1500 B.C.E. * Iron-working developed in Asia Minor. * Seminomadic stockbreeding tribes inhabit the steppes. * Amunhotep III initiates the cult of the solar (gold) Aton at Heliopolis * Amunhotep IV sees the light of a flying disc shining on him, hears a voice from it tell him to build a new capital named after Aton, uses a new ideographic symbol for horizon (a disc flying over a mountain range), changes his name to Akhnaton (Aton's Being of Light) [UPenn Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology, Frontier Stelae] * Akhnaton sparks a religious & cultural revolution devoted to Aton & his flying disc: adds a temple to Aton at Thebes, whose decoration ushers in a new artistic era; replaces former manifestations of Ra-Horakhty & other gods with that of the disc shining beams of The Light terminating in his hands as blessings to Egypt; builds Akhet-Aton (Aton's resting point) as Egypt's new capital; systematicly obliterates names & images of Amun & other gods; dismisses the priests of Amun; demotes himself from a god to the only begotten son of Aton, and the sole priest or mediator between Aton & Egyptians, so that no one can come to worship the one true God but through him, who in turn is to represent them before Aton [Great Hymn to Aton.] * Tutankhamun gradually reverses the monotheistic revolution of Akhnaton, and changes his name from Tutankhaton; reinstates the priests of Amun * Celestial North makes closest approach to kappa Draconis * Along the upper Euphrates, the Mitanni develop a Vedic-like religion having Varuna as the sky-water ahura [equivalent to the Vedic sura], & Mithra [equivalent to Mitra] as both the sun ahura & the fire ahura {One of its priests, Zoroaster, will: stand the religion on its head by demoting some ahuras into Daevas (e.g. Indra as thunder Daeva, a 'fallen ahura' [a-sura] under the spirit of destruction, Angra Mainyu); reveal that Ahura Mazda is THE Lord (of Wisdom/Light), while his twin, Harahvati [Sarasvati (keeper of celestial waters), Vedic cosmic river goddess likened to Aphrodite, and Brahma's wife] is Virtuous Immortal Anahiti (THE Lady, likened to Artemis), clad in the hardest stone (the firmament), through whom acts of creation are performed by Ahura Mazda, such as incarnating Varuna (Son of The Waters/Apas<on>) & his twin, Mithra (THE Mediator, as the Perfect One & Savior of all human life)} * Non-uniform motions of the sun & of the moon ascribed to non-circular orbits about an earth that rotates on its axis; gravity is described by Indian astronomy as strings exerting a pull on the planets (~1350) [Lagadha, Vedanga Jyotisa.] * Chinese record their first use of decimal place-values, representing zero in each decimal place by a blank space * Solar eclipse during reign of Hittite King Murshili II (1335) * Trojan War * Solar eclipse during reign of Hittite King Muwatalli II (1312) * Rameses II sacks (Yeru)Shalem 1300 B.C.E. * Rameses III builds temples to Khonsu, God of the Moon in Lower Egypt, God of the Waters in Upper Egypt where he is the first god whose symbol is a star (Canopus, which in The Avesta is described as "pushing the waters forwards"), so becoming "the Greatest God of the Great Gods" as well as the great snake who fertilises the Cosmic Egg at the Creation * Solar eclipse over Ugarit presages Bronze Age collapse (1223) * David unites Judah (temple at Gibeon) & Israel (temple at Bethel) into one kingdom (Solomon to extend its influence via Phoenicia's fleet, & build Jerusalem's First Temple--aided by a Phoenician, Hiram of Tyre) [Septuagint: Iesou 18.2; III Basileoi 21.27] * Phoenicia becomes a centre of maritime trade in the Mediterranean * Temple dedicated to gamma Draconis in City of the Dragon, Thebes (1130) [Cadmus] * King Wen of the Zhou fiefdom leads armed rebellion against a tyrannical Shang emperor (1122) [Lui Xin] 1100 B.C.E. * King Wu, Wen's son, completes overthrow of Shang dynasty; justifies the rebellion later by issuing the Mandate of Heaven stating: the most high god Di was so displeased by the megalomania of the late Shang, that a righteous ruler was sought around China as a replacement; it was good King Wen who received the approval to replace the last Shang emperor [Bamboo Annals.] * Zhou dynasty founded; the worship of divine universal order, Tien, to develop (1045) * In training Hebrew scribes, a solar calendar is inscribed into limestone in which Abib is referred to as the month of barley harvest [Istanbul Archaeological Museum, Gezer Calendar.] 900 B.C.E.