How their hearts must have beat fast when reports of Cyrus’ incredible successes reached them, the fall of Media and Ecbatana, then of Lydia with its impregnable capital, Sardis. This evidence of weakness was apparent to the watchful Jews, as was possibly also, during the next decade, the report of a new star on the horizon-Cyrus of Persia, whom Isaiah had described as their future liberator. When Nebuchadnezzar, the strong man of Babylon, died, three ephemeral rulers successively occupied his throne. After this catastrophe we find the Jews in captivity in the Mesopotamian valley watching the signs which heralded the political weakening of their oppressors, and the rising of new powers in the east-the Medes first and the Persians a little later. This period begins with the destruction of the kingdom of Judah and its capital city, Jerusalem, by the brutal war machine of Nebuchadnezzar. Setting of This Period.-This article deals with the period of the Exile and Restoration of the Jews, at the time of two world powers, one succeeding the other-the Neo-Babylonian and Persian empires.