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Sep 27, 1066
William the Conqueror invades England
William argued that Edward had previously promised the throne to him and that Harold had sworn to support William's claim. William built a large fleet and invaded England in September 1066, decisively defeating and killing Harold at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066 -
Sep 27, 1150
Paper is first mass-produced in Spain
The oldest recorded document on paper was a deed of King Roger of Sicily, of the year 1102; and there are others of Sicilian kings in the 12th century. -
Sep 27, 1215
Magna Carta
The document, essentially a peace treaty between John and his barons, guaranteed that the king would respect feudal rights and privileges, uphold the freedom of the church, and maintain the nation’s laws. -
Sep 27, 1270
End of the Crusades
the death of his father Henry III forced him to return to England. The crusading era in the Holy Land ended in 1291, with the fall of Acre, the last crusader base in Palestine. -
Sep 27, 1348
The Plague
the shores of Italy in the spring of 1348 unleashing a rampage of death across Europe unprecedented in recorded history. -
Sep 27, 1378
First appearance of Robin Hood in literature
is Robin’s first appearance in a text, be it literary or historical, and it is not a shining reference. Sloth suggests songs of Robin Hood are widely known in taverns, implying he is a popular figure without a literary pedigree. -
Sep 27, 1387
Chaucer writes The Canterbury Tales
Out of school, he went on to a page in the household of the Countess of Ulster. Chaucer rose in royal employment and became a knight of the shire for Kent. As a member of the king's household, Chaucer was sent on diplomatic errands throughout Europe. -
Sep 27, 1455
War of the Roses
both houses were direct descendents of king Edward III; the ruling Lancastrian king, Henry VI, surrounded himself with unpopular nobles; ) the civil unrest of much of the population; ) the availability of many powerful lords with their own private armies; and ) the untimely episodes of mental illness by Henry VI. -
Sep 27, 1485
First printing of Le Morte d’Arthur
the characters of Arthur and his knights were already well-known in England. In the ninth century, a monk-historian named Nennius gave the name Arthur to a sixth-century Roman-British general who waged some successful battles against invading Saxons. -
Sep 27, 1485
First Tudor king, Henry VII, is crowned
the battlefield was to be named after the small neighboring town of Market Bosworth; the fallen King was the third and ablest of English monarchs who bore the name Richard; and the man whom the battle made a king was to be the seventh and perhaps the greatest of those who bore the name Henry. -
Nov 8, 1485
Richard III is killed in battle
On 22 August 1485, Richard was killed at Bosworth Field, the last English King to die in battle, thereby bringing to an end both the Plantagenet dynasty and the Wars of the Roses. Henry Tudor was crowned King Henry VII. -
Nov 8, 1492
Christopher Columbus reaches the Americas
Christopher Columbus Discovers 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. -
Nov 8, 1503
Leonardo da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
Mona Lisa, oil painting on a poplar wood panel by the Italian painter, draftsman, sculptor, architect, and engineer Leonardo da Vinci, probably the world’s most-famous painting. It was painted sometime between 1503 and 1519, -
Nov 8, 1516
1516 Thomas More’s Utopia is published
Written in Latin for a European audience, More's Utopia is the quintessential humanist dialogue. First published in Louvain, Belgium, in 1516, Utopia was an immediate sensation. Set as a dialogue in Antwerp between More and a voyager returned from newly discovered lands, the complexity of the work ensured that it would have nearly as many interpretations as readers -
Nov 8, 1543
With the Supremacy Act, Henry VIII proclaims himself head of Church of England
The joke in church circles is that the Episcopal church is the only denomination that started because of a divorce. In fact, as part of an advertising campaign in the 1980s, the Episcopal church designed a poster featuring Henry VIII that stated: “The Episcopal Church welcomes divorced people.” -
Nov 9, 1558
1558 Elizabeth I becomes queen of England
Elizabeth I (7 September 1533 – 24 March 1603) 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 last monarch of the Tudor dynasty. -
Nov 8, 1564
William Shakespeare, the Bard of Avon, is born
Though no birth records exist, church records indicate that a William Shakespeare was baptized at Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon on April 26, 1564. From this, it is believed he was born on or near April 23, 1564, and this is the date scholars acknowledge as William Shakespeare's birthday. -
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, on land owned by Thomas Brend and inherited by his son, Nicholas Brend and grandson Sir Matthew Brend, and was destroyed by fire on 29 June 1613. -
Shakespeare writes King Lear and Macbeth
Shakespeare not only articulated the perils of separation, but also conceived a new drama that reflected the teeming anxieties of post-Elizabethan England. -
1607 First permanent English settlement in North America is established at Jamestown, Virginia.
William Kelso writes that Jamestown "is where the British Empire began ... this was the first colony in the British Empire." Jamestown was established by the Virginia Company of London as "James Fort" on May 4, 1607 (O.S., May 14, 1607 N.S.), and was considered permanent after brief abandonment in 1610. -
Shakespeare’s sonnets are published
a collection of 154 sonnets by William Shakespeare, which covers themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty and mortality. ... The sonnets were first published in a 1609 quarto with the full stylised title: SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS. Never before Imprinted. -
King James Bible is published
known as the Authorized Version (AV) or the King James Bible (KJB), is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England begun in 1604 and completed in 1611. -
1620 The Mayflower lands at Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts
The great Separatist experiment in the Netherlands came to a quick end, as they began to look elsewhere for a purer place to build their society. Some headed for English islands in the Caribbean. Those who would be forever known to future Americans as the Pilgrims set their sights on the New World in late 1620. -
Newspapers are first published in London
Corante: or, Newes from Italy, Germany, Hungarie, Spaine and FranceOffsite Link was published by the printer Nathaniel ButterOffsite Link 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. -
c.1658 John Milton begins Paradise Lost
Milton composed the ten books of Paradise Lost between 1658 and 1663. He had first planned the work as early as 1640, intending to write a tragedy titled Adam Unparadised. By 1652 he had become completely blind, probably due to glaucoma. Blindness forced him to compose orally, rendering him entirely reliant upon amanuenses (casual copyists among his friends and family circle) to whom he gave dictation. -
1660 Puritan Commonwealth ends; monarchy is restored with Charles II
Restoration, Restoration of the monarchy in England in 1660. It marked the return of Charles II as king (1660–85) following the period of Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth. The bishops were restored to Parliament, which established a strict Anglican orthodoxy.
