Who Came When?
Every person Scripture lets us date, on one line from Eden to today. Search a name, pick up to ten, and see them side by side — who they were, how long they lived, and how they connect.
Side by side
The line of Jesus, name by name
Both Gospel lists in full — 41 names and 77 names
Two Gospels give the family line in full. Matthew opens his Gospel with it, starting at Abraham and coming forward through David and Solomon to Joseph — three sets of fourteen generations, 41 names, with David closing the first set and opening the second. Luke gives it after Jesus’ baptism, starting at Jesus and going back through David’s son Nathan all the way to Adam — 77 names. They agree from Abraham to David and meet again at Shealtiel and Zerubbabel; between and after those points they follow different branches. Matthew’s is the legal line through Joseph; the usual reading is that Luke’s runs through Mary, since Luke names Heli, not Jacob, as Joseph’s father. Tap any name to put it on the line.
According to Matthew
Matthew 1:1-17According to Luke
Luke 3:23-38How they connect
Pick two or more names and the connections between them appear here — family ties, how their lives overlapped, and where Scripture itself draws a line from one to the other.
From Adam to Jacob, Scripture records the age of each father when his son was born, so the years can be added up exactly. From the kings onward it gives reign lengths. The dates here follow the traditional chronology built from those numbers alone (creation about 4004 BC). Where the text gives no number — the judges, most prophets, the New Testament — a dashed bar means our best estimate, and a faded bar means the year of death is not recorded. Good scholars date some of these differently; the order and the overlaps are what matter most.
The gold star marks the people named in Jesus’ family line in Matthew 1 or Luke 3. Matthew traces the legal line through Joseph; Luke’s list is widely understood to run through Mary.