Key Dates

Useful Dates for the Final Exam from Ms. Stevens

What makes these dates useful is that they provide “mile markers” with which to get oriented. These particular ones are especially helpful for crossing over between cultures. The dates switch from BCE to CE at the break, and some are approximate. As usual, I will not ask you to recall specific dates, only to determine the relative sequence of events. I do not expect (or even want) you to memorize all of these, but I do expect you to have a clear sense of the sequence.

2050 Start of the Middle Kingdom in Egypt
1792 Hammurabi establishes the Babylonian Empire
1550 Start of the New Kingdom in Egypt
1200 Sea People defeat Hittites
1046 Western Zhou replaces Shang Dynasty
770 Start of Spring and Autumn Period (Eastern Zhou)
753 Traditional date for the founding of Rome
750 Start of the Archaic Period in Greece
612 New Babylonians defeat Assyrians
539 Cyrus defeats the New Babylonians
509 Start of the Roman Republic
501 Democracy in Athens
480 Start of the Warring States Period AND Battle of Thermopylae
338 Philip II of Macedon defeats Greece
330 Alexander defeats Persia
264 Punic Wars begin
221 Start of the Qin Dynasty (only 15 years long)
146 Carthage destroyed by Rome (3rd Punic War) AND Greece falls to Rome
100 Marius is consul
82 Sulla is dictator
44 Caesar assassinated
27 Roman Empire begins

69 Year of the Four Emperors
180 Marcus Aurelius dies
220 Fall of the Han Dynasty
312 Constantine converts to Christianity
476 Odoacer deposes Romulus Augustulus
565 Death of Justinian
1453 Byzantine Empire falls to the Ottoman Turks

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Start and End Dates from Ms. Stevens

Culture	Start	End
Old Kingdom	2700 BCE	2200 BCE
Middle Kingdom	2050 BCE	1652 BCE
New Kingdom	1567 BCE	1085 BCE
Minoans	2800 BCE	1450 BCE
Mycenaeans	1600 BCE	1100 BCE
Shang	1500 BCE	1046 BCE
Western Zhou	1046 BCE	777 BCE
Eastern Zhou: S & A	770 BCE	481 BCE
Eastern Zhou: WS	480 BCE	222 BCE
Qin	221 BCE	206 BCE
Han	206 BCE	220 CE
Assyria	1100 BCE	612 BCE
New Babylonians	612 BCE	539 BCE
Archaic Greece	750 BCE	500 BCE
Classical Greece	500 BCE	338 BCE
Persia	559 BCE	330 BCE
Alexander's Empire	338 BCE	323 BCE
Hellenistic Kingdoms	323 BCE	30 BCE
Rome: Monarchy	753 BCE	509 BCE
Rome: Republic	509 BCE	31 BCE
Rome: Empire	27 BCE	476 CE

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Helpful Hints for the FALL Exam

Please be advised that these won't all work for the Spring Exam.

1. The Old and Middle Kingdoms come before everything else on our timeline.
2. The Han Dynasty is after everything else on our timeline.
3. The Shang Dynasty lines up with the New Kingdom.
4. The New Babylonians fall during the Spring and Autumn Period.
5. The Battle of Thermopylae lines up with the start of the Warring States Period.
6. The Sea Peoples arrived c. 1200 BCE, which totally changes the map of the Ancient Near East.