How Religions Evolved: the data behind the chart

A structured dataset of how five religious traditions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism) began, branched and divided, as drawn on the How It Evolved chart (https://howitevolved.com/chart/). Every dated item links to the How It Evolved chapter that gives its evidence and sources. Contents: 64 chapters of the five series with start and end years; 180 dated first attestations of ideas and practices, each with its attesting source, a note, a confidence level and the chapter URL; 160 tree nodes (trunks, branches and currents) with parent, start and end years and confidence; present-day adherent estimates with their sources; and 5 cross-tradition links. Years are integers (negative is BCE, no year 0). Each date is the first datable attestation the cited chapter gives, not the date an idea is supposed to have begun. Confidence levels: consensus, majority, contested, speculative, political (politically contested). See README.md for details.