Prior to this time, Judah had been a vassal of the Assyrian empire, but the rapid decline of Assyria after c. 630 led Josiah to assert his independence and institute a religious reform stressing loyalty to Yahweh, the national God.

Prior to achieving its independence, Cuba was a colony of Spain.

Prior to independence, Makarios-by virtue of his post as Archbishop of Cyprus and head of the Cypriot Orthodox Church-was the Greek Cypriot Ethnarch, or de facto leader of the community.

Prior to independence as Zimbabwe, the nation had been known by several names: Rhodesia, Southern Rhodesia, and Zimbabwe-Rhodesia.

Prior to Lesotho's independence in 1966, the only paved road in the country was the Kingsway in the capital, Maseru, between the Mejametalana Airport and the Royal Palace.

Prior to the independence as a modern state in 1947, the country was both independent and under various colonial empires throughout different time periods.

Prior to independence, the French establishment and Catholic Church feared Opangault's radicalism and favored the rise of Fulbert Youlou, a former priest.

Prior to Belarus gaining its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, the language was known in English as Byelorussian or Belorussian, transliterating the Russian name,, or alternatively as White Ruthenian or White Russian.

Prior to independence, the act allowed the U. S to maintain military forces in the Philippines and to call all military forces of the Philippine government into U. S. military service.

Prior to independence, " Harare " was the name of the Black residential area now known as Mbare.

Prior to Mozambique's independence in 1975, thousands of tourists from South Africa and Rhodesia ( now Zimbabwe ) frequented the city and its scenic beaches, high-quality hotels, restaurants, casinos and brothels.

Prior to Texas's independence from Mexico in 1836, the town was listed as under the jurisdiction of the town of Mier, Tamaulipas, and prior to Mexican independence existed under Spanish rule.

Prior to independence, the People's Republic of China supported the country's indigenous movement for independence against the Portuguese Empire and the relationship continued after independence.

Prior to independence, Al Ain was part of the Arabian slave trade network that extended from east Africa into the Persian Gulf.

Prior to independence, funaná was denigrated by colonial authorities, who considered it African.

Prior to June 1776, the New Jersey delegation in the First Continental Congress was opposed to independence.

Prior to the independence of Liberia in 1847, executive power in the Commonwealth of Liberia was held by the Governor of Liberia, who was appointed by the American Colonization Society.

Prior to independence, Tunku Abdul Rahman managed to convince the sultans to cede some states ' powers to the federal government.

Prior to independence it was expanded to form one contiguous territory, with a total land area of 6, 807 km².

Prior to being president, he led the Eritrean People's Liberation Front ( EPLF ) to victory in May 1991, thus ending the 30-year-old armed liberation struggle for Eritrean independence.

Prior to this, he was a leading figure in the independence movement and then the new government, and played a crucial role in facilitating and protecting Botswana ’ s steady financial growth and development.

Prior to independence, the districts of Hoshiarpur and Gurdaspur were home to a large number of Muslim Maliks.

Prior to the Revolution, New Englanders consumed large quantities of rum and beer, as maritime trade provided them relatively easy access to the goods needed to produce these items: Rum was the distilled spirit of choice, as the main ingredient, molasses, was readily available from trade with the West Indies.

Prior to major influence from outside, there were approximately 25, 000 Aleuts on the archipelago.

Prior to the release of the VHS Volumes, a laserdisc titled Beavis and Butt-Head: The Essential Collection was issued in 1994, containing sixteen episodes from the second and third seasons.

Prior to the Smartmodem, modems were almost entirely manual in operation, having developed from acoustic couplers that used a traditional telephone for dialling and hanging up.

During an absence from Clairvaux, the Grand Prior of Cluny went to Clairvaux and enticed away Bernard's cousin, Robert of Châtillon.

Prior to 1931, New York Times reporter William Buehler Seabrook, allegedly in the interests of research, obtained from a hospital intern at the Sorbonne a chunk of human meat from the body of a healthy human killed in an accident, then cooked and ate it.

* Woodson, C. G., The Education of the Negro Prior to 1861: A History of the Education of the Colored People of the United States from the Beginning of Slavery to the Civil War.

Prior to 1947, the only definition of first-class cricket had been one in Great Britain that dated from a meeting at Lord's in May 1894 between the Marylebone Cricket Club ( MCC ) committee and the secretaries of the clubs involved in the official County Championship, which had begun in 1890.

Prior to rising to power, from 1939 to 1941, Peron had developed a deep admiration of Italian Fascism and modelled his economic policies on Italian Fascist economic policies.

Prior to this discovery, biologists had been largely unable to establish a family tree of cats from the fossil record because the fossils of different cat species all look very much alike, differing primarily in size.

Prior to the Crucifixion the Jews are called Israelites, the honorific title of God's chosen people ; after it, they are called " Ioudaioi ", Jews, a sign that through their rejection of the Christ the " kingdom of Heaven " has been taken away from them and given instead to the church.

Prior to that, hunting by local natives can be documented from Late Stone Age Scandinavia and eastern North America, as well as from early 5th century Labrador, where the bird seems to have occurred only as a straggler.

Prior to satellite geodesy era, the coordinate systems associated with a geodetic datum attempted to be geocentric, but their origins differed from the geocentre by hundreds of metres, due to regional deviations in the direction of the plumbline ( vertical ).

Prior to Gardner's investigations, no serious archaeological excavation had occurred at the city, though he himself soon unearthed four miles of earthworks, and uncovered finds that included tombs, pottery, and porcelain dating from Ming China.

Prior to the separation of the colony of Victoria from New South Wales in 1951, the area was called the Port Phillip District of New South Wales.

Prior to Verdi's body's being driven from the cemetery to the official memorial service and its final resting place at the Casa di Riposo per Musicisti, Arturo Toscanini conducted a chorus of 820 singers in " Va, pensiero ".

Prior to Parsons ' departure from The Byrds, he had accompanied the two Rolling Stones to Stonehenge ( along with McGuinn and Hillman ) in the English county of Wiltshire, where Richards had a house near the ancient site.

Prior to his death, Parsons stated that he wanted his body cremated at Joshua Tree and his ashes spread over Cap Rock, a prominent natural feature there ; however, Parsons ' stepfather arranged for a private ceremony back in New Orleans and neglected to invite any of his friends from the music industry.

Prior to the start of the Great Depression, Hoover's first Treasury Secretary, Andrew Mellon, had proposed and seen enacted, numerous tax cuts, which cut the top income tax rate from 73 % to 24 % ( under Presidents Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge ).

Prior to the start of the season the Astros acquired outfielder Billy Hatcher from the Cubs for Jerry Mumphrey.

Prior to the introduction of the Latin term, incest was known in Old English as sibbleger ( from sibb ' kinship ' + leger ' to lie ') or mǣġhǣmed ( from mǣġ ' kin, parent ' + hǣmed ' sexual intercourse ') but in time, both words fell out of use.

Prior to the 386, the difficulty of manufacturing microchips and the uncertainty of reliable supply made it desirable that any mass-market semiconductor be multi-sourced, that is, made by two or more manufacturers, the second and subsequent companies manufacturing under license from the originating company.