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Marco Polo is released as a prisoner of war in Genoa: at about this time, Marco marries a Venetian, Donata: they have three daughters, Belela, Fantina and Moreta: the death of Nicolo Polo
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On 25 May 1420, Henry gained appointment as the governor of the very rich Order of Christ, the Portuguese successor to the Knights Templar, which had its headquarters at Tomar. Henry would hold this position for the remainder of his life, and the order was an important source of funds for Henry's ambitious plans, especially his persistent attempts to conquer the Canary Islands, which the Portuguese had claimed to have discovered before the year 1346.
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Nicolaus Copernicus was born on February 19, 1473.
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Columbus headed for Spain, but another storm forced him into Lisbon. He anchored next to the King's harbor patrol ship on 4 March 1493 in Portugal. After spending more than one week in Portugal, he set sail for Spain. He crossed the bar of Saltes and entered the harbor of Palos on 15 March 1493. Word of his finding new lands rapidly spread throughout Europe.
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By December 16, 1497 the fleet had passed the Great Fish River (Eastern Cape, South Africa) - where Dias had turned back - and sailed into waters previously unknown to Europeans. With Christmas pending, da Gama and his crew gave the coast they were passing the name Natal, which carried the connotation of "birth of Christ" in Portuguese.
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When he was 27, Luther was assigned to travel to the holy city of Rome to represent his monastery
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Caught in a thunderstorm, pledges to become a monk
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In late March, Magellan's fleet anchored for the winter in what is now southern Argentina. During the Winter a storm destroyed their ship the Santiago. In an edition, mutiny broke out shortly after the men set up their winter quarters. Magellan and his crew resumed their voyage on October 18th.
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While the French were besieging the citadel of Pampeluna, a cannon ball, passing between Ignatius' legs, tore open the left calf and broke the right shin (Whit-Tuesday, 20 May, 1521).
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Cortés eventually rejoined his Tlaxcalan allies and reorganized his forces before again marching on Tenochtitlán in December 1520. After subduing the neighbouring territories he laid siege to the city itself, conquering it street by street until its capture was completed on August 13, 1521. This victory marked the fall of the Aztec empire. Cortés had become the absolute ruler of a huge territory extending from the Caribbean Sea to the Pacific Ocean.
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Pizarro reaches Cajamarca and captures Atahuallpa, the emperor of the Incas. Thousands of Incas were killed.
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In 1533, John Calvin experienced a powerful religious conversion which convinced him, on the one hand, of the absolute glory and power of God and, on the other hand, of the absolute sinfulness and depravity of human beings.
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Cartier departs for his third trip on may 23 1541 to canda to, this time, to set a colonization which later became the cause of the quebec and french speaking in canada.
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The first was the total eclipse of the Sun predicted for Aug. 21, 1560. Such a prediction seemed audacious and marvellous to a 14-year-old student, but when Tycho witnessed its realization he saw and believed--the spark was lit--and, as his many later references testify, he never forgot the event.
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Johannes Kepler discovered the third law.
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Sir Francis Bacon died on 9 April, 1626 of pneumonia contracted whilst testing his theory of the preservative and insulating properties of snow
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Galileo summoned to Rome
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"Newton's most famous experiment, the experimentum crucis, demonstrated his theory of the composition of light. Briefly, in a dark room Newton allowed a narrow beam of sunlight to pass from a small hole in a window shutter through a prism, thus breaking the white light into an oblong spectrum on a board" (Hatch, 1).
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His health became still worse in 1691, and he died on 31 December that year, just a week after that of the sister with whom he had lived for more than twenty years. Robert Boyle died from paralysis.
