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Originally Posted by littlemanpoet
I think that starting with the emergence of the Persians is a bit late, and would start things with the beginnings of Greek and Greek-like (Philistine for example) dominance; this would be roughly 1200 B.C., which does seem to be just a couple centuries after the Hebrew Exodus; and incidentally correponds with the onset of the Iron Age.
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I'm not sure I agree. Keep in mind that Iliad and Odyssey were written roundabout, I think, 800 B.C., and even though the Odyssey is already far less archaic, we agree to let them be part of the First Age. The early Greeks remind me a bit of the Easterlings, destroying the minoian Crete and being a constant thorn in the side of the Hittite empire. The parallel would be even more striking if historians would agree on whether the Sea Peoples were Greeks or not.
Even though the Greeks slowly emerged from 1200 B.C. on, this time was dominated by the Assyrians and Babylonians, whom I would keep in the first age.
I don't want to offend, but I think you might overemphasize the importance of ancient Israel. After all, most of the time it was conquered by somebody and its cultural and religious influence only came A.D.
That's why I saw the coming to power of the Persians so significant. Here, for the first time (if we ignore the short period of Echnaton in Egypt), a monotheistic culture is in a dominant position, even largely influencing the jewish religion.
Maybe we shouldn't try to match Middle-earth-ian history one-to-one to real history and just match eras to other eras, allowing gaps. We then could cut at 1200 B.C. or so and resume with the slow rise of Greek (after the Dorian migration/invasion) and Persian culture from around 800 B.C. on, letting them grow in time like the Númenorians, gradually founding colonies and then assume real power from around 500 B.C. on.