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Aug 22, 1485
Richard III is killed in battle.
He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty. His defeat at the Battle of Bosworth Field was the decisive battle of the Wars of the Roses and is sometimes regarded as the end of the Middle Ages in England. He is the subject of an eponymous play by William Shakespeare. -
Aug 3, 1492
Christopher Columbus reaches the Americas
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. His first stop was the Canary Islands where the lack of wind left his expedition becalmed until September 6. -
Jan 1, 1503
Leonardo da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
Is a half-length portrait of a woman by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci,The painting, thought to be a portrait of Lisa Gherardini, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, is in oil on a poplar panel, and is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506 -
Dec 1, 1516
Thomas More's Utopia is published
Is a work of fiction and political philosophy.The English humanist Sir Thomas More extended this monastic communism in Utopia (1516), which describes an imaginary society in which money is abolished and people share meals, houses, and other goods in common. -
Jan 1, 1543
With the Supremacy Act, Henry VIII proclaims himself head of Church of England.
The title was created for King Henry VIII, who was responsible for the English church breaking away from the authority of the Roman Catholic Church after the Pope excommunicated -
Jan 1, 1558
Elizabeth I becomes queen of England.
When she became queen in 1558, she was twenty-five years old, a survivor of scandal and danger, and considered illegitimate by most Europeans. She inherited a bankrupt nation, torn by religious discord, a weakened pawn between the great powers of France and Spain. -
Apr 26, 1564
William Shakespeare the Bard of Avon, is born
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon". -
Shakespeare writes King Lear Macbeth
Is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. The title character descends into madness after foolishly disposing of his estate between two of his three daughters based on their flattery, bringing tragic consequences for all. -
Shakespeare's sonnets are published.
Shakespeare's sonnets are a collection of 154 sonnets, dealing with themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty and mortality, first published in a 1609 quarto entitled SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS.The first 17 poems, traditionally called the procreation sonnets, are addressed to a young man urging him to marry and have children in order to immortalise his beauty by passing it to the next generation. -
King James Bible is published.
Was England's authorized version of the Bible translated from the original Hebrew and Greek languages into English at the request of King James I of England. -
The Mayflower lands at Plymouth Rock , Massachusets
Plymouth Rock is the traditional site of disembarkation of William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims who founded Plymouth Colony in 1620. It is an important symbol in American history. -
Newspapers are firts published in London.
In 1621 the newspaper "Corante" is published in London. -
John Milton begins Paradise Lost
Is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse. A second edition followed in 1674, changed into twelve books (in the manner of the division of Virgil's Aeneid) with minor revisions throughout and a note on the versification. -
Puritan Commonwealth ends;monarchy is restored with Charles II
The Restoration of the English monarchy began in 1660 when the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under Charles II after the Interregnum that followed the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. The term Restoration is used to describe both the actual event by which the monarchy was restored, and the period of several years afterwards in which a new political settlement was established. It is very often used to cover the whole reign of Charles II (1660-1685). -
First permanent English settlement in North America is established at Jamestown, Virginia.
Jamestown was the first successful English settlement on the mainland of North America.Named for King James I of England, Jamestown was founded in the Colony of Virginia on May 14, 1607. -
Globe Theatre is built in London.
Globe theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. It was built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, and was destroyed by fire on 29 June 1613
