After this, in the beginning of the Reign of Zedekiah, that is, in the ninth year of Nebuchadnezzar, God threatned that he would give the Kingdoms of Edom_, Moab, and Ammon, and Tyre and Zidon, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar King of Babylon, and that all the nations should serve him, and his son, and his son’s son until the very time of his land should come, and many nations and great Kings should serve themselves of him_, Jer. xxvii.  And at the same time God thus predicted the approaching conquest of the Persians by the Medes and their confederates:  Behold, saith he, I will break the bow of Elam_, the chief of their might:  and upon Elam will I bring the four winds from the four quarters of heaven, and will scatter them towards all those winds, and there shall be no nation whither the outcasts of Elam shall not come:  for I will cause Elam to be dismayed before their enemies, and before them that seek their life; and I will bring evil upon them, even my fierce anger, saith the Lord; and I will send the sword after them ’till I have consumed them; and I will set my throne in Elam, and will destroy from thence the King and the Princes, saith the Lord:  but it shall come to pass in the latter days, viz. in the Reign of Cyrus_,_ that I will bring again the captivity of Elam, saith the Lord._ Jer. xlix. 35, _&c._ The Persians were therefore hitherto a free nation under their own King, but soon after this were invaded, subdued, captivated, and dispersed into the nations round about, and continued in servitude until the Reign of Cyrus:  and since the Medes and Chaldaeans did not conquer the Persians ’till after the ninth year of Nebuchadnezzar, it gives us occasion to enquire what that active warrior Cyaxeres was doing next after the taking of Nineveh.

When Cyaxeres expelled the Scythians, [409] some of them made their peace with him, and staid in Media, and presented to him daily some of the venison which they took in hunting:  but happening one day to catch nothing, Cyaxeres in a passion treated them with opprobrious language:  this they resented, and soon after killed one of the children of the Medes, dressed it like venison, and presented it to Cyaxeres, and then fled to Alyattes King of Lydia; whence followed a war of five years between the two Kings Cyaxeres and Alyattes:  and thence I gather that the Kingdoms of the Medes and Lydians were now contiguous, and by consequence that Cyaxeres, soon after the conquest of Nineveh, seized the regions belonging to the Assyrians, as far as to the river Halys.  In the sixth year of this war, in the midst of a battel between the two Kings, there was a total Eclipse of the Sun, predicted by Thales; [410] and this Eclipse fell upon