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476
The Fall Of The Roman Empire
When the Visigoths came in 476 AD, they took the last emperor Romulus Augustus out of his power and that started The Dark Ages and only the Western half got conquered and the Eastern half was changed to the Byzantine Empire. -
Period: 476 to May 15, 1450
The Middle Ages
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May 16, 1066
William the Conqueror
William I, usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman King of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087. Williams's mother had not been married to his father when he was born, but William still inherited his father's property and his title of Duke of Normandy. People called him William the Bastard (that means that his parents were not married). He wanted to do something big and adventurous. -
May 15, 1095
1st Crusade
In 1095 AD Pope Urban made a great speech at Clermont in southern France, where he urged the people to take up weapons and go fight to free Jerusalem from the rule of the Fatimids. People were wildly enthusiastic. Even children and old women and old men wanted to go. Thousands of Jews were robbed and killed by these Crusaders, just because they were not Christians. Finally in the fall of 1096 the main Crusade left for Jerusalem. -
May 16, 1144
2nd Crusade
By 1144, a Mamluk general, Imad-ed-din Zangi, had managed to unite enough Turks and Arabs in his army to attack the Christian kingdoms. Zangi did not take Jerusalem, but he did take the Syrian city of Edessa nearby. Most of Conrad's soldiers were killed as they marched through Turkey. When Louis and Conrad reached Jerusalem, they decided to attack Damascus, which would have made up for the loss of Edessa. But their attack on Damascus failed, and the kings and queens went home in disgust. -
May 16, 1192
3rd Crusade
The third Crusade was just like the second they ran into trouble. Friedrich died on the way to Jerusalem, drowned while he was taking a bath in a creek. Most of his soldiers went home. Meanwhile Richard and Philippe went by boat to Jerusalem. Richard conquered the island of Cyprus on the way to Jerusalem, but he conquered it from a relative of the Roman Emperor, who therefore became Richard's enemy. The French and English armies beseiged Acre (AH-kerr). -
May 16, 1202
4th Crusade
In order to get enough ships to take everyone to Egypt, the armies needed help from the great sea power, Venice. In 1202, the Crusaders came to Venice to get their ships, but they didn't have enough money to pay for them. So the Venetians said, "Okay, you can pay us later, but in exchange you have to fight for us to get back the city of Zara (in modern Hungary) that went over to the Hungarians a few years ago." The Crusaders agreed to do this, even though Zara was a Christian city. -
May 16, 1204
The Fall of Constantinople
The Paleologi were the last dynasty on the throne of the Roman Empire, from 1204 to 1453 AD. At first they did pretty well. They made a good alliance with the Italian city of Genoa, and together the Byzantines and Genoa dominated the Mediterranean Sea in the 1200s AD. In addition in the 1300s, a terrible bubonic plague came from the Mongol Empire in the 1300s and killed thousands of people in Constantinople and the Byzantine Empire. Finally in 1453 AD the Ottomans conquered Constantinople. -
May 16, 1215
Magna Carta
King John didn't seem to be taking such good care of England. First he lost almost all of the English land in France. Then he made everyone who owned land in England pay extra taxes. And he got into fights with the Pope about who would control the Catholic Church in England. So in 1215 AD, the earls, the dukes, and the counts - decided to try to get back some of the power from the king. They wrote a letter (Latin "carta") saying that everyone in England would have certain rights. -
May 15, 1328
The Black Death
During the Hundred Years' War, a lot of people in Europe were very poor and hungry because the soldiers fighting the war had wrecked their farms. Then people began to catch a terrible sickness that was spreading along Mongol trade routes from China through Central Asia to Europe beginning in 1328 AD.This sickness was the bubonic plague. Bacteria caused it, getting inside people usually when infected fleas bit them.When you caught the plague you got big black spots called buboes on your neck. -
May 16, 1338
100 Years War
When the last French king in the direct Capetian line died in 1328 AD, the English king Edward III, who already held a large part of France, claimed the right to rule all of France - to be the king of France as well as the king of England. At this time Edward III was only eighteen years old. War broke out in 1338. At first the English won some big battles. But the war went on and on, even after Edward III died in 1377. -
Charlemagne
When Charlemagne's father Pippin died the frankish empire was left to him in 768 AD. While the Franks were already strong but Charlemagne still made them stronger . In 774 AD Charlemagne conquered the Lombards in northern Italy. When Charlemagne was crowned the holy Roman emperor and at that moment in 800 the emperor of Constantinople a woman Irene, they thought she was not emperor because she was a woman. Charlemagne had offered to marry Irene, to put a man back on the throne but Irene refused.
