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1449
Birth of Lorenzo de'Medici
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1455
Gutenberg prints the first bible
Johann Gutenberg holds the distinction of being the inventor of the movable-type printing press. In 1455, Gutenberg produced what is considered to be the first book ever printed: a Latin language Bible, printed in Mainz, Germany. -
1492
Columbus discovered a new world
America, 1492. Columbus led his three ships - the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria - out of the Spanish port of Palos on August 3, 1492. His objective was to sail west until he reached Asia the Indies where the riches of gold, pearls and spice awaited. -
1504
Michelangelo sculpts the David
The story of David and Goliath is a biblical one, found in Book 1 Samuel. The teenage David had to defeat the giant Goliath, he could not be defeated by strength since David was smaller. It took cunning and skill to defeat someone bigger than him, and he did so with the slingshot. -
1513
Niccolo Machiavelli writes the prince
is a 16th-century political treatise by the Italian diplomat and political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. ... However, the printed version was not published until 1532, five years after Machiavelli's death. -
1517
Martin Luther posts 95 theses on the door of castle church
On this day in 1517, the priest and scholar Martin Luther approaches the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, and nails a piece of paper to it containing the 95 revolutionary opinions that would begin the Protestant Reformation. -
1519
Leonardo da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
The Mona Lisa is a half-length portrait painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci that has been described as "the best known, the most visited, the most written about, the most sung about, the most parodied work of art in the world". -
1536
John Calvin publishes Institutes of the Christian Religion
seminal work of Protestant systematic theology. -
1543
Nicolas Copernicus publishes On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres
just before his death, placed the sun at the center of the universe and argued that the Earth moved across the heavens as one of the planets. -
1556
Founding of the Society of Jesus by lgnatius of Loyola
The Jesuit movement was founded by Ignatius de Loyola, a Spanish soldier turned priest, in August 1534. The first Jesuits–Ignatius and six of his students–took vows of poverty and chastity and made plans to work for the conversion of Muslims. -
1564
William Shakespeare is born
William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's greatest dramatist. -
Galileo invents a thermometer
first time, allowed temperature variations to be measured. ... It was perhaps the first crude clinical thermometer, as it was designed to be placed in a patient's mouth for temperature taking.
