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1506 BCE
Mona Lisa Completed 1506
The Mona lisa, was completed by Leonardo da Vinci in 1506. The length of the picture is 11.75 inches less than twice the width. if the perimeter of the picture is 102.5 inches, find its dimensions. The Louvre Museum in Paris has confirmed a report that the "Mona Lisa" by Leonardo da Vinci was completed later than previously thought. The Art Newspaper reported earlier this month that the painting was finished more than a decade later, possibly as late as 1519. -
Period: 1096 to 1291
Crusades are Fought
The crusades were fought mainly between the Arabs that controlled Jerusalem and Europe's armies, mainly the Holly Roman Empire. The first crusade was fought between 30,000 soldiers from Europe (including commoners, peasants, and knights) and the Seljuk Turks, who had taken control of The Holy Land from the Arabs. The Crusades were a series of religious wars fought between Christians and Muslims over control of the Holy Land. Traditionally, they took place between 1095 and 1291. -
1300
Renaissance Begins
It immediately followed the period in Europe known as the Middle Ages. The Renaissance began in Italy during the 14th century and reached its height in the 15th. In the 16th and 17th centuries it spread to the rest of Europe. -
Period: 1337 to 1453
100 Year War Begins
The name the Hundred Years’ War has been used by historians since the beginning of the nineteenth century to describe the long conflict that pitted the kings and kingdoms of France and England against each other from 1337 to 1453. One factor lays at the origin of the conflict: first, the status of the duchy of Guyenne (or Aquitaine)-though it belonged to the kings of England, it remained a fief of the French crown, and the kings of England wanted independent possession. -
1347
Black Death Begins in Europe
The Black Death arrived in Europe by sea in October 1347 when 12 Genoese trading ships docked at the Sicilian port of Messina after a long journey through the Black Sea. Most of the sailors aboard the ships were dead, and those who were still alive were gravely ill. They were overcome with fever, unable to keep food down and delirious from pain. Strangest of all, they were covered in mysterious black boils that oozed blood and pus. -
1353
Back Death Begins In Europe
The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 75 to 200 million people in Eurasia and peaking in Europe in the years 1346–1353. Although there were several competing theories as to the cause of the Black Death, analyses of DNA from people in northern and southern Europe published in 2010 and 2011 indicate that the pathogen responsible was the Yersinia pestis bacterium, resulting in several forms of plague. -
May 30, 1431
Joan of Arc Burned at the Stake
Joan of Arc was burned at the stake by the English on May 30, 1431. As a source of military inspiration, Joan of Arc helped turn the Hundred Years War firmly in France’s favor. By 1453, Charles VII had reconquered all of France except for Calais, which the English relinquished in 1558. In 1920, Joan of Arc, one of the great heroes of French history, was recognized as a Christian saint by the Roman Catholic Church. Her feast day is May 30. -
1440
Johannes Gutenberg printing press
The Gutenberg press with its wooden and later metal movable type printing brought down the price of printed materials and made such materials available for the masses. It remained the standard until the 20th century. It was there in 1440 that Johannes Gutenberg created his printing press, a hand press, in which ink was rolled over the raised surfaces of movable handset block letters held within a wooden form and the form was then pressed against a sheet of paper. -
1453
Fall of Constantinople
The fall of Constantinople was when the Ottoman Empire took over Constantinople, the capital city of the Byzantine Empire, on 29 May 1453. The Ottomans were commanded by 21-year-old Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, who defeated an army commanded by Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos. -
1478
Start of the Spanish Inquisition
Ferdinand and Isabella chose Catholicism to unite Spain and in 1478 asked permission of the pope to begin the Spanish Inquisition to purify the people of Spain. They began by driving out Jews, Protestants and other non-believers. In 1483 Tomas de Torquemada became the inquisitor-general for most of Spain. -
1492
Christopher Columbus Lands in the New World
Guanahani is an island in the Bahamas that was the first land in the New World sighted and visited by Christopher Columbus' first voyage, on October 12, 1492. -
Period: 1492 to 1492
Columbian Exchange
The Columbian Exchange was the widespread transfer of plants, animals, culture, human populations, technology, and ideas between the Americas and the Old World in the 15th and 16th centuries, related to European colonization and trade after Christopher Columbus's 1492 voyage. -
Period: 1502 to
Slave Trade
1502 First reported African slaves in the New World. 1860s The Atlantic slave trade was abolished over a 30-year period ending with Portugal’s 1836 ban on slave trading. But legal abolition did not end the still profitable trade. It continued illegally well into the 19th century. As long as there remained a market for slaves in the Americas, mostly in Brazil and Cuba, the trade would continue until the 1860s. -
1508
Michelangelo begins painting the Sistine Chapel
Michelangelo was summoned to Rome by Pope Julius II. He first thought that he would only be working on the pope’s tomb, but was also given the job of painting figures of the twelve apostle against a starry sky on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Bramante hoped that by suggesting a sculptor to paint a fresco, Michelangelo would present “less creditable work than Raphael of Urbino, to whom, out of hatred for Michelangelo, they gave every support.” -
Period: 1509 to 1547
King Henry VIII Reign
When Henry VII died in 1509, this popular eighteen-year-old prince, known for his love of hunting and dancing, became King Henry VIII. Soon after he obtained the papal dispensation required to allow him to marry his brother's widow, Catherine of Aragon. In 1521 Pope Leo X conferred the title of Defender of the Faith on Henry for his book 'Assertio Septem Sacramentorum', which affirmed the supremacy of the Pope in the face of the reforming ideals of the German theologian, Martin Luther. -
1517
Martin Luther post 95 Theses
At the time, a Dominican priest named Johann Tetzel, commissioned by the Archbishop of Mainz and Pope Leo X, was in the midst of a major fundraising campaign in Germany to finance the renovation of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Though Prince Frederick III the Wise had banned the sale of indulgences in Wittenberg, many church members traveled to purchase them. When they returned, they showed the pardons they had bought to Luther, claiming they no longer had to repent for their sins. -
1521
Cortez Conquers the Aztecs
Cortez conquered the Aztecs in 1521. After landing in Mexico in 1519 he systematically besieged and destroyed the Aztec Empire and on August 13, 1521 he captured Cuauhtemoc, the ruler of Tenochtitlán. -
1532
The Prince
The Prince is a 16th-century political treatise by the Italian diplomat and political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. From correspondence a version appears to have been distributed in 1513, De Principatibus. However, the printed version was not published until 1532, five years after Machiavelli's death. This was done with the permission of the Medici pope Clement VII, but "long before then, in fact since the first appearance of The Prince in manuscript, controversy had swirled about his writings." -
Period: 1545 to 1563
Counter Reformation
The Counter-Reformation was a movement within the Catholic Church to reform itself in the wake of the Protestant Reformation. The term, "Counter-Reformation," was still unknown in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and was coined later by non-Catholic historians to denote a Catholic reaction to the Reformation. -
1555
Peace of Augsburg
The Peace of Augsburg, also called the Augsburg Settlement, was a treaty between Charles V and the forces of the Schmalkaldic League, an alliance of Lutheran princes, on September 25, 1555, at the imperial city of Augsburg, in present-day Bavaria, Germany. -
Spanish Armada
The Spanish Armada was an ill-fated invasion force sent by Spain against England in 1588. King Philip II of Spain launched the attack because of the Protestant rule of Elizabeth I and piracies by British ships against the Spanish trade with the New World. -
Edict of Nantes
The Edict of Nantes, signed probably on 30 April 1598, by Henry IV of France, granted the Calvinist Protestants of France (also known as Huguenots) substantial rights in the nation which was, at the time, still considered essentially Catholic. In the Edict, Henry aimed primarily to promote civil unity. -
Period: to
Era of the Samurai
The samurai (or bushi) were the warriors of premodern Japan. They later made up the ruling military class that eventually became the highest ranking social caste of the Edo Period. Samurai employed a range of weapons such as bows and arrows, spears and guns, but their main weapon and symbol was the sword. -
William Shakespeare's Death
William Shakespeare died on 23 April 1616, his 52nd birthday (Shakespeare was born on 23 April 1564). In truth, the exact date is not known as only a record of his burial two days later has survived. -
Petition of Rights
The Petition of Right is a major English constitutional document that sets out specific liberties of the subject that the king is prohibited from infringing. Passed on 7 June 1628, the Petition contains restrictions on non-Parliamentary taxation, forced billeting of soldiers, imprisonment without cause, and the use of martial law. -
King Charles the First Executed
Charles I (19 November 1600 – 30 January 1649) was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. -
Lord George Macartney Expelled
It is named for its leader, George Macartney, Great Britain's first envoy to China. The goals of the mission included the opening of new ports for British trade in China, the establishment of a permanent embassy in Beijing, the cession of a small island for British use along China's coast, and the relaxation of trade restrictions on British merchants in Guangzhou (Canton). Macartney's delegation met with the Qianlong Emperor, who rejected all of the British requests. -
Period: to
Opium War
The First Opium War, also known as the Opium War and as the Anglo-Chinese War, was fought between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Qing Empire over their conflicting viewpoints on diplomatic relations, trade, and the administration of justice for foreign nationals. -
Period: to
Queen Elizabeth's Reign
She married Prince Philip on November 20, 1947 in Westminster Abbey, where William and Kate made their vows four years ago. Because of post-World War II shortages, she paid for her wedding dress with ration coupons. The white satin gown was designed by Sir Norman Hartnell and was woven at Winterthur Silks Limited in Dunfermline, Scotland.
