<P> The biblical Book of Esther is set in the Persian capital of Susa ( Shushan ) in the third year of the reign of the Persian king Ahasuerus . The name Ahasuerus is equivalent to Xerxes ( both deriving from the Persian Khshayārsha ) , and Ahasuerus is usually identified in modern sources as Xerxes I , who ruled between 486 and 465 BC , as it is to this monarch that the events described in Esther are thought to fit the most closely . </P>
when does the book of esther take place
in the third year of the reign of the Persian king Ahasuerus between 486 and 465 BC