| b.c. | |
| Battle of Karkar, in which Ahab and Benhadad were defeated | 854 |
| Jehu pays tribute to Shalmanezer II. | 842 |
| Menahem tributary to Assyria | 738 |
| Fall of Samaria | 722 |
| Sennacherib's Invasion | 701 |
These dates do not accord with those which we should derive from the Book of Kings in the ordinary system of chronology, which seem to fix the Fall of Samaria in 737.
The dates of the later Kings of Assyria seem to be as follows:—
| b.c. | |
| Rimmon-Nirari III. | 810 |
| Shalmanezer III. | 781 |
| Assur-dân IV. | 771 |
| Tiglath-Pileser III. (Pul, a usurper) | 745 |
| Shalmanezer IV. | 727 |
| Sargon | 722 |
| Sennacherib | 705 |
| Esar-haddon I. | 681 |
| Assur-bani-pal | 668 |
| Destruction of Nineveh | 606 |
Adding up the separate data of this book for the kings of Israel we have from Jeroboam to the death of Joram ninety-eight years seven days; and for the same period of the kings of Judah from Rehoboam to Ahaziah we have ninety-five years. Supposing that some such errors as we have indicated have crept into the computation, the dates of the reigns may be, as reckoned by Kittel:—
| b.c. | |
| Saul | 1037-1017 |
| David | 1017-977 |
| Solomon | 977-937 |
| Jeroboam I. | 937-915 |
| Nadab | 915-914 |
| Baasha | 914-890 |
| Elah | 890-889 |
| Zimri | 889 |
| Omri | 889-877 |
| Ahab | 877-855 |
| Ahaziah | 855-854 |
| Jehoram | 854-842 |
| Rehoboam | 937-920 |
| Abijah | 920-917 |
| Asa | 917-876 |
| Jehoshaphat | 876-851 |
| Joram | 851-843 |
| Ahaziah | 843-842 |
From Phœnician inscriptions (recorded in the Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum) little of historical importance has hitherto been reaped.
In the Egyptian monuments there is nothing which illustrates the period of the Kings except the inscription of Sheshonk recording his invasion in the days of Rehoboam, of which I have given some account (p. [315]).
The Assyrian inscriptions, to which allusion is made in their place, are of extreme importance and interest, and from the lists of kings we have good details of chronology. The best book on their bearing upon Hebrew history is that of Schrader, Die Keilinschriften und d. Alte Testament, 1883.
On the datum of four hundred and eighty years from the Exodus to the building of the Temple, I have already touched. It does not agree with Acts xiii. 20, nor with the Book of Judges. The LXX. reads "four hundred and forty." It is almost certainly a late and erroneous chronological gloss derived in very simple fashion, thus:—The wanderings forty years, Joshua forty years, Othniel forty years, Ehud eighty years, Jabin twenty years, Barak forty years, Gideon forty years, the Philistines forty years, Samson twenty years, Samuel forty years, Saul forty years, David forty years = four hundred and eighty, or twelve generations of forty years.