Page "Book of Joshua" Paragraph 41

There is now general agreement that Joshua was composed as part of a larger work, the Deuteronomistic history, stretching from Deuteronomy to Kings.

In 1943 the German biblical scholar Martin Noth suggested that this history was composed by a single author / editor, living in the time of the Exile ( 6th century BCE ).

A major modification to Noth's theory was made in 1973 by the American scholar Frank M. Cross, to the effect that two editions of the history could be distinguished, the first and more important from the court of king Josiah in the late 7th century, and the second Noth's 6th century Exilic history, and other scholars have detected many more authors / editors than either Noth or Cross allowed for.