The World of Judges is understood in this work to include the period of biblical history from the entrance of Israel into Canaan to the establishment of the monarchy. The biblical literature pertinent to the period is that of the books of Joshua and Judges; Ruth, though it has long been placed in the Bible after Judges, is a production of a much later period and adds no historical information to the period treated here.Geographically the world of the Judges includes only Palestine; there are a few brief references to other regions but this period of Israelite history was, as far as we can now reconstruct it, determined by historical forces immanent in Palestine.