An outline of the current discussion about the period coincident and subsequent to the fall of Jerusalem in the early sixth century BCE known alternatively as the exile, the Templeless Age, or the Neo-Babylonian period. It pays particular attention to historical, archaeological, and exegetical reconstructions of the time as well as the circumstances and thought of the three main communities that survived the disaster – the exiles in Babylon, the remnant in the devastated homeland, and the refugees who fled to Egypt. It also briefly considers the ideologies of exile and diaspora in biblical memory.