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Our knowledge of Jewish history in the last three centuries B.C relies heavily onJosephus. His account of the period is contained in two different works - theJewish War, which starts with a summary of Jewish history from the Maccabean revolt onwards, and theJewish Antiquities, a longer history of the Jewish nation starting from the earliest times. Even when Josephus wrote, at the end of the first century A.D., the quality of the information available to him was variable - he can only give a patchy account of the third century B.C., whereas the sections dealing with the reign of Herod are vivid and detailed - but overall, he is our most important guide to the periods of early Jewish history that are not covered by the Bible.

Only the sections directly concerned with the history of the last three centuries B.C. are shown here. The translation of the 'Jewish Antiquities' is by R. Marcus (1943); and the translation of the 'Jewish War' is by H.St.J. Thackeray (1927); however, book 15 of the 'Antiquities' is adapted from the old translation by W. Whiston, because the more recent translation is still in copyright. There are links throughout to the Greek text ( inPerseus ).

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