Christians and Jews located Muslim conquerors within Daniel’s four-empire scheme

Evidence

Sebeos, like the anonymous author of the Doctrine of Jacob Recently Baptized, created a niche in history for the Muslim conquerors by using Daniel’s four-empire scheme; contemporary Jewish authors did the same. … But for Sebeos the “Ishmaelites” represented not one of the horns of the beast, but the fourth beast itself, in other words, the last great world empire, an honor generally reserved for Rome. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 312

Categorization

• DEFINE: Daniel’s four-empire scheme provided the shared apocalyptic timeline template that both Jewish and Christian authors used to make sense of the conquests.