David J.A. Clines, "Regnal Year Reckoning in the Last Years of The
AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGY REGNAL YEAR RECKONING IN THE LAST YEARS OF THE KINGDOM OF JUDAH D. J. A. CLINES Department of Biblical Studies, The University of Sheffield A long debated question in studies of the Israelite calendar and of pre-exilic chronology is: was the calendar year in Israel and Judah reckoned from the spring or the autumn? The majority verdict has come to be that throughout most of the monarchical period an autumnal calendar was employed for civil, religious, and royal purposes. Several variations on this view have been advanced. Some have thought that the spring reckoning which we find attested in the post-exilic period came into operation only during the exile, 1 but many have maintained that the usual autumnal calendar gave way in pre-exilic Judah to a spring calendar as used by Assyrians and Babylonians.2 Some have 1. So e.g. J. Wellhausen, Prolegomena to the History of Ancient Israel (ET, Edinburgh, 1885, r.p. Cleveland, 1957), 108f.; K. Marti, 'Year', Encyclopaedia Biblica, iv (London, 1907), col. 5365; S. Mowinckel, 'Die Chronologie der israelitischen und jiidischen Konige', Acta Orien talia 10 (1932), 161-277 174ff.). 2. (i) In the 8th century according to E. Kutsch, Das Herbst/est ill Israel (Diss. Mainz, 1955), 68; id., RGG,3 i (1957), col. 1812; followed by H.-J. Kraus, Worship in Israel (ET, Richmond, Va., 1966), 45; similarly W. F. Albright, Bib 37 (1956), 489; A. Jepsen, Zllr Chronologie der Konige von Israel lInd Judo, in A. Jepsen and R. Hanhart, Ullter sllchllngen zur israelitisch-jiidischen Chrollologie (BZAW, 88) (Berlin, 1964), 28, 37.
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