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Period: 1300 to
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a period in European history, from the 14th to the 17th century, regarded as the cultural bridge between the Middle Ages and modern history -
1347
The Black Death
The Black Death arrived in Europe by sea in October 1347 when 12 Genoese trading ships docked at the Sicilian port of Messina after a long journey through the Black Sea. This ravages Europe for the first time.The tragedy was extraordinary. In the course of just a few months, 60 per cent of Florence’s population died from the plague, and probably the same proportion in Siena. By changing the economic situation, the devastating disease helps lay the preconditions for Renaissance. -
1450
Francesco Sforza Takes Power In Milan
The illegitimate son of a mercenary commander, Muzio Attendolo Sforza.In 1449 Milan concluded peace with Venice behind Sforza’s back, whereupon he blockaded the city, starving it into insurrection. Subsequently, on February 26, 1450, he made his triumphant entry into the city as duke of Milan.The following year Venice, Naples, Savoy, and Montferrat joined forces against Sforza, who turned to Cosimo de’ Medici. -
1503
Pope Julius II Appointed Pope; Start Of "Roman Golden Age"
The ascension of Pope Julius II begins the Roman Golden Age, during which the city and Papacy both prosper. Julius II reverses the trend of moral degradation in the Papacy and takes great steps in the rebuilding of Rome. -
Period: 1550 to
Age of Absolution
The Age of Absolutism describes a period of European history in which monarchs successfully gathered the wealth and power of the state to themselves. Louis XIV is the poster image of the absolute monarch. When he said "L'etat c'est moi" (I am the state) he was to a great extent correct. France was powerful and prosperous and represented that which all European monarchs aspired to -
1569
Mercator Projection World Map
The fact that the Earth is a sphere made it difficult for explorers to create a decent map of any area that they explored. In 1569, the Flemish geographer turned cartographer, Gerardus Mercator published his first cylindrical map of the globe. This map was printed on eighteen separate pieces of paper and measured 202 x 124 centimeters. The only problem with the map was that of stretching the landforms to allow them to be flat on a surface. -
1571
The Battle of Lepanto
The naval Battle of Lepanto took place on 7 October 1571 at the northern edge of the entrance to the Gulf of Corinth (then the Gulf of Lepanto), off western Greece. A galley fleet of the Holy League, a sometimes-flimsy coalition of Pope Pius V, Spain, Venice, Genoa, Savoy, Naples, the Knights of Malta and others, defeated a force of Ottoman galleys. -
Catholic Reformation
Catholic Revival, in the history of Christianity, the Roman Catholic efforts directed in the 16th and early 17th centuries both against the Protestant Reformation and toward internal renewal; the Counter-Reformation took place during roughly the same period as the Protestant Reformation, actually (according to some sources) beginning shortly before Martin Luther’s act of nailing the Ninety-Five Theses to the church door -
Spanish Inquisition
The council, especially after its reorganization during the reign of Philip II put the effective control of the institution more and more into the hands of the civil power. The condemned were presented before a large crowd that often included royalty, and the proceedings had a ritualized, almost festive, quality. The number of burnings at the stake during Torquemada’s tenure was exaggerated by Protestant critics of the Inquisition, but it is generally estimated to have been about 2,000. -
King Louis XIV
The day after Cardinal Mazarin's death, Louis XIV, at the age of twenty three, expressed his deterrnination to be a real king and the sole ruler of France. Louis proved willing to pay the price of being a strong ruler . He established a consci entious routine from which he seldom deviated, but he did not look upon his duties as drudgery since he judged his royal profession to be "grand, noble, and delightful." -
Hobbes Publishes "Leviathan"
Its name derives from the biblical Leviathan. The work concerns the structure of society and legitimate government, and is regarded as one of the earliest and most influential examples of social contract theory.[5] Leviathan ranks as a classic western work on statecraft comparable to Machiavelli's The Prince. Written during the English Civil War (1642–1651), Leviathan argues for a social contract and rule by an absolute sovereign. -
Peter The Great
Peter “the Great” was an energetic and ruthless leader. After Peter visited Western Europe early in power, he began to model the Russian Empire similarly to the Western technology, military organization, and political practice. He invited Western advisors and technicians to Russia to help institute a government protection for industries and commercial enterprises. -
The Palace of Versailles
n 1789, the French Revolution forced Louis XVI to leave Versailles for Paris. The Palace would never again be a royal residence and a new role was assigned to it in the 19th century, when it became the Museum of the History of France in 1837 by order of King Louis-Philippe, who came to the throne in 1830. The rooms of the Palace were then devoted to housing new collections of paintings and sculptures representing great figures and important events that had marked the History of France. -
Period: to
Enlightenment
European politics, philosophy, science and communications were radically reoriented during the course of the “long 18th century” (1685-1815) as part of a movement referred to by its participants as the Age of Reason, or simply the Enlightenment. Enlightenment thinkers in Britain, in France and throughout Europe questioned traditional authority and embraced the notion that humanity could be improved through rational change. -
The Steam Engine is Invented
In 1712, Thomas Newcomen's atmospheric engine became the first commercially successful engine using the principle of the piston and cylinder, which was the fundamental type steam engine used until the early 20th century. The steam engine was used to pump water out of coal mines -
Period: to
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in the period from about 1760 to sometime between 1712 and 1908. This transition included going from hand production methods to machines, new chemical manufacturing and iron production processes, the increasing use of steam power, the development of machine tools and the rise of the factory system -
Montesquieu Published "Persian Letters"
Montesquieu never referred to Lettres persanes (Persian Letters) as a novel until "Quelques remarques sur les Lettres persanes," which begins: "Nothing about the Lettres persanes was more ingratiating than to find in it unexpectedly a sort of novel. There is a visible beginning, development, and ending […]." Initially, for most of its first readers as well as for its author, it was not considered primarily a novel, and even less an "epistolary novel" as it is often classified now. -
Death of King Louis XIV
The story of Louis XIV’s death is worthy of a Shakespearean tragedy. His health started to decline on 10 August 1715 upon his return from a hunting trip in Marly, when he felt sharp pains in his leg. Fagon, his doctor, diagnosed sciatica. But the pain was always in the same place, and shortly afterwards black marks appeared, indicating senile gangrene. Despite excruciating pain, the king carried on with his daily routine without flinching, fully intending to do his duty to the end. -
Voltaire Published "Candide"
French satire first published in 1759 by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment.The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled Candide: or, All for the Best Candide: or, The Optimist and Candide: or, Optimism It begins with a young man, Candide, who is living a sheltered life in an Edenic paradise and being indoctrinated with Leibnizian optimism by his mentor, Professor Pangloss. -
The Spinning Jenny is Invented
The Spinning Jenny inventor was a man called James Hargreaves who in 1764 was working as a weaver and carpenter in Standhill, Lancashire and although he was illiterate he knew there was a problem producing sufficient thread for the weavers. He began to consider the design for a machine that would increase the output of thread by increasing the number of spindles able to be operated by a single wheel. -
Period: to
American Revolution
The American Revolution is also known as the American Revolutionary War and the U.S. War of Independence. The conflict arose from growing tensions between residents of Great Britains 13 North American colonies and the colonial government which represented the British crown. Skirmishes between British troops and colonial militiamen in Lexington and Concord in April 1775 kicked off the armed conflict and by the following summer the rebels were waging a full-scale war for their independence. -
Lexington and Concord
The Battles of Lexington and Concord, fought on April 19, 1775 kicked off the American Revolutionary War. Tensions had been building for many years between residents of the 13 American colonies and the British authorities, particularly in Massachusetts. On the night of April 18, 1775, hundreds of British troops marched from Boston to nearby Concord in order to seize an arms cache. Paul Revere and other riders sounded the alarm colonial militiamen began mobilizing to intercept the Redcoat column. -
Battle of Bunker Hill
On June 17, 1775, early in the Revolutionary War (1775-83), the British defeated the Americans at the Battle of Bunker Hill in Massachusetts. Despite their loss, the inexperienced colonial forces inflicted significant casualties against the enemy, and the battle provided them with an important confidence boost. Although commonly referred to as the Battle of Bunker Hill, most of the fighting occurred on nearby Breed’s Hill. -
British Surrender at Saratoga
The Battle of Saratoga was the turning point of the Revolutionary War. The scope of the victory is made clear by a few key facts: On October 17, 1777, 5,895 British and Hessian troops surrendered their arms. General John Burgoyne had lost 86 percent of his expeditionary force that had triumphantly marched into New York from Canada in the early summer of 1777. -
Kings Mountain Victory
During the American Revolution, Patriot irregulars under Colonel William Campbell defeat Tories under Major Patrick Ferguson at the Battle of King’s Mountain in South Carolina.One thousand American frontiersmen under Colonel Campbell of Virginia gathered in the backcountry to resist Ferguson’s advance. Pursued by the Patriots, Ferguson positioned his Tory force in defense of a rocky, treeless ridge named King’s Mountain. -
Condorcet Published a Treatise on Women Rights
What Condorcet termed, in a 1790 essay by that name, “the admission of women to the rights of citizenship” was widely opposed on the grounds that women possessed distinctive natures, which perfectly suited them to the fulfillment of their domestic duties.[4] Women were deemed unqualified for the realm of public affairs because of their alleged greater susceptibility to sensations, flawed rationality, and weaker sense of justice. Women did not get the vote during the French Revolution. -
U.S. Constitution Replaces The Articles of Confederation
The Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, the first constitution of the United States but the states did not ratify them The Articles created a loose confederation of sovereign states and a weak central government. Nationalists, led by James Madison, George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Wilson, almost immediately began working. They turned a series of regional commercial conferences into a national constitutional convention at Philadelphia in 1787. -
Estates General
Estates-General, also called States General, French États-Généraux, in France of the pre-Revolutionary monarchy, the representative assembly of the three “estates,” or orders of the realm: the clergy and nobility—which were privileged minorities—and a Third Estate, which represented the majority of the people. -
Period: to
French Revolution
A watershed event in modern European history, the French Revolution began in 1789 and ended in the late 1790s with the ascent of Napoleon Bonaparte. During this period, French citizens razed and redesigned their country’s political landscape, uprooting centuries-old institutions such as absolute monarchy and the feudal system. -
Tennis Court Oath
The swearing of the Tennis Court Oath (in French, Serment du jeu de Paume) is one of the pivotal scenes of the French Revolution. On the morning of June 20th 1789, deputies in the newly formed National Assembly gathered to enter the meeting hall at the Hôtel des Menus-Plaisirs at Versailles. Gathering on the floor of this court, the 577 deputies took an oath, hastily written by Emmanuel Sieyès and administered by Jean-Sylvain Bailly. -
France Declares War on Austria and Prussia
he first three years of the French Revolution were free of war. That changed in April 1792, when Girondinist deputies instigated a revolutionary war with France’s neighbour Austria. Some claimed that war was necessary to ‘save the revolution’ from external threats. They would also the course of European history, France’s wars rolling one into the other and lasting for a decade. -
Thomas Paine Wrote "The Age of Reason"
The Age of Reason; Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology is a work by English and American political activist Thomas Paine, arguing for the philosophical position of Deism. It follows in the tradition of eighteenth-century British deism, and challenges institutionalized religion and the legitimacy of the Bible. It was published in three parts in 1794, 1795, and 1807. It was a best-seller in the United States, where it caused a short-lived deistic revival. -
French Victory Over Austrians at Fleurus (Belgium)
The battle of Fleurus (26 June 1794) was the decisive battle in the two year long campaign in the Austrian Netherlands between the forces of revolutionary France and the powers of the First Coalition. The French plan for 1794 was to carry out offensives at both ends of the front line on the southern border of the Austrian Netherlands, with one army attacking in western Flanders and another towards Charleroi on the Sambre. -
Period: to
Napoleonic Era
The Napoleonic era is a period in the history of France and Europe. It is generally classified as including the fourth and final stage of the French Revolution. -
Renewed War With Britain
After the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789, Britain had remained neutral, watching from the side-lines, but in 1793, when French troops occupied Belgian lands, threatening the Dutch as well as British overland trade via the River Scheldt, war was instigated. British troops were sent onto continental Europe, but were defeated at the battle of Hondschoote in the September of 1793. -
Treaty of Tilsit
The Treaties of Tilsit were two agreements signed by Napoleon I of France in the town of Tilsit in July 1807 in the aftermath of his victory at Friedland. The first was signed on 7 July, between Tsar Alexander I of Russia and Napoleon I of France, when they met on a raft in the middle of the Neman River. The second was signed with Prussia on 9 July. -
German Campaign
The Coalition allies now had a clear numerical superiority which they eventually brought to bear on Napoleons main forces despite earlier setbacks as in the Battle of Dresden. The high point of allied strategy was the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813 which ended in Napoleons decisive defeat. The Confederation of the Rhine an alliance of west German rulers allied to France had already lost battles against the Coalition allies in Bavaria and Saxony and after defeat at Leipzig dissolved completely -
Napoleon Abdicated as Emperor
After his defeat at the Battle of Waterloo, instead of remaining in the field with his shattered army Napoleon returned to Paris in the hope of retaining political support for his position as Emperor of the French. With his political base secured he hoped to then be able to continue the war. It was not to be; instead the members of the two chambers created a Provisional Government and demanded that Napoleon abdicate. -
Napoleon Escaped From Elba
On February 26, 1815, Napoleon managed to sneak past his guards and somehow escape from Elba, slip past interception by a British ship, and return to France. Immediately, people and troops began to rally to the returned Emperor. French police forces were sent to arrest him, but upon arriving in his presence, they kneeled before him. Triumphantly, Napoleon returned to Paris on March 20, 1815. -
Napoleon Died
Napoleon was subsequently exiled to the island of Saint Helena off the coast of Africa. Six years later, he died, most likely of stomach cancer, and in 1840 his body was returned to Paris, where it was interred in the Hotel des Invalides. -
Samuel Morse Invents the Telegraph
Soon, as overhead wires connected cities up and down the Atlantic coas the dots-and dashes method that recorded messages on a long moving strip of paper was replaced by the operator's ability to interpret the code in real time (once the receiver was given two different types of stop pin that each made a different sound) and transcribe it into English letters as he heard it. Telegraph lines soon extended westward, and within Morse's own lifetime they connected the continents of Europe and America -
Elisha Otis Invents The Sewing Machine
Howe's model was a strange-looking sewing machine. Every part has been improved, and many new ones have been added, but every one of the millions of sewing machines made since, owes at least one essential part to this machine, built in 1845. The way it sews is simple enough. The curved needle, with an eye at the point, carries the thread through the cloth, and the loop of the needle thread is locked by a thread passed through this loop by the shuttle. -
Henry Ford Creates The Model T.
The first production Model T was produced on August 12, 1908 and left the factory on September 27, 1908, at the Ford Piquette Avenue Plant in Detroit, Michigan. On May 26, 1927, Henry Ford watched the 15 millionth Model T Ford roll off the assembly line at his factory in Highland Park, Michigan.
