Stop 4. The record across the top

Turn to Chart 2. It has one time axis from left to right. The red zig-zags mark where the scale changes. The time before writing is squeezed, the first century is stretched, and the future on the right is drawn in order only, with no dates.

The bands across the top are the record. Each one is a civilization dated by its own writings, king lists, radiocarbon, and eclipses. In Mesopotamia: the first cities of Uruk (about 4000 to 3100 BC), the Sumerians, Akkad, Ur, and Hammurabi's Babylon. In Egypt: the Old Kingdom of the pyramids (about 2543 to 2120 BC), then the Middle and New Kingdoms. Then Assyria, the new Babylon, Persia, the Greek kingdoms, and Rome.

These dates are not perfect. Older Mesopotamian dates can shift by about 60 years depending on which system you use. But the order is firm, and so is the rough length of each one.

The pink band near 1200 BC is the Bronze Age collapse, when the Hittites and many other kingdoms fell.

Israel lived in the middle of all of this. That is why these bands matter. They are the outside witnesses.

Picture: Chart 2, the record lanes.