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Assyrian captivity · KJV chronology

The Removal of the Northern Kingdom:
Israel carried into Assyria

The northern kingdom did not disappear in a single unexplained moment. Assyria first pressed Israel for tribute, then removed northern districts, and finally took Samaria after a three-year siege. Scripture records both the political end of the kingdom and the reason the LORD removed it.

Chronology boundary: The established timeline places Samaria’s fall in Creation year 3208. Kings synchronizes it with Hoshea’s ninth year and Hezekiah’s sixth year. Because the month is not stated, the event overlaps the project’s Nisan 761/762 boundary; no extra year is inserted.

Special timeline

From division to removal

The only exact Creation years shown below are already established on the main timeline. Where Scripture gives sequence or a reign without naming the event year, the row says so plainly.

CY 2962The kingdom divides
Israel in the north · Judah in the south
1 Kings 12:26–30King James Version“Jeroboam made two calves of gold, placing one in Beth-el and the other in Dan; this thing became a sin.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
CY 3149–3159Assyria first presses Menahem
Exact year within Menahem’s reign is not stated
2 Kings 15:19–20King James Version“Pul king of Assyria came against the land. Menahem paid him a thousand talents of silver and exacted the money from Israel.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
CY 3161–3181Northern districts are carried away
During Pekah’s counted reign · exact year not stated
2 Kings 15:29King James Version“Tiglath-pileser took cities in Gilead, Galilee, and Naphtali and carried their inhabitants captive to Assyria.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
CY 3199Hoshea begins to reign
Final king of the northern kingdom · nine-year reign
2 Kings 17:1–4King James Version“Hoshea became servant to the king of Assyria, later withheld tribute, sought help from Egypt, and was bound in prison.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
Reign markerThe siege of Samaria begins
Hoshea year 7 · Hezekiah year 4
2 Kings 18:9King James Version“Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria and besieged it.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
CY 3208Samaria falls; Israel is carried away
Hoshea year 9 · Hezekiah year 6 · Nisan 761/762 boundary
2 Kings 17:5–6; 18:10–12King James Version“At the end of three years Samaria was taken. Israel was placed in Halah, Habor by the river of Gozan, and the cities of the Medes.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
After CY 3208Foreign peoples are settled in Samaria
Sequence stated · exact year not stated
2 Kings 17:24–29King James Version“The king of Assyria brought peoples from Babylon, Cuthah, Ava, Hamath, and Sepharvaim and placed them in the cities of Samaria.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
The three-way synchronizationCreation year 3208 · Hoshea’s ninth year · Hezekiah’s sixth year. Second Kings 18:9–12 repeats the siege and fall specifically to preserve that parallel count.

The first removals

The captivity began before Samaria fell

2 Kings 15:19–20 · KJV

“And Pul the king of Assyria came against the land: and Menahem gave Pul a thousand talents of silver… So the king of Assyria turned back, and stayed not there in the land.”

2 Kings 15:29 · KJV

“In the days of Pekah king of Israel came Tiglath-pileser king of Assyria… and carried them captive to Assyria.”

Menahem preserved his throne through tribute. Later, during Pekah’s reign, Assyria took named cities and the regions of Gilead, Galilee, and Naphtali. The final fall of Samaria therefore completed a removal that had already begun.

The final synchronized count

Hoshea nine · Hezekiah six · siege three

2 Kings 17:5–6 · KJV

“Then the king of Assyria came up throughout all the land, and went up to Samaria, and besieged it three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria…”

2 Kings 18:9–10 · KJV

“In the fourth year of king Hezekiah, which was the seventh year of Hoshea… Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against Samaria… And at the end of three years they took it: even in the sixth year of Hezekiah, that is the ninth year of Hoshea…”

The second account is not a competing date. It is Scripture’s cross-check: Hoshea’s seventh year matches Hezekiah’s fourth when the siege begins, and Hoshea’s ninth matches Hezekiah’s sixth when Samaria is taken. The main timeline keeps its established Creation-year placement at 3208.

Why the kingdom was removed

Kings explains the judgment

2 Kings 17:21–23 · KJV

“For he rent Israel from the house of David… For the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did; they departed not from them; Until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he had said by all his servants the prophets. So was Israel carried away out of their own land to Assyria unto this day.”

The account reaches back to the division under Jeroboam and the calf worship at Beth-el and Dan. It also records high places, idols, divination, the passing of children through fire, and refusal to hear the prophets. Assyria was the human conqueror; Kings identifies covenant rebellion as the reason for the removal.

Prophetic warningIsrael’s removal
Hosea 1:6–7King James Version“And God said unto him, Call her name Lo-ruhamah: for I will no more have mercy upon the house of Israel; but I will utterly take them away. But I will have mercy upon the house of Judah.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
Prophetic warningIsrael’s removal
Amos 5:27King James Version“Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, saith the LORD, whose name is The God of hosts.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.
Prophetic warningIsrael’s removal
Isaiah 7:8–9King James Version“Within threescore and five years shall Ephraim be broken, that it be not a people. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria.”Read the full chapter →Tap the reference again to close.

Israel and Judah distinguished

The northern kingdom ended; Judah remained

2 Kings 17:18 · KJV

“Therefore the LORD was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of his sight: there was none left but the tribe of Judah only.”

2 Kings 18:11–12 · KJV

“And the king of Assyria did carry away Israel unto Assyria… Because they obeyed not the voice of the LORD their God, but transgressed his covenant…”

This ends the northern kingdom’s independent kingship. It is separate from Judah’s later Babylonian captivity. Judah and Jerusalem continued under Hezekiah, and the Assyrian army did not take Jerusalem in his day.

What “removed” means hereThe kingdom and its ruling line were removed from the land. Scripture does not say that every individual descended from every northern tribe vanished; it later speaks of a remnant from Ephraim, Manasseh, Asher, Zebulun, and others.

The remnant remained identifiable

Not every northern Israelite disappeared

2 Chronicles 30:6, 10–11 · KJV

“Turn again unto the LORD God… and he will return to the remnant of you, that are escaped out of the hand of the kings of Assyria… Nevertheless divers of Asher and Manasseh and of Zebulun humbled themselves, and came to Jerusalem.”

2 Chronicles 34:9 · KJV

“The Levites… had gathered of the hand of Manasseh and Ephraim, and of all the remnant of Israel, and of all Judah and Benjamin.”

These notices prevent the political fall of the northern kingdom from being turned into a claim that every person of the northern tribes ceased to exist. A remnant remained and could still respond to Judah’s reforms.

Samaria after the removal

Assyria settles other peoples in the cities

2 Kings 17:24, 27–29, 33 · KJV

“And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim… Then one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and dwelt in Beth-el… They feared the LORD, and served their own gods.”

The transplanted peoples asked to learn “the manner of the God of the land.” A returned priest taught at Beth-el, but the chapter says the nations combined fear of the LORD with service to their own gods. This settlement belongs after Israel’s removal; Scripture does not give it a separate Creation year.

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