
Whence it seems that the Medes were conquered before,
& that the Empire of the Assyrians was now grown
great. For the God of Israel stirred up the spirit of Pul king of Assyria & the spirit of Tiglathpilaser to make
Salmanasser (called Enemesser by Tobit(Chap. 1)
invaded a
Israel, & placed them in Chalach & Chabor by the river Gozan & in the cities of the Medes, [& either he or one of his And Hosea
successors peopled Samaria with captives brought from Babylon, &
from Cutha or Susa, & Ava or Iva & from Hamath or Antioch
& from Sepharvaim
seems to say that he took Arbela. And his successor Sennacherib
saith that his fathers had conquered also Gozan & Haran (or Carrhæ)
& Reseph (or Resen) & the children of Eden & Arpad or the
Arradij. 2 King. XIX.12.
Sennacherib called Sargon by Isaias (chap. in the 14XX.1.)th
year of Hezekiah, invaded Phœnecia & took several cities of
Iudah & attempted Egypt; & Sethon or Sevechus king of Egypt
& Tirhakah king of Æthiopia coming against him, he lost in
one night 185000 men, as some say by a plague or perhaps by
lightning or a fiery wind which blows sometimes in the
neighbouring deserts, or as others by being disarmed by mise or
memory of this action erected a statue to Sethon holding in
his hand a mouse, the Egyptian symbol of destruction. Vpon
this defeat Sennacherib returned in hast to Nineveh, & his
kingdom became troubled so that Tobit could not go into
Media. And he was slain soon after by two of his sons who
fled into Armenia, & his son Asserhadon succeeded him. At that time did Merodach Baladan or Mardocempad
king of Babylon, send an Embassy to Hezekiah king of
Iudah.
Asserhadon corruptly called Sarchedon by Tobit (ch. I.
21) & Assardin by the Seventy, began his reign at Nine
veh in47
year of Nabonassar 67 or
captives brought from several parts of Assyria
Dinaites, the Apharsathchites, the Tarpelites, the Aphar
sites, the Archevites, the Babylonians, the Susanchites,
the Dehavites, the Elamites (Ezra IV.2, 9.) & therefore
Samaria & Damascus invaded Iudea in the first or year of Ahaz; & within 65 years after, that is,
second
in the 21th or 22th year of Manasseh, Samaria ceased
to be a people (Isa. VII.8,) vizt by carrying the re
mainder of Samaria into captivity & placing these
nations in their room. Then he invaded Iudea, took
Azot carried Manasses a
Egypt Thebais & Ethiopia above Thebais. And by
this war he seems to have put an end to the reign
of the Ethiopians over Egypt anno Nabonass. 77 or 78.
In the reigns of Sennacherib & Asserhadon the
Assyrian empire seems arrived at its greatness, being
united under one Monarch & conteining Assyria, Media,
Apolloniatis, Susiana, Chaldæa, Mesopotamia, Cilicia,
Syria, Phœnicia, Egypt, Ethiopia, & part of Arabia, & reach
ing eastward into Elimais, & Paratacene a Province of the