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Why do the dates of early rulers go down?

(so & so ruled from 1508-1482bc) is this our modern way of saying the years of earlier times until "before christ" or did they (back in that time) say the years backwards anticipating the end of time?

thx ahead!!


Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: 5BC-4BC-3BC-2BC-1BC-0-1ad-2ad-...
the modern calender is "calibrated" on the birth of Christ as the year "0".
Historians in the pre-christian period worked out the chronology based on events or, on the reign of Monarchs. So imagine three pre christian kings "Tom", "Dick" and "Harry". Now for example, we know Harry died in the year "0" after reigning 30 years and before him Dick reigned 7 years, and Tom reigned 17 years. Chroniclers would describe events something like
"In the third year of King Dick, Bob, lord of the wobbly people invaded the lands to the south. King Dick and his son Harry traveled south and did vanquish lord bob from the lands"
So by using a little bit of maths we can work out this event happened in 34 BC (harry hadn't become king and dick had 4 more years as king)