Judean exiles returned from Babylon early in the following Persian period , starting the period in the starting of a Judahite presence in the province of Yehud , as Judah was now called . Following their liberation by the Persian conqueror , Cyrus The Great , Judean exiles returned to Jerusalem early in the following Persian period , inaugurating the formative period in the development of a distinctive Judahite identity in the Persian province of Yehud .