Accession Year: the Year in Which a Ruler Begins to Reign

HOW OLD WAS SO AND SO?

Why Bible Correctors Err in Regard to

The Ages of Kings and When their Reigns Begin?

accession year: The year in which a ruler begins to reign.

Accession-year dating: The method employed for numbering the years of a king when the year in which he comes to the throne is termed his accession year, and his first official year is that which begins with the new year's day after his accession. Also called postdating.

Antedating: See nonaccession-year dating.

Canon of Ptolemy: A document prepared by the famous Egyptian astronomer Ptolemy (A.D. 70-161) in which he enumerates the years of a consecutive series of rulers commencing with Nabonassar of Babylon in 747 B.C. as the first year, and continuing with the succeeding rulers of Babylon; then the rulers of Persia to Darius III, the last ruler of Persia when it was overthrown by Alexander the Great; next the Greek rulers of Egypt from Alexander and the Ptolemies to Cleopatra; and concluding with the Roman rulers of Egypt from Augustus to Antoninus Pius (A.D. 138-161). What makes Ptolemy's Canon of such immeasurable chronological value is the fact that in his Almagest Ptolemy has recorded over eighty solar, lunar, and planetary positions together with their dates, which may be coordinated with the years of the Nabonassar era beginning in 747 B.C., and thus securing a complete confirmation of this series of years.

Chronology: The science that deals with time and assigns dates to the years involved.

Co regency: A period of rulership when a son sits on the throne with his father.

Dual dating: The method of numbering the years of rulership of a king who rules as regent during a period when a rival ruler controls some other part of the land, in which the total years of reign are counted from the time when he first comes to the throne, including both his years of overlap and sole reign, but giving the year of his accession as the year when the overlapping reign ends and the sole reign begins.

Eponym: Any Assyrian official whose name was given to some particular year in his honor.

Eponymy: An Assyrian year that was named after some officer of state.

No accession-year dating: The method of numbering the years of a ruler in which the year he comes to the throne is termed his first year, and his second official year begins with the new year's day following his accession. Also called antedating.

Official reign: The years of reign as officially counted. In the case of an overlapping reign this may include both the years of overlap and of sole reign, or it may include only the years of sole reign.

Overlapping reign: A reign which overlaps the reign of some other ruler in the land. This may be a coregency in which the years of a son overlap those of his father, or it may be a reign in which the years of one king overlap those of another in some other part of the land.

Postdating: See accession-year dating.

Regency: The period of a ruler's reign.

Regal: Pertaining to the year of reign.

Synchronism: The coordination of the year of a ruler in one nation with the same year of a ruler in another nation.

Synchronistic: Taking place at the same time.

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