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Jan 1, 1449
Birth of Lorenzo de' Medici
Lorenzo de' Medici was an Italian statesman and de facto ruler of the Florentine Republic. He is recognised as one of the most powerful persons of the Renaissance. -
Mar 12, 1455
Gutenberg prints the first Bible
Before Gutenberg, every book produced in Europe had to be copied by hand. (Although the Chinese had been mass producing books since the ninth century.) Now it was possible to speed up the process without sacrificing quality. We know for certain about this first printed Bible from a letter. -
Nov 1, 1478
Spanish Inquisition is introduced
The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition (Spanish: Tribunal del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición), commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition (Inquisición española), was established in 1478 by Catholic Monarchs Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. It was intended to maintain Catholic orthodoxy in their kingdoms and to replace the Medieval Inquisition, which was under Papal control. It became the most substantive of the three different manifestations of the wider Christian Inq -
Oct 12, 1492
Columbus discovers the new world
The explorer Christopher Columbus made four trips across the Atlantic Ocean from Spain: in 1492, 1493, 1498 and 1502. He was determined to find a direct water route west from Europe to Asia, but he never did. Instead, he accidentally stumbled upon the Americas. -
May 20, 1498
Vasco da Gama sails to India
Portuguese explorer Vasco de Gama becomes the first European to reach India via the Atlantic Ocean when he arrives at Calicut on the Malabar Coast. Da Gama sailed from Lisbon, Portugal, in July 1497, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and anchored at Malindi on the east coast of Africa. -
Dec 29, 1501
Michelangelo sculpts the David
David (Italian pronunciation: [ˈdaːvid]) is a masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture created between 1501 and 1504 by Michelangelo. It is a 5.17-metre (17.0 ft) [a] marble statue of a standing male nude. The statue represents the Biblical hero David, a favoured subject in the art of Florence. -
Sep 29, 1503
Leonardo da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
The Mona Lisa 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" -
Oct 30, 1513
Niccolo Machiavelli writes 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, using a Latin title, De Principatibus. -
Oct 30, 1516
Rapheal paints the Transfiguration
The Transfiguration is the last painting by the Italian High Renaissance master Raphael. Commissioned by Cardinal Giulio de Medici, the later Pope Clement VII and conceived as an altarpiece -
Oct 30, 1516
Thomas More writes Utopia
Utopia is a work of fiction and political philosophy by Thomas More published in 1516 in Latin. The book is a frame narrative primarily depicting a fictional island society and its religious, social and political customs. -
Oct 31, 1517
Martin Luther posts 95 Theses on the door of Castle Church
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. -
Oct 30, 1534
King Henry VIII begins Protestant Anglican church
The Church of England is part of the Anglican Communion, which is a worldwide family of churches in more than 160 different countries. On any one Sunday more than a million people attend Church of England services, making it the largest Christian denomination in the country. -
Oct 30, 1536
John Calvin publishes Institutes of the Christian Religion
Institutes of the Christian Religion is John Calvin's seminal work of Protestant systematic theology. -
Oct 30, 1540
Founding of the Society of Jesus by Ignatius of Loyola
The Society of Jesus is a male religious congregation of the Catholic Church. The members are called Jesuits. The society is engaged in evangelization and apostolic ministry in 112 nations on six continents. -
Oct 30, 1543
Nicolas Copernicus publishes On the Revolution of the Celestial Spheres
De revolutionibus orbium coelestium is the seminal work on the heliocentric theory of the Renaissance astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus -
Jan 1, 1559
Elizabeth I begins rule in England
Elizabeth I was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana or Good Queen Bess, the childless Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty. -
Apr 26, 1564
William Shakespear 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 pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet, and the "Bard of Avon". -
Sir Walter Raleigh tries to establish Roanoke (present day North Carolina
Sir Walter Raleigh was an English adventurer and writer who became a favorite ... Between 1584 and 1589, he helped establish a colony near Roanoke Island . -
King Phillip II of Spain assembles the Spanish Armada
The Spanish Armada (Spanish: Grande y Felicísima Armada, literally "Great and Most Fortunate Navy") was a Spanish fleet of 130 ships that sailed from A Coruña in August 1588, under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia with the purpose of escorting an army from Flanders to invade England. -
Galileo invents a thermometer
A Galileo thermometer (or Galilean thermometer) is a thermometer made of a sealed glass cylinder containing a clear liquid and several glass vessels of varying densities. As the temperature changes, the individual floats rise or fall in proportion to their respective density.
