These are dates of writing, and most are estimates. Where scholars give a range the entry gives the range, and “c.” means roughly. Dates for the gospels are the ones most scholars give; Christian tradition puts Matthew first of the four, and some scholars date all four before AD 70. An event marked “by tradition” carries the date the ancients counted from, not one anybody can prove. The same books drawn to scale.
ScriptureFathersTheologyGreeceRomeMiddle Ages Paler bar: the date is an estimate
Written over centuries. Tradition gives many to David, about 1000 BC; the collection was translated into Greek by the second century BC.
Meanwhile: The Zhou dynasty rules China (c. 1000 BC); David reigns in Jerusalem (c. 1000 BC, by tradition); The Phoenician alphabet, ancestor of the Greek and Latin ones, is in use (c. 1000 BC).
Composed in Ionia from a long oral tradition.
Meanwhile: The first Olympic Games the Greeks recorded (776 BC, by tradition); Rome is founded (753 BC, by tradition); The Assyrian king Sennacherib besieges Jerusalem (701 BC).
Composed in Boeotia, by a poet who names himself and his brother.
Meanwhile: Rome is founded (753 BC, by tradition); The Assyrian king Sennacherib besieges Jerusalem (701 BC).
Thought to be a generation later than the Iliad.
Meanwhile: Rome is founded (753 BC, by tradition); The Assyrian king Sennacherib besieges Jerusalem (701 BC).
Told in the sixth century BC, by Herodotus’s account; written down by others much later.
Meanwhile: Babylon destroys Jerusalem and its Temple; the exile begins (587 BC); Confucius is born (551 BC, by tradition); Cyrus of Persia takes Babylon and lets the exiles go home (539 BC).
Read aloud in parts before it was finished.
Meanwhile: Thermopylae and Salamis (480 BC); Work begins on the Parthenon (447 BC); Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC).
Begun as the war broke out; it stops in 411 BC, unfinished.
Meanwhile: Work begins on the Parthenon (447 BC); Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC).
Medea in 431 BC, the Trojan Women in 415, the Bacchae staged after his death.
Meanwhile: Work begins on the Parthenon (447 BC); Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC).
Written in Athens, about twenty years after Socrates died.
Meanwhile: Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC); Alexander crosses into Asia (334 BC).
Written decades after the march of 401 BC it describes.
Meanwhile: Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC); Alexander crosses into Asia (334 BC); Alexander the Great dies at Babylon (323 BC).
Written in his old age, in exile from Athens.
Meanwhile: Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC); Alexander crosses into Asia (334 BC).
One of his late dialogues.
Meanwhile: Socrates is executed in Athens (399 BC); Alexander crosses into Asia (334 BC); Alexander the Great dies at Babylon (323 BC).
Lectures from his years at the Lyceum.
Meanwhile: Alexander crosses into Asia (334 BC); Alexander the Great dies at Babylon (323 BC).
Staged at Roman festivals; the last in 160 BC.
Meanwhile: Rome destroys Carthage and Corinth (146 BC).
Left unrevised at his death.
Meanwhile: Julius Caesar is assassinated (44 BC); Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC).
Seven books by Caesar; the eighth was added by his officer Hirtius.
Meanwhile: Julius Caesar is assassinated (44 BC); Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC).
Written in the autumn after Caesar’s murder, for his son.
Meanwhile: Julius Caesar is assassinated (44 BC); Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC).
Both written in 44 BC, the year before he was killed.
Meanwhile: Julius Caesar is assassinated (44 BC); Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC).
Written in retirement, after Caesar’s murder.
Meanwhile: Julius Caesar is assassinated (44 BC); Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC).
The first book of Satires about 35 BC, the Art of Poetry near the end of his life.
Meanwhile: Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC); Herod the Great dies (4 BC).
Unfinished when Virgil died in 19 BC.
Meanwhile: Julius Caesar is assassinated (44 BC); Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC).
Begun early in the reign of Augustus and continued until Livy died.
Meanwhile: Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at Actium (31 BC); Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC); Herod the Great dies (4 BC).
Finished as Augustus sent Ovid into exile in AD 8.
Meanwhile: Octavian takes the name Augustus (27 BC); Herod the Great dies (4 BC); Jesus is crucified in Jerusalem (c. AD 30).
Written from Ephesus.
Meanwhile: Rome invades Britain (AD 43); The Great Fire of Rome, and Nero’s persecution (AD 64); The Jewish revolt against Rome begins (AD 66).
Written from Corinth, before Paul had seen Rome.
Meanwhile: The Great Fire of Rome, and Nero’s persecution (AD 64); The Jewish revolt against Rome begins (AD 66); Titus destroys the Temple in Jerusalem (AD 70).
Held by most scholars to be the earliest gospel.
Meanwhile: The Great Fire of Rome, and Nero’s persecution (AD 64); The Jewish revolt against Rome begins (AD 66); Titus destroys the Temple in Jerusalem (AD 70).
Tradition, from the second century, puts it first of the four.
Meanwhile: The Jewish revolt against Rome begins (AD 66); Titus destroys the Temple in Jerusalem (AD 70); Vesuvius buries Pompeii (AD 79).
The first half of a single work.
Meanwhile: The Jewish revolt against Rome begins (AD 66); Titus destroys the Temple in Jerusalem (AD 70); Vesuvius buries Pompeii (AD 79).
The second half, addressed to the same Theophilus.
Meanwhile: The Jewish revolt against Rome begins (AD 66); Titus destroys the Temple in Jerusalem (AD 70); Vesuvius buries Pompeii (AD 79).
The last of the four.
Meanwhile: Vesuvius buries Pompeii (AD 79); Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition); The empire at its widest, at the death of Trajan (AD 117).
Finished, he says, in the thirteenth year of Domitian.
Meanwhile: Titus destroys the Temple in Jerusalem (AD 70); Vesuvius buries Pompeii (AD 79); Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition).
Written under Trajan about the civil wars of AD 69.
Meanwhile: Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition); The empire at its widest, at the death of Trajan (AD 117); Hadrian’s Wall is begun (AD 122).
Written at Chaeronea in Greece, in his last decades.
Meanwhile: Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition); The empire at its widest, at the death of Trajan (AD 117); Hadrian’s Wall is begun (AD 122).
Written in Rome; an early list dates it to the time Pius was bishop there.
Meanwhile: Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition); The empire at its widest, at the death of Trajan (AD 117); Hadrian’s Wall is begun (AD 122).
Arrian’s record of his teaching at Nicopolis.
Meanwhile: Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition); The empire at its widest, at the death of Trajan (AD 117); Hadrian’s Wall is begun (AD 122).
Written while he was secretary to Hadrian.
Meanwhile: Cai Lun presents paper to the Han court (AD 105, by tradition); The empire at its widest, at the death of Trajan (AD 117); Hadrian’s Wall is begun (AD 122).
Written in Roman Africa.
Meanwhile: Hadrian’s Wall is begun (AD 122); The Antonine plague spreads through the empire (AD 165); The Han dynasty ends (AD 220).
Notes to himself, much of it written on campaign on the Danube.
Meanwhile: The Antonine plague spreads through the empire (AD 165); The Han dynasty ends (AD 220).
Finished after Constantine’s victory in 324.
Meanwhile: Constantine and Licinius tolerate Christianity at Milan (AD 313); The Council of Nicaea (AD 325); Constantinople is dedicated (AD 330).
Written soon after Antony died in 356.
Meanwhile: The Council of Nicaea (AD 325); Constantinople is dedicated (AD 330); Theodosius makes Nicene Christianity the religion of the empire (AD 380).
Preached at Antioch.
Meanwhile: Theodosius makes Nicene Christianity the religion of the empire (AD 380); The empire is divided for good between east and west (AD 395); The Visigoths sack Rome (AD 410).
Written soon after he became bishop of Hippo.
Meanwhile: Theodosius makes Nicene Christianity the religion of the empire (AD 380); The empire is divided for good between east and west (AD 395); The Visigoths sack Rome (AD 410).
Preached at Constantinople.
Meanwhile: Theodosius makes Nicene Christianity the religion of the empire (AD 380); The empire is divided for good between east and west (AD 395); The Visigoths sack Rome (AD 410).
Preached and dictated at Hippo.
Meanwhile: The empire is divided for good between east and west (AD 395); The Visigoths sack Rome (AD 410); The Council of Ephesus, over which Cyril of Alexandria presides (AD 431).
Begun in answer to the sack of Rome in 410.
Meanwhile: The empire is divided for good between east and west (AD 395); The Visigoths sack Rome (AD 410); The Council of Ephesus, over which Cyril of Alexandria presides (AD 431).
Sermons preached at Alexandria.
Meanwhile: The Visigoths sack Rome (AD 410); The Council of Ephesus, over which Cyril of Alexandria presides (AD 431); The Council of Chalcedon (AD 451).
Written in prison, awaiting execution.
Meanwhile: Benedict founds Monte Cassino (c. AD 529); Hagia Sophia is finished in Constantinople (AD 537).
Finished at Jarrow in 731.
Meanwhile: Muslim armies cross into Spain (AD 711); Charles Martel turns back an Umayyad army near Tours (AD 732).
Made for Pope Urban IV.
Meanwhile: The Mongols sack Baghdad (AD 1258); Marco Polo sets out for China (AD 1271); Dante is exiled from Florence (AD 1302).
The chains on Mark, Luke and John followed by 1268.
Meanwhile: The Mongols sack Baghdad (AD 1258); Marco Polo sets out for China (AD 1271); Dante is exiled from Florence (AD 1302).
Finished in exile, shortly before Dante died in 1321.
Meanwhile: Dante is exiled from Florence (AD 1302); The papacy moves to Avignon (AD 1309); The Hundred Years’ War begins (AD 1337).
Kempis’s own manuscript copy is dated 1441.
Meanwhile: The Council of Constance ends the Great Schism (AD 1417); Joan of Arc relieves Orléans (AD 1429); Constantinople falls to the Ottomans (AD 1453).
Dates of composition are the conventional ones found in standard reference works, given as ranges where those works disagree. Nothing on this page is a reader figure.