Renaissance Timeline

By jamie.sanchez
  • Aug 22, 1485

    Richard III is killed in battle.

    Richard III (2 October 1452 – 22 August 1485) was King of England for two years, from 1483 until his death in 1485 during the Battle of Bosworth Field. 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.
  • Sep 26, 1492

    Christopher Columbus reaches the Americas.

    Though Columbus was not the first European explorer to reach the Americas (having been preceded by the Norse expedition led by Leif Ericson in the 11th century. Columbus's voyages led to the first lasting European contact with America, inaugurating a period of European exploration and colonization of foreign lands that lasted for several centuries. They had, therefore, an enormous impact in the historical development of the modern Western world.
  • Sep 27, 1503

    Leonardo da Vinci paints the "Mona Lisa".

    The Mona Lisa (La Gioconda or La Joconde, or Portrait of Lisa Gherardini), wife of Francesco del Giocondo is a half-length portrait of a woman by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci, which has been acclaimed as "the best known, the most visited, the most written about, the most sung about, the most parodied work of art in the world.
  • Sep 26, 1516

    Thomas More's Utopia is published.

    Utopia is a work of fiction and political philosophy by Thomas More published in 1516. English translations of the title include A Truly Golden Little Book, No Less Beneficial Than Entertaining, the Best State of a Republic, and of the New Island Utopia, and A Fruitful and Pleasant Work of the Best State of a Public Weal, and of the New Isle Called Utopia.The book, written in Latin, is a frame narrative primarily depicting a fictional island society,its religious, social, and politcal customs.
  • Sep 27, 1543

    With the Supremacy Act, Henry VIII proclaims himself head of Church of England.

    The first Act of Supremacy was a piece of legislation that granted King Henry VIII of England Royal Supremacy, which means that he was declared the supreme head of the Church of England. It is still the legal authority of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. Royal Supremacy is specifically used to describe the legal sovereignty of the civil laws over the laws of the Church in England.
  • Sep 27, 1558

    Elizabeth I becomes queen of England.

    Elizabeth set out to rule by good counsel,[1] and she depended heavily on a group of trusted advisers led by William Cecil, Baron Burghley. One of her first moves as queen was the establishment of an English Protestant church, of which she became the Supreme Governor. This Elizabethan Religious Settlement later evolved into today's Church of England.
  • Sep 26, 1564

    William Shakespeare, the Bard of Avon, is born.

    William Shakespeare (26 April 1564 (baptised) – 23 April 1616) 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". His surviving works, including some collaborations, consist of about 38 plays,154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and several other poems.

  • Globe Theatre is built in London.

    The Globe Theatre was a 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. A second Globe Theatre was built on the same site by June 1614 and closed in 1642. A modern reconstruction of the Globe, named "Shakespeare's Globe", opened in 1997 approximately 750 feet (230 m) from the site of the original theatre.

  • Shakespeare writes King Lear and Macbeth.

    Macbeth was written around 1605 during Shakespeare's so-called "Tragic Period." It is a tragedy about a wealthy Scottish noble, Macbeth, who kills his king to gain the throne.King Lear 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.

  • First permanent English settlement in North America is estabilished at Jamestown, Virginia.

    Jamestown Colony, first permanent English settlement in North America, located near present-day Williamsburg, Virginia. Established on May 14, 1607, the colony gave England its first foothold in the European competition for the New World, which had been dominated by the Spanish since the voyages of Christopher Columbus in the late 15th century.

  • 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. Never before imprinted. (although sonnets 138 and 144 had previously been published in the 1599 miscellany The Passionate Pilgrim). The quarto ends with "A Lover's Complaint", a narrative poem of 47 seven-line stanzas written in rhyme royal.

  • King James Bible is published.

    The Authorized Version, commonly known as the King James Version, King James Bible, AV, KJB, or KJV, is an English translation of the Christian Bible by the Church of England begun in 1604 and completed in 1611. First printed by the King's Printer Robert Barker, This was the third official translation into English.

  • The Mayflower lands at Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts.

    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. There are no contemporaneous references to the Pilgrims' landing on a rock at Plymouth, and it is not referred to in Edward Winslow's Mourt's Relation (1620–21) or in Bradford's journal Of Plymouth Plantation (1620–47).

  • Newspapers are first published in London.

    Corante: or Newes from Italy, Germany, Hungarie, Spain and France was published by the printer Nathaniel Butter in London. The earliest of the seven surviving copies is dated September 24, 1621, but it is thought that this single page news sheet began publication earlier in 1621. Corante was the first private newspaper published in English. As a result of a 1586 edict from the Star Chamber, it carried no news about England.

  • John Milton begins "Paradise Lost".

    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 end; 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.