Athaliah - Further Chronological Notes

Further Chronological Notes

The calendars for reckoning the years of kings in Judah and Israel were offset by six months, that of Judah starting in Tishri (in the fall) and that of Israel in Nisan (in the spring). Cross-synchronizations between the two kingdoms therefore often allow narrowing of the beginning and/or ending dates of a king to within a six-month range. For Athaliah, the Scriptural data allow the narrowing of her accession to some time between Nisan 1 of 841 BC and the day before Tishri 1 of the same BC year. For calculation purposes, this should be taken as the Judean year beginning in Tishri of 842/841 BC, or more simply 842 BC. Her death occurred at some time between Nisan 1 and Tishri 1 of 835 BC, i.e. in 836/835 BC by the Judean calendar. At this time of rapprochement between the two kingdoms, Judah was using Israel's "non-accession" method of reckoning the years, so that she was deposed in her "seventh year" (2 Kings 11:4), after being monarch for six actual years (2 Kings 11:3).