47 
Artaphanes. Nine years later, Artaphanes sought to set up for 
himself, having a sort of regent power for seven months ; was 
slain by Artaxerxes, who thereby had a second beginning of his 
reign, as he would have a third at the time of his father’s death ; 
Thucydides taking the first as reckoned at Greece; Ptolemy’s 
canon the second, as reckoned at Babylon, and Josephus the 
third.”* That a different mode of reckoning the accession of 
various kings in ancient times by sacred and secular historians 
alike, may be seen in the several instances of Nebuchadnezzar, 
Tiberius, and Augustus Caesar. 
19. The result of this investigation appears in what has been 
already set forth, that Nehemiah, the cupbearer of King 
Artaxerxes, dates the accession of his master to the throne in 
the same way as Thucydides and Charon of Lampsacus, and not 
according to the usual computation of Ptolemy’s canon. Assum- 
ing then that Artaxerxes was taken into partnership with his 
father in the twelfth year of Xerxes’ reign, B.C.474, the twentieth 
year of the son’s associated reign, when the decree was granted 
to Nehemiah to rebuild the broken-down walls of Jerusalem, 
must be reckoned at B.C. 455 ; and as Nehemiah tells us lie 
received the commission “ in the month Nisan,” the same as the 
more ancient name of Abib, the first of the Hebrew months, in 
which the Passover was observed, we may fairly suppose that 
it was at the time of the Passover that Nehemiah received the 
decree so favourable to his own people from the king. Bearing 
then in mind the prophecy of Daniel, that from the issuing of 
such a decree to the cutting off of the Mesiah was to be a pro- 
longed period of 7 + 62 hebdomads, or 69 in all, he., in reality 
483 years, we may easily calculate that period from the Passover 
B.C. 455, and we are brought to the Passover A. D. 29, when, as 
I have shown on historical testimony, the crucifixion took 
place. It is somewhat remarkable that in these two years the 
Passover was celebrated on exactly the same day. According to 
the astronomical tables, the new moon (by which the Jews regu- 
lated the beginning of the year) commenced in the years B.C. 
455 and A.D. 29, on the 4th of March ; consequently the 14th 
day of the Moon, when the Passover was kept, must have fallen 
in both those years, on w r hat answers to our 17th of March, the 
* Whiston’s Literal Accomplishment of Scripture Prophecies , p. 7"< 
Archbishop Usher in his Annals, and the learned Petavius in his Rational-. 
Temp., par. ii. p. 154, alike adopt the same conclusion respecting the 
accession of Artaxerxes as being eight or nine years earlier than the canon 
of Ptolemy allows. 
