68 | CHAPTER 3
From this rough tabulation emerges an especially intensive exegetical ac-
tivity in the major spheres of Greek philosophy, Christianity, Judaism, and
Roman law during the core period of the third to sixth centuries, what we
conventionally call late Antiquity. Mazdaism thanks to Sasanian support,
and Manicheism thanks to its missions, also attained a peak of influence at
this time. The Christian scriptures were composed and largely canonized be-
fore the core period but still within the First Millennium. The Mazdean and
Jewish scriptures, the origins of Greek philosophy, and a great deal of Roman
law (from the Twelve Tables c. 450 BCE onward) belong to the previous mil-
lennium; but even so the Jewish Bible was not firmly fixed nor the rabbinic
tradition evolved, the Avesta not written down, philosophy not matured
through the harmonizing of Plato and Aristotle, and Roman law not finally
codified, until the First Millennium CE. The development of Islam came just
after the core period, but was well on its way by the end of the First Millen-
nium, even if the completest reconciliation of the conflicts between theol-
og y, Sufi mysticism and philosophy was not achieved until Ghazālī, who died
in 1111. Whatever their variations, though, all seven traditions attained an
intellectual and institutional maturation, and became (those that survived)
the recognizable forerunners of what they are today, during the First
Millennium.
Monotheist historiography
No previous historian has used the First Millennium as a historical peri-
odization in the way suggested here. Nevertheless, significant parts of the
concept are foreshadowed in writings that belong to the First Millennium
itself. The first step was to get away from the hitherto prevalent idea of em-
pire as simply political and cultural dominion. Hellenistic historians had al-
ready developed the model of the succession of Oriental monarchies; some
even included the Celts.^29 Polybius (d. 118 BCE) showed how all history,
conceived as a “corporate whole,” culminated with the establishment of
Roman imperium.^30 Diodorus of Sicily (d. after 36 BCE) depicted a univer-
sal Roman Empire that reincarnated an earlier, mythical universality, real-
ized by Dionysus in the East and Heracles in the West.^31 But while few
doubted that the gods had favored and indeed participated in these develop-
ments, and it was henceforth taken for granted that human history was
somehow fulfilled with the establishment of Rome’s dominion over land and
29 A. Momigliano, On pagans, Jews, and Christians (Middletown, Conn. 1987) 31–57.
30 K. Clarke, Between geography and history: Hellenistic constructions of the Roman world (Oxford
1999) 77–128.
31 H. Inglebert, Interpretatio Christiana (Paris 2001) 468–70.