Hutchinson Chronology of World History [Compact ed.] 9781859865293

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The Hutchinson Chronology of World History Compact Edition Preface The Hutchinson Chronology of World History Compact Edition is a reference book, with entries arranged by year. To go directly to a particular period, click on the link in the table of contents.

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Table of contents The The The The The The The The

Big Bang to the earliest human societies (15 billion–3001 first civilizations (3000–801 BC) Classical world (800 BC–AD 499) Dark Ages (500–999) divided world (1000–1492) expansion of Europe (1493–1789) European ascendancy (1790–1945) making of global civilization (1946–2005)

BC)

The Big Bang to the earliest human societies (15 billion–3001 c. 15 billion

BC)

The approximate date of the origin of the universe.

BC

c. 13 billion BC The hydrogen and helium atoms in the young universe begin to form into areas of greater and lesser density. The dense patches form into clusters of galaxies under the force of gravity. c. 10 billion time.

Our Galaxy, the Milky Way, is probably formed at around this

BC

c. 4600 million

BC

Our Sun and our Solar System are formed.

c. 1500 million

BC

The first plants, algae, appear on Earth.

c. 1 billion

BC

The first fungi appear on Earth.

c. 570 million BC The first invertebrate animals (arthropods, molluscs, and worms) appear on Earth. c. 520 million

BC

The first vertebrates appear on Earth.

c. 500 million

BC

The first fish appear on Earth.

c. 450 million BC The first lichens appear on Earth. They may have been the first form of life to live on land. c. 350 million

BC

The first amphibians appear on Earth.

c. 350 million

BC

The first land-living animals, the arthropods, appear on Earth.

c. 300 million

BC

The first reptiles appear on Earth.

c. 245 million BC Many plants and animals die out in a mass extinction. It may have been caused by a huge meteorite impact. c. 205 million

BC–c.

65 million

c. 200 million

BC

The first mammals appear on Earth.

c. 180 million

BC

The first birds appear on Earth.

BC

Dinosaurs flourished on Earth.

c. 65 million BC The dinosaurs and many other species of plant and animal become extinct. This may have been caused by a huge meteorite impact. c. 50 million

BC

The first primates appear on Earth.

c. 3 million BC An ice age begins on Earth. Mammals that can adapt to the cold weather prosper. c. 2500000 BC Homo habilis, small intelligent apes, evolve. They walk on their back legs and later learn to use tools. c. 1750000 BC A semicircle of stones 3 m/10 ft in diameter is constructed at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, within a concentration of animal bones and stone tools – the first known homebase or campsite. c. 1700000 BC Homo erectus evolves from Homo habilis. They learn to hunt, build huts, and use fire. c. 1420000 BC Evidence suggests that Homo erectus at Koobi Fora in Kenya may have used fire. c. 1 million BC Acheulian hand axes appear in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Typically 20–25 cm/8–10 in long, the entire surface is flaked to produce a diamond-shaped axe. Since the edges are formed by flaking from both sides they are sharper than the previous choppers and are used primarily as hunters' knives. Some of the earliest hand axes are used in Olduvai Gorge by Homo erectus. c. 500000

BC

Homo erectus in China is the first regularly to use fire.

c. 300000 BC Oval huts 15 m/50 ft by 6 m/20 ft are built at Terra Amata near Nicaea (Nice), France – the first houses to be constructed. c. 200000 BC Scrapers for working hides become common suggesting that Homo erectus begins to wear clothing. c. 200000 BC Tools made from wood and bone begin to be developed and used in Africa, near Lake Turkana in present-day Kenya. c. 40000 BC The Upper, or Late, Palaeolithic cultural period begins. It is characterized by complex and specialized tools and the emergence of regional stone tool industries such as Perigordian, Aurignacian, Solutrean, and Magdalenian in Europe. An important new tool is the burin, or engraver, used to scrape grooves in bone; two parallel grooves are used to detach a sliver of bone to make a needle, awl (pin), or fish hook. Blade tools lacking a serrated edge, and small thin blades, are also made and are used to create long cutting edges when cemented into a piece of wood using resin. c. 35000 BC Homo sapiens produces advanced tools requiring assemblage of head and haft which provides more kinetic energy and allows large trees to be cut down. c. 34000 BC Homo sapiens sapiens, the ancestors of modern humans, are established in Britain. Their emergence has been attributed to their ability to

develop tools to cope with the increasingly cold climate. c. 30000 BC Palaeolithic peoples record tallies on bone in central Europe and France; one wolf bone has 55 cuts arranged in groups of five – the earliest counting system. c. 28000 BC The earliest ceramics (small statues and beads) are made from local loess at the Pavlov Hills in what is now the Czech Republic. c. 25000 BC The bullroarer is invented. One of the first musical instruments, it consists of a thin piece of wood, bone, stone, or ivory attached to a long cord. When it is swung around the player's head the disc rotates to produce a tone. The whistle and flute – perforated bone and antler – also appear about this time. c. 14000 BC–c. 12000 Asian wolf.

BC

Near Kirkuk, Iran, the dog is domesticated from the

c. 12000 BC Leaf-shaped projectile points are made in the southwest of North America. They are known as Clovis points. c. 11000 BC Hunters in Somerset, England, develop a rudimentary calendar. The passage of lunar months is etched onto a hare's shinbone. c. 10000 BC Distinctive leaf-shaped arrowheads, as well as scrapers, knives, and blades, known as the Folsom cultural complex, begin to be made by hunting cultures on the Great Plains, North America. c. 10000 BC–c. 7000 BC The Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age begins in northern Europe. It is a food-gathering way of life, based on fishing and fowling rather than wide-range hunting; and it is adapted to new conditions, either a forest or a waterside environment, with humans forced to the periphery by the allpervading forest. Economically and materially it is to some extent a retrograde step from the easy hunting days of the Palaeolithic Age. The 'kitchen midden' sites (as on the Danish coast) show people living close to or on top of a huge dump of the discarded remains of shellfish. c. 9000 BC Humans have reached the southernmost tip of South America by now, as shown by carbon-14 dating at the site of Fell's Cave in Patagonia. c. 9000 BC Many large Pleistocene mammals, such as the camel, mammoth, horse, giant ground sloth, and tapir, become extinct in North America, possibly due to human hunting. c. 8000 BC After a very brief Mesolithic Age, the Neolithic or New Stone Age begins in the Middle East. This is a settled, food-producing way of life, dependent on the cultivation of crops and the domestication of animals, with people moving from struggling against nature to exploiting it for their own benefit.

c. 8000 BC Cattle are domesticated in the Middle East, probably from the wild ox Bos taurus. c. 8000 Syria.

BC

Domesticated wheat is grown at Tell Mureybit on the River Euphrates,

c. 8000

BC

The population of the world is over 5 million.

c. 8000 BC The woolly mammoth becomes extinct in Europe, possibly due to overhunting. c. 8000 BC–c. 2700 BC The Mesolithic or Middle Stone Age begins in western Europe. It is characterized by the use of microliths (very small stone tools mounted on a shaft), chipped stone tools, and bone, antler, and wooden tools. Important inventions include the barbed fish-hook, harpoon, woven basket, clay cooking pot, and the comb. Some examples of these tools have been found at Star Carr in Yorkshire, England. c. 7500 BC The ice covering much of the Earth has by now melted to roughly modern levels. This destroys many land bridges, for instance across the Mediterranean. The separation of the British Isles from the European mainland occurs about this time. c. 7350 BC The earliest known township of Jericho in the Middle East is surrounded by a wall 6.4 m/21 ft high, and a moat 4.6 m/15 ft wide and 2.7 m/9 ft deep, making Jericho the first fortress, and indicating that organized raiding and warfare have appeared. c. 7000

BC

Agriculture begins to be practised in the Aegean region.

c. 7000 BC Navigation of the open sea begins. Greek seafarers ship obsidian 121 km/75 mi from the island of Melos to the Franchthi cave on the gulf of Argolis in Greece. c. 7000 BC The bow and arrow are developed in North Africa, probably to facilitate hunting in dense woodland. c. 7000 BC The earliest known domesticated pigs are kept at the village site of Cayonu, Asia Minor. c. 7000

BC

The first pottery is made, in Eurasia.

c. 7000 BC The Neolithic or New Stone Age begins in southern Europe, Asia, north Africa, and South America. It is characterized by polished stone tools, settlement in permanent villages, a more complex social structure, and the domestication of plants and animals. c. 6800

BC

The first evidence of settled existence in houses appears at the site of

Jericho in the Dead Sea valley, Palestine, and settlement expands very rapidly. This can only be explained by the development of new agricultural techniques creating a complex irrigation system leading to larger areas of fertility. Such development implies a considerable degree of social organization and a central authority to organize a workforce. c. 6000 BC At Çatal Hüyük in Anatolia, southeast of the modern Turkish city of Konya, one of the oldest towns is thriving. Pottery is in use here, as is an advanced artificial agricultural irrigation system. Çatal Hüyük is one of the largest Neolithic sites in the Near and Middle East, with a sophisticated trade and urban life. c. 6000 BC Human skulls are made into ornamental masks in Jericho, in what may be a cult of ancestor worship. Painted clay and cowrie shells are used for eyes. c. 6000 BC Rock drawings in Egypt indicate the use of relatively large ships in the eastern Mediterranean and on the Nile. Constructed out of bundles of reeds, the ends of the ships are bound together and bent upward to form the bow and the stern giving the keel-less ship a crescent-shaped profile. c. 6000 BC Rock paintings of the Capsian culture begin to appear in areas of North Africa, such as at Tasili (on the edge of the Sahara) and at Gafsa or Capsa (in Tunisia). Similar paintings are also executed in southeastern Spain, possibly by migrants from Gafsa. They usually depict hunting and food gathering scenes, and may have magical and luck-bringing significance similar to that of Palaeolithic cave paintings. They differ, however, in that the human figure is boldly shown in Capsian art, something that the Palaeolithic artist avoids. Some of the human figures appear strange and terrifying and perhaps represent anthropomorphic gods. c. 5500

BC

Copper is smelted in Persia, the first metal to be smelted.

c. 5500 BC The wheat–barley/cattle–pigs–sheep agricultural complex reaches what is modern Bulgaria. The complex diffuses both east and west at a rate of about 1.5 km/1 mi per year from its centre in the fertile crescent. c. 5000 BC The equal-arm balance is invented in Egypt. It consists of a beam supported by weighing pans hung from both ends. c. 5000 BC The wheat–barley/cattle–pigs–sheep agricultural complex reaches southern Italy. c. 4500 BC The fourth of the great Neolithic river valley civilizations is formed on China's Huang He or Yellow River, the other three being the Nile, the Tigris–Euphrates, and the Indus valley civilizations. The oldest culture in the Huang He region is known as Dang-shao, economically based on millet, the pig, the goat, and the dog. c. 4400

BC

People in Europe and Eurasia start to use flint to make axe-heads.

c. 4400 BC The weaving loom is invented in Egypt. It consists of a frame that holds two sets of alternating parallel threads in place (the warp). By raising one set of threads it is possible to run a cross-thread (the weft) between them using a shuttle. c. 4200 BC The Sumerian civilization begins in southern Mesopotamia, although the Sumerian language may have come with later immigrants. Townships begin to form, such as that at Eridu, traditionally the first in the area.The first move is made to occupy the marshland of the twin rivers Tigris–Euphrates, probably from the Iranian plateau to the east. c. 4100 BC The Chalcolithic (copper–stone) Age begins at the end of this millennium and continues for the first half of the next, affecting most of the 'Fertile Crescent', from the Nile valley through Palestine and Syria to the Tigris–Euphrates valley. Tools as well as ornaments are now made of copper as an alternative to stone. Copper beads are used by the Badarian culture of the Nile. c. 4000 BC Rice is cultivated in China and at Non Nok Tha, in present-day Thailand. c. 4000 BC The 'Windmill Hill People', named after a site near Avebury in Wiltshire, appear in Britain. Their settlements, known as 'causewayed camps', show them to be herdsmen rather than agriculturists, and their 'camps' may have been used only for seasonal gatherings. c. 4000 BC The Neolithic way of life develops in northern Europe, including Britain, in this millennium. This development may be spontaneous or it may be indebted to influence, or even migrations, from the Mediterranean area. c. 4000 BC Villages are built over, or on the edge of, lakes in the district of modern Zürich, Switzerland, presumably for protection against attack by people and animals. They house an elaborate and successful culture that lasts into the Bronze Age. c. 4000 BC Wheat, barley, peas, dates, and other fruits are grown in the Indus valley. Water buffalo, camels, and cattle are bred for food and as draft animals. c. 3500 BC The ass, the first draft animal, is domesticated and is in common use in northeast Africa, Egypt, the Mediterranean basin, and both the Near and Far East. They are used as pack animals and are in regular service on caravan routes stretching from eastern Europe and northern Africa to India and China. c. 3500 BC The Grand Menhir of Locmariaquer is erected in Brittany, France. Set among other standing stones, it is the largest in the world, at 20 m/66 ft high and 380 tonnes in weight. c. 3500

BC

The llama and alpaca are domesticated in present-day Peru.

c. 3500 BC The potter's wheel is in use in the manufacture of Sumerian pottery, giving it a more symmetrical style. c. 3500 BC The Sumerians invent the wheel. Consisting of two or three wooden segments held together by transverse struts that rotate on a wooden pole, its invention transforms transportation, warfare, and industry. It also suggests that draft animals had been tamed by this date and that metallurgy for making saws and axles is also available. Evidence indicates that the wheel was invented only once and then spread to Asia and Europe. c. 3500 BC The wheat–barley/cattle–pigs–sheep agricultural complex reaches Britain and Scandinavia. c. 3400 BC Cuneiform (wedge-shaped) writing is invented by the Sumerians at Uruk. Consisting initially of about 1,500 symbols it is first used to make inventories of goods and to record transactions on clay tablets. One of the earliest documents, the Standard Professions List, gives the titles of officials and professions arranged in hierarchical order. The cuneiform script is gradually improved over the next few centuries but knowledge of it is lost in the 2nd century BC with the development of papyrus and paper. The new technique influences the Egyptian development of hieroglyphics. c. 3400 BC The first important metallic alloy, bronze, is discovered. Alloying copper with tin makes bronze. c. 3400

BC

The first symbols for numbers, simple straight lines, are used in Egypt.

c. 3300 BC The thin flat stones called palettes, used in Egypt for grinding malachite for eye-painting, develop into significant works of art. Some are inscribed with early pictographic and post-pictographic writing, and others with scenes of intercity warfare. They also show a Sumerian influence, as does an ivory knife handle of the period which pictures 'the master of the beasts', a man or god flanked by tamed lions.The most famous palette depicts King Menes, founder of the 1st dynasty of kings in Egypt, defeating the lord of the Delta Land (the Nile delta area of lower Egypt). 3100 BC King Menes advances from his southern capital of Thinis (Abydos) in Egypt and overcomes the Lord of the Delta Land. He creates the so-called 1st dynasty of the combined prehistoric kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt. c. 3100 BC The earliest form of Egyptian hieroglyphics (sacred carvings) appear. They are used until about AD 40. c. 3100 BC The Egyptian king Menes has a large (15 m/49 ft high) masonry dam built on the Nile south of Memphis (Cairo) to provide water for irrigation and for the city. It is the first large-scale dam.

The first civilizations (3000–801

BC)

c. 3000

BC

Camels are domesticated in the Middle East.

c. 3000

BC

Candles made of tallow begin to be used in Egypt and Crete.

c. 3000

BC

Cotton fabric is first woven in the Indus valley.

c. 3000

BC

Irrigation canals begin to be built in Mesopotamia and Egypt.

c. 3000

BC

Papyrus, derived from reed, is invented in Egypt.

c. 3000 BC The abacus, which uses rods and beads for making calculations, is developed in the Middle East and adopted throughout the Mediterranean. A form of the abacus is also used in China at this time. c. 3000 BC The arch, a fundamental architectural structure, is first used in Egypt at a tomb in Helouan, outside Cairo. c. 3000 BC The building of megalithic monuments begins to spread throughout northwestern Europe. Great stones are used to build either chambered barrows (passage graves such as those found at West Kennet in Wiltshire, England, or at New Grange, Ireland) or, later, impressive monuments of upright stones for religious and/or social purposes (such as those at Avebury and Stonehenge in England, or at Carnac in France). c. 3000 BC The chariot is invented in Ur and Tutub in Sumeria. It is constructed of solid wheels that rotate on a fixed axle, a wooden platform protected by sidescreens framed with wood and covered with skins, and a draft pole linked to the yoke of a pair of oxen. They are mounted by both spear-carriers and charioteers. c. 3000 BC The cubit, the length of the arm from the elbow to the extended finger tips, is devised in Egypt as the standard unit of linear measure. A royal cubit of black granite serves as the standard for all other cubit sticks. c. 3000 BC The Egyptians develop a civil calendar of 365 days divided into twelve 30-day months, plus five intercalated days added at the end. It is based on the lunar cycle and regulated by the appearance of Sirius (the Dog Star) above the horizon, and the flooding of the Nile. c. 3000 BC The Sumerians of Babylon develop a sexagesimal (based on 60) numbering system. Used for recording financial transactions, the order of the numbers determines their relative, or unit value (place-value), although no zero value is used. It continues to be used for mathematics and astronomy until the 17th century AD. c. 2900

BC

The Deluge or Flood commemorated in Sumerian and biblical legend is

most likely to have happened at this time. Archaeological evidence suggests more than one flood. c. 2900 BC The Indus Valley civilization (known as the Harappan) is formed. Considerable Sumerian influence is apparent. Its two chief cities are Mohenjo Daro, in modern Sind, about 400 km/250 mi up the River Indus, and Harappa, 560 km/350 mi further upstream on the River Ravi in the Punjab. c. 2800 BC The Neolithic monument Stonehenge is built in England near Salisbury, Wiltshire, comprising a circular earthwork 97.5 m/320 ft in diameter with 56 small pits around the circumference (later known as the Aubrey holes). The position of the 'heel stone' outside the circle suggests a connection with Sun worship and observation. It is probably an astronomical observatory with religious functions; the motions of the Sun and Moon are followed with the aid of carefully aligned rocks. c. 2700 BC A lunar calendar is developed in Mesopotamia in which new months begin at each new moon. A year is 354 days long and the calendar is used primarily for administrative purposes. c. 2700

BC

Tea is known in China.

c. 2700 BC The horse is domesticated, probably by pastoral nomads in the Ukraine. 2686 BC Egypt's 3rd dynasty is founded by Sanakht and is the start of Egypt's Old Kingdom (2686 BC–2180 BC). Under Zoser (Djoser), its second king, Egypt's southern boundary is established at the Nile's first cataract, and the first, stepsided pyramid is built at the necropolis of Saqqara in the city of Memphis (Cairo), by his minister Imhotep, physician, architect, and author. The oldest monument of hewn stone in the world, it consists of six steps and is 62 m/200 ft high. 2686 BC The tomb of the Egyptian king Khasekhemui, last king of the 2nd dynasty, and often considered the founder of the Old Kingdom, is built. It is the earliest stone building that can be accurately dated. 2675 BC Gilgamesh, King of the Sumerian city of Uruk, revolts against another Sumerian city, Kish. He becomes a legendary hero and later has an epic written about him. c. 2650 BC Chinese emperor Huang Di begins the canon of internal medicine, with the text Nei Jing/Inner Canon of Medicine, which balances ideas of yin and yang. Most subsequent Chinese medical literature is founded on it. There is some evidence, however, suggesting that the Nei Jing may actually date from only the 3rd century BC. c. 2650 BC The Egyptian Books of Wisdom are written, using papyrus as a writing material. Written for religious instruction, one of them is credited to the Egyptian physician and architect Imhotep.

c. 2650 BC The Egyptian healer Imhotep is the first to attempt to find nonreligious causes of disease. c. 2650 BC The wife of Chinese emperor Huang Di reputedly discovers how to produce silk, and the domestication of the silkworm begins. c. 2600 BC Iron is first used; it is valued as a precious metal without its superior qualities being recognized. Two iron artefacts are placed in the Great Pyramid of at El Gîza. c. 2600 BC The Egyptians begin the art of mummification; internal organs are removed and preserved in jars containing a salt solution. The body is prepared with bitumen, which is thought to have medicinal properties. c. 2590 BC King Snefru has two pyramids built at Dahshur in Egypt; the first, called the 'bent' pyramid, has a double slope and is the first attempt to build a true pyramid (one without steps). The second, the North Stone Pyramid, is the first true pyramid. c. 2575 BC The Egyptian king Khufu (Greek Cheops) builds the Great Pyramid at El Gîza. One of the Seven Wonders of the World, it is the largest pyramid ever built, measuring 270 m/776 ft each side and standing 146 m/481 ft high. Consisting of 2.3 million bricks, each weighing 2,500 kg/2.5 tonnes, the pyramid is a marvel of engineering skill. Its base is an almost perfect square with its right angles deviating by only 0.05%. Alongside the pyramid a separate pit contains a dismantled boat. His nobles are buried in mustabas, mud-brick tombs covered with a flat-roofed superstructure of brick. c. 2550 BC The temple of the Great Sphinx is built at El Gîza by the Egyptian king Khafre (Chephren). It is smaller than those built by Khufu (Cheops). c. 2500 BC A temple in the Babylonian city of Nippur is filled with clay tablets to create the first known library. c. 2500

BC

Elephants are domesticated in India.

c. 2500 BC Highly advanced water-supply systems, involving wells, storage reservoirs, aqueducts, and canals, are built along the Tigris, Euphrates, Nile, and Indus rivers. c. 2500 BC Metal mirrors, made of highly polished silver, gold, and bronze, are used in Egypt. c. 2500 BC Ptahhotep, governor of Memphis at the time of the 5th dynasty of Egypt, writes the first known book of philosophy, his Instructions to his son. c. 2500

BC

The art of dyeing fabrics begins in Egypt. The practice probably began

earlier in India with indigo. c. 2500 BC The Egyptians make glass beads – the earliest glass objects known. The glass is cut and polished after cooling, rather than moulded while hot. c. 2500

BC

The practice of acupuncture is developed in China.

2331 BC Sargon of Akkad, a man of humble origin, usurps the throne of the north Sumerian city of Kish and sweeps south, defeating King Lugal-zaggisi of Umma, to make himself master of all Sumeria. He conquers the Elamite city of Susa and may even have conquered Cyprus. He builds a new capital near Kish, which he calls Akkad (the exact site of which is still unknown). c. 2300 BC The Babylonians portray canals, rivers, and surrounding mountains on clay tablets – the first maps. Egyptian map-making is developing at about the same time. c. 2300 BC The statue of Egyptian king Pepi I is made using the lost-wax method – the earliest known example of the method. The statue is cast in wax and then covered with a claylike material to form the mould which is then heated to harden it and to melt the wax. The mould is then filled with molten metal. 2250 BC The Mesopotamian king Naram Sin, third son of Sargon, king of Akkad, erects a stele Victory of Naram Sin, which boasts of his conquests, depicting his military campaigns and the warlike Akkadians, and showing him trampling his enemies. In later legend, however, Naram-sin appears as an unlucky ruler. c. 2250

BC

The use of the scarab beetle as an amulet begins to appear in Egypt.

2205 BC Chinese civilization traditionally begins with the founding of the Xia dynasty by You the Great, although 1989 BC has been put forward as an alternative date. c. 2200 BC The Avebury stone circles are constructed in Wiltshire, England. Consisting of three circles of about one hundred sandstone pillars, some weighing over 50 tonnes each, it is the largest such stone monument in Europe. 2190 BC The Sumerian Empire of Sargon is swept away by barbarians from the mountains to the north, whom the Sumerians call the Guti or 'the Vipers from the Hills'. The invasion and the ensuing confusion is described as a time of terror by Sumerian literature. c. 2160 BC–c. 2040 BC Egypt's 1st Intermediate Period begins after the death of King Pepi II. It is a time of warring, near anarchy, and a host of local rulers lasting through the 7th to 10th dynasties. 2113 BC Sumeria revives for the last time under the third and most famous of Ur's dynasties, founded by Ur-nammu. Prosperity lasts for about a century under him

and his descendants, Dungi and Ibi-Sin. 2040 BC King Mentuhotep (or Nebhapetre) II of the 11th dynasty, who came to power in 2060, achieves the reunion of Egypt, and establishes Egypt's Middle Kingdom (2040 BC–1786 BC). c. 2000 BC A two-wheeled chariot with spoked wheels is depicted on a seal from Hissar in northern Elam. The body of the chariot is light, consisting of a high wickerwork dashboard and a floor of leather planks. Domesticated horses are yoked on either side of a pole and controlled by a bit made of two links of metal. This military chariot revolutionizes warfare by providing armies with unprecedented mobility. c. 2000 BC Disturbances force Aryan-speaking Indo-Europeans to move southwards into Asia Minor and northern Greece and Italy. The disturbances must have begun in the steppe north of the Caspian Sea where Aryan-speaking IndoEuropeans have been leading a nomadic existence, tending horses, for centuries. c. 2000 BC Sumeria is invaded from the north by the Amorites (Semitic desert tribes), led by the king of Mari, and from the east by the Elamites. The Sumerian city of Ur is besieged. Its great 3rd dynasty comes to an end and King Ibi-Sin is carried away in chains. c. 2000 BC The 'Beaker People', named after their distinctive drinking vessel, the bell beaker, migrate from Spain. They reach areas in modern south Germany, Czechoslovakia, and England. They are agriculturists, their weapon is the bow and arrow, and they introduce the use of bronze. c. 2000 BC The first seed drills are used in Egypt. Seeds are deposited into the ploughed furrow by a funnel attached to the back of the plough. c. 2000 BC The Minoans in Crete develop ships with log keels, ribbing, and planking on the sides from stem and stern to protect the bow against damage from waves. 1991 BC Amenemhet I, the first king of the great 12th dynasty, comes to the throne and consolidates the reunification of Egypt begun by the 11th dynasty. A noble of Thebes, he establishes Itj-towy, a new capital further north, close to the Old Kingdom's Memphis. The 12th dynasty creates a feudal age in Egypt, the king ruling with enhanced economic and religious sanction but through the local nobles, or nomarchs. 1971 BC Amenemhet I makes Senusret (Sesostris) co-regent to ensure continuation of the dynasty. Subsequent rulers continue the practice. 1955 BC A 'lament' is written for the destruction of Ur, the ancient city of Sumerian civilization, in Babylon, Mesopotamia. c. 1900

BC

The 'amber routes', the earliest roads in Europe, are built by the

Etruscans and Greeks to transport amber and tin from northern Europe to the Mediterranean and Adriatic. They are used until about 300 BC. c. 1900 BC The tomb of Chnemhotep, administrator of the Eastern Desert, is built in Egypt, with wall paintings depicting the great man fishing and fowling, and such captions as 'how delightful is the day of hunting the hippopotamus'. 1870 BC Egyptian king Senusret (Sesostris) III's engineers cut a channel 79 m/260 ft long, and 10 m/34 ft wide, through the cliffs of the Nile's first cataract at Elephantine so that his war galleys may pass. 1842 BC King Amenemhet III, the greatest monarch of the Middle Kingdom, comes to the throne in Egypt and reigns for 45 years. He is known as 'the good god', who benefits Egypt more than any before him. He restores the outpost garrison at the third cataract of the River Nile. 1800 BC Abraham, generally recognized as the first historical character in the Bible, leaves the Sumerian city of Ur, where he was born. He and his family may well have sojourned in Egypt, along with other wandering Semites. c. 1800

BC

Chinese historical records refer to earthquakes.

c. 1800 BC More than 3,000 menhirs, or standing stones, are erected in several parallel rows 4.8–6.4 km/3–4 mi long at Carnac, Brittany, in France. c. 1800 BC Neolithic farming reaches the Orkney Islands, off the northeast coast of Scotland, in the shape of a settlement at Skara Brae of well-built stone huts skilfully protected from the elements. c. 1800 BC The Assyrians enter history in a reference to their merchants' activities at the site of Kanesh (modern Kultepe) at the eastern end of the Anatolian plateau. The city has been excavated showing Assyrian merchants' quarters in one section of the native city. c. 1800 BC The Indus valley Harappan civilization, with its magnificently planned cities, is coming to an end due to invaders who, with little doubt, must be the peoples of Indo-European stock who later write the Vedas (Hindu scriptures). c. 1800 BC The typical barrow or tumulus (burial mound) in northwestern Europe becomes the round barrow rather than the Neolithic or megalithic long or chambered barrow. The use of round barrows continues into the Iron Age. 1792 BC King Hammurabi the Great establishes the first Babylonian Empire and a golden age of peace, prosperity, and law and order. He extends his empire west to the Mediterranean, east to Elam, defeating Rim-Sin, ling of Elam, who occupied most of Sumeria, and north to the land of the Assyrians, conquering their city of Eshnunna.

1790 BC King Hammurabi of Babylon establishes a great bureaucracy to run his empire and personally attends to details such as correcting the calendar. His Code of Laws, although harsh, attempts to fit punishments to crimes; it protects the rights of women and recognizes an upper class, imposing harsher penalties for upper-class transgressors. 1786 BC Egypt's 13th dynasty reigns in the north but is not recognized in Thebes. It begins Egypt's Second Intermediate Period (1786–1567) and consists of a series of short-lived and unimportant kings who rule until the end of the century. The Second Intermediate Period is characterized by a loss of central political control and social upheaval. Power rests in the hands of the vizier, the king's chief advisor. 1780 BC Sophisticated inlay is used to decorate faience (glazed earthenware) at Knossos in Crete. The most famous example is the so-called Town Mosaic which shows houses of considerable sophistication, some with three storeys. 1750 BC Hammurabi, sixth Babylonian king of the Amorite dynasty c. 1792–c.1750 BC, dies. c. 1750 BC The Indus Valley civilization collapses as some of its cities are destroyed and their populations slaughtered, probably by Aryan peoples moving in from the west. The Aryan tribes move gradually eastwards, out of the Indus Valley and into the valley of the Ganges. c. 1700 BC The doors in the palace of Khorsabad in Nineveh, Assyria, are sealed with a device consisting of a pin-tumbler, a large wooden bolt pierced by several holes, and several wooden pins positioned to drop into these holes and grip the bolt – the first lock. c. 1675 BC The horse-drawn war chariot is introduced into Egypt by the Hyksos, a Semitic nomad people. It becomes the great new fighting weapon and status symbol for the military aristocracy of the Middle East. War chariots are also used by the Mycenaeans, but not the Minoans. c. 1600 BC Crete's favourable position on trade routes across the eastern Mediterranean extends Minoan influence throughout the Aegean. The new palaces develop into political, economic, administrative, and religious centres, also containing storehouses and craftsmen's workshops, and the Minoan rulers go down in Greek legend as great lawmakers. c. 1600 BC Greek-speaking invaders in the Aegean have penetrated the Peloponnese, where they begin to prosper and grow rich. They evolve the Mycenaean culture, named after its chief stronghold. Mycenae is ruled by a dynasty of kings, whose 'shaft graves' contain great wealth and fine art and weaponry, indicating that the Mycenaean princes are rapidly accumulating wealth. c. 1600

BC

The snake goddess and other artefacts found at Knossos and

elsewhere in Crete probably indicate that the Minoan people worship a mother earth goddess at this time. The bull-leap fresco at Knossos and similar works demonstrate a great Minoan preoccupation with the bull. c. 1600 BC The cat is domesticated in Egypt. (Although it has been proclaimed sacred since c. 2500 BC it is unlikely to have been domesticated at this time.) c. 1600 BC The Edwin Smith papyrus is written. The first medical book, it contains clinical descriptions of the examination, diagnosis, and treatment of injuries, and reveals an accurate understanding of the workings of the heart, stomach, bowels, and larger blood vessels. The papyrus is named after US scientist Edwin Smith, a pioneer in the study of Egyptian science who acquired it in Luxor, Egypt, in 1862. c. 1600 BC The four great Minoan palaces of Crete are built or rebuilt in this century with an architectural and artistic skill and sophistication that causes surprise when they are later discovered. The palaces are at Knossos, Phaestus (with its 'summer residence' at nearby Hagia Triada), Mallia, and Zakro. Frescos are now commonplace, and are used on the walls of Knossos palace. The new Minoan palaces use 'light wells' to give illumination without heat from the Sun, tied to an aqueduct system, and sanitation facilities flushed with water. c. 1570 BC Amose I becomes king and founds Egypt's great 18th dynasty. He finally destroys the Hyksos in their capital of Avaris and pursues what is left of them into Syria. He thus unites Egypt's new kingdom or New Empire (1567 BC–1085 BC). Ahmose I marries his sister, Ahmose-Nofretari. c. 1546 BC The Egyptian king Amenhotep I acceeds to the throne (1546 BC–1526 BC) and changes to an expansionist foreign policy, in direct contrast to the former policy of restoring or maintaining the country's boundaries. In the south he begins to subdue and colonize Nubia ('Kush'), while in the north he reaches the upper Euphrates and possibly penetrates the lands of the Hittites and the Mitanni in Asia Minor. He also initiates the practice of being buried in a rock-cut tomb rather than a pyramid. c. 1525 BC Thutmose I succeeds Amenhotep I as king in Egypt. His is the first tomb to be built in the Valley of the Kings; Egypt's 18th dynasty is now well established, with its capital at Thebes, and experiences a century and a half of greatness. c. 1503 BC Queen Hatshepsut has herself crowned pharaoh of Egypt. She assumes the double crown of Egypt, dresses as a man, and even wears the king's ritual wooden beard. With the help of her chief favourite, Senenmut, she concentrates on internal progress rather than foreign conquest. 1500 BC Chinese astronomers make the earliest record of an appearance of a comet. c. 1500

BC

Neolithic skills similar to those in Europe – weaving, basketmaking,

pottery, the building of houses, and the formation of villages – develop in the Americas, as well as a priest class. The use of iron, the wheel, the plough, and money will not develop until the coming of European colonialists. c. 1500 India.

BC

The Hindu Vedic hymns and religious rituals become established in

c. 1500 BC The Hittites of Asia Minor are the first to discover how to obtain iron from iron ore. Although iron is the second most abundant metal in the Earth's crust, metallic iron is only known from the rare discovery of iron-rich meteorites. c. 1500 BC The Urnfield cultures flourish in this and the following century in England (in Wessex), southern Germany, and Denmark. The Urnfield people are pastoral rather than agricultural, use bronze extensively, and are ruled by a warrior class of aristocracy. They cremate chiefs and their families and place the remains in urns which are then interred in cemeteries. The culture continues into the Iron Age (c. 700 BC). c. 1500

BC

Wheeled vehicles appear in China.

c. 1471 BC Egyptian king Thutmose III reaches the height of his success in his eighth campaign by crossing the upper reaches of the Euphrates River and temporarily defeating the Mitanni of Asia Minor, possibly with Hittite help. This is the farthest point that Egyptian armies will reach for nearly 800 years. c. 1470 BC The island of Thera is destroyed in a volcanic eruption. It causes a tidal wave and subsequent famine in Egypt, and destroys the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete over 120 km/75 mi away. It may be the source of the Atlantis myth. c. 1450

BC

A balance with a pointer indicating the weight is developed in Egypt.

1450 BC–1400 BC The Linear B script supersedes Linear A at Knossos, Crete. Linear B is an early form of Greek, and its adoption in Crete demonstrates Mycenaean domination there. It is not as flexible as current cuneiform or Egyptian hieroglyphics, and seems to have been used for administration purposes only, for example in accounting, ration issues, lists of personnel, tallies of tax receipts in kind. These documents (incised on clay but also probably written on papyrus) show signs of agricultural prosperity, particularly in the number of sheep. c. 1400 BC An alphabet is developed in Ugarit, Syria, that consists of 30 characters. c. 1400 BC The clepsydra (water clock), consisting of a vessel with a hole in the base and lines on the inside to indicate the passage of time, begins to be used in Egypt. It has the advantage over the sundial in that it can be used to tell the time at night. It may already have been in use in Babylon.

1374 BC Egyptian king Amenhotep IV changes his name to Akhenaton (or Aknaton, or Ikhnaton) to conform to a new religion which worships the sun god Aton over the previous cult of Amon. Akhenaton institutes a religious and cultural revolution with the worship of Aton. He builds a large temple to Aton at Karnak and constructs a new capital, Akhetaton ('The Horizon of Aton'), halfway between Thebes and Memphis. c. 1370 BC Tutankhamen, King of Egypt (1361–1352 discovered in 1922, born (–1352 BC). 1361

BC

BC),

whose intact tomb was

Chinese astronomers make the first recording of an eclipse of the Moon.

1361 BC The boy king Tutankhaton, son-in-law of Akhenaton (or Aknaton, or Ikhnaton) and younger brother of Smenkhkare, ascends to the Egyptian throne. Two years later he changes his name to Tutankhamen, rejecting the worship of Aton in favour of the worship of Amon-Re, and returns to Thebes. The religious revolution is over and the new capital of Akhetaton is left to crumble. 1352 BC Egypt's wealth is demonstrated by the magnificent grave goods of Tutankhamen, a youthful and comparatively unimportant king. They include iron daggers, a chariot, a wooden chest, depicting the king in battle behind his prancing chariot horses, the throne-panel showing Ankhesenamen endearingly touching her husband, and the scene on an ivory chest of the young Ankhesenamen and Tutankhamen picking flowers. The tomb, which – exceptionally – was not robbed, was discovered by the English archaeologist Howard Carter in 1922, and opened in 1923. 1352 BC Tutankhamen, King of Egypt 1361–1352 discovered in 1922, dies (c. 18).

BC,

whose intact tomb was

1340 BC The Hittite king Suppiluliumas defeats and ends the power of the Mitanni, capturing Carchemish and making Syria his dependency. The Assyrians, however, absorb the Mitanni's lands. c. 1302 BC The first recording of an eclipse of the Sun is made by Chinese astronomers. 1300 BC The Shang dynasty in China establishes the solar year at 365 1/4 days. The calendar consists of 12 months of 30 days each, with intercalary months added to adjust the lunar year to the solar. c. 1300 BC Tholoi, dry-stone beehive-shaped tombs, are built outside the walls of Mycenae, Greece, demonstrating considerable architectural skill in their construction. Grave goods include engraved gems, ivories, and decorated pottery. c. 1300 BC The first Chinese writing appears. About 2,000 characters of three kinds – pictographs, ideograms, and phonograms – are used to make oracular inscriptions on bone and tortoise shell.

c. 1300 BC The great city of the Shang dynasty in China – Anyang on the Huan River, north of the Huang He – is founded. This is the last of seven capitals of the Shang dynasty. Archaeological digging has shown that the traditional claim for a great city is justified, and that a brilliant but barbaric culture exists for two and a half centuries. c. 1300 BC The people of the Chinese Shang dynasty demonstrate skill in architecture (with rammed earth buildings) and ceramics (with near-porcelain) at their capital, Anyang. The dynasty sees the start of the Bronze Age, with the development of bronze-casting techniques which enable the manufacture of a variety of urns or chalices, probably for use in religious services, each type having a different function. A sophisticated range of skills, including writing, chariot construction, and specialized forms of divination are to be found at this time. c. 1290 BC The Hypostyle Hall at Karnak, Egypt, started by Horemheb in 1320 BC but now completed by Ramses II, shows Ramses II in his chariot behind prancing steeds. 1276 BC With the accession of Shalmaneser I to the Assyrian throne, Assyria enters the first of its three periods of power. Shalmaneser strikes north and west, taking Carchemish but leaving Babylon to his successor. c. 1240 BC The Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt is most likely to have happened at this date, almost certainly in the reign of King Ramses II, though possibly earlier. The Israelites leave after being used to build the city of PiRamses on the Nile delta; they are led by Moses. 1232 BC The Egyptian king Merneptah achieves a victory over the invading Libyans, who are helped by the displaced Peoples of the Sea. Nearly 10,000 Libyans and their allies are killed, with few Egyptian casualties. 1223 BC The reign of Merneptah is followed by a 20-year period of five relatively unimportant kings and internal unrest. The last of these, and the last of the 19th dynasty, is a woman, Tausert – the only queen of Egypt, besides Hatshepsut to be buried in the Valley of the Kings. c. 1200 BC The I Ching/Book of Changes, a Chinese dissertation on divination, may have been written in this century. c. 1200 BC The Dorian Greeks, or at least a new group of Greek speakers, probably first arrive in the Peloponnese. Their arrival is followed during the remainder of the century by the destruction of the Mycenaean palaces. The palaces destroyed are Mycenae itself, Tiryns (probably caused by an earthquake), and Pylos. c. 1200 BC The Hallstatt culture appears in southern Germany, named after a later cemetery found at Hallstatt, Austria. This culture originates in the Late

Bronze Age in southern Germany and Austria and later, in the Iron Age, spreads throughout most of Europe. Burial is by inhumation below a tumulus (grave mound or barrow), with bronze (or later iron) swords, brooches, and pottery. c. 1200 BC The Iron Age begins as iron displaces bronze as the most important metal in Egypt and elsewhere. c. 1200 BC The Olmec civilization begins at San Lorenzo on the Gulf Coast plain of Mexico, near modern Vera Cruz. This is the first civilization of Mesoamerica (the area of the Mexican and Mayan civilizations). San Lorenzo is the predominant centre until 900 BC. Maize is almost certainly the staple crop. The Olmecs are skilled stone workers and also carve small jade objects. c. 1200 BC–c. 1100 BC This century sees the end of the Bronze Age in the Middle East and the Aegean and the beginning of a Dark Age, at least in the latter area. The turmoil caused by the displaced Peoples of the Sea may have been prompted by renewed pressure, from the north, of Indo-European tribes; as the century progresses these tribes, in particular the Phrygians and Dorian Greeks, penetrate Asia Minor and Greece. 1195 BC The death of Moses and the entrance of the Israelites into Palestine under their military leader Joshua probably occur at this time. The Israelites cross the River Jordan and capture Jericho. c. 1140 BC Chinese emperor Wen Wang establishes the first zoo. It covers 1,500 acres and is named the Ling-Yo/Garden of Intelligence. 1122 BC China's Shang dynasty declines, although some sources state that it lasts until 1027 BC, and the Zhou dynasty begins, said to have been founded by kings Wën and Wu. The Zhou dynasty makes China stable and prosperous for at least three centuries. For the first time China is knit, though loosely, into one feudal kingdom. c. 1122 BC Smallpox is first described, in China. Pharaoh Ramses V, who dies in 1157 BC, is considered the first known victim of the disease. 1115 BC King Tiglath-Pileser I comes to the Assyrian throne and consolidates Assyrian power. He strikes northwest into the Taurus Mountains, relieves the pressure of a combination of petty princes on his province of Kummukh (Roman Commegane), and defeats the remnants of the Hittites. He also reaches the Mediterranean coast and extracts tribute from Lebanon, Byblos, and Sidon. c. 1100 BC In the last third of the century there is a struggle among the Israelites, between those who want to continue as a theocracy and those who want to be like other nations with a king. The latter win. c. 1100 BC The Dorians spread to Crete. The Minoans reach the end of their distinctive civilization after three centuries of Mycenaean domination during which they have still retained their identity; for a few generations they flee

before the invaders to live in the hills. The dispossessed Mycenaeans escape, partly to Arcadia, but largely to Attica and Athens itself. They also begin the socalled Ionian migration into the Aegean coastline of Asia Minor. The Dorians themselves migrate to the southern corner of this coastline. Cyprus has an influx of Greek immigrants at about this time, or even earlier. c. 1100 BC The Phoenicians are beginning to create a colonial empire, certainly trading with Spain, and possibly founding Tarshish and Gades in Spain, although these foundations may have been later. Similarly the Israelites, left alone for a while by their powerful neighbours, are succeeding in their efforts to develop from a collection of tribes into a united people and to dominate Palestine. c. 1100 BC The spinning wheel is invented in China, derived from the machines used to draw out silk from the silkworm. It subsequently spreads to India and reaches Europe about the 13th century AD. c. 1100 BC With the Egyptian empire much reduced the flow of riches into Egypt diminishes, and the country reverts to a state of near anarchy. The high priest falls and tomb robbery and the depredation of monuments becomes rife. Civil war also rages in Egypt, with Libyans and also Nubians taking part. c. 1100 BC–c. 1000 BC Both Assyria and Babylonia suffer from incursions by a confederacy of tribes, speaking a northern Semitic language called Aramaeans. Even the Assyrians, relapsing into a dark-age period of which little is known, are apparently fighting for their very existence. 1085 BC The death of the Egyptian king Ramses XI brings Egypt's New Kingdom, or New Empire, to an end. The country suffers confusion and rebellion during its 21st, 22nd, and 23rd dynasties, with occasional upsurges of interference in the Middle East, where its reputation, though lessened, is still considerable. Egypt loses control of Nubia and its Asiatic Empire during the 21st dynasty. 1084 BC Greek poet Aeschylus records that in this year Queen Clytemnestra, at her palace in Argos, Greece, is informed of the fall of Troy and her husband Agamemnon's return by a system of signal fires – the first recorded telegraph system. 1050 BC The Israelites in Palestine reach the height of their struggle with the Philistines, originally one of the displaced Peoples of the Sea but now settled along the coast of Canaan, as the Ark of the Covenant (the symbolic residence of the Israelite God) is captured and their holy city of Shiloh destroyed. 1027 BC The Zhou dynasty, traditionally said to have been founded by kings Wën and Wu in 1122 BC, overruns the failing Shang dynasty, establishing the Zhou people as the ruling force in China. 1025 BC Saul is made king of Israel and saves his country from the Amalekites (in the Negeb). Agag, king of the Amalekites, is spared by Saul but is assassinated by Samuel, the last of the Judges, as a fitting sacrifice in a holy war.

1010 BC King Saul of Israel and his son Jonathan are defeated and slain by the Philistines at the Battle of Mount Gilboa. David, Saul's successor, becomes king of Judah. 1003 BC David becomes king of a united Israel and Judah; he defeats the Jebusites and from their city creates his new capital, Jerusalem, the city of David. The Philistines attack him and he wins two battles over them. c. 1000 BC A Bronze-Age settlement is established at Hallstatt, Austria. The presence of salt is the primary attraction. The salt mines are worked using techniques developed in the Alps for the extraction of copper. At this time the Hallstatt culture is still confined to the area around southern Germany and Austria. c. 1000 BC A clay tablet is made in Babylon depicting the Earth as a disc surrounded by water with Babylon at its centre – the first map of the world. c. 1000 BC Assyria is quiet until at least the end of the century. The Israelites are therefore able, with the help of the Phoenicians, to develop their brief period of political significance and economic greatness. c. 1000 BC Human excrement, manure, and plant waste are used as fertilizer in Mesopotamia and Egypt. The idea of fertilization subsequently spreads throughout the Mediterranean. 1000 BC–961 BC The reign of David, King of Israel and Judah, faces internal dissent. The chief events of his reign (to which exact dates cannot be given) are: David brings the Ark of the Covenant to his new city, Jerusalem. He becomes prosperous and subdues his enemies, including the Edomites, whom he all but exterminates. During the Ammonite War, David has Uriah the Hittite 'put in the forefront of the battle' so that he can take Uriah's wife Bathsheba for his own. She bears David two children, of whom the second is the future king Solomon. David's favourite son, Absalom, murders his half-brother for the incestuous rape of his sister and flees the court. He is forgiven by David, but then revolts against him. David in turn has to flee Jerusalem. Absalom is defeated, slain, and ultimately lamented. Further revolts and wars accompanied by pestilence bring David's reign to a close. c. 990 BC Solomon, King of Israel, traditionally regarded as the author of the Old Testament books, the Book of Proverbs and the Song of Solomon, born (–931 BC). c. 962 BC David, second king of Israel, who established Israel as a united kingdom, and features prominently in the holy texts of the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic religions, dies (c. 70). 959 BC The temple of King Solomon of Israel and Judah in Jerusalem is completed. He proceeds to build palaces for himself and his wives. According to the Old Testament, Solomon's temple is made of ashlar stone and with liberal use

of gold. However, at 27m/90 ft by 9 m/30 ft (taking the cubit at 46 cm/18 in) it is still smaller than his palace, which measures some 46 m/150 ft by 23 m/75 ft. Solomon's temple is said to be designed more to Canaanite standards than Jewish. 945 BC Libyan chieftains, calling themselves chiefs of the Meshwash, take control in Egypt and begin the 22nd dynasty under Sheshonk I. They rule from the Nile delta. Thebes remains a religious centre, although considerable power is still exerted by the priesthood, which is increasingly dependent on the oracle. 945 BC Queen of Sheba's visit to King Solomon of Israel and Judah takes place about this time. Solomon begins to collect his vast harem of foreign women and attempts to please them with a proliferation of idolatries. 931 BC King Solomon dies, and the combined kingdom of Israel and Judah begins to disintegrate. He is succeeded by his son Rehoboam. c. 930 BC Solomon, King of Israel, traditionally regarded as the author of the Book of Proverbs and the Song of Solomon of the Old Testament, dies (c. 59). 925 BC–914 BC King Rehoboam of Israel and Judah, Solomon's son, is faced with discontent from his people as well as many external enemies. This dual pressure results in splitting the territory into two separate kingdoms: Israel (or the Ten Tribes) in the north, under King Jeroboam I, and Judah (hence 'the Jews') in the south, under King Rehoboam, with Jerusalem as its capital. c. 900 BC–c. 800 (Austria).

BC

The use of iron spreads into Europe, particularly to Hallstatt

c. 900 BC–c. 740 BC The Iron Age Villanovan culture is spreading in Italy, named after a typical site at Villanova near Bologna. There is greater skill in metallurgy and a gradual increase in the use of iron. Cremation is practised, with ashes being placed in an urn in a round hole in the ground. One of the main areas of Villanovan culture is Etruria. c. 900 BC–c. 500 BC La Venta becomes the major centre of the second phase of Olmec civilization in Mexico. The site of San Lorenzo is abandoned, possibly in a violent overthrow of the local elite, or possibly for religious reasons. La Venta is a ceremonial or elite centre, supported by a large agricultural population. It has a large main pyramid in addition to smaller ones. 879 BC–824 BC The rulers Ashurnasirpal II and Shalmaneser III of Assyria build themselves palaces at Calah, Assyria, (modern Nimrud, Iraq) including outstanding features such as colossal carvings of winged bulls and reliefs showing royal lion hunts and battle scenes. The archaeologist Sir Henry Layard unearths the palaces in the 19th century AD. 876 BC King Ashurnasirpal II of Assyria marches west to the Mediterranean and conquers Syria, founding the fortress of Harran from which to administer the country. He appears to leave the Jews alone, but extracts tribute from the

Phoenicians. On his way he subdues the Neo-Hittite city of Carchemish. c. 850 BC The Chauvín de Huantar temple in Peru is constructed. Built without using mortar and with cantilevered ceilings, it is the oldest known building in South America. c. 850

BC

The first arched bridge is built, at Izmir in present-day Turkey.

841 BC The oppressive Chinese king Li is dethroned in favour of the Gong He or Public Harmony regency. Authentic chronology in Chinese history now begins; a feudal age follows, until the arrival of the Han dynasty in 206 BC. 827 BC The Chinese drive the nomadic Huns out of their domains. This may set in motion a movement of their western neighbours, the Scythians, which becomes apparent in the next two centuries. 814 BC The city of Carthage in north Africa is traditionally founded. It is developed as a Phoenician colony by the city of Tyre.

The Classical world (800

BC–AD

499)

c. 800 BC Book XXIII of the Greek epic poem The Iliad contains the earliest known extensive description of a sporting event, the Funeral Games of Patroclus. It is mostly devoted to chariot racing, but there are briefer descriptions of boxing, wrestling, discus and javelin throwing, and foot races. In another epic poem, The Odyssey, Homer describes a game resembling team handball, which he says was invented by Angagalla, a Spartan princess. c. 800 BC The Greeks begin colonization and foundation of new cities along the mid-Mediterranean and Aegean coasts. This movement is caused by increased prosperity and the pressure of expanding populations. c. 800 BC The Hindu metaphysical treatises Upanishads, sacred texts in Hinduism, are begun. The earlier Upanishads, written in archaic Sanskrit, are completed before 500 BC, though they continue to be produced for centuries. 776 BC Coriobis of Elis becomes the first recorded victor in the pan-Hellenic games, the Olympiad, winning the only event – the stade running race (a distance of 192.27 m/630.80 ft). This is the first definite date in Greek history. 771 BC The original Zhou dynasty of China (also known as the West Zhou period) ends with the deposing of its king, You, and the shifting of the capital city to Luoyang. The Zhou dynasty continues for another five centuries, but as a much looser confederacy of often-warring barons under a head who is little more than a religious symbol, 'the king of Heaven'.

15 June 763 BC Assyrian archivists record an eclipse of the Sun. This is probably the event described in the Bible, in Amos 8:9. 753 BC Rome is traditionally founded by Romulus and Remus: this is the year from which the Romans date all subsequent events. The date is not completely reliable, though by now Latin-speaking tribes do exist in Italy, probably arriving from further east, with Etruscans to their north and Greek colonial city-states about to be founded to their south. 750 BC The city-state, or polis, is on the rise in Greece; it is distinguished by common gods and common law administered from a fixed place. With the political change come different military needs and the hoplite formation, heavily armed infantrymen in close order behind a wall of shields, is developed. c. 750 BC The Iliad and the Odyssey, the two great epic poems ascribed to the legendary Greek poet Homer, are composed. Though written around this date, they draw on a long tradition of oral poetry dating back to at least 1000 BC. c. 750 BC The Greek 'geometric' style of pottery gives way to an 'orientalizing' style, which introduces new motifs, particularly fantastic animals. c. 750 BC The radiating arch, where each wedge-shaped piece radiates away from its support, is developed by Etruscan architects. 722 BC The Israelite capital of Samaria falls to Assyria after a three-year siege and 27,290 Israelites are deported wholesale into Mesopotamia. This marks the end of Israel as a nation and the start of the so-called Captivity of the Ten Tribes. Judah is left alone. Israel becomes the land of the Samaritans, while Judah, under King Hezekiah, remains inviolate. 705 BC Sennacherib succeeds to the Assyrian throne. Assyria's vassal states and external enemies take the opportunity to stage a general revolt led by the king of Babylon and supported by the pharaoh of Egypt. King Hezekiah of Israel agrees to join the revolt (against the advice of the prophet Isaiah), hoping for Egyptian support. 705 BC The poet and farmer Hesiod of Boeotia, Greece, writes his Works and Days, a compilation of practical and ethical advice based on rural life, which is also the first recorded instructional book on agricultural practice, and his Theogony, which gives an account of the origin of the world and the birth of the Greek gods. He and Homer are said to have 'given the Greeks their gods'. 703 BC–701 BC The Assyrian king Sennacherib reacts energetically to the revolt by vassal states and defeats Babylon, which supported the revolt. He then turns west into Palestine, defeating an Egyptian army and taking Lachish (a city to the south of Jerusalem) as well as 'forty-six walled cities'. He records in stone the feats of his army at the siege of Lachish. c. 700

BC

Oil lamps appear in Greece, replacing torches. The Greeks also invent

the fibula (safety-pin), although the idea is lost after the fall of the Roman Empire. c. 700 BC The Assyrian king Sennacherib continues his campaign in Palestine and besieges Jerusalem. Hezekiah, King of Judah, with the prophet Isaiah's moral support, defies the Assyrians and successfully repulses them. Although he has to pay considerable tribute to Sennacherib, Judah remains independent. Sennacherib lists the booty stolen from Jerusalem and taken to his capital, Nineveh, on what has become known as the Rassam cylinder, named after the 19th-century archaeologist who found it, Hormuzd Rassam. c. 700 BC The Greeks develop the bireme, a galley about 24 m/80 ft long with two banks of oars staggered on either side of the vessel. c. 700 BC The Iron Age starts in much of Europe. (In Greece it began much earlier, about 1050 BC, and in Italy about 900 BC. In Britain it is later, about 650 BC.) c. 700 BC The rulers of the old civilizations, Egypt, Babylon, and Assyria, spend much of this period warring amongst themselves and so fail to appreciate the threat presented by new powers of different races, such as the Cimmerians, Scythians, Phrygians, Medes, Lydians, and Ionian Greeks. 691 BC The Assyrian king Sennacherib builds the 20-m/66-ft wide Jerwan aqueduct which brings water from a tributary of the Greater Zab River to Nineveh 80 km/50 mi away. Stone-lined, and constructed in 15 months, according to a surviving plaque, the aqueduct uses advanced techniques including sluice gates and a 275 m/900 ft limestone bridge, 9 m/30 ft high and 15 m/30 ft wide. It is the earliest significant public water-works project. c. 690 BC Ashurbanipal, last great king of Assyria (668–c. 627 BC), who created, at Nineveh, the first ancient library in the Middle East, born (–c. 627 BC). 671 BC Assyria renews its attack on Egypt, taking the city of Memphis. The pharaoh Taharqa is defeated but escapes to Nubia. King Esarhaddon of Assyria appoints local rulers, including Necho of Saïs, and then retires to deal with home affairs. 670 BC The Greek city-state of Argos, under King Pheidon, is at the height of its power, though soon to decline. Mycenae and Tiryns, two client states of Argos, temporarily defeat the city-state of Sparta in the Battle of Hysiai. 668 BC Ashurbanipal succeeds to the Assyrian throne, the last great king of Assyria. He concludes a treaty with the Phoenician city of Tyre, and the Phoenician coastal cities acknowledge Assyrian sovereignty. 668 BC At Nineveh, Assyrian king Ashurbanipal begins to assemble the world's first great library. Consisting of thousands of catalogued tablets (over 20,000 still exist) accumulated from temple libraries throughout the Middle East, the

collection includes medical treatises (including prescriptions and guides to the diagnosis and treatment of disease), tables of multiplication, lists of plants, astronomical and astrological tables, and a treatise on glassmaking. 668 BC The scenes of royal lion hunts decorating the palace of Ashurbanipal in Assyria show Assyrian art at its finest, as do other excellent works in bronze and ivory. Military scenes have declined in popularity as the subject of works of art. 667 BC In his first Egyptian campaign, King Ashurbanipal of Assyria turns Pharaoh Taharqa out of Memphis, reappoints pro-Assyrian governors throughout the country, and then retires. Taharqa flees south to Nubia, where, in 664 BC, he dies. Assyria's puppet king in Egypt, Necho of Saïs, who had joined the rebels against Assyria, is temporarily taken away to the Assyrian capital of Nineveh as a captive. 663 BC In his final Egyptian campaign, King Ashurbanipal of Assyria claims to have penetrated to Thebes and to have carried away vast booty. However, the Egyptians also claim a victory. Both the pharaoh Tanutamon and the Assyrians retire, the former to his native Ethiopia (modern Sudan) where he settles in the city of Meroe. The 25th dynasty of Egypt ends with his passing from the Egyptian scene. 660 BC Japan's first emperor, Jimmu, traditionally comes to power. A Mongolian people begin to enter Japan, probably coming through Korea, and oust the indigenous Ainus. 651 BC Assyria retreats from Egypt for the last time, in order to deal with trouble nearer home. Egyptian pharaoh Psamtik I reforms the Egyptian government and removes the last traces of Cush rule. 650 BC The Hallstatt people learn to make use of iron and emerge as the great Iron Age Celtic culture of northern Europe. As trade routes reach them via the Rhône and Danube rivers, so their influence grows. They bury their chiefs in great style, the dead leader lying in his four-wheeled chariot with his weapons around him. They make their swords of iron or from iron models copied in bronze. 648 BC Archilochus of Paros, one of the earliest of the Greek lyric poets, is writing at this time. He directs some of his poems at the family who barred him from marrying their daughter, reputedly leading some members of the family to commit suicide. 648 BC Assyrian king Ashurbanipal besieges Babylon, causing famine in the city and driving its citizens to cannibalism. Babylon capitulates to Assyria and is again devastated, but Ashurbanipal orders that the city be rebuilt. 630 BC The Greek city-state of Sparta wages its second war against Messenia, southwest of the Peleponnese. The revolt and second subjugation of the Messenians may well be the origin of the unique system of government in Sparta, by which a dedicated military aristocracy perennially suppresses a subjugated

serf class of Messenians known as the helots. Particularly noted for its peculiar harsh laws and customs, The Spartans themselves credit their laws and constitution to a semi-mythical figure, Lycurgus. c. 630 BC Solon, Athenian statesman who replaced the ruling aristocracy with a rule by the wealthy, born (–c. 560 BC). c. 627 BC Ashurbanipal, last great king of Assyria (668–c. 627 BC), who created, at Nineveh, the first ancient library in the Middle East, dies (c. 63). c. 627 BC The death of King Ashurbanipal of Assyria marks the start of the disintegration of Assyria's last period of greatness as it finds itself overextended and without allies. 626 BC According to the Old Testament, the Hebrew prophet Jeremiah (credited with writing Lamentations and the Book of Jeremiah) warns his countrymen of a disaster that is about to befall them, in an invective full of phrases that have survived to become part of European literature. His warning refers to the Captivity, in which Jewish deportees are exiled to Babylon. The Hebrew prophets Zephaniah, Nahum, and Habakkuk are also active at this time. 626 BC The Scythians pour down through Syria and Palestine, helping to weaken Assyria, annihilating the Philistines, and reaching the borders of Egypt. 625 BC Sappho of Lesbos, the famed female Greek lyric poet, is active at this time. Her lyric poems are famous for their depiction of erotic love between women. c. 625 BC Spartan lyric poet Alcman writes Partheneia, choral songs for maidens. Parts of two songs survive to modern times. 612 BC The Medes persuade the Scythians to join with them and the Babylonians. They besiege the Assyrian capital Nineveh, which falls after three months and the Assyrian king perishes in the burning city. An Assyrian general, Assuruballit, assumes the kingship and takes up a new stand at Harran. 608 BC Pharaoh Necho II, seeing the chance to fill the vacuum left by Assyria and to reassert Egypt's traditional sway over Syria, sends his full army north. King Josiah of Judah, who still considers himself Assyria's vassal, meets the Egyptians single-handed at Megiddo and is slain. It is this battle that gives its name to the prophetic world-battle of the biblical book of Revelations: 'Har' (the Mountain of) 'Megiddo', Armageddon. 608 BC The Assyrians under Assuruballit fail to recapture Harran from the Babylonians and Medes and fade out of the records. The victorious Medes turn upon the Scythians, their temporary allies, who retire to their own lands. 604 BC The people and towns of the old Assyrian Empire acknowledge Nebuchadnezzar, the Chaldean king of Babylon, as their new master. Only the

Phoenician town of Askelon, and Jehoiakim, King of Judah, resist. Askelon is destroyed while Jehoiakim relies on the strength of Egypt, against the advice of the prophet Jeremiah. 600 BC The Athenians undertake their first overseas venture, the capture of Sigeum (a promontory controlling the Hellespont) from their neighbour Megara. The expedition is motivated more by economic than political or military considerations and marks the beginning of Megara's lagging behind in the great rivalry between the various Greek city-states. c. 600 BC Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar begins building the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. One of the Seven Wonders of the World, the gardens, located on terraces on a ziggurat, are irrigated by pumps from the River Euphrates. c. 600 BC Bronze begins to be replaced by iron in central Europe because of the growing ability to smelt and work metallic ores at high temperatures. c. 600 BC Roman king Tarquinius Priscus introduces the Roman Republican calendar. It consists of 12 months with a total of 355 days. An intercalated month is added between February 23 and 24 every two years in order to keep step with the seasons. Intercalations, however, are made irregularly and it becomes hopelessly confused. The calendar forms the basis of the Gregorian calendar. c. 600 BC–c. 480 BC The Greek Archaic period of sculpture is evident, a typical form being the kouros, a rigid freestanding nude. 597 BC King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon lays siege to Jerusalem in January and finally captures the city in March. A puppet king, Zedekiah, is installed, while King Jehoiakim and the leading men and artisans of the city are deported into Babylonia. The future prophet Daniel is a child among them. This period (until 538 BC) is known as the 'Exile' or 'Captivity of the Jews' in Jewish history. 596 BC Sparta, by now the most powerful Greek city, arbitrates in the long dispute and war between Athens and Megara over the island of Salamis and decides in Athens' favour. 594 BC In the Greek city-state of Athens, the statesman Solon is appointed archon with unlimited powers. He lays down new laws and a constitution, which end the practice of selling bad debtors into slavery and make a compulsory reduction in all debts. The reforms also include opening the Assembly to the lowest classes, the codification of the law, democratic reforms in the law courts, and a system of appointment to office by the drawing of lots amongst all citizens. 586 BC King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon resumes the siege of Jerusalem in response to King Zedekiah's rebellion against Babylonian rule, and the city falls – this time it is completely destroyed. This is the end of Judah as a nation, 136 years after the end of Israel. King Zedekiah of Judah flees but is captured at Jericho, and has to witness the death of his sons before being blinded.

28 May 585 BC The first accurate prediction of an eclipse of the Sun is made in 585 BC, by the Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus. 582 BC The Pythian Games are inaugurated at Delphi, Greece, as a Panhellenic festival modelled on the Olympic Games. In the cycle of the four Panhellenic festivals, the Pythian Games are eventually held in the third year of each Olympiad. c. 581 BC Cyrus the Elder ('Cyrus the Great'), Persian emperor who founded the Achaemenid empire which stretched from the Indus River to the Aegean, born in Media Orpersis (–c. 529 BC). 578 BC Servius Tullius becomes king of Rome. He reigns for 43 years and organizes Rome as a soldier state, dividing all citizens into 'classes' according to their material worth. Taxation is based on these classes as is a citizen's role in the army. 570 BC Greek astronomer and philosopher Anaximander of Miletus continues the work of the Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus and his speculation on ultimate reality, in On the Nature of Things. 570 BC The Egyptian pharaoh Apries tries to help the Libyans to destroy the Greek city of Cyrene in north Africa but fails and is deposed by the army, which mutinies. After a short civil war, Ahmose II, an Egyptian army general, is elected king of Egypt. Egypt prospers under his reign, during which he marries a Cyrenean, develops the delta town of Naucratis as a (mainly Greek) port, and acquires a reputation for being philhellenic. 570 BC The Greek city-state of Athens finally succeeds in winning the island of Salamis from Megara, the city-state between Athens and Corith. The young politician Pisistratus makes his name on the expedition. c. 570 BC Cleithenes of Athens, statesman and magistrate of Athens (525–524 who founded Athenian democracy, born (–c. 508 BC).

BC),

c. 569 BC Indian sage Mahavira takes up the ascetic life, renounces his family, and spends the next 12 years wandering India and developing the doctrine of ahimsa, or nonviolence, after which he re-organizes Jaina doctrine, founding Jainism. 566 BC The Panathenaea, the greatest of the Greek local festivals, is inaugurated at Athens. Held every year in summer with an even grander celebration (the Greater Panathenaea) every four years, it includes athletic and equestrian events, and musical, dancing, and poetry contests. 563 BC Gautama Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama), Indian philosopher and founder of Buddhism, born in Kapilavastu, India (–c. 483 BC).

560

BC

Pisistratus becomes tyrant of the Greek city-state of Athens.

560 BC Under king Croesus Lydia benefits from being well situated for trade between East and West. The Greek cities on the coast of Asia Minor also benefit so, despite their precarious situation, they find it worthwhile to pay tribute to Croesus. c. 560 BC Solon, Athenian statesman who replaced the ruling aristocracy with a rule by the wealthy, dies (c. 70). 556 BC Pisistratus, the tyrant of the Greek city-state of Athens, is ousted and forced into exile. 551 BC Confucius (Chinese: K'ung-fu-tzu, or Pinyin: Kongfuzi), celebrated Chinese philosopher and political theorist, born in Ch'u-fu, Lu, now in Shantung Province, China (–479 BC). 550 BC Celts from Europe begin to arrive in the British Isles, mainly in Ireland, but also in Scotland and England. 550 BC Rome's second Etruscan king, Servius Tullius, achieves his greatest political successes in this decade. He begins an alliance with his neighbours in the shape of a Latin League, while at home he is reputed to have given a modicum of power to the assembly of the plebeians, set up in addition to the existing senate of elders which advises the king. c. 550 BC Lydian king Croesus builds the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus. One of the Seven Wonders of the World, it is known for its great size, being 110 m/350 ft by 55 m/180 ft. 546 BC King Croesus of Lydia retires to his capital, Sardis, for the winter and sends for help against Persia from Egypt, Sparta, and Babylon. However, King Cyrus of Persia follows rapidly and Sardis falls; Croesus is probably spared. 545 BC The Ionian Greek cities of Asia Minor are forced to accept Persian suzerainty, although they retain their freedom to trade so long as they pay tribute. However, the Phocaeans, 'pioneer navigators of the Greeks', refuse to submit and flee to Corsica where they reinforce the colony of Alalia (or Aleria). 540 BC Greek astronomer and philosopher Anaximenes of Miletus, who studies cosmogony, the study of the origins of the universe, is active. 540 BC The exiled tyrant Pisistratus returns to the Greek city-state of Athens once more and remains tyrant until his death in 527 BC. His tyranny is remarkable for his respect for law and constitutional procedure, and his encouragement of agriculture and trade. c. 540

BC

Athens, under its tyrant Pisistratus, takes over the Ionian religious

festival on the sacred island of Delos. 29 October 539 BC King Cyrus of Persia triumphantly enters Babylon. The Persian Empire takes over from the short-lived Neo-Babylonian Empire and absorbs the kingdom of the Medes. 538 BC King Cyrus of Persia occupies Jerusalem and allows all the Jews in Babylon who wish to do so to return to their native land. 534 BC The last of Rome's kings, Tarquinius Superbus ('the Proud' or 'Arrogant'), traditionally accedes to the throne. He sets the tone of his 24-year reign by putting to death many senators and revoking his predecessor's concessions to the plebeians. Roman territory is extended during his reign. 533 BC King Cyrus of Persia crosses the Hindu Kush mountains (in modern Afghanistan) and receives tribute from the Indian cities of the Indus valley. The Greek historian Herodotus says he forms his twentieth satrapy (administrative district) of Gandhara there. 530 BC Siddhartha Gautama (later Gautama Buddha) leaves his life as a Bengal prince at the age of 30, and becomes an ascetic. c. 530 BC Because it casts an arcuate shadow on the moon during eclipses, Pythagoras of Samos proposes that the Earth might be spherical. c. 530 BC The golden age of Athenian vase pottery begins, in which the pottery is distinguished by red figures, left in the natural colour of the clay, on black. The Greek vase painters Euphronius and Euthymides are working at this time. 529 BC Cambyses becomes king of Persia following the death of his father, King Cyrus II the Great of Persia. The Persian Empire has now been firmly established, and this is considered to be its foundation date. 529 BC King Cyrus II the Great of Persia, who founded the Persian Achaemenid Empire, dies leading an expedition against the Massagetae, an Asiatic people from around the Sea of Aral (c. 52). 525 BC King Cambyses II of Persia invades Egypt, wins the stubbornly fought Battle of Pelusium, and besieges Memphis. Egypt passes into the Persian Empire under Persian kings who form the 27th dynasty. c. 525

BC

Aeschylus, first Athenian tragic dramatist, born (–c. 456).

521 BC After dynastic trouble, Darius I becomes king of Persia. There are revolts in Babylon and other parts of the Persian Empire. 520 BC King Tarquinius Superbus makes Rome the undisputed head of the Latin League. He uses a combination of guile, military power, and diplomatic marriage.

520 BC The Sibyl, one of many prophetic priestesses, offers to sell the Sibylline Books, a collection of prophecies, to the king of Rome Tarquinius Superbus. He initially refuses to pay the price of 300 pieces of gold, and only after the Sibyl has burnt most of them does he realize their worth. He purchases the remaining books for the original price. They are consulted by the Roman senate in times of crisis, the last known occasion being in AD 363. c. 519 BC Xerxes I, King of Persia (486–465 Persia (–465 BC).

BC),

who invaded Greece, born in

517 BC Chinese philosophers Confucius and Lao Zi (Lao Tzu) reputedly meet. Lao Zi, who is credited with Tao Te Ching/The Book of the World Law and its Power, may be a mythical founder figure, invented to support the philosophy of Taoism. 510 BC King Cleomenes of Sparta helps the Athenians oust the tyrant Hippias, the son of Pisistratus, and the period of 'tyranny' in Athens ends. In return, Athens is forced to join Sparta's Peloponnesian League. c. 510 BC The temple of the virgin goddess Aphaea is built on the island of Aegina. It is famed for its sculptures, which in modern times are held in Munich, Germany. 508 BC The exiled king of Rome, Tarquinius Superbus, fights the indecisive Battle of Silva Arsia against the Romans, with the help of the Etruscan people of Veii, and fails to win back his throne He allies himself with the Etruscan Lars Porsena, King of Clusium. c. 508 BC Cleithenes of Athens, statesman and magistrate of Athens (525–524 who founded Athenian democracy, dies (c. 62).

BC),

507 BC Lars Porsena, the Etruscan king of Clusium, marches on Rome and besieges it. It is probable that he captures the city, but his stay there is brief. 507 BC Would-be chief magistrate Cleisthenes' legal constitutional reforms in the Greek city-state of Athens and establishes firmly its particular form of democracy. The four ancient tribes are abolished and replaced by ten new ones, and all citizens are enfranchized with a personal vote in the popular assembly. 506 BC Cleomenes of Sparta organizes a full-scale Peloponnesian invasion of Attica. However, the city-state of Corinth withdraws support and the plan collapses. Athens demonstrates its new-found power by defeating the Boeotians and Chalcidians. 500 BC Greek traveller and geographer Hecataeus of Miletus, writes Ges periodos/ Tour Around the World, a description of the geography and ethnography of Europe, northern Africa, and Asia – the first book on geography. c. 500

BC

Etruscan art flourishes, especially in the fields of bronze, pottery, and

tomb wall paintings. c. 500 BC Greek philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus centres his philosophy on the proposition that 'everything flows', and the belief that the cosmos is in a constant process of change. c. 500 BC Greek physiologist Alcmaeon is the first person to dissect the human body for research purposes. He discovers the optic nerve, describes the difference between arteries and veins, and recognizes that the brain, which he describes in detail, is the source of intelligence. He also possibly practises vivisection. c. 500 BC Phrygian religion influences Greece and, at a later date, Rome, with their mother goddess Cybele and her male attendant-god Attis. c. 500 BC The Greeks introduce the trireme, a galley about 45 m/150 ft long and 6 m/20 ft wide with three banks of oars. The oars are worked from an outrigger that extends down the length of the hull, and the ship carries about 200 people, mostly oarsmen. It becomes the model warship for both the Greeks and the Romans. c. 500 BC The town of Monte Albán is founded in the Oaxaca region of Mexico. It becomes the capital of the Zapotec culture. The town is sited on a steep, high bluff in the centre of a valley, and dominates the surrounding area for the next 12 centuries. 500 BC–490 BC King Darius the Great is enraged by mainland Greek intervention in Asia Minor. He demands earth and water, the symbols of submission, from the Greek city-states. Some, including Aegina, submit but Athens and Sparta disdainfully reject his demand and in 490 BC the Persian Wars begin. c. 500 BC–c. 400 BC Rome and its Latin allies are almost constantly at war with both the Etruscans in the north and the native mountain tribes to the south, in particular the Aequi and the Volscians. c. 500 BC–c. 400 BC The Celts begin to make an impression on European history. They are divided into a number of different tribes, sharing a distinctive decorative style of art, characterized by curving designs and mythical animals. These can be seen on their jewellery (gold and bronze torques), their weapons (decorated shields and sword scabbards), and their pottery and other vessels. The Celts probably originate in northwest and central Europe, France (particularly the area of Champagne), Switzerland, Lower Austria, and western Slovakia. The area of the western Hallstatt, Upper Austria, is also associated with the Celts. 499 BC Aristagoras, tyrant of Miletus in Asia Minor, induces the Ionian cities of Asia Minor to revolt against Persia. The Spartans fail to respond to a request for help but Athens and Eretria (in Euboea) send troops. During the revolt, the proPersian tyrant of Mytilene is stoned to death.

498 BC–446 BC Greek lyric poet Pindar composes odes in honour of athletes, most of them charioteers, at the Olympic, Pythian, Isthmian, and Nemean Games in Greece. 496 BC Sophocles, Greek playwright, author of Oedipus Rex, born in Colonus, near Athens (–406 BC). c. 495 BC Pericles, Athenian statesman chiefly responsible for making Athens the centre of Greece and for Athenian democracy, born in Athens, Greece (–429 BC). 494 BC At the end of a military campaign, the plebeian element in the Roman army (those who do not belong to the privileged patrician class) retires to the Sacred Mount outside Rome – the so-called 'Secession of the Plebs' – and threatens to found a new city. The Senate grants concessions, including establishing the Tribunate, an office charged with the protection of plebeian interests. 492 BC The Persian general Mardonius, nephew and son-in-law of King Darius I the Great of Persia, subdues Thrace and Macedon, but the Persians lose part of their fleet on the promontory of Mount Athos (Chalcidice). 490 BC King Darius I of Persia launches an expedition to mainland Greece, seeking revenge on the Athenians and Eretrians who backed the Ionian revolt against Persian rule. The city of Eretria is destroyed and Athens is in danger. The Persians land in the Bay of Marathon, north of Athens, where they meet in battle against the Athenians, supported by the Plataeans. The runner Philippides (or Pheidippides) is sent to Sparta to get help, but the Spartans delay sending troops, and the Greeks under Miltiades the Younger defeat the Persians without their help. The decisive role of the city-state of Athens in this anti-Persian coalition and the Spartans' failure to back the venture will have great ramifications for Greek politics in the 5th century BC. 486 BC Darius I the Great, Achaemenid king of Persia 522–486 several attempts to conquer Greece, dies.

BC,

who made

486 BC Encouraged by the news of the Greek victory over the Persians at Marathon in 490 BC, the Egyptians revolt against Persian rule after the death of Darius I. 486 BC Xerxes I accedes to the Persian throne following the death of his father, King Darius I the Great of Persia. He is to be a harsher king than his father. His first act is to quell the Egyptian revolt against Persian rule. He never visits Egypt and uses Persian rather than Egyptian administrators. c. 486 BC The Romans make a treaty with the tribe of the Hernici, who live in the Trerus valley southeast of Rome, between the powerful tribes of the Volsci on the coast and the Aequi in the mountains between the Trerus and Anio rivers. This treaty prevents the Hernici being crushed between its two powerful

neighbours and gives Rome a buffer state between its enemies. The triple alliance of Rome, the Latins, and the Hernici fights intermittent wars with the Aequi and Volsci for the next century. 484 BC Herodotus, Greek historian, author of an important history of the GrecoPersian wars, born in Halicarnassus, Asia Minor (now Bodrum, Turkey) (–c. 425 BC). c. 484 BC Euripides, one the great Athenian tragic dramatists, whose best-known plays include Medea (431 BC) and Electra (418 BC), born (–406 BC). 483 BC King Xerxes of Persia, having crushed the Egyptian revolt, prepares for his great expedition against the Greeks. The plan is for a land army to cross the Bosporus and to skirt round the Thracian and Macedonian coast, with a fleet always in support. He has a canal cut through the promontory of Mount Athos and builds a pontoon (floating bridge) over the Hellespont (Dardanelles) for his invading army to cross. According to Herodotus, it is 3km/2 mi long and consists of 676 ships positioned in two rows. c. 483 BC Gautama Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama), Indian philosopher and founder of Buddhism, dies in Kusinagara, Nepal (c. 80). 8 August 480 BC A small force under King Leonidas of Sparta holds the invading Persian land force at the pass of Thermopylae (leading from Thessaly to Phocis in central Greece), inflicting heavy casualties on them. The Spartans are wiped out but their bravery becomes almost legendary. 9 September 480 BC The Greek city of Athens is besieged and burnt by the Persians, but the Athenians, under general Themistocles and Aristides, who has recently been recalled from exile, destroy the Persian fleet in a naval battle in the Bay of Salamis. The Persian army retires to winter in Thessaly. 480 BC Celts of the Hallstatt culture of upper Austria begin to arrive in Britain in substantial numbers. This is the main period of Celtic immigration, greatly augmenting and changing the balance of Britain's population, and is known as Britain's 'Iron Age' culture. 480 BC–330 BC The Greek classical style of sculpture develops more realism than the preceding Archaic period. Its leading exponents are Phidias (in the 5th century BC), and Praxiteles, Scopas, and Lysippus (in the 4th century BC). 479 BC Confucius (Chinese: K'ung-fu-tzu, or Pinyin: Kongfuzi), celebrated Chinese philosopher and political theorist, dies in Lu, now in Shantung Province, China (c. 72). 479 BC King Xerxes of Persia leaves the conduct of the war in Greece to his general, Mardonius, and the Persians are defeated at the Battle of Plataea. They are also defeated at sea in the Battle of Mycale, off the coast of Asia Minor, and their ships are destroyed. The task of freeing the Ionian cities from Persian domination begins: the Athenians under the command of Xanthippus proceed to

the Hellespont and capture the town of Sestos. 478 BC Hieron succeeds his brother Gelon as tyrant of the Greek city of Syracuse in Sicily. He defeats the Etruscans in their efforts to win the Greek city of Cumae in Italy: this may be said to mark the end of Etruscan power. 477 BC The Delian League, an alliance of Greek states around the Aegean Sea, is formed to continue the fight against the Persians. Although formally all the allies have an equal say, the confederacy is very much under the leadership of Athenian politician Cimon. 476 BC Greek poets Pindar and Bacchylides write odes celebrating the chariot team of Hieron I, tyrant of Syracuse, winning a victory at the Olympics. Four books of Pindar's victory odes survive to modern times, but only fragments of the rest of his work. Some of the works of Bacchylides, written on papyrus, also survive to modern times. c. 475 BC The two-masted sailing ship, with the forward sail being the smaller, is depicted on the wall of an Etruscan tomb. 475 BC–425 BC In the 50 years that follow the end of the Persian Wars, the Greek city-state of Athens reaches the zenith of its greatness. In addition to its empire and political power, creative and intellectual culture flourish. The great tragic playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides are writing, as is the comic playwright Aristophanes. The sculptor Phidias supervises the construction of the frieze on the Parthenon, and the painter Polygnotus decorates the wall of the Stoa (the colonnade in the marketplace) with murals. Athens is now one of the main commercial centres of the eastern Mediterranean. 472 BC The earliest extant play of the Athenian tragedian Aeschylus, Persae/ Persians, describing the Persians at the Battle of Salamis, wins the Athenian tragedy prize. Aeschylus gained firsthand experience of the wars, having fought at the Battle of Marathon and, probably, at the Battle of Salamis. c. 470 made.

BC

One of the extant bronze statues at Delphi, that of a charioteer, is

c. 470

BC

Socrates, Athenian philosopher, born in Athens (–399

BC).

c. 470 BC The disciples of the Chinese philosopher Confucius reputedly collect and record his teachings, which are ethical rather than religious and centre on the golden rule of doing to others as one would have done to oneself. 468 BC Athenian tragedian Sophocles defeats Aeschylus in the contest for tragedy at the Dionysia festival in Athens. Of Sophocles's 120 plays, only seven survive, and of those only two can be dated accurately, Philoctetes, dated from 409 BC and Oedipus at Colonos, produced posthumously in 401 BC, both of which win prizes. The remaining five plays are Ajax, probably written in the period 451–444 BC, Antigone and Trachiniae, which are dated after 441 BC, and Electra and

Oedipus Tyrannus, probably written in the period 430–415 satyr-drama Ichneutai/Trackers, survives in fragments.

BC.

An eighth play, the

467 BC The Greek island of Naxos tries to secede from the Delian League but is blockaded and brought into subjection by the Athenian-dominated fleet, a highhanded action resented by the rest of Greece and widely seen as an early attempt by the Athenians to treat the confederacy as their own personal empire. 467 BC–466 BC Athenian statesman Cimon carries the war against Persia into Asia Minor and rallies all the cities of Lycia to the Greek cause by winning the battle of the River Eurymedon. Persia is decisively defeated, though it remains an enemy of the Greeks. 465 BC Xerxes I, king of Persia 486–465 BC, who invaded Greece, is assassinated in Persepolis, Persia, by Artabanus, his uncle and the head of his bodyguard (c. 54). 465 BC–462 BC The Greek city-state of Sparta is unable to help the island of Thasos fight off the Athenians, despite increasing concern at the rise of Athens as an imperial power, as the Spartans have their own troubles at home – they are suffering the effects of a severe earthquake and the ensuing revolt of the helots (serfs) in Messenia. 463 BC–461 BC The democratic statesman Ephialtes, with the support of the statesman Pericles, introduces a package of radical democratic reforms in the Greek city-state of Athens. They reduce the powers of the Council of the Areopagus, transferring them to 'democratic' popular institutions – the Council of Five Hundred, the Assembly, and the popular law courts. The office of judge becomes paid (so that it is no longer the exclusive preserve of the wealthy) and is recruited by lot from a list open to any citizen. 462 BC The Peloponnesian city of Argos, taking advantage of Sparta's preoccupation with its internal problems, finally conquers the city of Mycenae (which seems to have been temporarily independent). The inhabitants are dispersed, some finding their way into Macedon. 461 BC–446 BC Athenian foreign policy, now under the control of the nationalistic statesman Pericles, becomes very aggressive and imperialist. This period sees intermittent war, known as the First Peloponnesian War, between the Athenianled Delian League, edging ever closer to becoming an Athenian Empire, and the Spartan-dominated Peloponnesian League, consisting of the Peloponnesian states of Laconia (Sparta), Messenia, Ellis, and Arcadia, plus Corinth and Megara. 460 BC–457 BC The temple of Zeus is built at Olympia, Greece. The labours of the Greek hero Heracles are illustrated on friezes in the temple. 459 BC The Athenian politician Pericles' first move in his aggressive foreign policy is to try to isolate central Greece and replace Theban control by Athenian occupation. Athens makes strategic alliances with the city-states Argos and Megara, and the region of Thessaly. Corinth and the island of Aegina feel that

these actions threaten their sea trade, and declare war on Athens. 458 BC After a great effort, the Greek city-state of Athens is victorious over its Peloponnesian enemies and the Peloponnesian city of Aegina is forced to join the Delian League. 458 BC The Greek city-states of Sparta and Thebes, the capital of Boeotia, declare war on Athens. A Spartan force, going to the help of Boeotia in a local dispute, is nearly cut off by the Athenians on its return. 458 BC The Old Testament Book of Ezra tells how the Babylonian priest and scribe Ezra is sent by King Artaxerxes I of Persia to Jerusalem to restore the neglected Jewish laws of the Pentateuch. He is accompanied by a large number of Jewish exiles and carries valuable gifts for the temple, from both Jews and the Persian king himself. After fasting and prayer, he and a chosen committee blacklist those guilty of mixed marriage. 458 BC The trilogy Oresteia, by the Athenian dramatist Aeschylus, is performed. It comprises Agamemnon, Choephoroi, and Eumenides. 457 BC On returning from their Boeotian expedition, the Spartans are drawn into fighting with the Athenians, the latter being defeated at the ensuing Battle of Tanagra. The Spartans are unable to follow up their victory, however, and withdraw from the area. Athens then advances into Boeotia, which becomes a member of the Delian League. c. 456

BC

Aeschylus, first Athenian tragic dramatist, dies in Gela, Sicily (c. 69).

456 BC–454 BC The Athenian-led expedition to Egypt to assist the pharaoh Inaros in his revolt against Persia ends in disaster: the fleet is defeated with heavy losses and the army retreats in disarray. The army retreats across the Sinai Desert to Byblos before its remnants are rescued; Inaros is crucified. 455 BC The first play by the Athenian tragic dramatist Euripides, Daughters of Pelias, comes third at the Dionysia, a competition held in honour of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, in Athens. 453 BC Achaea, on the southern shore of the Corinthian Gulf, is forced to join the Delian League, which is now all but an Athenian Empire. 451 BC Athenian politician Pericles introduces pay for men serving on juries, who are drawn by lot from a panel of 600. Pay for public service is a recent principle in Greece, starting with pay for the office of judge, c. 462 BC. It is strongly criticized by the oligarchs, but is a great aid to poor citizens. The following year it is extended to soldiers, sailors, officials, and members of the council. 451 BC The warring Greek city-states are temporarily exhausted and a five-year truce is arranged between Athens and the Peloponnese.

450 BC Aristophanes, outstanding Greek comic dramatist, 11 of whose plays survive, including The Clouds, The Birds, and The Frogs, born (–c. 388 BC). 450 BC At La Tène (in modern Switzerland), Lake Neuchâtel becomes a site for Celtic votive offerings, and the artistic style of the same name also flourishes at this time. It is an art of curved lines and patterns. The votive offerings often include imported objects from classical cultures. These mark definite progress in Celtic art and have given their name to the Iron Age culture of northwestern Europe of this time. The La Tène culture lasts until the time, some three and a half centuries later, of Germanic interference and then Roman conquest. 450 BC–445 BC According to his own accounts, the Greek historian Herodotus visits Babylon and Egypt in order to collect stories for his Histories. 449 BC The Greek city-states finally make peace with Persia, the so-called Peace of Callias, which is maintained for most of the next century. There is no longer any formal need for the Delian League and the Athenians now have to force members to pay their contributions. The Peace of Callias traditionally marks the transformation of the Delian League into the Athenian Empire. 447 BC Athenian statesman Pericles commissions the construction of the great temple of Athena, the Parthenon, on the Acropolis in Athens. He intends the Parthenon and other edifices to have a dual religious and patriotic symbolism. Supervised by his friend, the Greek sculptor Phidias, the work is completed in about ten years. Also built on the Acropolis is the Propylaea (or 'entrance') and, in later times, the temple of Athene Nike and the temple known as the Erechtheum. 447 BC Athens loses control of Boeotia after Thebes, the capital, successfully instigates a revolt in the cities taken over by the Athenians. The Athenian general Tolmides, sent to recapture them, is defeated at the Battle of Coronea. This encourages the city of Euboea to revolt and the city of Megara to declare independence. Before Euboea can be recovered, the Athenian truce with Sparta lapses and the Spartan army invades Attica. 446 BC The Athenian statesman Pericles rounds off a difficult period in foreign affairs by negotiating a somewhat humiliating peace treaty with Sparta and its Peloponnesian allies, restoring independence to Achaea on the southern shore of the Corinthian Gulf, and extending the 5-year truce for another 30 years. This brings the First Peloponnesian War to an end. c. 445 BC Greek philosopher and scientist Empedocles distinguishes the 'four elements' – earth, fire, water, and air – which he claims all substances are made of, and which also explain the development of the universe by the forces of attraction and repulsion. The doctrine is embodied in Aristotle's works and influences Western thought until the 17th century AD. c. 444 BC Athenian leader Pericles asks the sophist (itinerant teacher of oratory and argument) Protagoras of Abdera to write a constitution for the new colony of

Thurii in Italy. Protagoras is famed for his agnosticism, his belief that the existence of God cannot be proved. 442 BC The aristocratic Athenian politician Thucydides continues his opposition to the statesman Pericles' abuse of the funds of the Delian League to rebuild the city of Athens and is ostracized (expelled by majority vote) by the people with whom Pericles' policy is very popular. Pericles is now unopposed and governs Athens for a further 15 years. 433 BC Corcyra and Corinth are at war: Athenian ships are deployed in the Battle of Sybota at the request of Corcyra, a Corinthian colony, enraging the Corinthians. The quarrel spreads to Potidaea in Chalcidice, a member of the Athenian Empire but originally a Corinthian colony, which now revolts in sympathy. 432 BC The Athenians besiege the city of Potidaea in Chalcidice; Corinth appeals to Sparta. At an intercity assembly at Sparta, Athens is accused of breaking the 30-year peace treaty agreed in 446 BC. 5 May 431 BC The Spartans invade Attica, marking the start of the 27-year Peloponnesian War. The Athenian army is outclassed by the Spartans and Athens' power lies in its navy, so the Athenian statesman Pericles brings the population of the country districts into the city of Athens while pursuing an active naval war. Athens insures itself against danger from the island of Aegina by supplanting its Doric population with Athenians. 431 BC The Athenian statesman Pericles makes his famous funeral oration for the fallen in the year's campaigns. The Athenian historian Thucydides describes the incident in his History, showing that the speech is much more than an oration for the dead and amounts to an assertion of Athenian values and aspirations. c. 431 BC The Greek sculptor Phidias moves to Olympia and carves his statue of Zeus, which becomes celebrated as one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It does not survive to modern times, but is described by the 1st century AD Greek historian Strabo and the 2nd century AD historian Pausanias. 430 BC The Spartans make the second of their five invasions of Attica. The Athenians have some successes in sea raids on their enemies and the city of Potidaea in Chalcidice is taken. In Athens itself, full to bursting point with refugees, plague breaks out. Pericles is deposed from his position as strategus (general) and fined, but is soon reappointed. c. 430 BC Athenian philosopher Socrates is active. He claims to know nothing and to be a 'midwife to truth', bringing forth the truth which others already know, but his participation in intellectual debates changes philosophy, focusing it on the inner nature of humanity. He writes no accounts of his work and, in later times, is known mainly through the works of the philosophers and historians Plato, Xenophon, and Aristotle.

429 BC Pericles, an Athenian statesman chiefly responsible for making Athens the centre of Greece and for establishing Athenian democracy, dies in Athens, Greece (c. 66). 428 BC Plato, Greek philosopher, often considered one of the greatest in history, born in Athens, or possibly Aegina, Greece (–347 BC). 428

BC

The city of Mytilene takes advantage of Athens' weakened state to revolt.

427 BC The Athenian Assembly, influenced by the demagogue Cleon, votes for the destruction of the population of Mytilene, following its revolt and surrender to Athens. However, in response to the pleading of Diodotus, this harsh decision is reversed and only the ringleaders of the Mytilenean revolt are executed. 427 BC The southern Boeotian city of Plataea surrenders to Sparta, and the Aegean city of Mytilene to Athens. The Athenians are more merciful in victory than the Spartans. Thebes and Sparta show no mercy to the Plataeans following their revolt and subsequent surrender to Sparta. Each prisoner is asked: 'Have you in the present war done any service to the Lacedaemonians (Spartans) or their allies?' Some 200 prisoners who cannot say yes are put to death. 425 BC The Athenian general Demosthenes lands at the Peloponnesian city of Pylos, defeats the Spartans, and captures 420 Spartan hoplites (soldiers) on the neighbouring island of Sphacteria. He then fortifies Pylos and Sphacteria. Sparta breaks off its invasion of Attica to send troops to Pylos. The Athenian statesman Cleon takes command and wins a victory for Athens. Sparta makes peace overtures which Cleon persuades Athens to reject. c. 425 BC Herodotus, Greek historian, author of an important history of the Greco-Persian wars, dies (c. 59). 423 BC A year's truce in the Second Peloponnesian War is agreed between the Greek city-states of Athens and Sparta. 423 BC The play The Clouds, by the Greek comedy dramatist Aristophanes, is produced. It includes ridicule of the Athenian philosopher Socrates. 422 BC Cleon of Athens, leader of the Athenian democracy (429 BC), ends the truce in the Second Peloponnesian War and resolves on the rescue of the Athenian colony of Amphipolis in Thrace, which was captured by Sparta in 424 In a battle outside the city both the Athenian leader Cleon and the Spartan general Brasidas are killed. The victory goes to the Spartans.

BC.

418 BC Sparta invades the Peloponnesian city of Argos, and Athens, which allied itself with Argos in 420 BC, breaks the peace and comes to the aid of the Argives, attacking the Peloponnesian city of Epidaurus and advancing on the city-state of Tegea in southeast Arcadia. 418

BC

The Argives (inhabitants of the Peloponnesian city of Argos) and the

Athenians are defeated at the Battle of Mantinea in the centre of the Peloponnese, and Argos switches allegiance from Athens to Sparta, as do its allies. Athens is becoming increasingly isolated. 416 BC With the encouragement of the politician and general Alcibiades, the Athenians take the island of Melos, in the Cyclades. Its inhabitants are treated with great cruelty, an action later regretted by the Athenians. 416 BC–415 BC The Sicilian city of Segesta asks for Athenian help against the Dorian city of Selinus, which has the backing of the powerful Greek city of Syracuse. A large Athenian expedition under the joint command of the Athenian leaders Nicias and Alcibiades sets sail for Sicily to aid Segesta, hoping to gain a foothold in Sicily and attain control of the sea. Alcibiades is immediately recalled to meet charges of impiety arising from the mutilation of all the protective statues of Hermes outside the house of Athens, the Hermae, on the eve of the Sicilian expedition; the sacrilege is believed to have been committed during drunken pranks by Alcibiades and his friends. He flees to the court of the Spartan king Agis II. 9 September 413 BC Despite the arrival of a second fleet under the command of the Athenian general Demosthenes, the Athenian expedition in Sicily is heavily defeated in a joint land and sea battle near Syracuse. The Athenian leaders Nicias and Demosthenes are captured and put to death; most of the surviving soldiers are sent to die in the Sicilian quarries. 411 BC An oligarchic council of 400 seizes power in the Greek city-state of Athens in an effort to exert more efficient control in the conduct of the Second Peloponnesian War. The orator Antiphon is one of the chief instigators of this oligarchic revolution, and one of the two ringleaders to be executed subsequently. A fragment of his defence speech, recorded on papyrus, survives to modern times, together with three other complete speeches. 411 BC Athenian historian Thucydides finishes writing his History. The Greek historian Xenophon continues the work in 383 BC. 411 BC The comedy Lysistrata, by the Greek comedy dramatist Aristophanes, voices the war-weariness of Athens. Women in the play withdraw sex in order try to force their menfolk to make peace. 409 BC The Carthaginian general Hannibal, grandson of Hamilcar, invades Sicily with a strong force, intending to reimpose its influence over the island, and defeats the Sicilian Greeks at a second Battle of Himera. Hannibal avenges his grandfather by the torture and immolation of 3,000 prisoners. 406 BC Euripides, one the great Athenian tragic dramatists, whose best-known plays include Medea (431 BC) and Electra (418 BC), dies in Macedon (c. 78). 406 BC Musician and dithyrambic poet Timotheus of Miletus acquires a reputation as an innovator, writing a nome (a song sung to the accompaniment of the

cithara, a stringed musical instrument) called Persae, for which the Athenian tragic dramatist Euripides writes the prologue. 406

BC

Sophocles, Greek playwright, author of Oedipus Rex, dies in Athens (90).

406 BC The Greek city-state of Athens wins its last naval battle at Arginusae, near Lesbos. The Athenian generals (including the late Athenian statesman Pericles' son) are put on trial, after allegedly failing to save their damaged vessels and pick up survivors, and are put to death. 405 BC Athenian naval supremacy is finally shattered by the Spartans under the general Lysander at the Battle of Aegospotami in the Sea of Marmara. When the news reaches the Athenians, they remember their harsh treatment of the inhabitants of the island of Melos in 416 BC and are afraid that they too will be enslaved. 404 BC Artaxerxes II, eldest son of King Darius II of Persia, ascends the Persian throne following the death of his father. The Egyptian Amyrtaeus takes the opportunity to mount a successful rebellion against Persian rule, founding Egypt's 28th dynasty 404–399 BC, of which he is the only king. 404 BC The Peloponnesians lay siege to the Greek city of Athens, which falls to the Spartans. The Second Peloponnesian War is over. The long walls between Athens and its port of Peiraias are pulled down to the playing of flutes, and a puppet oligarchic government, the Council of Thirty, is set up, led by the Athenian orator and politician Critias. It rules by a bloody reign of terror. 403 BC The former Athenian naval commander Thrasybulus deposes the oligarchic Council of Thirty and restores democracy in the Greek city-state of Athens. The Council is dissolved and its leader, Critias, killed. 400 BC The restoration of democracy in the Greek city-state of Athens after the end of the oligarchy of the Council of Thirty is accomplished with remarkable restraint and success. A small change is effected by making members of the Council preside in the Assembly. c. 400 BC Celtic tribes begin to move into northern Italy; the Boii and Senones cross the River Po and settle in the Po valley. The Insubres occupy Lombardy, with their capital at Milan (Roman Mediolanum). These Celtic tribes are collectively called Gauls by the Romans. At the same time, other Celtic groups are colonizing the banks of the Yonne and Seine rivers in France, and yet others are moving into Bohemia and Bavaria. c. 400 BC Coins begin to appear in northern India, the idea having arrived from Greece via Persia. c. 400 BC The Chinese begin to use bitumen for cooking food and burning in lamps – the first use of oil as a source of energy. In Europe it is used as a lubricant and as a medicinal ointment.

c. 400 BC The epic Indian poem Mahabharata and the popular collection of cosmic stories Puranas are first composed, though both gradually grow over the next thousand years. c. 400 BC The Zapotec culture develops in Mexico; it lasts more than 1,100 years, centred on the town of Monte Albán in Oaxaca. The Zapotecs use a basic writing system (possibly borrowed from the Olmecs) and a calendar. Over the course of the next 11 centuries, Monte Albán grows to be an enormous ceremonial centre and elite residence. c. 400 BC–ADc. 250 The Late Formative (or pre-Classic) period of Mayan culture takes place in Mexico. By 400 BC, large structures have been built at several sites in the tropical lowland jungle. In the highlands, people begin to put up large clay platforms, some the basis for temples and others for elite houses, flanking open plazas. 399 BC Athenian philosopher Socrates is convicted for impiety and for corrupting the young. He is sentenced to death by drinking the poison hemlock, but is also offered the option of exile which, despite entreaties from his friends, he refuses. His last days are described by his pupil, the philosopher Plato, in Apology and Phaedo. 399

BC

Socrates, Athenian philosopher, commits suicide in Athens (c. 70).

398 BC Dionysius the Elder, tyrant of the Greek city of Syracuse in Sicily, strikes at Carthage while it is still weakened by plague, attacking its cities in the western corner of Sicily. There is a massacre of Carthaginians in many cities and the city of Motya with its fine harbour is taken. 396 BC King Agesilaus of Sparta campaigns with some success in Asia Minor against the Persian satraps (governors) Pharnabazus and Tissaphernes. After the Peloponnesian War, Persia regained control of the Greek cities of Asia Minor; Sparta is now determined to liberate them. 394 BC The Athenian general Conon and the Persian satrap (provincial governor) Pharnabazus win a naval victory over the Spartans at Cnidus. The Athenians are avenged, at the expense of receiving help from Persia, and the Spartan bid for empire begins to crumble. Persia is virtually the arbiter of Greece. 6 June 390 BC A wandering tribe of Celts (whom the Romans call Gauls) defeats the Romans, deserted by their allies, at the Battle of the Allia and Rome is besieged for six months until only the Capitol is unconquered. The rest of the city is sacked by the Gauls. They are probably bought off with gold, though the legend grows that the former Roman dictator Camillus is recalled from exile and defeats them. 388 BC Aristophanes, outstanding Greek comic dramatist, 11 of whose plays survive, including The Clouds, The Birds, and The Frogs, dies (c. 62).

387 BC Sparta is unsuccessful in the war against Persia and the attempt at empire and so concludes 'the King's Peace' (sometimes known as the Peace of Antalcidas, after the Spartan envoy), which hands back the Greek cities of Asia Minor to Persian rule. 385 BC Rome defeats an alliance of the Latins, Volsci, and Hernici. A Latin colony is established in the Volscian town of Satricum and three years later, one at Setia. The Latins and Volsci continue to give trouble, especially the Volscian towns of Satricum, Antium, and Velitrae, which are repeatedly captured and besieged by each side, until Rome is victorious with the defeat of the Latin League in 338 BC. 384 BC Aristotle, celebrated Greek philosopher and scientist, pupil of Plato, and tutor of Alexander the Great, born in Stagira, Chalcidice, Greece (–322 BC). 380 BC Egypt's 30th dynasty, the last native house to rule Egypt according to the Egyptian historian Manetho, begins with the pharaoh Nectanebo I, an Egyptian general who usurps the throne and who builds many monuments and restores many temples, including a temple to Thoth, god of wisdom and learning, at Hermopolis, Egypt c. 380 BC The Greek philosopher Plato reputedly composes his first group of Socratic dialogues, including Ion, Laches, Lysis, Apology, Euthyphro, Charmides, Menexenus, Hippias Major, Hippias Minor, Protagoras, Crito, and Cleitophon. 378 BC–377 BC The Greek city-state of Athens allies itself with the city of Thebes and forms a second Athenian Confederacy (the first being the Delian League, formed in 477 BC). Most of the other Boeotian cities and some of the Ionian islands join the confederacy. War breaks out between the Thebans and Spartans in Boeotia. c. 375

BC

Greek scientist Archytas of Tarentum invents the screw.

7 July 371 BC Theban general Epaminondas wins a decisive victory over the Spartans at the Battle of Leuctra in southern Boetia. The victory shocks Greece, as Spartan soldiers have always been believed to be invincible; Athens does not welcome the victory, fearing the rising aggression of the city of Thebes. The Arcadians decide to reassert their independence from Sparta and form an Arcadian League; they rebuild their city of Mantinea as well as building a new federal city, Megalopolis. 371 BC The Greek city-states of Sparta and Athens make peace, another Peace of Callias (the first being that of 449 BC). The treaty is again named after one of the Athenian envoys. 369 BC The Theban leader Epaminondas frees the Peloponnesian state of Messenia from Spartan rule. Not wishing to disturb the balance of power, the Greek city-state of Athens allies itself with Sparta, its traditional enemy.

367 BC Ptolemy I, Macedonian ruler of Egypt (323–285), and founder of the Ptolemaic dynasty, born in Macedonia (–283). c. 366 BC Greek mathematician and astronomer Eudoxus of Cnidus builds an observatory and constructs a model of 27 nested spheres to give the first systematic explanation of the motion of the Sun, Moon, and planets around the Earth. 364 BC The Boeotian city of Thebes builds a fleet of 100 triremes (warships) to combat Athens. The Thebans win no naval battles but the existence of the fleet influences the ever-changing kaleidoscope of Greek city alliances. Thebes shocks the Greek world by destroying its Boeotian rival Orchomenus. 364 BC The Greek sculptor Praxiteles of Athens sculpts his Hermes and his masterpiece, the Aphrodite of Cnidus. The Aphrodite does not survive to modern times, but is known from contemporary references and praise. 362 BC The Peloponnesian state of Arcadia drifts into an alliance with the citystate of Sparta. The Thebans invade Arcadia and win the Battle of Mantinea at the expense of death of the Theban leader Epaminondas. His dying wish, for Koine Eirene/a general peace, comes to be, and the brief supremacy of the Boeotian city of Thebes comes to an end. 361 BC The Persian Empire is weakening, despite the failure of a joint EgyptianSpartan expedition to the Phoenician coast, and many satraps (provincial governors) revolt, including Straton I at Sidon. The city of Sidon (in modern Lebanon) has become rich and prosperous again by this time. 360 BC King Agesilaus of Sparta, displeased with his reception in Egypt in 363 BC, supports a revolt against the pharaoh Tachos, who flees to Susa, Persia, and makes peace with the Persians. The new pharaoh, Nectanebo II, a grandson of Nectanebo I, pays the Spartans off. He reigns until 343 BC and carries out considerable building work. With him Egypt's 30th and last native dynasty comes to an end. 356 BC Alexander the Great, King of Macedon who conquered Persia and much of the Near East, born in Pella, Macedon (–323 BC). 356 BC Philip II of Macedon, regent for Amyntas IV, assumes the full title of king and takes Potidaea and other Athenian strongholds in Thessaly and Chalcidice. He forges a unified professional army with a national spirit from the disparate groups of warring Macedonian tribesmen. 356 BC The temple of Artemis at Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, is burnt down by Herostratus, who wishes to do something that history will remember him by.

354 BC The Phocians of central Greece are defeated in the Sacred War over the protection of pilgrims to the shrine of Apollo in the Phocian-held city of Delphi, but they revive under a new leader. c. 353 BC The building of the tomb of Mausolus, tyrant of Caria in Asia Minor, at Halicarnassus, is completed. The tomb becomes celebrated as one of the Seven Wonders of the World, and gives rise to the word 'mausoleum'. It is 125 m/411 ft square and has 26 columns on top of which rests a 24-step pyramid surmounted by a four-horse, marble chariot. 352 BC After two initial defeats, Philip II of Macedon drives the Phocians of central Greece south as he begins to execute his plan to dominate the Greek world. The city-states of Athens and Sparta support the Phocians and Philip is checked at Thermopylae but then moves against Thrace. Athens is saved by Philip falling ill. 352 BC Chinese astronomers make the earliest known record of a 'visitor star', probably a supernova. 350 BC By the beginning of this decade the Romans have finally recovered from the setback caused by the sack of their city by the Gauls in 390 BC and have reasserted their ascendancy in Italy. The Gauls, once more threatening Rome, are decisively beaten. 350 BC Coinage is introduced in China, along with the use of the horse as a cavalry charger rather than for drawing chariots. Earthwork walls are built at various places along the northern and western frontiers as protection against the surrounding nomads. (These are later used as a basis for the Great Wall.) In central China, the Han state is being formed, though it is the Qin state that is the most powerful. c. 350 BC Aristotle defends the doctrine that the Earth is a sphere, in De caelo/ Concerning the Heavens, and estimates its circumference to be about 400,000 stadia (one stadium varied from 154 m/505 ft to 215 m/705 ft). It is the first scientific attempt to estimate the circumference of the Earth. c. 350 BC Hot air from underground fires is directed into clay pipes beneath the floors of houses in the Greek city of Lacedaemon, Sparta – the first central heating. c. 350 BC Work begins on Shan-yang Canal in China; it later forms the Southern Grand Canal. 349 BC Philip II of Macedon cements his control over the remaining Greek cities in Macedon, in particular taking the city of Olynthus. The Athenians send help to Olynthus eventually, but are diverted by a revolt in Euboea, stirred up by Philip, which leads to Euboea being declared independent. 347

BC

Plato, Greek philosopher, often considered one of the greatest in history,

dies in Athens (c. 81). 347 BC The Greek city-state of Athens sends embassies to Philip II of Macedon, and the Peace of Philocrates establishes a status-quo ante. Philip refuses to forgo the right to punish the Phocians for their 'sacrilege' of looting the temple at Delphi in the Sacred War. Greece and Macedon spend much of the rest of the decade preparing for war in an interval of uneasy peace. 343 BC–341 BC The Samnites, a group of warlike tribes in eastern central Italy, are at war with Rome in what is known as the First Samnite War. Defeated by Rome, they successfully plead with Rome not to destroy their city of Capua. The war effectively dissolves the Latin League, a confederation of villages and tribes around and including Rome which had banded together for protection. Rome is left in control of Latium after the war. 342 BC–341 BC Philip II of Macedon conquers Thrace (modern Bulgaria); this is regarded by the Greek city-state of Athens as a further threat to its safety. Thrace has been governed by native princes since Persia's expulsion from Europe by the Greeks. Philip builds several cities in Thrace, including Philippopolis. 340 BC Philip II of Macedon starts a war against the Greek city-state of Athens in the Bosporus area, and is not successful at first. He then has to attend to trouble from the Scythians near the mouth of the River Danube; he is wounded but soon recovers. 340 BC–338 BC The Romans are at war with the Latin League. The Romans defeat the Latins at a battle on the Campanian coast, near Mount Vesuvius, according to the Roman historian Livy. 338 BC Philip II of Macedon wins the battle for the supremacy of the Greek world against the Athenians and Thebans, at Chaeronea, west of the Boeotian capital of Thebes. He advances into the Peloponnese, subdues the city-state of Sparta, and summons a pan-Hellenic congress at Corinth where he announces that the Greeks will set about reliberating the Greek cities of Asia Minor from Persian rule. 336 BC After the murder of Philip II of Macedon, his 20-year-old son, Prince Alexander the Great, becomes king of Macedon. He puts down rebellion at home and subdues the Boeotian city of Thebes. He is elected by the Greeks assembled at Corinth as their commander against Persia. 336 BC Philip II of Macedon, while sending an advance force to begin the invasion of Asia Minor, attends to his personal affairs. He puts away his wife, Olympias, sister of King Alexander of Epirus, and marries a nobleman's daughter called Cleopatra. Then, to appease Alexander of Epirus, he gives him his own daughter in marriage and attends the wedding feast. At the feast he is murdered, supposedly by Olympias (46). 336 BC Philip II of Macedon is buried at Aegae (modern Vergina). In modern times (1977 AD) his tomb is discovered with the burial chamber intact and containing

grave goods of a splendour unparalleled in the Greek world. 336 BC The ascetic Greek philosopher Diogenes the Cynic reputedly meets the king of Macedon Alexander the Great at Corinth and, on being offered any favour, asks him to 'stand out of the sun'. 334 BC Alexander the Great of Macedon sets out on his conquest of the Persian Empire. He crosses the Hellespont with some 35,000 troops, visits Troy, and then marches east to the River Granicus where he defeats a Persian army commanded by the Greek mercenary Memnon. He subdues the Greek cities of Miletus and Halicarnassus and winters in Gordium, the ancient capital of Phrygia in one-time Hittite territory. 10 October 333 BC Alexander the Great of Macedon defeats King Darius III of Persia at Issus in southeast Cilicia and becomes master of Syria. Darius flees; his family are captured but treated well by Alexander. The Greeks send congratulations and a golden crown. 333 BC The king of Macedon Alexander the Great proves to the priests and people of Gordium, the capital of Phrygia, that he is the destined conqueror of Asia by cutting the Gordian knot. According to tradition, the chariot of Gordius, founder of Gordium, was lashed to a pole by an intricate knot which could only be untied by the future conqueror of Asia. By cutting the knot instead of untying it Alexander's actions give rise to the phrase 'cutting the Gordian knot', meaning a bold solution to a difficult problem. November 332 BC Alexander the Great of Macedon enters Egypt, meeting no Persian resistance. He is greeted as a liberator. 7 April 331 BC Alexander the Great of Macedon takes the first major step in his Hellenizing process by founding the greatest of the cities he names after himself, Alexandria, in the Nile delta, Egypt. Many Greeks emigrate to these new cities. 1 October 331 BC Alexander the Great of Macedon, having left Egypt earlier in the year, defeats the Persian king Darius III at the Battle of Gaugamela (near present-day Mosul, Iraq). He is now master of the Persian Empire. After Gaugamela he advances to Babylon, which surrenders to him, then into Persia, where he finds vast treasure at Susa. 330 BC King Darius III of Persia is made prisoner by Bessus, his satrap (provincial governor) of Bactria (northern Afghanistan), and is assassinated in July, just as Alexander the Great catches up with the Persians, who cease all resistance. 330 BC The Greek sculptor Lysippus of Sicyon is reputedly the favourite of the king of Macedon, Alexander the Great, and his portraits of Alexander profoundly influence the iconography of rulers of the time. The colossal statue Farnese Hercules is thought to be a Roman copy of an original by Lysippus. 330

BC–323 BC

Greek philosopher Aristotle composes his History of Animals,

Rhetoric, Physics, Metaphysics, Nicomachean Ethics, Logic, Poetics, Politics, and a large number of other works. In politics he shows no sympathy with either his one-time pupil Alexander the Great, King of Macedon, or the democracy of Athens. 327 BC Alexander the Great marries Roxana, the captured princess of a Bactrian chief. He invades India, with the intent of securing trade routes, and defeats the Indian king Porus in a well-contested battle on the River Hydaspes. At Samarkand in the early months of the year, Alexander kills his foster-brother Clitus who dares to criticize him. A plot against him is discovered but suppressed. 326 BC Alexander the Great reaches his farthest point in the east, the River Hyphasis in India where his Macedonian troops refuse to go any further. He retraces his steps to the River Hydaspes, and, by water and land, retreats down the river and then down the River Indus to the sea. He is seriously wounded at the siege of the capital of a local Indian tribe, the Malli. 326 BC Roman intervention in the dispute over Neapolis (Naples) causes the Samnites to declare war on Rome – the Second Samnite War. 325 BC Alexander the Great reaches the Indian Ocean. With his army of perhaps 30,000, he makes a difficult retreat westwards along the coast and through the desert of Gedrosia (modern Makran, Pakistan). His army reaches the Persian capital of Persepolis in December, while his navy, under the Macedonian general Nearchus, reaches Susa, Persia, in the same month. c. 325

BC

The population of the British Isles is around half a million.

13 June 323 BC Alexander the Great, King of Macedon, who conquered Persia and much of the Near East, develops a fever and dies in the palace of Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon (now in Iraq) (c. 33). 323 BC Alexander the Great reaches Babylon, which he intends to develop as the capital of his empire, and plans the conquest of Arabia. On reaching Babylon, he is met by deputations from most of the western Mediterranean peoples, fearful that the great king now intends to conquer Europe. 323 BC–322 BC Ptolemy, one of Alexander the Great's generals and possibly his half-brother, has Alexander's body brought to Memphis in Egypt and buried there in a gold sarcophagus. He marries Alexander's mistress, Thaïs, and claims the position of satrap of Egypt, thereby founding the Ptolemaic dynasty. 322 BC Aristotle, celebrated Greek philosopher and scientist, pupil of Plato, and tutor of Alexander the Great, dies in Chalcis, Euboea (c. 62). 322 BC The struggle to succeed Alexander the Great develops in Babylon. A compromise is reached whereby Roxana's son, Alexander Aegus, and the dead king's young half-brother, Arrhidaeus, are to be considered rulers. Perdiccas, Alexander's head general, is appointed regent of the empire, and tries to keep

effective control. Antipater, Alexander's regent in Macedon, is confirmed in his position. 321 BC During the Second Samnite War, a Roman army is caught by the Samnites at a mountain pass, the Caudine Forks, and forced to capitulate. It suffers the indignity of 'passing under the yoke' – the Roman soldiers are stripped of their weapons and forced to pass under a 'yoke' of weapons held by their enemies. Rome surrenders the colony of Fregellae. 321 BC Perdiccas, regent of the late Alexander the Great's empire, invades Egypt but is murdered by his own mutinous army, led by the Macedonian general Seleucus. A truce is arranged, leaving Ptolemy, one of Alexander's generals and possibly his half-brother, in power in Egypt and Seleucus in Babylon. Antipater, the regent in Macedon, is made regent of the whole empire. 320 BC Alexander the Great's empire begins to disintegrate in the major power struggle to succeed him between his former generals, the Diadochi. This struggle dominates the scene for the next two decades. The main protagonists are Ptolemy (Egypt), Seleucus (Babylon and Syria), Antipater and his son Cassander (Macedon and Greece), Antigonus (Phrygia and other parts of Asia Minor), Lysimachus (Thrace and Pergamum), and Eumenes (the Pontus area). c. 320 BC Greek philosopher Theophrastus begins the science of botany with his books De causis plantarum/The Causes of Plants and De historia plantarum/The History of Plants. In them he classifies 500 plants, develops a scientific terminology for describing biological structures, distinguishes between the internal organs and external tissues of plants, and gives the first clear account of plant sexual reproduction, including how to pollinate the date palm by hand. c. 320 BC The Greek scholar Theophrastus writes one of the earliest botanical treatises, called Historia Plantarum. 316 BC Cassander, king of Macedon, arranges for the murder of the widow of Philip II of Macedon, Olympias (also mother of Alexander the Great). He also imprisons Alexander the Great's widow, Roxana, and their son, Alexander Aegus, putting them to death five years later. 316 BC Eumenes, one of the generals fighting for control of Alexander the Great's empire, is defeated by another general, Antigonus, and executed. Antigonus now has control of Asia Minor. 314 BC The Romans inflict a crushing defeat on the Samnites at the Battle of Tarracina in southern Italy. Samnite losses are said to be over 10,000. The Romans reduce the city of Capua, which had defected to the Samnites. A Latin colony is founded at Luceria. 313 BC Cassander, the ruler of Macedon, largely loses his grip on central Greece, and Antigonus, the ruler of Asia Minor, declares the 'freedom' of the Greek cities.

313 BC Roman victories against the Samnites continue. Fregellae and Nora are recaptured, Nola and Calatia made allies, and Latin colonies are established at Suessa and Pontia to guard the coast road, at Saticula to watch the Campanian frontier, and at Interamna to cover the middle Liris valley. 312 BC Roman statesman Appius Claudius begins the construction of the first great Roman road, the Via Appia (Appian Way), which links Rome with the military centre of Capua. Cambered, flanked with a curb, and with solid foundation layers, its construction serves as the standard for road building for the next 2,000 years. At the height of the Roman Empire (about 200 AD) 85,000 km/53,000 mi of road have been built. 310 BC Rome has to deal with renewed trouble from the Etruscans, who join the Samnites and march on Sutrium. Rome advances into Etruria and makes treaties with the Etruscan cities of Cortona, Perusia, and Arretium, and takes Volsinii. 307 BC Just as Rome is finally winning against the Samnites, the Hernici revolt, with many of their cities going over to the Samnites. The Aequi join them two years later. 305 BC Macedonian king Demetrius I introduces catapults onto ships; they fire heavy darts and stones – the first missile weapons – and result in the building of forecastles and sterncastles – temporary wooden turrets – to provide elevated platforms from which to fire. 305 BC Seleucus, the ruler of Babylon, consolidates his Asian empire as far as India where he is checked by Indian emperor Chandragupta Maurya who gains control of the Indus valley as well as the Ganges valley, laying the foundations of the Mauryan Empire. Seleucus relinquishes all claims, receiving 500 war-trained elephants as a gift. 304 BC The Second Samnite War ends with a peace under which Rome gains no territory but the Samnites renounce their hegemony over Campania in southern Italy. 301 BC King Cassander of Macedon and Lysimachus of Thrace persuade Seleucus of Babylon and Ptolemy I of Egypt to join them in trying to destroy King Antigonus I of Asia Minor. They defeat him at Ipsus in Asia Minor, resulting in the final dissolution of Alexander the Great's empire. c. 300 BC Alexandrian mathematician Euclid sets out the laws of geometry in his Stoicheion/Elements; it remains a standard text for 2,000 years. He also sets out the laws of reflection in Catoptrics. c. 300 BC Egyptian ruler Ptolemy I establishes a museum and library at Alexandria, Egypt. Organized by Demetrius of Phaleron, the library contains hundreds of thousands of vellum and papyrus scrolls, the texts of classical antiquity. Although it is intended to be an international library most scrolls are in Greek. It is destroyed in AD 391.

c. 300 BC Greek philosopher Zeno of Citium, having lived and studied in Athens for about 12 years, opens his Stoic school of philosophy at the Stoa Poikile there, which specializes in paradoxes. Legend tells that Zeno lives to the age of 98. c. 300 BC The Egyptian pharaoh Ptolemy I writes a history of the wars of Alexander the Great. Though the work does not survive to modern times, it is used by the later Greek historian Arrian in his account of the period. c. 300 BC The Romans invent the hypocaust. Developed from the Spartan heating system, hot air from underground fires is funnelled through pipes in the walls and under floors to heat public baths and most private houses. c. 300 BC There is rapid population growth and the development of a two-tiered settlement hierarchy – large ceremonial centres where the elite live, surrounded by smaller villages, in the Mayan jungle lowlands of Mexico. The site of El Mirador in Guatemala is probably the main lowland centre of the Mayan Late Formative period. 298 BC The Third Samnite War in Italy is started by the Samnites, aided by Gaulish marauders and Etruscan allies. The Samnites seize their chance while Rome is engaged on the Lombard plain. The Romans penetrate into the heart of Samnite country. 297 BC Indian emperor Chandragupta Maurya abdicates in favour of his son Bindusara who extends the Mauryan Empire as far south as Mysore in India. Bindusara is known to the Greeks as Amitrochates, perhaps from the Sanskrit for 'the Destroyer of Foes', and continues cultural contact with the Seleucids. 292 BC The Colossus of Rhodes, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, is begun by Chares of Lindus. Cast in bronze, it is 32 m/105 ft high, holds a torch aloft, and guards the entrance to the harbour at Rhodes. 290 BC The Third Samnite War ends in Italy, with the Samnites subdued but recognized by the Romans as autonomous allies. 287 BC The plebeians in Rome secede again. The Senate appoints Hortensius as dictator to deal with the situation, and the Lex Hortensia is passed. This law recognizes the plebiscites (laws passed by the plebeians) of the plebeian tribal assembly as valid and binding on the whole state, without the need for senatorial ratification as previously, so that the will of the people as a whole becomes sovereign. c. 285 BC Herophilus, an anatomist working at Alexandria, dissects human bodies and compares them with large mammals. He distinguishes the cerebrum and cerebellum, establishes the brain as the seat of thought, writes treatises on the human eye and on general anatomy, and writes a handbook for midwives. 283

BC

At a battle near Lake Vadimo, Rome finally quells the allied Etruscans and

Gauls, becoming undisputed master of northern and central Italy. 283 BC–282 BC King Ptolemy I, Macedonian ruler of Egypt (323–285 BC), and founder of the Ptolemaic dynasty, dies in Egypt during the winter of 282 BC (c. 81), having already abdicated in favour of his son, Ptolemy II. 281 BC King Seleucus I of Nicator invades Macedon and kills Lysimachus of Thrace in the Battle of Corupedion, leaving him master of western Asia Minor. Seleucus and his son Antiochus also extend their territory east into Persia to the borders of India, making the Seleucid dynasty heir to the greater part of Alexander the Great's Persian Empire. 280 BC The Colossus of Rhodes, the greatest of many new statues in this now flourishing city, is finally erected. Celebrated as one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the bronze statue stands 32 m/105 ft high, holds a torch aloft, and guards the entrance to the harbour at the Greek island state of Rhodes. It was completed by the sculptor Laches after the original sculptor, Chares of Lindus, dies. Lindus is said to have committed suicide when the cost exceeded his estimate. 279 BC A horde of Gauls – a Celtic people from central Europe – sweeps down from the Danube valley through Macedon into Greece, killing and plundering. They are only just halted by the Aetolian League before they reach Delphi, where they intended to plunder the shrine. They turn back north, where King Antigonus II defeats them in Macedon, winning popular support for his kingship. 279 BC In renewed fighting, King Pyrrhus of Epirus wins another 'Pyrrhic' victory (in which his losses are almost as great as those of his opponents) against the Romans at Asculum in Italy. Disheartened, he retires to the Greek city of Tarentum in Italy. Later in the year, he marches on Rome but realizes he cannot take the city and suggests peace terms. These are refused, largely at the instigation of the ex-censor, Appius Claudius. 278 BC–276 BC The Carthaginians besiege the Greek city of Syracuse in Sicily, which appeals to King Pyrrhus of Epirus for help. He crosses from the Greek town of Tarentum in Italy to Sicily and drives the Carthaginians back to the town of Lilybaeum. After two years the Greeks of Sicily ask him to leave, and he returns to Italy. 275 BC From about this time the Near East and Aegean are relatively peaceful with the stabilizing of the three great Hellenistic kingdoms that were formed from Alexander's Persian Empire – Ptolemaic Egypt, Seleucid Asia, and Antigonid Macedon. These kingdoms maintain a balance of power through diplomacy and limited war until about 220 BC, with the accession of ambitious rulers to the thrones of Macedon and Asia and the rise of Rome. 275 BC Syracusan poet Theocritus, creator of the bucolic (pastoral) genre, writes in praise of the tyrant of Syracuse, Hieron II and, later, in praise of the Egyptian pharaoh Ptolemy II.

270 BC Rome, having successfully concluded its lengthy Italian wars, continues with a determined economic policy of colony planting within Italy and road building; the Via Appia is extended southwards. 270 BC The north African city of Carthage is ruled by an oligarchy of merchants under two suffetes or chief magistrates. It produces good military commanders but relies on mercenary soldiers. By this time, Carthage controls Sardinia as well as southern Spain and its own Numidian neighbours, and has naval control of the western Mediterranean. In Sicily, since the departure of King Pyrrhus of Epirus, it has reoccupied most of the island, excluding, however, the Greek city of Syracuse. c. 270 BC Greek physicist and inventor Ctesibius of Alexandria lays the foundations for the development of modern pumps with his invention of a small pipe organ, the hydraulis, which is supplied with air by a piston pump. 269 BC The first true coins appear in Rome. Made of cast bronze in different denominations, the obverses depict the head of a deity and the reverses a ship's prow. 267 BC Hieron, the young king of Syracuse in Sicily and a descendant of the tyrant Hieron who came to power in 474 BC, beats back the Mamertines from his territory. (The Mamertines are a society of disbanded mercenaries formed in 289 BC.) . 264 BC King Hieron of Syracuse, Sicily, threatens to renew his attack on the Mamertines (society of disbanded mercenaries), who appeal to Carthage and receive a Carthaginian garrison; they then appeal to Rome, get rid of the Carthaginian garrison, and welcome two Roman legions under Appius Claudius (a relative of the Roman censor). The Carthaginians, affronted, send a force to Sicily, and they are supported by Hieron. Appius Claudius beats them off, and the First Punic War breaks out. 263 BC The Romans attack the city of Syracuse in Sicily and force its king, Hieron, into alliance with them. He continues to rule Syracuse benevolently. 262 BC The Carthaginians are defeated by the Romans at Agrigentum in Sicily. They retire to reorganize their fleet, while the Romans sack Agrigentum and enslave its Greek inhabitants. 260 BC The Mauryan emperor Asoka completes the conquest of virtually the whole of the Indian subcontinent by the bloody defeat of Kalinga on the east coast. After this he renounces war, and Buddhism prospers throughout India. It is introduced to the island of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), where it has continued to flourish. 260 BC The Romans win a resounding naval victory over the Carthaginians off Mylae in Sicily (the date may be two years earlier).

256 BC The Chinese state of Qin makes war upon the last of the Zhou emperors, who abdicates. 256 BC The Romans repeat their naval success against the Carthaginians at the Battle of Mylae by defeating them again at the Battle of Ecnomus. They send a force under the consul Regulus to Africa, who settles down for the winter in the hope of capturing the city of Carthage in the spring. 255 BC The Roman consul Regulus, sent to capture Carthage, is defeated and taken prisoner by the Carthaginians. A Roman fleet sent to rescue Regulus is wrecked. c. 255 BC The doctrine of the pulse, which emphasizes feeling the pulse as the most important aspect of diagnosis, and that a healthy life is achieved by a balance of yin and yang, is introduced in China. It will be compiled into the Mo Jing in about AD 300 by Wang Shu-he. c. 250 BC Greek mathematician and inventor Archimedes, in his On the Sphere and the Cylinder, provides the formulae for finding the volume of a sphere and a cylinder; in Measurement of the Circle he arrives at an approximation of the value of π; in The Sand Reckoner he creates a place-value system of notation for Greek mathematics; and in Floating Bodies, the first known work on hydrostatics, he discovers the principle that bears his name – that submerged bodies are acted upon by an upward or buoyant force equal to the weight of the fluid displaced. c. 250 BC Greek mathematician and inventor Archimedes invents the Archimedes screw for removing water from the hold of a large ship. A similar device is already in use in Egypt for irrigation. 247 BC Hannibal the Great, celebrated Carthaginian general who conducted the Second Punic War against Rome 218–201 BC, born in North Africa (–c. 182 BC). 246 BC King Ptolemy III of Egypt sets out on a career of conquest in the Seleucid Empire, now under Seleucus II: the Third Syrian War. Ptolemy is partly motivated by a desire for revenge for the murders of the Seleucid king Antiochus II and his wife Berenice (Ptolemy III's sister) by Antiochus's ex-wife Laodice in 249 BC. 246 BC The short-lived Qin dynasty is set up in China with the accession of King Zheng, who changes his name to Shi Huangdi. 245 BC King Ptolemy III of Egypt temporarily defeats and permanently weakens most of the Seleucid Empire. He reaches as far as Bactria and the borders of India. However, he is forced to return to Egypt to meet internal trouble and the Seleucid rulers resume control. c. 245 BC The Greek engineer Ctesibius builds the first gun. It consists of a bronze tube sealed at one end and contains a piston. When the piston is pulled back the air in the tube is compressed. Pulling the stop catch releases the air

violently forcing out projectiles such as arrows. 241 BC The Romans win a resounding victory off the Carthaginian city of Lilybaeum in Sicily with their new fleet and the Carthaginians accept severe peace terms; the First Punic War is over. Carthage agrees to abandon all claim to Sicily, to refrain from sailing its warships in Italian waters, and to pay an indemnity of 3,200 talents. The Carthaginian army, however, is allowed to return home with its arms. 240 BC Chinese astronomers make the first recorded observation that can definitely be associated with Halley's Comet. 240 BC Rome takes over full control of Sicily and stations a legion there; it treats Sicily more like a defeated country than it has ever treated any part of Italy. Sicilian peasants are heavily taxed and an increasing amount of corn is imported from the island, Roman farmers now turning more to the olive and the vine. 240 BC–237 BC The rulers of Carthage in north Africa refuse to pay the troops returning from the First Punic War in Sicily, provoking a ruthless civil war in which the proletariat join the mercenaries under Spendius and Matho, who are later executed. The Carthaginian general Hamilcar Barca finally puts down the rebellion. 234 BC Marcus Porcius Cato ('the Elder' or 'the Censor'), Roman statesman and orator, the first major Latin prose writer, whose De agri cultura/On Agriculture survives, born in Tusculum, Latium (–149 BC). 232 BC Asoka, last major emperor of the Mauryan dynasty of India (c. 265–232 BC), who encouraged the expansion of Buddhism in his empire, dies. His death marks the beginning of the rapid decline of the Mauryan Empire in India, which is to disappear completely over the next 50 years. 231 BC The queen mother Teuta comes to power in Illyria as regent. She extends Illyrian influence to Epirus and Acarnania to the south, and increases the sea raiding that Illyria has always practised further into the Ionian Sea, and even to the coast of Italy. c. 230 BC Alexandrian mathematician Apollonius of Perga writes Conics, a systematic treatise on the principles of conics in which he introduces the terms 'parabola', 'ellipse', and 'hyperbola'. c. 230 BC Copper-lined pottery jars, with asphalt plugs, containing metal rods – the first electric battery – are used in Baghdad to coat objects with thin layers of gold or silver – the first example of electroplating. c. 230 BC Greek scholar Eratosthenes of Cyrene develops a method of finding all prime numbers. Known as the sieve of Eratosthenes it involves striking out the number 1 and every nth number following the number n. Only prime numbers then remain.

229 BC–228 BC Rome becomes embroiled for the first time with the affairs of Greece by taking retaliatory action for the murder of Italian merchants and Roman envoys in Illyria, and for Illyrian piracy in the Adriatic Sea; the First Illyrian War takes place. The Greeks congratulate Rome on quelling the pirates; Antigonus III, the new king of Macedon, is not so pleased, however, and pursues a policy of befriending the Illyrians, a policy continued by his successor Philip V. 220 BC Antigonus III (Doson) is succeeded by the young Philip V as king of Macedon. Philip immediately comes into collision with Rome over the Illyrian pirates, when Rome again tries to drive them from the area and their chief seeks refuge with Philip who is deeply resentful of Roman interference. The Second Illyrian War takes place (220–219 BC). 219 BC The Carthaginian general Hannibal attacks the Spanish city of Saguntum, which is allied with Rome. The Romans send the dictator and consul Quintus Fabius to Carthage to negotiate peace or war; he makes a symbolic gesture with the folds of his toga, asking 'Shall it be peace or war?' The Carthaginians leave the decision to him and he chooses war. Hannibal presses the siege of Saguntum, and the Second Punic War begins. 218 BC In the spring the Carthaginian general Hannibal sets out from New Carthage (Cartagena) in Spain to invade Italy, reputedly with nearly 100,000 men and 50 elephants. The Romans send an army to Spain under Gnaeus Scipio, which arrives too late to stop Hannibal, but it remains in Spain to prevent reinforcements from reaching them. Hannibal crosses the Alps and, after meeting great hardships and dangers, reaches the Po valley in Italy in the late autumn. 217 BC Quintus Fabius is elected dictator by the Romans and earns the cognomen Cunctator (the Delayer) by avoiding a set battle and creating a 'scorched earth' area around Hannibal's invading army to deprive the Carthaginians of supplies. 217 BC The Roman consul T Quinctius Flamininus, instead of remaining at Arretium to guard the western route through the Apennines, decides to pursue the Carthaginian general Hannibal. T Quinctius Flamininus and his army are ambushed and defeated by Hannibal at Lake Trasimene. Two complete legions are wiped out in a serious defeat for the Romans. 216 BC The Roman dictator Quintus Fabius Cunctator is relieved of his command by an impatient Senate. The Romans are devastatingly defeated by the Carthaginians at Cannae (modern Canne in Apulia, Italy), after which Quintus Fabius is reinstated. There are revolts in central Italy, and the city of Capua sides with the Carthaginian general Hannibal. However, Hannibal fails to obtain reinforcements from Carthage, and the whole of Latium, Umbria, and Etruria remain loyal to Rome. 216 BC–205 BC King Philip V of Macedon, resenting Rome's interference in Illyria, seizes his opportunity and invades Illyria, starting the First Macedonian War. The

war continues in a somewhat desultory fashion for 11 years. 215 BC The Carthaginians fail to recapture Sardinia. Their general, Hannibal, captures the city of Tarentum in southern Italy, but is denied any reinforcements from Spain by the activities of the Roman general Publius Scipio senior and his brother Gnaeus. The Greek city of Syracuse in Sicily revolts against Rome and holds out for four years. 214 BC–206 BC Chinese emperor Shi Huang-ti employs general Meng Dian to connect a number of existing defensive walls in northern China to form a single fortified system with watchtowers to keep out the Xiongnu (Huns). Known as the Great Wall of China, it is 2,400 km/1,500 mi long, 9 m/30 ft high, 8 m/25 ft wide at its base, and 5 m/17 ft wide at its top. It is the largest building project ever undertaken. 212 BC The Numidian chiefs Syphax and Masinissa on Carthage's eastern border declare war on Carthage with Roman encouragement. The Carthaginian general Hasdrubal dashes across to Africa from Spain and stamps out this rebellion. He then returns to Spain, where he manages to turn the tide against the Romans; the Roman generals Publius Scipio and his brother, Gnaeus, are killed in battle. 211 BC The city of Syracuse, Sicily, falls to the siege of the Roman commander Marcus Claudius Marcellus, who also suppresses the remaining resistance in Sicily. Syracuse is looted and many citizens killed, including Archimedes, the Greek mathematician and inventor. 209 BC The Roman general Scipio Africanus makes skilful use of the tide to besiege and capture New Carthage (Cartagena) in Spain, encouraging his soldiers by telling them that Neptune, god of the sea, is on their side. He frees the hostages taken from Spanish tribes by the Carthaginians to ensure their loyalty. Several Spanish tribes come over to the Roman side. Scipio recruits the young Numidian prince Masinissa. 207 BC The Carthaginian general Hasdrubal escapes from defeat in Spain and, crossing the Alps with an army of 25,000 men, tries to come to his brother Hannibal's rescue. On the River Metaurus in northern Italy (at the northern end of the Via Flaminia) Hasdrubal is defeated by the Romans and his head is thrown into Hannibal's camp. Hannibal realizes that he has virtually lost the war in Italy. 206 BC Chinese emperor Ershi Huang-ti is deposed after a reign of only four years, and China's Han dynasty is formed by Liu Bang, a populist monarch. c. 206 BC According to the Chinese poet Li-Yu (c.AD 50–c. 130), a game of zuzhu, an ancient Chinese form of football, is played on the emperor's birthday in 206 BC. The game he describes has some remarkable similarities to modern football, with a stuffed leather ball and two goal areas. 205 BC King Philip V of Macedon, who made an alliance with Carthage in 215 BC, expecting the Carthaginian general Hannibal to rapidly conquer Rome so that he

could regain control of the Roman protectorate in western Greece, makes a temporary peace with Rome at Phoenice, ending the First Macedonian War. Rome retains most of its protectorate. 203 BC The Numidian chief Syphax and Carthaginian armies under General Gisco are defeated by the Roman general Scipio the Younger (Scipio Africanus Major) at the Battle of the Great Plains. The Carthaginian general Hannibal is compelled to return home from Italy. 202 BC The Roman general Scipio the Younger (Scipio Africanus Major) advances on Carthage with the Numidian prince Masinissa. Masinissa captures the Numidian chief Syphax, but becomes ensnared by his wife, Sophonisba, until Scipio extricates him. 201 BC Rome and Carthage sign a peace treaty to end formally the Second Punic War. The peace terms are harsh: Carthage has to surrender all but 10 ships of its great fleet, pay an indemnity of 10,000 talents, allow the Numidian prince Masinissa independence as king of Numidia, give up Spain to Rome, and refrain from warmongering without Rome's approval. The Romans then oust the Carthaginians from Malta. 200 BC Following appeals from the Aetolian League and many other Greek citystates, especially Rhodes and Pergamum, the Romans declare war on King Philip V of Macedon – the Second Macedonian War begins. Rome is concerned about the changes in the balance of power among the Hellenistic kingdoms to the east that are currently occurring. Athens immediately joins Rome. c. 200

BC

Coal is first used in China as fuel.

c. 200

BC

Eurasian horseriders invent the horseshoe. It reaches Rome by 100

BC.

c. 200 BC The Greeks invent the astrolabe. It is used for observing the positions and altitudes of stars. c. 200

BC

The Old Testament Book of Ecclesiastes is written.

c. 200 BC The Romans invent concrete. It is used mainly for public works projects, the largest being the port of Caesarea built by Herod the Great in the early 1st century AD. c. 200 BC–ADc. 200 During this period the Nazca Lines are drawn in the desert along the south coast of Peru. These are enormous stylized outlines of animals, including a monkey, whale, spider, and hummingbird, and sets of parallel lines, some as long as 20 km/12 mi. They are believed to be a development of Chavín de Huantar art; they may have had religious significance, or they may have been connected with astronomy. 198 BC The Roman consul T Quinctius Flamininus crosses to Macedon with an army and pushes King Philip V of Macedon's forces to disaster in the Vale of

Tempe. Abortive peace negotiations take place. The Greek cities of Boeotia, Sparta, and the Aetolian League come over to Rome. 197 BC Spain is organized as two Roman provinces, Nearer Spain and Further Spain, and the number of praetors is increased from four to six to govern them. 197 BC The Roman consul T Quinctius Flamininus defeats the Macedonians at Cynoscephalae in Thessaly and dictates peace terms. The Second Macedonian War is over. 195 BC Parchment is invented at the library of Pergamum after an embargo on papyrus by Egyptian king Ptolemy V hinders copying. c. 193

BC

The Venus de Milo statue is made, now in the Louvre, Paris, France.

192 BC–189 BC The Romans are at war in Greece with King Antiochus III the Great of Syria, who is trying to extend his empire westwards. 191 BC Scipio Africanus is now a figure of great authority in Rome and has borne the cognomen 'Africanus' since just after his success against the Carthaginian general Hannibal in the Battle of Zama in Africa. He persuades the Senate to continue the war in Greece against King Antiochus III the Great of Syria and to complete his defeat by pursuing him into Asia Minor. 191 BC The Latin comic poet Plautus produces his play Pseudolus. He bases his plays on Greek originals, but adapts them to Roman tastes. Twenty of his plays survive to modern times. 190 BC The Romans under the command of Domitius Ahenobarbus defeat King Antiochus III the Great of Syria at the Battle of Magnesia in Caria, Asia Minor. Ahenobarbus is aided by King Eumenes II of Pergamum, who is rewarded with a great increase of territory. The towns of Asia Minor surrender to the Romans and Antiochus flees. c. 190

BC

Chinese mathematicians use powers of 10 to express magnitudes.

189 BC Following the defeat of King Antiochus III the Great of Syria at Magnesia, an armistice is concluded between the king and the Romans. Antiochus agrees to withdraw from Asia Minor beyond the River Taurus, to pay a large indemnity, and to surrender the Carthaginian general Hannibal. Hannibal is forced to flee from the Seleucid court and seeks refuge first in Crete and then with the king of Bithynia in Asia Minor. Antiochus has now lost all of Asia Minor. 189 BC The kingdom of Bactria (in modern Afghanistan) under Euthydemus and his son Demetrius is now strong enough to expand and to take over the Persian satrapies (provinces) that lie between it and India. This consolidates Bactria's hold on the trade routes and eventually leads its kings on to India.

183 BC A lifelike bust is made of the Roman general Scipio Africanus. This is one of the earliest Roman examples of this form of sculpture, and it illustrates the realism of Roman portraiture (probably resulting from the practice of making death masks). 183 BC King Demetrius of Bactria crosses the mountains between Bactria and India and proceeds down the Kabul valley to the town of Taxila, which he captures. He advances to the River Indus, capturing the city of Pattala in Arachosia and refounding it as Demetrias. He sends his general, Menander, east through the Punjab, where he occupies Sagala and the Mauryan capital, Paliputra, on the Upper Ganges River. Demetrius takes his Indian allies into the ruling council to form a joint government. Greek craftsmen are brought in, coins minted, and the sea route from the Indus to Arabia is developed. 182 BC The Romans demand the extradition of the celebrated Carthaginian general Hannibal the Great (who conducted the Second Punic War against Rome, 218–201 BC) from Libyssa, Bithynia (now in Turkey). Rather than face the extradition, Hannibal commits suicide (c. 63). 181 BC–179 BC In Spain, the Lusones, a Celtiberian tribe, try to migrate into Carpetania, and the First Celtiberian War begins. Fulvius Flaccus defeats them at Aebura, captures their capital at Contrebia, and takes the district known as Celtiberia Citerior (Nearer Celtiberia) to the Romans. The following year Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus senior takes over the war, and continues to defeat the Celtiberians. He makes a treaty with the Nearer Celtiberians, by which they provide tribute and auxiliary troops, and an alliance with Further Celtiberia. May 180 BC Following the death of King Ptolemy V of Egypt after a reign of 25 years in which the Egyptian monarchy greatly declined, little is left of the Egyptian empire except Cyprus and Cyrenaica. Ptolemy VI Philometor, a child, succeeds Ptolemy V, with his mother as regent. 180 BC Rome rounds off its subjugation of all Italy by defeating the Ligurians who live in the Apennines between the River Arno and Savoy (in the area of modern Genoa) and deporting 40,000 of them to the area around Beneventum in Samnium, southern Italy. 177 BC Tiberius Gracchus senior subdues Sardinia, enslaving some of the population. 173 BC For the first time, both consuls in Rome are plebeians (members of the ordinary people rather than the privileged class of patricians). 171 BC–167 BC Rome declares war on King Perseus of Macedon, who is vehemently anti-Roman, and the Third Macedonian War begins. The Romans initially suffer several defeats due to bad leadership. The Greek kingdom of Epirus joins Macedon, but the Greek leagues hold back. c. 170

BC

The first paved streets in the world are created in Rome.

169 BC King Antiochus IV of Syria attempts to regain the kingdom of Bactria and India for the Seleucid Empire. Although he does not succeed, he weakens the kingdom sufficiently to lead to its subsequent downfall. With increasing nomadic pressure from the steppes, the kingdom has disappeared by 128 BC. 168 BC During the Third Macedonian War, King Perseus of Macedon gains the support of Genthius, the Illyrian king who reigns in Scodra. The Roman consul Aemilius Paullus takes charge of the Roman forces fighting Perseus in Thessaly. He defeats Perseus at the Battle of Pydna, and later captures him to adorn his subsequent triumphal parade in Rome. The Roman praetor L Anicius Gallus campaigns against Genthius in Illyria, defeating him and taking the city of Scodra. The Third Illyrian War is over in less than a month; by the post-war settlement, towns loyal to Rome are granted freedom from taxation and the rest pay to Rome about half the previous royal tax. Rome then withdraws from the area. 167 BC King Antiochus IV of Syria attempts a policy of religious centralization in the Seleucid Empire with a view to forcing its people to worship the same gods as the Greeks. A Syrian god is identified with the Greek god Zeus for this purpose. When Antiochus tries to force the Jews to worship Zeus, putting a statue of Zeus in the temple at Jerusalem, and confiscating the temple treasures, the Jewish priest Mattathias rebels and slays the enforcing official and those Jews who attempt to obey. Mattathias leads a rebellion, and on his death in the following year is succeeded by his son Judas, the 'Maccabee' or the 'Hammer'. 166 BC The Latin comic poet Terence produces his first play The Girl from Andros. Five other plays follow, his last being The Brothers in 160 BC. c. 165 BC Chinese astronomers first observe and record sunspots. Continuous records of sunspots are kept by Imperial astronomers from 28 BC to AD 1638. 12 December 164 BC Judas Maccabaeus, leader of the rebellion against the rule of King Antiochus IV of Syria, defeats the Seleucid forces by guerrilla tactics and gains control of Jerusalem. He cleanses and rededicates the temple, destroys the idols, and restores Judaism. 163 BC On the news of King Antiochus IV of Syria's death, the Syrian general in Judaea offers the Jews full religious freedom if they will lay down their arms. Even though the Chasidim consent, Judas Maccabaeus, the leader of the revolt against Syrian rule, holds out for full political as well as religious freedom. 161 BC Judas Maccabaeus, the leader of the revolt against Syria in Judaea, strengthens himself by an alliance with Rome but is slain in the Battle of Elasa against the Seleucid forces, leaving his brother Jonathan to continue the struggle. c. 160 BC Roman statesman and writer Marcus Porcius Cato ('the Elder' or 'the Censor') writes his book on agriculture De agricultura/On Agriculture, which gives advice to an estate owner.

157 BC Jonathan Maccabaeus, the leader against Syrian rule in Judaea, is recognized by the Seleucids as a minor king within the Syrian dominions. 153 BC The tribes in Nearer Celtiberia revolt against Rome again, starting the Second Celtiberian War (153–151 BC). The consul Nobilior is sent to Spain with four legions. The tribes of Further Celtiberia join the revolt, and Nobilior is heavily defeated near the town of Numantia. 152 BC–151 BC The Roman consul Marcus Claudius Marcellus takes over the war against the Celtiberians in Spain. He makes peace with the Celtiberians of the town of Numantia by paying them a large sum of money. When the new consul Lucius Licinius Lucullus arrives the following year, he brutally attacks another tribe who were not involved in the war. This stiffens the resistance of other cities and when Lucullus fails to take them he withdraws, ending the Second Celtiberian War. 150 BC During this period, the Huns, faced with a strong and expanding China under the Han dynasty, find themselves pushed inwards from the east rather than themselves pushing into China. They press on a kindred people, the Yue Ji, who infiltrate westwards into Turkestan and around the Sea of Aral. This affects the Scythians, soon to be known by the Indians as the Shakas. c. 150 BC The Greek historian Polybius publishes the first part of his History. Written to explain the rise of Rome, in its final form it covers the period 264 BC–146 BC. c. 150 BC The Silk Road, a trade route from China to India and Europe, begins to be used. By AD 200 it is 6,400 km/4,000 mi long and stretches from the Levant in the eastern Mediterranean to Sian in China. It is the longest road in the world for nearly 2,000 years. 149 BC Marcus Porcius Cato ('the Elder' or 'the Censor'), Roman statesman and orator, the first major Latin prose writer, whose De agri cultura/On Agriculture survives, dies (c. 85). 149 BC Rome regards the action of Carthage in defending itself against Numidian incursions in 150 BC as a casus belli (justification for war) and the Third Punic War begins. The oligarchic government of Carthage offers to submit but the Roman terms are harsh. These state that the city shall be destroyed and that its 700,000 inhabitants shall rebuild their homes elsewhere, 'but not within 10 miles of the sea'. The Carthaginians refuse to leave their city. 148 BC Viriathus, a survivor of the Lusitanian massacre in Spain of 150 BC, persuades the Lusitanians to fight. He defeats and kills a Roman governor and then for eight years withstands the armies of Rome, inflicting several defeats and capturing Roman towns. 147

BC

A Roman delegation, arriving in Corinth to resolve the dispute between

the Spartans and the Achaean League, is snubbed and insulted and the League declares war on Sparta. The Roman praetor Q Caecilius Metellus hurries south from Macedonia and defeats a Greek force but is recalled to Rome at the end of his term of office. 146 BC After a prolonged and terrible siege Carthage is finally taken by the Roman consul Scipio Aemilianus. The Carthaginians make their final stand in their temple of Eshmoun (equivalent to Aesculapius, god of medicine), reputedly setting fire to the building and dying in the flames. The wife of the Carthaginian commander Hasdrubal shows herself in splendour with her two children before she and they are burnt. Carthage is destroyed and the Roman province of 'Africa' is established. Scipio Aemilianus is the son of the Roman consul Aemilius Paullus and adopted heir of Scipio Africanus Major whose name he takes, being known as Scipio Africanus the Younger. 146 BC After the Greek city-state of Corinth has suffered similar treatment to that meted out to Carthage, all semblance of Greek liberty vanishes. The country, though not yet made a province, is placed under the close surveillance of the Roman governor of Macedonia. 143 BC Revolt against the Romans spreads in Spain, encouraged by the success of the Lusitanian rebel Viriathus, and the Celtiberians rebel once more, starting the Third Celtiberian or Numantine War. 142 BC Judaea gains its independence from Syria under Simon Maccabaeus, who is both ruler and high priest. 140 BC China's greatest Han emperor, Wudi (the 'Martial Emperor'), comes to the throne and accelerates the expansion of China. 139 BC The Lusitanian rebel Viriathus is murdered in Spain by his friends, who have been bribed by the Romans, and his rebellion against Rome peters out. 133 BC The issues raised by Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus concerning land distribution and the power of the tribunate are far from settled with Tiberius' death. They lead to a period of unrest and may have contributed to the Social War. Clashes between the Senate and the tribunate are a feature of Roman politics until the end of the Republic. 133 BC Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, the elder of the two Gracchi brothers, is elected tribune (magistrate) of the plebeians (the common people) in Rome. He institutes drastic and highly controversial agrarian reforms and embarks on a radical programme aimed at alleviating the worst poverty. When King Attalus III of Pergamum leaves his kingdom to Rome, Tiberius Gracchus attempts to use the legacy to pay for reforms, an unprecedented interference in foreign policy, which was previously dictated by the Senate. 132 BC On his return from Spain, the Roman censor Scipio Aemilianus (Scipio Africanus the Younger) finds himself in opposition to the policies put in place by

the Roman tribune (magistrate) Tiberius Gracchus, his brother-in-law. He champions Rome's Italian allies (many of whom he has led in battle) against the intended redistribution of land, which, he claims, will be to their disadvantage. 125 BC Fulvius Flaccus, a follower of the Gracchi brothers and agrarian reformers in Rome, fails in an attempt to obtain Roman enfranchisement for the Italians; the town of Fregellae revolts and is destroyed. 121 BC Gaius Sempronius Gracchus fails to be elected as Roman tribune (magistrate) for a third time in succession. He appears in the Roman Forum to protest against the repeal of some of his enactments and a riot ensues. He is induced to flee, but, on the point of capture, asks his slave to kill him. About 3,000 of his followers are killed in the subsequent fighting. His earlier land reforms are reversed, and land concentration becomes the norm throughout Europe for centuries. 116 BC While a Roman senatorial commission is examining his claim to the Numidian throne at some length, the claimant Jugurtha, the nephew of King Masinissa, defeats his surviving rival, Masinissa's grandson, at Cirta; he also massacres some of the Italian merchants there. 111 BC The Roman Senate finally takes action against King Jugurtha of Numidia, by sending one of the consuls, Calpurnius Bestia, to subjugate him. However, Bestia achieves little and makes peace. 110 BC The Roman army, under the consul Albinus, pursues King Jugurtha of Numidia into the Numidian desert, in north Africa, but is trapped and made to 'pass under the yoke' (divested of its weapons and made to walk under a 'yoke' of spears held by the enemy). The consuls Bestia and Albinus are exiled by the Romans. 108 BC The Chinese emperor, Wudi, founds a military colony, Lak Lang, in northern Korea. 29 September 106 BC).

BC

Pompey, Roman general and statesman, born in Rome (–48

106 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla, the Roman commander Gaius Marius' quaestor, persuades King Bocchus of Mauritania to turn against King Jugurtha of Numidia, who is lured to a conference and kidnapped. Sulla has the scene of capture carved on his signet ring and makes no secret of his jealousy of Marius. 106 BC Marcus Tullius Cicero, Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, orator, and writer, whose major works include De republica/On the Republic, born in Arpino, Italy (–43 BC). 105 BC The Cimbri, a Celtic tribe, inflict a more serious defeat on the Romans at Arausio (modern Orange) on the River Rhône; the province of Transalpine Gaul in southern France now appears to be at their mercy and Rome itself seems

threatened. 104 BC The reforms of the Roman consul Gaius Marius make the Roman army more professional and democratic. He increases the legion from about 5,000 to 6,000; changes the 120-strong maniple to the 600-strong cohort; abolishes dependence upon class for recruitment to various ranks of the army; and converts the cavalry to an auxiliary arm. He gives the legions names and numbers and introduces the eagle as a standard for each. 101 BC The Roman consul Gaius Marius completely defeats the Cimbri, a Celtic tribe, at the Battle of Vercellae in the Po valley, northern Italy, with a reputed slaughter of 120,000 men. Rome has no more threats from the Celtic and Germanic barbarians for another five centuries. Marius returns to Rome a hero. c. 12 July 100 BC (Gaius) Julius Caesar, Roman general, dictator, and statesman, conqueror of Transalpine Gaul, born (–44 BC). c. 100

BC

Glass windowpanes begin to be used in Roman houses.

c. 100

BC

The Chinese begin to use ice for refrigeration.

c. 100 BC The two main lines of successors to Alexander the Great's empire, the Ptolemaic in Egypt and the Seleucid in Syria, continue to decline amidst a confusion of petty and complicated intrigue, both to end in Roman absorption (the former by the emperor Augustus, the latter by the soldier Pompey the Great). Parthia, Pontus, and Armenia all gain in strength during this period. c. 90 BC The Roman scholar Marcus Terentius Varro writes that disease is caused by the entry of imperceptible particles into the body – the first enunciation of germ theory. 90 BC–88 BC Rome is seriously threatened during the Social War by the Italians, who establish a federal capital at Corfinium, east of Rome. The Senate, with an apprehensive eye on the threat of King Mithridates VI the Great of Pontus, compromises. While giving command in Campania to the Roman consul for 88 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla, it offers the Italians, with only a few provisos, what they are fighting for: Roman citizenship. 88 BC King Mithridates VI the Great of Pontus invades the Roman province of Asia. He captures the city of Pergamum and massacres unpopular Roman and Italian merchants and officials. Mithridates' invasion comes after the king of Bithynia tries to invade Pontus on Roman advice. 87 BC In Rome, Cinna, the consul left behind by Lucius Cornelius Sulla, stirs up trouble and is forced to leave the city. He joins forces with the Roman general and politician Gaius Marius; the two return to Rome, name themselves consuls, and institute a massacre of patricians. After only 18 days of consulship, Marius dies of pleurisy.

87 BC–86 BC The Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla presses Mithridates' general, Archelaus, back onto Athens and besieges the city. In the spring of 86 Athens falls and is sacked, though its great reputation saves it from total destruction. The Athenian tyrant and ally of Mithridates, Aristion, is captured and killed. Sulla publishes his losses as only 15 men.

BC

c. 85 BC–ADc. 52 The earliest known Chinese lacquer (found at Lak Lang in North Korea in modern times) is produced. 84 BC Gaius (Valerius Maximianus) Catullus, outstanding Roman lyric poet, born in Verona, Cisalpine Gaul (modern Italy) (–c. 54). 84 BC The Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla and King Mithridates VI the Great of Pontus agree peace terms at a meeting near Troy. Sulla sails for Brundisium, leaving two legions to police Rome's Asiatic territories. Heavy taxation on those who had taken the enemy side, and looting, force people to borrow heavily, swelling the purses of Roman money lenders. Lucius Cornelius Cinna, ruling as tyrant in Rome, packs the Senate with his followers and declares Sulla an outlaw. A financial crisis ensues, which Cinna tries to allay by the remission of debts, but the unrest is to result in his death at the hands of his own troops. 83 BC Returning from his victory over King Mithridates VI the Great of Pontus, the Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla lands at Brundisium in southern Italy, recruits many soldiers who had followed the late Gaius Marius to his side, and advances northwards towards Rome. He is assisted by the young Roman soldier Pompey the Great (Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus). 82 BC Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla enters Rome as victor and institutes his 'Proscription' lists – lists of enemies who are to be murdered and have their property confiscated. He includes Julius Caesar's name in this list after he refuses to divorce his wife, Cornelia, the daughter of the rebel Roman politician Cinna, but is persuaded to delete it. He is appointed dictator under a law of the interrex Lucius Valerius Flaccus. c. 82 BC Mark Antony, Roman general who influenced the end of the Roman Republic, and who is known for his association with Cleopatra of Egypt, born (–30 BC). 81 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla has himself made dictator of Rome for an indefinite period of time, using a bodyguard of slaves left over from the victims of his proscription (murder of his enemies and confiscation of their property). He adds 300 new (conservative) members to the Senate and makes the popular Assembly wholly subservient to it. 80 BC The Marian general Quintus Sertorius, who was sent to Spain by the Roman consul and rebel Cinna, is driven into Africa by the dictator L Cornelius Sulla's troops. He returns on the invitation of the Lusitanians and sets up an anti-Sullan regime in Spain with the enthusiastic support of the natives.

80 BC The second wave of Celtic Belgae arrives in Britain from Gaul during this period. They settle mostly in the southeast and tackle the less well drained and still forested land, farming with a plough that can turn the sod. They are probably responsible for the white horse on the chalk downs at Uffington in Oxfordshire. 78 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla (Felix), Roman consul who fought King Mithridates VI of Pontus in Rome's first civil war, and then became Roman dictator 82–79 BC, dies in Puteoli, near Naples (60). 78 BC The Roman consul Lepidus quarrels with his co-consul to the point of bloodshed. He assembles an army, advances on Rome, is beaten, and flees the country. The task of rounding up the rebels is entrusted to the Roman soldier Pompey the Great, although some escape to join the rebel Roman general Quintus Sertorius in Spain. 73 BC Chinese emperor, Zhaodi, dies and is succeeded by Xuandi, who enlarges the Han Empire to an extent never known before. He makes alliances with all the enemies of the Huns, then penetrates into their territory, conquering parts of it. This causes a civil war among the Huns, and one claimant asks for Xuandi's aid. Xuandi helps him to become ruler of Mongolia, and he marries a Chinese princess. 73

BC

Herod the Great, King of Judaea under the Romans 37–4

BC,

born (–4

BC).

73 BC Spartacus, a gladiatorial slave, takes up the cause of the badly treated agricultural slaves in Italy, and sets up bandit headquarters on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius. Spartacus' followers increase rapidly and he tries to curb their worst excesses, hoping to march north to the Alps, from where his soldiers can return to their homes. 71 BC The Roman general Marcus Crassus drives the Spartacists (slave rebels led by the gladiatorial slave Spartacus) into the tip of the Italian peninsula, defeats them, and has 6,000 of them crucified along the Appian Way. The Roman soldier Pompey the Great defeats some remnants and the two argue over who has stamped out the rebellion. They are persuaded to settle their differences and stand for the consulate. 15 October 70 BC Virgil, Roman poet, author of the Aeneid, born in Andes, near Mantua, Italy (–19 BC). 70 BC Roman commanders Pompey the Great and Marcus Crassus become consuls in Rome and repeal part of the reactionary legislation of the former dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla. 69 BC Cleopatra VII, Queen of Egypt 51–30 (–30 BC).

BC,

lover and ally of Mark Antony, born

66 BC A bill is passed in Rome, with the support of the orator and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero and the quaestor Julius Caesar, giving the Roman general

Pompey the Great proconsular command in the East, with powers of declaring war. Pompey sets out on a four-year career of conquest and settlement in the East. December 65 BC Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus), celebrated Roman lyric poet and satirist, born in Venusia, Italy (–8 BC). 65 BC King Mithridates VI Eupator the Great of Pontus is decisively defeated by the Roman general Pompey the Great near Dasteira in Pontus (later renamed Nicopolis, 'City of Victory'), and flees to the Crimea. Pompey also defeats King Tigranes of Armenia, who is allowed to retain his kingdom of Armenia as a vassal prince and a bulwark against Parthia, but loses all his foreign acquisitions. 64 BC–ADc. 52 The Roman general Pompey the Great arrives at Antioch in Syria and dictates terms: King Antiochus XIII of Syria is deposed and the Seleucid dynasty ends. Syria becomes part of the Roman provinces. Hyrcanus II and his brother Aristobulus II, rival claimants for the Hasmonaean throne of Judaea, bring their claims before Pompey. Pompey supports the claim of Hyrcanus, but makes Palestine into a Roman province, appointing Hyrcanus as high priest of the Jews but the Idumean Antipater as governor of Roman Judaea. 23 September 63 BC Augustus, first emperor of the Roman Empire 27 born as Gaius Octavius (Octavian) (–AD 14).

BC–AD

14,

63 BC The Roman general Pompey the Great marches on Jerusalem, where followers of the rival claimant Aristobulus II have refused to submit to Hyrcanus II as high priest and are resisting him on the temple hill. After a three-month siege by Pompey they capitulate. Hyrcanus is recognized as high priest and ruler but not as king of Judaea. 63 BC While the Roman orator and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero is consul in Rome he exposes Catiline's conspiracy to obtain power to the Senate, who grant him authority to protect the state. Cicero orders the arrest of the conspirators, who are executed. Cicero's fellow consul is the Roman statesman and general Mark Antony's uncle, C Antonius Hybrida; Marcus Porcius Cato the Younger is tribune (magistrate) of the plebeians and supports Cicero in this role. 60 BC Roman politician Julius Caesar returns from a successful campaign in Further Spain but is refused dispensation by the Senate either to hold a triumph (victory procession) or to run for consulship. Caesar and the Roman military commanders Pompey the Great and Marcus Crassus form the First Triumvirate, a political alliance to acquire and divide power by mutual cooperation. c. 60 BC Druidism, the religion of the Celtic people, flourishes in Britain and Gaul, while Mithraism, the mystery religion based on the worship of the Persian god of light Mithras, begins to permeate the Roman legions, spreading from Persia via Asia Minor. c. 60

BC

Latin poet Gaius (Valerius Maximianus) Catullus writes his Love Poems to

Lesbia, possibly to Clodia, sister of the Roman politician Publius Clodius Pulcher. c. 60 BC The Roman poet Lucretius describes how the sequential display of images can produce the illusion of motion. 58 BC Latin poet Lucretius publishes De rerum natura/On the Nature of Things, a Latin epic based on the doctrines of the Greek philosopher Epicurus. 58 BC The Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar begins his campaign to subdue Ariovistus, leader of the Germanic Suevi in northern Gaul, advancing through the Belfort Gap. Ariovistus, with a Teutonic army said to be 120,000 strong and stationed between the Vosges mountain range and the River Rhine, is defeated in a battle near modern Colmar. The Germans move back to the Rhine, and Ariovistus dies soon afterwards. 58 BC The tribe of the Helvetii from Switzerland begins to migrate west into Gaul (France) under their leader, Orgetorix, but is checked by the Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar, in alliance with the Gallic tribe of the Aedui, at the Battle of Bibracte (near Autun, France). This victory brings several requests for friendship and help from the tribes of central Gaul against Ariovistus, the leader of the Suevi, a Germanic people who have crossed the River Rhine and settled in northern Gaul, threatening the Gallic tribes in the area. 56 BC The Breton tribe of the Veneti revolt in Gaul during the absence of the Roman proconsul Julius Caesar, and several other tribes are restless. Caesar sends lieutenants to deal with the Aquitani in the southwest, to watch the Belgae and Germans in the north, and to Normandy, while he moves against the Veneti, defeating them in a naval battle in Quiberon Bay. He takes savage deterrent action against them, executing their councillors and selling the population into slavery. 9 September 55 BC The Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar sails for Britain with two legions. He is content to do no more than show his superiority in arms, but it is received with popular acclaim in Rome. He lands, despite opposition, probably near modern Walmer, Kent. The Britons return the Roman ambassador Commius but sue for peace. However, when a high tide destroys some of Caesar's ships, they renew the fighting and Caesar, having made his point, recrosses the English Channel. 55 BC Roman orator and writer Marcus Tullius Cicero wishes to retire from public life to concentrate on literary pursuits, publishing his De oratore/The Orator this year and finishing De republica/On the Republic in the following year. However, in 51 BC he is appointed governor of Cilicia, in Asia Minor, and goes reluctantly. 54 BC The Roman proconsul Julius Caesar returns to Britain with five legions and Gallic cavalry. He marches inland and receives the submission of the Trinovantes in Essex. He then defeats the Belgic chiefs under Cassivellaunus, chieftain of the Catuvellauni, in his stronghold near modern Wheathampstead in Hertfordshire. Cassivellaunus sues for peace and Caesar, having shown his strength, returns to

Gaul where, in his absence, the Gauls have revolted and the Roman army has suffered a reverse near Liège. c. 54 BC Gaius (Valerius Maximianus) Catullus, outstanding Roman lyric poet, dies in Rome (c. 30). 6 June 53 BC The Roman general and statesman Marcus Crassus rashly penetrates into the Mesopotamian desert, which results in the defeat of his army by the Parthians (led by their Arsacian king, Orodes II) at the Battle of Carrhae. 52 BC The Gauls unite in revolt under a young Celtic prince, Vercingetorix, of the tribe of the Arverni. The Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar defeats Vercingetorix and forces him into the hill town of Alesia, which he besieges. Caesar then defeats the Gallic relief force, perhaps a quarter of a million strong, and Vercingetorix surrenders and is taken captive. The battle and siege of Alesia are Caesar's greatest military success in Gaul. 52 BC The Roman general Julius Caesar writes his De bello gallico/The Gallic War with the intention of winning popular support for himself by publicizing his actions in Gaul. 50 BC A frieze is painted in what becomes known as the 'Villa of Mysteries' in Pompeii, depicting the Dionysiac Mysteries, the rites associated with the worship of Dionysus, Greek god of wine. 50 BC There is much manoeuvring for power in Rome between the Senate, with Pompey the Great as consul, and the supporters of the proconsul Julius Caesar. Mark Antony as tribune (magistrate) acts on Caesar's behalf, but there are arguments over the consulship Caesar was promised at the end of his Gallic command and the demand that he should disband his army. Caesar is declared an enemy of the people by the Senate. c. 50 BC The Laocoön group is created by three sculptors in Rhodes. It depicts the Trojan priest Laocoön and his sons being devoured by serpents. Rediscovered in 1516, it is now in the Vatican, Rome, Italy. 49 BC Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar marches through Italy to confront Pompey the Great. However, Pompey crosses to Greece where he has armies and great support. In Numidia, north Africa, King Juba I gains a victory over Caesar's forces on Pompey's behalf. Caesar's general, Labienus, defects to Pompey. Caesar crosses to Spain and defeats Pompey's forces there. 28 September 48 BC The Roman general Pompey the Great is assassinated in Egypt by King Ptolemy XIII of Egypt's troops when he lands at Pelusium, Egypt (57). 47 BC Roman dictator Julius Caesar settles affairs in Egypt, restoring Cleopatra VII to her throne and defeating her brother, Ptolemy XIII.

47 BC Roman dictator Julius Caesar marches rapidly through Syria and Asia Minor and defeats King Pharnaces of Pontus at the Battle of Zela, where he boasts: Veni, vidi, vici! ('I came, I saw, I conquered'). 46 BC Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar returns to Rome and is made consul and dictator for ten years. He is also given a new office, Prefect of Morals, equivalent to the office of Censo but with vastly extended powers. He declares an amnesty for those who have borne arms against him. The defeated Celtic prince Vercingetorix graces Caesar's four-day triumph (victory procession) and is then put to death. Caesar gives cash bounties to his troops and money to all the poorest citizens of Rome. Marcus Lepidus is consul with Caesar. 46 BC The Roman consul and dictator Julius Caesar instructs Alexandrian astronomer Sosigenes to bring the Roman Republican calendar into line with the solar year. He creates the Julian calendar in which the year is 365 1/4 days long and begins 1 January. An extra day is inserted between 23 and 24 February every four years. The year 46 BC is 445 days long to bring it into line with the solar year. 46 BC The Roman statesman and general Julius Caesar overwhelmingly defeats the Pompeian forces at the Battle of Thapsus in Carthaginia, north Africa. Titus Labienus, the only officer of the Gallic Wars to have deserted Caesar for Roman general and statesman Pompey the Great, and Pompey's son Sextus Pompeius flee to Spain, where Gnaeus Pompeius, another of Pompey's sons, has established himself. The Roman tribune (magistrate) Marcus Porcius Cato the Younger and King Juba I of Numidia commit suicide, and Numidia becomes a Roman province. 45 BC Roman dictator and consul Julius Caesar increases the Senate to 900 and widens its recruitment. He reduces the free corn ration but encourages colonization for Roman citizens, especially in Africa, Spain, and the East. He also settles many of his veterans in colonies, mainly in Gallia Narbonensis, Sicily, and Africa. He begins the rebuilding and repopulation of both Carthage and Corinth. He issues sumptuary laws against luxury, appoints a commission to simplify the laws, and begins the task of putting Rome's finances in order. On 1 January he also introduces the Julian calendar, which has become the calendar of the Western world. 45 BC The Roman consul and dictator Julius Caesar is forced to fight one last battle against the Pompeians to end the civil war. He returns to Spain, where he finally defeats Pompey the Great's sons and the turncoat general Titus Labienus at the hard-fought Battle of Munda (between Seville and Málaga), although Sextus Pompeius escapes. Caesar severely punishes the Spanish districts that supported the Pompeians, and makes some preliminary plans for the colonies he intends to establish there, then returns to Rome. 15 March 44 BC A conspiracy of 60 Roman senators, led by Gaius Cassius Longinus and Marcus Junius Brutus, culminates in the assassination of (Gaius) Julius Caesar, Roman general, dictator, statesman, and conqueror of Transalpine Gaul, in the Senate House in Rome on the Ides of March (c. 56).

44 BC Roman dictator Julius Caesar's great-nephew, Octavian, returns to Rome from Illyria, learns of his adoption into the Gens Julia, and claims the right to succeed his adoptive father, Julius Caesar, because of their common ancestry. Rivalry over the succession breaks out between him and the triumvir Mark Antony, as well as other minor contenders. 20 March 43 BC Ovid, Roman poet known for his poem 'Ars amatoria'/'Art of Love', born in Sulmo, Roman Empire (–AD 18). 7 December 43 BC Marcus Tullius Cicero, Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, orator, author of De republica/On the Republic, having inflamed the Senate against the Roman consul Mark Antony by his brilliant series of speeches The Philippics (in which he accuses Antony of aiming at dictatorship), is executed at the order of the Second Triumvirate, in Formia, Italy (c. 63). 43 BC Roman consul Mark Antony gets a law passed allotting him the provinces of Cisalpine and Transalpine Gaul for five years instead of Macedonia, when his consulship ends. He moves to take up command, but the senator to whom they had originally been allotted, Decimus Junius Brutus, refuses to evacuate the area, and Mark Antony besieges him in Mutina, northern Italy. 43 BC The newly-appointed Triumvirate (power-sharing alliance between the Roman leaders Octavian, Mark Antony, and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus) divide the Roman world between them: Africa, Sicily, and Sardinia to Octavian; the East and Cisalpine and Transalpine Gaul go to Mark Antony; and Spain and the remainder of Gaul go to Lepidus. Lepidus is to be consul in 42 BC while Antony and Octavian go east to attack the armies led by Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus. 43 BC With the support of the Senate (persuaded by the orator and politician Marcus Tullius Cicero that Mark Antony is aiming at dictatorship), Octavian and the consuls march to defeat Mark Antony, and lift the siege of Mutina in northern Italy. A reconciliation is achieved, and Octavian, Mark Antony, and Marcus Lepidus meet at Bononia (modern Bologna). Between the three of them they have more than 33 legions at their command. They form the Second Triumvirate and agree to divide power between them. Octavian becomes consul for 42 BC. 16 November 42

BC

Tiberius, second Roman emperor

AD

14–37, born (–AD 37).

42 BC At the Battle of Philippi in Macedonia, the Roman consul and heir to Julius Caesar, Octavian, and Mark Antony defeat Gaius Cassius Longinus and Marcus Junius Brutus, who have gone to the East to raise armies against Antony and the supporters of the former dictator Julius Caesar. Cassius and Brutus both kill themselves. 10 October 40 BC The Pact of Brundisium is arranged by the Roman triumvir Octavian's friend Maecenas, reconciling the three members of the Second Triumvirate and slightly rearranging their territories and commands of troops. Transalpine Gaul is removed from Mark Antony and given to Octavian. Marcus

Aemilius Lepidus remains with Africa. Octavian gives his sister Octavia in marriage to Mark Antony to help cement the alliance again. 39 BC The Treaty of Misenum is signed between the Roman triumvirs Mark Antony and Octavian and Sextus Pompeius, the son of the soldier and politician Pompey the Great. Pompeius has held possession of Sicily and Sardinia since the death of the Roman dictator Julius Caesar, constantly interrupting Rome's vital corn supply. It is agreed that Pompeius will be given a proconsular command for five years in Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia, and Achaea. Octavian soon breaks the treaty, accepting Sardinia from a treacherous governor. c. 39

BC

The Roman poet Virgil writes his pastoral poems, the Eclogues.

37 BC The Roman triumvir Mark Antony sends two legions under C. Sosius to install Herod, son of Antipater, the former governor of Judaea, on the throne of Jerusalem in Judaea. After the city is captured the reign of Herod the Great begins. He had previously married a member of the Hasmonaean royal family to support his claim to the throne, but had had her grandfather and brother put to death. With Herod's accession to the throne, Judaea is no longer a Roman province, but a client kingdom of Rome. 36 BC–31 BC Roman triumvir Octavian cements his power: in 36 BC he is granted the traditional tribunician rights of sacrosanctity as a mark of honour; in 32 BC he makes his adherents and troops swear an oath of personal loyalty; and in 31 BC he is granted the first of nine successive consulships. c. 35 BC King Menes, first king of Egypt c. 3100–c. 3040 BC, who united Upper and Lower Egypt into a single kingdom, founding the 1st dynasty, dies in Egypt. According to Manetho, a 3rd-century BC Egyptian historian, he is killed by a hippopotamus. 34 BC Roman triumvir Mark Antony lapses into the life of an Eastern potentate with Queen Cleopatra of Egypt, his wife since 37 BC, when he celebrates his triumph over the Armenian king Artavasdes in the style of Alexandria. In an episode known as the Donations of Alexandria, Mark Antony stages a pageant at which he and Cleopatra, dressed as the Egyptian gods Osiris and Isis, sit on golden thrones together with their children and Cleopatra's son Caesarion whom they declare to be the legitimate son of the Roman dictator Julius Caesar. They proclaim him king of kings, joint ruler of Egypt and Cyprus along with Cleopatra. Antony and Cleopatra's children are also named as future rulers of parts of the empire yet to be conquered. The declaration enrages the Roman triumvir Octavian, for he sees it as transferring Roman property into Greek hands. 34 BC The Roman triumvir Mark Antony invades Armenia and carries its king Artavasdes, whom he blames for his defeat by the Parthians in 36 BC, captive to Alexandria, Egypt. 32 BC The two Roman consuls and some senators defect to the Roman triumvir Mark Antony, and the triumvir Octavian formally terminates Antony's command in

the East and declares war on him. 2 September 31 BC The Roman leader Octavian's fleet of 400 ships under the general Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa blockade the Roman general Mark Antony's Egyptian fleet at Actium in western Greece. In the ensuing Battle of Actium Agrippa defeats Antony and his wife Queen Cleopatra of Egypt and they flee back to Alexandria, Egypt. Octavian follows them and Antony's troops desert him. 30 August 30 BC Cleopatra VII, queen of Egypt 51–30 BC, lover and ally of Mark Antony, commits suicide in Alexandria, Egypt (c. 39). 30 August 30 BC Mark Antony, Roman general under Julius Caesar and later triumvir 43–32 BC, ally and husband of Cleopatra VII, queen of Egypt, commits suicide in Alexandria, Egypt (53). 30 August 30 BC The joint suicide of Cleopatra VII of Egypt and the Roman triumvir Mark Anthony, following their defeat by the triumvir Octavian at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, brings to an end the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt. Egypt is subsequently annexed by Rome. 30 BC King Herod the Great does much for Judaea on a material level, developing its economy, re-fortifying Jerusalem and beginning the rebuilding of the temple there. By behaving as a Hellenistic monarch, however, he gains the hatred of the Jews and despite restricting his taste for grandeur he has to keep control by force. 29 BC The Roman historian Livy begins his huge history of Rome Abe urbe condita/ From the Founding of the City. He continues to work on this throughout the reign of the emperor Augustus. Of an original 142 books only 35 survive to modern times. 16 January 27 BC The Roman Senate, in gratitude, bestows on the Roman consul Octavian the name of Augustus. Augustus remains Imperator ('emperor', or head of the army), and invents for himself the new title of Princeps ('first citizen'). His authority as an elder statesman gradually hardens into imperial power. The Senate also gives him provincial imperium for ten years over a large province consisting of Spain, Gaul, Syria, and Egypt. The other provinces are given back to the Senate for administration. 27 BC Roman architect Marcus Vitruvius Pollio writes De architectura/On Architecture, a treatise on architecture divided into 10 books dealing with city planning, building materials, and architecture in general. He also emphasizes that architects should have a good knowledge of drawing and discusses the procedures and practices to be followed in making drawings, thus writing the first textbook on engineering drafting. 27 BC Roman general and engineer Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa builds the Pantheon (temple dedicated to all the gods) in Rome to commemorate the victory over the Roman general Mark Antony at Actium by the Roman emperor Octavian (now

Augustus). 26 BC–19 BC Spain suffers a period of bitter warfare as the Cantabrians prove themselves brave and fierce enemies of Rome. The Roman emperor Augustus travels to Spain from Gaul and begins the difficult task of pacification, which is later finished by his general Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa. 23 BC Roman emperor Augustus gives up the consulship, which he has held annually since 31 BC. Instead, the Senate gives him a special power over all provincial governors, and the powers of the tribunate, which together give him effective power over all aspects of government. 23

BC

Roman poet Horace publishes the first three books of his Odes.

20 BC The Roman emperor Augustus orders his stepson Tiberius to advance through Armenia and to meet him on the borders of Parthia. King Phraates IV of Parthia decides not to fight the Romans and negotiates instead. Augustus secures the recovery from the Parthians of the Roman standards lost at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BC and those prisoners still alive. In Armenia, King Artaxes is murdered and Tiberius crowns Tigranes as a Roman client king. 21 September 19 BC Virgil, Roman poet, dies in Brundisium, Italy (50), leaving his Aeneid unfinished. It is published posthumously. 19 BC Roman emperor Augustus returns to Rome and the day is made an annual holiday. The Roman general Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa completes the war of pacification in Spain. 16 BC Tiberius, the son of Livia and stepson of the Roman emperor Augustus, is made praetor, and his brother Drusus, quaestor, and their period of responsible and successful military command begins. Augustus leaves Rome again to quell trouble on the northern frontiers of the empire. 13 BC Roman emperor Augustus returns to Rome after three years of campaigning in the northern parts of the Empire. He refuses to accept any other honour than the building of an Altar of Peace from the Senate, although they press him to allow them to grant him further honours. His imperium is again extended for five years. 12 BC Tiberius, the stepson of the Roman emperor Augustus successfully continues the Danubian War after the death of the co-regent, Marcus Agrippa. Tiberius' brother, Drusus, warring against the German tribes, advances to the River Elbe. 9 BC Nero Claudius Drusus Germanicus, the younger stepson of the Roman emperor Augustus, successfully draws his German campaigns towards completion. Shortly before his death, Drusus and his brother Tiberius are at last allowed by Augustus to adopt the military title of Imperator.

9 BC Under its king Aretas IV, who comes to the throne this year, the kingdom of Nabataean Arabia reaches a peak of wealth and culture and prospers until the Roman emperor Trajan makes it a Roman province in the 2nd century AD. Its capital, Petra, on the caravan route from Aqaba to Gaza, is a Hellenistic city though its written language is a form of Aramaic. 27 November 8 BC Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus), celebrated Roman lyric poet and satirist, dies (56). 7

BC

The population of the world is around 250 million.

6 BC Tiberius, the stepson of the Roman emperor Augustus, having successfully continued the German campaign started by his brother, Drusus, and twice held the consulship the previous year, is finally made a colleague of the ageing Augustus with the grant of tribunician powers. However, he feels that Augustus' grandsons (and adopted sons), Gaius and Lucius Caesar, are being favoured over him, and retires to Rhodes where he is to remain for seven years. March 4 BC Herod the Great, king of Judaea under the Romans 37–4 Jericho, Judaea (c. 69).

BC,

dies in

4 BC A Roman legion keeps order in Jerusalem in Judaea, and the policy of the Roman emperor Augustus of weakening the kingdom of Herod the Great is continued. The kingdom is divided between Herod's three surviving sons; Herod Antipas succeeds to the tetrarchy of Galilee and Peraea, which he holds until AD 39; Archelaus gets Judaea and Idumaea; and Philip receives the outlying parts in the northeast, which he rules for 37 years. 4 BC Jesus Christ, Jewish religious teacher, probably born this year, although 6 is another possible date (–AD 30).

BC

4 BC King Herod the Great of Judaea massacres Pharisees who have attempted to pull down the Roman eagle from the temple in Jerusalem and may also have instituted the biblical 'massacre of the innocents'. Shortly before Herod's death in March, his eldest son, Antipas, is executed. 4 BC Seneca, Roman philosopher, orator, tragedian, and virtual ruler of Rome 54–62, born in Córdoba, Spain (–AD 65). 3 Paul the Apostle, who spread Christianity through his journeys and letters, born in Tarsus, Cilicia, Roman Asia Minor (–c.AD 65). 4 The Roman general Tiberius, stepson, son-in-law, and heir to the emperor Augustus, resumes his military career, winning victories in Germany. 7–12 Germanicus, nephew and adopted son of Tiberius, heir to the Roman Empire, conducts campaigns under his uncle in Illyricum and Germany.

9 German forces under Arminius, chief of the Cherusci people, ambush three Roman legions (17th, 18th, and 19th) under Quintilius Varus in the Teutoburger Forest. The legions are wiped out and Varus commits suicide. 9 The Roman law Lex Papia Poppaea completes the Leges Juliae/Julian Laws, imposing penalties for celibacy and childlessness in an effort to increase the Roman population. 10 The Temple of Jupiter is the first of the magnificent Roman buildings to be constructed at Heliopolis (Baalbek), in Roman Syria (modern Lebanon). c. 13 The Portland Vase (probably made in Greece for a Roman and now in the British Museum, London, England) dates from this time. Made of opaque glass, it is a small amphora on which there are carved cameos depicting mythological scenes. It is one of the very finest pieces of Roman glass. 19 August 14 Augustus, first emperor of the Roman Empire 27 Nola, near Naples, Italy (75).

BC–AD

14, dies in

17 September 14 Tiberius formally succeeds his adoptive father Augustus as Roman emperor. 14 After his death, the Roman emperor Augustus (Caesar Octavius) is deified and granted a temple and priests. 14 The Roman emperor Tiberius, continuing Augustus' policy of cooperation with the Senate, makes the Senate the sole electoral body, leaving the people without any direct voice. 17 Germanicus, adopted son and heir of the Roman emperor Tiberius, is given special powers over all the governors of the eastern Roman provinces and installs Artaxias as sovereign of Armenia. Tiberius appoints Gnaeus Piso governor of Syria as a counterbalance to Germanicus. 17 Ovid, Roman poet known for his poem 'Ars amatoria'/'Art of Love', dies in Tomis, Moesia (60). 17 The Roman emperor Tiberius recalls his nephew and heir Germanicus from the wars in Germany. There is no serious trouble from Germany for the next 50 years. 18–27 Peasant revolts break out in China and civil war begins. The usurping emperor Wang Mang is defeated in 22, but the civil wars continue. 19 As part of the campaign in support of traditional Roman religious practices, the emperor Tiberius has an image of Isis, an Egyptian deity with a growing cult in the Roman world, thrown into the River Tiber. The cult's priests are crucified.

c. 19–c. 45 Gondopharnes becomes king of the Sakas in India. Under him, the Sakas reach the height of their power. 20 Gnaeus Piso, governor of Syria, returns to Rome where his alleged poisoning of Germanicus, adopted son and heir of the Roman emperor Tiberius, is investigated by the Senate; he commits suicide before a verdict is reached. Germanicus' widow, Agrippina, suspects Tiberius of having engineered her husband's death. 23 Pliny the Elder, prolific Roman writer, author of Historia naturalis/Natural History, born in Como, Italy (–AD 79). 25 In China's civil war, one of the Han claimants to the throne is proclaimed Emperor Guang Wudi, founding the later Han Dynasty. He finally brings an end to the peasant revolts in 27. 27 The Jewish prophet John the Baptist is put to death by Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee and son of Herod the Great. The Jewish historian Josephus attributes his death to Herod's fear of a political rebellion. 27 The Jewish religious teacher Jesus Christ begins his mission, in Roman Palestine. 27 The Roman emperor Tiberius retires to Capri, where he spends the last decade of his life. He is saved from a landslide by Sejanus, commander of the Praetorian Guard. Sejanus becomes all-powerful. 17 March 30 Jesus Christ, Jewish religious teacher, probably crucified for sedition at this time, at Golgotha, Judea (c. 35). 30 This is the most probable year of the death of the Jewish religious teacher Jesus Christ. On the 14th day of the Jewish month of Nisan, almost certainly in this year, Christ eats the Passover meal with his disciples in Jerusalem, Judea, where he is betrayed by Judas Iscariot and taken to the house of Caiaphas, the High Priest. The next day he is taken before the Roman procurator of Judea, Pontius Pilate, and is crucified for sedition, at Golgotha. c. 30–c. 50 The Kushans in India are united under King Kadphasis I, and begin to challenge the power of the Sakas, gaining control of the region around modern Kabul, Afghanistan. 31 Sejanus, commander of the Roman Praetorian Guard, is brought before the Senate, accused of plotting to overthrow the emperor Tiberius, and is executed. 33 On the road to 'Damascus' (almost certainly not Damascus, Syria) to persecute the followers of Jesus Christ, Saul of Tarsus has an intense religious experience and is converted to Christianity. He is later known as the apostle Paul.

16 March 37 Tiberius, second Roman emperor 14–37, dies in Capri, Italy (78). 15 December 37 Nero, Roman emperor 54–68, born in Antium (modern Anzio), in Latium, Italy (–68). 37 Following the death of the Roman emperor Tiberius, he is succeeded by Gaius Caesar, the son of Tiberius's nephew Germanicus. Gaius Caesar is popularly known by his original name, Caligula. c. 37 The Latin writer and statesman Lucius Annaeus Seneca begins work on a series of essays expounding Stoic philosophy. Among the better known are 'De otio'/'On Leisure' and 'Ad Marciam de consolatione'/'The Consolation of Marcia'. 40 The emperor Caligula exhausts the Roman treasury by his personal extravagance. c. 40 The philosopher Philo Judaeus of Alexandria writes works that seek to reconcile the Jewish scriptures and Greek philosophy. His arguments – for example, that the Logos (the word) of Greek thought is identical with divine reason – have a profound influence on the development of Christian theology. 25 January 41 Having murdered the Roman emperor Caligula (Gaius Caesar), the soldiers of the Praetorian Guard proclaim Caligula's uncle, Claudius, emperor. 46 Plutarch, Latin essayist and biographer whose work had a major influence on the development of the essay, biography, and historical writing in Europe between the 16th and 19th centuries, born in Chaeronea, Boeotia, in Roman Greece (–c.AD 120). c. 47 The Christian apostle Paul undertakes his first missionary journeys, accompanied by Barnabas and Mark. He visits Cyprus and Asia Minor. Their followers begin to be called 'Christians'. 48 Chinese emperor Guang Wudi reconquers Inner Mongolia, which revolted during the civil wars of 18–25. c. 50–c. 78 Kadphises II becomes king of the Kushans. In the west, he siezes the modern Punjab area from the Sakas, and in the east the Kushans occupy the area of Magadha as far as the city of Benares. 51 The British chieftain Caractacus is finally defeated by Roman forces in the northwest of what is now Wales, and is handed over to the Roman authorities. 14 October 54 Nero, 16-year-old stepson and heir of the emperor Claudius, is proclaimed Roman emperor by the Praetorian Guard, at the instigation of his mother Agrippina the Younger, Claudius's widow. 58–60 The Roman general Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo drives the Parthians out of

Armenia, burning the Armenian capital Artaxata and establishing the former Cappadocian prince Tigranes as Rome's client ruler. 59 The Roman emperor Nero boasts of his skill on the lyre – probably quite genuine – a clear indication that by now the Romans have overcome their earlier rugged disapproval of Greek music and dancing. c. 60 Greek engineer Hero of Alexandria, in his Pneumatica/Pneumatics, describes a primitive steam turbine that he calls an aeolipile; it is the first known device to use steam to produce rotary motion. c. 60 Juvenal (Decimus Junius Juvenalis), Roman satirical poet, author of 16 'Satires', born in Aquinum, Roman Italy (–c. 140). 61 Boudicca (Boadicea), Queen of the Iceni of East Anglia, leads a major rebellion against Roman rule. Her people destroy the Roman settlements at Camulodunum (Colchester), Verulamium (St Albans), and Londinium (London). Boudicca commits suicide after her forces are defeated by Suetonius Paulinus, the governor of Britain. His forces defeat and massacre the British tribes of what is now Wales at Mona (modern Anglesey). 65 After the great fire of Rome in 64, the emperor Nero starts to build a less congested, nobler, and more handsome city. He also starts to build his extravagant 'Golden House', a vast palace complex. 65 The Latin poet Lucan (Marcus Annaeus Lucanus) and his uncle Seneca the Younger, Roman orator, philosopher, poet, dramatist, and political adviser to Nero, die (26 and c. 68). They were implicated in a plot against Nero and were forced to commit suicide. Lucan leaves an epic poem, De Bello Civili/Civil War, sometimes known as the Pharsalia. Seneca, who virtually ruled Rome (54–62) leaves his Letters, a collection of tragedies, and many works on Stoic philosophy and ethics. c. 65 Paul the Apostle, who spread Christianity through his journeys and letters, is executed in Rome (c. 62). 66 A major revolt breaks out in Judea, Palestine, against the Roman procurator Gessius Florus. A vicious war between Jews and Gentiles follows. Jewish extremists seize the Masada, the strongest of Herod the Great's fortresses. 67 Roman emperor Nero creates a spectacle by taking part in the Greek games. He is allowed to win 1,808 prizes, but his antics and dubious victories are not officially recorded. 67 The Roman soldier Vespasian is sent to restore order to Judea, Palestine. The siege and fall of Jotopata in Galilee follows, at which the Jewish general Joseph ben Matthias (later the historian Josephus) surrenders to Vespasian. 9 June 68 Nero, Roman emperor 54–68, hearing that provincial governors have

risen against him, commits suicide just outside Rome (31). 68–69 Anarchy breaks out in Rome after the death of the emperor Nero, with Galba, Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian each claiming the throne during the socalled 'year of four emperors'. 70 During the siege of Jerusalem, the Romans allow the Jewish religious leader Johanan ben Zakkai to leave and later to establish a school at Jamnia (Jabneh). His teaching there will be profoundly important in securing the continuity of Judaism. 70 Jerusalem is captured and sacked by Titus, elder son of the Roman emperor Vespasian, after a siege lasting 139 days. The Temple is burnt down. 15 April 73 Herod the Great's fortress of Masada in Judea, Palestine, occupied by Jewish extremists, is taken by the Romans under Flavius Silva after a two-year siege. 73 The Romans destroy the community at Qumran near the Dead Sea. The inhabitants leave behind the Dead Sea Scrolls hidden in nearby caves. The inhabitants of Qumran are either the Essenes or a similar ascetic sect. This Roman destruction, at about the same time as the destruction of Masada, sees the end of all the Jewish ascetic sects that had flourished since the time of the Maccabees in the 2nd century BC. 75 The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (Joseph ben Matthias) publishes his Bello Judaico/History of the Jewish War, in Rome. Originally written in Aramaic for a Jewish readership, it gives vivid accounts of the sieges of Jotopata (where he was captured), Jerusalem, and the Masada. Spared by the Roman commander Vespasian, he settles in Rome, where he is given a house and a pension. 76 Hadrian, Roman emperor 117–138, adopted as his heir by the emperor Trajan, born in Rome (–138). 77 Iulius Agricola is made Roman governor of Britain. He completes the conquest of what is now Wales and consolidates the subjugation of the Brigantes. 24 August 79 Mount Vesuvius, in southern Italy, erupts, accompanied by violent earthquakes; Herculaneum, Pompeii, and Stabiae are buried in ash and their citizens are overcome by poisonous gases. 24 August 79 Pliny the Elder, Roman writer on natural history and other subjects, is killed in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, near Stabiae, in Italy (56). c. 80 An epigram of the Roman poet Martial shows that false teeth are used in Rome. 13 September 81 Domitian becomes Roman emperor on the death of his

brother, Titus. 81–91 The Chinese general Ban Chao drives the Xiongnu nomads, who have been attacking China, out of the entire Tarim Basin (modern Sinkiang) in Central Asia. He is made protector general of the western regions. 83 The first compass is described in a Chinese book, the Louen Heng/Discourses Weighed in the Balance. It consists of a spoon-shaped piece of magnetite which spins on a bronze plate, the handle of the spoon pointing north. It is derived from a divining board – where objects are scattered on a platter and the direction of their pointing is found significant – and is not likely to have been used for navigation. 84 Julius Agricola, the Roman governor of Britain, wins the battle of Mons Graupius (probably modern Bennachie) against the Picts and considers that he has conquered Hibernia (modern Scotland). 85 Julius Agricola, the Roman governor of Britain, is recalled. The Roman occupation of Hibernia (modern Scotland), at least as far north as modern Perthshire, endures for about 15 years. 86 The Dacians, from the area of modern Romania, cross the River Danube into the Roman province of Moesia under their king, Decebalus, defeating the Roman legate there. 86 The Latin poet Martial begins publishing his books of epigrams: witty, satirical observations on Roman life and society. The last book will be published around AD 100. He survives in Rome by flattering his patrons and friends and vilifying their enemies. 89 The Roman governor of Upper Germany, Antonius Saturninus, persuades two legions in Mainz to declare him emperor. Emperor Domitian patches up a peace with the Dacian king Decebalus to save Rome from invasion. 92–102 The Chinese general Ban Chao extends his conquests in Central Asia across the Pamir Mountains to the Caspian Sea. 98 The Roman historian Publius Cornelius Tacitus publishes two of his finest works. Germania describes the Germanic tribes on the Roman frontier on the River Rhine, and records that the social customs revere women and encourage them to participate in politics and warfare. De vita et moribus Julii Agricolae/ The Life and Death of Agricola (usually known simply as Agricola) is a biography of the statesman Julius Agricola, his father-in-law. 98 Trajan arrives in Rome to take up his emperorship, entering the city humbly on foot. 100 Indian metallurgists invent cast steel. The proportion of carbon within the steel is tightly controlled at less than 1.7% of the total.

c. 100 Boys in Rome are preferred over girls, who are often left in the open to die or abandoned. Some orphaned girls are raised by brothel owners to be prostitutes. c. 100 Chinese agriculturalists use powdered chrysanthemum flowers as an insecticide – the flowers contain the natural insecticide pyrethrum. c. 100 Girls are educated in Rome from age seven to fourteen, studying grammar, Greek and Latin, music, astronomy, history, mythology, philosophy, and dancing. c. 100 Parchment scrolls begin to be replaced by notebooks (collections of pages, written on both sides and sewn together down the middle), in the Roman Empire. c. 100 Women in Greece are allowed to participate in public athletic contests such as foot and chariot races. c. 100–c. 200 Great building projects are carried out in the pre-Toltec city of Teotihuacán in the Mexican Basin. A great central avenue is laid out, now known as the Street of the Dead. The Temple of the Sun is also completed, dominating the Street of the Dead; at 65 m/216 ft, it is the highest pyramid in Mexico. Another slightly smaller pyramid, to the Moon, is also constructed. Twenty further temples line the avenue. 101–102 King Decebalus of Dacia has strengthened his standing and is implacably anti-Roman. The Roman emperor Trajan invades Dacia with ten legions and, after a difficult campaign, forces Decebalus to surrender. The defeated chieftain is allowed to remain on the throne as a client king. 104–106 King Decebalus of Dacia revolts again, overwhelming the Roman garrisons left north of the River Danube and raiding the Roman province of Moesia across the Danube. 105 The Roman emperor Trajan invades Dacia again, with 13 legions. During this war, he wins the confidence of his legionaries – one story tells how during the battle he tears up his own cloak to help bandage the wounded. 106 Dacia (roughly equivalent to modern Romania) becomes a Roman province. Thousands of Dacians are transported to the southern side of the River Danube, while Dacia is colonized and developed by the Romans after the Roman emperor Trajan has carried off much booty. Trajan recognizes the strategic value of Dacia in any further clash with the German tribes. 106 On the death of King Dabel of Arabia Petraea, the last buffer state between Syria and Parthia, comprising the Sinai Peninsula and the Negev Desert and commanding the trade routes to the East, the area is added to the Roman Empire

in a campaign led by A Cornelius Palma, the Roman governor of Syria. 109 Roman satirist Juvenal's first of five books of Satires appears about this time. Each 'Satire' attacks a different aspect of what Juvenal saw as the moral degeneracy of Roman society under Domitian. 114–116 The Roman emperor Trajan mounts a campaign of spectacular conquest. He takes Ctesiphon, the Parthian capital, gaining much booty, and reaches the Gulf. Looking toward India, he regrets that he is too old to emulate Alexander the Great and make further conquests there. 117 Trajan, Roman emperor 98–117, who expanded the Roman Empire eastward to include Dacia, Armenia, Arabia, and Mesopotamia, and who undertook major public works projects, dies in Selinus, Cilicia, Asia Minor, following a stroke (65). Hadrian, his second cousin and nearest male relative, succeeds to the throne. Hadrian is initially uncertain whether Trajan has nominated him his successor but finds allies in Trajan's widow, Plotina, and the Praetorian prefect, who back his claim to the throne. 118 Hadrian, the new Roman emperor, halts the expansionist policy of his predecessor, Trajan: like the former emperor Augustus, he accepts the River Euphrates as the Roman frontier. This policy is not popular with his generals, nor does he achieve popularity at home, in spite of liberal gestures. Hadrian withdraws the legions from Armenia, Assyria, Mesopotamia, and Parthia, and makes Armenia a client kingdom instead of a province. 118 The Pantheon, a temple dedicated to all the gods, is rebuilt in Rome. A domed structure, probably designed by the emperor Hadrian himself, it is one of the few classical buildings to have survived virtually intact. 118–120 There are serious revolts against the Romans in Britain, with the 9th (Hispana) Roman Legion, stationed at Lindum (modern Lincoln, England), totally disappearing from the records. 120 Rome is the largest city in the world, with an estimated population of more than 1 million. 120 The Roman historian Tacitus refers to the Goths as having moved south from their original home around the Baltic Sea. They are a Germanic people who migrate to Scythia (modern southern Russia) about this time. c. 120 Plutarch, Greek essayist, philosopher, and biographer, whose work had a major influence on the development of the essay, biography, and historical writing in Europe between the 16th and 19th centuries, dies at his home in Chaeronea, Greece (c. 75). c. 120 The Romans begin an extensive programme of road building in England. 123 Roman emperor Hadrian orders the building of a great temple in the town of

Cyzicus on the Sea of Marmara (in modern Turkey). Completed by Marcus Aurelius about 167, it becomes one of the wonders of the world. 126 The Roman emperor Hadrian orders a codification of the Roman law which has grown enormously overcomplicated, with a vast amount of judgement law having been added to the original Twelve Tables of the ancient city of Rome. The codification is undertaken from 126 to 129 by the African jurist Salvius Julianus, grandfather of the future emperor Didius Julianus. Its publication gives a great impetus to legal studies in Rome. 127 Hadrian's Wall, marking the northern boundary of Roman colonization in Britain, is virtually completed. It is 117 km/73 mi long and interspersed with forts: if well manned, it will be almost impregnable. 132 Chinese engineer and philosopher Zhang Heng develops the first known seismometer/seismograph. 135 The Jews under their leader Simeon Bar-Kokhba are finally defeated by the Romans in Judaea, after a rebellion lasting three and a half years and costing over half a million lives. Many Jews are sold into slavery. This is the final destruction of the Jews as a nation in Judaea; they are forbidden to enter Jerusalem, which is renamed Aelia Capitolina. From now on, the Jews of the 'Diaspora', or 'Dispersion', are to take on most significance. Judaea is changed into the new consular province of Syria Palaestrina. 10 July 138 Hadrian, Roman emperor 117–138, dies in Baiae, near Naples (62). He had moved into his villa at Tibur while his vast mausoleum was being built on the banks of the River Tiber in Rome, before retiring to Baiae to see the sea for a last time. 138 Antoninus, member of a rich family from Nîmes in the province of Narbonese Gaul (southern France), succeeds Hadrian as Roman emperor. c. 140 Juvenal (Decimus Junius Juvenalis), Roman satirical poet, author of 16 'Satires', dies, probably in Rome (c. 73). 141 During the reign of Antoninus Pius the Roman Empire enters upon what is generally recognized as its most prosperous, settled, and peaceful period. 149 The writer Lucius Apuleius lectures on philosophy, in Rome. His fame rests on his comic 'novel'The Golden Ass, which recounts the adventures of a sorcerer's apprentice accidentally turned into an ass. 150 The Egyptian astronomer Claudius Ptolemy publishes the work he calls 'The Mathematical Collection' but later known as the Almagest or 'The Greatest', an astronomical encyclopedia in 13 volumes that was to be highly influential for over a millennium.

c. 150 A great building complex known as the Ciudadela is constructed in Teotihuacán in the Mexican Basin, about 1.2 km/ 0.75 mi from the great Pyramid of the Sun. This building is now known as the 'Temple of Quetzalcoatl' after the temple in its midst, and may have been the residence of the rulers of Teotihuacán. 152–153 The Egyptian peasants revolt but are put down by the Romans. Rome's corn supply is cut and widespread unrest breaks out. The Roman emperor Antoninus Pius makes a distribution from his own funds – as he does on eight other occasions during his reign. 156 The Sien-Pei, a Mongol horde who have conquered Mongolia, attack the Liaodong Peninsula in China and continue to make frequent raids over the frontier. 3 March 161 The Roman emperor Antoninus Pius calls his adopted son and heir Marcus Aurelius to his bedside in Lorium, Etruria, Italy, has his golden statue of Fortune transferred to his adopted son's room, and dies. Marcus Aurelius succeeds Antoninus Pius and, remembering Antoninus' wish, has his fellow adopted son and heir, Lucius Verus, made his full colleague. This sets a precedent for later divisions of the imperial maiestas. 162–166 The Parthian War is successfully continued by the Roman general Avidius Cassius, a Syrian by birth. The city of Seleucia and the capital Ctesiphon are taken and despoiled. Cassius is given a triumph (victory procession in Rome), which he shares with the emperor Marcus Aurelius and is made governor of Rome's eastern provinces. 167 The second wave of northern European peoples moves south in the shape of the Germanic Marcomanni, Quadi, and Vandals. They pose a serious threat to the borders of the Roman Empire, and the emperor Marcus Aurelius has to recruit from all classes of the population and bring in help from other Germanic tribes to resist them. He leads the army himself. The Germans cross the River Danube, destroy a Roman garrison of 20,000 troops, and pour south until they besiege the town of Aquileia in northern Italy. 167–170 Plague – probably bubonic – is brought back from the East by Roman troops. Asia Minor, Greece, Gaul, and Egypt are affected as well as Italy. 168–169 With help (duly paid for) from other German tribes and from the Scythians, the Romans eventually beat back the Marcomanni-led German invaders from the town of Aquileia in northern Italy. 169 Germanic tribes again break through northern frontiers of the Roman Empire and invade the provinces from Raetia (modern Switzerland) to Moesia (modern Bulgaria) – the Second Marcomannian War. At the same time, the Moors of north Africa invade Spain, and the Lombards appear on the River Rhine. c. 170 Claudius Ptolemy, Greek scientist, creator of the Ptolemaic astronomical

system which dominated Western science for over 1,000 years, dies, probably in Alexandria, Egypt (c. 78). 171–173 The Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius continues the Second Marcomannian War in Rome's Danubian provinces (Thrace, Moesia, and Dacia) from his base in Upper Pannonia, defeating the Marcomanni in 172. 174 While on various military campaigns, Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius composes his Meditations: philosophical thoughts, influenced by Stoicism, which reflect his disillusionment with the aspirations of mankind and his own sense of duty. 175 A rebellion in Egypt is suppressed by the Roman general Avidius Cassius, who then declares himself emperor. The Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, asserting that he will gladly yield to Cassius if the soldiers wish it, advances eastwards to meet him, but Cassius is to be killed by one of his own centurions. 178–180 The Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, believing that Rome will only be safe with its frontiers extended to the Carpathian Mountains, renews the Marcomannian Wars along the River Danube. By 180 he has cleared the Roman provinces of Germanic invaders and is preparing to advance the frontier. 181 Commodus, the new Roman emperor, returns to Rome and gives himself up to dissipation. He is a skilled huntsman, swordsman, and bowman, and takes part in the gladiatorial shows. He reputedly keeps a harem of some 300 women and an equal number of boys. In the ensuing decade of his reign there is virtually no trouble from the barbarians of the north whom his father, Marcus Aurelius, had fought. Rome is at the apex of its power, but the marks of decay are apparent and in future the initiative will largely be taken by the barbarians. 192 The Chinese general Cao Cao assumes power in China, imprisoning the boyemperor Xiandi. The court eunuchs are destroyed and the 400-year rule of the Han dynasty is now virtually at an end. 192 The Roman emperor Commodus is becoming more paranoid and, as a result, more murderous. To save their own lives, Marcia, one of his concubines who has protected Christians in Rome, and the new head of the Praetorian Guard, Quintus Aemilius Laetus, poison Commodus on the last day of the year. He clings to life but is finished off by his former wrestling companion. 193 Helvius Pertinax, the Roman general, returns to Rome at the start of the year and is chosen emperor. However, he earns the displeasure of the soldiers for instituting much-needed economies and reforms and is murdered by members of the Praetorian Guard. The Praetorian Guard puts the throne up to the highest bidder. The rich Didius Julianus wins but survives only two months. The people of Rome, angered at the death of Pertinax, appeal to the legions in Britain, Syria, and Pannonia. 193 The Roman commander Septimius Severus arrives in Rome, by which time

the Praetorian Guard has put the emperor Didius Julianus to death and the Senate has deified the former emperor Helvius Pertinax. Septimius Severus is declared Roman emperor. One of his first acts is to reorganize and subdue the Praetorian Guard. The Guard is demobilized and replaced with 15,000 legionary soldiers, to give Severus control in Italy while he deals with his rivals. Military service is made compulsory, but forbidden to citizens of Italy, thus giving more power to the provincial legionaries. A large number of the Senate are executed for having declared for Clodius Albinus, the Roman governor in Britain, instead of Severus. Once more, all power is taken from the Senate. The imperial throne becomes virtually a hereditary military monarchy. A Phoenician by birth, Severus has been well educated and has practised law as well as soldiering. Ulpian, a rising jurist, and the emperor's chief adviser, obligingly argues in defence of absolute power. 194 Clodius Albinus in Britain, one of the two rivals to the Roman emperor Septimius Severus is placated with the title of Caesar and promises of the succession. 194 The Roman emperor Septimius Severus marches against his second rival, Pescennius Niger, and defeats him at Issus in Cilicia, Asia Minor. Severus confiscates vast estates from Niger's supporters and punishes rebellious cities. Antioch is deprived of its position as capital of Syria, and Byzantium is destroyed after a siege of two years. 196 The Roman governor in Britain, Clodius Albinus, is named a public enemy following the discovery of treasonable correspondence. He declares himself emperor, leaves Britain with all the troops he can muster, and sets up court at Lugdunum (modern Lyon) in Gaul. Outside the city he meets the army of the Roman emperor Septimius Severus, but is defeated and is to commit suicide. The city of Lugdunum is looted and partially destroyed. 197 Sections of Hadrian's Wall in Britain, denuded of Roman troops and with the Antonine Wall already abandoned, are destroyed by the Lowlanders, the Maeatae, who reach southwards as far as Roman Eboracum (modern York, North Yorkshire). A new governor, Virius Lupus, is sent to Britain and restores order. He begins the considerable task of rebuilding Hadrian's Wall. 197 The Roman emperor Septimius Severus renews his war against the Parthians. Their capital city, Ctesiphon, is again captured and is destroyed. Severus leaves the small state of Osrhoene in Mesopotamia in the hands of a client king, Abgar IX, but he makes the rest of Mesopotamia into a Roman province, with its capital at Nisibis. 200 The Greek astronomer and mathematician Claudius Ptolemy produces many important geometrical results with applications in astronomy. 200 The Japanese state of Yamato is founded, based around the port of Osaka. It soon takes in much of the island of Honshu. The tombs of the first emperors are protected by terracotta figures, as in China. On the other islands indigenous

groups remain independent and follow a traditional way of life, such as the Ainu of Hokkaido. 200 The Japanese warrior empress, Jingu, invades and subdues part of Korea. c. 200 The Indian Buddhist monk Nagarjuna expounds the Madhayamika (Middle Path) of Buddhism. Arguing that all worldly thought is empty (sunya), he advocates a middle way which will lead to a realization of the Buddha nature beyond being and nonbeing. c. 200 The Nok culture of west Africa (modern Nigeria) disappears. From c. 900 BC, the Nok had created a remarkable range of terracotta heads and figures, the earliest surviving sculptures of sub-Saharan Africa. 200–700 The Zapotec site of Monte Albán in Central America is at its peak in this period. It may have had 30,000 or more inhabitants. It is the centre of a complex of public buildings, temples, and dwellings that cover 40 sq km/15 sq mi. 201 By the time of the reign of the Roman emperor Septimius Severus, the Goths, a Germanic tribe who moved from their original homeland around the Baltic Sea in the reign of the emperor Hadrian, have founded an empire on the northern shores of the Black Sea (known as the Cernjachov culture) and around the Danube delta (known as Wielbark cultures). 205 Plotinus, Roman philosopher, founder of the Neo-Platonic school of philosophy, born in Lyco, Egypt (–270). 208–210 The Roman emperor Septimius Severus campaigns in northern Britain. Hadrian's Wall has now been repaired, and he plans to subdue the land to the north of it, ravaging it so severely that a second wall will not be necessary. Roadbuilding and forest-clearing as he goes, Severus reaches beyond modern Aberdeen. The Scottish tribes conduct skilful guerrilla warfare against him. 212 The new Roman co-emperor Caracalla inherits the cruelty of his late father, Septimius Severus, but none of his statesmanship, and has his brother and coemperor, Geta, and many of Geta's supporters murdered. Caracalla prefers hunting and the company of gladiators to imperial business. He is reputed to have had 20,000 of his brother's supporters put to death. 212 The Roman jurist Aemilius Papinian, one of three famous jurists who flourished during the reign of the late emperor Septimius Severus (the other two being Domitius Ulpian and Julius Paulus), refuses to write a legal defence of the co-emperor Caracalla's murder of his brother, Geta, and is beheaded in Rome, in Caracalla's presence. Caracalla quietens the objections of the army to Geta's murder by huge donations. Then, to obtain more tax revenue, he extends Roman citizenship to all free male adults throughout the empire: the Constitutio Antoniniana ('Antonine Constitution'). 213–214 The Roman emperor Caracalla expels some German marauders from

Gaul, then meets the Alemanni, an increasingly powerful collection of German tribes between the upper Danube and the upper Rhine. Caracalla wins a victory over the Alemanni on the banks of the River Main, and gives himself the title 'Germanicus'. It is probably while campaigning in Germany that he takes a liking to the caracalla, a Celtic or German tunic from which he acquires the name by which he is known. 217 Callistus is elected as the 16th pope but is opposed by the theologian Hippolytus who accuses him of laxity and of being a Modalist, one who denies any distinction between the three persons of the Trinity. Hippolytus sets up a breakaway church and becomes the first antipope. 217 The vast and magnificent baths of Caracalla are completed in Rome. 217 While campaigning in Parthia, the Roman emperor Caracalla is assassinated by his legionaries near Edessa. Macrinus, head of the Praetorian Guard, declares himself emperor and makes peace with Parthia. 218 Julia Maesa, the aunt of the assassinated emperor Caracalla, who has been banished to her home in Syria by the head of the Praetorian Guard and selfproclaimed emperor, Macrinus, declares her grandson Elagabalus emperor. Macrinus advances westwards to meet Julia, who fights in person, defeats him, and has him executed. The Syrian legionaries support Elagabalus, a priest of Elagabal (Baal), who is about 14 years of age. 221 With the collapse of the Han dynasty in China, the Chinese general Cao Cao's son has power in the north, Souen Kiuan secedes from the empire in the area to the south of the River Chang Jiang, while Liu Bei proclaims himself emperor in Sichuan in the west. Three kingdoms thus arise – the Wei in the north, the Wu in the south, and the Shu Han in the west. These kingdoms fight each other for more than half a century. 222 After the murder of the Roman emperor Elagabalus and his mother by the Praetorian Guard, Elagabalus' cousin Alexander Severus becomes emperor, having successfully undergone a philosophic and severe training. He curbs the power of the army and endeavours to restore the power of the Senate and the aristocracy in Rome. He reduces taxes, lends money at 4%, encourages traders' and workers' associations, and censors public morals. He is advised by the Roman jurist Domitius Ulpian, who is appointed one of the Praetorian prefects. 224 The kingdom of Parthia comes to an end. King Ardashir of Persis, having made himself increasingly powerful in the area, defeats King Artabanus IV, the last of the Parthian Arsacid dynasty, in three great battles. 226 With the accession of King Ardashir of Persia, Rome exchanges one enemy for another, the rising Sassanid Persian enemy taking the place of the long declining Parthian enemy. 231–233 The Roman emperor Alexander Severus, accompanied by his mother,

campaigns against the Persian king Ardashir. Ardashir defeats part of the Roman army, and the Romans win some minor victories, then both sides retire. The Roman–Persian frontier remains the same as it was previously. Roman coinage of the time depicts a Roman victory. 235 Following the assassination of the emperor Alexander Severus, Rome enters another anarchic period, sometimes known as the 3rd Century Crisis, during which power rests with the legionaries and no fewer than 37 men are declared emperor within 35 years. 235–238 The new Roman emperor, Maximinus, campaigns on the rivers Danube and Rhine in Germany, defeating the Alemanni, and never visits Rome. He is accepted by the Senate, but taxes the rich aristocracy heavily and engenders such hostility among them that they plot against him. 236 Wu-ti (Wudi), founder and first emperor of the Western Chin dynasty 265–90, born in China (–290). 238 The Roman proconsul of Africa Gordian I accepts the Roman emperorship jointly with his son, Gordian II, when his troops proclaim him. They are defeated by supporters of the Roman emperor, Maximinus. After defeating the first two Gordians, Maximinus takes his revenge with a brutal proscription in Rome. 238 The Roman Senate outlaws the Roman emperor Maximinus for his bloodthirsty proscriptions in Rome, and nominates two of its members, Pupienus and Balbinus, to the throne. Maximinus advances upon the Senate's nominees at Aquileia in northern Italy, but is killed by his soldiers. Pupienus and Balbinus return to Rome, only to be killed by the Praetorian Guard who then make Gordian III, son of Gordian II and grandson of the former Roman emperor Gordian I, their emperor. 240 This year sees the start of the worst danger that Rome has so far experienced, with enemies active on several fronts at the same time. Africa revolts, and tribes in northwest Germany, under the name of the Franks, combine into a warlike federation. In Persia, King Ardashir is assassinated. 241 At the court of Shapur I, Mani, a young mystic of Ctesiphon, proclaims himself a prophet and preaches a new doctrine throughout Persia. His teaching, known as Manichaeism, borrows from Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Mithraism, and Gnosticism, and divides the world into the rival realms of Light and Darkness. 244 Following the murder of the Roman emperor Gordian III by his army commander, Philip the Arab, Philip replaces him as emperor. Philip makes peace with Persia and returns to Rome as Rome's first Arab emperor. 244 Gordian III, Roman emperor 238–244, grandson of Gordian I, is murdered in Zaitha, Mesopotamia, while campaigning (18). A mound is raised Carchemish in his memory.

245 Diocletian, Roman emperor (284–305), noted for restoring efficient government to the empire, born, possibly in Salonae, Dalmatia, now Split, Croatia (–316). 247 Himiko, Queen of Japan, first known Japanese ruler, dies. 249 Discontented at having an Arab as emperor, the legionaries in several Roman provinces revolt. Philip offers to abdicate, then sends his general Messius Quintus Gaius Decius to pacify the legionaries in Pannonia, who seem to consider themselves the guardians of true Roman virtues. They force Decius to assume the throne and to lead them into Italy. At a battle at Verona, northern Italy, Philip is defeated and slain and Decius becomes emperor. 249 The Goths cross the River Danube and ravage the Roman provinces of Thrace, Moesia, and Dacia. Civil war in Gaul is suppressed. 250 The earliest Chinese references to a device known as 'the emperor's southpointing carriage' date to this period. An ingenious and complex system of gearing was used so that, whichever way the carriage turned, a statue on the top always pointed in the same direction. 250 The Late Formative (or Pre-Classic) period in Mayan history comes to an end, and the Classic period (250–c. 800) begins, when the civilization is at its height. 251 Following the deaths of the Roman emperor Decius and his son, Herennius, at the hands of the Goths in a battle in Moesia (north of Thrace), Vibius Trebonianus Gaius Gallus, senatorial governor of Moesia, is elected emperor by the troops. However, Goth attacks on the Roman Empire's Danubian provinces continue for some 20 years, causing enormous damage. 251 The prosperity of Roman Britain declines during this period as the Germanic tribes of the Franks and Saxons, whose homelands are in Friesland and the Low Countries, make raids around the southeast coast. 253 Marcus Aemilius Aemilianus, the Roman general left in charge in Moesia, achieves some successes against the Goths, and is proclaimed emperor by the troops. He advances on Rome and is met by the emperor Trebonianus Gallus and his son. However, Gallus' troops are so few and so disloyal that they assassinate him and his son rather than fight. Aemilianus rules for four months and then meets the same fate as Gallus, being replaced by Publius Valerian of the Rhine legions. 254 The Roman Empire is threatened simultaneously by the Franks, Alemanni, and Marcomanni in Germany, by the Goths in the Danubian provinces (Thrace and Moesia) and Asia Minor, and by the Persians in the East. The emperor Publius Valerian makes his son, Publius Gallienus, ruler of the Western half of the empire and himself ruler of the Eastern half. 255–265 Peace and unity are finally restored in China with the victories of the

Wei Kingdom in the north. The ruling dynasty is worn out by war, and the kingdom is ruled by ministers on their behalf – the Ssu-mas. During the next decade, Ssu-ma Chao conquers the western kingdom of Shu Han. 256 In simultaneous attacks on the Roman Empire, the Franks penetrate into Spain by sea, the Goths ravage Macedonia, and the Persians invade Mesopotamia and Syria. 259 The Alemanni break into Italy but are repulsed by the ruler of the western Roman Empire, Publius Gallienus, at Milan in the north. The eastern emperor of the Roman Empire, Publius Valerian, simultaneously leads an army of 70,000 men to relieve the city of Edessa in Syria, besieged by the forces of King Shapur I of Sassanian Persia. 260 The Roman emperor Publius Valerian decides to attack the Persians, who have reached Edessa (modern Urfa). He changes his mind, however, and offers to negotiate. King Shapur of Persia demands a personal interview on the field and Valerian consents, and is either treacherously captured by Shapur, or is captured in battle while campaigning, and ends his days a captive. 260 The son of the captured Roman emperor Publius Valerian, the Western ruler Publius Gallienus, meets and overcomes rival claimants to the imperial throne in Dalmatia, and becomes emperor of the entire Roman Empire. 263 After his defeat of King Shapur of Persia, King Odenathus of Palmyra declares himself king of the area west of the River Euphrates and is declared 'Dux Orientalis' by the Roman emperor Publius Gallienus, who needs his help to suppress rival claimants to the empire. 265 The ruling minister of the northern Chinese kingdom of Wei, Ssu-ma Chao, dies, and his son Ssu-ma Yen usurps the throne from the royal family, becoming known as the emperor Wudi, and founding the Western Chin dynasty. For the next 50 years the northern kingdom exerts some suzerainty over the other kingdoms. 267 The Goths, originally from Scandinavia, with the Sarmatians (from modern Iran), pour down into the Balkans and Greece and sail through the Hellespont into the Aegean Sea. The Greek cities of Athens, Argos, Sparta, Corinth, and Thebes are all sacked. 268–270 Following the death of Roman emperor Publius Gallienus at the hands of his soldiers, Claudius II, a Dalmatian of obscure origin, becomes emperor. 270 Plotinus, Roman philosopher, founder of the neo-Platonic school of philosophy, dies in Campania (65). 270 The Roman emperor Claudius II succumbs to the plague and Aurelian (Lucius Domitus Aurelianus), another Dalmatian, becomes emperor. He wins a further battle over the Goths and then makes peace with them. He relinquishes the

province of Dacia to the Goths and transfers the name and the civilian population to a province south of the River Danube. c. 270 The Chinese invent gunpowder, a mixture of saltpetre, sulphur and charcoal. At first, it appears to have been used only for fireworks. 271 The Roman emperor Aurelian pushes the Vandals back from Pannonia over the River Danube and the Alemanni and Iuthungi out of Italy again, where they had returned after defeat by the former emperor Claudius II, defeating them near Milan in the north with one of the earliest large-scale cavalry actions. 272 The Roman emperor Aurelian sends his commander Marcus Probus to restore Roman rule in Egypt, and himself advances on Queen Zenobia's capital, Palmyra, which he takes after a difficult campaign. Zenobia is captured; her life is spared but her advisor, the Greek philosopher Longinus, is put to death. Having retraced his steps across the Bosporus, Aurelian receives the news that Palmyra has revolted. He returns and suppresses the revolt, this time dealing more harshly with the city. 274 The Roman usurper Postumus has been succeeded as 'Emperor of Gaul' by Tetricus, whom the Roman emperor Aurelian easily defeats. Rome greets Aurelian as Restitutor Orbis ('Restorer of the World') and accords him a magnificent triumph (victory procession), which is graced by his captives Gaius Pius Esuvius Tetricus and Queen Zenobia of Palmyra, the latter loaded with golden chains. Zenobia is allowed to live out her life with her children at Hadrian's palace, Tivoli. . 275 Following the murder of the Roman emperor Aurelian, the Roman army passes the appointment of the next emperor to the Senate, which chooses the 75year-old Cornelius Tacitus, a descendant of the historian of the same name. 275 St Denis, the first bishop of Paris and later the patron saint of France, converts Paris to Christianity and establishes a religious centre on an island in the Seine. 275 While on his way to attack Persia, the Roman emperor Aurelian (full name Lucius Domitius Aurelianus)is murdered by a group of officers who mistakenly believe that their lives are in danger. Aurelian, Roman emperor 270–275, who reunited the empire, dies in Byzantium, Thrace (now Istanbul, Turkey). 277–279 The Roman emperor Marcus Probus continues the former emperor Aurelian's forcible pacification of the empire, pushing the Franks back across the River Rhine, expelling the Goths and Vandals from Raetia and Pannonia (modern Switzerland and Hungary) – which he resettles with groups displaced by the Goths – quelling trouble in Britain and Dalmatia, and forcing Moorish invaders of Spain back to North Africa. 280 Wudi, the emperor of the northern Chinese kingdom of Wei, occupies most of the southern kingdom of Wu, uniting China once more under one rule. Wudi's

capital is the old and prosperous city of Luoyang. It is a thriving centre of commerce, and ambassadors from throughout the world arrive there. 282 The Roman army grows more and more discontented with the emperor Marcus Probus as a result of his crackdown on discipline. His soldiers mutiny and kill him while he is superintending viticulture at Sirmium, his birthplace, a city on the Sava in Pannonia Inferior. Marcus Aurelius Carus, said to be a scholar as well as a soldier, is elected his successor. 283 The Roman emperor Marcus Aurielius Carus dies in mysterious circumstances during an expedition against the Sasanians near Ctesiphon in Persia, reputedly after being hit by a stroke of lightning. 283–285 Following the death of Roman emperor Marcus Aurielius Carus, his two sons, Numerianus and Carinus, are declared his heirs. Numerianus is subsequently murdered in the East, and the other, Carinus, fights for the throne with the Roman commander Diocletian, the army's choice. Diocletian defeats Carinus and kills him. 285 The Roman emperor Diocletian makes Maximian, a fellow soldier from the Danubian provinces (Thrace and Moesia), his second in command as Caesar, and sends him to pacify Gaul. Here the Bagaudae, bands of peasants, have revolted and set up two emperors of their own. Maximian deals with Gaul rapidly and mercifully. 285 The Roman emperor Diocletian transfers his capital from Rome, Italy, to Nicomedia in Bithynia, near Byzantium, as a more strategic base from which to defend the Empire. Similarly, his second in command, Maximian, chooses Milan in northern Italy as his base. 286 Following Maximian's successful campaign in Gaul, the Roman emperor Diocletian raises him from Caesar to Augustus, making him his joint ruler with responsibility for the West, reviving the practice of splitting the command of the Empire between East and West. 287 The Roman Caesar, Maximian, places a soldier named Carausius in charge of the Roman fleet at Boulogne, the Classis Britannica, to clear the English Channel of Frankish and Saxon pirates. Carausius catches many pirates, but keeps the spoils for himself. When Maximian orders his execution, he revolts, keeping control of the north coasts of Gaul and using his naval power to cross to Britain, where he declares an independent empire on the model of Postumus in Gaul. c. 287 Constantine I the Great, first Christian Roman emperor (312–324 western empire; 324–337 whole empire), born at Naissus in Roman Moesia Superior (modern Niš, Serbia (–337). 290 The soldier and naval commander Carausius, a self-proclaimed Roman emperor who has established himself in Britain, is reluctantly acknowledged by Maximian and Diocletian as a third emperor. He rules in Britain for the next three

years, efficiently defeating Saxon and Frankish raids. 290 Wu-ti (Wudi), founder and first emperor of the Western Chin dynasty 265–90, dies in Lo-yang, China (c. 54). 293 Diocletian, the Roman emperor of the East, further develops his plan for ruling the Empire: it is to be ruled jointly by two Augusti (Diocletian for the East and Maximian for the West), each of whom is to have a Caesar to help him. Diocletian chooses the soldier Galerius as his Caesar and Maximian appoints his Praetorian prefect Constantius Chlorus. The Tetrarchy, known as the Quattuor Principes Mundi ('Four Rulers of the World'), has genuine power: all laws and edicts are to be issued in the names of all four rulers and are to be equally valid; no sanction from the Roman Senate is required. Each Caesar will marry into the Augustus' family and then succeed him after 20 years. So Galerius gives up his wife to marry Diocletian's daughter Valeria, and Constantius gives up his wife Helena, mother of the future emperor Constantine I the Great, to marry Maximian's daughter Theodora. 294–297 Galerius, Roman Caesar in the East, proves his worth in campaigning in the Danubian provinces, fighting the Goths, Marcomanni, Sarmatians, Bastarnians, and Carpi, but becomes embittered when he has to follow up with the unspectacular job of land reclamation and repopulation, moving the entire tribe of the Carpi to settlements within the Roman Empire. 296 After two years of preparation, Constantius Chlorus, Roman Caesar of the West, invades Britain. One squadron of his fleet, led by his Praetorian prefect Asclepiodotus, lands near the Isle of Wight and defeats Allectus in Hampshire. The other Roman squadron, under Constantius, sails up the River Thames to London just in time to prevent the sack of the city by the remains of Allectus' army. He rebuilds at Eboracum (York), Londinium (London), and Verulamium (St Albans), fortifies the 'Saxon Shore' (the coastline from the Wash to the Isle of Wight), and does much to restore prosperity to Britain. 296–297 Rebellion again breaks out in Egypt and the Eastern Roman emperor Diocletian goes there in person with the young Constantine I the Great (later the first Christian emperor of Rome) on his staff. He besieges Alexandria and deposes the city's 'emperor', Achilleus. 297 Galerius, the Roman emperor Diocletian's Caesar in the East, is given the job of combating the Sassanian King Narses of Persia. After initial success he suffers a serious defeat near Carrhae; Diocletian deliberately inflames his pride by making him walk behind his chariot as a punishment. 297 The tomb of a Chinese military commander of this date contains metal belt ornaments made of aluminium, not isolated by Western scientists until 1827. 298 Galerius, the Roman emperor Diocletian's Caesar in the East, redeems his humiliation of the previous year by winning a complete victory over King Narses of Sassanian Persia, capturing his wives and children and taking a huge booty,

then pressing on to capture Ctesiphon itself, the capital of the Sassanian Empire. King Narses cedes Mesopotamia and five small provinces beyond the River Tigris to Rome. The city of Nisibis is designated a centre for commercial relations between the two empires. In return for this, Narses' wives and children are restored. 299 The 3rd century ends in peace, with the Roman Empire recovered in power and prestige and the emperor Diocletian's innovations in government apparently vindicated. c. 300 The Kama Sutra, an Indian handbook on the art of sexual love, is probably produced around this time by the sage Vatsyayana. 303 The most severe period of Roman persecution of the Christians begins. 304 At Spalato (Split) in Dalmatia the palace planned for the Roman emperor Diocletian's retirement is begun in oriental style. 304 The Huns under the Chinese-educated Liu Yuan decide to connect themselves with China's past and form a 'Hun Han' dynasty in northern China. 305 Diocletian, the Roman emperor of the East, abdicates in Nicomedia, Bithynia, and Maximian, the emperor of the West, does the same in Milan, Italy. They are succeeded as Augusti by the former Caesars, Constantius Chlorus in the West and Galerius in the East. The posts of Caesar now go to Severus in the West and Maximinus Daia in the East, both protégés of Galerius. The obvious choices of Maxentius, son of Maximian, and Constantine I the Great, son of Constantius, are passed over. 306 Constantius I Chlorus, the Western Roman emperor 293–306, who rules in a tetrarchy with Maximian, Diocletian, and Galerius, returns to Britain and undertakes a punitive expedition against the Picts beyond the repaired Hadrian's Wall. His son Constantine (Constantine I the Great) has managed safely to reach his father from the court of Eastern emperor Galerius, and together father and son win a brilliant victory. However, on his return to Eboracum (modern York) in July, Constantius dies. Constantine is declared Augustus (emperor) by his troops, and awaits recognition by Galerius. Despite his anger at this development, Galerius compromises and recognizes Constantine as Caesar in order to avert civil war. He makes Caesar Flavius Valerius Severus the new Augustus in the West. Constantine accepts this decision for the moment, in order to avoid civil war. 306 Goaded by Constantine I the Great's success in being recognized as Caesar, Maxentius, son of the former Western emperor Maximian, joins a revolt by the Praetorian Guard in Rome, angry at its suppression by the current Western emperor Severus. Rome and the south of Italy, bitter over their subjection to taxation and loss of privilege, support Maxentius, as does Africa. Northern Italy supports Severus, who has his seat in Milan. 307 Maxentius calls on his father, the former Western Roman emperor Maximian,

to come out of retirement to help him. The emperor of the East, Galerius, orders Severus, Emperor of the West, to march on Rome against Maxentius. Many of Severus' soldiers have previously served under Maximian, however, and Severus is forced to retire to Ravenna, where Maximian, who has resumed his position as Augustus (emperor), persuades him to become his hostage against Galerius. Maximian travels to Gaul to gain the support of Constantine against the Eastern emperor, who acknowledges Maxentius as Augustus in the West. Constantine accepts promotion to the rank of Augustus and marries Maximian's daughter Fausta. 309 A plague that may be related to anthrax spreads across the Roman Empire, causing a drastic decline in the population. 312 The Western Roman emperor Constantine I the Great defeats and kills his rival Western emperor Maxentius at the Battle of the Milvian (or Mulvian) Bridge (sometimes called the Battle of Saxa Rubra) on the River Tiber, about 14 km/9 mi from Rome, Italy. This may be described as Rome's first battle of the Christian religion – Constantine's troops go into battle with the Chi-Rho monogram on their shields after Constantine is reported to have been told in a dream to put the heavenly sign of God on his soldiers' shields. 313 The Eastern Roman emperor Maximinus Daia, who holds Asia and Egypt, attacks his rival emperor Licinius on his return to the East, driving him back into Thrace and capturing Byzantium. Licinius calls up reinforcements and completely defeats Maximinus at Tzurulum, near Adrianople (modern Edirne, Turkey), pursuing him across Asia Minor to Tarsus, where Maximinus is killed. 313 The Western Roman emperor Constantine I the Great meets the Eastern emperor Licinius in Milan, Italy. They issue a joint edict and agree to cooperate. Complete religious tolerance for Christians is agreed. Licinius marries Constantine's sister Constantia. Constantine moves to the defence of Gaul and Licinius to consolidate his Eastern possessions against his rival Maximinus Daia. 313 The Western Roman emperor Constantine I the Great defeats the Eastern emperor Licinius in Pannonia and exacts surrender of the provinces of Pannonia and Moesia, thus gaining control of all of Roman Europe except Thrace. Licinius retires to his Eastern capital Nicomedia in Bithynia, Asia Minor. 316 Diocletian, Roman emperor 284–305, noted for restoring efficient government to the empire, dies in Salonae, Dalmatia, now Split, Croatia (68). 317 The Hun Han dynasty founded by the Huns in 304 is now fully established in northern China. 321 The Western Roman emperor Constantine I the Great expels the barbarians from Roman Dacia, repairs the former emperor Trajan's bridge over the River Danube, penetrates the old province of Dacia, and makes peace with the barbarians.

323 Goths invade the Roman province of Thrace but the Eastern Roman emperor Licinius takes no action, forcing the Western emperor Constantine I the Great to cross into Thrace and expel the barbarians himself. 324 Negotiations between the Western Roman emperor Constantine I the Great and the Eastern emperor Licinius fail, and war breaks out. In two battles, near Adrianople (modern Edirne, Turkey) and Chrysopolis (Usküdar, Turkey), Constantine defeats Licinius. 324 The Eastern Roman emperor Licinius (308–324) is pardoned following his defeat in 324 by the Western emperor Constantine I the Great as a result of the supplication of his wife (who is Constantine's sister). He is banished to Thessaloníki (Salonika), and is subsequently executed on the charge of indulging in renewed intrigue. 325 A schism arises within the Eastern Christian church over the nature of Christ's divinity. The Roman emperor Constantine I the Great, feeling it his religious and imperial duty to ensure unity within the church, summons an ecumenical council of bishops in Nicaea, Asia Minor (now Iznik, Turkey), over which he presides. 325 Following the death of the Eastern Roman emperor Licinius, the Roman Empire once again has a single ruler, Constantine I the Great. 325 The ecumenical council at Nicaea confirms the 'consubstantiality' of Christ with God the Father. The Nicene Creed, which is adopted as the fundamental statement of Christian belief, contains the anti-Arian statement that the Son 'is of one substance with the Father'. 330 The Roman emperor Constantine I the Great dedicates the city of Constantinople, or Nova Roma (modern Istanbul, Turkey), and makes it his new, Christian, base. Although he does not intend to move the capital of the Empire from Rome, his establishment, together with that of the imperial court, in Constantinople effectively brings the long history of Rome as the centre of the world to an end. 331 Flavius Claudius Julianus (Julian the Apostate), Roman emperor 361–63, a noted scholar and military commander, born in Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) (–363). 22 May 337 Constantine I the Great, first Christian Roman emperor of Western empire 312–324, And of whole empire 324–337, dies in Ancyrona, near Nicomedia, in Bithynia, Asia Minor (now Izmit, Turkey) (c. 57). 337 Shortly before his death, Roman emperor Constantine is baptized by Eusebius of Nicomedia. 338 The late Roman emperor Constantine I the Great's three surviving sons – Constantius, Constantine II, and Constans – meet in Pannonia and try to resolve

their differences. They divide the Empire up, possibly according to their father's plans: Constantius gets the East; Constantine II receives Spain, Britain, and Gaul; and Constans becomes ruler of Italy, Africa, and western Illyricum. 339–350 The Roman emperor Constantius hastens to his territory in the East, where a revived Persia under King Shapur II is attacking the Roman province of Mesopotamia. For the next 11 years the two powers engage in a war of border skirmishing with no real victor. 340 The Roman emperor Constantine II crosses the Alps and attacks the army of his brother Emperor Constans at Aquileia in northern Italy. When he is ambushed and killed by Constans, Constans is left master of the West, with his other brother, the emperor Constantius, master of the East. 341–351 During this decade Samudra Gupta, ruler of the Gupta dynasty, extends his kingdom or his influence over most of India. A pillar found at Allahabad, northeast India, sings his praises. 349–350 When Constans, the Western Roman emperor, makes himself extremely unpopular, Gaulish army commander Magnus Magnentius usurps the throne with the support of the military leaders in Rome. Constans flees to Spain, where he is subsequently assassinated. Magnus Magnentius is welcomed in Britain, Spain, Africa, and the rest of Italy, as well as in Gaul. 352 Eastern Roman emperor Constantius defeats the pretender to the Empire in the West, Magnus Magnentius, at the hard-fought Battle of Mursa in Mesopotamia. Magnentius flees to Aquileia in northern Italy and fortifies the Alpine passes. Both sides suffer huge losses in the battle. Cavalry armoured with chain mail help Constantius win the battle, and this new style of cavalry, or catafractarii, will become a major element in the later Roman Empire. Constantius declares an amnesty for Magnentius' men, many of whom desert to him. By the end of the year Constantius is in Milan, Italy, repealing all Magnentius' measures. Magnentius flees to Gaul. 353 The Chinese calligrapher Wang Xi-zhi produces 'Preface to the Poems Composed at the Orchid Pavilion' in running script style. It becomes a model for future calligraphers. 353 When Magnus Magnentius, the usurper of the Western Roman throne, commits suicide in Gaul, his British follower Martinus holds out. An official named Paulus is sent to control him and proves so harsh in his rule that Martinus kills him and then kills himself. Savage vengeance is taken on the followers of Martinus. 354 As a result of the armies of the West having been withdrawn by the usurper Magnus Magnentius to fight the Roman emperor Constantius, hoards of barbarians now sweep across the River Rhine into Gaul, ravaging the whole country. 355 The Huns of Central Asia begin their great drive westwards with an advance

into Scythia (modern Russia). They overcome and absorb the Alans, the nomadic and warlike horse-breeding people from the steppes northeast of the Black Sea. 357–359 The Roman emperor Constantius appoints Julian, the governor of Gaul, supreme commander over the troops in Gaul. The following year Julian wins an important victory at Strasbourg, and then in a series of brilliant campaigns he drives the barbarians out of Gaul, regaining first the Upper Rhine and then the Lower Rhine for Rome. He goes on to free the Roman hostages taken by the barbarians, and refortifies the frontier. He also builds a fleet to secure the corn supply from Britain for the garrisons of the Rhine and passes several measures which help to restore Gaul's prosperity. 360 Julian, the Roman Caesar, is declared emperor by his troops in Paris, Gaul; they refuse to go East to the aid of the emperor Constantius struggling against King Shapur II of Persia. Julian and Constantius exchange several letters, both hoping to avoid civil war, although both prepare for it. Julian finally takes the first step towards war by setting out with his army towards the East. 361 When the Roman emperor Constantius dies of a fever in Cilicia, Asia Minor (modern Turkey), while on his way to confront his cousin Julian, Julian takes over the combined emperorship of East and West and rules from Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey). He declares himself a pagan and makes a final attempt at hellenizing the empire. 363 Flavius Claudius Julianus (Julian the Apostate), Roman emperor 361–363, a noted scholar and military commander, dies from wounds received in battle at Ctesiphon, near Baghdad, Persia (c. 32). 363 The Roman emperor Julian invades Sassanian Persia and reaches the capital Ctesiphon, but his army is enticed into the desert by a ruse. King Shapur II of Persia avoids battle and adopts a scorched earth policy, leaving the Romans desperately short of supplies. As the Romans retreat, Julian is mortally wounded in a skirmish, and Jovian, Captain of the Guard and a Christian, succeeds him and makes peace, surrendering four of the five provinces gained by the Caesar Galerius in 298, and the cities of Nisibis and Singara. 364 The soldier Valentinian is elected Roman emperor. He retains the West and makes his younger brother Valens emperor of the East. 365–366 The Alemanni pour across the frontier into Gaul. The Western Roman emperor Valentinian I moves to Paris to command the war, appointing Jovinus, his master of horse, general of the army. Jovinus defeats the Alemanni in three successive battles. 17 November 375 The Western Roman emperor Valentinian I (364–375) concludes an enduring peace with the Alemanni in Germany, then marches to help defend the Danube frontier. While negotiating with the Quadi, Valentinian dies in Sirmium in modern Yugoslavia (c. 54).

375 Following the death of the Western Roman emperor Valentinian I, his son Gratian succeeds him as emperor of the West. His other son, the four-year-old Valentinian II, is appointed co-emperor of the West, to which Gratian agrees. 375 The earliest extant books – a school textbook and an account book – with bound wooden leaves, are lost at the Dakhla Oasis in western Egypt. The desert sands preserve them for modern archaeologists. 376 The Western Roman emperor Gratian recalls the military commander Theodosius, son of the executed general Theodosius the elder, from retirement in Spain and puts him in charge of the Roman troops in Thrace. Theodosius defeats the Sarmatians, and in 379 is appointed co-emperor by Gratian to replace Valens. c. 376 The first pastoral romance Daphnis and Chloe is written by the Greek sophist Longus. 376–378 The Visigoths north of the River Danube, defeated by the Huns, are allowed to settle in Roman territory, but revolt and overrun Thrace. The Eastern Roman emperor Valens meets them near Hadrianople, but when he is defeated and killed he leaves Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) itself in danger from the Goths. The Gothic heavy cavalry proves decisive in the battle. 379 Buddhism is declared the state religion of China. 380 Easter Island, in the south Pacific Ocean, has been occupied by Neolithic seafarers who about this time begin to fortify the island. They also build platforms of cut and polished stone on which they set statues, although not the gigantic statues for which the island is famous – these do not appear until later. 382 The Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius I the Great, recognizing the impossibility of expelling the Goths from Thrace, concludes a treaty of alliance with the Visigoths and assigns them territory within the province in exchange for military service. 383 When the Western Roman emperor Gratian becomes a weak and inefficient ruler, Magnus Maximus, the Spanish commander left behind in Britain by the Roman soldier Theodosius the elder, claims the throne of the Western Empire. He defeats Gratian near Paris, Gaul, and becomes master of Gaul and Spain. Gratian flees and is subsequently killed by his own troops, leaving his halfbrother Valentinian II to succeeds him as the rightful emperor of the West. Magnus Maximus crosses from Britain to Gaul in a bid to make himself Roman emperor. He withdraws many of the troops from Britain, with the result that Hadrian's Wall, the northern Roman frontier in Britain, is overrun and falls into ruin. c. 385 Saint Patrick, patron saint of Ireland who brought Christianity to the island, born in Britain (–c. 461).

387 Magnus Maximus, the usurping emperor of the West, invades Italy. The rightful emperor Valentinian II flees with his mother and sister to Thessaloníki, Thrace, where the Eastern emperor Theodosius I the Great meets him and marries Valentinian's sister, Galla. 387 Southern China is saved at the Battle of Fei Shui from Hunnish invasion but the weakened north suffers another wave of invading Hunnish or Tatar tribes. 388 Chandra Gupta II, the ruler of the Indian Gupta dynasty, begins a war against the Shaka dynasty, which finally gives him control of northwest India. He calls himself Vickramaditya ('Sun of Prowess'). 388 The usurping Western Roman emperor Magnus Maximus is defeated in three battles by the Eastern emperor Theodosius I the Great, who is in command of an army including Goths, Huns, and Alans. When Maximus is killed near Aquileia, Italy, the rightful emperor, Valentinian II, is restored to power. With the death of his mother Justina, Valentinian's most influential adviser is the early Christian leader and theologian Bishop Ambrose of Milan. 389 Resentment among the citizens of Thessaloníki, Thrace, at the billeting of Germanic troops on them, breaks out into violence, in which the captain of the garrison is killed. The Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius I the Great orders vengeance, despite the pleas of Ambrose, bishop of Milan, for mercy, and more than 7,000 citizens are killed by the troops. 390 Bishop Ambrose retires to Milan, Italy, refusing to meet the Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius I the Great until he repents for ordering the massacre of over 7,000 citizens in Thessaloníki the previous year. Theodosius is by now filled with remorse at his action, and kneels in humility, stripped of his royal purple, before the altar of the cathedral in Milan, thus humbling himself before the power of the church. 390–392 The Visigoths and Huns invade Thrace, led by Alaric, a Visigoth prince. Command of the Roman defensive campaign goes to Flavius Stilicho, a commander of Vandal origin, who defeats the invaders. The Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius I the Great permits them to go free on condition they provide military services to the Empire. 392 The Western Roman emperor Valentinian II is assassinated while advancing into Gaul against a Frankish usurper, Arbogast, after being sent to restore order in Gaul by the Eastern emperor Theodosius I the Great. Arbogast appoints a weakling, Eugenius, as emperor of the West, and is thus the first of the Germanic kingmakers of the Roman Empire. 393 The Roman emperor Theodosius I the Great abolishes the Greek Olympic Games by decree because of their association with paganism. 394 The Eastern Roman emperor Theodosius I the Great defeats the Frankish usurper Arbogast and Arbogast's appointed emperor of the West, Eugenius, near

Aquileia, Italy, at the Battle of the River Frigidus. The Gothic contingent of Theodosius' army is commanded by the Visigoth leader Alaric. Theodosius' victory is aided by a storm, which hampers Arbogast's forces, and by desertions to his side. 396 The Roman general Flavius Stilicho controls the young emperor Honorius as his regent and becomes virtual ruler of the West. The Goths under Alaric rampage through Greece when Stilicho ceases to employ or subsidize them, creating a kingdom for themselves. Alaric destroys the temple of Eleusis, and harries the Peloponnese. Stilicho advances, makes peace with the Goths, and allows them to settle in Epirus. 397 Bishop Augustine begins his Confessions, an autobiograpy that recounts his intellectual and spiritual development. 397 The Moorish prince Gildo revolts against Roman rule in Africa, taking much of North Africa and cutting off the corn supply to Rome. The Roman general Flavius Stilicho concludes a hasty treaty with the Goths in the Balkans and returns to Italy to raise troops against the rebel Moorish prince in Africa. Stilicho supervises the war, and Gildo is defeated. c. 400 Egyptian astronomer and mathematician Hypatia distinguishes herself as one of the first women scientists, becoming head of the Neo-Platonist school at Alexandria, and a widely consulted authority on matters of physics and mathematics. c. 400 The Graeco-Roman physician Caelius Aurelianus is practising. His De morbis acutis et chronicis/Concerning Acute and Chronic Illness, a guide to acute and chronic diseases, becomes a highly respected text in the Middle Ages. 400–500 Shaturanga (or chaturanga), 'the army game', an ancestor of chess through the Persian game of shatranj (or chatrang), evolves in the Indus Valley on the Indian subcontinent. 401 The Slavs first appear in European history as a confederation of tribes living between the Dnieper and Dniester rivers, known as the Antae. 403 Alaric and the Visigoths invade Italy again, but are defeated by the Roman general Stilicho near Verona. A treaty is made, and the emperor Honorius and Stilicho celebrate their victory. 403 The Western Roman emperor Honorius deserts Milan for Ravenna, which he makes the Western capital. 405 The German king Radagaisus gathers an army of Ostrogoths, Vandals, and others, with which he invades Italy. The Roman general Stilicho saves Florence and brings Radagaisus in chains to the emperor Honorius. 31 December 406 The River Rhine in central Europe freezes over, allowing

hordes of Vandals, Alans, and Scieri to invade the Roman Empire, ultimately leading to its collapse. 406 As the Roman government has ceased to send out governors or organize troops in the wake of the Vandal conquest of Gaul, the Romano-British elect their own emperors. The first is Marcus, who is succeeded by Gratian. 406 Attila, King of the Huns jointly with his brother Bleda 434–45 and on his own 445–53, who invaded the southern Balkan provinces of the Roman Empire, Greece, Gaul, and Italy, born (–453). 407 Germanic tribes settling across northwest Europe introduce the cultivation of new crops, such as rye, oats, and hops, and the manufacture of butter. 408 In Rome, the chancellor Olympius, jealous of the general Stilicho and believing him to be at heart pro-German, persuades the emperor Honorius to have him assassinated, together with many of Stilicho's Vandal soldiers. Alaric seizes his opportunity and uses the pretext of an unpaid bribe (promised him by Stilicho in 402) to invade Italy once again. Following Stilicho's death, Roman troops are allowed to rob and murder the families of Teutonic troops in Italy, causing many to desert to the Visigoth king Alaric. 409 The Vandals, under King Gunderic and their allies the Alani and Suevi, invade Spain and plunder the rich cities there. Constans, the son of the usurping emperor Constantine in Gaul, despite having installed Gerontius as prefect in Spain, does nothing to stop the Vandal invasion. 409 The Visigoth king Alaric besieges Rome, bringing the inhabitants close to starvation. Twice he is bought off but twice returns. Many Germanic slaves escape to his side. The emperor Honorius in Ravenna refuses to negotiate for peace, despite repeated offers from Alaric. After his second siege of Rome, Alaric comes to terms with the Senate and sets up the prefect of the city, Attalus, as a rival emperor to Honorius. Attalus proves incapable, however, losing the vital province of Africa (the granary of Rome) to Honorius. Alaric deposes him and reopens negotiations with Honorius. Hindered by the machinations of his Gothic enemy Sarus, Alaric begins his third siege of Rome. August 410 The city of Rome is captured by the Visigoth king Alaric when a slave opens the gates and the Visigoths enter. The city is taken 800 years after its previous fall to the Gauls. The Visigoths spare the churches of St Peter and St Paul. 411 The Western Roman emperor Honorius tells the Britons that they must look to their own defences, finally abandoning the Romans' claims to the island. 411 The Western Roman emperor Honorius sends two generals to deal with the usurper Constantine in Gaul. They kill Gerontius, Constantine's rebellious prefect of Spain, then besiege Arles and defeat Constantine. The Teutonic tribes in Spain join the empire as foederati (allies with military commitments).

413–426 Bishop Augustine begins to writes his De civitate dei/City of God as a reply to the charge that Christianity was responsible for the decline of the Roman Empire. According to Augustine, obedience to the state is important, although man's ultimate end is the City of God beyond this world. 418 The western Roman emperor Honorius bribes Wallia, King of the Visigoths, into regaining Spain for the Empire. His victory over the Vandals, who overran Spain in 409, forces them to retire to Vandalusia (Andalusia). The Visigoth land in Gaul now extends from the River Garonne to the Loire, and becomes known as the Visigoth kingdom of Toulouse. 425 The usurper John is defeated and the young Valentinian III, son of the Roman Constantius and Placidia, the daughter of the emperor Theodosius I the Great, becomes Emperor of the West. Real power is in the hands of his mother Placidia, the widow of the Visigoth Ataulf. The Roman soldier Aëtius enters her service. 430 The Vandals in Spain, under King Genseric (or Gaiseric), are invited to come to Africa by the Roman governor Boniface, who has quarrelled with the imperial government. The Vandals conquer Roman Africa, helped by a revolt of the Moors and of Donatist Christians. They besiege and take the city of Hippo Regius, killing its bishop, Augustine (later St Augustine). c. 433 Attila, King of the Huns, consolidates his power in his Hungarian capital, probably on the site of Buda. Both emperors, Theodosius II in the East and Valentinian III in the West, bribe him to keep the peace. Attila initially inherits the Hunnish kingdom with his brother Bleda, but reputedly murders him in 444. 440 St Leo I, known as Leo the Great, becomes pope. 442 The Western Roman emperor Valentinian III makes peace with Genseric, the king of the Vandals, recognizing his rule in Africa as independent. This marks the end of the Vandal migrations; they settle in Africa with Carthage as their capital. 449 Vortigern, a Welsh king whose authority extends as far east as Kent, invites the Saxons, under their leaders Hengist and Horsa, to settle in Kent, Britain, in order to help him in his struggle with the Picts and Scots. 451 Attila, king of the Huns, makes his grand attack on the Western Roman empire. His army is reputedly half a million strong, including the Franks and Ostrogoths. The Roman commander Aëtius, realizing that he cannot defeat the Huns alone, makes an alliance with the Visigoths under Theodoric in southwest Gaul. Although the outcome of the Battle of the Catalaunian Fields (Chalons, sometimes called the Battle of Troyes) is inconclusive, it proves to be a moral victory for the Romans and the Huns return home. 452 Under Attila, the Huns advance into Italy. The emperor Valentinian III flees from Ravenna to Rome and sends Pope Leo I to persuade Attila to return to his

capital. Aquileia falls to Attila and Milan has to buy him off before Pope Leo, his hand strengthened by news of reinforcements from the Eastern Roman Empire and the plague breaking out among the Huns, is able to persuade Attila to withdraw. 453 After a wedding feast, on his marriage to the German Ildica, King Attila is found dead in bed with a burst blood vessel. His empire is divided between his sons and the Hunnish threat to the Western Roman empire is ended. 453 Attila, King of the Huns jointly with his brother Bleda 434–45 and on his own 445–53, who invaded the southern Balkan provinces of the Roman Empire, Greece, Gaul, and Italy, dies (c. 47). 455 Genseric the Vandal takes advantage of the death of Emperor Valentinian III and crosses from Africa to attack and loot Rome. Along with his booty Genseric abducts the Empress Eudoxia and her two daughters. 455 The Saxons rebel against the Welsh king Vortigern and fight the Britons in Britain. The Saxon leader Horsa, brother of Hengist, is said to have been slain at Aylesford. 456–457 The Western Roman emperor Avitus is forced to flee Rome due to famine caused by Vandal possession of Africa and Vandal control of the western Mediterranean. Rome goes through a period of chaos and changing rulers, with the Visigoth Ricimer the power behind the throne. The new emperor is Majorian. 460 The Western Roman emperor Majorian gathers a large force to attack the Vandals in Africa. The failure of the attack forces him to make peace and leads to his dismissal as emperor the following year by the Visigoth Ricimer. He is replaced by Libius Severus. c. 460–c. 477 Most of the 30 caves at Ajanta in Central India are completed during this time. Cut into the volcanic rock and elaborately carved and painted, they form the richest surviving Buddhist complex in India. c. 461 Saint Patrick, patron saint of Ireland who brought Christianity to the island, dies (c. 76). 466–470 Theodoric II, King of the Visigoths, is killed by his brother Euric who succeeds him on the throne. He conquers Spain and Massilia (modern Marseille), adding them to the existing Visigoth kingdom of Toulouse, which includes all Gaul south of the Loire and west of the Rhône. 472 The Western Roman Empire enters a period of unrest beginning when the Visigoth Ricimer captures Rome and kills the Western Roman emperor Anthemius. He appoints Olybrius his successor. When Ricimer dies shortly thereafter, Gundobad, king of the Burgundians, takes control of the western armies. Olybrius then dies, leaving the Western Roman Empire without an emperor.

c. 475 The Hindu Dashavatara temple at Deogarh in Uttar Pradesh, India, is built around this time. Sacred to Vishnu, it contains the finest Gupta-period sculpture in India. 476 More Germanic tribes invade Italy, and in Rome the emperor Romulus Augustulus resigns his throne to their general, Odoacer. Odoacer agrees to become king of Italy while Zeno of Constantinople becomes emperor of the nominally re-combined Eastern and Western Roman empires. 476 The Roman emperor Zeno makes an agreement with the Vandal king Genseric, formally recognizing the Vandal kingdom as including the Roman province of Africa, the Balearic Isles, Pithecusae, Corsica, Sardinia, and Sicily. Genseric gives Sicily, with the exception of the city of Lilybaeum, to Odoacer, the Germanic king of Italy, in return for tribute. 482 Justinian I (Flavius Justinianus), Eastern Roman emperor 527–65, nephew of Justin I, born in Tauresium, Moesia (near the modern Niš, Serbia) (–565). c. 493 The Ostrogoth king Theodoric invites Odoacer, King of Italy (whom he defeated in 489), and his son to a peace treaty and feast at Ravenna, where he assassinates them. Theodoric extends his realm to the western Balkans and to Sicily and settles down as a king with nominal subordination to the Eastern Roman emperor at Constantinople. Cassiodorus, the historian, becomes his secretary (probably at a fairly early age, although his date of birth is unknown). c. 499 The Babylonian version of the Talmud, a collection of rabbinical literature, is completed. Consisting of the Mishnah (the codified Jewish laws) and the Gemara (discussions of those laws), it is completed approximately a hundred years later than the Palestinian version and is more comprehensive.

The Dark Ages (500–999) c. 500'Arturus, Dux Bellorum', the legendary King Arthur, takes up the struggle against the Saxons. In 12 battles he subdues the Saxons, the last battle being at Mons Badonicus (site unknown). Arthur is a 'war leader', a Christian RomanoBriton, who defeats the Saxons with a mobile field army of armoured cavalrymen, the typical army of the British chieftains. The authenticity and provenance of Arthur are ever in dispute, but not his date. c. 500 By the end of the 5th century nation and culture.

AD,

the Japanese have coalesced into one

c. 500 The habit of tea drinking becomes popular in southern China, a custom which has probably been imported from Tibet. c. 500 Theodora, Byzantine empress, influential wife of Justinian I (527–65),

born (–548). c. 501 The Indian medical manual Susruta is compiled. It becomes a standard text for Indian physicians. 507–510 Clovis, King of the Franks, defeats the Visigoth Alaric II at the battle of Vouglé, near Poitiers. Clovis ends the division between the Riparian and Salic Franks, thus uniting under his rule all the Franks on the left bank of the Rhine, and moves his capital to Paris. 508 The Ostrogoths under Theodoric take southern Gaul from the Franks. Clovis, King of the Franks, establishes his capital at Lutetia (present-day Paris). 27 November 511 Clovis I, Merovingian founder of the Frankish kingdom, dies (c. 45). 511 On his death, Clovis, king of the Franks, leaves his kingdom (in modern France and Germany) to his four sons. They soon expand it, imposing their rule over the Franks on the right bank of the River Rhine. 516 The Indian astronomer and mathematician Aryabhata I produces his Aryabhatiya, a treatise on quadratic equations, the value of π, and other scientific problems, in which he adds tilted epicycles to the orbits of the planets to explain their movement. c. 521 St Columba, Irish abbot and missionary, traditionally considered chiefly responsible for converting Scotland to the Christian faith, born in Tyrconnell, in modern County Donegal, Ireland (–597). 523 While imprisoned in Rome for suspected treason, the philosopher Boethius writes his De consolatione philosophiae/On the Consolation of Philosophy, a prose dialogue in which the lady, Philosophy, responds to Boethius's misfortunes with Stoic, Platonic, and Christian advice. 526 A massive earthquake in Asia Minor destroys the city of Antioch, and kills over 200,000 people. 528 The White Hun king Mihirakula (sometimes called the Attila of India) is deposed and the Hunnish invasion of India, which never produces a kingdom, begins to lose its force. 529 St Benedict of Nurcia establishes the first Benedictine monastery and hospital at Monte Cassino, near Naples, Italy. The monastery will become a centre of medical knowledge throughout the Middle Ages. 529 The first Codex Constitutionum of the eastern Roman emperor Justinian is issued. It is a list of all the enactments of the emperors and their answers to still valid legal questions. It is known later as Codex Iustinianus.

530 St Brendan explores the Atlantic in an Irish curragh, or coracle, and is said to have reached America. Early Irish monks certainly reached the Shetland Islands and Iceland. 532 The building of the great Church of Holy Wisdom, Hagia Sophia, is begun in Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) at the command of the emperor Justinian. It is designed by two mathematicians, Anthemius of Tralles and Isidorus of Miletus. 532 The Eastern Roman emperor Justinian patches up an expensive peace with Sasanian Persia and plans to send his general Belisarius on the first campaign to fulfil his own great ambition of re-unifying the Roman Empire by taking Africa back from the Vandals. Belisarius is accompanied by the historian Procopius of Caesarea. 533–534 The Eastern Roman general Belisarius sets sail to win back Vandal Africa for the Empire. He takes Carthage and decisively defeats the Vandal king Gelimar at Tricamarum, effectively destroying the Vandals as a political power. North Africa remains part of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) empire until its conquest by the Arabs in the following century. 536 Dust from volcanic eruptions in Southeast Asia is flung high in the atmosphere, blocking out sunlight and cooling the climate, causing a severe winter as far away as Europe, where the Mediterranean is covered by a 'dry fog'. 536–540 The Roman general Belisarius captures Naples and enters Rome unopposed. Witigis, new king of the Ostrogoths, besieges Belisarius in Rome but gives up after a year. Belisarius in turn besieges Ravenna, which finally capitulates. 540 St Gregory, Pope Gregory I the Great 590–604, theologian and reformer of church organization and liturgy, born in Rome, Italy (–604). 541 Wen Ti, Chinese emperor 581–604 who reunified and reorganized China, and founded the Sui dynasty, born in China (–604). 542 Huge numbers of invading rats from Egypt bring bubonic plague to Constantinople. In the following years, it will spread across the whole of Europe. June 548 Theodora, Byzantine empress, influential wife of Justinian I (527–65), dies (48). 548–549 The Roman general Belisarius is recalled to Constantinople and the Ostrogoth king Totila recaptures most of Italy. 550 The Toltecs conquer the city of Teotihuacán in the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, overcoming its ancient civilization.

551 The Avars, a central Asian nomadic people, begin to migrate into eastern Europe via the south of modern Russia. They ultimately drive the Lombards into Italy, and settle in the Balkans. 551–553 The Roman general Narses, successor to Belisarius, defeats the Ostrogoth Totila and expels the Goths from Italy. Narses uses Lombard mercenaries. 553 By the end of the Gothic war, Italy is economically ruined. Rome's population has dwindled to about 40,000, with its aristocracy so depleted that the Senate peters out. 563 St Columba flees from Ireland and founds a monastery on the Hebridean island of Iona, from where he sends out missionaries to mainland Britain. Iona becomes a great centre of book copying and illustration. November 565 Justinian I (Flavius Justinianus), Eastern Roman emperor 527–65, nephew of Justin I, dies in Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) (c. 83). 568 Up to 130,000 Lombards, led by King Alboin, pressed from behind by Avars, cross the Alps into the plains of the River Po and overrun northern Italy. With the emperor Justinian and his general Belisarius dead and the general Narses deposed and disgraced, the Eastern Roman Empire is unable to halt their advance. 570 Muhammad, founder of Islam, born in Mecca, Arabia (–632). 579–581 The Eastern Roman general Maurice continues his successful campaign against Sasanian Persia, which has now lost its great king, Chosroes I. 586–601 During Recarred's reign, Visigoth Spain converts from Arian to orthodox Catholic Christianity. 589 China approaches unity again under the warlike Yang Chien of the shortlived Sui dynasty. 590 St Gregory, now abbot of St Andrew's monastery in Rome, is elected as pope. He sets about reforming the administration of the church and establishing its temporal authority. 590 The usurping general Bahram seizes the Sasanian Persian throne, forcing the young King Chosroes II to flee to Syria where he seeks Roman protection. The emperor Maurice re-establishes him firmly on the Sasanian throne and makes a favourable peace with him. 8 June 597 St Columba, Irish abbot and important missionary, traditionally considered chiefly responsible for converting Scotland to the Christian faith, dies on the island of Iona, in modern Scotland (c. 76).

598–665 Indian mathematician and astronomer Brahmagupta uses negative numbers in mathematics, and introduces a method of approximation for calculating the sines of small angles. 602 Determined to break the power of the nomadic Avars, the Eastern Roman emperor Maurice orders his army to winter in the Avar territory on the River Danube. His decision is unpopular and rebellion erupts under the leadership of Phocas, an uneducated centurion. When Maurice is killed while attempting to escape from Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) to seek help from his ally King Chosroes II of Sassanian Persia, Phocas becomes emperor in Maurice's place. 602 Mu'awiyah I (also Moawiyah), caliph 661–80, founder of the Umayyad dynasty, who assumed the caliphate after the assassination of 'Ali, reunified the Arab empire, and transferred the capital to Damascus, born in Mecca (–680). 604 St Gregory, Pope Gregory I the Great 590–604, theologian and reformer of church organization and liturgy, dies in Rome, Italy (c. 64). 604 The Japanese regent, Prince Shotoku Taishi, introduces a Chinese-influenced constitution to increase the power of the Japanese emperors. 604 Wen Ti, Chinese emperor 581–604 who reunified and reorganized China, and founded the Sui dynasty, dies in China (65). 605–647 During his reign of over 40 years, King Harsha of Kanauj, on the River Ganges, brings most of northern India under his control. He is the last Indian king to rule a more than purely regional state until the 13th century. 605–649 During his 44-year reign, King Srong-btsan-Gyam-po unites the Tibetans in a powerful kingdom, annexes the area of modern Nepal, and builds himself a capital at Lhasa. For the next 200 years Tibet is the major power of central Asia. 606 The Sasanian Persians conquer northern Mesopotamia from the Eastern Roman Empire and advance west across the River Euphrates. Phocas, the Eastern Roman emperor, fails to organize an effective defence. 607 Prince Shotoku Taishi of Japan founds the Buddhist Horyuji temple complex near Nara. It is the earliest surviving example of Sino-Japanese architecture and the oldest existing wooden structure. 610 The first stretch of the Chinese Grand Canal, which will ultimately stretch 1,000 km/620 mi and link Beijing with the Chang Jiang River, is opened. 610 The young Heraclius, son of the military governor of Roman Africa, deposes the usurper Phocas and becomes Eastern Roman emperor himself. Phocas, an incompetent and despotical ruler, has allowed the administrative structure of the Empire to decay and Heraclius is forced to undertake fundamental reforms in the following years: these are so far-reaching that the Eastern Roman Empire is

subsequently known to historians as the Byzantine Empire after the old Greek name for Constantinople, Byzantion. 610 While sleeping in a cave near Mecca (in modern Saudi Arabia), the Arab prophet and founder of Islam, Muhammad, has a vision of the angel Gabriel who announces that he is 'the messenger of God'. Muhammad subsequently experiences revelations that he believes to come directly from God. He confides his vision to his wife Khadija and his immediate family. 614 After dominating Frankish politics for 20 years, the ruthless queen Brunhild is executed by the young Chlotar II who reunites the (Merovingian) Frankish kingdom under a single ruler after 50 years of civil wars. 614 King Chosroes II of Sasanian Persia declares holy war on the Christian Byzantine Empire and sacks Jerusalem, capturing the True Cross. His victories over the Byzantines earn Chosroes the nickname Parvez ('the Victorious'). 614 St Hilda of Whitby, one of the leading abbesses of Anglo-Saxon England, founder of Whitby Abbey, born in Northumbria, England (–680). 24 February 616 Aethelbert I, King of Kent (560–616), who issued the first code of Angle-Saxon laws, dies. 616–619 King Chosroes II of Persia conquers Byzantine Egypt and Asia Minor. He occupies both Alexandria in Egypt and Chalcedon, across the Bosporus from Constantinople. Byzantine control of the sea prevents Chosroes from attacking Constantinople but the loss of corn supplies from Egypt causes hardship in the city. 622 Faced with the opposition of the city authorities, Mohammed flees from Mecca to Yathrib (Medina) where he establishes himself as a religious and political leader. His faith becomes known as Islam, the 'submission' to Allah, and his followers are called Muslims, 'those who submit'. Mohammed's flight, known as the Hegira, marks the beginning of the Muslim era. 622 Isidore, the scholarly bishop of Seville, compiles his Originum sive etymologiarum/Etymologies, an encyclopedia of the arts and sciences, which also founds the study of etymology – the origin of words. Despite its unreliability, it remains influential throughout the Middle Ages. 622–627 Using the Byzantine fleet to bypass the Persian army occupying Asia Minor, the Byzantine emperor Heraclius sets out on a brilliant campaign against the Persians, penetrating as far as Hamadan. The warlike Persian king Chosroes II has retired from active campaigning and his generals are much less successful against the Byzantines. 625 Wu Hou, Chinese concubine who became Empress of China 655–705, and unified the Chinese Empire, born in China (–705).

626 Gaozu, the first emperor of the Chinese Tang dynasty, is overthrown by his son Taizong, one of the ablest rulers in Chinese history. Under his rule trade and agriculture prosper and Chinese control is extended far into central Asia. 628 When King Chosroes II of Sassanian Persia is murdered by his son following his defeat by the Byzantines at Nineveh, Mesopotamia, in 627, the Byzantine emperor Heraclius makes an advantageous peace with the Sassanian Empire. Both the Byzantine and Sassanian Persian empires have been severely weakened by their 24-year long war. 630 The Arab prophet and founder of Islam, Muhammad, captures the city of Mecca (in modern Saudi Arabia) and declares its ancient pagan shrine, the Kaaba, to be the holy place of Islam. Medina (also in modern Saudi Arabia) remains his capital, however. 630–668 During the reign of Narasimhavarman I, the Pallava dynasty is the dominant power of southern India. After his death, the Pallava kingdom comes under pressure from the Chalukyas and goes into decline, disappearing about 900. 8 June 632 Muhammad, founder of Islam, dies in Medina, Arabia (62). 632 Abu Bakr, the successor to the founder of Islam Muhammad, suppresses an anti-Islamic Arab revolt with the aid of his general Khalid and launches raids on Byzantine Syria. 23 August 634 Abu Bakr, companion of the prophet Muhammad and first caliph 632–34, who brought central Arabia under Muslim control, and began Arab expansion into Persia and Syria, dies. August 634 Umar succeeds Abu Bakr as the second caliph (civic and religious leader of Islam) and adopts the title 'commander of the faithful'. A stern but just ruler, Umar sees the Arab caliphate become the dominant power of the Middle East during his ten-year reign. August 636 The Arab general Khalid defeats the Byzantine emperor Heraclius at a decisive engagement on the Yarmuk River near Damascus, Syria, opening the way for the Arab conquest of Syria and Palestine. June–September 637 The Persian general Rustam, with an army of 50,000 men, is defeated by a much smaller Arab army under Sa'd in a three-day battle at Qadisiya in Persia (modern Iraq). The Persian capital at Ctesiphon falls to the Arab army three months later. January 638 The Byzantine patriarch Sophronios surrenders Jerusalem to the Arab caliph Umar after a long siege. The city is subsequently regarded as a holy place by Muslims as well as Christians and Jews. 640 Slav tribes, later known as the Serbs and Croats, settle in the old Roman

provinces of Pannonia (modern Hungary) and Illyria (Dalmatia, modern Croatia). They adopt the Greek and Roman forms of Christianity respectively. 642 The death of Oswald, the Christian king of Northumbria, at the hands of Penda, the pagan king of Mercia, at the Battle of Maserfelth (probably near modern Oswestry, Shropshire, England), marks the rise of Mercia at the expense of Northumbria. 644 Following the murder of the Arab caliph Umar by a Persian slave, he is succeeded by Uthman, who centralizes the administration of the Arab caliphate and promulgates an official version of the Koran, the written record of the Islamic prophet Muhammad's teachings. c. 650 The Chinese invent the horse collar, which enables the animal to pull from the shoulders without restricting its wind-pipe, leading to great improvements in transport and agriculture. 653 Yezdegird III, the last king of the Sasanian dynasty of Persia, is murdered at Merv (in modern Turkmenistan), bringing Persian resistance to the Arabs to a complete end. 17 June 656 The rapid growth of the Arab caliphate causes social and political tensions, culminating in the murder of the caliph Uthman in his own home in Medina (in modern Saudi Arabia) by rebel soldiers. The Islamic prophet Muhammad's son-in-law, Ali, becomes the fourth caliph, though many suspect him of complicity in Uthman's murder. December 656 Muawiya of the Umayyad clan revolts but is defeated by Ali, the caliph of Islam, at the Battle of the Camel at Khoraiba in South Iraq. Muawiya is supported by the Islamic prophet Muhammad's widow, Aisha, who commands her contingent of troops from the back of a camel, from which the battle gets its name. July 661 On the death of caliph Ali, Muawiya becomes the fifth caliph of Islam, founding the Umayyad dynasty. He realizes that Medina (in modern Saudi Arabia) is too remote from the new centres of Arab power in Syria, Iraq, and Egypt, and moves the capital of the Arab caliphate to Damascus, Syria. 673 St Bede (Baeda or Beda; 'the Venerable Bede'), Anglo-Saxon theologian, historian, and chronologist, known chiefly for his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum/Ecclesiastical History of the English People, born, possibly in Monkton in Jarrow, Northumbria, England (–735). 677 Having suffered heavy losses in their seven-year siege of the city, the Arab army retreats from the Byzantine capital Constantinople. The Byzantine emperor, Constantine IV, who has led the defence, makes an advantageous peace with them. 17 November 680 St Hilda of Whitby, one of the leading abbesses of Anglo-

Saxon England, founder of Whitby Abbey, dies in Whitby, Northumbria, England (c. 66). 680 Following the death of the caliph Muawiya, a war of succession once again breaks out among the Arabs. Husein, a son of the murdered 4th caliph, Ali (ibn Abi Talib), responds to an appeal to seize the leadership but is to be defeated and killed (at Karbala in modern Iraq) by supporters of Muawiya's son Yazid, who becomes caliph. Husein is regarded as a martyr by those who believe that the caliphate can only rightly be held by a descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and they break away to form the minority Shiite movement of Islam. 680 Mu'awiyah I (also Moawiyah), caliph 661–80, founder of the Umayyad dynasty, who assumed the caliphate after the assassination of Ali (ibn Abi Talib), who reunified the Arab empire and transferred the capital to Damascus, dies in Damascus (c. 78). c. 680 Indian mathematicians develop what is now known as the Hindu-Arabic decimal place–value system. Using a multiplicative system to base ten, and employing the number zero, this becomes the basis of the modern Western number system. 683 On the death of her husband, the Chinese emperor Gaozong, the empress Wu Hou exiles his successor, her elder son Zhongzong, and appoints her weak younger son Ruizong emperor while retaining real power for herself. 687 Pepin the Stout, mayor of the palace (administrator of the royal court of the Merovingian Frankish dynasty), defeats his rivals at the Battle of Tertry and becomes the effective ruler of all the Frankish kingdom (except Aquitaine). He gives himself the title Dux et Princeps Francorum ('Duke and Prince of the Franks') but does not depose the Merovingian king, Theuderic III, who is maintained as a powerless figurehead. 688 The Byzantine emperor, Justinian II, recovers Macedonia and Thrace from the Slavs. Many Slavs are drafted into the Byzantine army while thousands of others are deported and resettled as farmers in northwest Anatolia under the title of 'the Abundant People'. 691 On the orders of Caliph Abd-al-Malik, work begins on a Muslim shrine in Jerusalem. Built on the rock from which Muhammad is supposed to have ascended into heaven, the shrine later becomes a mosque and is known as the 'Dome of the Rock' or the Mosque of Omar. It is the first major monument in Islamic history. 695 The Byzantine emperor Justinian II provokes a rebellion by his ruthless taxation policies. He is captured by Leontius, a malcontent general, who cuts off Justinian's nose and banishes him to the Crimea before assuming the throne himself. 697 The Arabs recapture Carthage, the capital of Byzantine Africa, and the

Byzantines are never able to recover it. Following this defeat the Byzantine navy rebels against the emperor, Leontius, who has his nose cut off and is banished. The general Apsimar becomes emperor under the name Tiberius II. c. 699 An epic poem in Old English describing the exploits of the dragon-slaying hero Beowulf is completed. The finest surviving achievement of Anglo-Saxon poetry, it was probably written in England though set in Scandinavia. c. 700 King Ine of Wessex, England, issues one of the earliest written AngloSaxon law codes. The fact that the area, which includes the modern counties of Dorset and Somerset, still contains many Celts, is shown by a reference to a separate class called Welshmen. Most crimes are punishable by payments of compensation to the victims or their families. c. 700 Teotihuacán in the Valley of Mexico, for over 500 years the dominant power of Mesoamerica (the area of the Mexican and Mayan civilizations), is sacked and burnt by unknown attackers and abandoned. 702 The Arab governor in Byzantine Africa, Musa, completes the pacification of the Berbers (also known as Moors) and they soon become enthusiastic converts to Islam. 704 The earliest known printed book, the Buddhist text Dharani Sutra, is written; it is discovered in modern South Korea on 14 October 1966. February 705 Popular discontent directed against her depraved courtiers leads to a rebellion against the empress Wu Hou of China. She is compelled to abdicate in favour of her son Zhongzong, and she retires to her palace where she is later to die. 16 December 705 Wu Hou, Chinese concubine who became empress of China 655–705, and who unified the Chinese Empire, dies in China (80). 705 Aided by Tervel, Khan (ruler) of the Bulgars, the exiled Byzantine emperor Justinian II returns to Constantinople and the deposed emperor Leontius, his successor, Tiberius II, and most of their followers are massacred. 7 July 711 At the invitation of the rebel governor of Ceuta, the Arabs and their Moorish allies invade the Visigoth kingdom of Spain. Led by the Moorish chief Tariq, the Muslim army lands at Gibraltar (Jebel el-Tariq, 'the mountain of Tariq'). At the battles of Guadelete and Ecija the smaller Arab army decisively defeats Roderick, the last Visigoth king of Spain, and before the end of the year the Visigoth capital of Toledo falls without resistance. Except for the mountainous northwest, all of Spain comes under Muslim control within two years. 711 The Byzantine emperor Justinian II's ruthless pursuit of his political opponents causes discontent and fear. When he sends an expedition to punish the people of Cherson who ill-treated him while in exile in the Crimea, the army

and navy rebel. Bardanes, an Armenian general, is proclaimed emperor (under the name Philipicus). He sails to Constantinople and captures and executes Justinian and his family. 713 Xuanzong becomes the sixth emperor of the Chinese Tang dynasty. During his long and prosperous reign (43 years), the Tang dynasty achieves its greatest power and prestige. 714–717 The Frankish mayor of the palace, Pepin II the Stout, dies. After three years of civil war, his illegitimate son Charles Martel the Hammer makes himself undisputed ruler of the Frankish kingdom, uniting Neustria and Austrasia. Like his father before him, Charles rules in the capacity of mayor of the palace, maintaining the Merovingian king, Chilperic III, as a powerless figurehead. 716–717 The Byzantine emperor Anastasius II is deposed while attempting to discipline his army. He is followed, unwillingly, by Theodosius III, who abdicates the following year in favour of the general of the army in Asia Minor and a saviour of the Empire, Leo III the Isaurian. 717 The Arabs make their last and greatest effort to take Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire. The city's walls and defenders both hold out through a winter siege and the Arabs retreat with heavy losses. 718 Resistance to the Arabs has continued in northwest Spain, and following a convincing victory at Covadonga, the Visigoth Pelaya makes himself king of Asturias. In Spanish tradition this victory marks the beginning of the Christian Reconquista ('Reconquest'). 725 Charles Martel, the Frankish mayor of the palace, defeats an invasion of the Frankish kingdom by the Alemanni and Saxons. The invading Arabs, moving northwards, take the town of Autun (now in central France), but Duke Eudo of Aquitaine stops their further advance. 730 Byzantine emperor Leo III's iconoclasm arouses much opposition in the Empire and a rival emperor is proclaimed in Greece but he and his fleet are defeated while attempting to capture the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. Of more lasting consequence, it also arouses great hostility in the Latin West where religious images have great importance as teaching aids in missionary activity, thus beginning the gradual alienation of the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches. Pope Gregory II refuses to implement the decree. The monk John of Damascus attacks the Iconoclasts in a series of pamphlets. He remains safe from persecution by Leo III because he resides in Muslim territory. c. 731 The English Benedictine scholar Bede completes his greatest surviving work, Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum/Ecclesiastical History of the English People. 732 The Arab general Abd-ar-Rahman resumes the offensive against Duke Eudo of Aquitaine. Eudo is forced to appeal for help to the Frankish mayor of the

palace, Charles Martel, who defeats Abd-ar-Rahman at the Battle of Tours (sometimes called the Battle of Poitiers) in the Frankish kingdom, decisively halting the advance of the Arabs into Europe. As a result of this victory Charles Martel earns his title of Martel the Hammer. 25 May 735 St Bede (Baeda or Beda; 'the Venerable Bede'), Anglo-Saxon theologian, historian, and chronologist, known chiefly for his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum/Ecclesiastical History of the English People (731), dies in Jarrow, England (c. 63). 739 The Frankish mayor of the palace, Charles Martel, supported by King Liutprand of the Lombards of northern Italy, finally succeeds in driving the Arabs and Moors out of Provence, southern France, having laid waste to much of the countryside and burned the amphitheatre at Nîmes. 741 Pepin the Short and Carloman jointly succeed their father, Charles Martel, as Frankish mayors of the palace – Carloman is to rule the west (Neustria) and Pepin the east (Austrasia). Zacharias succeeds Gregory III as pope; Walid II succeeds Hisham as caliph (ruler of the Islamic world); and Constantine V, a militant iconoclast, succeeds Leo III the Isaurian as Byzantine emperor. 2 April 742 Charlemagne (Carolus Magnus), King of the Franks 768–814 and Frankish emperor 800–14, who united much of Western Europe under his rule, born (–814). 750 Abu-al-Abbas, founder of the Abbasid dynasty of Arab Islamic rulers, defeats the Umayyad caliph Merwan II at the Battle of the River Zab. Merwan flees to Egypt but is caught and killed and his head is sent to Abu. Abu-al-Abbas's victory is followed by a general massacre of the Umayyad family and of members of his own family whose popularity he fears, for which he earns the nickname asSaffah, 'the blood-shedder'. 751 Following an appeal from the ruler of Tashkent for military assistance, the Arabs defeat the Chinese at the Battle of the Talas River near Samarkand, causing the collapse of the Chinese Empire in central Asia. Chinese craftsmen captured after the battle introduce papermaking into the Middle East. 751 Islamic craftsmen in the Middle East learn the secret of paper manufacture from Chinese captured during the Muslim conquest of Samarkand. The Arab paper industry rapidly develops. 751 With Pope Zacharias's support, the Frankish mayor of the palace Pepin the Short deposes Childeric III, the last king of the Merovingian dynasty, and is crowned king of the Franks by St Boniface at Soissons in the Frankish kingdom, founding the Carolingian dynasty. Childeric, who has been a mere figurehead under Pepin's control, is allowed to retire to a monastery. 755 The threat of frequent invasions by the Tibetans and steppe nomads leads to a build-up of the Chinese army and an increase in the power of the military

governors, culminating in the rebellion of An Lushan, a general of Turkish origin. He seizes the capital Siking (modern Xian), forcing Emperor Xuanzong to flee. Shortly after he is forced to abdicate in favour of his son, Suzong. 756 The Moors in Spain break away from the Abbasid caliphate to form an independent emirate under Abd-ar-Rahman I, one of the few survivors of the Abbasid caliph Abu-al-Abbas's massacre of the Umayyad family in 750. He makes the southern Spanish city of Córdoba his capital. This marks the beginning of the break-up of the political unity of the Muslim world which has endured since the time of Muhammad, the prophet and founder of Islam. 757 A short civil war following the death of King Aethelbald results in his cousin Offa becoming king of Mercia, England. Offa reigns for 39 years and brings about the height of Mercian power, making it the leading Anglo-Saxon kingdom. He is addressed by the Popes as 'king of England' without qualification. During his reign he builds a 272-km/69-mi-long rampart ('Offa's Dyke') to define the border between his kingdom and the Welsh, one of the most ambitious engineering works of early medieval Europe. 757 When King Aistulf of Lombardy again threatens Rome, the Frankish king Pepin the Short again invades Italy in support of Pope Stephen III. Pepin takes the city of Ravenna from the Lombards and gives it to the Pope – the so-called 'Donation of Pepin'. Aistulf dies following a riding accident soon afterwards and is succeeded by Desiderius. 760 At Ellora, in the Deccan province of India, the monolithic Kailasa cave temple represents the high point of Indian rock-cut architecture. Kailasa is a Hindu temple, but Ellora also contains fine Buddhist and Jain temples. 760 On the death of the sixth Imam, his eldest son, Ismail, is only recognized as his successor by a minority of Shia Muslims. His followers call themselves Ismailis. 762 Persian, Greek, and Jewish scholars flock to Caliph Mansur's newly established capital at Baghdad, in modern Iraq. The books of classical Greek science begin to be translated into Arabic. 763 The rebellion against the Chinese Tang dynasty, begun by An Lushan in 755, is finally put down, but the authority of the dynasty has been permanently weakened. Tibetans sack the Chinese capital, Changan (modern Xian), which has only just been recaptured from the rebels. February 766 Haroun al-Rashid, fifth caliph of the Islamic Abbasid dynasty 786–809, who made Baghdad wealthy and whose court was immortalized in Alf Laylah wa-Laylah/A Thousand and One Nights – The Arabian Nights, born in Rayy, Persia (–809). 768 The accession of Charlemagne as king of the Franks marks the beginnings of medieval civilization as the king gathers to his court artists and scholars from across the world. Contemporaries call the period a renovatio, the renewal of a

surviving tradition of Christian art and learning. 772 Muslim astronomer Al-Fazari translates the Indian astronomical compendium Mahasiddhanta/Treatise on Astronomy. 774 The Lombard city of Pavia is taken by the Franks and Charlemagne, King of the Franks, banishes the Lombard king, Desiderius, to a monastery. Charlemagne promptly assumes the crown of Lombardy in northern Italy, confirms his father's 'donation' to the papacy of 757, and accepts the role of protector of the church. Charlemagne and Pope Hadrian I become close friends and allies. 776 The abbey church of Saint-Denis in Paris, France, is consecrated in the presence of Emperor Charlemagne. It is designed with a three-aisled Roman basilica with two towers at the west end. 780 Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Muslim theologian, who founded a school of Islamic law called the Hanbali and adopted a traditionalist approach in interpreting and codifying the legal aspects of the Koran (the sharia), born in Baghdad, Persia (–855). 786 The death of Abbasid caliph Al Hadi leads to the accession of his younger brother, Harun ar-Rashid, to the throne. Al Hadi is said to have been murdered by his mother, who favours Harun. Harun makes Yahya the Barmakid his vizier and awards him and his four sons great powers. Harun reigns until 809, presiding over a golden age of Arab civilization. c. 786 The Abbasid caliph Harun ar-Rashid encourages artistic activity at his court. Stories, founded on an earlier Persian collection of tales, are recorded in the archives and give rise to the legend of Scheherezade and the Alf Laylah waLaylah/A Thousand and One Nights – The Arabian Nights. Some of the tales involve Harun and his friend the great lyric poet Abu Nuwas. 787 Charlemagne, King of the Franks and Lombards, issues a directive to his bishops encouraging the study of Latin literature and language in monasteries and bishop's houses. The palace school at Aachen, in the Frankish kingdom, becomes one of Europe's greatest centres of scholarship and learning. 789 The first recorded Viking raid in England occurs at Portland in the kingdom of Wessex. The king's reeve Beaduheard is murdered when he mistakes the Norsemen for merchants. 791 Charlemagne, King of the Franks and Lombards, launches a meticulously planned attack on the Avars, a Hunnish nomad people settled in Pannonia (modern Hungary). Avar resistance collapses almost immediately and Charlemagne's armies spend 52 days plundering the Avar lands, taking many prisoners and much treasure. The death of thousands of horses in an epidemic at the end of the expedition prevents major campaigning the following year. 791 Following a crushing defeat by the Tibetans at Tingzhou, the Chinese lose

control of the strategic Gansu Corridor, shutting them out of central Asia for nearly a thousand years. 792 King Offa of Mercia annexes the minor Anglo-Saxon kingdom of East Anglia to Mercia. Of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, only Wessex and Northumbria retain their independence of Mercia. 795 On the death of Hadrian I, Leo III becomes pope. He immediately recognizes Charlemagne, King of the Franks, as 'patrician of the Romans'. 797 The Byzantine empress Irene deposes and blinds her son, the emperor Constantine VI, and reigns as emperor (not empress). 799 The last monuments are erected at the Mayan city of Palenque in Mesoamerica (the area of the Mexican and Mayan civilizations): it is abandoned soon afterwards, marking the beginning of the decline of the Classic Maya civilization. The causes of the decline are unknown but the most likely explanation is that soil exhaustion caused by overcultivation leads to the collapse of agriculture. c. 799 Shankara, the Brahman philosopher and theologian, is active in this period. An exponent of the Advaita Vedanta school, he writes commentaries on the Upanishads, Hindu philosophical writings, which affirm his belief in an everlasting and unchanging reality. 25 December 800 Charlemagne, King of the Franks and Lombards, is crowned Emperor of the Romans by Pope Leo III in Rome on Christmas Day. The coronation ceremony consciously recalls those of the Western Roman Empire, which fell in 476, but the Byzantines refuse to recognize his title as a successor. 800 An astronomical altar known as 'the hitching post of the Sun' is built in the Peruvian city of Machu Picchu, and is used to measure solar and lunar movements with great accuracy. 800 Muslim scholar Al-Batriq produces Arabic translations of major works by the Greek physicians Galen and Hippocrates; they will have a lasting effect on Arab medicine. c. 800 Tea is introduced to Japan from China as a medicine. 801 The Spanish city of Barcelona is taken by the Franks from the Moors after a two-year siege. The Abbasid caliph Harun ar-Rashid sends the Frankish emperor, Charlemagne, an elephant as a present. 802 Jayavarman II, a minor king in the Angkor district of southeast Asia (modern Cambodia), declares himself devaraja ('god king'); he unites the Khmer peoples and founds the Khmer empire.

805 Returning from China, Saicho introduces the T'ien T'ai school of Buddhism to Japan where it is known as Tendai. Tendai teaches that the Buddha-nature within everyone can be realized through ethical behaviour and discipline. 806 The Abbasid caliph (ruler of the Islamic world) Harun ar-Rashid invades Anatolia with a force of 135,000 men and takes Heraclea and other places in Cappadocia, Asia Minor, forcing the Byzantine emperor Nicephorus I to resume payment of tribute. 24 March 809 Harun ar-Rashid, 5th caliph of the Abbasid dynasty 786–809, who made Baghdad wealthy and whose court was immortalized in Alf Laylah waLaylah/A Thousand and One Nights – The Arabian Nights, dies in Tus, Persia (43). 24 March 809 When the Abbasid caliph Harun ar-Rashid falls ill and dies after suppressing a revolt in Samarkand, his Muslim Arab empire is divided between his sons, al-Ma'mun and al-Amin. 810 The Danish king, Godfred, ravages Frisia with a large fleet, exacting a large tribute, and threatens to attack the Frankish emperor Charlemagne's capital, Aachen. Shortly afterwards, Godfred is murdered and is succeeded by his nephew Hemming who makes peace with Charlemagne. 26 July 811 The Byzantine emperor, Nicephorus I, is killed when his army is ambushed in a mountain pass by the Bulgars. The Bulgar khan, Krum, has Nicephorus's skull lined with silver for use as a drinking cup. 28 January 814 Charlemagne (Carolus Magnus), king of the Franks 768–814 and Frankish emperor 800–14, who united much of Western Europe under his rule, dies (in Aachen, modern Germany) (71). 815 King Egbert of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex, England, conquers the Britons (Welsh) of Cornwall. 816 Pope Stephen IV crowns Louis I the Pious as King of the Franks and Emperor of the West at Reims, in the Frankish Empire (now France). In the Pactum Hlodovicianum, Louis confirms the territories around Rome as papal possessions in Italy. 816 The Council of Chelsea, a church council convened at King Offa's palace, introduces the anno Domini system of dating into England. 7 July 817 In an attempt to end the factional rivalry of the Sunni Muslims and breakaway minority Shiite Muslims, the Abbasid caliph al-Ma'mun appoints Ali alRida, leader of the Shiites, as his heir. This proves unacceptable to the Sunnite majority, however, and a revolt breaks out in Baghdad (in modern Iraq). 819 The Abbasid caliph al-Ma'mun abandons his attempt at reconciliation with the Shiite Muslims, bringing the rebellion against him at Baghdad (in modern Iraq) to an end.

25 December 820 The Byzantine emperor, Leo V, is murdered during a Christmas Day service by supporters of Michael the Amorian, who is under sentence of death for treason. He becomes emperor as Michael II. 824 The Frankish emperor, Louis I the Pious, sends his son, the co-emperor Lothair I, to Rome to order the affairs of the papacy. The Constitutio Romana ('Roman Constitution') defines an imperial role in papal elections and requires popes to swear allegiance to the Frankish emperors. 825 In one of the most important battles in English history, King Egbert of Wessex defeats King Beornwulf of Mercia at Ellandun (now Nether Wroughton, Wiltshire). Later the same year, Beornwulf is killed when the East Anglians rebel against Mercian control and Egbert conquers Kent, Sussex, and Essex, making Wessex the strongest Anglo-Saxon kingdom. 827 Muslim scholar Al-Hajjaj translates the 2nd-century Egyptian astronomer Ptolemy's Great Mathematical Compilation into Arabic, as al-Majisti. It is later known as simply the Almagest. 830 Einhard, an adviser to the Frankish emperors Charlemagne and Louis I the Pious, retires to Seligenstadt, Franconia, and begins his Vita Karoli Magni/Life of Charlemagne. Modelled on Suetonius'Lives of the Caesars, it presents a lively picture of the emperor's character and achievements. c. 830 Basil the Macedonian, Byzantine emperor (867–86), who founded the Macedonian dynasty and formulated the Basilica, the Byzantine legal code, born in Thrace (–886). 833 The Chinese Tang dynasty emperor, Wenzong, attempts to reduce the influence of the palace eunuchs. His plot misfires and the eunuchs massacre his chief ministers in 'the Sweet Dew Incident', greatly enhancing their power as a result. 1 March 834 Louis I the Pious is restored as Frankish emperor by his eldest son, Lothair I, after he quarrels with his brothers, Louis the German and Pepin. 834 Taking advantage of the political problems of the Frankish Empire, the Vikings sail down the River Rhine and sack Dorestadt (near Utrecht, in the modern Netherlands), the empire's richest and largest port. 836–890 After the disasters of Ramabhadra's reign, his son, King Bhoja I, restores the Gurjara kingdom as the leading power of northern India. 837 Louis I the Pious, King of the Franks and Emperor of the West, despatches missi (itinerant officers) to restore order in Frisia in the north of the Frankish Empire, which has been badly hit by Viking raids. Vikings attack a coastguard fort on the island of Walcheren at the mouth of the River Rhine and many senior

officers are killed or captured. 20 June 840 The Frankish emperor, Louis I the Pious, dies shortly after an expedition to put down a rebellion by his son Louis the German. He is succeeded as emperor by his eldest son, Lothair I, who is immediately embroiled in territorial disputes with his brothers, Louis the German and Charles the Bald, over their share of the empire. 841 Norwegian Vikings found a permanent raiding base at the mouth of the River Liffey in Ireland. It becomes an important trading centre and develops into the first city in Ireland (Dublin), until this time a country entirely without urban development. 8 August 843 The Treaty of Verdun settles the quarrels of the heirs of the late Frankish emperor Louis I the Pious over their inheritance. Lothair I retains the title of emperor and receives 'the Middle Kingdom' (Italy, lands between the Rhine and Rhône–Saône–Scheldt, and Frisia, including the imperial capitals Rome and Aachen), while Louis the German receives the East Frankish Kingdom (Saxony, Franconia, Swabia, Bavaria, and Carinthia) and Charles II the Bald receives the West Frankish Kingdom (Neustria, Aquitaine, Gascony, and the Spanish March). 843 Kenneth I (called MacAlpin), King of the Scots of Argyll, conquers the Picts of Caledonia to create the kingdom of Alba or 'Scotland'. 843 The Byzantine emperor, Michael III, restores the veneration of religious icons in the Byzantine Empire. Prominent supporters of iconoclasm such as the patriarch Ignatius are soon eased out of power, ending the diplomatically damaging and socially divisive iconoclastic dispute. 22 November 845 The Bretons, led by Duke Nomenoë, defeat an army sent by the West Frankish king, Charles II the Bald, to enforce their subjection, at Ballon, Brittany. 845 After they sack Paris, the West Frankish king, Charles II the Bald, pays the Vikings 'Danegeld' (protection money) to persuade them to leave. 846 With the help of his overlords, the Chalukyas of central India, Vijayalaya captures the city of Tanjore in the Pandya kingdom of South India, marking the birth of the Chola Empire which remains a major power until 1279. 10 August 847 On the death of the Abbasid caliph al-Wathiq, his brother, alMutawakkil, becomes caliph (ruler of the Islamic world). A sternly orthodox Muslim, al-Mutawakkil immediately begins the persecution of the Shiite Muslim minority and introduces restrictions on the activities of Christians and Jews. c. 847 Building begins on the Great Mosque of al-Mutawakkil at the second Abbasid capital of Samarra (in modern Iraq). The largest mosque in the world, its most distinctive feature is its huge spiral minaret built of brick.

849 Alfred the Great, King of Wessex 871–99, who defended Saxon England against the Danes, born, probably in Wantage, Oxfordshire, England (–899). 4 April 850 Louis II, son of the Frankish emperor Lothair I, is crowned in Rome as emperor and king of Italy. 850 A university is founded at Salerno, Italy. It is the first such institution in medieval Europe. c. 850 Jewish immigrants in central Europe form a distinct cultural identity, the Ashkenazim. Their language, Yiddish, is a fusion of various middle-eastern languages and Germanic dialects. 851 Aethelwulf of Wessex defeats the Danes at Oakley, England, and King Athelstan of Kent defeats a Danish fleet at Sandwich, but another Danish fleet enters the River Thames, defeats the Mercians, and sacks the cities of London and Canterbury. The Danes then winter in England for the first time, in Thanet, Kent. 851 The crossbow is first used in France. Although it takes longer to load than traditional bows, the bolts it fires travel much further and faster. 854 The leading Danish king, Horik, is killed in a civil war following a rebellion within his own family. His kingdom disintegrates and little is known of Denmark for the next century. 22 September 855 Worn out by illness, the Frankish emperor Lothair I retires to the monastery of Prüm (in present-day Germany) and partitions his lands among his three sons. The emperor Louis II receives Italy, Lothair II receives the area from Frisia to the Alps, called Lotharii regnum ('Reign of Lothair', Lotharingia or Lorraine), and Charles receives the kingdom of Provence. Lothair I dies six days later (28 September). 20 November 855 The Byzantine emperor, Michael III, begins his personal rule after arranging the murder of Theoctistus the Logothete, the principal minister of his mother, the empress and regent Theodora. Michael banishes Theodora to a convent. 855 Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Muslim theologian, who founded a school of Islamic law called the Hanbali and adopted a traditionalist approach in interpreting and codifying the legal aspects of the Koran (the sharia), dies in Baghdad, Persia (c. 75). 855 On the death of Pope Leo IV a succession dispute breaks out. The clergy and people of Rome elect Benedict III, but the Frankish emperor, Louis II, installs Anastasius as pope, by force. When the popular antipathy to Anastasius becomes apparent, Louis gives way and allows Benedict's appointment; his authority suffers a setback as a consequence.

858 Fujiwara Yorifusa, a member of a leading aristocratic family, becomes regent for the young Japanese emperor, Seiwa. Yorifusa uses his position to consolidate the Fujiwara family's hold on power and reduce the emperors to mere figureheads under a perpetual regency. However, the Fujiwara are unable to maintain a strong central government and their rise marks the beginning of Japan's development into a decentralized feudal state. 858 Pope Nicholas I strengthens papal authority by declaring that bishops are his delegates and not subject to secular authorities. 860 Rurik, a semi-legendary Viking chief, founds a state in northwest Asia with its capital at Novgorod. Taking its name from Rus, the Finnish name for the Swedish Vikings, the state becomes known as Russia. 861 A major rift opens between the Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches (the 'Photian Schism') when Pope Nicholas I objects to the Byzantine emperor, Michael III, appointing Photius, a lay theologian, as patriarch of Constantinople. 3 September 863 Petronas, the uncle of the Byzantine emperor, Michael III, annihilates an Abbasid army which has invaded Anatolia. The Abbasid general Omar is killed in the battle, which ends the Arab threat to the Byzantine Empire. 865 Prince Boris of the Bulgar Khanate converts to Christianity. After a short delay he accepts the jurisdiction of Constantinople rather than Rome. 865 Under its leaders Halfdan, Guthrum, and Ivar, the 'Great Heathen Host', the largest Danish army yet seen, arrives in England bent on conquering lands for settlement. 24 September 867 The Byzantine emperor, Michael III, is murdered by his ruthless protégé, Basil the Macedonian, who succeeds him as Basil I, founding the Macedonian dynasty (867–1059) which brings the Byzantine Empire to the peak of its power. 3 November 867 The Byzantine emperor Basil I deposes Photius and restores Ignatius as patriarch of Constantinople, ending the schism between Greek and Roman churches. 867 Ya'cub ibn-al-Laith al-Saffar ('the coppersmith'), a craftsman turned bandit leader, seizes control of Seistan (in eastern Persia) and establishes the Saffarid dynasty in independence from the Abbasid caliphate. Under Ya'cub the Persian language enjoys a revival after two centuries of strong Arabic influence. 11 May 868 A printed paper roll, dated 11 May and containing part of a Chinese translation of the Buddhist text Dharani Sutra, is the earliest surviving evidence for a printed book.

870 Foster brothers Ingolf and Hjorleif become the first Viking colonists of Iceland. Hjorleif is murdered by his Irish slaves, but Ingolf founds a successful settlement at Reykjavik. 4 April 871 Alfred the Great becomes king of Wessex, England, on the death of his brother, King Aethelred. c. 873 The cult of the Buddha Amida, the 'the Buddha of Immeasurable Light' begins to spread in Japan. Followers believe that when they die, Amida will take them to paradise in the western heavens. Many artists are inspired by the cult and the bodhisattva Kwannon (Kuan-yin in China) becomes extremely popular. 873–874 The Danes capture Repton, the royal centre of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia, England. Disheartened by his failure to resist the Danes, the Mercian king, Burgred, flees into exile in Rome. The Danish army winters at Repton and in the spring it splits up, Halfdan returning to York, Guthrum and the other leaders going to Cambridge. 874 Following a terrible drought, a peasant rising led by Huang Chao and Wang Xianzhi takes control of Henan in eastern China. 31 January 876 The Frankish emperor, Charles II the Bald, is accepted as king of Italy at Pavia, following the death of Louis II without legitimate issue. Charles promotes Boso, Count of Vienne, to duke and leaves him in charge of Italy when he returns to his West Frankish kingdom. 28 August 876 The East Frankish king Louis the German dies. His lands are divided between his sons Carloman (Bavaria and the East March), Louis the Younger (Saxony and Franconia), and Charles the Fat (Alemannia). 876 Halfdan founds the Danish kingdom of York (which survives until 954). The Danes are now beginning to settle on the lands they have won in eastern England. 876 Henry I the Fowler, German king 919–36, founder of the Saxon dynasty, born (–936). 6 October 877 The Frankish emperor, Charles II the Bald, falls ill after a meeting with Pope John VIII at Vercelli, Italy, and dies at Briançon while returning to Francia to face a rebellion of his magnates. He is succeeded by his son Louis II the Stammerer. 877 Ahmad-ibn-Tulun, Emir of Egypt, seizes Syria from the declining Abbasid caliphate. 5 May 878 King Alfred the Great of Wessex, England, defeats the Danes at Edington (in Wiltshire). By the Peace of Wedmore which follows, the Danish leader, Guthrum, is baptized as a Christian.

10 April 879 Louis II the Stammerer, King of the Franks, dies. He is succeeded by his sons, Louis III and Carloman, after an abortive invasion by Louis of Saxony who tries to seize the kingdom. 881–882 In the worst year of raiding ever experienced by the Low Countries and the Rhineland, the Vikings sack the cities of Liège, Tongres, Maastricht, Deventer, Neuss, Cologne, Bonn, Coblenz, Malmedy, Stavelot, Prüm, Aachen, and Trier. 20 January 882 King Louis of Saxony and Bavaria dies and is succeeded by the Frankish emperor, Charles III the Fat of Alemannia, who thus reunites Germany. 882 The Russian prince Oleg captures Kiev from the rival Viking leaders Askold and Dir, whom he kills, and makes it the capital of the Rus state (Russia) in place of Novgorod. 883 The Abbasid caliph's forces finally suppress the Zenj (African slave) rebellion that started in 869, after immense slaughter has been caused. 884 The usurping Chinese emperor, Huang Chao, is driven into Henan and finally into Shandong by the Tang emperor's Shatuo Turkish allies. Abandoned by most of his followers, Huang Chao commits suicide. Despite defeating the rebellion, the authority of the Tang dynasty has been permanently broken and power now devolves on provincial warlords. 885 Ashot I the Great is recognized as king of Armenia by both the Abbasid caliphate and the Byzantine Empire. His reign marks the beginning of a centurylong golden age of Armenian Christian culture. 29 August 886 Basil the Macedonian, Byzantine emperor (867–86), who founded the Macedonian dynasty and formulated the Basilica, the Byzantine legal code, dies (c. 56). October 886 After almost a year under siege by the Vikings, Paris is finally relieved by the Frankish emperor Charles III the Fat, but instead of fighting the Vikings he pays them 318 kg/700 lb of silver and allows them to sail further up the River Seine to raid in Burgundy. 886 King Alfred the Great of Wessex, England, expels the Danes from London and, in a treaty with the Danish king Guthrum, defines the frontier of the 'Danelaw', the area of eastern England which is to be ruled by the Danes. 887 Amid dismay at his unwillingness to fight the Vikings, an assembly of German magnates at Tribur, near Darmstadt, deposes the Frankish emperor, Charles III the Fat, leading to the final break-up of Charlemagne's empire (the 'Carolingian Empire'). 13 January 888 The deposed Frankish emperor, Charles III the Fat, dies and his empire is dismembered. German vassals declare his successor to be Arnulf of

Carinthia, illegitimate son of Carloman of Bavaria; in Italy, Berengar, Margrave of Friuli, and Guido, Duke of Spoleto, contend for the crown; King Boso's son, Louis, holds Provence; Rudolph of Auxerre, Duke of Jurane Burgundy, establishes a kingdom of Burgundy; while in West Francia (which develops into the kingdom of France), surviving royal authority disintegrates. 890 The court of Alfred the Great becomes a centre of learning. Alfred translates works by St Gregory the Great, Orosius (a 5th century work of history and geography), Bede, and Boethius. He may also have initiated the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, an annalistic history of England continued to 1154. January 891'Abd ar-Rahman III, first caliph 929–61 and greatest ruler of the Umayyad dynasty of Spain, born (–961). October 891 King Arnulf of Germany wins an impressive victory over the Vikings at the Battle of the Dyle near Louvain and the Vikings withdraw to Boulogne. Arnulf's victory marks the end of the worst period of Viking raiding on the European mainland. 892 The Danish army leaves France for England where King Alfred the Great of Wessex has used the respite from Viking raids following his earlier victories to reform his army and build a fleet and a network of forts ('burhs') to resist them. 28 January 893 Following a revolt against King Odo of France organized by Archbishop Fulk of Reims, Charles the Simple, the posthumous son of Louis II the Stammerer, King of the Franks, is crowned king of France in his place. 895 By blocking the River Lea, King Alfred the Great of Wessex, England, traps the Danes led by King Haesten in their camp near London. The Danes escape overland to Bridgnorth in Mercia, but lose their entire fleet to Alfred's West Saxons. 895 The Byzantine emperor, Leo VI, prompts the Magyars (a nomadic people settled between the Dnieper and the Danube rivers) to attack the Bulgar Khanate. The Bulgar khan Symeon retaliates by inciting the Pechenegs, recent arrivals on the Dnieper, to invade Magyar territory. Consequently the Magyars, after their expulsion from Bulgaria, are forced to seek lands elsewhere and settle in central Europe, on the River Theiss. 896 Seeking to escape the dominance of the Roman emperor Lambert of Spoleto, Pope Formosus calls on King Arnulf of Germany for help. Arnulf storms Rome and is crowned emperor by Formosus. However, Arnulf falls ill and is forced to leave Italy, Formosus dies soon afterwards, and Lambert recovers his position. 7 July 897 Pope Stephen VI's treatment of the late Pope Formosus's corpse causes a popular rebellion in Rome: Stephen is deposed, jailed, and shortly afterwards strangled. The papacy now falls prey to bitter faction fighting – six Popes rule in the next six years.

26 October 899 Alfred the Great, king of Wessex 871–99, who defended Saxon England against the Danes, dies (c. 50). 26 October 899 Following the death of King Alfred the Great of Wessex, he is succeeded by his son, Edward the Elder. c. 900 Spices from the East Indies are introduced to Europe around this time. They are used principally for medicinal purposes. 900–1000 The Polynesian ancestors of the Maori people discover and begin the settlement of New Zealand. 6 March 902 The Abbasid caliph al-Mu'tadid dies. He is the last caliph (ruler of the Islamic world) to rule in his own right; his successors are, generally, controlled by their Turkish bodyguards. 21 July 905 Berengar of Friuli, the deposed king of Italy, captures the emperor, Louis III, at Verona, blinds him, and expels him from Italy back to his kingdom of Provence. 906 After defeating a German and Slav army at Pressburg, the Magyars overrun and destroy the Moravian kingdom and also raid Saxony. 907 The Chinese warlord Zhuwen deposes Aidi, the last Tang dynasty emperor, and declares himself Chinese emperor. The Tang empire collapses and China fragments into 11 warring states, beginning the 'Period of the Five Dynasties and the Ten Kingdoms' (907–960). Zhuwen and his successors, styled the Later Liang dynasty, establish control over the Chang Jiang Basin, the richest region of China. 7 December 909 After overthrowing the Sunni Aghlabid dynasty of Kairouan (in modern Tunisia), Sa'id ibn-Husayn is proclaimed as Ubaydullah al-Mahdi ('the divinely guided one') in Tunis and sets up an Ismailite (Shiite) caliphate in opposition to the Sunni caliphate of Baghdad (in modern Iraq). Al-Mahdi founds the Fatimid dynasty (named after the Islamic prophet Muhammad's daughter Fatima, from whom Sa'id claims descent). 910 The Magyars defeat King Louis the Child of Germany near Augsburg. 911 Ethelred, ealdorman of Mercia, England, dies and is succeeded by his wife, Aethelflaed (daughter of King Alfred the Great), known as 'the Lady of the Mercians'. Her brother, King Edward the Elder of Wessex, occupies London, formerly a Mercian city. 911 King Charles III the Simple of France receives the homage of Rollo (Hrolf), the Norse leader established on the River Seine, at St Clair-sur-Epte. Rollo agrees to prevent other Vikings entering the Seine and is baptized as a Christian. In return, Charles grants him the county of Rouen. Rollo's lands become known as Normandy after the Nordmanni ('Northmen').

23 November 912 Otto I, Duke of Saxony 936–961 (as Otto II), German king 936–973, and Emperor 962–973, born (–973). 912 Zhuwen, the first emperor of the Later Liang dynasty of northern China, is murdered by his son Yingwang, who succeeds him. 6 June 913 Shortly after provoking a war with the Bulgars, the Byzantine emperor, Alexander, dies leaving the empire in the hands of his seven-year-old nephew Constantine VII (the son of the former emperor Leo VI). 915 On the initiative of Pope John X, the Arab base on the River Garigliano in Italy is destroyed by Byzantine and Italian forces, thus ending the Arab presence in central Italy. 916 Apaochi, chief of the Qitan (or Khitan Mongol) nomads, proclaims himself emperor of the Qitan and establishes the state of Liao in imitation of Chinese methods of government. Liao survives until 1125. The Qitan are also known as Kitai from which the medieval European name for China, 'Cathay', is derived. 20 August 917 The Bulgar khan, Symeon, demands that he should be recognized as Byzantine emperor, after defeating the imperial forces near Anchialus on the River Achelous, invading Thrace, and making himself master of the Balkans. 12 June 918 On the death of his sister Aethelflaed, the 'Lady of the Mercians', King Edward the Elder annexes Mercia to his kingdom of Wessex. He also completes the conquest of the Danish Midlands. 919 The Vikings under Rognvald conquer Brittany (northwest France), making Nantes their capital. Those Bretons who are able to escape seek refuge with King Athelstan in England. 15 June 923 The usurping king of France, Robert of Neustria, defeats King Charles III the Simple of France at Soissons, but is himself killed in the battle. Charles is captured and imprisoned by Count Herbert of Vermandois. 13 July 923 Duke Raoul of Burgundia is crowned as king of France in succession to Robert of Neustria. He cedes the duchy to Giselbert, who is challenged by Robert's brother, Count Hugh the Black, and by Duke Hugh the Great of the Franks. 923 The Later Liang dynasty, the first of the 'Five Dynasties' of northern China, is overthrown by the Shatuo Turks, who establish the Later Tang dynasty. 17 July 924 King Edward the Elder of England dies; he is succeeded by his capable son, Athelstan. 924 Symeon, Khan of the Bulgars, fails in his attempt to take the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. In negotiations afterwards, the Byzantines recognize

Symeon's right to call himself 'emperor of the Bulgars' but not his claim to the Byzantine throne. 924 The Magyars resume their raids. In Italy they burn the northern city of Pavia, but King Rudolph of Italy and Hugh of Arles, the effective ruler of Provence, drive them off into southern France. They also invade Germany, where King Henry I the Fowler obtains a truce for Saxony, which he uses to strengthen his duchy by building fortified towns. 927 Athelstan, King of Wessex and Mercia, drives the Norse king Guthfrith out of York and receives the submission of the Northumbrians, so becoming the first king to rule all of England. In a meeting near Penrith, Cumberland, the kings of Scotland and Strathclyde recognize Athelstan as their overlord. 927 T'ai Tsu, Chinese emperor (960–76) who reunited China and founded the Sung dynasty, born in Lo-yang, China (–976). 5 May 928 Pope John X is deposed and murdered. He is succeeded by Leo VI, who dies before the year is out and is replaced by another puppet pope, Stephen VII, who is completely dominated by the aristocracy of Rome. 4 September 929 A German army defeats the pagan Wends at Lenzen, on the River Elbe, and they are compelled to submit and accept Christianity. 930 The Althing (parliament) is established in Iceland; it meets annually until it is abolished by the Danes in 1800. 933 King Harold I Haarfager of Norway dies; he is succeeded by his son Erik Bloodaxe who kills two of his brothers in order to secure the throne. 935 Wang Kon reunites Korea, founding the Koryo dynasty (which gives the name 'Korea'), with the capital at Kaesong. c. 935 Topiltzin-Quetzalcoatl, a Toltec ruler whose opposition to human sacrifice ultimately causes the Toltecs to expel him, is born in Central America. He later becomes identified with the god Quetzalcoatl ('feathered serpent'). 19 June 936 Louis IV d'Outremer, son of Charles III the Simple, is recalled from exile in England by Count Hugh the Great, the Capetian Duke of the Franks, and crowned king of France following the death of King Raoul. 2 July 936 Henry I the Fowler, German king 919–36, founder of the Saxon dynasty, dies in Memleben, Saxony (c. 60). 936 The Later Tang dynasty, the second of the 'Five Dynasties' of northern China is overthrown, with help from the Qitan nomads, by the Shatuo Turkish general Shi Jingtang, who founds the Later Jin dynasty.

938 Abu 'Amir al-Mansur (Almanzor), chief minister (vizier) and virtual ruler of the Umayyad caliphate of Córdoba, Spain 978–1002, born (–1002). 27 October 939 Athelstan (or Aethelstan or Ethelstan), Anglo-Saxon king of Wessex and Mercia 924–25 and first king of England 925–39, dies in England (c. 44). 27 October 939 Edmund succeeds o the throne of England following the death of his brother King Athelstan (or Aethelstan or Ethelstan) of England. 939 The Annamese rebel leader Ngo Quyen defeats the Chinese and founds the kingdom of Dai Viet (or Annam, modern northern Vietnam), with his capital at Coloa. 939 The Breton chief Alain Barbetorte completes the liberation of Brittany (northwestern France) from the Vikings when he takes their stronghold at Trans near Dol. 941 Brian Bórumha, high king of Ireland 1002–14, born near Killaloe, Ireland (–1014). 16 December 944 The Byzantine emperor, Romanus I Lecapanus, is deposed and exiled by his sons. The co-emperor, Constantine VII, assumes sole rule and crushes the rebellion of Romanus's sons. 945 The historian Al-Mas`udi, known as 'the Herodotus of the Arabs', settles in Damascus after years of travel. Among his many works, the most important to survive is Muruj al-Dhahab wa-M`adin al Jawhar/Meadows of Gold and Mines of Gems, a historico-geographical encyclopedia. 17 January 946 Ahmad ibn-Buwayh Adud ad-Dawlah, the Shiite Muslim ruler of western Persia, expels the Turks from Baghdad, the capital of the Abbasid caliphate. His Buwayhid dynasty now rules the Arab caliphate from its capital of Shiraz and has the title of sultan. The Abbasid caliph is reduced to a religious figurehead without political power. 26 May 946 When King Edmund of England is murdered at a feast, his brother, Eadred, succeeds to the throne. 947 Weakened by devastating Khitan nomad invasions, the Later Jin dynasty, the third of the 'Five Dynasties' of northern China, is overthrown by Gaozu, a Shatuo Turk general, who establishes the Later Han dynasty. 948 Erik Bloodaxe, the deposed king of Norway, captures York, England, and makes himself king. 949 Krishna III, the Rashtrakuta king, defeats and kills the Chola king Parantaka I's son, Rajaditya, at Takkolam. He then takes Tanjore, the Chola capital, and

much other territory in southern India. 950 Anthologia Palatina/Greek Anthology is collected by Constantine Cephalas. It consists of poems and brief inscriptions by some 300 writers from the 5th century BC to the 6th century AD. 950 The Later Han dynasty, the fourth of the 'Five Dynasties' of northern China, is overthrown by Guowei, a Chinese general who establishes the Later Zhou dynasty. c. 950 A heretical Christian sect called the Bogomils emerges in the Bulgar Khanate. Bogomilism has links with Manichaeism and the Paulicians: they believe that the world and the body are of Satan and only the spirit is created by God. 9 September 951 Adelaide, the widow of King Lothair II of Italy, appeals to the German king Otto I, later Holy Roman Emperor, for help against Berengar of Ivrea, who has imprisoned her. Otto invades Italy, takes the northern city of Pavia, marries Adelaide, and assumes the Italian crown. Berengar takes refuge in the Alps. 10 September 954 King Louis IV of France dies (c. 33). He is succeeded by his son, Lothair, the penultimate Carolingian king of France. 954 Erik Bloodaxe, the last Scandinavian king of York, England, is murdered by a rival at York. King Eadred takes possession of the kingdom and, as a consequence, holds all of England. 10 August 955 King Otto I of Germany defeats the Magyars on the Lechfeld, near Augsburg. Their raids on Western Europe now cease and they begin a settled life in Hungary. c. 956 Vladimir I, Grand Prince of Kiev who united Kiev and Novgorod into a single state, and who determined the course of Christianity in Russia, born in Kiev (–1015). 1 October 959 King Eadwig of England dies. He is succeeded by his brother, Edgar, who recalls Abbot Dunstan of Glastonbury from exile. 9 November 959 The Byzantine emperor Constantine VII (913–59) dies. As devoted to study as he was to politics, his many writings include De administrando imperio/On Imperial Administration, on foreign policy, and De cerimoniis aulae Byzantina/On the Ceremonies of the Byzantine Court, which describes the elaborate ceremonial of the Byzantine court. 960 A guard commander, Zhao Kuangyin (known posthumously as Taizu), overthrows the Later Zhou dynasty, the last of the 'Five Dynasties' of northern China, and founds the Northern Song dynasty.

960 Abd-ar-Rahman III, caliph (Islamic ruler) of Córdoba, Spain, exploiting the civil war in the Spanish kingdom of León, takes the city of Oviedo, and with García I of Navarre, restores Sancho I as king of León. c. 960 The Koryo dynasty pushes the border of Koryo (Korea) north to the Yalu River, which remains the northern border of Koryo. 9 September 961 In answer to an appeal from Pope John XII for protection against King Berengar II of Ivrea, King Otto I of Germany invades Italy and, with his son Otto, is acknowledged as king of Italy on his capture of the northern city of Pavia. 15 October 961 Abd-ar-Rahman III, first caliph 929–61 and greatest ruler of the Umayyad dynasty of Spain, dies in Córdoba, Spain (70). 2 February 962 King Otto I of Germany is crowned Roman emperor by Pope John XII, an event which marks the foundation of the Holy Roman Empire. 16 August 963 Following the death of the Byzantine emperor Romanus II, the Byzantine general Nicephorus Phocas is crowned Byzantine emperor (Nicephorus II), and shortly after marries Romanus's widow. 4 December 963 The Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I of Germany, deposes Pope John XII for corruption and appoints Leo VIII as his successor. 26 December 963 The Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I of Germany, captures former king Berengar II of Italy and exiles him to Germany. 963 Zhao Kuangyin (known posthumously as Taizu), the ruler of northern China and first emperor of the Song dynasty, begins a series of military and diplomatic campaigns against the independent 'Ten Kingdoms' of southern China. 14 May 964 The deposed pope John XII dies after a stroke, allegedly suffered while in bed with a married woman. He was still only in his mid-twenties. The Romans elect Benedict V the Grammarian as John's successor. 23 June 964 The Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I of Germany, marches on Rome, exiles Pope Benedict V the Grammarian to Hamburg, Germany, and restores Pope Leo VIII. c. 964 Olaf I Tryggvason, Viking king of Norway 995–1000, who was the first to attempt to Christianize Norway, born (–1000). 1 October 965 Following the death of Pope Leo VIII, the Holy Roman Emperor, Otto I of Germany, refuses the request of the Romans for the restoration of the deposed pope Benedict V and secures the appointment of John XIII. c. 965 King Harald Bluetooth of Denmark becomes the first Christian king in

Scandinavia. Subsequently, Christianity spreads rapidly in Scandinavia. 966 Mieszko I of Poland is converted to Christianity following his marriage to Dobrava, daughter of Duke Boleslaw I of Bohemia. The first Christian missionary bishop subsequently arrives in Poland. 967 Boleslaw I the Brave, first king of Poland 1024–25, who made Poland a major European state, born in Gniezno, Poland (–1025). 968 Dinh Bo Linh, after succeeding as ruler of Dai Viet (Annam) and suppressing all opposition, declares himself emperor (adopting the name Dinh-Tien-hoang), with his capital at Hoa-lu. The Song emperors of China recognize him as a vassal. 6 July 969 The fourth Fatimid caliph (Islamic ruler), al-Mu'izz, already ruling Kairouan, the Maghreb, and Libya in northern Africa, conquers Egypt and extinguishes the Ikshidid dynasty. He founds a new capital at Cairo, Egypt, which becomes the centre of a Shiite empire. 10 December 969 The general John Tzimisces, becomes Byzantine emperor after murdering the emperor Nicephorus II, in a conspiracy with Nicephorus's wife, Theophano, who is his lover. 969 The Chinese introduce playing cards. The earliest known pack consists of 56 cards divided into 4 suits of 14 cards each. The cards are printed in several inks, using separate wood blocks for each part of the pattern. They are used as paper money as well as for gaming. 21 July 971 The Byzantine emperor John Tzimisces again defeats Prince Svjatoslav I of Kiev and compels him to evacuate the Balkans and the Crimea. 971 Mahmud III, Emir of Ghazni 998–1030, an area covering modern Afghanistan and northeastern Persia, who conquered Kashmir, the Punjab, and much of Persia, also noted as a patron of the arts, born (–1030). 972 The Pechenegs, under Kurya, defeat and kill Prince Svjatoslav I of the Rus principality of Kiev in an ambush on the cataracts of the River Dnieper. Svjatoslav I is succeeded by his son, Jaropolk I. 6 May 973 Henry II (St Henry), German king 1002–24 and Emperor 1014–24, last of the Saxon dynasty of emperors, born, probably in Albach, Bavaria (–1024). 7 May 973 Otto I, Duke of Saxony 936–961 (as Otto II), German king 936–973, and Holy Roman Emperor 962–973, dies in Memleben, Thuringia (60). 7 May 973 The Holy Roman Emperor and German king, Otto I the Great dies, and is succeeded in both positions by his son, Otto II. 973 Taila, a provincial governor, overthrows the Rashtrakuta dynasty of central

India, establishing his own Chalukya dynasty. 10 October 974 Benedict VII is crowned as pope in Rome, Italy. 29 April 975 The Byzantine emperor John Tzimisces enters Baalbek (Heliopolis), Egypt, in the course of his third campaign, when he conquers northern Palestine, taking the cities of Caesarea and Damascus. 975 The Great Mosque at Córdoba, Spain, begun in 786, is extended, and lavish decoration is applied to the new mihrab (prayer niche indicating the direction of Mecca). 10 January 976 The Byzantine emperor John Tzimisces dies of typhoid contracted on his triumphant campaign in Syria and Palestine in 975. He is succeeded by Basil II and Constantine VIII, the sons of Romanus II. The Bulgarians, led by Samuel, begin a war for independence. 14 November 976 T'ai Tsu, Chinese emperor (960–76) who reunited China and founded the Song dynasty, dies in K'ai-feng, China (49). 977 Stephen I, first king of Hungary (1000–38), founder of the Hungarian state, born (–1038). 18 March 978 King Edward of England is murdered by servants whilst visiting his stepbrother, Aethelred II the Unready, who succeeds him. Edward is subsequently regarded as a martyr and Aethelred, probably unfairly, is suspected of complicity in the murder. 10 October 978 The Holy Roman Emperor, Otto II of Germany, invades France, harrying as far as Paris, in retaliation for an attempt by King Lothair IV of France to seize Lorraine. 979 The Chinese Song emperor, Taizong, conquers the independent Chinese kingdoms of Jin and Yen, completing the reunification of China begun by his brother Taizu. 981 Al-Mansur, regent of the Umayyad caliphate of Córdoba, Spain, takes the city of Zamora and subjugates the kingdom of León. 981 Prince Vladimir I of the Rus principality of Kiev takes Przemysl, Czerwien, and other areas in Red Russia from Poland. 982 Eric the Red begins the Viking colonization of Greenland. 7 December 983 When the Holy Roman Emperor and German king Otto II dies in Rome, Italy, from malaria, he is succeeded by his three-year-old son, Otto III, under the guardianship of his mother, Theophano.

983 Following the defeat of the Holy Roman Emperor, Otto II of Germany, in Italy, the Wends revolt against German rule and restore their pagan religion. 983 Harald Bluetooth, King of Denmark, is deposed by his son, Sven I Forkbeard. 23 March 984 Henry the Wrangler, the former Duke of Bavaria, proclaims himself king of Germany, but the Saxons and many others oppose him. 29 June 984 A diet of German princes recognizes Otto III, the young son of the late Holy Roman Emperor Otto II, as king of Germany. Henry the Wrangler surrenders Otto to his mother, Theophano, and grandmother, Adelaide, and is restored to the duchy of Bavaria in compensation. 3 July 987 Hugh Capet, Duke of the Franks, is elected to succeed Louis V and is crowned king of France, so founding the Capetian dynasty. King Hugh's authority is weak and his own duchy of Neustria disintegrates as his vassals make themselves effectively independent. 987 Kukulcan ('feathered serpent'), who is probably the exiled Toltec king Topiltzin-Quetzalcoatl, captures Chichén Itzá from the Maya and establishes an empire in the northern Yucatán, Central America. 987 Toltec conquerors of the Central American Mayan city of Chichén Itzá construct monuments with ritual astronomical alignments to the rising and setting of the Sun and the sacred planet Venus. 2 February 988 Prince Vladimir of the Rus principality of Kiev is baptized as a condition of a proposed marriage with Anna, the sister of the Byzantine emperor, Basil II. The marriage is a reward for Vladimir's help against the rebel Byzantine general Bardas Phocas. 988 Abu 'Amir al-Mansur (Almanzor), the Umayyad regent of Córdoba, Spain, razes the Spanish city of León and makes its king a tributary to the caliphate of Córdoba. 988 The rebel Byzantine general Bardas Phocas is defeated in the summer at Chrysopolis by loyal imperial forces assisted by an army of 'Varangians' (Russian Vikings) sent by Prince Vladimir of the Rus principality of Kiev. This is the origin of the Byzantine emperors' Varangian Guard. 990 The Orthodox Church is founded in Russia. 29 March 991 Bishop Asselin of Laon captures Duke Charles of Lower Lorraine, the pretender to the French throne, and Archbishop Arnulf of Reims on King Hugh of France's behalf, so ending Charles's attempt to win the throne of France. 991 The Byzantine emperor Basil II subjugates the area of modern Albania and begins his pacification of the Bulgar Khanate.

992 Prince Mieszko I of Poland dies at Gniezno. His lands (Poland as far west as the River Oder, plus Pomerania and Moravia) are divided among his sons, one of whom, Boleslaw Chrobry (the Brave), subsequently reunites them. 995 The Byzantine emperor Basil II completes his first subjugation of the Bulgarians. c. 995'The Battle of Maldon', an Old English poem by a now-unknown poet is written at about this time, dealing with a historically attested skirmish between Saxon forces and Danish raiders at Maldon in Essex, England, in 991. c. 995 Olaf II Haraldsson, Viking king 1015–30, and patron saint of Norway, who was the first to rule the entire country and who also introduced a religious code which became the country's first national legislation, born (–1030). 3 May 996 Bruno of Carinthia becomes the first German pope when he is crowned as Gregory V. 24 October 996 King Hugh of France, the founder of the Capetian dynasty, dies and is buried at Saint-Denis. He is succeeded by his son, Hugh Cape, Robert II the Pious. 997 The Chinese Song emperor, Taizong, dies. Though he has reunited the Chinese under a single dynasty, he has been unable to recover all the territories ruled by the Tang dynasty. Thus the Song empire is the smallest of the Chinese empires, confined only to areas inhabited by ethnic Chinese. 998 Unable to defend Dalmatia against the Bulgar King Samuel, the Byzantine Emperor Basil II grants it to Venice. 999 Following the death of Gregory V, Gerbert of Aurillac is elected as Pope Sylvester II. He is the first French pope.

The divided world (1000–1492) 31 March 1000 Boleslaw Chrobry (the Brave) convinces the Emperor Otto III to create the archbishopric of Gniezno for Poland, with Silesia and Pomerania subject to it. Poland is consequently recognized as independent both politically and ecclesiastically. 25 December 1000 Duke Stephen is crowned as king of Hungary. He has placed his country under the protection of the Pope, from whom he receives the crown and the establishment of a Hungarian ecclesiastical hierarchy under the archbishopric of Gran. 1000 Makura no Soshi/The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon is written around this

time. A Japanese lady's commonplace book with often mischievous reflections and anecdotes about court life, it is one of the masterpieces of Japanese literature. 1000 By a majority decision of the Althing (parliament), Iceland adopts Christianity. Pagan worship is permitted in private. 1000 King Svein of Denmark defeats and kills King Olaf I Tryggvesson of Norway at Svöld and thus conquers Norway. c. 1000 Chess is widely known throughout Europe. c. 1000 Coffee is being drunk in Arabia and Persia. References in the work of the Persian philosopher and physician Avicenna (ibn Sina) testify to its use being largely medicinal. c. 1000 Olaf I Tryggvason, Viking king of Norway 995–1000, who was the first to attempt to Christianize Norway, dies (c. 36). c. 1000 Polynesian migrants reach New Zealand, where they settle and become the Maori people. The Polynesian migration across the Pacific Ocean, using the stars for navigation, has taken centuries to complete. c. 1000 The rival Andean empires of Tiahuanaco and Huari collapse within a few years of each other. c. 1000 Traders and fishermen from Macassar in Sulawesi in Southeast Asia (modern Indonesia), make contact with the Aborigines of northern Australia. 1000–1100'Tables', or backgammon, is introduced to Europe by the Arabs (or reintroduced, as it is similar in name and appearance to the Roman game Tabula). It becomes extremely popular over the next few centuries. The name 'backgammon' is first used in the mid-17th century. 1001 Building begins on the Church of St Michael in Hildesheim, Germany. Possibly designed by its bishop, St Bernward, it is the first example of a church in which the different areas of the interior are clearly articulated. 7 July 1002 Boleslaw Chrobry (the Brave) recognizes King Henry II of Germany as overlord and cedes his recent conquests, retaining Lusatia and Milsko. As Boleslaw leaves their meeting, an attempt is made to murder him, for which he blames Henry, so beginning a war. 10 August 1002 Abu 'Amir al-Mansur (Almanzor), chief minister (vizier) and virtual ruler of the Umayyad caliphate of Córdoba, Spain, dies in Spain (c. 64). 10 August 1002 Following the death of the Umayyad regent Abu 'Amir al-Mansur (Almanzor), vizier of Córdoba, after his defeat at Calatañazor by the kings of

León and Navarre, he is succeeded by his son, al-Muzaffar. 13 November 1002 The 'St Brice's day massacre' takes place in England. Danes resident in southern England are massacred at the instigation of King Aethelred of England. 1003 King Svein of Denmark invades England to gain revenge for the 'St Brice's day massacre', in which Danes resident in the south of England were murdered on the orders of King Aethelred of England. 1003 Vladivoj, Duke of Bohemia dies and is succeeded by his son, Jaromir. Shortly afterwards, King Boleslaw of Poland expels him and restores Duke Boleslaw III, who proceeds to murder his former opponents. The Bohemians then call back Boleslaw of Poland, who deposes and blinds Boleslaw III, and rules Bohemia himself. 9 September 1004 King Henry II of Germany restores Jaromir as Duke of Bohemia in a war which follows Boleslaw Chrobry (the Brave) of Poland's refusal to pay homage. 28 March 1005 King Henry II of Germany makes an alliance with the Wends (a Slav tribe) against King Boleslaw of Poland, who has seized territory between the River Oder and the River Elbe. Henry later invades Poland as far as Poznan but is defeated by Boleslaw. 9 September 1006 A joint expedition by King Henry II of Germany and King Robert II of France fails to recover Valenciennes from the expansionist Count Baldwin IV of Flanders, who has also seized the castle of Ghent. 1010 The caliph Suleiman of Córdoba, in Spain, is deposed and Mohammad II is restored. The latter is then murdered and Hisham II restored. The Umayyad Caliphate now slides into political anarchy. c. 1010 Murasaki Shikibu ('Lady Murasaki') writes Genji Monogatari/The Tale of Genji about the love affairs of Prince Genji. The first psychological novel, it is regarded as one of the greatest works of Japanese literature. c. 1010 Persian poet Firdausi completes his Persian national epic, Shah-nama/ The Book of Kings. Its 50 chapters relate the history of the Persian kings up to the fall of the Sassanian dynasty. c. 1010 The Toltecs introduce the cult of Quetzalcoatl, 'the feathered serpent', to the Central American cities that they have recently invaded. 12 May 1012 The death of Pope Sergius IV within a few weeks of that of his patron John II Crescentius leads to suspicions that they have both been murdered. The election of Sergius IV's successor is disputed: the Crescentius family nominate Gregory, but he is soon expelled by the counts of Tusculum, who put Theophylact of Tusculum, as Benedict VIII, in possession of the papacy.

1012 Rice is introduced into China from Champa (modern southern Vietnam) and becomes the staple diet. 20 April 1013 Hisham II, Caliph of Córdoba in Spain, disappears following the capture of the city by Suleiman, who resumes his rule. Civil war between Moors and Arabs is now endemic in the Umayyad Caliphate. 24 May 1013 The Peace of Merseberg is signed. Boleslaw Chrobry (the Brave) of Poland pays homage to King Henry II of Germany and is permitted to retain all his conquests with the exception of Bohemia. He is now free to make war in Russia. 1013 King Svein of Denmark, having been accepted in England as king in Northumbria and the Danelaw, now conquers Wessex. King Aethelred II of England flees to Normandy. 3 February 1014 Following the death of Sewyn I (Sven Forkbeard), king of Denmark, Norway, and England, he is succeeded by his sons, Harold, in Denmark, and Cnut, in England. However, when the English king Aethelred II is restored, Cnut is forced to return to Denmark. 14 February 1014 King Henry II of Germany and Italy is crowned emperor by Pope Benedict VIII in Rome, to the accompaniment of anti-German rioting. 23 April 1014 Brian Bórumha, high king of Ireland 1002–14, is killed at the Battle of Clontarf, near Dublin, Ireland (c. 73). 29 July 1014 Byzantine emperor Basil II surrounds and captures a Bulgarian army in the pass of Kleidon, Bulgaria. 15,000 Bulgar prisoners are blinded before being sent home. 6 October 1014 Samuel, the Bulgarian emperor, dies two days after seeing the 15,000 survivors of the defeat at the pass of Kleidon who had been blinded by the Byzantine emperor Basil II. 15 July 1015 St Vladimir I, grand prince of Kiev, who united Kiev and Novgorod into a single state, and who determined the course of Christianity in Russia, dies in Berestova, near Kiev (59). 1015 Decorated bronze doors are made for the Church of St Michael in Hildesheim, Germany. 1015 Following the death of St Vladimir I, grand prince of Kiev and first Christian ruler of Russia, he is succeeded by his son, Sviatopolk I, after he murders his brothers, Boris and Gleb. Another brother, Jaroslav, holds out against Sviatopolk in Novgorod. c. 1015 Fan K'uan, whose atmospheric ink landscapes of Chinese mountain

scenery epitomize the Northern Song School of painting, is active around this time. 23 April 1016 Edmund Ironside succeeds to the English throne following the death of his father, King Aethelred II the Unready of England. Edmund revitalizes English resistance to Cnut, the Danish claimant to the English throne. 30 November 1016 On the death of King Edmund Ironside, Cnut, king of Denmark, is accepted as sole king of England. 1016 Suleiman, the Umayyad caliph of Córdoba in Spain, is deposed by the general Ali ibn-Hammud, who founds the Hammudid dynasty. 14 August 1018 King Boleslaw of Poland enters Kiev, Russia, and restores his sonin-law Sviatopolk I to the throne, but is then forced to retire when Sviatopolk organizes an anti-Polish rising. Boleslaw, however, retains Czerwien and Przemysl for Poland. 1018 The Qitans (Khitans) of Liao, in northern China, again invade Koryo (Korea) in pursuit of their territorial claims, but their army is surrounded and defeated with heavy loss near Kaesong. A lasting peace settlement is agreed shortly afterwards. 1019 King Cnut of England takes possession of the Danish throne in succession to his brother, Harold. 1019 The Byzantine emperor Basil II completes his conquest of Bulgaria and its former empire in the Balkans. The western frontier of his empire now extends to the Adriatic Sea and in the north along the River Danube. 1022 Emperor Henry II's Italian expedition checks the Byzantine advance. He takes Capua and Troia before malaria compels the German army to retire. 13 July 1024 Henry II (St Henry), German king 1002–24 and Holy Roman Emperor 1014–24, last of the Saxon dynasty of emperors, dies without heirs near Göttingen, Germany (50). 25 December 1024 Boleslaw Chrobry (the Brave) is crowned as king of Poland with the approval of Pope John XIX. 1024 The Song dynasty government in China takes over the banks of Chengtu, in Szechwan. Their certificates of deposit then become official and thus become the first paper currency in the world. 17 June 1025 Boleslaw I Chrobry (the Brave), first king of Poland 1024–25 who made Poland a major European state, dies at Gniezno, Poland (c. 58). 15 December 1025 When the Byzantine emperor Basil II the Bulgarslayer dies

without an heir, his brother, Constantine VIII, already co-emperor, becomes sole emperor. c. 1025 The Italian writer Guido d'Arezzo publishes his musical treatise Micrologus de disciplina artis musicae/Short Discourse on the Discipline of the Art of Music. He establishes a system of precise pitch notation through the introduction of a four-line stave and the ut-re-mi-fa-so-la names for notes. 26 March 1027 King Conrad II of Germany and Italy is crowned emperor by Pope John XIX in Rome. 14 May 1027 In accordance with the custom of the Capetian dynasty, Henry, Duke of Burgundy and eldest son of King Robert II, is crowned as king of France during his father's lifetime. 1028 Following the death of the Byzantine emperor Constantine VIII, he is succeeded by his son-in-law, Romanus III. 1028 Having made himself unpopular for his brutal imposition of Christianity, Olaf Haroldson, King of Norway, is expelled from his kingdom by King Cnut of Denmark and England. The chiefs of the Faroes, Orkneys, and Shetlands also recognize Cnut's rule. 1028 Sancho III of Navarre unites the Spanish realm of Castile with his kingdom following the murder of its young Count Garcia. 1028 William I the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy 1035–87, King of England 1066–87, born in Falaise, Normandy (–1087). 21 April 1030 Mahmud III, emir of Ghazni 998–1030, an area covering modern Afghanistan and northeastern Persia, who conquered Kashmir, the Punjab, and much of Persia, also noted as a patron of the arts, dies in Ghazni (c. 59). 29 July 1030 Olaf II Haraldsson, Viking king 1015–30, and patron saint of Norway, who was the first to rule the entire country and who also introduced a religious code which became the country's first national legislation, dies in Stiklestad, Norway (c. 35). 20 July 1031 Henry I succeeds to the throne of France following the death of his father, Robert II the Pious, king of France. 30 November 1031 The caliphate of Córdoba comes to an end with the deposing of Hisham III, the last of the Umayyad dynasty. Dozens of independent Moorish and Arab kingdoms arise in Andalusia. 1031 King Mieszko II of Poland is attacked by a coalition; the Russians take Red Russia and he has to cede Lusatia to Emperor Conrad II. He is then expelled in a popular rising which establishes his brother, Bezprym, as ruler of Poland.

1031 King Stephen of Hungary makes peace with Emperor Conrad II, to whom he restores Vienna, and with Oldrvich of Bohemia, to whom he cedes Moravia. 2 February 1033 Emperor Conrad II is crowned as king of Burgundy, which now becomes known as the kingdom of Arles and is attached to the German crown. This marks the end of the independent kingdom of Burgundy. 1033 King Sancho III of Navarre creates the kingdom of Castile for his son, Ferdinand I (in present-day Spain). 11 April 1034 When the Byzantine emperor Romanus III dies, he is succeeded by Michael IV the Paphlagonian, who marries Zoe, widow of Romanus and daughter of Constantine VIII. 2 July 1035 On the death of Robert I ('the Devil' or 'the Magnificent'), duke of Normandy, he is succeeded by his illegitimate son, William I, who is later known as William the Conqueror. 12 November 1035 Cnut (Canute I) the Great, powerful Danish king of England 1016–35, of Denmark (as Cnut II) 1019–35, and of Norway 1028–35, dies (c. 40). 12 November 1035 Following the death of Cnut, king of England, Denmark, and, nominally, Norway, dies. He is succeeded by his son Harthacnut in Denmark, with Harold Harefoot, another son, his regent in England. In Norway, Magnus I, the son of St Olaf, is established as king in a revolt against Cnut. 1035 Following the death of Sancho III Garcés, king of Navarre, he is succeeded in Navarre by his son García III, while another son Ramiro I is established in the newly-created kingdom of Aragon. Vermudo III of León is able to recover his capital León. 1037 Ferdinand I of Castile defeats and kills Vermudo III of León at Tamaron (in modern-day Spain), and takes possession of his kingdom. 15 August 1038 Stephen I, first king of Hungary 1000–38, founder of the Hungarian state, dies in Esztergom, Hungary (c. 61). 15 August 1038 When Stephen I, first king of Hungary, dies, he is left without a direct heir because his son Imre has already died, so Peter the German, a distant relation by marriage, is elected as his successor. 4 June 1039 Henry III, king of Germany, becomes Holy Roman Emperor following the death of hi father, Conrad II. 1039 In a civil war in Sicily, Emir Ahmad is assisted by the Byzantine general, George Maniaces, who engages Norman soldiers for the campaign. 17 March 1040 Harold I Harefoot, King of England, dies. He is succeeded by his

brother, Harthacnut, King of Denmark. 10 December 1041 Following the death of the Byzantine emperor Michael IV, he is succeeded by his nephew, Michael V. 14 April 1042 The Byzantine emperor Michael V is deposed, blinded, and succeeded by Theodora and Zoe, the popular but incompetent daughters of Constantine VIII. Their rule is marked by intrigue and corruption and weakens the Byzantine empire. 8 June 1042 Harthacnut, King of England and Denmark, dies. He is succeeded in England by his adopted heir, Edward the Confessor, son of Aethelred II the Unready, and in Denmark by Magnus I, King of Norway. 12 June 1042 The Byzantine empresses Zoe and Theodora prove incapable of governing effectively. Zoe therefore remarries, and her husband Constantine IX Monomachus succeeds as emperor. 1043 Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar ('El Cid'), Spanish military leader and national hero, conqueror of Valencia, born in Vivar, near Burgos, in Castile, Spain (–1099). 1044 Song dynasty emperor Jen Tsung accepts a proposal by his chief minister Fan Chung-yen for the establishment of a national school system. 10 January 1045 After several months of faction fighting between the great families of Rome, Italy, following the deposition of Benedict IX, Sylvester III, a nominee of the Crescentii, is elected as pope. 10 March 1045 Pope Benedict IX returns from exile to Rome, Italy, and deposes Sylvester III. 1 May 1045 Pope Benedict IX resigns, after selling the papal office to John Gratian, who is elected as Gregory VI. 20 December 1046 In the synod of Sutri held by Emperor Henry III, Sylvester III and Gregory VI are formally deposed from the papacy for simony and other uncanonical practices. Benedict IX is also summoned to appear but he fails to turn up. 24 December 1046 Benedict IX is formally deposed from the papacy by Emperor Henry III and Bishop Suidger of Bamberg, is elected as Pope Clement II. Together Henry and Clement begin the reform of the papacy. 25 October 1047 Magnus the Good, King of Denmark and Norway, dies. He is succeeded in Denmark by Svein II Estrithson and in Norway by Harald Hardrada. 25 December 1047 Bishop Poppo of Brixen is nominated to succeed Pope Clement II by Emperor Henry III but he cannot be consecrated because the

deposed pope Benedict IX has occupied Rome, Italy. 1047–1080 The earliest known code of laws and customs of any French town, the Etablissements de Saint-Quentin, is drawn up. (The original code is lost but is known from a copy of 1151.) 18 May 1048 Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, mathematician, and astronomer, famous for his Rubaiyat, born in Nishapur, Persia (–1131). 1048 The Pechenegs, a Turkish tribe settled in the area of modern Ukraine, begin almost continuous plundering raids in the Byzantine Balkan provinces. 11 November 1050 Henry IV, German king 1054–1106 and Emperor 1084–1106, son of Henry III, born, possibly in Goslar, Saxony (–1106). 1050 The astrolabe, a new device for making astronomical measurements and calculations, arrives in Europe from the East, where Muslim scientists developed it two centuries ago. 1052 Duke William I of Normandy visits the English king Edward the Confessor. It is possible that Edward, who is childless, promises to make William his heir. 1053 The Hoodo (Phoenix Hall) is built in Byodoin Temple near Kyoto, Japan. The shape of the hall represents a phoenix with its wings outstretched. 4 July 1054 A bright new star, visible in daylight, appears in the constellation Taurus. The supernova is observed in China and Korea, and is recorded in rock paintings in southwestern America. 3 September 1054 Ferdinand I of Castile defeats and kills his brother García III of Navarre at Atapuerca, near Burgos, Spain. Garcia's son Sancho IV succeeds as king of Navarre. 1054 The papal legate Cardinal Humbert excommunicates the patriarch of Constantinople, Michael Cerularius, for obstructing an alliance between the Byzantine emperor and the Pope. Cerularius retaliates by excommunicating the cardinal and thus causes the final schism between the Eastern (Orthodox) church and the Western (Roman Catholic) Church. 11 January 1055 When the Byzantine emperor Constantine IX dies, his sister-inlaw, the empress Theodora, becomes sole ruler. 7 February 1055 Jaroslav I, Great Prince of Kiev, dies. In his will, Jaroslav divides his lands among his five sons who immediately fall out over their inheritance and civil war follows. Kiev and Novgorod are inherited by Jaroslav's eldest son Iziaslav, who is theoretically superior in status to his brother princes. 13 April 1055 After hesitating for almost a year before accepting the office,

Gebhard of Eichstatt is elected as Pope Victor II. 18 December 1055 The city of Baghdad surrenders to the Seljuk Turks, who thus end Buwayhid rule. Tughril Beg is proclaimed sultan, and the Abbasid caliph remains the spiritual leader of Sunni Muslims, under Seljuk control. 1055 Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, King of Gwynedd and Powys, completes the conquest of southern Wales to become the king of all Wales. 17 June 1056 Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, King of Wales, defeats and kills Bishop Leofgar of Hereford at Cleobury. Later in the year he is defeated by Earl Harold of Wessex and Earl Leofric of Mercia, and so compelled to recognize the lordship of King Edward the Confessor, who cedes to him English lands west of the River Dee. 21 August 1056 The Byzantine empress Theodora dies. She is the last of the Macedonian dynasty. She is succeeded by her designated heir Michael VI the Aged, a retired civil servant. 5 October 1056 When the Holy Roman Emperor Henry III dies, at Bodfeld, in Saxony, he is succeeded by his six-year-old son Henry IV, with his widow Agnes as regent. 2 August 1057 Following the death earlier in the year of Pope Victor II, Frederick of Lorraine, the abbot of Monte Cassino, is elected as Pope Stephen IX. The weak regency of the infant Henry IV of Germany is unable to interfere with the election, which begins the process of freeing the papacy from secular control. 31 August 1057 The Byzantine emperor Michael VI the Aged abdicates in favour of the general Isaac Comnenus, whose troops have already proclaimed him as emperor. 5 April 1058 Following the death of Pope Stephen IX (29 March), Cardinal John Mincius is elected as Pope Benedict X by Roman nobles who had seized control of Rome, Italy. 12 December 1058 Bishop Gerard of Florence is elected as Pope Nicholas II at Siena, Italy, by the reforming party of cardinals under the protection of Godfrey, Duke of Lorraine. 14 April 1059 A decree governing the election of popes is made in a council held at the Lateran palace by Pope Nicholas II. In future the choice is to be made by the cardinal bishops; secular authorities, including the people of Rome and the Emperor, are allowed only a marginal role. 8 August 1059 In the Treaty of Melfi, Pope Nicholas II invests Robert Guiscard as his vassal, proclaiming him Duke of Apulia and Calabria and Count of Sicily. These territories are still largely occupied by the Byzantines and the Arabs but the Pope's grant legitimizes Guiscard's campaigns to conquer them.

4 August 1060 Following the death of Henry I, king of France, he is succeeded by his eight-year-old son, Philip I, already crowned as co-king, with Baldwin V, count of Flanders, as his guardian. 30 September 1061 Following the death of Pope Nicholas II (22 July), Anselm of Baggio, bishop of Lucca is elected as Pope Alexander II, the first pope elected according to the election decree of Nicholas II. 28 October 1061 Cadalus, bishop of Parma, Italy, an opponent of the papal reform movement, is crowned as antipope Honorius II in Basel, in the presence of King Henry IV of Germany. 27 October 1062 Alexander II is declared to be the true Pope in a synod held at Augsburg, defeating his challenger Honorius II. 5 May 1063 Harold Godwinson, Earl of Wessex, begins a campaign against King Gruffydd ap Llywelyn of Wales. 8 May 1065 Ramiro I of Aragon is killed attacking the Moors in Graus. He is succeeded by his son, Sancho Ramirez. His death attracts volunteers from Western Europe to serve in the campaigns against the Moors. 1065 Stained glass is used for the first time, to decorate a window in the clerestory of Augsburg Cathedral, Germany. 6 January 1066 Following the death of King Edward the Confessor of England on the previous day, Harold Godwinson, earl of Wessex, is elected as his successor. 25 September 1066 Harald Hardrada, King of Norway and Earl Tostig are defeated and killed by King Harold Godwinson of England at Stamford Bridge, England. Harald of Norway is succeeded by his sons Magnus II and Olaf III. 14 October 1066 Harold II Godwinson, last Anglo-Saxon king of England January–October 1066, falls in battle against the Norman forces of William I of Normandy, at Hastings, Sussex, England (c. 46). 25 December 1066 Duke William I of Normandy is crowned king of England. 1066 The comet later known as Halley's Comet appears in the sky, and is taken as an omen by both the Norman and English sides before the Battle of Hastings. The victorious Normans record its appearance in the Bayeux Tapestry. 1066 With the Norman Conquest, Norman French becomes the language of the English court. Latin continues to be the language of the church and the law. 21 May 1067 The Byzantine emperor Constantine X dies. He is succeeded by his widow Eudocia Macrembolitissa.

1 January 1068 Romanus IV Diogenes, who has married the empress Eudocia Macrembolitissa, is crowned as Byzantine emperor. December 1069 William I the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy, retakes York from the English rebels and their Danish allies, and spends the winter in a brutal ravaging campaign, 'the Harrying of the North', to force northern England into submission. 1069 Duke Boleslaw II of Poland captures Kiev and restores his uncle, Iziaslav, as its prince; Boleslaw abandons Kiev within a year but recovers Red Russia for Poland. 19 August 1071 The Seljuk sultan Alp Arslan destroys a Byzantine army at Manzikert, Armenia, and captures Emperor Romanus IV, whom he frees for a ransom and the payment of tribute. The Seljuk Turks now complete their conquest of Armenia and overrun most of Anatolia (modern Turkey). In the same year, the Seljuks also conquer Syria and, under the general Atsiz ibn-Abaq, take Jerusalem from the Fatimid caliphate. 24 October 1071 Michael VII, the son of Constantine X, is proclaimed Byzantine emperor, and Romanus IV is deposed, imprisoned, and murdered. Michael unsuccesfully appeals to Western Europe for assistance against the Seljuk Turks. 1071 William I the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy, expels Hereward the Wake, the last significant English rebel, from his stronghold on the Isle of Ely. 25 November 1072 The Seljuk sultan, Alp Arslan, is murdered while campaigning in Transoxiana. He is succeeded by his son, Malik Shah. 22 April 1073 Following the death of Alexander II, Deacon Hildebrand, a radical church reformer, is elected by popular acclaim as Pope Gregory VII. 24–27 February 1075 At the Lent synod, Pope Gregory VII suspends seven German bishops for opposing his renewal of decrees against clerical marriage and issues a decree forbidding lay investiture of bishops, whereby secular leaders grant church officials the symbols of their authority. His ruling is strongly opposed, in particular by King Henry IV of Germany. June 1075 In defiance of Pope Gregory VII's decree against lay investiture, King Henry IV of Germany appoints his court chaplain to the archbishopric of Milan, so beginning the dispute between the papacy and the German monarchy known as the 'Investiture Contest'. 24 January 1076 King Henry IV of Germany responds to a letter from Pope Gregory VII threatening excommunication by holding a council at Worms where the German bishops renounce their allegiance to Gregory and declare him deposed. Gregory shortly afterwards excommunicates Henry and absolves his

subjects of their oaths of loyalty. 25 December 1076 Boleslaw II is crowned as king of Poland with a crown sent by Pope Gregory VII to reward his zeal in restoring the church in Poland, under the direction of papal legates, and for supporting the Pope against King Henry IV of Germany. Also in this year, Boleslaw campaigns against Bohemia with Russian assistance, and moves the Polish capital from Gniezno to Kraków. 1 January 1077 King Henry IV of Germany submits to Pope Gregory VII at Canossa and is absolved from excommunication. 1077 The conquest of Byzantine Anatolia (modern Turkey) completed, Suleiman ibn-Qutlamish establishes the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum ('Rome' in Turkish spelling), with his capital at Nicaea. 31 March 1078 After a revolt in Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey), the Byzantine emperor Michael VII abdicates and is succeeded by the general Nicephorus III Botaneiates, who has already been proclaimed emperor by the rebels. 1078–1124 Work begins on the Romanesque cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, using French masons. Built on a huge scale to accommodate the large number of pilgrims, it is largely completed by 1124. 7 March 1080 Pope Gregory VII again prohibits lay investiture, declares Henry IV to be deposed as king of Germany, and recognizes the 'antiking' Rudolph of Swabia in his place. 25 June 1080 King Henry IV of Germany holds a council of bishops at Brixen which declares Pope Gregory VII to be deposed and elects Guibert, archbishop of Ravenna, as Pope Clement III. 29 June 1080 In the Treaty of Ceprano, Pope Gregory VII makes an alliance against King Henry IV of Germany with Robert Guiscard, the Norman duke of Apulia, and recognizes his conquests in southern Italy and Sicily. 15 October 1080 In a battle near Hohen-Mölsen, Rudolf of Swabia defeats King Henry IV of Germany, but is mortally wounded. 3 March 1081 The Byzantine emperor Nicephorus III Botaneiates is deposed in favour of Alexius I Comnenus, founder of the Comnenian dynasty. 4 April 1081 A rebellion in Poland forces King Boleslaw II into exile. He is succeeded by his brother, Wladyslaw I Herman, under whom the Polish territories disintegrate in civil war, and the crown falls into abeyance until 1300. 9 August 1081 King Henry IV's enemies in Germany elect Hermann of Salm as king in succession to Rudolf of Swabia.

1081 William I the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy, makes an expedition into southern Wales, where Norman marcher lords are now established. 1083–1087 The Kiyowara clan, formerly allies of the Minamoto in the Nine Years' War, challenge Minamoto rule in northern Honshu, Japan. The Minamoto, led by Yoshiie, destroy the Kiyowara and impose absolute rule on the north. 21 March 1084 King Henry IV of Germany captures Rome and besieges Pope Gregory VII in the Castel Sant' Angelo. 24 March 1084 King Henry IV of Germany's antipope Clement III assumes the papacy in Rome. 5 May 1084 Answering a call for help from Pope Gregory VII, Robert Guiscard, the Norman duke of Apulia, expels the Germans from Rome; however, the Norman soldiers do so much damage that Gregory is forced to go into exile with them to escape popular anger. 17 July 1085 When the Norman duke Robert Guiscard of Apulia is killed at the siege of Cephalonia, Greece, he is succeeded as duke of Apulia by his son, Roger Borsa, who withdraws the Normans from Greece. Robert's brother, Roger, succeeds him as count in Sicily and Calabria. 25 December 1085 William I the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy, orders a survey of the resources of England subsequently recorded in the Domesday Book, possibly because of the threat of invasion from King Cnut IV of Denmark. 24 May 1086 Abbot Desiderius of Monte Cassino is elected, against his will, as Pope Victor III to succeed Gregory VII. Rioting forces him to leave Rome before he can consecrated and he resumes his duties as abbot. 11 August 1086 Henry V, German king 1099–1125 and Emperor 1111–25, the last emperor of the Salian dynasty, born (–1125). 23 October 1086 Yusuf ibn-Tashfin, the Almoravid emir of Morocco, who has been called into Spain by al-Mutamid of Seville to stem the Christian advance, defeats Alfonso VI of Castile and León at Azagal, near Badajoz. 1086 Suleiman, Sultan of Rum, is defeated and killed by Tutush, the semiindependent Seljuk governor of Syria and Palestine, while attempting to take Aleppo. He is succeeded by his son, Kilij Arslan. 9 September 1087 Following the death of William I the Conqueror, king of England and duke of Normandy, of wounds received suppressing a revolt in the county of Maine, he is succeeded in Normandy by his eldest son, Robert Curthose, who immediately faces a baronial rebellion he is never able to

suppress completely. William is succeeded in England by a younger son, William II Rufus. 9 September 1087 William I the Conqueror, duke of Normandy 1035–87, king of England 1066–87, dies in Rouen, Normandy (59). 1087 The Domesday Book, compiled for William I the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy, records 5,624 water-mills for corn south of the rivers Trent and Severn, roughly one mill for every 400 people, some stamping-mills for crushing iron-ore, and hammer-mills. It estimates the population of England at between 1 and 1.5 million, with East Anglia the most populous region. 12 March 1088 Cardinal Otto of Chatillon is elected as Pope Urban II at Terracina, near Gaeta, Naples, Rome being under the control of the Emperor Henry IV's antipope, Clement III. 29 April 1090 Aided by the Cumans, a nomadic people of Turkish origin, Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus defeats the Pechenegs, a Turkish people settled in the area of modern Ukraine, who are blockading Constantinople, at Mount Levunium. c. 1090 The Bayeux tapestry, a pictorial record of the Norman conquest of England, is embroidered. It may have been commissioned by Odo of Bayeux, halfbrother of William the Conqueror. 1091 The French-born Prior Walcher of Malvern Abbey, England, records his observations in Italy of an eclipse of the Moon. This is one of the earliest accurate western European observations of the phenomenon. 11 November 1092 Following the death of the Seljuk sultan Malik Shah, he is succeeded by his son Mahmud I, who is immediately attacked by his brothers. Torn by civil war, the Seljuk sultanate disintegrates as its provinces and cities become independent under local dynasties. 1093 King Conrad II of Germany rebels against his father, Emperor Henry IV, and is crowned as king of Italy. 1093 Work begins on Durham Cathedral in Durham, England, continuing until 1133 and including the first example of decorative rib vaulting. 29 December 1094 With the death of Caliph al-Munstansir the Fatimid caliphate goes into rapid decline, as the caliphate is held by a succession of powerless nonentities, several of whom are murdered. 1094 Pope Urban II regains possession of the Lateran Palace in Rome, so completing his recovery of Rome from the antipope Clement III. Although Emperor Henry IV's cause in Italy is now ruined, he is prevented from returning to Germany because of his son King Conrad II of Germany's rebellion, and the empress Adelaide deserts him.

1094 Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, the Cid, captures Valencia from the Moors and rules it nominally as a vassal of Alfonso VI of Castile and León. 3 March 1095 In a council at Piacenza, Pope Urban II appeals to Western Europe to rescue Constantinople from the Turks. 27 November 1095 At the council of Clermont, France, Pope Urban II proclaims the First Crusade, calling for the Holy Land to be freed from the Seljuk Turks and for there to be free access to Jerusalem for pilgrims. Participants are granted an indulgence (remission of penances due for sin). 1 December 1095 Count Raymond IV of Toulouse becomes the first major figure to join the First Crusade. 1095 The Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus repulses the Cumans, a Turkish people, at Adrianople and appeals to Pope Urban II for western aid against the Turks. c. 1095 Chanson de Roland/Song of Roland is recorded. It is the earliest extant example of the chivalric epics known as chanson de geste ('song of exploits') which were sung and possibly composed by French trouvères (poets with a narrative style). 1 August 1096 The 'People's Crusade', a poorly armed and ill-disciplined peasant army led by Peter the Hermit, arrives in Constantinople. 21 October 1096 Kilij Arslan, Seljuk sultan of Rum, destroys the army of the 'People's Crusade' at Civetot, shortly after it has crossed into Anatolia. 1 July 1097 The crusaders defeat Kilij Arslan, Seljuk sultan of Rum, at Dorylaeum, opening the way for their army to cross into Anatolia. 3 June 1098 The crusaders take Antioch after a traitor admits a party of knights led by the Norman prince Bohemond of Taranto under cover of night. 1098 Hildegard von Bingen, German Benedictine abbess, philosopher, mystic, and musician, born in Bermersheim, Germany (–1179). 10 July 1099 Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar ('El Cid'), Spanish military leader and national hero, conqueror of Valencia, dies in Valencia (c. 56). 15 July 1099 The crusaders take Jerusalem by storm after a short siege. 22 July 1099 Godfrey of Bouillon is elected as 'Defender of the Holy Sepulchre', refusing the title king, and so founds the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. 13 August 1099 Cardinal Rainer is elected as Pope Paschal II.

18 July 1100 Godfrey of Bouillon, Defender of the Holy Sepulchre, dies. He is succeeded by his brother, Baldwin I, who takes the title king of Jerusalem. 5 August 1100 William II Rufus' brother Henry is crowned king of England; he issues a charter of liberties and recalls Anselm as archbishop of Canterbury. 9 September 1100 The antipope Clement III dies; a Roman faction takes advantage of the absence of the legitimate pope Paschal II, currently in southern Italy, to crown Theodoric as Clement's successor, but he is expelled later in the year. c. 1100 Jeu de paume, a handball game and the forerunner of real-tennis, is first played in France by monks in monastery cloisters; it is later taken up and played on courts by the French monarchy and aristocracy but it is not played with rackets until around 1500. c. 1100 Old English, the common language of England, with strong roots in the Germanic languages of the early invaders, begins to be replaced by Middle English. Middle English embodies the Northern European origins of English, but is also starting to reflect the influence of Latin and Norman French. c. 1100 The often noble troubadours (lyric poets) of northern France and trouvères (poets with a narrative style) of southern France emerge, the subject of their songs usually being courtly love. Guillaume IX, Duke of Aquitaine, is the earliest troubadour whose works have survived. 1100–1532 The Inca empire dominates the Andes region of South America. Its population numbers as many as 12 million. Incan society is based on a strict hierarchy, with an emperor who rules with absolute power. Their religion is based on sun-worship, and they are skilled builders who create a system of roads and irrigation. 23 June 1101 A new crusading army, led from Constantinople by Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse, takes the city of Ankara from the Seljuk Turkish sultanate of Rum. 2 February 1102 Albert is elected as pope by the supporters of the former antipope Clement III. However, he is deposed in a matter of days following popular rioting. 1102 Empress Matilda (or Maud), daughter of King Henry I of England, consort of Emperor Henry V, thereafter claimant to the English throne, born in London, England (–1167). 24 August 1103 King Magnus III Barelegs of Norway is defeated and killed at Moycoba while invading Ulster, Ireland; he is succeeded by his sons, Eysten I, Olaf IV, and Sigurd I.

1103 The first recorded use of fireworks occurs, in China. 27 August 1105 King Baldwin I of Jerusalem defeats the Fatimids (Shiite Muslims) in the third battle of Ramleh, ending their attempts to reconquer Palestine. 12 December 1105 Emperor Henry IV is captured and imprisoned in Mainz, capital of the Rhineland palatinate, Germany, by his son King Henry V of Germany who is in rebellion against him, fearing that the conflict with the papacy is undermining royal authority. 28 December 1105 Raymond IV, Count of Toulouse, dies while besieging Tripoli, one of the few major Muslim strongholds remaining on the Syrian coast. 1105 After an interregnum, Niels succeeds his brother, the late Erik I the Good, as king of Denmark. 1105 Alexander III (original name Rolando Bandinelli), Pope 1159–81, a vigorous defender of papal authority against the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa and Henry II of England, born in Siena, Italy (–1181). 7 August 1106 Henry IV, German king 1054–1106 and Holy Roman Emperor 1084–1106, son of Henry III, dies in Liège, Lorraine, France (55). 9 September 1106 Yusuf ibn-Tashfin, the Almoravid emir of Morocco and Muslim Spain, dies; he is succeeded by his son `Ali. 28 September 1106 King Henry I of England defeats and captures his brother Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, at the Battle of Tinchebrai in Normandy. Robert is imprisoned and Henry becomes Duke of Normandy as well as king of England. 8 August 1107 King Henry I of England and Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, settle their disagreement over the investiture of bishops at the synod of Westminster: Henry agrees to end lay investiture (investiture by a lay ruler). 1107 A civil war in Poland ends with Duke Zbigniew recognizing the supremacy of his brother and co-ruler Duke Boleslaw III. 30 June 1109 King Alfonso VI of Castile and León dies; he is succeeded by his daughter Urracca, the wife of King Alfonso I of Aragon and Navarre, who begins to style himself 'Emperor of the Spains'. 1110 Emperor Henry V of Germany invades Poland on behalf of the exiled Polish Duke Zbigniew and is defeated near Wroclaw by Duke Boleslaw III of Poland. Zbigniew is subsequently permitted to return from exile and Boleslaw has him killed.

4 February 1111 In a meeting in Sutri, Italy, Pope Paschal II tries to settle the 'Investiture Contest' (conflict between the papacy and the Empire over lay investiture of senior churchmen) by offering to surrender all church lands in Germany to Emperor Henry V of Germany if he will renounce the practice of lay investiture (investiture by lay rulers). Henry accepts Paschal's offer, knowing that it is unworkable, and opposition by the German bishops, who will lose their wealth and status, ensures that it is never enforced. 12 April 1111 Emperor Henry V of Germany forces Pope Paschal II to concede to him the right to invest bishops by threatening to recognize the antipope Sylvester IV. Henry then orders Sylvester to abdicate. 13 April 1111 Pope Paschal II formally crowns Henry V of Germany as emperor in Rome. Henry has held the title unofficially since 1106. 1111 The Persian ascetic theologian and Sufi mystic Al-Ghazzali (Algazel) inspires Muslim intolerance to science, despite being a former academic himself. This leads to the decline of science in Islamic lands. 9 September 1112 A French synod under Archbishop Guido of Vienne declares lay investiture (investiture of senior churchmen by lay rulers) to be heretical and excommunicates Emperor Henry V of Germany. 1112–1167 During the reign of King Alaungsithu, the Burmese kingdom of Pagan reaches the peak of its political and cultural influence. 1114 King Coloman of Hungary, who has made his kingdom the dominant power in the Balkans by conquering Dalmatia, Croatia, and Herzegovina, dies. He is succeeded by his son, Stephen II. 11 February 1115 Duke Lothair of Saxony rebels against Emperor Henry V and defeats him at Welfesholz. 1115 A-ku-ta, leader of the Juchen (or Jurchen, a Tungusic pastoralist people in Manchuria), rebels against his overlords, the Khitans (Qitans) of Liao, and declares himself emperor, with the Chinese dynastic name of 'Jin'. 24 January 1118 John of Gaeta is elected as Pope Gelasius II following the death of Pope Paschal II. 8 March 1118 Emperor Henry V of Germany has Maurice Bourdin, archbishop of Braga, elected as Pope Gregory VIII and installs him in Rome, forcing the recently elected Pope Gelasius II to flee. 7 April 1118 Pope Gelasius II, in exile in Capua, Italy, excommunicates Emperor Henry V of Germany. 19 December 1118 King Alfonso I of Aragon and Navarre captures the city of

Zaragoza in northeast Spain from the Muslim ruler of the Almoravids. 1118 The Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus establishes a form of feudalism in the Byzantine Empire by granting estates conditional upon military service (known as pronoia). c. 1118 Saint Thomas Becket, chancellor of England 1155–62 and archbishop of Canterbury 1162–70, born in Cheapside, London (–1170). 2 February 1119 Guy, archbishop of Vienne, is elected as Pope Calixtus II following the death of Pope Gelasius II. 28 June 1119 On the 'Field of Blood' near Aleppo, Syria, the Norman army of Antioch is destroyed by Ghazi, the Danishmend emir. Though Roger of Salerno, Prince of Antioch, is killed in the battle, Ghazi does not follow up his victory. 25 November 1120 William, the son and heir of King Henry I of England, is drowned when the White Ship is wrecked in the English Channel, on its way to England from Normandy. 1120 The French-born Prior Walcher of Malvern Abbey, England, introduces the measurement of latitude and longitude in degrees, minutes, and seconds. 27 November 1121 Mohammad ibn-Tumart, the Berber prophet and leader of the Almohads of the Atlas Mountains, northwest Africa, is hailed as Mahdi (Muslim leader) by his followers and begins the conquest of the Almoravid territories in northwest Africa. 27 November 1121 With the capture of the city of Stettin (modern Szczecin), Boleslaw III, Duke of Poland, completes his conquest of Pomerania. 23 September 1122 The 'Investiture Contest' (conflict between the papacy and the Empire over lay investiture of senior churchmen) finally ends with the Concordat at Worms, Germany, between Pope Calixtus II and Emperor Henry V of Germany. Henry agrees to end the practice of lay investiture but in practice is allowed to retain some influence over the election of bishops. 1122 The Byzantines exterminate the Pechenegs, a Turkish people settled in the area of modern Ukraine. c. 1122 The theologian and philosopher Peter Abelard writes his Sic et non/Yes and No, a collection of seemingly contradictory statements from the Bible and the Christian Fathers, compiled in order to promote rational discussion. 18 March–5 April 1123 Pope Calixtus II holds the first general council of the church in Western Europe (the first Lateran council), which condemns simony (the buying and selling of church benefits) and the marriage of priests. He also sends a legate to complete the organization of the Polish church.

18 April 1123 King Baldwin II of Jerusalem is captured and his army destroyed in a surprise attack on his camp near Gargar, on the River Euphrates, by Balak of Khanzit, the nephew of the Danishmend emir Ghazi. 29 May 1123 An invading Fatimid (Shiite Muslim) army flees back to Egypt when faced by the Frankish army of Jerusalem at Ibelin; the Venetians destroy the Fatimid fleet off Ascalon. c. 1123 Frederick I Barbarossa, German king and Holy Roman Emperor 1152–90, born (–1190). 8 August 1124 Emperor Henry V of Germany attempts to invade France as the ally of King Henry I of England, but retires as the French vassals respond to King Louis VI of France's summons to military service. Louis's success in exercising his feudal rights marks a major advance in the authority of the French monarchy. 15 December 1124 Cardinal Teobaldo is elected Pope Celestine II, but before he can be ordained armed members of the Frangipani family storm the assembly and proclaim Cardinal Lamberto of Ostia as Pope Honorius II. Celestine is injured in the affray and resigns. 23 May 1125 Henry V, German king 1099–1125 and Holy Roman Emperor 1111–25, the last emperor of the Salian dynasty, dies in Utrecht, in the modern Netherlands (38). 30 August 1125 Lothair of Supplinburg, Duke of Saxony, is elected 'king of the Romans' (king of Germany) as Lothair III by the German nobles. 1125 King Alfonso I of Aragon leads a spectacular raid deep into Moorish Spain, liberating the Mozarabs (Spanish Christians living under Muslim rule) of Granada and resettling them in the north of Iberia. Few Christians now remain under Muslim rule in Spain. 1125 King David III of Georgia dies, having established his kingdom as the major power in Caucasia and Armenia and ended its theoretical subjection to the Byzantine Empire. He is succeeded by his son, Demetrius I. 1125 The Khitan (Qitan) state of Liao collapses following the fall of its capital at Beijing, and the Juchen emperor A-ku-ta establishes the Jin dynasty in its place. 1126 The Juchen (or Jurchen, a Tungusic pastoralist people from Manchuria) besiege Kaifeng, the capital of the Chinese Song Empire, and are bought off with massive tribute, only to return a few months later when they capture the city along with Emperor Huizong and his son Qinzong, 3,000 courtiers, and the imperial treasury. Gaozong, a younger son of the emperor, escapes to reestablish the Song dynasty in southern China. 1127'Imad ad-Din Zangi is appointed atabeg (governor) of Mosul in succession to

il-Bursuqi; he becomes the Muslim champion against the Franks and founds the Zangid dynasty. 1127 Stephen of Pisa writes Liber regius/Royal Book, which translates the work of the 10th-century Persian physician 'Ali ibn al-'Abbas' (Haly Abbas), and introduces Arab and Greek medicine into the West. 17 June 1128 King Henry I of England's daughter Matilda, widow of the late emperor Henry V of Germany, marries Geoffrey Plantagenet, heir to the county of Anjou; she is recognized in England as her father's heir. 2 February 1130 Prince Bohemond II of Antioch and his army, en route to attack the Armenians, are massacred by the Danishmend Turks on the Jihan. 13 February 1130 Following the death of Pope Honorius II, both Gregory Papareschi (as Innocent II) and Peter Pierleoni (as Anacletus II) are elected pope by different factions among the cardinals; Innocent is forced to leave Rome. 1130 The English monk Adelard of Bath writes Quaestiones naturales/Inquiries into Nature, comprising a series of 76 dialogues discussing scientific topics such as botany, meteorology, zoology, and astronomy. 21 August 1131 King Baldwin II of Jerusalem dies; he is succeeded by his son-inlaw Fulk V le juene of Anjou. 4 December 1131 Omar Khayyam, Persian poet, mathematician, and astronomer, famous for his Rubaiyat, dies in Nishapur, Persia (83). 1131 Magnus the Strong, the son of King Niels of Denmark, murders the popular duke Knud Lavard; civil war breaks out when Knud's son Erik Emune seeks revenge against Magnus. 1132 King Roger II of Sicily withdraws from Rome in the summer to suppress a rebellion in Apulia, so allowing the supporters of Pope Innocent II to gain control and expel Pope Anacletus II. 1132–1143 The Palatine Chapel in Palermo, Sicily is constructed for King Roger II of Sicily. It combines Byzantine, Islamic, and Norman styles of architecture in a dazzling hybrid. 4 June 1133 King Lothair III of Germany is crowned Emperor by Pope Innocent II in Rome. As the supporters of the antipope Anacletus II hold St Peter's, the coronation takes place in the Lateran palace. 7 September 1134 King Alfonso I of Aragon and Navarre dies. He is succeeded in Aragon by his brother, Ramiro II, while Navarre recovers its independence under García IV Ramirez, and Alfonso VII of Castile and León takes possession of Zaragoza.

1134 King Niels of Denmark is murdered at Schleswig by supporters of the popular duke Knud Lavard, who was murdered in 1131; he is succeeded by Erik II Emune. 3 March 1135 In a diet (legislative assembly) at Bamberg, the 'antiking' Conrad III Hohenstaufen and his son Frederick submit to Emperor Lothair III. 26 May 1135 King Alfonso VII of Castile and León is acclaimed as emperor of Spain. 8 August 1135 Emperor Lothair III makes peace between Poland and Bohemia, receiving homage from Boleslaw III, Duke of Poland; he also settles a dispute over the succession to the Hungarian crown. 14 December 1135 King Harold IV of Norway is murdered by his brother Sigurd; he is succeeded by his sons, Sigurd II and Inge I. 26 December 1135 Stephen of Blois, nephew of the late king Henry I of England and grandson of William the Conqueror, is crowned as king of England. 1 August 1137 King Louis VI the Fat of France dies; he is succeeded by his son, Louis VII. 18 September 1137 King Erik II Emude of Denmark is murdered; he is succeeded by Erik III, grandson of Erik I, who faces renewed civil war. c. 1137 Geoffrey of Monmouth completes his Historia Regum Britanniae/History of the Kings of Britain, a largely apocryphal British history containing the stories of King Arthur, King Lear, and other mythic figures. 1137–1140 The new west front of Saint-Denis in Paris, France, is built. The design and sculpture of its façade mark the beginning of Gothic architecture. Abbot Suger now begins a new east end, with Gothic vaulting and stained glass windows. 5 May 1138 Robert, Earl of Gloucester, begins a civil war in England by declaring himself for the late King Henry I's daughter Matilda against King Stephen. 22 August 1138 In the Battle of the Standard, near Northallerton (in present-day North Yorkshire), English forces rout the invading army of King David I of Scotland. 1138 Boleslaw III, Duke of Poland, dies following a defeat in Russia, ending a period of Polish expansion. His lands are partitioned by his sons, civil war follows, and Poland ceases to be a unified state for two centuries. The eldest son, Wladyslaw II, becomes the first grand prince of Poland, with Kraków as his capital; he possesses Silesia and Pomerania and is, in theory, hereditary suzerain in all Polish lands.

1138 Saladin, Sultan of Egypt, Syria, Yemen, and Palestine 1171–1193, who successfully captured Jerusalem from the Franks during the Third Crusade, born in Takrit, Mesopotamia (–1193). 20 October 1139 Henry the Proud, former Duke of Bavaria and Saxony, dies; his son Henry the Lion claims to succeed, but the king of the Germans, Conrad III Hohenstaufen, has granted Bavaria to Leopold IV of Austria and Saxony to Albert I the Bear of Brandenburg. 1139 On the death of Prince Jaropolk II of Kiev, Vsevolod II seizes power. The surviving political unity of the Russian federation now finally collapses with the rivalry of princes for leadership and the provincial separatism of their subjects. 1139–1141 Gratian of Bologna compiles Concordia discordantium canonum/ Reconciliation of Opposing Canons (known as the Decretum), a collection of around 4,000 texts which forms the first systematic codification of canonical law. 4 April 1140 The Saxons reject Albert I the Bear as their duke and refuse to surrender to Conrad III Hohenstaufen, king of the Germans. . 1140 Poema di mío Cid/Poem of the Cid is written. It is the most complete Spanish epic chanson de geste ('songs of exploits') and tells of the fantastic deeds of the military commander Rodrigo or Ruy Díaz de Vivar (El Cid), who died in 1099. 9 September 1141 The Seljuk sultan Sanjar is defeated on the Qatwan Steppe, at Samarkand, by the Kara-Khitai Turks who are establishing an empire stretching from China to the River Oxus (present-day Amu Darya) in central Asia. 1 November 1141 King Stephen of England is released in exchange for Robert, Earl of Gloucester, the leader of the rival claimant Matilda's party, whom his partisans have captured; the civil war continues with neither party able to establish ascendancy. 1141 Qingui, chancellor of the Chinese Southern Song Empire and an exponent of peace with the Jin (Juchen) Empire, arranges the arrest and murder of the general Yuefei, the leader of the war party. The Southern Song then declare themselves vassals of the Jin and pay tribute. 5 May 1142 The civil war in Germany is brought to an end by a diet (legislative assembly) in Frankfurt; Conrad III Hohenstaufen, king of the Germans, grants Saxony to Henry the Lion and Bavaria to Henry Jasomirgott, brother of Leopold IV of Austria. 1142 The philosopher and theologian Peter Abelard writes his 'Letters' to his former lover Héloïse, including the celebrated autobiography Historia calamitatum mearum/Story of My Misfortunes.

26 September 1143 Pope Celestine II is elected following the death of Pope Innocent II. 1143 King Alfonso VII of Castile and León, Emperor of Spain, recognizes Afonso I as king of Portugal; Afonso does homage to Pope Innocent II's legate, thus making Portugal a papal fief. 12 March 1144 Pope Lucius II is elected following the death of Pope Celestine II. 24 December 1144'Imad ad-Din Zangi, the Muslim governor of Mosul, takes Edessa (Urfa) (in eastern Turkey) after a four-week siege; though he massacres the Frankish inhabitants the native Armenian Christians are spared. The fall of the city calls for a new crusade. 1144 The English scholar Robert of Chester makes a Latin translation of the Arabic Book of the Composition of Alchemy attributed to the 9th-century Muslim alchemist Jabir (Geber). This is the first such translation of a writing on chemistry. 15 February 1145 Bernard of Pisa is elected Pope Eugenius III following the death of Pope Lucius II. 1145 Construction begins on the royal portal at the west end of Chartres Cathedral in Chartres, France. Its sculpture shows the transition from the Romanesque to the Gothic style of architecture. 1145 Construction begins on the 'Friday Mosque' at Isfahan, Persia, capital of the Seljuk Turks. 1145 The Khmer emperor Suryavarman II conquers the kingdom of Champa. 1 March 1146 Pope Eugenius III proclaims the Second Crusade on God's behalf. The response is disappointing until the French Cistercian abbot Bernard of Clairvaux begins preaching the crusade. 1146 Grand Prince Wladyslaw II, attempting to reunite Poland under his rule, is defeated by his brothers Boleslaw and Mieczyslaw and flees to Germany; Boleslaw IV replaces him as grand prince. 4 April 1147 The Almohad Mahdi (Muslim leader) `Abd-al-Mu'min completes his conquest of the Almoravid possessions in Morocco with the capture of the capital city of Marrakesh; he then crosses into Spain, where the Almoravid emirate has disintegrated into several kingdoms established in Córdoba, Valencia, Murcia, and other areas. 29 June 1147 An assembly of Saxon nobles plans a crusade against the pagan Wends of the Baltic.

9 September 1147 The Saxons abandon their crusade against the pagan Wends after failing to take Dobin. 25 October 1147 Conrad III Hohenstaufen, king of the Germans' crusading army, is heavily defeated by the Seljuk Turks on the River Bathys, near Dorylaeum in Anatolia (modern Turkey). 1147 Hildegard, a Benedictine nun, founds a monastery near Bingen in the Rhine valley of Germany. A woman of great learning and piety, she writes fervent religious poetry set to her own music. 19 March 1148 The Second Crusade, one army consisting mostly Frankish and German nobles, much reduced as a result of defeats by the Seljuk Turks of Rum while crossing Anatolia, reaches Antioch. 24–28 July 1148 The Second Crusade lays siege to the city of Damascus in Syria but is forced to retreat because of lack of water, so bringing the disastrous crusade to an ignominious end. 1148 A Byzantine mosaic of Christ Pantocrator is included in the apse of Cefalù Cathedral in Sicily. 15 July 1149 The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem is dedicated. 1149 `Abd-al-Mu'min, the Almohad Mahdi (Muslim leader), completes his conquest of the Muslim emirates in Spain. 1149 The first British university is founded at Oxford, England. Robert Grosseteste is appointed its first chancellor, and it attracts scholars including Friar Roger Bacon, making it a centre for scientific study. 1150 A vast temple complex is built at Angkor Wat (in modern Cambodia) by the Khmer emperor Suryavarman II. The building is to be his mausoleum. 1151 The Byzantine emperor Manuel I Comnenus makes his first attack on Hungary in a war which lasts, intermittently, until 1167. 16 May 1152 Henry Plantagenet, Count of Anjou and Maine and Duke of Normandy, marries Eleanor of Aquitaine, gaining her lands in southern France – he now controls more of France than King Louis VII of France. 12 July 1153 Anastasius IV is elected pope following the death of Eugenius III. 19 August 1153 The Fatimid (Shiite Muslim) garrison of Ascalon, a city on the Mediterranean coast in Palestine, surrenders to King Baldwin III of Jerusalem: the Christians now control the entire coast of the Holy Land. 20 August 1153 St Bernard of Clairvaux, influential Cistercian abbot and mystic,

founder of the abbey of Clairvaux, dies in Clairvaux, France (c. 63). 10 October 1154 King Frederick I Barbarossa of Germany begins an expedition to Italy to restore royal authority there after the disorders of the 'Investiture Contest' (conflict between the papacy and the Empire over lay investiture of senior churchmen) and its aftermath. 4 December 1154 Cardinal Nicholas Breakspear is elected Pope Adrian IV (the first and only English pope) following the death of Pope Anastasius IV. 19 December 1154 Henry II Plantagenet is crowned as king of England, founding the Plantagenet dynasty. 1154 The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles are completed. They have been written since 880 and record events in England from AD 449–1154. 18 June 1155 King Frederick I Barbarossa of Germany and Italy captures and executes as a heretic Arnold of Brescia, the antipapal leader of the Roman commune, and is crowned as Holy Roman Emperor (sacrum Romanum imperator) by Pope Adrian IV, the first emperor to use the full title. 1156 Erik Jedvardsson becomes king of Sweden following the murder of Sverker I. A resulting feud sees the throne alternating between descendants of Sverker and Erik IX the Saint for the next century. 1156 King Vikramanka of Rashtrakuta (in the Deccan) dies; his kingdom, which has been the most powerful in India for three centuries, collapses. 1156 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa confers the title 'Count Palatine' on his half-brother Conrad who controls much territory in the Rhineland. The Rhine Palatinate develops into one of the leading German principalities. 21 August 1157 King Alfonso VII of Castile and León, Emperor of Spain, dies; by his will his sons, Sancho III and Ferdinand II, become kings of Castile and León respectively. 8 September 1157 Richard I ('Richard the Lionheart'), King of England 1189–99, who gained popularity through his bravery during the Third Crusade, born in Oxford, England (–1199). 1157 After invading Poland, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa compels Grand Prince Boleslaw IV of Poland to admit, in the Peace of Krzyszkowo, the imperial overlordship of Poland (for the last time). 1157 King Erik IX the Saint of Sweden begins the conquest of the area of modern Finland.

31 August 1158 King Sancho III of Castile dies; he is succeeded by his infant son, Alfonso VIII. Civil war breaks out. 1158 King Henry II of England campaigns against the Welsh and gains the overlordship of Gwynedd and Deheubarth. He also becomes overlord of Brittany on the death of his brother, Geoffrey of Anjou. c. 1158 Peter the Lombard writes Sententiarum libri quator/Four Books of Opinions, which after initial opposition becomes one of the most popular theological textbooks of the Middle Ages. 4 July 1159 Wladyslaw II, the former grand prince of Poland, dies; the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa has his sons restored to Silesia, so attaching it to German interests. 7 September 1159 Rolando Bandinelli is elected Pope Alexander III by a majority of the cardinals, but a party favouring the interests of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa elects Cardinal Octavian as Pope Victor IV; neither is able to control Rome. 1 January 1160 The fall of Mahdiyah (in modern Tunisia) to local rebels completes the loss of all the conquests of the kings of Sicily in North Africa. 24 March 1160 Pope Alexander III excommunicates the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa for recognizing his rival Victor IV as pope. 1160 Jean Bodel's Le Jeu de St Nicholas/The Play of St Nicholas, the oldest extant miracle play in French literature, is performed at Arras, France. 1160 Taira Kiyomori, the leader of the Taira samurai clan in Japan, wins control of the imperial government after defeating his rivals in the Hogen and Heijii insurrections of 1156–59. 1160 The Muslim scholar ibn-Rushd (Averroës) writes his great medical encyclopedia Kitab al-Kulliyat fi-al-Tibb/Generalities of Medicine. 1161 An attempt by the Jin (emperors of the Juchen people) to conquer the Chinese Southern Song Empire is defeated at the Battle of Zaishi, near Yangzhou, China. 14 January 1162 King Ladislas II of Hungary dies; he is succeeded by his brother, Stephen IV. 1162 Charles VII, nephew of the former king Sverker I, succeeds as king of Sweden. 1162 King Haakon II of Norway is defeated and murdered by the jarl (earl) Erling, whose son Magnus VI succeeds as king.

11 April 1163 With the death of his rival Stephen IV, King Stephen III of Hungary regains full control of his kingdom. 1163 At the council of Tours in France, the Catholic Church issues an edict against the mutilation of dead bodies. Although primarily aimed at the stripping of crusaders' bones for transport back to Europe, it also affects medical research. c. 1163 A wooden stave church is built at Borgund in Norway. 1163–1220 The Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, France is constructed. 22 April 1164 Guido of Crema is (uncanonically) elected Pope Paschal III in succession to the late antipope Victor IV. The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa gives him protection, but German prelates who had recognized Victor as pope refuse to accept Paschal. 21 August 1165 Philip II (Philip Augustus), King of France 1179–1223, who reconquered French territories lost previously to England, born in Paris (–1223). 1166 Hoping to take advantage of the weak position of Pope Alexander III following the death of his supporter King William I of Sicily, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa begins his fourth expedition to Italy. 11 April 1167 King Amalric I of Jerusalem, in alliance with the Fatimid vizier Shawar, defeats the Syrians under the Zengid general Shirkuh and his nephew Saladin near Cairo, Egypt. Both the Syrians and the Franks of Jerusalem subsequently agree to leave Egypt. 24 June 1167 The Holy Roman Frederick I Barbarossa camps outside Rome; he subsequently forces an entry, Pope Alexander III flees to Benevento, and the antipope Paschal III is installed. 10 September 1167 Empress Matilda (or Maud), daughter of Henry I of England, consort of Emperor Henry V, thereafter claimant to the English throne, dies near Rouen, France (c. 65). 24 December 1167 John I ('John Lackland'), King of England 1199–1216, son of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, brother of Richard I, born in Oxford, England (–1216). 1167 Genghis Khan (original name Temüjin), great Mongol military leader who established the Mongol empire, born at Deligun Bulduk, on the River Onon (–1227). 1167–1168 The Lombard League, formed to defend the northern Italian cities against the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, builds the city of Alessandria to strengthen its defences.

9 September 1168 Abbot John of Struma is elected the successor to the antipope Paschal III, as Calixtus III, and recognized as pope by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa. 4 November 1168 King Amalric I of Jerusalem invades Egypt and takes the town of Bilbeis, near Cairo, from the Fatimids (Shiite Muslims). 1168 The Toltec Empire of Mexico collapses after its capital at Tula is sacked by invaders. 8 March 1169 Prince Andrey Bogolyubsky of Suzdal seizes and sacks Kiev; now the most powerful Russian prince, he assumes the title of great prince and establishes his capital at Vladimir (after which his principality subsequently takes its name). 29 December 1170 St Thomas à Becket, chancellor of England 1155–62, archbishop of Canterbury 1162–70, is murdered in his cathedral by four knights acting on an angry outburst by King Henry II of England, expressing his wish to be rid of 'this turbulent priest' (52). His tomb becomes one of the most important of all medieval pilgrimage sites. 1170 The Korean palace guards massacre civil officials and enthrone a puppet king; a period of civil war follows. 12 March 1171 In an attempt to end Venetian dominance of trade in the Byzantine Empire, the emperor Manuel I Comnenus orders the arrest of all Venetians in the empire and the confiscation of their goods; Venice retaliates by attacking Dalmatia and the islands of Chios and Lesbos. 13 September 1171 The last Fatimid (Shiite Muslim) caliph of Egypt, al-'Adid, dies. Egypt nominally becomes subject to the caliph of Baghdad but in practice is annexed to the Zangid emirate under the rule of Saladin, the vizier of Nur-adDin, Zengid ruler of Syria. 21 March 1173 The 'young' king Henry and his brothers Richard, Geoffrey, and John rebel against their father, King Henry II of England, with the help and encouragement of King Louis VII of France. 1173 King Vladislav II of Bohemia abdicates in favour of his son, Frederick. There follows a period of civil war, with 10 changes of ruler in 24 years, in which royal officials become established as feudal magnates; there is a simultaneous increase in German influence and settlement in Bohemia. 15 May 1174 Nur-ad-Din, the Zengid ruler of Syria, dies. His empire disintegrates as his heir, Ismail, is young; Saladin, Nur-ad-Din's vizier in Egypt, declares his independence, founding the Ayyubid dynasty. 12 July 1174 King Henry II of England does penance at Canterbury for Archbishop Thomas à Becket's murder in 1170.

13 July 1174 King William I the Lion of Scotland is captured while invading Northumberland; King Henry II of England has now suppressed his sons' rebellion in England. 1174 The choir of Canterbury Cathedral, England, is destroyed by fire. Its reconstruction by the French mason William of Sens marks the beginnings of English Gothic style. 1175 By the Treaty of Windsor, Rory O'Connor, High King of Ireland recognizes King Henry II of England's conquests in the east of Ireland but is permitted to retain dominion over the territories not under Anglo-Norman occupation on payment of tribute. 1175 The Italian scholar Gerard of Cremona makes a Latin translation from Arabic of Ptolemy's astronomical work the Almagest, having learnt Arabic especially for the task. It becomes the work's most popular translation of the Middle Ages. 1175 The Japanese Buddhist Amida cult becomes a separate sect called Pure Land Buddhism. It is founded by the priest Honen, who specifies that the chanting of the name Amida Buddha is the only practice necessary to reach the pure land (paradise). 29 May 1176 After Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, refuses to send reinforcements, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa is decisively defeated by the Lombard League, at Legnano, Italy. 17 September 1176 The Byzantine emperor Manuel I Comnenus invades the sultanate of Rum but his army is trapped and destroyed by Sultan Kilij Arslan II at Myriocephalum. 10 October 1176 By the Treaty of Anagni, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa recognizes Alexander III as the legitimate pope, so ending the schism between the empire and the papacy. 1176 Construction begins on Old London Bridge, the main crossing over the River Thames in London, England. The bridge has 19 arches, with access controlled by a drawbridge, and buildings overhanging the river on either side of the road. 23 July 1177 In the Treaty of Venice, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa makes a truce with the Lombard League of northern Italy and Sicily. 1177 King Jaya Indravarman IV of Champa sacks Angkor, capital of the Khmer Empire. Tribhuvanadityavarman, who had usurped the Khmer throne, is killed, and Jayavarman, son of Dharanindravarman II, assumes leadership of Khmer resistance to Champa domination.

1178 Malatya, the last stronghold of the Danishmend dynasty, falls to Kilij Arslan II, Sultan of Rum. c. 1178 French poet Chrétien of Troyes writes his Arthurian romances Yvain and Lancelot. 24 June 1179 Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, is put under the ban of the Holy Roman Empire for failing to appear before Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa to answer charges of oppressive rule in Saxony. 17 September 1179 Hildegard von Bingen, German Benedictine abbess, philosopher, mystic, and musician, dies in Rupertsberg, near Bingen, Germany (c. 81). 1179 The Toltec city of Chichén Itzá on the Yucatán peninsula of Central America, built entirely on alignments with the rising and setting of the Sun and Venus, is sacked and burnt by the Mayapán king Hunac Ceel. 24 September 1180 The Byzantine emperor Manuel I Comnenus dies; he is succeeded by his son, Alexius II, with his widow, Mary of Antioch, acting as regent. 1180 Serbia becomes independent of the Byzantine Empire under Stephen Nemanja, Grand Zupan of Rascia. 1180 The Byzantine emperor Manuel I Comnenus makes pronoia (grants of land held subject to military service) heritable; thus they come to resemble Western feudal tenures. They are also evidence of the decay of imperial authority following the defeat at Manzikert in 1176. 1180 The earliest European reference to a sternpost rudder is recorded. The increasing use of sails means that rudders are needed for steering, and oarpowered boats with steering oars become redundant. 30 August 1181 Alexander III (original name Rolando Bandinelli), pope 1159–81, a vigorous defender of papal authority against the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa and King Henry II of England, dies in Rome, Italy (c. 76). 1 September 1181 Cardinal Ubald of Ostia is elected Pope Lucius III following the death of Pope Alexander III. 1181 Jayavarman VII is crowned as king of the Khmer Empire following his expulsion of the Chams. 1181 St Francis of Assisi, founder of the Franciscan monastic orders and church reformer, principal patron saint of Italy, born in Assisi (–1226). 1181 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, supported by King

Valdemar I of Denmark, completes his dispossession of Henry the Lion when the port of Lübeck, founded by Henry, surrenders to Frederick; Henry submits and is banished (to the court of his father-in-law King Henry II of England) for three years, retaining only Brunswick. 1181 The Pomeranian princes of Stettin (modern Szczecin, Poland) become vassals of the Holy Roman Empire; thus western Pomerania, where Germans have settled, leaves the Polish sphere of influence. 12 May 1182 Following the death of King Valdemar I the Great of Denmark, he is succeeded by his son Cnut IV, who refuses to do homage to the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa. 9 September 1182 Andronicus I Comnenus, nephew of the former emperor John II Comnenus, usurps the throne of the Byzantine Empire, murdering the current emperor Alexius II, his mother, and her advisers. 1182 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa intervenes in the succession dispute among the Premysl rulers of Bohemia, taking the opportunity to make the Bohemian province of Moravia a margravate subject only to the Empire. 12 June 1183 Following the death of the 'young king' Henry, the first rebellion of King Henry II of England's sons collapses. 25 June 1183 By the Treaty of Constance, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa makes peace with the Lombard League of northern Italy, granting its cities self-government in return for an oath of allegiance. 25 April 1185 At the naval battle of Dan-no-ura the Japanese Minamoto clan finally destroys the Taira samurai clan. Minamoto Yoritomo, adopting the title Sei-i-tai Shogun ('barbarian-suppressing generalissimo'), becomes the effective ruler of Japan, making his capital at Kamakura (near Tokyo). Rule by the shoguns (military rulers) continues in Japan until 1868. 7 July 1185 By the Treaty of Boves with Count Philip of Flanders, King Philip II of France acquires Amiens and other lands and titles in northeast France, thus doubling the extent of the royal domain. 12 September 1185 The Byzantine emperor Andronicus I Comnenus is killed in a riot in Constantinople; he is succeeded by his cousin, Isaac II Angelus, who defeats the Normans at Mosinopolis and expels them. 25 November 1185 Humbert Crivelli, archbishop of Milan, is elected Pope Urban III following the death of Pope Lucius III. 17 May 1186 Pope Urban III causes a break with the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa by consecrating the papal candidate for the archbishopric of Trier despite having sworn earlier that he would not do this.

3 July 1187 The army of the kingdom of Jerusalem, advancing to raise the siege of Tiberias, is trapped and destroyed by Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria at the Horns of Hattin; King Guy of Jerusalem is captured and Reynald of Châtillon beheaded. The kingdom of Jerusalem is left virtually defenceless as Saladin takes the Franks' castles one by one. 3 October 1187 Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria takes Jerusalem after a short siege. 17 December 1187 Pope Gregory VIII dies, shortly after proclaiming the Third Crusade to liberate Jerusalem from the Muslims. Two days later, Paul Scolari is elected Pope Clement III. 1187 Albert of Morra is elected Pope Gregory VIII following the death of Pope Urban III. 1187 The Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angelus makes a truce with the Bulgarian brothers Theodore and Asen, from the ruling line of the Second Bulgarian Empire, recognizing Bulgarian independence de facto; Theodore (now named Peter) is crowned as tsar, although Asen actually rules. 1 January 1188 King Henry II of England and King Philip II of France, meeting at Gisors, France, to discuss a truce, are persuaded to make peace and go on crusade; they impose 'Saladin tithes' to finance their expeditions. 27 March 1188 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa takes the Cross (agrees to go on crusade); by his order Henry the Lion, the dispossessed Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, goes back into exile. 3 April 1189 In the Peace of Strasbourg, Pope Clement III and the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa resolve their differences over the appointment to the archbishopric of Trier in the Rhineland Palatinate. Both the papal and imperial candidates are dropped and a new election is held. 3 September 1189 Richard I the Lionheart is crowned as king of England; this date becomes the limit of legal memory (from 1290). 10 October 1189 With the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa absent on crusade, Henry the Lion, the dispossessed Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, returns to Germany and recovers much of Saxony and Holstein. 12 December 1189 Having raised money by the sale of offices and privileges, King Richard I the Lionheart leaves England to join the Third Crusade, leaving William de Mandeville, Earl of Essex and Hugh Puiset, bishop of Durham, in charge of England as justiciars (vice regents in the king's absence). 10 June 1190 Frederick I Barbarossa, Holy Roman Emperor 1152–90 and German

king, drowns in Lesser Armenia (Cilicia) during the Third Crusade (c. 67). 10 June 1190 When the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa is drowned in the River Saleph (now Göksu) in Lesser Armenia (Cilicia) while on the Third Crusade, his son Frederick of Swabia takes command, but his German army is demoralized by the death of the emperor and begins to break up. 1190 The Christian military order of the Knights of the Cross (later known as the Teutonic Knights) is founded at Acre, Palestine (modern Akko, Israel) to crusade against the pagan Slavs and Balts. 30 March 1191 Cardinal Hyacinth Bobo is elected Pope Celestine III following the death of Pope Clement III. 15 April 1191 Pope Celestine III crowns Henry VI as Holy Roman Emperor following the death of his father Frederick I Barbarossa on 10 October 1190. Henry then begins his conquest of his wife's kingdom of Sicily, held by Tancred, Count of Lecce. 8 May–5 June 1191 King Richard I the Lionheart of England conquers Cyprus from its Byzantine ruler, Isaac II Angelus. While there, at Limassol, he marries Berengaria of Navarre (12 May). 12 July 1191 Four days after the arrival of King Richard I the Lionheart of England, the crusaders take the Muslim-held port of Acre (present-day Akko, Israel); it becomes the capital of the kingdom of Jerusalem. 3 August 1191 Claiming to be in ill health, King Philip II of France sails for home from Palestine. 8 August 1191 Empress Constance is captured in a revolt in Salerno, Italy, while the Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI is forced by fever in his army to raise the siege of Naples and return to Germany. 1191 Jewish philosopher Moses Maimonides completes his major work, Dalalat alHa'irin/A Guide for the Perplexed, an attempt at a rational philosophy of Judaism aimed at reconciling Jewish theology and Muslim Aristotelianism. 23 May 1192 King Richard I the Lionheart of England takes Daron, thus completing the recovery of the Palestinian coast from Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria. 5 August 1192 King Richard I the Lionheart of England defeats Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria outside the Palestinian town of Jaffa. 2 September 1192 King Richard I the Lionheart of England negotiates a threeyear truce and access to Jerusalem for Christian pilgrims with Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria, thereby ending the Third Crusade.

11 December 1192 On his return journey to England from the Third Crusade, King Richard I the Lionheart is captured by Leopold V, Duke of Austria who he humiliated at Acre in Palestine. 1192 At the second Battle of Tarain, near Delhi in India, Sultan Mohammad of Ghur (modern Afghanistan) defeats a confederation of Rajput princes and goes on to conquer northern India. 1192 With King Richard I the Lionheart absent on crusade, his brother John claims to be king of England. 14 February 1193 Leopold V, Duke of Austria, surrenders King Richard I the Lionheart of England to the Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI for ransom; he uses the money to build towns and fortresses and establish the Wiener pfennig. 4 March 1193 Saladin, sultan of Egypt, Syria, Yemen, and Palestine 1171–93, who successfully captured Jerusalem from the Franks during the Third Crusade, dies in Damascus (c. 56). 1193 The Italian physician and scholar Burgundo of Pisa translates Galen's medical works from Greek into Latin, thus reintroducing much of Galen's thinking into Western Europe. 3 February 1194 King Richard I the Lionheart of England is released by the Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI in Mainz, in the Rhineland Palatinate, Germany; as he returns to England, he builds up an anti-French coalition in the Rhineland and Low Countries. His brother, the self-proclaimed King John of England, flees to the French court on hearing of his release. 12 May 1194 Having raised money by the sale of charters and a new tax called the Carucage (based on the Danegeld), King Richard I the Lionheart leaves England to re-establish his authority in his French lands. 26 December 1194 Frederick II, King of Sicily 1197–1250, king of Germany 1212–1250, and Holy Roman Emperor 1220–1250, King of Jerusalem 1229–1243, grandson of Frederick I Barbarossa, born in Jesi, Ancona, Italy (–1250). 1195 The physician Roger of Salerno, a teacher at the medical school there, writes Practica chirurgiae/Surgical Practice. This is the earliest European textbook on surgery. 7 July 1196 Al-`Adil, the brother of the late Saladin, Sultan of Egypt and Syria gains control of Egypt and much of Syria, styling himself sultan. 1196 Ch'oe Ch'ung-hon, a Korean general, massacres his rivals, takes control of the kingdom, and restores its unity; his family, the Ch'oe, retain power until 1258.

1197 Henry Bratislav, Duke of Bohemia, who conquered Moravia, dies. He is succeeded by Vladislav Henry, who soon abdicates in favour of Premysl Ottokar I (deposed in 1193); his recognition as duke ends a period of frequent civil war and strong imperial influence in ducal elections. 8 January 1198 Lotario di Segni is elected Pope Innocent III following the death of Pope Celestine III. 7 July 1198 Otto IV, a member of the Welf dynasty and son of Henry the Lion, is crowned as 'king of the Romans' (king of Germany) after he captures the city of Cologne; civil war breaks out in Germany between him and the Hohenstaufen party of Philip, Duke of Swabia, who has already been elected 'king of the Romans'. 15 August 1198 Pope Innocent III proclaims the Fourth Crusade to recover Jerusalem from the Muslims and offers an indulgence to those who fight the Albigensians (Cathars; members of a heretical Christian sect) in southern France. 13 January 1199 King Richard I the Lionheart of England and King Philip II of France meet on the River Seine near Andeli to make a treaty of truce: Philip concedes Richard's recent gains. 6 April 1199 Richard I the Lionheart, king of England 1189–99, who gained popularity through his bravery during the Third Crusade, dies of a wound received at the siege of the castle of Châlus in the Duchy of Aquitaine (41). 27 May 1199 John, the younger brother of the late King Richard I the Lionheart, is crowned as king of England. c. 1200 By this period, the Aztec and Maya peoples of Central America are manufacturing and using rubber, for example to make balls for use in games and sports. c. 1200 The Five Icelandic Sagas: The Saga of Burnt Njal/Njal's Saga; the Laxdaela/Laxdale's Saga; the Eyrbyggja, Egil's Saga/Egla; and The Saga of Grettir the Strong/Grettis Saga (legends and stories either about the deeds of the hero, or about events connected with a region) are compiled. c. 1200–c. 1230 Manco Capac founds the Inca state in the Cuzco Valley, Peru. 8 June 1201 By the Diploma of Neuss, King Otto IV cedes imperial authority in Italy to the papacy. In return, Pope Innocent III agrees to recognize Otto as 'king of the Romans' (king of Germany) instead of his rival Philip Hohenstaufen, Duke of Swabia. 1201 The St Gotthard Pass is opened through the Swiss Alps, connecting the Uri and Ticino regions and establishing a major overland commercial route between Italy and northern Europe.

30 April 1202 King Philip II of France declares that King John of England has forfeited his French lands because he fails to appear in Philip's court to answer the charges brought against him by Hugh of Lusignan, Count of La Marche, whose fiancée, Isabella of Angoulême, John has married. John's vassals, tired of his arbitrary rule, revolt against him. 15 November 1202 The crusaders take the Adriatic port of Zadar (Italian Zara) from the king of Hungary for Venice in lieu of payment for their transport to Egypt, which Venice cannot pay. Here the crusaders meet Alexius IV Angelus, son of the deposed Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angelus, who promises them troops and money for the Fourth Crusade if they will help his father regain the Byzantine throne. 1202 Pope Innocent III excommunicates King Alfonso IX of León and puts his kingdom under an interdict for allying himself with the Muslim Almohads against the Christian kingdom of Castile. 1202–1304 The Cloth Hall at Ypres, in Flanders (now part of Belgium), one of the finest Gothic secular buildings of the late Middle Ages, is built. It is destroyed in 1915. 17 July 1203 Carrying out their part of the arrangement made the previous November with Alexius IV Angelus, son of the deposed Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angelus, the crusaders force an entry into Constantinople; the Byzantine emperor Alexius III Angelus flees and Isaac is restored. 1 January 1204 An anti-Latin mob in Constantinople murders the Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angelus and proclaims Nicholas Canabus as emperor. 8 February 1204 The co-Byzantine emperor Alexius IV Angelus dies in an uprising of the citizens of Constantinople, who are angered at his inability to fulfil his pledge to the Crusaders who had helped install him on the throne. Nicholas Canabus, proclaimed emperor by the anti-Latins, is imprisoned. Alexius V Ducas Murtzuphlus, son-in-law of the deposed Alexius III and leader of the anti-Latin forces in Constantinople assumes the Byzantine throne. 1 April 1204 Eleanor of Aquitaine, Queen Consort first of King Louis VII of France, then of King Henry II of England, mother of King Richard I the Lionheart and King John of England, and one of the most influential women in 12th-century Europe, dies in Fontevrault, Anjou, France (c. 82). 12 April 1204 Realizing that the Byzantine promise of help for their crusade is not going to be kept, the crusaders take the Byzantine capital Constantinople by storm and sack it for three days. The emperor Alexius V Ducas Murtzuphlus flees, as does Constantine XI Lascaris after being offered the throne by Byzantine nobles during the attack. 24 June 1204 With the fall of the Norman capital Rouen, King Philip II's conquest

of Normandy is complete; of his French possessions King John of England retains only Gascony and the Channel Islands (originally part of the duchy of Normandy). 10 October 1204 The Latin emperor Baldwin of Constantinople, the Venetians, and the crusaders partition the Byzantine Empire by treaty. Continuing Byzantine resistance, however, means that many of the crusaders are unable to take possession of their territories. 8 November 1204 Kalojan is crowned as king of Bulgaria (styling himself tsar) by a papal legate, following his agreement with Pope Innocent III to reject Orthodox Christianity and accept the Roman church. 14 April 1205 Tsar Kalojan of Bulgaria defeats, captures, and executes the Latin emperor Baldwin of Constantinople at Adrianople (modern Edirne, Turkey). 1206 Having unified most of the Mongol peoples under his leadership, the Mongol conqueror Temüjin adopts the title Genghis (or Chingis) Khan ('Universal Khan') at the quriltai (Mongol assembly) in the spring, founding the Mongol Empire. 1 January 1207 Philip, Duke of Swabia and 'king of the Romans' (king of Germany), takes the city of Cologne, so achieving a dominant position in Germany; his rival king, Otto IV, flees through Denmark to England. 1207 Han T'o-chou, the Chinese Southern Song emperor, is killed by the Jin when attempting to reconquer northern China. 21 June 1208 Shortly after Pope Innocent III has recognized him as 'king of the Romans' and agreed to crown him Holy Roman Emperor, Philip, Duke of Swabia, is murdered by Otto of Wittelsbach, Count Palatine of Bavaria, over a personal grudge. 1208 At the Battle of the Irtysh, the Mongol leader Genghis Khan defeats Gushluk, leader of the Naiman tribe, completing his unification of the Mongol peoples. 1208 Mohammad al-Nasir, the Almohad emir of northwest Africa and Muslim Spain, destroys the last Almoravid strongholds in North Africa. 15 August 1209 The southern French town of Carcassonne is taken by the Albigensian crusaders; the Norman crusader Simon IV de Montfort is then elected leader and expropriates land from the Albigensian (Cathar) heretics and their supporters, becoming lord of Béziers and Carcassonne. 4 November 1209 King John of England's continued refusal to accept Stephen Langton, the Pope's choice, as archbishop of Canterbury leads to his excommunication by Pope Innocent III. 1209 Following riots between university scholars and townspeople in Oxford,

England, a group of English academics leave and move to the small town of Cambridge, England, where they establish a new university. 1209 The French nobleman Geoffrey of Villehardouin assumes the title of prince of Achaea, founding another feudal Latin dynasty in the Morea (that is, the Peloponnese in Greece, known as 'Romania' in the West). 17 July 1210 King Sverker II of Sweden is defeated, killed, and succeeded by Eric X Cnutson, the first Swedish king to be anointed at his coronation. 11 November 1210 The Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV, having agreed not to, opens a campaign to conquer the Italian duchy of Apulia and is therefore excommunicated by Pope Innocent III. Thus freed from their vows of obedience to Otto, his subjects in Germany rebel against him. 1210 Pope Innocent III unexpectedly sanctions St Francis of Assisi's new order, the Friars Minor. c. 1210 Gottfried von Strassburg writes his unfinished epic poem Tristan und Isolde/Tristan and Isolde in Middle High German. 16 July 1212 The Spanish kings Alfonso VIII of Castile, Sancho VII of Navarre, and Pedro II of Aragon and a few crusaders win a decisive victory over the Almohads at Las Navas de Tolosa. Muslim power in Spain is permanently broken. 19 November 1212 By the Treaty of Toul, Frederick II, Duke of Hohenstaufen, King of Sicily, and King Philip II of France make an alliance against King John of England and the Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV. 1212 Nicholas, a boy from the Rhineland, Germany, launches the 'Children's Crusade' in Cologne, Germany. Thousands of children from France and the Rhineland set out for the Holy Land in the hope of overcoming the Muslims through their faith. Many are sold into slavery, and the rest die on the journey. 19–29 April 1213 Pope Innocent III proclaims the Fifth Crusade and stops granting indulgences for the Albigensian Crusade against the Albigensian (Cathar) heretics of southern France. 13 May 1213 King John of England accepts Pope Innocent III's terms for ending the interdict placed on England, to avoid severe political consequences, receiving Stephen Langton as archbishop of Canterbury; he also resigns his kingdom to the Pope and receives it again as a papal fief, promising to pay tribute. 12 September 1213 The Norman crusader Simon IV de Montfort and the Albigensian crusaders defeat Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse, and kill his ally King Pedro II of Aragon at Muret. Pedro's heir in Aragon is his young son, James I, and civil war follows there.

27 July 1214 King John of England's allies, the Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV and the Flemings, are decisively defeated by King Philip II of France at Bouvines, Flanders. By capturing the counts of Flanders and Boulogne, Philip establishes French control there; John is forced to abandon his campaign to recover his French lands; and Otto's cause in the Holy Roman Empire suffers a fatal blow. 10 October 1214 King Alfonso VIII of Castile dies; he is succeeded by his son, Henry I, a minor; civil war follows. 15 October 1214 King John arrives back in England from France to face growing baronial discontent with his demands for money to fund his unsuccessful campaigns. 15–17 June 1215 King John of England and his opponents, the barons, meet at Runnymede (now in Surrey) on the River Thames, England, to agree on terms for peace. Three days of negotiations result in the Magna Carta (Great Charter) in which the king agrees to various curtailments of his powers and concedes 'liberties' to different classes of his subjects. 11–30 November 1215 Pope Innocent III legislates at the Fourth Lateran Council in Rome for the organization and financing of the Fifth Crusade, for the suppression of heresy, and for the regulation of religious orders, and orders that Jews and Muslims living in Christian lands must wear distinctive clothing. The Norman crusader and lord of Languedoc, Simon IV de Montfort, is confirmed in his lands in southern France. 1215 Kublai Khan, Mongol general, grandson of Genghis Khan, conqueror of China, and first emperor of the Yüan dynasty, born (–1294). 1215 The Mongol leader Genghis Khan captures and sacks Beijing, the former capital of the Jin Empire (the Jin have recently moved their capital to Kaifeng to escape Mongol attacks); its population is massacred. 18 July 1216 Cencio Savelli is elected Pope Honorius III. 19 October 1216 John I ('John Lackland'), King of England 1199–1216, son of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, brother of Richard I, dies in Newark, Nottinghamshire, England (48). 28 October 1216 King John of England's son, Henry III, a minor, is crowned king of England at Gloucester. William the Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, is appointed his guardian. 1216 King Maravarman Sundara of the Pandyas of southern India drives the Chola king, Kulottunga III, into (temporary) exile; the second Pandya Empire is now founded. 20 May 1217 William the Marshal, leading the loyalists for King Henry III of

England, defeats the French dauphin Louis and the rebels who invited him to become king at Lincoln, England. 12 September 1217 By the Treaty of Kingston, the English rebels make peace with King Henry III of England and the French dauphin Louis is paid to leave England. 1217 The Scottish astrologer and reputed magician Michael Scot makes a Latin translation of Alpetragius's Arabic Kitab al-Hay'ah of 1204. The work reintroduces many ideas of Aristotelian astronomy into Europe. 29 May 1218 The main contingent of the Fifth Crusade lands outside Damietta at the mouth of the River Nile, Egypt. 1218 Jayavarman VII of the Khmer Empire rebuilds and walls the city of Angkor Thom (in modern Cambodia), the temple of Bayon being the greatest of his buildings. 8 August 1219 St Francis preaches to the sultan and to the crusaders in Egypt. Missions of his friars are sent to France, Germany, Hungary, and Spain. 1219 Minamoto Sanetomo, the shogun (military ruler) of Japan, is murdered by the Hojo. Hojo Yoshitoki, leader of the Hojo, assumes power as regent: the shogunate becomes an honorific title. The Hojo family retains power until 1333. 1220 Construction begins on the cathedral at Salisbury, England, with Nicholas of Ely as architect. 1220 Jaya Parameshvaravarman II becomes king of Champa (corresponding roughly to modern southern Vietnam) on the withdrawal of the Khmers (of modern Cambodia). He begins a long and indecisive war with Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam, also known as Annam). 8 August 1221 The army of the Fifth Crusade, advancing into Egypt from Damietta, is trapped by the Nile floods and the Egyptian army; the leader of the crusade, Cardinal Pelagius, is forced to accept Sultan al-Kamil of Egypt's terms for withdrawal, including the surrender of Damietta. 24 November 1221 The shah of the central Asian province of Khwarizm, Jalal-adDin, defeats the Mongols under Kutikonian at Parvan (near modern Kabul, Afghanistan). The Mongol leader Genghis Khan quickly avenges the defeat, destroying Jalal-ad-Din's army at Bamian (in present-day Afghanistan); Jalal-adDin flees to India with the Mongols in pursuit. After defeating Jalal-ad-Din again on the River Indus, Genghis Khan withdraws his forces to avoid war with the Sultanate of Delhi. 6 June 1222 The Mongol leader Genghis Khan takes the city of Herat and massacres its population, completing his conquest of the Khwarizm shahdom (modern Iran, Afghanistan, and part of Central Asia).

1222 King Andrew II of Hungary grants his Golden Bull, which protects the rights of the lesser nobility against the magnates and limits the powers of the crown, granting the right to disobey unlawful commands. All subsequent Hungarian kings have to swear to observe these concessions. 14 July 1223 Philip II, King of France 1179–1223, who reconquered French territories lost previously to England, dies in Nantes, France (57). January–April 1224 King Henry III of England recovers control of royal castles that have been held by various barons since the civil war of King John's reign. 5 May 1224 King Louis VIII of France declares war on King Henry III of England; he then overruns Poitou and most of Gascony north of the River Garonne. 1224 St Thomas Aquinas ('Doctor Angelicus'), Italian Dominican theologian, outstanding medieval scholasticist, author of Summa theologiae/Summary of Theology and Summa contra gentiles/The Main Argument Against the Gentiles, born in Roccasecca, near Aquino, Sicily (–1274). 1225 Jalal-ad-Din, the shah of the central Asian province of Khwarizm, reestablishes control of Persia, then invades Georgia and sacks the capital Tbilisi (modern Tbilisi) after defeating the Georgians at Garnhi. 1225 St Francis of Assisi writes his 'Il cantico di Frate Sole'/'Canticle of Brother Sun', a hymn of praise to God written in Italian. 1225 The Italian mathematician Fibonacci writes Liber quadratorum/The Book of the Square, the first major Western advance in arithmetic since the work of Diophantus a thousand years earlier. 6 March 1226 A second Lombard League is formed by the northern Italian cities of Milan, Bologna, Brescia, Mantua, Bergamo, Turin, Vicenza, Padua, and others to oppose the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II. 3 October 1226 St Francis of Assisi, founder of the Franciscan monastic orders and church reformer, principal patron saint of Italy, dies in Assisi, Italy (c. 44). 27 November 1226 The first league of Rhenish towns, directed against the archbishop of Mainz, Germany, is suppressed by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II. 1226 The Mongol leader Genghis Khan conquers the Tangut state of Xixia (now in northwest China), destroying the Tangut army in a battle on the frozen Huang He River (or Yellow River). 19 March 1227 Ugolino dei Conti is elected Pope Gregory IX.

22 July 1227 King Valdemar II of Denmark is defeated at Bornhöved by the allies of Henry, Count of Schwerin, losing the town of Lübeck and other conquests in northern Germany. German colonization towards the east now resumes. 18 August 1227 Genghis Khan (original name Temüjin), great Mongol military leader who established the Mongol Empire, dies (c. 72). 24 August 1227 When the Mongol leader Genghis Khan dies, leaving behind an army numbering about 129,000, he is succeeded as great khan by his son Ogedai. A subordinate khanate is created for Ogedai's brother Chaghadai in Turkestan. 29 September 1227 Pope Gregory IX excommunicates the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II for his failure to fulfil his promise to go on crusade (Frederick has claimed to be too ill). 11 November 1227 Al-Mu'azzam, the Ayyubid sultan of Damascus, Syria, dies; alKamil, the Ayyubid sultan of Egypt, then seizes Jerusalem. 28 June 1228 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II sails for Palestine on the Sixth Crusade. Pope Gregory IX renews his sentence of excommunication, this time because excommunicates cannot go on crusade. 18 February 1229 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II negotiates the return of Jerusalem to Christian control with al-Kamil, the sultan of Egypt; the Sixth Crusade thus ends without any fighting. 18 March 1229 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II crowns himself as king of Jerusalem, in Jerusalem. 11 April 1229 The Treaty of Paris ends the Albigensian Crusade against the Albigensian (Cathar) heretics of Languedoc, southern France; Count Raymond VII of Toulouse submits to King Louis IX of France, ceding the duchy of Narbonne. 4 April 1230 John Asen II, Tsar of Bulgaria, defeats and captures Theodore Angelus, the despot of Epirus, at Klokotinitza; the Bulgarian Empire now extends from the Black Sea to the River Danube, the Adriatic Sea, and Thessaly. 23 July 1230 By the Treaty of Ceprano, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II makes concessions to the church in Sicily and agrees to respect the borders of the Papal States; in return Pope Gregory IX lifts his sentence of excommunication. 23 September 1230 King Alfonso IX of León dies; he is succeeded by his son, Ferdinand III of Castile, who thus finally unites the two kingdoms. 1230 Herman of Salza, the grand master of the Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order of crusading knights), takes possession of the town of Chelmno in Poland, granted to them by Prince Konrad of Masovia; the Knights now begin their conquest of Prussia.

c. 1230 The long era of Minnesingers (German court lyric poets and singers who wrote love lyrics of a formal style and aristocratic beauty) ends. Among the most eminent names were Wolfram von Eschenbach who died in 1220, and Walter von der Vogelweide who may have died in this year. 4 April 1231 Pope Gregory IX sets up the Holy Office (Inquisition), a permanent tribunal for investigating the various heresies proliferating in France and Germany. 15 August 1231 Jalal-ad-Din, Shah of Khwarizm, is murdered while fleeing a new Mongol invasion. Kay-Qubadh, Sultan of Rum, now occupies Ahlat and Queen Rusudan of Georgia reoccupies the Georgian capital Tbilisi (modern Tbilisi); the Mongols conquer the rest of his shahdom. 1231 The mausoleum of 'Sultan Ghari' (Nasir-ad-Din Mahmud, son of Iltutmish) is built in Delhi, India. 4 April 1233 With the surrender of the Cypriot port of Kyrenia to John of Ibelin, Lord of Beirut, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II's forces are expelled from Cyprus and Henry of Lusignan is restored as king. 8 August 1233 Richard the Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, in alliance with Llywelyn ap Iorwerth the Great, Prince of Gwynedd (north Wales), begins a revolt against King Henry III of England. 1234 Jin resistance to the Mongol invasions is finally crushed. 1235 Sundiata, a Mandingo chief from the minor state of Kangaba, rebels against Sumanguru of Kaniaga, the dominant ruler in the west African Sahel, and defeats him at the Battle of Kirina (in southwest Mali). Sundiata compels Sumanguru's subjects to recognize his overlordship, so founding the empire of Mali. 1235 The French engineer Villard de Honnecourt produces an architectural sketchbook, including plans of water-driven machinery such as sawmills, and a screw jack for lifting loads. It becomes a standard manual for engineers and architects. 1235 With the capture of Ibiza, King James I of Aragon completes his conquest of the Balearic Islands. c. 1235 The French mason Villard de Honnecourt produces a sketchbook; it provides a unique insight into the practices of Gothic architects. 7 July 1236 In a diet (legislative assembly) in Piacenza, Italy, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II announces his intention of restoring imperial authority in Italy. Pope Gregory IX replies by claiming the supreme temporal dominion of the papacy in Italy under the 'Donation of Constantine' (an 8th-century forgery, purporting to show that the Roman Emperor Constantine granted control of all of

Italy to Pope Sylvester I and the papacy in the 4th century). 1236 A Mongol army led by Batu, a grandson of the Mongol leader Genghis Khan, conquers the Volga Bulgars. 1236 The kingdom of Georgia is conquered by the Mongols and reduced to tributary status. 1236 The Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order of crusading knights) complete their conquest of the Pomeranians of west Prussia. c. 1237 Guillaume de Lorris writes the first 4,000 lines of the Le Roman de la rose/The Romance of the Rose, an allegory of courtly love and the most famous narrative poem of the Middle Ages. 4 March 1238 Juri (Yury) II, Great Prince of Vladimir–Suzdal, is defeated and killed by the Mongols under Batu on the Sita, near Yaroslavl (which is subsequently sacked). The spring thaw begins shortly afterwards, making the terrain impassable and halting the Mongol advance on Novgorod. Batu then withdraws to the Don basin. 1238 The earliest reference is made to the Palio horse race in Siena, Italy. Similar horse races are held in other Italian cities, usually on important holy days, but it is only in Siena that the tradition survives through to modern times. 20 March 1239 Pope Gregory IX excommunicates the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II for infringing the church's rights in Italy. In Germany, only Bavaria and Bohemia rebel in consequence. 1 September 1239 A new crusade, led by King Theobald of Navarre and Richard, Earl of Cornwall (King Henry III of England's brother), arrives at the Palestinian port of Acre (present-day Akko, Israel). 13 November 1239 King Theobald of Navarre's crusading army is defeated by the Egyptians at Gaza; subsequent negotiations, however, result in modest territorial gains for the kingdom of Jerusalem. 1239 Edward I Longshanks, King of England 1272–1307, son of Henry III, who subdued Wales, born in Westminster, London (–1307). 1239 Great Prince Jaroslav II of Vladimir–Suzdal begins the payment of tribute to the Mongols; the other Russian princes soon follow suit. 22 February 1240 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II reaches the outskirts of Rome, but withdraws to Sicily when Pope Gregory IX rouses the Romans to resist. Gregory, ineffectively, orders a crusade against Frederick in Germany. 9 September 1240 King Theobald of Navarre leaves Palestine, ending his

crusade. 6 December 1240 The Mongol leader Batu takes and sacks the Russian principality of Kiev, then ravages the principality of Galicia, also called Red Ruthenia. 9 April 1241 After sacking Kraków, a Mongol army led by Khaidu defeats the Poles, Silesians, and Teutonic Knights at Legnica in Poland. Grand Prince Henry II the Pious of Poland is killed. The Mongols next ravage Silesia and, when repulsed by the Bohemians, they go through Moravia into Hungary. 11 April 1241 The main Mongol army, under Batu, defeats the Hungarians at Mohi on the River Sajo: they ravage the Danube plain, but are repulsed at Grobnok by the Croatians. A crusade is proclaimed against them in Germany. 25 October 1241 Goffredo Castiglione is elected Pope Celestine IV. 1241 German immigrants flood into Poland to settle land depopulated by the Mongol invasion. 1241 The German towns of Hamburg and Lübeck form a peace-keeping league (which has been regarded as the origin of the Hanseatic League). 21 July 1242 King Henry III of England retreats to Saintes after he is defeated by King Louis IX of France at Taillebourg, France. Louis suppresses the revolt of Raymond VII, Count of Toulouse, and the Lusignans. 1242 Batu withdraws the Mongol army from central Europe in the spring in order to return to the Mongol capital, Karakorum, to elect the late Great Khan Ogedai's successor: a four-year interregnum follows. Batu now organizes the Mongol territories in Russia as a semi-autonomous state, known as The Khanate of the Golden Horde (supposedly named after the colour of the khan's tent). 25 June 1243 Sinibaldo dei Fieschi is elected Pope Innocent IV. 26 June 1243 The Mongols defeat Kay-Khusraw II, Sultan of Rum, and his Byzantine allies at Köse Dagh, near Erzinjan; he becomes their tributary, as does Queen Rusadan of Georgia. 1243 Jews from Belitz, near modern Berlin, Germany, are burnt to death in the earliest known case of a massacre of Jews in Germany, following an alleged desecration of the Host (the bread consecrated in the Christian Eucharist). 23 August 1244 Jerusalem is captured and sacked by Khwarizmian exiles employed by the sultan Ayyub of Egypt in his war against Damascus, Syria; the Christians are expelled, this time for good. 26 June–17 July 1245 Pope Innocent IV holds the General Council in Lyons,

France. It legislates for reform, calls for new crusades to liberate Jerusalem, and culminates with Innocent's declaration of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II's deposition and invitation to the German nobles to elect a new king. 1245 Pope Innocent IV sends John de Plano Carpinis, a Friar Minor, to the court of the great khan at Karakorum, Mongolia. This embassy leads to the establishment of Christian missions in China, which continue until around 1368. 1 January 1246 Provence becomes part of France with the marriage of Beatrice, heiress of Count Raymond Berengar IV (who died in 1245), to Charles, count of Anjou, the brother of King Louis IX of France. 8 August 1246 Guyuk, son of the late Great Khan Ogedai, is elected great khan of the Mongols; he receives Pope Innocent IV's envoy. 1246 The Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II suppresses a revolt in Sicily and deports its last Muslim inhabitants to Lucera, Italy. 4 April 1248 The death of Guyuk, Great Khan of the Mongols, is followed by an interregnum which lasts until 1251. 22 December 1248 The Muslim city of Seville in southern Spain surrenders to King Ferdinand III of Castile and León. 1248 Spanish-born Muslim Al-Baytar, 'chief of botanists' in Cairo, Egypt, writes Kitab al-jami/Collection of Simple Drugs, which lists 1,400 different remedies and is the largest and most popular Arab pharmacopoeia. 27 September 1249 Raymond VII, Count of Toulouse, dies; he is succeeded by his son-in-law Alfonse of Poitiers, the brother of King Louis IX of France, marking the definitive integration of Languedoc into France. 1249 The English monk and scholar Roger Bacon argues for the inclusion of scientific studies in the curriculum of Oxford University, England, which is primarily a religious institution at the time. 1249 University College, the earliest college of Oxford University, England, is founded. 6 April 1250 King Louis IX of France is defeated and captured by the Egyptians at the Battle of Fariskur, while withdrawing from Mansurah. 2 May 1250 Turan Shah, the last Ayyubid sultan of Egypt, is murdered by his Mameluke (slave) guards, who elect their commander `Izz-ad-Din Aybak as regent while Shajar-ad-Durr, the widow of the former sultan Ayyub, is made nominal ruler. After 80 days Aybak marries her and assumes the sultanate, founding the Mameluke dynasty.

6 May 1250 King Louis IX of France surrenders the Egyptian town of Damietta as part of the price for his release; he leaves Egypt for the Palestinian port of Acre (present-day Akko, Israel), where he is accepted as ruler (in practice, not in theory) of Outremer, the Crusader kingdoms in the Middle East. 13 December 1250 Following the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II (Stupor mundi, 'wonder of the world'), his son Conrad IV, king of the Romans (king of Germany), succeeds as king of Sicily and (nominal) king of Jerusalem. 13 December 1250 Frederick II, king of Sicily 1197–1250, king of Germany 1212–50, and Holy Roman Emperor 1220–50, king of Jerusalem 1229–43, grandson of Frederick I Barbarossa, dies in Castel Fiorentino, Apulia, Italy (55). c. 1250 The Harrowing of Hell, the earliest extant miracle play in English literature, is recorded. It is based on the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus. c. 1250 Carmina Burana, a collection of satirical poems, lyrics, and other goliardic (ribald) verses intended to be sung, is compiled. It belongs to the convent of Benediktbeurin in Munich, Germany. c. 1250 The bowsprit is introduced on ships, allowing the mainsail to be extended, and letting the vessel sail closer to the wind. c. 1250 The west African rainforest state of Benin is founded. 7 January 1251 The Italian city-republic of Florence admits the exiled antiimperialist party, the Guelphs. A new constitution is formed led by the capitano del popolo ('captain of the people') independent of the nobles. 7 July 1251 The imperialist party, the Ghibellines, are exiled from the Italian city-republic of Florence, following the return of the papist Guelphs the year before. 1251 Jatavarman Sundara Pandya I accedes to the throne of the Indian kingdom of the Pandya dynasty. Under his rule the Pandyas enter into hostilities with the Somesvara. 25 March 1252 William, Count of Holland, is again elected Holy Roman Emperor. Pope Innocent IV directs the Germans to accept him, following the death of the previous papal candidate, Henry Raspe of Thuringia, in 1247. 1252 King Jaya Parmesvaravarman II of Champa (corresponding roughly to modern southern Vietnam) is killed during an invasion from Dai Viet (modern Northern Vietnam, also known as Annam). Both states make peace, bringing 30 years of inconclusive warfare to a close. 10 October 1253 King Conrad IV of Germany and Sicily completes his suppression of a Sicilian rebellion with the recovery of the Italian kingdom of Naples.

1253 Hulagu, a grandson of Genghis Khan and younger brother of Great Khan Mongka, begins his conquest of the Islamic empire. His army is larger than that of Genghis Khan and contains contingents from all the Mongol princes. 1253 The Buddhist monk Nichiren, after years studying the various Japanese Buddhist sects, declares that the essence of true Buddhism is only to be found in the Lotus Sutra and that all other approaches are false. His doctrine is greeted with anger and disbelief. 1253 The Mongol leader Kublai Khan conquers the kingdom of Nanchao in Yunnan, south China. Its Thai people migrate to Thailand. He also attacks Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam, also known as Annam). 21 May 1254 The death of Conrad IV, Holy Roman Emperor and king of Sicily and Jerusalem, while on his way to recover control in Germany leads to an intensification of the factious dispute over succession within the royal house. He is succeeded in Sicily by his son, Conrad V (Conradin). 13 July 1254 A group of Rhineland towns form the Rhenish League, a confederation for mutual protection. 10 October 1254 Edward Plantagenet, the son of King Henry III of England, marries Eleanor, the sister of King Alfonso X of Castile and León. This helps seal the peace between Alfonso and Henry and ensures English control of Gascony: Prince Edward is endowed with Gascony and resides there. 3 November 1254 The Byzantine emperor of Nicaea, John III Vatatzes, dies. He is succeeded by his son Theodore II Lascaris. Under his rule the Latin Empire is isolated and the groundwork for the recapture of its capital, Constantinople, is laid. 2 December 1254 Manfred of Sicily, the illegitimate son of the late Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, defeats the papal army near Foggia, Italy. He thus wins the loyalty of the Puglia region for his imperial cause. 12 December 1254 Rinaldo Conti is elected Pope Alexander IV. 1254 King Afonso III of Portugal holds the first Cortes (national assembly) attended by representatives of Portuguese towns. This is the first assembly at which the commons are represented. 1254 The Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order) found Königsberg (modern Kaliningrad), Russia, in the heart of pagan territory. c. 1254 Marco Polo, Venetian explorer who spent 17 years in China and whose Il milione/The Million (Travels of Marco Polo) has become a classic in geography, born in Venice, Venetian Dalmatia (–1324).

1255 German Minnesinger (lyric poet) Ulrich von Lichtenstein completes his Frauendienst/The Service of Women, a collection of 60 songs within an autobiographical framework. 28 January 1256 The Holy Roman Emperor William of Holland dies. This dashes any chance for the unanimous election of a successor to the former emperor Frederick II; both Conrad IV and Conradin (Frederick's son and grandson) disgraced themselves politically making the continuation of the Hohenstaufen dynasty unpopular. 19 December 1256 A Mongol army under Hulagu, recently appointed ilkhan of Persia, besieges the stronghold of the Assassins (militant branch of the Islamic Ismaili sect) at Alamut in the Elburz Mountains. Their grand master, Rukn-ad-Din Kurshah, surrenders and is put to death. The Mongols now annihilate the Assassins in Persia. 13 January 1257 Richard, Earl of Cornwall, is elected King of the Romans by three of the College of Seven Electors. 1 April 1257 Four members of the College of Seven Electors elect King Alfonso X of Castile and León as King of the Romans. 17 May 1257 Richard, Earl of Cornwall, is crowned King of the Romans in Aachen, Germany. 1257 King Alfonso X of Castile and León and King Mohammad ibn Nasr of Granada expel the last Almohads (members of a Muslim dynasty of Berbers) from Spain. 1257 The Italian physician Aldobrandon of Siena writes his treatise Le régime du corps/The Bodily Regimen on the need for good hygiene and diet, which is a new concept in Western medicine. 1257 The Mongols sack the city of Hanoi but Tran Thai-tong forces them to leave Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam). 1257 The Rhenish League (confederation of Rhineland towns formed in 1254 for their mutual protection) gradually disintegrates. 20 February 1258 The last Abbasid caliph (Islamic ruler of Persia) al-Musta'sim and his family are put to death on the Mongol leader Hulagu's orders. 10 August 1258 Manfred of Sicily, the illegitimate son of the late Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II, assumes the crown of Sicily. 1258 Following the murder of the last Ch'oe dictator, Korean resistance to the Mongols ends. The Koryo kings remain as vassals. 1258 Georgia is partitioned. Its rulers remain vassals of the Mongols.

1258 Osman I, founder of the Ottoman Turkish state, born (–1324). 4 April 1259 Pope Alexander IV recognizes Richard, Earl of Cornwall, as King of the Romans. 4 December 1259 King Louis IX of France and King Henry III of England make peace in the Treaty of Paris. Henry renounces Normandy, Maine, Anjou, and other lost Angevin territories in France and does homage for Gascony to Louis, who cedes lands on its eastern borders which cannot be precisely defined. 1259 Matthew Paris completes his Chronica majora/Greater Chronicle, a chronicle of the world from the creation, but more particularly of England in the author's lifetime. 1259 Poland, Lithuania, and Galicia in central Europe are devastated in punitive raids by Mongols and Russians. 1259 The crown prince of Korea assumes the throne as King Wonjong. He is controlled by a Mongol resident commissioner, and a close relationship grows between Korea and the Mongols. 1 March 1260 The city of Damascus surrenders to the Mongols, who now occupy all Syria, extinguishing the Ayyubid Sultanate. The Mongol leader Hulagu is soon forced to withdraw most of his forces because of a succession dispute. 7 July 1260 The Lithuanians defeat the Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order) at Durben in Lithuania. This is followed by the revolt of Courland (Kurland) against the Knights and the apostasy (rejection of his Christian faith) of Prince Mindovg of Lithuania, who conquers the north Baltic region of Livonia. 4 September 1260 King Manfred of Sicily's Sienese forces, under Count Jordan, defeat the Florentine Guelphs (anti-imperialists) at Montaperto, Italy. The city submits to a Ghibelline (imperialist) podestà ('mayor'), Guido Novello. 1260 The English scholar, Roger Bacon, who becomes a Franciscan friar at the age of 33, begins 'true' experimental method in his investigation of optical phenomena. 1260 The Italian sculptor Nicola Pisano carves the pulpit in the baptistry of Pisa Cathedral, Italy. It marks the revival of a form of sculpture clearly based on classical models. 13 March 1261 By the Treaty of Nymphaeum, the Genoese undertake to assist the Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus to recover the city of Constantinople from the Latin Empire in return for trading concessions hitherto enjoyed by the Venetians. 25 July 1261 The Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus recovers the city of

Constantinople and is crowned there, deposing his ward and fellow emperor, John IV Lascaris. This marks the end of the Latin Empire of Constantinople. 29 August 1261 Jacques Pantaléon of Troyes a professor of canon law in Paris before becoming a bishop, then patriarch or Jerusalem, is elected Pope Urban IV. He offers the crown of Sicily to Charles of Anjou, in an attempt to dislodge the German Hohenstaufen family from Italy. 1261 The Mongol leader Kublai Khan establishes his supremacy as great khan. He continues the conquest of China, where Beijing is rebuilt as his winter capital. 1262–1269 War is waged between the Ilkhan of Persia, Hulagu, and Berke, Khan of the 'Golden Horde'. It is inconclusive but saves Egypt from Mongol attack. 16 July 1263 King Henry III of England makes peace with his baronial opponents by accepting their terms, following a number of armed clashes and the rising of the city of London, England, against him. The leader of the barons, Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, and his allies occupy London. 3 October 1263 King Alexander III of Scotland defeats King Haakon IV of Norway, in the Battle of Largs, after King Haakon IV attempts to subjugate the Hebrides off the west coast of Scotland, having already received the submission of Iceland and the colonists in Greenland. Alexander then subdues the Hebrides himself. 15 December 1263 King Haakon IV of Norway dies in the Shetland Islands, off the north coast of Scotland, where he has enforced an act of union with Norway by its people and those of the Orkney Islands. He is succeeded by his son, Magnus VI the Law-Mender. 1263 Prince Mindovg of Lithuania is murdered. His death assists the Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order), who now complete their near extermination of the Sambians in the suppression of their rebellion. 1263 The Venetians defeat the Genoese, the allies of the Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus, in a naval battle off Settepozzi, Italy, in their struggle to gain control of trade with the Byzantine Empire. 23 January 1264 King Louis IX of France, arbitrating between King Henry III of England and the English barons, pronounces in favour of Henry in the Mise of Amiens, freeing him from any obligations to maintain the Provisions of Westminster (plan for legal reforms) and affirming his customary rights as king. This decision drives the baronial leader Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, and the barons into open war. 14 May 1264 After a failed attempt to make peace, the leader of the baronial opposition to the monarchy, Simon IV de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, defeats and captures King Henry III of England at Lewes, England. 28 June 1264 King Henry III of England accepts a 'form of government' giving

control to the baronial party of Simon IV de Montfort, Earl of Leicester. A provisional administration is established by the earls of Gloucester and Leicester and the bishop of Chester. The king's affairs are to be controlled by a council of nine. 1264 Prince Boleslaw V of Kraków grants a charter to Jews who, with Germans, are settling in Poland. This charter acts as the model for all subsequent confirmations of Jewish liberties in Poland until the end of the 18th century. 5 February 1265 Guy Foulquoi, the papal legate to England, is elected Pope Clement. 4 August 1265 King Henry III of England and his son Edward Plantagenet defeat and kill the leader of the baronial party Simon IV de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, at Evesham, England. 1265 Dante Alighieri, Italian poet, prose writer, moral philosopher, and political theorist, author of Divina commedia/Divine Comedy, born in Florence, Italy (–1321). c. 1265 Jacobus de Voragine, archbishop of Genoa, compiles his Legenda aurea/ Golden Legend, a collection of the lives and legends of the saints, which becomes an important source book for pre-Reformation artists. 6 February 1266 Charles of Anjou defeats and kills Manfred, former king of Sicily, at Benevento, southern Italy. From this point until the death of Robert of Naples in 1343 the Angevin dynasty is the dominant power in Italy. 2 July 1266 By the Treaty of Perth agreed with King Alexander III of Scotland, King Magnus VI of Norway renounces his claims to the Hebrides and the Isle of Man. This ends the last stage of the growth of the monarchy of Scotland. 23 July 1266 The Mameluke sultan of Egypt, Baybars, wins control of the Galilee region of the Kingdom of Jerusalem by taking the Templars' fortress of Safed. Despite assurances, all 2,000 knights (members of the Knights Templar) are executed. 1266 Berke, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', dies, bringing to an end his war with the ilkhan of Persia, which began in 1262. He is succeeded by Mangu-Temur. 1266 King Alfonso X of Castile and León, aided by King James I of Aragon, conquers the kingdom of Murcia, taking it from the Muslims and leaving King Mohammad I of Granada as the last Muslim vassal of Castile. 29 September 1267 By the Treaty of Montgomery, King Henry III of England recognizes Llywelyn ap Gruffydd as prince of Wales and as his vassal. 1267 King Alfonso X of Castile and León and King Afonso III of Portugal define

their frontier in the Convention of Badajoz. The Algarve is now formally annexed to Portugal. 4 April 1268 The Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus makes peace with the Venetians and restores their trading privileges, though at the same time keeping a similar treaty with Genoa. This double treaty gives distinct political and trading advantages to the Nicaeans. 21 May 1268 The Mameluke sultan of Egypt, Baybars, takes Antioch, Syria (modern Antakya, Turkey), from its Crusader occupants, and destroys the city with unprecedented slaughter. The city never recovers. 23 August 1268 Conrad V (Conradin) of the German royal house of Hohenstaufen invades Italy to recover his father, Conrad IV's, kingdom of Sicily. He is defeated by Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, at Tagliacozzo, northern Italy. 29 October 1268 Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, has Conrad V (Conradin) executed, extinguishing the German royal house of Hohenstaufen. Conrad was also nominally king of Jerusalem. 1268 Philip IV, King of France 1285–1314, born in Fontainebleau, France (–1314). c. 1268 Jatavarman Sundara, the Pandya ruler who has made himself supreme in southern India and Ceylon (modern Sri Lanka), dies. He is succeeded by Maravarman Kulasekhara, who brings the Pandya dynasty into hostility with the Somesvara. 1269 Ya'qub III takes Marrakesh, Morocco, and finally destroys the Muslim dynasty of the Almohads. He founds the Marinid dynasty, which rules until 1465. A new capital is founded at Fès (or Fez). 1 July 1270 The French king Louis IX sails from France on the Eighth Crusade to the Holy Land to recover Palestine from the Muslims. 25 August 1270 Philip III succeeds to the French throne following the death of his father, King Louis IX of France. 1 November 1270 Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, now leader of the Eighth Crusade to the Holy Land after the death of King Louis IX of France, makes a peace treaty with the emir of Tunis, intending to direct the crusade fleet towards Constantinople. The emir resumes payment of the tribute formerly paid to the Hohenstaufen kings of Sicily. 23 November 1270 The Eighth Crusade fleet is destroyed by a storm at Trapani, Sicily, preventing Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily and leader of the crusade, from directing it towards Constantinople. c. 1270 William Wallace, Scottish hero who led the first resistance movements

to free Scotland from English rule, born near Paisley, Renfrew, Scotland (–1305). 21 August 1271 Alfonse of Poitiers dies. His nephew, King Philip III of France, thus inherits the counties of Poitou and Toulouse, which are absorbed into the royal domain. Philip presents the Comtât Venaissin, east of the River Rhône, to the papacy. 1 September 1271 Tedald Visconti of Piacenza is elected Pope Gregory X. 1271 King Stephen V of Hungary makes Bulgaria a tributary state. 20 November 1272 Edward Plantagenet, the son of the late King Henry III, is proclaimed king of England by hereditary right. 1272 The Alfonsine Tables are completed and published by two Jewish astronomers working for King Alfonso X of Castile. They will be used to calculate planetary positions and eclipses for the next three centuries. 1273 The Mongols take the Chinese twin cities of Xiangyang after a five-year siege. This is an important set-back for the Chinese Song dynasty. 1273 The Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus makes peace with Nogay, the Mongol ruler of the Lower Danube. Nogay holds influence with the 'Golden Horde', and is able to prevent anti-Nicaean action by the Bulgarians. 7 March 1274 St Thomas Aquinas ('Doctor Angelicus'), Italian Dominican theologian, outstanding medieval scholasticist, dies in Fossanova, near Terracina, Italy (c. 50). He is the author of Summa contra gentiles/The Main Argument Against the Gentiles and his greatest work, Summa theologiae/ Summary of Theology, which is left incomplete. A vast compendium of moral and political philosophy, it attempts to reconcile reason, faith, and Aristotelian philosophy with Christian theology. 7 May 1274 Pope Gregory X opens the General Council of Lyon in France, in the hope of ending the schism with the Greek church. The council recognizes the Dominican, Franciscan, Carmelite, and Austin Friars, and orders the suppression of all smaller mendicant orders. 6 July 1274 With the enemies of the Byzantine Empire united under Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, at the General Council of Lyon the ambassadors of the Byzantine emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus take an oath accepting the pope's supremacy. Pope Gregory X then causes Charles to make a truce with Michael. 11 July 1274 Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland 1306–29, who freed Scotland from English rule, winning a decisive victory at Bannockburn (1314), born (–1329). 1274 A fleet sent by Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor of China, to conquer Japan is repulsed at Hakata Bay and subsequently destroyed by a storm.

1274 The Polish scholar Witelo Ciolek of Wroclaw, Poland, writes the most important medieval European treatise on optics, based on the work of the 11thcentury Arab scientist Alhazen. 21 January 1276 Peter of Tarantaise is elected Pope Innocent V. 14 June 1276 Shih, the seven-year-old half-brother of the captured Chinese Song emperor, is enthroned. 11 July 1276 Ottobuono Fieschi is elected Pope Adrian V after the death of Pope Innocent V. 8 September 1276 Peter Juliani of Portugal is elected Pope John XXI. 25 November 1276 Following King Rudolf I of Germany's siege of Vienna and a revolt in Bohemia, King Ottokar II of Bohemia, by the Treaty of Vienna, surrenders Austria, Styria, Carinthia, and all his other lands except Bohemia and Moravia, for which he does homage to Rudolf. Rudolf then makes Vienna the capital of his Habsburg lands. 1276 Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor of China, takes Hangzhou, the Song dynasty capital, after a failed attempt by the empress dowager to achieve an accommodation with the Mongols. 1276 Vasili, Grand Duke of Vladimir, Russia, dies. The throne is assigned to his nephew, Dmitri I, the eldest living son of the former Grand Duke Alexander Nevsky, by Mangu-Temur, Khan of the 'Golden Horde'. 9 November 1277 Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, Prince of Wales, submits to King Edward I of England in the Treaty of Conway. He is forced to give up all his claims to the kingship of Wales. 25 November 1277 John Gaetan is elected Pope Nicholas III. 1277 An army sent by Kublai Khan defeats his cousin Khaidu at Karakorum in central Asia, but he survives this and subsequent attempts to suppress his rebellion. 1 May 1278 William de Villehardouin, Prince of Achaea, dies. He is succeeded by Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily. Although apparently threatening the Byzantine Empire, Achaea is exhausted by war and the Byzantine Empire is able to extend its territories as far as Arcadia. 28 August 1278 King Ottokar II of Bohemia is defeated and killed by King Rudolf I of Germany and King Ladislas IV of Hungary at Dürnkrut, on the River Danube near Stillfried. He is succeeded by his seven-year-old son, Wenceslas III, in Bohemia only, where civil war breaks out.

1 January 1279 King Afonso III of Portugal dies. He is succeeded by his son Dinis. 14 February 1279 King Rudolf I of Germany, Holy Roman Emperor, recognizes the superior authority of the papacy and cedes all claims to sovereignty over the Papal States and southern Italy. 1279 In the course of a dispute with John Pecham, archbishop of Canterbury, King Edward I of England forbids grants of land to the church in the Statute of Mortmain. This is the first act of anticlerical legislation in England. 1279 Kublai Khan completes the Mongol conquest of China with a naval victory near Macau. The southern Chinese Song dynasty is extinguished. 1280 Alessandro della Spina and Salvino degli Armati of Florence, Italy, are traditionally credited with the invention of spectacles. Their first designs use convex lenses to correct long-sightedness. 1280 Mangu-Temur, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', dies. He is succeeded by his brother Tuda-Mangu, but Nogay, the Mongol ruler of the Lower Danube, assumes joint rule in Russia as khan of 'the Nogay Horde', ruling between the Dnieper and Danube rivers. Tuda-Mangu ravages Vladimir and replaces Dmitri with his brother Andrew as grand duke. 22 February 1281 Simon de Brie is elected Pope Martin IV. He appoints Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, as senator of Rome. 10 April 1281 Pope Martin IV, under the influence of Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, excommunicates the Byzantines and renounces the union of 6 July 1274. 3 July 1281 By the Treaty of Orvieto, the Venetians undertake to assist Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, to restore the Latin Empire in Constantinople. Pope Martin IV declares Michael VIII Palaeologus, the Byzantine emperor, deposed. 15 August 1281 A second fleet sent by Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor of China, to conquer Japan is destroyed by a typhoon in Hakata Bay. The grateful Japanese call it kamikaze (divine wind). 30 October 1281 The Mameluke sultan of Egypt, Qalawun, defeats the Mongols, Armenians, and Knights Hospitallers (members of an order of Christian chivalry) at Homs, Syria, after a failure by the Ilkhan of Persia to persuade Pope Martin IV to order a crusade against the Mamelukes. 21 March 1282 David ap Gruffydd, brother of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, Prince of Wales, begins a widespread Welsh revolt against King Edward I of England by capturing Hawarden Castle. A Welsh 'parliament' soon commits the Welsh to war. 25 April 1282 The Welsh revolt against King Edward I of England collapses with the surrender of Harlech Castle to the English.

11 December 1282 The Byzantine emperor Michael VIII Palaeologus dies. He is succeeded by his son, Andronicus II Palaeologus, who immediately renounces the reunion of the Greek church with Rome. 1283 Skurdo, the last Prussian leader, flees to Lithuania. The Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order) have now exterminated or subjugated the Prussians, whose lands are colonized by Germans and Poles. 1284 A plague of rats throughout Europe gives rise to the German tale The Pied Piper of Hamlin, a story which may have some basis in fact. 1284 Peterhouse, the first college at Cambridge University, England, is founded. 2 April 1285 Jacopo Savelli is elected Pope Honorius IV. 7 September 1285 King Philip III of France takes the town of Gerona in Aragon. He now withdraws from his 'crusade' against King Pedro III of Aragon as his army is ravaged by disease. 5 October 1285 King Philip III the Bold of France dies of the plague. He is succeeded by his son, Philip IV the Fair. 1285 The Rucellai Madonna is painted as the altarpiece for the Church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence, Italy. Once attributed to Cimabue, it is now thought to be the work of the Sienese painter Duccio. 1287 The army of Kublai Khan, the Mongol emperor of China, is repelled during its attempted invasion of Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam), but then invades Burma (now Myanmar) and destroys the kingdom of Pagan. The fall of Pagan allows the emergence of several principalities of the Thais, who have recently been moving southwards into Burma and Cambodia, while Burma itself is divided into three states. 2 February 1288 Jerome of Ascoli is elected Pope Nicholas IV. He soon receives an ambassador from the Ilkhan Arghun of Persia, who has been visiting the European kings to organize a joint crusade against Egypt. 1288 Leszek III the Black, Grand Prince of Poland, dies without issue. There are several candidates for the succession. The Mongol raids into Poland (since 1282) now cease. 1288 The Jewish astronomer Jacob ben Makir ibn Tibbon writes a Hebrew treatise on the construction and use of an instrument called the quadrant. This is a considerably simpler device than the astrolabe for making astronomical measurements. 1289 The block printing of complete manuscript pages is introduced for the first time in Europe at Ravenna, Italy.

1289 The Chinese Mongol ruler Kublai Khan completes the extension of the Chinese Grand Canal (originally completed around 605), linking Beijing with the Chang Jiang River. 18 July 1290 King Edward I of England expels the Jews from England. 19 July 1290 King Ladislas IV of Hungary is murdered by Cumans. He is succeeded by his adopted heir, Andrew III, grandson of Andrew II. King Rudolf I of Germany invests his own son, Albert, as king, while Pope Nicholas IV favours Charles Martel of Anjou, who is crowned by a papal legate. 1 August 1291 The Three Forest Cantons of Schwyz, Uri, and Unterwalden (in modern Switzerland) form a defensive league against the Habsburgs. 1291 Nogay, Khan of 'the Nogay Horde' (between the Dnieper and Danube rivers), deposes and kills Tele-Buga and has Tokhta proclaimed as khan of the 'Golden Horde'. 10 May 1292 Adolf, Count of Nassau, is elected Holy Roman Emperor and becomes king of Germany. 1292 Albert of Habsburg defeats the Swiss Confederation but fails to take Zürich. 5 July 1293 Peter, the hermit of Monte Murrone, is elected Pope Celestine V. 1293 The Mongols, under Nogay, Khan of the 'Nogay Horde' (between the Dnieper and Danube rivers), invade Serbia. King Stephen Uroš becomes Nogay's vassal. 1293 Tokhta, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', ravages Russia, including Vladimir and Moscow, in re-establishing Andrew as grand duke in place of Dmitri I, the vassal of Nogay, Khan of 'the Nogay Horde' (between the Dnieper and Danube rivers). 1 January 1294 King Edward I of England responds to his summons, by proxy, to the Parlement of Paris to answer for attacks by Anglo-Gascons on French seamen, and agrees to surrender castles in Gascony during an enquiry. The consequent French seizure of Gascony leads to war between the two countries. 24 August 1294 In the Treaty of Nuremberg, King Edward I of England and the Holy Roman Emperor Adolf I of Nassau make an alliance against France. 23 December 1294 Benedict Gaetani is elected Pope Boniface VIII. 1294 Following the death of Kublai Khan, great khan and Mongol (Yuan) emperor of China, he is succeeded by his grandson, Temür. 1294 King Yagba-Siyon of Ethiopia dies. This is followed by a long period of civil war, resulting in the institution of the royal prison at Mount Gishen.

1294 Kublai Khan, Mongol general, grandson of Genghis Khan, conqueror of China and first emperor of the Yüan dynasty 1294, dies (c. 79). 5 July 1295 Scotland and France seal a treaty of alliance (the 'Auld Alliance'). 1295 King Sancho IV of Castile and León dies. He is succeeded by his four-year old son, Ferdinand IV. Ferdinand's minority offers the Spanish kingdom of Aragon a chance to make territorial gains at the expense of Castile. c. 1295 Venetian shipwrights develop the huge, oar-powered boats known as 'great galleys', which are up to 50 metres long. These will allow Venetian merchants to dominate Europe. 30 March 1296 King Edward I of England takes the town of Berwick as he begins his campaign to subdue Scotland. 10 July 1296 John de Balliol, King of Scotland, surrenders to King Edward I of England and abdicates. 8 August 1296 King Edward I of England returns from Scotland, bringing 'the Stone of Destiny', on which Scottish kings are crowned, as a symbol of his conquest of Scotland, from Scone to Westminster Abbey, London, England. 5 May 1297 The Scottish nationalist William Wallace leads a Scottish rising against King Edward I of England, burning an English castle and attacking one of the king's justiciars. 11 September 1297 The Scottish nationalist William Wallace defeats the English forces, under Earl Warrene, at Stirling Bridge, Scotland. 1297 The Japanese shogunate cancels all the debts of its retainers in order to relieve their growing impoverishment – the consequence of high living standards and partible inheritances. The Japanese 'feudal' structure is collapsing under these strains. 1297 The Venetians sack the Genoese port of Kaffa, in the Crimea, in their struggle to seize control of trade with the Byzantine Empire. The Genoese ravage the Venetian island of Crete and are assisted by the emperor Andronicus II Palaeologus in massacring Venetian merchants in the Byzantine Empire. 1297–1301 Italian sculptor Giovanni Pisano sculpts the pulpit of S Andrea, Pistoia, Italy. 2 July 1298 In a battle near Göllheim (near Worms), Germany, the Holy Roman Emperor Adolf I of Nassau is defeated and killed by Albert of Habsburg. 27 July 1298 Albert of Habsburg is elected Holy Roman Emperor.

8 September 1298 The Genoese destroy the Venetian navy off the Dalmatian island of Curzola in their struggle to gain control of trade with the Byzantine Empire. As a result, Venice 'closes' its Great Council, a council of nobles who deal with administrative and legislative affairs, restricting its membership. 1298 A spinning wheel for manufacturing thread from fibre is first mentioned in Europe in the Drapers' Statutes of the German town of Speyer. It is introduced from India via the Middle East. 1298 Marco Polo writes Il milione/The Million (Travels of Marco Polo) while in prison. It is the first European account of the geography, economy, civilization, and government of China. 1298 Nogay, Mongol Khan of the 'Nogay Horde' (operating between the Dnieper and Danube rivers), ravages the Crimea after defeating Tokhta, Khan of the 'Golden Horde'. 1298–1299 Mohammad Abu Abdullah, a Muslim visionary, makes an abortive attempt to conquer the Christian kingdom of Ethiopia. 5 May 1299 Matteo Visconti negotiates a peace between Genoa and Venice, ending their war (since 1261) to control trade with the Byzantine Empire. 1299 Italian tarot cards are first mentioned in a manuscript. They are used both for gaming and fortune telling, and the modern pack of playing cards derives from them. 1299 Tokhta, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', defeats and kills Nogay, Khan of the 'Nogay Horde' (between the Dnieper and Danube rivers), on the River Kagamlyk. The Mongols in eastern Europe are thus reunited. 5 May 1300 Guy of Flanders, having been deserted by all his allies, surrenders to King Philip IV of France and is imprisoned. Flanders is placed under French governance, and is adminstered by Jacques de Châtillon, the uncle of the queen. 8 August 1300 The Holy Roman Emperor Albert I abandons his siege of Nijmegen in the war against John of Hainault. This failure is followed by a revolt of the Rhenish princes. 1300 A new wave of Turks, known as the 'Ottomans' after their founder Osman, are driven westwards by the Mongols. They defeat the Byzantines in Bithynia, and occupy western Anatolia. The Byzantine Empire holds on only in Nicaea, Heraclea, and Smyrna. 1300 The Shans in Burma defeat a punitive Mongol expedition from China, following Burmese rebellion after the death of Kublai Khan in 1294. c. 1300 Chinese playwright Guan Han-qing is active. Regarded as China's greatest

classical dramatist, his most important works include Snow in Midsummer. c. 1300 Italian poet Dante Alighieri completes his Vità nuova/New Life, including 25 sonnets, 4 canzoni, and a ballata, with linking prose telling the story of the poet's love for Beatrice (Portinari). 14 January 1301 King Andrew III of Hungary, the last of the Árpád dynasty, dies. King Wenceslas II of Bohemia declines the crown, but his son Wenceslas is elected and crowned, taking the Hungarian name of László (Ladislas). Pope Boniface VIII supports the candidature of Charles Robert of Anjou. 10 April 1302 King Philip IV of France holds the first known meeting of the Estates General (assembly containing representatives of the three estates, aristocracy, clergy, and commons) in Paris, France, to rally national opinion against Pope Boniface VIII. 18 May 1302 The French garrison is massacred in the 'Matins of Bruges', beginning the revolt of the Flemings against French occupation. The whole of Western Flanders is soon up in arms, and the French royal army is sent in to crush the rebels. 11 July 1302 The French army, considered to be the finest fighting force of the time, is destroyed by the Flemish urban militia at Courtrai, Flanders. The Flemings repel the French cavalry, inflicting over a thousand casualties at a cost of only a few hundred casualties to their side. 24 September 1302 Following the destruction of Charles of Valois's army by malaria, a truce between Charles of Naples and Frederick II of Sicily is made by the Treaty of Caltabellotta. Frederick's kingdom is named Trinacria. This ends the war of the 'Sicilian Vespers'. Frederick's Catalan mercenary troops, now unemployed, form the Grand Company and go to Greece. 1302 The physician Bartolomeo de Varignana of Bologna, Italy, a strong supporter of the medical tradition of Galen, gives the first written account of a post mortem examination. 30 April 1303 Pope Boniface VIII recognizes Albert I of Habsburg as Holy Roman Emperor. 20 May 1303 King Philip IV of France and King Edward I of England make peace in the Treaty of Paris, in which the French duchy of Gascony is restored to Edward for which he must pay fealty to Philip. 9 September 1303 King Philip IV of France releases Count Guy of Flanders in an attempt to calm the Flemish uprising, after an unsuccessful French campaign in Flanders. 12 September 1303 Pope Boniface VIII, imprisoned in Anagni, Italy, by an Italian force for King Philip IV of France, is released in a rising by the people of Anagni.

22 October 1303 The Italian clergyman Niccolò Boccasini is elected Pope Benedict XI following the death of Pope Boniface VIII. 20 July 1304 Petrarch (Petrarca), Italian poet whose work was a major influence on the growth of Renaissance poetry, born in Arezzo, Tuscany (–1374). 1304 A revolt in Hungary causes King Ladislas (Wenceslas) IV of Hungary to return to Bohemia. The Holy Roman Emperor Albert I invades Bohemia but retires on failing to take Kutná Hora. King Wenceslas II of Bohemia is then expelled from Poland and King Wladyslaw restored. 3 March 1305 Guy, Count of Flanders, dies and is succeeded by his son, Robert of Béthune. 4 April 1305 Roger de Flor, the captain of the Catalan mercenary Grand Company, is murdered in Constantinople. His followers defeat the imperial troops of Andronicus II Palaeologus, the Byzantine emperor, and plunder Thrace. 5 June 1305 The French clergyman Bertrand de Got is elected Pope Clement V in Rome. 6 June 1305 In the Treaty of Athis-sur-Orge, King Philip IV of France restores Flanders to Robert of Béthune for the payment of an indemnity. 21 June 1305 King Wenceslas II of Bohemia dies. He is succeeded by his son, Wenceslas III, who makes peace with the Holy Roman Emperor Albert I. 4 August 1305 King Wenceslas III of Bohemia is murdered, ending the Premyslid dynasty. 23 August 1305 The Scottish nationalist William Wallace, leader of the first resistance movement to free Scotland from English rule, is executed in London, England, as a traitor against King Edward I of England, after having been betrayed and captured in Glasgow, Scotland (c. 35). He is tried in Westminster Hall, London, and promptly hung, drawn, and quartered. His head is displayed on London Bridge in London. 9 September 1305 King Edward I of England enacts an ordinance for the government of Scotland. The country is to be ruled by a governor, a lieutenant, and a chamberlain. There is also to be a separate Scottish parliament. 1305 King Edward I of England introduces measures to standardize certain weights and measures, including the yard and the acre. c. 1305 Italian artist Giotto di Bondone completes a series of frescoes in the Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel in Padua illustrating the life of the Virgin and the life of Jesus. Bringing a new realism and drama to painting, this major series of

frescoes is seen as marking the beginning of Italian Renaissance art. 17 June 1307 Edward I Longshanks, king of England 1272–1307, son of Henry III, who subdued Wales, dies in Burgh by Sands, near Carlisle, England (68). 7 July 1307 When King Edward I of England dies whilst leading an army to Scotland, he is succeeded by his son, Edward II. 8 August 1307 King Edward II of England campaigns in Scotland, briefly. On his withdrawal Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, re-establishes himself. 6 October 1307 Corso Donati, an aristocrat and leader of the Black faction of the pro-papal Guelph party in Florence, is killed while evading arrest. He had planned a coup to reverse the recent reform of the Florentine constitution, produced as a result of financial depression and popular unrest. Donati's failure and death brings to an end the period of dominance of the ancient noble families in Florence. 1307 Temür Öljeitü, the great khan, dies. He is succeeded by his nephew Haishan. Mongol rule in China now declines into dissension and civil war. 1 May 1308 The Holy Roman Emperor Albert I is murdered by John, Duke of Swabia. 15 August 1308 The Byzantine island of Rhodes surrenders to the Knights Hospitallers (a predominantly French order of Latin Christian chivalry). It becomes their headquarters. 27 November 1308 Henry IV, Count of Luxembourg, is elected Holy Roman Emperor. 1309 Guzmán el Bueno takes Gibraltar from the Moors. Valencia is permanently annexed to Aragon. 1309 Pope Clement V begins his (and the papacy's) residence at Avignon, in the south of France. Known as the Babylonian Captivity, the papacy's stay in Avignon lasts until 1377. 1309 The Teutonic Knights (a German Christian military order) complete their seizure of East Pomerania. Their grand master moves his headquarters from Venice to Marienburg. 1310 The city of Lyon is incorporated into the kingdom of France on its occupation by King Philip IV of France's forces, who arrests its archbishop. c. 1310 The anonymous Spanish prose romance Amadís de Gaula/Amadis the Gaul (possibly Portuguese in origin) is written. The best-known version of this story is published by the Spanish writer Garcia Rodríguez de Montalvo in 1508.

16 August 1311 A parliament meets in which King Edward II of England accepts the Ordinances for the reform of his government and banishes his favourite, Piers Gaveston, Earl of Cornwall. 16 October 1311 The General Council of Vienne, an ecclesiastical assembly convoked by Pope Clement V under pressure from the French king Philip IV the Fair, opens in Vienne, France. It decides to create chairs in Arabic and Tatar at Paris, Louvain, and Salamanca; to suppresses the religious groups, the Béguins and Beghards; and to abolish the Knights Templars. 1311 Italian artist Duccio de Buoninsegna completes his painting Maestà for the high altar of Siena Cathedral. It consists of a huge panel painting depicting the Virgin and Child on one side and 26 scenes of the Passion of Christ on the other. Commissioned to commemorate the failure of a siege of Siena, the work is paraded through the streets when it is finished. 1311 On leaving northern Italy for Rome, the Holy Roman Emperor Henry VII appoints Matteo Visconti as imperial vicar of Milan, and Can Grande della Scala as vicar of Verona, thus legitimizing their despotisms. Florence appoints Robert of Naples as its lord to defend it against Henry. 19 June 1312 The banished Piers Gaveston, Earl of Cornwall, who has returned to England, is captured and killed by the earls of Lancaster and Warwick. His death causes a split among King Edward II of England's baronial opponents. 17 September 1312 King Ferdinand IV of Castile and León dies. He is succeeded by his infant son, Alfonso XI. In the chaos caused by Alfonso's minority, civil war breaks out. 1312 Tokhta, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', dies. He is succeeded by Uzbekh, a Muslim who completes the conversion of the horde to Islam. 1313 Giovanni Boccaccio, Italian poet and scholar who, with Petrarch, laid the foundations of Renaissance humanism, author of the Decameron, born in Paris, France (–1375). 1313 Tran Anh-tong, Emperor of Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam), occupies Champa (southern Vietnam) and establishes Che Nang, of the Cham royal dynasty, as puppet ruler. c. 1313 German Grey Friar Berthold der Schwarze is traditionally credited with the independent invention of gunpowder. He is also acknowledged as the first European to cast a bronze cannon. c. 1313 Italian writer Dante Alighieri completes his De monarchia/On Monarchy, a Latin treatise expressing his view that world government should be based on the Holy Roman Emperor and not the pope.

24 June 1314 Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, inflicts a disastrous defeat on King Edward II of England in the Battle of Bannockburn and so completes his expulsion of the English from Scotland. 19–20 October 1314 Frederick the Handsome, Duke of Austria, sometimes called Frederick the Fair, is elected Holy Roman Emperor. The following day Ludwig IV of Bavaria is also elected, and civil war ensues. 29 November 1314 Philip IV, king of France 1285–1314, dies in Fontainebleau, France (46). 30 November 1314 Louis X succeeds his father, King Philip IV the Fair of France, to the French throne. 1314 Persian scholar Rashid al-Din completes his Jami altawarikh/Histories, a universal history based on Arabic, Persian, Mongol, and Chinese sources. This is one of the first of the great Persian illustrated books. 1314 The Mappa mundi/Map of the World of Hereford Cathedral, England, is compiled. This is a famous symbolic map of the world showing Jerusalem at its centre, in accordance with the Bible. 1314 The Egyptian Mamelukes establish a Muslim as king of Dongola (north Sudan), ending a Monophysite Christian monarchy dating from 543. From this time Arabs fleeing Mameluke rule begin to settle in the Sudan. 25 May 1315 Edward Bruce, brother of Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, invades Ireland, having been offered the high kingship by Donal O'Neill, King of Tyrone. 15 November 1315 The Swiss defeat Duke Leopold of Austria at Morgarten. 2 May 1316 Edward Bruce, brother of Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, is crowned as king of Ireland at Dundalk in Ireland. 7 August 1316 Following the death of Pope Clement V, the French clergyman Jacques Duèse (D'Euze) is elected Pope John XXII. 1316 Famine in Western Europe, brought on by the previous bad harvest, causes heavy mortality and brings population growth to a halt. 1316 The Italian physician Mondino de Liuzzi conducts the first properly recorded dissection of a human corpse at Bologna University, Italy. His book Anatomia will become the standard work on anatomy for two centuries. 12 December 1317 Eric, Duke of Södermanland, leader of the baronial opposition to the monarchy in Sweden, is captured by King Birger of Sweden, his brother, and presumably murdered. This is followed by a general rebellion.

5 May 1318 Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, raids as far as Ripon in England, exacting tribute. 14 October 1318 Edward Bruce, King of Ireland, is defeated and killed by an Anglo-Irish force under John de Bermingham at Faughard, near Dundalk, Ireland. 1318 George V becomes sole king of a newly unified Georgia. 1318 Members of the 'Spirituals', an Italian group of Franciscans who insist on a strict interpretation of the beliefs of Saint Francis, are burnt at the stake in the persecution of this branch of the Franciscans ordered by Pope John XXII in 1318. c. 1318 Urban V, Italian pope whose election caused the French cardinals to establish the antipope, born in Naples (–1389). 1319 The chapterhouse of Wells Cathedral in England is completed. It introduces the late Gothic practice of using vault ribs for decorative rather than purely structural reasons. 26 April 1320 The Declaration of Arbroath is signed, in which the earls and barons of Scotland announce to Pope John XXII their rejection of English rule and their loyalty to Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, stating that 'it is not for glory, riches nor honours that we fight, but for freedom alone'. c. 1320 The French composer Philippe de Vitry publishes Ars nova/The New Art, a treatise on the 'new style' of music that developed in France and Italy in the 14th century. He also writes Ars contrapunctus/Art of Counterpoint. 14 September 1321 Dante Alighieri, Italian poet, prose writer, moral philosopher, and political theorist, author of Divina commedia/Divine Comedy, dies in Ravenna, Italy (56). 1321 The restoration of the monastery of Christ of Chora (Kariye Camii) in Constantinople is completed, the walls decorated with mosaics and frescoes that are of the highest quality and among the finest examples of late Byzantine art. 2 January 1322 King Philip V of France dies and is succeeded by his brother Charles IV. 16 March 1322 King Edward II of England defeats Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, at Boroughbridge, England. In the course of the battle the Earl of Hereford is killed, the Earl of Lancaster and his captains surrendering to Edward the following day. 28 September 1322 King Ludwig IV of Bavaria is aided by King John I of Bohemia in defeating and capturing Frederick of Austria on the River Inn at Mühldorf, on the Austrian border. 2 February 1323 The papal legate Bertrand du Poujet opens his campaign

against the Lombard 'Ghibellines', the German imperialists, with the capture of Tortona and Monza in Italy. 8 October 1323 As a result of King Ludwig IV of Bavaria's claim of imperial authority in northern Italy, Pope John XXII asserts his right to confirm imperial elections and requires Ludwig to surrender the kingship of the Romans. 1323 The earliest reference to water-driven bellows used in an iron forge, at Briey, France, is recorded. 23 March 1324 Pope John XXII excommunicates King Ludwig IV of Bavaria for his refusal to surrender the kingship of the Romans. 22 May 1324 In the Appeal of Sachsenhausen, King Ludwig IV of Bavaria denounces Pope John XXII and denies his claim to temporal authority in Germany. 8 August 1324 King Charles IV of France invades Gascony when the parliament of Paris declares the province confiscated because King Edward II of England's lieutenant has sacked the French fortified town of Saint-Sardos. 1324 Marco Polo, Venetian explorer who spent 17 years in China, and whose Il milione/The Million (Travels of Marco Polo), has become a classic in geography, dies in Venice (c. 70). 1324 Osman I, founder of the Ottoman Turkish state, dies in Sogut, Ottoman Empire (c. 66). 2 February 1325 Andronicus III is crowned co-emperor with his father Andronicus II in order to end the civil war in the Greek Empire. 9 March 1325 King Edward II of England sends his wife Isabella of France to negotiate for peace with King Charles IV of France. When in France, she becomes the mistress of Roger Mortimer, exiled lord of Wigmore. 1325 The cortes of Castile declares that Alfonso XI of Castile is of age, bringing to an end the anarchy prevailing since 1312. c. 1325 Italian artist Giotto di Bondone completes a series of frescoes in chapels in the Church of Santa Croce in Florence. In the Bardi chapel he paints scenes from the life of Saint Francis, in the Peruzzi chapel scenes from the life of John the Baptist. 6 April 1326 Ghazi Orkhan succeeds his father Osman I as ruler of the Ottoman Turks and takes the Byzantine city of Bursa (in modern Turkey), making it his capital. 16 November 1326 King Edward II of England and Hugh Despenser the Younger are captured at Neath Abbey in Wales. Hugh Despenser the Younger is executed.

1326 With Mongol support, Che A-nan defeats the kingdom of Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam) and rules the kingdom of Champa (southern Vietnam) independently. 20 January 1327 King Edward II of England abdicates in favour of his son Edward III. 31 March 1327 Under the Treaty of Paris, King Charles IV of France and King Edward III of England end the 'war of Saint-Sardos' and restore Gascony to English rule. 21 September 1327 Edward II of Caernarvon, the former King Edward II of England 1307–27, is murdered in Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire, in England (43). 1327 French-born Jewish philosopher Levi ben Gerson (Gersonides) completes his Milhamot Adonai/Wars of the Lord, a philosophical defence of Judaism based on Aristotle. 7 January 1328 King Ludwig IV of Bavaria enters Rome, Italy, and is crowned emperor by the 'four syndics of the Roman people'. Pope John XXII declares a crusade against Ludwig who retaliates by declaring John deposed. 17 March 1328 Under the Treaty of Edinburgh, King Edward III of England makes peace with Scotland, recognizing Robert the Bruce as king of Scotland. 22 May 1328 Having deposed Pope John XXII when the Pope declares a crusade against him, King Ludwig IV of Bavaria elects the Italian clergyman Pietro Rainalducci (Peter of Corvara) as the antipope Nicholas V. 24 May 1328 Andronicus II, co-emperor of Byzantium, is forced to abdicate, leaving his grandson Andronicus III as sole Greek emperor. 21 October 1328 Hongwu or Hung-wu, Chinese emperor 1368–98, founder of the Ming dynasty, born in Hao-chou, China (–1398). 7 June 1329 Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland 1306–29, who freed Scotland from English rule, winning a decisive victory at Bannockburn (1314), dies in Cardross, Dunbartonshire, Scotland (c. 55). 12 December 1329 King Ludwig IV of Bavaria returns to Germany from Italy, ending the final attempt to restore German imperial authority in Italy. 28 June 1330 Stephen Uroš III, King of Serbia, defeats and kills Michael Šišman, the Bulgarian tsar, near Velbuzd, thereby establishing Serbian dominance in Macedonia. Michael Šišman is succeeded in 1331 by John Alexander. 1330 The English philosopher William of Occam proposes 'Occam's razor', the

principle that the simplest explanation is most likely to be true – an idea that will be highly influential when applied to scientific theories. c. 1330 I fioretti di San Francisco/The Little Flowers of Saint Francis, a popular collection of stories and legends describing the life of Saint Francis, is written and widely circulated. 1331 Italian defenders of the besieged town of Civitate, Italy, repel German forces using firearms – their first deployment in European warfare. 1332 Alexander III, Grand Duke of Vladimir, dies and is succeeded by Ivan I Kalita (the Pouch) of Moscow, Russia. With the metropolitan (leader of the Russian Orthodox chruch) Peter also preferring to reside in Moscow, it becomes the civil and ecclesiastical capital of Christian Russia. 1333 Go-Daigo, assisted by the great feudatory Ashikaga Takauji, defeats the Hojo regency and establishes himself as emperor of Japan. The Hojos are extinguished and the effective Japanese capital is removed from Kamakura and restored to Kyoto. 1333 The Black Death (a combination of bubonic and pneumonic plagues) appears in China, afflicting a population weakened by starvation. It will be spread in the West by travellers and merchants returning from the Far East to Europe. 1333 The onset of famines, which persist until 1347, and the flooding of the Yellow River combine to ruin the Chinese economy and further weaken the Yüan (Mongol) dynasty. 20 December 1334 The French Benedict monk Jacques Fournier is elected Pope Benedict XII following the death of Pope John XXII. 1334 Italian artist Giotto di Bondone is put in charge of the building of Florence Cathedral, and designs the campanile. 11 November 1335 King John I of Bohemia, King Charles I of Hungary, and King Casimir (Kazimierz) III of Poland meet in congress at Vyšehrad, near Buda, Hungary. King John I of Bohemia and King Charles I of Hungary decide that the Teutonic Knights should restore Kujavia and Dobrzyn to Poland but retain Pomerania as vassals of King Casimir (Kazimierz) III of Poland. King Casimir (Kazimierz) III of Poland recognizes Bohemian overlordship in Silesia, while King John renounces his title to the Polish crown. 1335 An illustrated edition of the Shah-nama/Book of Kings, the Persian national epic, is produced at Tabriz. This edition is one of classics of Persian bookmaking. 1335 The English abbot of St Albans Richard of Wallingford writes Quadripartitum de sinibus demonstratis, the first original Latin treatise on trigonometry.

1335 The world's first public clock, regularly striking the time in hours, is erected in the town square at San Gottardo, Milan, Italy. 18 April 1336 Harihara I, who led a Hindu revolt against Muslim rule, is crowned in his newly built capital, Vijayanagar, and thus founds the Sangama dynasty of the Vijayanagar empire of southern India. July 1336 The Japanese emperor Go-Daigo's attempt to restore imperial authority in Japan collapses. Forces of the Ashikaga clan under Ashikaga Takauji defeat those of Go-Daigo. Takauji takes Kyoto and enthrones a new emperor, Komyo. 1336 Italian artist Andrea Pisano completes his bronze doors for the south doorway to the Baptistry in Florence. Two other sets are added in the 15th century. 1336 Mubarak Shah rebels against Mohammed II, Sultan of Delhi, and declares eastern Bengal independent. 1336 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), ruthless Turkic leader who conquered Persia, India, and Anatolia, born in Kesh, near Samarkand, Transoxiana (–1405). c. 1336 The Sammas, a Rajput tribe, oust the ruling Sumras and assume control of the Sind region of India. 21 January 1337 Charles V the Wise, King of France 1364–80 who led France to recovery after the first phase of the Hundred Years' War (1337–1453), born in Vincennes, France (–1380). January 1337 Go-Daigo, the deposed emperor of Japan, escapes from Kyoto, the capital, and flees to Yoshino, where he sets up a rival imperial court. 24 May 1337 King Philip VI of France announces the confiscation of Gascony as a reaction to the 'rebellion' of King Edward III of England. Its seizure begins the Hundred Years' War. 15 July 1337 Under the Treaty of Valenciennes King Ludwig IV of Bavaria and King Edward III of England become allies against France. 7 October 1337 King Edward III of England claims the French crown through his mother, Isabella of France, daughter of Philip IV. 28 December 1337 James van Artevelde becomes the accepted leader of the Flemings, who are in revolt against the Count of Flanders because of the hardship caused by the English embargo on the export of wool to Flanders. 1337 Mansa Musa, ruler of the Mali empire, dies. Under his rule, the empire

achieved its greatest range, including Gao and Timbuktu. 1338 Ashikaga Takauji restores the shogunate, which remains in his family until 1573. Its control of Japan is never complete and feudal anarchy prevails. He also issues the Kemmu Code to organize his government, which has its capital at Kyoto, Japan. 1339 Ali Shah rebels against Mohammed II, Sultan of Delhi, and declares western Bengal independent. 1339 The earliest antipersonnel gun known is made. The ribauldequin is constructed from a row of separate smallbore firearms on a rack, each loaded separately, but fired off simultaneously. 25 January 1340 King Edward III of England assumes the title of king of France at Ghent, Flanders, and is recognized as such by the Flemings. 24 June 1340 The English fleet wins a naval victory over the French at Sluys, Flanders. 24 September 1340 King Edward III of England and King Philip VI of France make a truce at Esplechin when Edward runs out of money to continue the war. 30 October 1340 King Alfonso XI of Castile and King Afonso IV of Portugal defeat a Muslim invasion from Africa on the River Salado. c. 1340 The York Cycle of mystery plays – a set of religious plays performed annually by the citizens of York, England – is written. c. 1340–c. 1370 Welsh writer Dafydd ap Gwilym writes a body of poems – mostly love lyrics and nature poems – which are the highpoint of Welsh Medieval literature. 26 October 1341 John Cantacuzenus, grand domestic of the Greek Empire, proclaims himself emperor. This begins a civil war in which the nobility supports John Cantacuzenus, while the populace back the young John V. 11 November 1341 Charles of Blois captures John de Montfort, and imprisons him in France. John's niece, Jeanne, wife of Charles of Blois, recognizes King Edward III of England as king of France and seeks his assistance to continue the Breton war of succession. 1341 Rebellions break out in China against the Yüan dynasty. 7 May 1342 The French clergyman Pierre Roger is elected Pope Clement VI. c. 1342 Geoffrey Chaucer, the principal English writer before Shakespeare, whose best-known work is The Canterbury Tales, born (–1400).

19 January 1343 King Edward III of England and King Philip VI of France make a truce under the Treaty of Malestroit. 8 July 1343 The Treaty of Kalisz ends the war between the Teutonic Knights and King Casimir (Kazimierz) III of Poland, who cedes Pomerania. 1343 Tatar forces of the Khanate of the 'Golden Horde' are struck by Black Death while besieging the Genoese trading town of Caffa in the Crimea. Escaping merchants carry the disease across Europe. 28 October 1344 A crusading fleet organized by Pope Clement VI takes the Turkish-held port of Smyrna in Anatolia (modern Izmir, Turkey). The port is held, first by Papal forces and then by the Knights Hospitaller, until 1402. 1345 The great banking houses of Bardi and Peruzzi, in Florence, Italy, go bankrupt following the failure of King Edward III of England to pay his debts. The proletariat (populo minuto) makes its first attempt to win political significance and is defeated. Its leader Ciuto Brandini is hanged. 4 April 1346 By abandoning imperial claims in Italy, Charles of Bohemia receives the consent of Pope Clement VI to his election as king of the Romans. Pope Clement VI subsequently orders the German electors to choose a king to replace Ludwig I of Hungary. 16 April 1346 King Stephen Dušan IV of Serbia is crowned emperor of the Serbs and Greeks in Skopje, Serbia. 12 July 1346 King Edward III of England, seeking to exploit Norman disaffection with King Philip VI of France, lands in northern Normandy at Saint-Vaast-laHougue. 26 August 1346 King Edward III of England defeats a French force at Crécy, France. Among those killed on the French side are King John I of Bohemia who is succeeded by Charles, and Louis of Nevers, Count of Flanders, who is succeeded by his son Louis de Maële. King Philip VI of France escapes to Amiens, France. 17 October 1346 King David II of Scotland invades England and is defeated and captured at Neville's Cross, outside Durham, England. His action helps to relieve the pressure placed on France by King Edward III of England. 3 August 1347 Hasan, leader of the Muslim rebels in the Deccan, India, is proclaimed Bahman Shah and founds the Bahmani dynasty of Kulbarga, India. 4 August 1347 Calais in France surrenders to King Edward III of England, who expels its citizens and establishes an English colony. 28 September 1347 King Edward III of England makes a truce with King Philip VI of France.

11 October 1347 King Ludwig IV of Bavaria, King of the Romans, dies. His successor Charles IV has already been crowned and now receives general recognition. 1347 The Black Death (bubonic plague) breaks out in Europe. It first appears in Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey), Sicily, Naples, Genoa, and the south of France, but quickly spreads over the whole continent. The disease is borne by bacteria carried by fleas and spread by rats. 1348 The Black Death (a form of bubonic plague) spreads in Italy, and into Spain, central and northern France, and southern England, reducing populations by more than half in some parts. 13 January 1349 Louis of Flanders takes Ghent, Flanders, and completes his suppression of the revolt of the Flemish weavers. 26 March 1349 King Alfonso XI of Castile dies of the Black Death (a form of bubonic plague) while besieging the Muslims in Gibraltar. He is succeeded by his son Pedro I. 1349 The Black Death (a form of bubonic plague) spreads to northern England, Ireland, and Scandinavia, and to Germany and the Swiss Confederation, where Jews are massacred for their supposed responsibility for the pestilence. 22 August 1350 Following the death of King Philip VI of France, he is succeeded by his son John II. 1350 Cannon of cast bronze are in use by this date across Europe. 27 March 1351 The 'Battle of the Thirty' is fought between thirty English champions and the same number of Bretons and others of the Montfort party, in an attempt to end the dispute over the occupancy of the duchy of Brittany. The English party lose. 1351 The Chinese government provokes large-scale revolts by impressing labour to rebuild dykes along the Yellow River, and loses control of much of central China. c. 1351 Italian writer Francesco Petrarch (Petrarca) begins arranging his many poems so that they form a coherent whole (he constantly revised his works). Many are love poems addressed to Laura, a woman he knew only from a distance, falling into two separate categories: Rime in vita di Laura/Poems During Laura's Life and Rime in morte di Laura/Poems After Laura's Death. 2 March 1352 The Ottoman Turks take Gallipoli from the Byzantine Empire. Originally involved only as allies of the Byzantine emperor John VI Cantacuzenus in his new war with John V of Byzantium, they now remain in Gallipoli (in

modern Turkey), making it their base for conquests in Europe. 8 August 1352 The English forces in Brittany defeat the Montfort faction at Mauron, Brittany, ending the dispute over the occupancy of the duchy of Brittany. 18 December 1352 The French clergyman Etienne Aubert is elected Pope Innocent VI and sets aside the 'compromise' made by cardinals before his election, which was designed to restrict papal prerogatives. 1352 Acamapitzin is elected king of the Aztecs. 1352 The Black Death (a form of bubonic plague) spreads eastward across Europe, reaching Moscow, Russia, and returning towards India and China. 1352 The Cathedral of Antwerp in Flanders is completed. 1353 Fa Ngum, a Siamese (now Thai) prince who has conquered the Upper Mekong Valley, is proclaimed Chieng Dong Chieng Tong, King of Lan Chang ('the country of a million elephants'), at Luang Prabang (modern Laos). 1353 Italian writer Giovanni Boccaccio completes his Decameron, a collection of tales supposedly told by ten young people living in the country to escape the plague in Florence. It is one of the major prose works of early Italian literature. 1353 King Edward III of England transfers the wool staple (the town appointed to be the exclusive wool marketplace) from Bruges, Flanders, to England. 1353 Margaret I, regent of Denmark 1375–97, Norway 1380–89, and Sweden 1388–97, thereafter effective ruler of all three countries through her son Erik VIII, born in Søborg, Denmark (–1412). 11 November 1354 John VI Cantacuzenus is forced to abdicate, leaving John V as the sole Byzantine emperor. 5 April 1355 King Charles IV of Bohemia, King of the Romans, is crowned Holy Roman Emperor in Rome, then returns immediately to Bohemia. 1 May 1355 Genoa and Venice make peace. 1355 The Serbian empire of King Stephan Dušan IV of Serbia begins to collapse following his death while advancing to take Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey). 17 January 1356 Pope Innocent VI declares a crusade against Francesco Ordelaffi, lord of the northern Italian towns of Cesena and Forli. 20 January 1356 Edward Balliol abdicates as king of Scotland, selling his claim to King Edward III of England who now invades as far as Edinburgh, Scotland.

19 September 1356 Edward, Prince of Wales, the Black Prince, son of Edward III of England, raids central France from Gascony, defeating and capturing King John II of France at Maupertuis, near Poitiers, France. 1356 In a campaign to enforce order in Bohemia, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV authorizes commoners to prosecute their lords in courts of law, where Bohemian is to be the official language. 3 October 1357 Under the Treaty of Berwick, King Edward III of England releases King David II of Scotland for a ransom and makes a truce for ten years. However his time in England has set David at odds with the Scottish magnates. 1357 The synagogue (now the Church of El Transito) in Toledo, Spain is completed. 24 June 1358 The Jacquerie peasant revolt in France is savagely suppressed. 1358 Following the death of Takauji, the first Ashikaga shogun (military ruler) of Japan, he is succeeded by Yoshiakira Ashikaga. 1358 Pyang-chubrGyal-mtsham, ruler of the Tibetan territory of Phag-mo-gru, seizes power from the Sa-skya, and so achieves almost complete control of Tibet. 1359 Berdibeg, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', is murdered and is succeeded by his brother Kulpa. This initiates the 'great troubles', a period of turmoil within the 'Horde'. 1359 Italian artist Orcagna (Andrea di Cione) sculpts the Tabernacle in the shrine of Orsanmichele in Florence, Italy. A complex, richly decorated work, it has been made to house Bernardo Daddi's Madonna and Child Enthroned with Angels (1347). 8 May 1360 King Edward III of England concludes the preliminary terms of a treaty of peace with France at Brétigny, France, later to be confirmed in the Treaty of Calais. It gives Edward full sovereignty of Gascony and other debatable lands, as well as territory in the north of France. In return he renounces his claim to the throne of France. 24 October 1360 The Treaty of Calais confirms the terms made between England and France at Brétigny, France. 1360 The Cathedral of Freiburg in Germany is completed. 1360 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), the great khan, begins his conquest of Transoxiana (modern Uzbekistan), the region in which he was born, with the seizure of Kesh, near Samarkand, from Ilyas Khoja, the governor of the region for the khanate of Kashgar.

c. 1360 English writer William Langland writes his long religious allegory The Vision of Piers Plowman. A longer version appears in the 1370s. 1361 Nevruz, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', is murdered and succeeded by Khidyr. The 'Horde' is now disintegrating, with its court tied up with succession disputes. 28 September 1362 Guillaume de Grimoard is elected Pope Urban V. 1362 King Ludwig I of Hungary defeats and captures King Strascimir of Bulgaria. He conquers northern Bulgaria, extending his control over the Balkans. 30 November 1363 Albert II is elected king of Sweden when his father Albert, Duke of Mecklenburg, Germany, leads a rebellion which deposes King Magnus II of Sweden. 1363 Firuz, Sultan of Delhi, India, regains control of the Sind region of India. 1363 King Olgierd of Lithuania defeats Mongol forces near the mouth of the River Bug and progresses to the Black Sea. 10 October 1365 A crusade led by King Peter I of Cyprus takes Alexandria, in Mameluke Egypt. He departs after sacking the town and massacring its population. 1365 The Doges' Palace in Venice is completed. Changes, particularly to the façades, continue during the 15th century. April 1366 Henry IV, King of England 1399–1413, son of John of Gaunt, born in Bolingbroke Castle, Lincolnshire, England (–1413). 1366 Italian writer Francesco Petrarch (Petrarca) completes his Latin treatise De remediis utriusque fortunae/Remedies Against Fortune. 18 January 1367 King Pedro I of Portugal dies and is succeeded by his son Ferdinand I. 3 April 1367 Edward, Prince of Wales, the Black Prince, son of King Edward III of England, invades Castile on behalf of the usurped King Pedro I and defeats King Henry of Castile, capturing his French ally Bertrand du Guesclin at Nájera, Spain. Illness subsequently forces him to withdraw and new rebellions break out against King Pedro I. 1367 Chu Yüan-chang, having defeated rival rebel leaders, takes Beijing, China, and expels Toghan Temur, the last Yüan (Mongol) emperor. Chu Yüan-chang, under the name Hung-wu, founds the Ming Dynasty, establishing his capital at Nanjing. 3 December 1368 King Charles V of France accepts a judicial appeal from

Gascon nobles against their governor, Edward, Prince of Wales, the Black Prince, son of King Edward III of England, thus effectively renewing the war against England. 1368 Following the collapse of the Mongol Yuan dynasty in China, the Sa-skya lamas are no longer appointed and Tibet regains full independence. 23 March 1369 Henry of Trastamare kills Pedro I, former king of Castile, and becomes King Henry II in uncontested control of the kingdom. This places the Castilian fleet in the hands of an ally of France. 21 May 1369 King Charles V of France declares war on England. 3 June 1369 King Edward III of England reassumes the title king of France. 10 October 1369 The Byzantine emperor John V Palaeologus visits Rome, Italy, on a mission to solicit aid against the Ottoman Turks, and is accepted into the Roman church. 30 November 1369 Under the Treaty of Stralsund, King Waldemar IV of Denmark makes peace on terms favourable to the Hanse and its allies, who have conquered Scania, Sweden. 1369 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), Grand Amir of the Mongols, gains control of the khanate of Chaghadai, centred in Turkestan and with its capital at Samarkand. 30 December 1370 Pierre Roger de Beaufort is elected Pope Gregory XI following the death of Pope Urban V. 1370 The earliest iron needles are manufactured, at Nuremberg, Germany, with a closed hook on the end; needles with eyes are manufactured in the Netherlands about 1400. 26 September 1371 Murad, leader of the Ottoman Turks, defeats and kills King Vukašin of Serbia at Crnomen, on the Marica. He conquers Macedonia, while the Byzantine Empire and Bulgaria become Turkish tributaries. 3 March 1372 John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, claims the throne of Castile on his standing as the son-in-law of King Pedro I of Castile. King Henry II of Castile besieges Lisbon, Portugal, in order to compel King Ferdinand I of Portugal to abandon his alliance with John of Gaunt. 23 June 1372 In a naval battle off the coast of La Rochelle, France, King Henry II of Castile, as the ally of France, destroys an English fleet bringing John Hastings, Earl of Pembroke and lieutenant of King Edward III of England, to Gascony, France. 28 April 1373 Duke John IV of Brittany flees to England following a pro-French

revolt by his subjects, leaving only the town of Brest, Brittany, remaining in English hands. 16 June 1373 Under the Treaty of London, England and Portugal make a perpetual alliance. 19 July 1374 Petrarch (Petrarca), Italian poet whose work was a major influence on the growth of Renaissance poetry, dies in Arqua, near Padua, Carrara (70). c. 1374 The English mystic Julian of Norwich writes the first version of her Revelations of Divine Love, a record of her visions. She writes a second longer version c. 1400. c. 1374 The Japanese novel Taiheiki, possibly by the priest Kojima, is completed. It describes the civil wars of the period from 1318 to 1367. 27 June 1375 English and French embassies confer at Bruges, Flanders, and conclude a general treaty of truce. King Edward III of England now holds only Calais, Brest, Bordeaux, and Bayonne in France. 21 December 1375 Giovanni Boccaccio, Italian poet and scholar who, with Petrarch (Petrarca), laid the foundations of Renaissance humanism, author of the Decameron, dies in Certaldo, Tuscany, Italy (c. 62). 1375 The anonymous Middle English alliterative poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a chivalric romance, is written. The author may also have written The Pearl about 1370. c. 1375 The Voiage and Travaile of Sir John Mandeville, Knight, a collection of travel tales, appears in England. It claims to have been written by a gouty English knight, Sir John Maundeville (Mandeville), though it is likely that Sir John is the creation of the French chronicler and poet Jean d'Outremeuse. The work first appears in a French text dated about 1357. Popular throughout Europe, the book appears many times in English, notably in a 1496 printing. c. 1375 The Dutch mystic Gerhard Groot of Deventer forms the Brethren of the Common Life, a religious society of clergy and lay people, at Windesheim. Their teachings, known as the Devotio moderna/Modern Devotion, had an important impact during the 14th and 15th centuries. 1376 Scottish writer John Barbour completes The Bruce, an epic poem in 20 books on the life and deeds of the Scottish king Robert the Bruce. It is best known for its description of the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314. 1376 The Byzantine emperor John V Palaeologus grants the Aegean island of Tenedos to Venice, while his son Andronicus IV, who claims the imperial throne, grants it to Genoa. This triggers a new war between Venice and Genoa.

27 January 1377 The 'bad parliament' meets in England and reverses the acts of the 'good parliament', and grants a poll tax of four shillings on everyone over the age of 14 to fund the continuation of the French wars. 21 May 1377 Ulm and thirteen other German towns that are members of the Swabian League defeat the forces sent by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV to suppress their organization, at Reutlingen, Germany. 21 June 1377 Richard II succeeds to the English throne following the death of his grandfather, King Edward III of England, and begins his rule with a council of regency. 1377 Hayam Wuruk, Emperor of Majapahit (Java), destroys the last remains of the Hindu empire of Srivijaya (Sumatra). 1377 The population of England is estimated at 2 million; before the Black Death (a form of bubonic plague) it was between 3.5 and 5 million. 1377 Tran Due-tong, Emperor of Dai Viet (modern northern Vietnam), is killed in his unsuccessful invasion of the kingdom of Champa (southern Vietnam). Che Bong Nga, King of Champa, subsequently again sacks Hanoi, Dai Viet. 8 April 1378 On the death of Pope Gregory XI the Italian churchman Bartolomeo Prignano is elected Pope Urban VI in Rome, a position he holds until 1389. When he refuses to move to Avignon in France (where the papal court has been since 1309) his election is declared void and the Swiss churchman Robert of Geneva is elected Pope (in effect Antipope) Clement VII in Avignon, a position he holds until 1394. This marks the beginning of the Great Schism, when there are two Popes, which lasts until 1417. 20 September 1378 Dissident cardinals, encouraged by King Charles V of France, elect Robert of Geneva as Pope Clement VII. This means that there are two current Popes. 29 November 1378 Following the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV, king of Bohemia, he is succeeded by his son Wenceslas. His younger sons, Sigismund and John, are endowed respectively with the Mark of Brandenburg and the newly formed Duchy of Görlitz. 1378 The English religious reformer John Wycliffe (Wyclif) publishes De potestate papae/On Papal Power, in which he rejects papal authority and proposes a range of church reforms. 8 September 1380 Dmitri III of Moscow, Russia, Grand Duke of Vladimir, leads the Russians to victory over the 'Golden Horde' at Kulikovo Pole, on the upper River Don, Russia. The supremacy of Moscow in Russia is thus confirmed. 16 September 1380 Charles V the Wise, king of France 1364–80, who led France to recovery after the first phase of the Hundred Years' War (1337–1453), dies in

Nogent-sur-Marne, France (42). 1380 The Cathedral of Siena is completed in Italy. It is one of the finest examples of Italian Gothic. 1380 Thomas à Kempis (original name Thomas Hemerken), theologian to whom the highly influential De imitatione Christi/On the Imitation of Christ is attributed, born in Kempen, near Düsseldorf, Germany (–1471). 1380 While suppressing a conspiracy, Hung-wu, Ming emperor of China, abolishes the office of prime minister and the central chancellery, thereby introducing a new system in which Chinese emperors assume personal and autocratic rule. 15 January 1381 Under the Treaty of Vincennes, John de Montfort ends his rebellion and is recognized by King Charles VI of France as Duke of Brittany. Thomas of Woodstock, Earl of Buckingham, accordingly vacates Brittany, leaving a garrison in Brest, France. A truce of six years is made with France. 14 June 1381 The 'peasants' revolt' against the poll tax in England begins. The rebels (originating mainly from Essex and Kent) occupy London and kill the chancellor, Archbishop Sudbury, and the treasurer, Robert Hales. On the following day, King Richard II of England meets the rebel leader Wat Tyler, who is later killed by the mayor of London, Sir William Walworth. The revolt is subsequently suppressed. 26 August 1382 Tokhtamysh, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', sacks Moscow, Russia, and then withdraws after having restored his suzerainty over Russia. 1382 Hung-wu, Ming emperor of China, completes the conquest of China and finally expels the Mongols. 1382 The Burji line (of Circassian origin) of Mameluke sultans of Egypt is established. Its history is one of intrigue and murder, and boasts a total of 23 sultans. 1383 Poland and Lithuania unite under the Treaty of Volkovysk. Queen Jadwiga of Poland marries Grand Prince Jagiello of Lithuania, and Lithuania accepts Christianity, so ending the crusades of the Teutonic Knights, whose expansion prompted the union. 1383 Ships entering Marseille, France, are required to spend 40 days in isolation, quarantina, to prevent the spread of plague. 18 December 1385 The Peace of Tournai between Philip the Bold of Burgundy and the weavers of Ghent, Flanders, ends a period of social upheaval in Flanders. 1386 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), the grand amir, completes his conquest of Persia and sacks Tbilisi (in modern-day Georgia), where he captures King Bagrat V of

Georgia. He is subsequently compelled to withdraw from Azerbaijan after Tokhtamysh, Khan of the 'Golden Horde', takes Tabriz. 3 August 1387 King Olaf VI of Denmark and Norway dies. His mother Margaret is elected to continue as regent in both countries for her lifetime. 16 September 1387 Henry V, King of England 1413–22, son of Henry IV, born in Monmouth, Wales (–1422). 1387 English writer Geoffrey Chaucer begins The Canterbury Tales. Told by a party of 30 pilgrims travelling from London to Canterbury, it consists of 24 tales, told in verse, that provide a vivid picture of 14th-century England. 1387 Work begins on Milan Cathedral in Italy. A vast building, combining the Romanesque and Gothic styles, it has a complicated history, with work continuing, on and off, for hundreds of years. Over the years a number of architects work on its design, including Simonde da Orsenigo, Bonino da Campioni, Master Johann of Freiburg, Henrich Parler, and Jean Mignot of Paris. 3 February 1388 The 'merciless parliament' meets and convicts the courtiers of King Richard II of England, who are accused by the lords appellant. The lords appellant take control of the government. 15 June 1389 Following the death of Murad I, ruler of the Ottoman Turks, while defeating the Serbians at Kosovo, he is succeeded by his son Bayezid I. King Lazar of Serbia is also killed in the battle. In the ensuing disintegration of his dominions Montenegro becomes independent. 15 June 1389 Murad I, Ottoman sultan 1360–89, father of Bayezid I, whose reign saw rapid expansion in Anatolia and the Balkans, is killed at the Battle of Kosovo, in Serbia (c. 63). 27 September 1389 Cosimo de' Medici the Elder, financier and statesman, born in Florence, Italy (–1464). 15 October 1389 Urban V, Italian pope whose election caused the French cardinals to establish the antipope, dies in Rome (c. 71). 2 November 1389 Pietro Tomacelli is elected Pope Boniface IX. 1389 Rajasanagara, King of Java, dies and his empire, which extends throughout the whole of modern Indonesia, now collapses. 2 February 1390 Che Bong Nga, King of Champa (modern southern Vietnam), is assassinated. His conquests in Dai Viet (northern Vietnam) are abandoned by his successor La Khai. 1391 The Court of Lions in the Alhambra in Granada, one of the finest examples

of Moorish art in Spain, is completed. 1392 A period of feudal warfare in Japan, which has been taking place since 1336, ends with the abdication of the southern emperor in favour of the northern emperor in Kyoto, who is still controlled by the Ashikaga shoguns. 1392 Yi Song-gye, a Korean general, usurps the throne, ending the Koryodynasty and founding the Yi dynasty. He recognizes Chinese supremacy. 8 March 1393 Sikandar, Sultan of Delhi, India, dies and is succeeded by his brother, Mahmud. The kingdom of Delhi is dissolving into feudal anarchy. 1393 Dutch artist Claus Sluter completes his carvings for the portal of the abbey of Chartreuse de Champmol, in Dijon, France. 1393 The first translation of the Bible into English is completed. The work was begun by the English reformer John Wycliffe in 1380 and continued on Wycliffe's death in 1384 by Nicholas Hereford. 1393 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), Grand Amir of the Mongols, campaigns against the 'Golden Horde' in Russia, reaching Moscow. He also completes his conquest of Persia and Mesopotamia, extinguishing the last independent Mongol dynasties. 17 May 1395 The Hungarians and Wallachians defeat the Ottoman Turks at Rovine, but Wallachia becomes tributary to the Turks, who also conquer the Dobrudja area of the Balkans. 26 August 1395 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), Grand Amir of the Mongols, abandons his campaign against Moscow, Russia, having destroyed the economy of the 'Golden Horde'. 12 March 1396 A treaty of truce for 28 years is made between France and England. Isabella, the daughter of King Charles VI of France, is betrothed to King Richard II of England. 25 September 1396 The Ottoman Turks destroy the crusading army of King Sigismund of Hungary and his western allies at Nicopolis, Bulgaria. 17 June 1397 Queen Margaret of Denmark and Norway holds an assembly of Scandinavian nobles at Kalmar, Sweden, for the coronation of her grand-nephew, Eric VII of Pomerania, as king of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden – the 'Kalmar Union'. 24 June 1398 Hongwu or Hung-wu, Chinese emperor 1368–98, founder of the Ming dynasty, dies (69). 28 July 1398 King Charles VI of France announces his country's withdrawal from obedience to Pope Benedict XIII of Avignon. King Henry III of Castile and León

does likewise. January–March 1399 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), Grand Amir of the Mongols, continues his massacres and ravages in India, causing a famine. 29 September 1399 King Richard II of England abdicates and is declared deposed in a quasi-parliamentary assembly. Henry, Duke of Lancaster claims and receives the crown as Henry IV. 1399 Italian-born French writer Christine de Pisan writes her long poem L'Epitre au dieu d'amour/Letter to the God of Love, in which she defends women against the satire directed at them in earlier Medieval romances. The work is translated into English by Thomas Hoccleve in 1402. 16 September 1400 Owen Glendower (Owain Glyndwr), Lord of Glydyfrdwy and Cynllaith, revolts following a dispute with Reginald Grey of Ruthin, Lord of Dyfryn Clwyd, a member of the council of King Henry IV of England. 25 October 1400 Geoffrey Chaucer, the principal English writer before Shakespeare, whose best-known work is The Canterbury Tales (1390s), dies in London, England (c. 58). 1400 Chieftain of the Kano kingdom Kanajeji Sarki arms his troops with chain mail and war horses, leading them to a string of victories and dominance over West Africa. 1400 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), Grand Amir of the Mongols, defeats the Mameluke Egyptians at Aleppo and Damascus and sacks the cities of Syria. c. 1400 The Wilton Diptych, a panel painting showing King Richard II of England facing the Virgin Mary, is painted, probably by a French artist. The estimated dates for this work differ widely, ranging from c. 1380 to c. 1410. c. 1400 French historian Jean Froissart completes his Chronicles, a history of Europe from 1307 to 1400, the later years of which often include his own eyewitness accounts. It is the most important account of the Hundred Years' War. From 1400 the work was continued by others, ending in 1467. It is translated into English by John Bourchier, Lord Berners in 1523–25. 3 September 1402 When Gian Galeazzo Visconti, duke of Milan, dies, he is succeeded by his son, Giovanni Maria, with a regency. His death leads to the break out of anarchy in Lombardy, northern Italy, while the war against Florence ends. 21 July 1403 King Henry IV of England defeats and kills Henry 'Hotspur', son of the Earl of Northumberland, at Shrewsbury, England, so ending his revolt and preventing him from joining forces with the Welsh rebels.

14 June 1404 The Welsh nationalist leader Owen Glendower, having won control of Wales, assumes the title of prince of Wales and holds a parliament. 17 October 1404 Cosmo Migliorato is elected Pope Innocent VII in Rome. 1404 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), Grand Amir of the Mongols, leaves Anatolia, having reinstated the Turkish princes and thus dismembered the Ottoman Empire. 19 February 1405 Timur Leng (Tamerlane), ruthless Turkic leader who conquered Persia, India, and Anatolia, dies in Otrar, near Chimkent, Transoxiana. 19 February 1405 When Timur Leng (Tamerlane), grand amir of the Mongols, dies while leading an expedition to China, his heirs retain only Transoxiana and Khorasan, with his son, Shah Rukh, ruling from Heart. The Mamelukes recover Syria, while the dynasty of Black Sheep Turkomans from Azerbaijan establishes a dominion from eastern Anatolia to Baghdad, Persia, and the Safavid dynasty appears in Persia. 1405 The Chinese emperor Yongle recognizes the Sumatran prince Paramesvara, the founder of the Sultanate of Malacca in Southeast Asia, as its king. The flow of Chinese seaborne trade with India and the Middle East through Malacca makes it the greatest trading centre in Southeast Asia by the 1430s. 30 November 1406 Angelo Correr is elected Pope Gregory XII in Rome. 25–26 December 1406 King Henry III of Castile dies. He is succeeded by his infant son, John II. 1406 Florentine priest James Angelus translates Ptolemy's Geographia into Latin, using a copy brought to Italy from Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey). The reintroduction of the text into Western Europe will drive the age of exploration. 1 January 1409 The Welsh rebels holding Harlech Castle surrender to the English. The rebellion of Owen Glendower, Prince of Wales, has now collapsed. 5 June 1409 The Council of Pisa declares the deposition of Popes Benedict XIII of Avignon and Gregory XII of Rome. The latter holds a council at Cividale. 26 June 1409 The cardinals meeting in Pisa elect Cardinal Peter Philarges as the antipope Alexander V. 1409 The Italian artist Donatello (Donato di Niccolò) sculpts David, his first version of this subject. 15 July 1410 In the Great Northern War, King Wldyslaw Jagiello of Poland and Grand Duke Vitold of Lithuania defeat the Teutonic Knights at Grunwald (Tannenberg).

20 September 1410 Following the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Rupert III of Wittelsbach, King Sigismund of Hungary is elected his successor. 1 October 1410 Jošt, Margrave of Moravia, is elected Holy Roman Emperor, in competition with King Sigismund of Hungary who has also been elected. 1410 Edward, Duke of York, translates The Master of Game, which is largely an English translation of the French Count Gaston Phoebus' treatise on hunting of 1391 Le Déduits de chasse/The Pleasures of the Hunt (or Le Miroir de Phoebus/ The Mirror of Phoebus). c. 1410 The Flemish artists the Limbourg brothers (Pol, Herman, and Jean) complete the illuminations for the book of prayers Les Belles Heures du Duc de Berry/The Beautiful Hours of the Duke of Berry. 8 January 1411 Jošt of Moravia, rival Holy Roman Emperor, dies. Brandenburg thus reverts to the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund of Hungary, who later in the year mortgages it to Frederick of Hohenzollern, Burgrave of Nuremberg, in whose family it thereafter remains. c. 1411 Russian artist Andrey Rublev paints The Old Testament Trinity, one of the finest Russian works of the period. 18 May 1412 By the Treaty of Eltham, King Henry IV of England makes an alliance with the 'Armagnacs' (supporters of the late Louis, Duke of Orléans) against the duchy of Burgundy, France. 28 June 1412 A commission ends the succession dispute in Aragon by electing Ferdinand, uncle and regent of King John II of Castile and León, as king. 27 November 1412 Margaret I, regent of Denmark 1375–97, Norway 1380–89, and Sweden 1388–97, thereafter effective ruler of all three countries through her son Erik VIII, dies in Flensburg, now in Germany (c. 59). 1412 Italian-born French writer Christine de Pisan writes Le Livre de paix/The Book of Peace, a treatise on government. 20 March 1413 Henry IV, king of England 1399–1413, son of John of Gaunt, dies in London, England (46). 20 March 1413 Henry V succeeds to the English throne following the death of his father, King Henry IV of England. 29 May 1413 Despite the issue of the Ordonnance Cabochienne reforming the government, fresh riots break out in Paris, France, and the butchers establish a rule of terror, slaughtering supporters of the 'Armagnacs' (supporters of the late Louis, Duke of Orléans, rival of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy).

4 August 1413 The 'Armagnacs' (supporters of the late Louis, Duke of Orléans) restore royal authority in Paris, France, with the help of the dauphin Louis, quelling the riots that have been sweeping the city. 2 October 1413 The Union of Horodlo, a charter issued by King Wldyslaw Jagiello of Poland and Grand Duke Vitold of Lithuania, reaffirms the unity of the two states but makes the autonomy of Lithuania permanent and cedes new privileges to its nobility. 28 May 1414 Khizr Khan, the Mongol ruler of the Punjab, India, takes the city of Delhi and establishes the Sayyid dynasty of Delhi. He is initially acting as viceroy for Shah Rukh, successor to the late Timur Leng (Tamerlane), grand amir of the Mongols. 6 July 1415 The Council of Constance issues the decree Haec sancta/These Holy Things, which asserts the supremacy of general councils in the church. The Council also condemns the Bohemian reformer John Hus as a heretic and he is burnt at the stake in Constance, Germany, a year later. 5 September 1415 The nobles of Bohemia and Moravia form an association to oppose the church authorities and prevent the execution of the condemned Bohemian religious reformer John Hus. 25 October 1415 King Henry V of England inflicts a crushing defeat on the French at the Battle of Agincourt. c. 1416 Owain Glyndwr (Owen Glendower), Welsh leader, self-proclaimed prince of Wales and rebel against English rule, dies (c. 62). 11 November 1417 The Great Schism (the period 1378–1417 of rival Popes in Rome, Italy, and Avignon, France) ends with the election of Pope Martin V at the Council of Constance in Germany. 1418 The Hanse makes its first legislative act, regulating the alliance and its trading operations. The German port of Lübeck is recognized as its leading member. c. 1418 The anonymous French artist known as the Rohan Master completes the illuminations for the book of prayers The Rohan Hours. Among its best-known images is A Dying Man Commends His Soul to God. 19 January 1419 Rouen, the capital of Normandy, France, surrenders to King Henry V of England, whose conquest of Normandy is thus complete. 1419 Prince Henry the Navigator of Portugal sets up the first school of navigation in Europe, at Sagres, Portugal. c. 1419 Italian artist and architect Filippo Brunelleschi draws 'perspective

panels', boards on which there is a drawing of a scene and a pinhole to view the scene itself. His device helps to create a mastery of linear perspective that plays a major role in Renaissance art. 25 March 1420 In the first battle of the Hussite Wars, the extremist antipapal Taborites, led by John Ziška, defeat the Bohemian Catholics at Sudomer, Bohemia. 14 July 1420 In the Hussite Wars, the extremist antipapal Taborites, led by John Ziška, defeat a crusading army led by the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund, King of Hungary and Bohemia, on the Vitkow, now Ziška's Hill, outside Prague, Bohemia. The 'Four Articles of Prague' defining the principles common to the Hussites are now published. 1 November 1420 The Hussites again defeat the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund, King of Hungary and Bohemia, under the Heights of Vyšehrad, near Prague, Bohemia: the first anti-Hussite crusade fails. Four further unsuccessful crusades follow. c. 1420 The Flemish artist brothers Hubert and Jan van Eyck develop the technique of painting using oils as a medium to hold the pigment. 1 June 1421 The estates (representatives of the aristocracy, clergy, and commons) of Bohemia and Moravia, meeting at Câslav, renounce the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund as their king and form a government. 2 November 1421 In the Hussite Wars, the Bohemians defeat a second invading crusade by German princes at Saaz, Bohemia. This marks the failure of the second anti-Hussite crusade. 1421 More than 100,000 people die in over 70 Dutch villages when the Zuider Zee floods. 1421 Work begins on the Church of San Lorenzo in Florence, Italy. The design is by the Italian artist and architect Filippo Brunelleschi, whose aim is to construct the entire church in cubic units – a revolutionary approach that has a profound effect on Italian Renaissance architecture. 31 August 1422 Henry V, king of England 1413–22, son of Henry IV, dies in Bois de Vincennes, France (34). 31 August 1422 On the death of King Henry V of England, he is succeeded by his infant son, Henry VI, with the lords establishing a council to rule in his minority. 21 October 1422 In accordance with the 1420 Treaty of Troyes, King Henry VI of England succeeds to the French throne following the death of King Charles VI of France.

30 October 1422 The dauphin Charles, son of the late king Charles VI of France, assumes the title of King (Charles VII) of France, in defiance of the 1420 Treaty of Troyes by which King Henry VI of England is the successor to the French throne. c. 1422 William Caxton, the first English printer and influential translator and publisher, born in Kent, England (–1491). 27 April 1423 John Ziška, leader of the antipapal Taborite Hussites, defeats the moderates at Horic, Bohemia, in the first battle of the Bohemian civil war. 1423 The Italian artist Gentile da Fabriano paints the altarpiece The Adoration of the Magi. 1424 Italian artist Lorenzo Ghiberti completes the sculpting of the 28 relief scenes for the second pair of bronze doors of the Baptistry in Florence, Italy (the first are by Andrea Pisano). The work began in 1403. In 1425 he begins a third set, completed in 1452. 21 July 1425 The Byzantine emperor Manuel II, who has ruled only Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) while his brothers have ruled other remaining fragments of the empire in Greece, dies. He is succeeded by his eldest son, John VIII. c. 1425 French writer Alain Chartier writes his poem La Belle dame sans merci/ The Beautiful Lady without Pity, one of the best-known medieval lyrics of courtly love. 16 June 1426 The Hussites, led by Prokop the Great, destroy a German crusading army at Usti, Bohemia: the third anti-Hussite crusade fails. 1426 Italian artist Donatello (Donato di Niccolò) sculpts Habbakuk (Lo Zuccone) for the façade of Florence Cathedral, Italy. 27 August 1427 A crusading army led by the English cardinal Henry Beaufort flees from Stribo on the approach of the Bohemians: the fourth anti-Hussite crusade fails. c. 1427 Italian artist Masaccio (Tommaso di Giovanni di Simone Guidi) paints the fresco The Trinity, one of the major works of the early Italian Renaissance, in the Church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence, Italy. 1428 Italian artists Masaccio (Tommaso di Giovanni di Simone Guidi) and Masolino da Pinicale paint frescoes in the Brancacci Chapel in the Church of Santa Maria del Carmine, Florence, Italy. Masaccio's works there, painted according to the newly discovered principles of linear perspective, and with a solidity and drama not seen since Giotto, are among the most important works of the early Renaissance.

1428 The leader of the Vietnamese resistance to Chinese occupation, Le Loi, having defeated the Chinese, declares himself emperor of Dai Viet (Vietnam) as Le Thaito, establishing the Le dynasty. The Ming recognize him on his admission of Chinese suzerainty. c. 1428 The Flemish artist Robert Campin (the Master of Flémalle) paints The Mérode Altarpiece. 29 April 1429 The French military leader Joan of Arc arrives at Orléans, France and relieves the English siege. 23 May 1430 Burgundian troops capture the French military leader Joan of Arc as she attempts to prevent the fall of the town of Compiègne, France. She is sold to the English for 10,000 livres tournois. 1430 New metallurgical techniques for making plate iron and steel lead to innovations in military equipment. Metal plate armour becomes standard for European knights , and 'Mad Marjorie', a huge 5-m/16-ft cast-iron cannon, is constructed. 1430 Selim I, Ottoman sultan (1512–20), who extended the Ottoman empire to Egypt, Syria, and the Hejaz, born in Amasya, Ottoman Empire (–1520). c. 1430 King Yeshaq of Ethiopia dies. A succession crisis follows. c. 1430 The Italian artist Donatello (Donato di Niccolò) sculpts his bronze David, the first free-standing, life-sized nude of the Renaissance. Suggested dates for this work vary widely from 1430 to 1460. 3 March 1431 Gabriel Condulmer is elected Pope Eugenius IV. 30 May 1431 After being captured by Burgundian troops and then handed over to English troops, the French military leader Joan of Arc is burnt as a heretic in Rouen, France. 14 August 1431 A crusading army led by Cardinal Cesarini flees from Domazlice, Bohemia, on the approach of the Bohemians: the fifth anti-Hussite crusade fails. 16 December 1431 The nine-year old King Henry VI of England is crowned as king of France in Paris, France. 1431 Alexander VI (original name Rodrigo Borgia), Pope 1492–1503, notorious for his corruption and worldliness, father of Cesare and Lucretia Borgia, born in Játiva, Aragon, Spain (–1503). 1432 Flemish artists Hubert and Jan van Eyck paint The Adoration of the Lamb (Ghent Altarpiece), a polyptych in the Church of Saint Bavo in Ghent, Flanders (now Belgium). Van Eyck paints Portrait of a Man, which may be a self-portrait.

30 November 1433 The delegates of the General Council of Basel in Prague, Bohemia, make terms for a settlement with the Bohemian Hussite moderates – the 'Compacts of Prague' – which grant some degree of freedom to the Moravians and Bohemians if they swear loyalty to the Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund. However the extremist antipapal Taborites do not agree to this. 30 May 1434 In the Battle of Lipany, the Bohemian Catholics and Utraquists (the moderate Hussites) defeat the extremist antipapal Taborite Hussites led by Andrew Prokop, who is killed. 5 October 1434 The Florentine banker Cosimo de' Medici returns from exile to Florence, becoming its effective ruler. The oligarchy is overthrown, and his rival the political leader Palla Strozzi is banished. 1434 The Flemish artist Jan van Eyck paints The Arnolfini Marriage, a double portrait, full of complex symbolism, of the Italian banker Giovanni Arnolfini and his wife Giovanna Cenani on their wedding day. 5 August 1435 King Alfonso V of Aragon is defeated and captured by the Genoese in a naval battle off the island of Ponza. He is soon afterwards released, having made a treaty of alliance with Milan, in which his claim to the throne of Naples is recognized. 13 April 1436 The French city of Paris is taken from the English for King Charles VII of France, who restores it as his capital. 23 August 1436 The Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund enters Prague, Bohemia, having been fully recognized as king of Bohemia following his recognition of the 1433 Compacts of Prague. 1436 French composer Guillaume Dufay composes the collection of motets Nuper rosarum flores to commemorate the completion of the dome of Florence Cathedral, designed by Filippo Brunelleschi. The structure of the music reflects the mathematical ratios Brunelleschi used in designing the dome. 1436 The dome of Florence Cathedral in Italy, designed by the Italian artist and architect Filippo Brunelleschi, is completed. This marks the completion of the cathedral (known as the Duomo and as Santa Maria del Fiore), though it is ten years before the lantern surmounting the dome is added. Work began in 1296 to a design by Arnolfo di Cambio, enlarged by Francesco Talenti in the 1350s. c. 1436 English mystic Margery Kempe completes The Book of Margery Kempe, the earliest 'autobiography' in English literature, which was dictated to a scribe as Kempe was illiterate. 9 December 1437 Unrest follows the death of the Holy Roman Emperor, Sigismund, when he is succeeded as king of Hungary by Albert V, duke of Austria, and the Bohemians refuse to accept Albert as their king.

1437 The Italian artist Fra Filippo Lippi paints The Madonna and Child (The Tarquinia Madonna) and the first two of his Annunciations. 24 January 1438 The General Council of Basel decrees the suspension of Pope Eugenius IV from the exercise of papal authority. 7 July 1438 The Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges is published. It is a declaration by a council of the French church held by King Charles VII of France restricting papal authority in France. 1438 A baronial rebellion forces King Eric VII of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden to flee from Denmark to the Swedish island of Gotland, where he resorts to piracy. The Swedes also revolt and a diet appoints Charles Knutson as regent. c. 1438 The Flemish artist Rogier van der Weyden paints The Descent from the Cross. 6 July 1439 English and French embassies meet at the Congress of Calais in France. They fail to make peace as the English will not renounce King Henry VI of England's title to be king of France, but the English make a truce with Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (on 28 September). 6 July 1439 The union of the Latin and Greek churches is proclaimed at the Council of Florence. Despite the subscription of the Byzantine emperor John VIII and his delegation to the union, the citizens of Constantinople (modern Istanbul, Turkey) refuse to accept it. 27 October 1439 The Holy Roman Emperor Albert II dies. He is succeeded as king of Hungary by King Wladyslaw III (Warnenczyk) of Poland. 1440 German churchman and philosopher Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) publishes De docta ignorantia/On Learned Ignorance. 1440 German craftsman Johann Gutenberg of Mainz, Germany, is the first European to develop a method of printing by movable metal type, improving on the current Chinese and Korean methods. 1440 Italian artist Fra Angelico (Guido di Pietro) paints Madonna and Saints (San Marco Altarpiece), one of the first of many works at the monastery of San Marco in Florence, Italy. c. 1440 Italian scholar and humanist Lorenzo Valla publishes his treatise De libero arbitrio/On Free Will. c. 1440 Work begins on the Pazzi Chapel in Florence, Italy, designed by the Italian architect Filippo Brunelleschi. It is completed in the 1460s, with changes made by other architects.

20 November 1441 By the Treaty of Cavriana (published 10 December), Milan and Venice make peace through the mediation of Francesco Sforza, the Venetian captain, who has married Bianca, daughter and heir of Filippo Maria Visconti, Duke of Milan. 1442 King Alexander I the Great of Georgia, who has reunited the kingdom, dies. 1 September 1443 Japanese dramatist Seami Motokiyo, perhaps the greatest of the No dramatists, dies. He was the son of Kan'ami Kiyotsugo, one of the founding figures of No. Motokiyo wrote nearly half of the classic No repertoire, as well as essays on the theatre, including the major work Kadensho/Book of the Flowery Tradition. 10 November 1443 A crusading army led by János Hunyadi, Voivode (governor) of Transylvania, defeats the Ottoman Turks at Niš, Bulgaria. He subsequently also takes the city of Sofia. 1443 The Albanian national hero George Castriota, known as Skanderbeg, begins the revolt of Albania against the Ottoman Turks, having served with them against János Hunyadi, Voivode (governor) of Transylvania. 28 May 1444 By the Treaty of Tours, King Charles VII of France makes a truce for two years with King Henry VI of England, who becomes engaged to marry Margaret, daughter of René I, Duke of Anjou. 12 June 1444 The Ottoman sultan Murad II makes a truce for ten years at Szeged, Bulgaria, with the crusaders, with the Albanian nationalist Skanderbeg, and with George Barnkovic, who is restored as despot of Serbia. 10 November 1444 The Ottoman sultan Murad II destroys the crusading army at Varna, Bulgaria. János Hunyadi, Voivode (governor) of Transylvania, escapes; cardinal Cesarini disappears; and King Wladyslaw III (Warnenczyk) of Poland and Hungary is killed. 1444 The Swiss artist Konrad Witz paints The Miraculous Draft of Fishes (Altarpiece of Saint Peter's). 1445 Sandro Botticelli (original name Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi), Florentine painter of the early Renaissance, whose major works include The Birth of Venus (c. 1485) and Primavera/Spring (1477–78), born in Florence (–1510). 1445 The sultan of Adal (in present-day Somalia), Ahmed Badly Walasma, is killed by King Zara Ya'qub of Ethiopia. This turns the tide against the Islamic alliance that is threatening Christian Ethiopia. c. 1445 The French artist Jean Fouquet paints Portrait of Charles VII of France. 6 March 1447 Tommaso Parentucelli is elected Pope Nicholas V.

25 June 1447 Grand Prince Casimir (Kazimierz) IV Jagiellonczyk of Lithuania is crowned as King Casimir (Kazimierz) IV of Poland. It is now presumed that King Wladyslaw III (Warnenczyk) of Poland and Hungary was killed by the Ottoman Turks at Varna, Bulgaria, in 1444; his body was never recovered leading to tales of apparitions in different parts of Europe and Asia. 1447 Shah Rukh, the son and successor of Tamerlane, Great Emir of the Mongols, dies. This is followed by the dissolution of the Timurid house of Herat: the Turkoman dynasty of the White Sheep now rules Persia, except for Khorasan, from Tabriz. 1447 The Üç Serefeli Mosque in Edirne, the first centrally-planned mosque in the Ottoman Empire, is completed. Built in the Ottoman style, it is noted in particular for its fine minarets. 2 February 1448 Envoys of Pope Nicholas V conclude the Concordat of Vienna with Frederick III, Elector of Brandenburg, and other German princes. In return for the right to exercise some papal powers in their territories, they abandon the General Council of Basel. 17 October 1448 The Ottoman sultan Murad II defeats János Hunyadi, Voivode (governor) of Transylvania, at the second Battle of Kosovo Polje in Serbia and thus regains control of the Balkans, excluding Albania. 1448 The Flemish artist Rogier van der Weyden paints The Last Judgement Altarpiece. 1 January 1449 Lorenzo de' Medici the Magnificent, statesman and ruler of Florence 1453–92, born in Florence, Italy (–1492). 1449 Italian scholar and humanist Poggio Bracciolini publishes his dialogue Contra hypocritas/Against Hypocrites. 1449 The first British patent of invention is issued by Henry VI to Flemish-born John of Utznam for his technique for making stained glass for Eton College. Patents rapidly become the recognized way of asserting rights over an invention. 3–5 July 1450 The rebellious peasants of Kent and Sussex, under the Irish rebel leader 'Jack Cade', control the English capital, London. 29 August 1450 The formal union of Denmark and Norway, under King Christian I, is enacted in Bergen, Norway. c. 1450 Hieronymus Bosch (pseudonym of Jerome van Aeken), highly original Dutch painter, associated with complex and fantastic symbolism and allegory, whose major works include The Temptation of St Antony and The Garden of Earthly Delights, born in 's-Hertogenbosch, Brabant (–1516).

c. 1450 The Italian artist Piero della Francesca paints The Baptism of Christ. c. 1450 The Italian artist Paolo Uccello paints three versions of The Battles of San Romano. 19 April 1451 Buhlul Khan, Afghan governor of Punjab, deposes and retires the last Sayyid (claiming descent from Mohammed's grandson Husein) sultan of Delhi, 'Alam Shah, and claims the throne for himself, founding the Lodi dynasty. 22 April 1451 Isabella I the Catholic, Queen of Castile 1474–1504 and Aragon 1479–1504, who ruled the two kingdoms jointly with her husband, Ferdinand, from 1479, born in Madrigal de las Altas Torres, Castile (–1504). 1451 Christopher Columbus, navigator and explorer, the first discoverer of the New World to achieve long-term historical impact, born in Genoa, Italy (–1506). 1451–1456 German craftsman Johann Gutenberg produces the first printed Bible, in Mainz, Germany, using movable, reusable, metal type. The work is printed in Gothic type, with 42 lines per page; 48 copies of the original printing currently survive. 10 March 1452 Ferdinand the Catholic, King of Sicily (as Ferdinand II) 1468–1516, Aragon (as Ferdinand II) 1479–1516, Castile (as Ferdinand V and joint sovereign with his wife Isabella I) 1474–1504, and Naples (as Ferdinand III) 1504–16, who united the Spanish kingdoms into one nation and began Spain's period of imperial expansion, born in Sos, Aragon (–1516). 19 March 1452 Pope Nicholas V crowns the Habsburg Frederick III as Holy Roman Emperor in Rome, Italy. Frederick will be the last emperor to be thus crowned. September 1452 The city of Tabor, Bohemia, last stronghold and headquarters of the Taborites (the radical social revolutionary wing of the Hussite movement), surrenders to George of Podebrady, leader of the reformist Utraquist wing and governor of Bohemia. 1452 Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter, sculptor, draughtsman, architect, engineer, and scientist, one of the most influential Renaissance humanists, who painted Mona Lisa, and Last Supper, and whose science was ahead of its time, born in Vinci, Republic of Florence (–1519). 19 October 1453 The beleaguered port of Bordeaux, France, finally surrenders to the forces of King Charles VII of France, an event which sees the fall of the last English stronghold in Gascony and in France (excepting Calais) and ends the Hundred Years' War. 1453–1457 A series of natural disasters including blizzards, floods, drought, and earthquakes causes widespread famine and internal migration in China.

6 March 1454 King Casimir (Kazimierz) IV of Poland proclaims the incorporation of Prussia into Poland when the Prussian Union of Cities (led by Gdansk) and the gentry renounce allegiance to the Teutonic Order of Knights. The Thirteen Years' War follows between Poland and the Teutonic Order of Knights. 9 March 1454 Amerigo Vespucci, Italian-born Spanish explorer who participated in a number of voyages to the New World and after whom North and South America are named, born in Florence (–1512). 8 September 1454 The forces of the Teutonic Order of Knights severely defeat Polish forces under King Casimir (Kazimierz) IV of Poland at Chojnice, Poland, in the first major battle of the Thirteen Years' War. 1454 Johann Gutenberg produces the first printed calendar, in Mainz, Germany. 1454 Trailok, King of Ayutthaya (in modern Thailand), institutes Sadki Na grades which fix the permissible size of land-holdings for any individual on the basis of the number of 'dignity marks' they hold. The effect is to establish a new social settlement and abolish landlessness. 2 March 1455 Pope Nicholas V proclaims and joins the 'Italian League' formed by Milan, Venice, and Florence following the Peace of Lodi of 1454, to which the kingdom of Naples soon adheres. The League, which is to last for 25 years, is a pact against internecine (mutually destructive) warfare and foreign invasion, with permanent diplomatic representation between its members. 8 April 1455 The College of Cardinals in Rome, Italy, elects the Spanish compromise candidate, Alfonso de Borgia, as pope, in order to satisfy both the Roman Orsini and Colonna factions. Taking the name Calixtus III, he succeeds Nicholas V, who died a fortnight earlier. 22 May 1455 The Wars of the Roses begin when forces under Richard, Duke of York, and the Neville earls of Warwick and Salisbury are refused a parley and rapidly defeat the armies of King Henry VI of England in St Albans, England. The king's commander, the Duke of Somerset, is killed, and the king is wounded and captured. c. 1455 Italian artist Piero della Francesca completes his cycle of frescoes The Legend of the True Cross in the Church of San Francesco in Arezzo, Italy. Among the best-known scenes are The Discovery of the True Cross and The Meeting of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. 1456 Italian artist Donatello (Donato di Niccolò) sculpts Judith and Holofernes. c. 1456 French writer François Villon writes his long poem Le Lais/The Legacy (better known by its later title Le Petit Testament/The Shorter Testament). One of the most important French literary works of the 15th century, it describes his need to leave Paris because of an ill-starred love affair (though in fact Villon fled because implicated in robbery). It is first published in 1489.

1456–1457 Ota Dokan founds the city of Yedo (modern Tokyo) in Japan by building a castle near the mouth of the River Sumida, which strategically controls Kanto Plain. February 1457 A group of military and civil service leaders stage a coup against the ailing Ching Ta'i emperor, the conspirators forcing the palace gate and enthroning the former Cheng-T'ung emperor Ying-tsung (who was deposed while a captive of the Mongol leader Esen in the period 1449–50). Thus begins the T'ienShun reign. June 1457 King Charles VIII of Sweden (Karl Knutson) flees from Sweden when there is a rebellion among the nobles (led by the Oxenstierna and Vasa families) over his extension of royal powers. Christian I of Denmark is recalled as king. 1457 A statute of the Scottish parliament bans football and golf. The ban is repeated in 1471 and 1491, though probably with little effect. It is the first certain reference to the word 'golf'. 1457 The Venetian monk and cartographer Fra Mauro produces a new map of the world for Prince Henry the Navigator of Portugal, based on information from voyages the prince has sponsored. 2 March 1458 The Bohemian diet elects the regent (and leader of the Hussite Utraquists) George of Podebrady as king of Bohemia. He invades Habsburg Austria. 1459 Vlad IV Tepes the Impaler, voivod of Wallachia, establishes a frontier fortress against the Ottoman Turks on the Danube plain, effectively founding the city of Bucharest, later capital of Romania. 30 December 1460 Richard, duke of York, claimant to the English throne, besieged in Sandal Castle in Yorkshire, England, following grievous Lancastrian attacks throughout his journey to pacify Yorkshire, is killed near Wakefield, Yorkshire. His head, along with that of the earl of Salisbury, is impaled on the city gates of York, England (49). c. 1460 Italian artist Benozzo Gozzoli paints the fresco The Adoration of the Magi in the Chapel of Medici-Riccardi Palace in Florence, Italy. 3 February 1461 The Yorkist forces of Edward, Earl of March (the future King Edward IV of England), defeat and break Lancastrian forces including French, Breton, and Irish troops at Mortimer's Cross, Herefordshire, England. Owen Tudor (Pembroke) is captured and beheaded. 4 March 1461 Having been welcomed into London, England, three days previously, Edward of York, Earl of March, is acclaimed King Edward IV by the populace. He pursues the Lancastrian forces of Henry VI northwards.

August 1461 Prince Carlos de Viana, son and heir of John II of Aragon, dies suddenly in Barcelona, Spain. Civil war breaks out in Aragon and Navarre against John II, and Catalan Barcelona attempts a republican revolution. 1462 An Ottoman force devastates the principality of Wallachia, causing its ruler Vlad IV Tepes the Impaler to flee. He is replaced by a native vassal of the Ottoman Empire. 6 December 1463 Matthias I Corvinus, King of Hungary, takes Jajce, the former capital of Bosnia, from the Ottoman Turks, and claims suzerainty over Bosnia, Serbia, Moldavia, and Wallachia. 1463 Pope Pius II (Enea Silvius Piccolomini) completes his Commentarii/ Commentaries, the first autobiography by a pope and one of the finest autobiographies of the Renaissance. 23 February 1464 Hsien-Tung succeeds as the Ch'eng-Hua emperor following the death of his father Ying-tsung, and immediately orders military reforms, creating 120,000 elite capital troops and introducing military examinations. 1 August 1464 Cosimo de' Medici the Elder, financier and statesman, dies in Careggi, near Florence, Italy (74). 1464 Sonni `Ali accedes to the rule of Gao, Mali, on the River Niger. Relying on cavalry, he defeats Mossi attacks, conquers the Dogon and Fulani peoples in the Bandiagara Hills to the southwest, and expels the Tuaregs, thus founding the Songhai empire (–1591). March 1465 Duke Francis II of Brittany, Charles the Bold, heir to Burgundy and Count of Charolais, René, Duke of Anjou, the Duke of Nemours, and Charles, brother of King Louis XI of France, form the League of the Public Weal to resist Louis XI's exertions of royal power. 5 June 1465 A faction of nobles led by Alphonso Carillo, archbishop of Toledo, declares King Henry IV of Castile and León deposed in favour of his infant brother Alfonso in the 'farce of Avila'. This decision, prompted by wrangling over the legitimacy of Henry's heir Joan 'La Beltraneja/child of Beltran', provokes civil war. 5 October 1465 King Louis XI of France is forced to make the Peace of Conflans with the League of the Public Weal, the price being the cession of territory on the Somme to Burgundy, and the grant of the duchy of Normandy to his brother Charles, Duke of Berry. 1465 The Italian artist Paolo Uccello paints The Hunt. 19 October 1466 The Thirteen Years' War between Poland and the Teutonic Order of Knights ends with the Peace of Torun. The Teutonic Order of Knights cedes the disputed areas of Pomerania and West Prussia to Poland, and becomes

a vassal of King Casimir (Kazimierz) IV of Poland. 1466 Montezuma II (or Moctezuma), ninth Aztec emperor 1502–20, born (–1520). c. 1467 The Italian artist Andrea Mantegna paints the Dead Christ. 1467–1477 The kingdoms of Jaffna and Kandy in the north and centre of modern Sri Lanka respectively, wrest their independence from the kingdom of Kotte following the death of its king Parakramabahu VI and end its control over the entire island. 17 January 1468 Skanderbeg, the Albanian national hero and bulwark against the Ottoman Turks, dies at the port of Lezhë, Albania and is succeeded by his son John Castriota II. 3 May 1469 Niccolò Machiavelli, Italian statesman, writer, and political theorist whose best-known work is Il principe/The Prince (1513), born in Florence, Italy (–1527). 28 October 1469 Desiderius Erasmus, humanist, considered the greatest scholar of the northern European Renaissance, born in Rotterdam, Netherlands (–1536). 1469 Montezuma I, the fifth Aztec ruler, dies after a long reign in which the Aztecs extended their empire as far as the Gulf of Mexico and traded ever more widely; this expansion is to continue until the Spanish conquest. 1469 Nanak, Indian religious leader, first Guru of the Sikhs, born in Rai Bhoi di Talvandi, near Lahore, India (–1539). 1470 Sir Thomas Malory completes Le Morte d'Arthur/The Death of Arthur. Based on French originals, it is the first prose account in English of the Arthurian legend. Malory remains a shadowy figure. He is thought to be a Welsh knight who translated the story from French while languishing in prison. The book is published by Caxton in 1485. 14 April 1471 Having sailed from Burgundy to land at Ravenspur in Holderness, England, on 14 March, King Edward IV of England musters support and enters London, England, capturing Henry VI and annihilating the Lancastrian Neville forces in the fog at Barnet. The Lancastrian leaders, the Earl of Warwick and Lord Montague, die in battle. 21 May 1471 Albrecht Dürer, considered to be the greatest German painter and printmaker of the Renaissance, born in Nuremberg, Germany (–1528). 21 May 1471 Richard, duke of Gloucester, brother of King Edward IV of England, defeats an attack on London, England, by the Lancastrian Lord Fauconberg that is aimed at taking Henry VI from confinement in the Tower of London. Edward has Henry executed, thereby extinguishing the Lancastrian dynasty.

8 August 1471 Thomas à Kempis (original name Thomas Hemerken), theologian to whom the highly influential De imitatione Christi/On the Imitation of Christ is attributed, dies in Agnietenberg, near Zwolle, Netherlands (c. 92). 11 October 1471 Following its defeat by Muscovite forces, the extensive and wealthy republic of Novgorod becomes subject to Ivan III, Grand Duke of Muscovy, and Moscow. The ascendancy in Russia of the principality of Muscovy is established. 26 October 1471 Following the death in July of Pope Paul II, the Genoese Francesco della Rovere is elected Pope Sixtus IV. 1471 Le Thanh-tong, emperor of Dai Viet, starts the annexation of the northern provinces of the Champa kingdom. A 500 kilometre stretch of Annam is conquered and settled southwards from Da Nang to Nha Trang. 1471 Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui, the ninth Inca emperor, abdicates in favour of his son Topa Inca Yupanqui, after seeing his reign transform Tawantisiyu (the Inca state) from being a small principality around Cuzco to the dominant state of the Andes through victories over Chimú and Chacan. 17 October 1472 Barcelona, Catalonia, surrenders on compromise terms to King John II of Aragon. The secessionist revolt of Catalonia under its Generalitat (parliament) ends, and Catalonia and Aragon are united when they face King Louis XI of France in Roussillon, France. 1472 Italian diplomat and military adviser Roberto Valturio publishes his influential De re militari libri XII/Twelve Books on the Art of War. 1472 Italian physician Giovanni Matteo Ferrari, writes his Useful Repertory of the Precepts of Avicenna, a commentary on the work of the great 11th century Arab physician Avicenna. 19 February 1473 Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer, who put forward the theory that the Earth revolved about its axis and around the Sun, born in Torun, Poland (–1543). 6 June 1473 In Japan, Hosokawa Katsumoto, leader of the loyalist faction in the Onin War, dies. Following the earlier death of his opponent Yamana Mochitoyo, this ends any prospect of a truce and many residents leave the devastated capital, Kyoto, as Japan descends into feudal chaos. 1473 De imitatione Christi/On the Imitation of Christ attributed to the German mystic Thomas à Kempis (Thomas Hemerken) is first printed in Augsburg. The text had been widely circulated in manuscript for many years before being published. A classic of devotional literature, it will become the most widely read Christian book after the Bible.

1473 Gesta Romanorum/Roman Tales is first printed, in Utrecht, Holland. A collection of illustrative tales, anecdotes, and historical narratives written in Latin, it was begun in about 1330 and gradually expanded to become a rich store of tales from Christian, Jewish, and classical sources. It provided many writers (including Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower) with material. 1473 The earliest known example of printed music, the Constance Gradual is published in Germany. April 1474 Ming forces construct the present-day 'Great Wall' along the border of the Ordos desert in the Shensi province of China in order to hold back persistent Mongol incursions. September 1474 King Edward IV of England ends six years of desultory naval war against the Hanseatic League with the Peace of Utrecht, and restores the League's trading privileges and English depots (steelyards) at London, Boston, and King's Lynn. 12 December 1474 Henry IV the Impotent, King of Castile, dies and is succeeded by his sister Isabella and her husband Ferdinand V, son and heir of John II of Aragon. 1474 Italian artist Andrea Mantegna completes his frescoes in the Camera degli Sposi/Marriage Room in the Ducal Palace in Mantua, Italy. It presents a vivid depiction of the life at the Mantua court. 6 March 1475 Michelangelo (di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni), Italian Renaissance sculptor, painter, and architect, also poet, whose best-known works include the fresco The Last Judgement (1534–41) and the sculptures Pietà (c. 1500) and David (1504), born in Caprese, Italy (–1564). 4 July–29 August 1475 King Edward IV of England lands at Calais, France, with a large army. He finds his allies unwilling or unable to campaign, and manoeuvres as far as the River Somme, where he bargains with King Louis XI of France. The Treaty of Picquigny specifies a seven-year truce, the freedom and security of merchants, and compensation to Edward of 75,000 crowns, followed by annual payments of 50,000 crowns. 11 December 1475 Giovanni de' Medici, Pope Leo X 1513–21, noted for his political skill and personal extravagance, born in Milan, Italy (–1521). 1475 An Ottoman force conquers the Crimea. The Genoese trading colony at Khaffa (Feodosiya) falls, and the Tatar (Mongol) Krim Khan becomes an Ottoman vassal. 1475 English printer William Caxton prints The Recuyell of the Histories of Troye, in Bruges, Belgium. His own translation from the French romance by Raoul le Fèvre, it is the first work to be printed in English.

c. 1475 A radically new version of chess, very similar to the game played today, is devised in southern Europe and quickly spreads across the continent and beyond. Among the most important changes are the introduction of castling and the elevation in status of the queen from one of the weakest pieces on the board to the most powerful. c. 1475 The Italian artist Antonio del Pollaiuolo paints The Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian. c. 1475 Thomas Wolsey (Cardinal Wolsey), English cardinal and statesman who dominated King Henry VIII's government (1515–29), born (–1530). 1476 Ottoman forces win a Pyrrhic victory at Valea Alba in Moldavia when they defeat the armies of Stephen the Great of Moldavia but are forced to retreat from his principality. Stephen receives the accolade 'the athlete of Christ' from Pope Sixtus IV. 1476 Sonni `Ali, founder of the Songhai empire in Mali, leads the subjugation of the Niger lakes region west of Timbuktu, Mali. c. 1476 The Flemish artist Hugo van der Goes paints The Portinari Altarpiece, one of his most important works. It was painted for Tommaso Portinari, an Italian banker working in Bruges for the Medicis. When taken to Florence it was greatly admired by Italian artists. 5 January 1477 When Charles the Bold, duke of Burgundy, is killed by a Swiss dominated army in a battle outside Nancy, capital of the duchy of Lorraine, France, which was being besieged by the remnants of his forces, he is succeeded by his daughter Mary. However, King Louis XI of France quickly seizes the duchy and county of Burgundy and Picardy, although he faces stubborn resistance in Artois, France. 7 February 1477 Thomas More, English humanist and statesman, Chancellor of England 1529–32, born (–1535). 1477 The regent of Sweden, Sten Sture the Elder, founds the first Scandinavian university at Uppsala, Sweden. 18 January 1478 Ivan III the Great, Prince of Muscovy, uses the pretext of contact with Lithuania as evidence of rebellion and sacks the merchant city and republic of Novgorod, deporting many boyar (noble) families. He incorporates the republic into Muscovy, now the undisputed suzerain of Russia. 24 January 1478 Mary of Burgundy and her husband Maximilian of Austria end the bitter legacy of her father's war with the Swiss and make peace at Zürich, Switzerland. 26 April 1478 Pope Sixtus IV, resentful of Medici intervention against papal

authority in the Romagna region of the Papal States, encourages the 'Pazzi Conspiracy', an attempted coup in Florence, Italy. Giuliano de' Medici is murdered while at Mass, but his brother and co-ruler Lorenzo survives, and the conspirators are hunted and killed by the populace. 1 June 1478 Following the failure of the 'Pazzi Conspiracy' and the murder of the conspirator, the archbishop of Pisa, Pope Sixtus IV, excommunicates Lorenzo de' Medici and allies with Naples in a war against Florence, Venice, and Milan, Italy. November 1478 Pope Sixtus IV provides Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia (the future Pope Alexander VI) with a bull ratifying the Spanish Inquisition, which was established under the control of King Ferdinand V and Queen Isabella I at Seville, Castile, in the previous year. 1478 Arnold Buckinck produces printed maps, in Rome, Italy. Twenty-seven maps by Conrad Sweynheym appear in Ptolemy's Cosmographia. 1478 Krujë, last stronghold of the Albanian prince George Castriota, son of Skanderbeg, falls to the Ottoman Turks, who thus complete their conquest of Albania save for a few Venetian outposts. 1478 The De medicina/On Medicine of the Greek physician Galen is produced in print for the first time, giving new currency to his theories. 19 January 1479 John II, King of Aragon, dies and is succeeded by his son Ferdinand II, King of Castile. A union of the two crowns is created through the person of Ferdinand. 4 September 1479 The Peace of Alcáçovas favours Isabella I, ending the succession struggle in Castile between Afonso V of Portugal and Ferdinand V and Isabella I, and Afonso tries to abdicate from the throne of Portugal. Under the agreement, the Atlantic islands are apportioned. The Canary Islands go to Castile, while Madeira, the Cape Verdes, and the Azores are retained by Portugal. 6 March 1480 Having travelled to Naples, Italy, after receiving overtures of peace, Lorenzo de' Medici reaches agreement with Ferrante, King of Naples, for peace between Naples and Florence, Italy. The papacy, Milan, and Venice accede shortly afterward, ending the War of the Pazzi. April 1480 Lucretia Borgia, daughter of Pope Alexander VI and sister of Cesare Borgia, Italian noblewoman, and a central figure in the notorious Borgia family, born in Rome (–1519). 1480 Dutch humanist scholar and poet Rudolph Agricola (Roelof Huysman) publishes De inventione dialectica/On Dialectic Invention, a defence of Renaissance humanism. Agricola's works make a deep impression on Desiderius Erasmus. 1480 Ferdinand Magellan, Portuguese navigator and explorer, born in Sabrosa or

Porto, Portugal (–1521). 1480 Italian artist Ghirlandaio (Domenico Bigordi) paints the fresco Last Supper in the monastery of Ognissanti in Florence. 1480 Ivan III, Grand Duke of Muscovy, dispels the last relics of domination by the Mongol Tatar 'Golden Horde' when his armies face down the forces of its khan Akhmet at the 'battle' of the River Ugra, at which the Horde's Lithuanian allies fail to appear. 1480 The Cortes (parliament) at Toledo, Castile, grants concessions to the Castilian towns against the nobility, rescinding the grant of land and the rights to raise taxes and wage war, and returning them to the crown, thereby raising 30 million maravedis annually. The construction of new castles is forbidden and many existing ones are demolished. 1480 The Flemish artist Hugo van der Goes completes his painting The Trinity Altarpiece. The work includes panels depicting the Scottish royal family: James III, the Queen, and their son, the future James IV. c. 1480 The Flemish artist Hieronymus Bosch paints Christ Mocked. 1481 Abu-al-Hasan (Muley Hacen), Sultan of Granada, surprises and takes the fortified Castilian town of Zahara, starting the War of Granada, the final phase of the Reconquista ('Reconquest'). 1481 The first Auto da fé/Act of Faith, the pronouncement and enactment of sentences (including burning) on victims of the Spanish Inquisition, is carried out in Seville, Castile. Approximately 300 conversos (Jewish converts to Christianity) are burnt in the first year. January–April 1482 Reports of the excesses of the Spanish Inquisition lead Pope Sixtus IV to rescind his bull of 1478, which authorized it. He later reinstates it when he needs King Ferdinand V and Queen Isabella I as allies in Italy. 26 February 1482 Castilian forces under Ferdinand of Aragon capture the stronghold of Alhama from Muslim Granada. `Abu-Abd-Il (Boabdil), governor of Guadix, Granada, is aided by the Abencerrajes family in usurping the throne of Granada from his father `Ali Abu-al-Hasan (Muley Hacen) who retreats to Málaga, Spain. 23 December 1482 By the Treaty of Arras, King Louis XI of France and the Habsburg regent Maximilian agree the partition of the Burgundian lands. Maximilian's daughter Margaret is to marry the dauphin (soon to be Charles VIII), taking as her dowry Artois and the Franche-Comté. Maximilian's infant son Philip is to retain the Netherlands, while the duchy of Burgundy, with Picardy and the Boullonais, will go to France.

c. 1482 The Italian artist Sandro Botticelli (Alessandro di Mariano dei Filipepi) paints Primavera/Spring, commissioned by a member of the Medici family. One of his most important and characteristic works, it is a depiction of Spring ('primavera') in terms of Classic mythology. It may also be an allegory based on the Neo-Platonist philosophy of the contemporary scholar Marsilio Ficino (also a member of the Medici circle). 15 February 1483 Babur (original name Zahir-ud-Din Mohammad), emperor of India 1526–30, founder of the Mogul dynasty, descendant of Genghis Khan and of Timur Leng (Tamerlane), born in the principality of Fergana, Uzbekistan (–1530). 2 August 1483 A bull of Pope Sixtus IV appoints Queen Isabella I's confessor, the harsh Dominican Tomás de Torquemada, as the first Grand Inquisitor of Castile. His implacable paranoid hostility toward Jews and Muslims subsequently directs the actions of the Inquisition. August 1483 John II (Hans), having succeeded his father Christian I as king of Norway and Denmark in 1481, is recognized by the Swedish state council as king of Sweden. The regent Sten Sture contrives to postpone the coronation. August 1483 The 'princes in the Tower', Edward V and his brother Richard, disappear. Rumours suggest that they have been murdered by their uncle and guardian, Richard III of England. 10 November 1483 Martin Luther, great German theologian, preacher, and biblical translator, instigator of the Protestant Reformation, born in Eisleben, Saxony (–1546). 1484 The German artist Albrecht Dürer draws his Self-Portrait at the age of 13. 14 January 1485 The Duke of Orléans (the future Louis XII) and Duke Francis II of Brittany lead a coalition of French magnates in defiance of the regent, Anne of Beaujeu, and supporting the rights of the Estates General. Thus begins la Guerre Folle (the 'Mad War'). 1 June 1485 The burghers of Vienna, Austria, surrender their city to the besieging army of Matthias I Corvinus, King of Hungary. Frederick III the Holy Roman Emperor loses his capital, as he has already lost much of his territory in the duchies of Austria, Styria, and Carinthia. 15 September 1485 During a campaign against the Ottoman and Tatar forces advancing along the Black Sea coast, King Casimir (Kazimierz) IV of Poland receives the homage of the voivod of Moldavia, Stephen III the Great. 22 September 1485 Louis, Duke of Orléans and heir to the French throne, submits to the French regent Anne of Beaujeu, ending the noble rebellion known as la Guerre Folle (the 'Mad War'). c. 1485 The Italian artist Sandro Botticelli (Alessandro di Mariano dei Filipepi)

paints The Birth of Venus. 16 February 1486 The diet at Frankfurt, Germany, elects Maximilian I of Habsburg as king of the Romans, a subsidiary title of the Holy Roman Emperor. His father Frederick III the Holy Roman Emperor relinquishes government to Maximilian, who proclaims a general peace in Germany for ten years. 1486 Malleus maleficarum/The Hammer of Witches, a book accepting the existence and powers of witches, is published. It is written by two Dominican monks, Heinrich Krämer and Jakob Spränger, and authorized by Pope Innocent VIII. It becomes infamous for encouraging witch-hunts throughout Europe over the next few centuries. c. 1486 De architectura/On Architecture, a treatise on architecture written by 1st-century BC Roman architect Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, is printed in Rome, Italy. Versions of the text were known throughout the Middle Ages, but the discovery of a superior manuscript in 1414 renewed interest in classical architecture. This book had a profound effect on the development of Renaissance architecture. c. 1486 The Italian artist Andrea Mantegna paints The Triumph of Caesar, a series of nine paintings. 1486–1494 Having expelled rampaging feudal armies, leaders of the insurgent Yamashiro Ikki league (in which the gentry have joined with the peasants) meet at Uji, Japan, to formulate a provisional government for the province. 16 June 1487 King Henry VII of England defeats the army of the pretender, Lambert Simnel, who has marched from a landing in Lancashire to the battle site at East Stoke, near Newark, Nottinghamshire, England. Simnel's major backer, the Earl of Lincoln, is killed in this last battle of the Wars of the Roses. January 1488 The Portuguese expedition led by Bartolomeu Dias rounds the Cape of Good Hope and enters the Indian Ocean. 5 February–16 May 1488 Maximilian, King of the Romans, and his court are taken prisoner while trying to garrison the rebellious city of Bruges in Flanders. They are sent to Ghent, Flanders, as hostages, and Maximilian is forced to proclaim his acquiescence to a peace that guarantees the autonomy of the Netherlands 'Union'. 1488 The Persian miniaturist Kamal al-Din Bihzad illustrates scenes in an edition of the poem Bustan/The Tree-Garden by the 13th-century poet Sa'di. 25 November 1489 Mohammed XII Zagal of Granada surrenders to King Ferdinand V and Queen Isabella I of Aragon and Castile when they capture the city of Baza in Granada. Mohammed XI Boabdil resumes the rule of the kingdom of Granada, which has been reduced by the surrender of the cities of Almería and Guadix with Mohammed XII Zagal.

1489 Frederick III the Holy Roman Emperor appoints Franz von Taxis as imperial postmaster. He develops a courier service for official mail through his firm 'Thurn und Taxis'. 6 April 1490 The death of Matthias I Corvinus, king of Hungary, without an heir, leads to the dissolution of his empire, and the Habsburgs, under Maximilian, king of the Romans, recover his conquests in Austria. 1490 While visiting Milan, Italy, the Italian scholar and artist Leonardo da Vinci begins to keep notebooks detailing his ideas and inventions. He discovers and describes capillarity, the way in which liquids rise up through small-bore tubes. 25 January 1491 Polish–Lithuanian forces under Jan Olbracht, son of King Casimir (Kazimierz) IV of Poland, decisively defeat the Kazan Tartars at Zaslaw, Poland, gaining respite from their raids. 28 June 1491 Henry VIII, King of England 1509–47, who broke with the Roman Catholic Church and had six wives, two of whom he executed and two of whom he divorced, born in Greenwich, near London, England (–1547). 7 November 1491 Maximilian, King of the Romans, is unable to pay his mercenaries and abandons his attempt to conquer Hungary. He recognizes Wladyslaw (Ulászló) II as king of Hungary in the Treaty of Bratislava, which also states that the throne is to revert to the Habsburgs if Wladyslaw dies without an heir. 6 December 1491 Anne of Brittany, coerced by the victory of the invasion forces of Anne of Beaujeu, regent of France, forsakes Maximilian, King of the Romans, and marries Charles VIII of France, thus incorporating the duchy of Brittany into France. Its autonomy is guaranteed through the Treaty of Laval. 1491 St Ignatius de Loyola, highly influential Spanish theologian, founder of the Jesuits (1534), born in Loyola, Castile, Spain (–1556). 1491 William Caxton, the first English printer and influential translator and publisher, dies in London (c. 69). 2 January 1492 Granada, the last Muslim city in Spain, surrenders, completing the Christian Reconquista ('Reconquest') and unifying Spain (apart from Navarre) under its besiegers of nine months, Ferdinand V and Isabella I of Aragon and Castile. 31 March 1492 King Ferdinand V and Queen Isabella I of Aragon and Castile issue an edict that gives Spanish Jews the choice of converting to Christianity within three months or emigrating. 170,000 subsequently choose the latter, many seeking refuge in the Maghreb in North Africa. 9 April 1492 Lorenzo de' Medici the Magnificent, statesman and ruler of Florence

1453–92, dies in Careggi, near Florence, Italy (43). 17 April 1492 Queen Isabella I of Spain contracts to finance a voyage of discovery headed by Christopher Columbus, naming him admiral and viceroy of any discoveries. 1492 German navigator Martin Behaim, with painter Goerg Glockendon, constructs a terrestrial globe at Nuremberg, the earliest still in existence. 1492 Italian scholar Leonardo da Vinci experiments with lifting devices, and draws a flying machine lifted by an Archimedes screw (an early ancestor of the helicopter). It is never built.

The expansion of Europe (1493–1789) 23 May 1493 King Charles VIII of France restores Artois and Franche-Comté (the county of Burgundy) to the Holy Roman Empire under the Treaty of Senlis. He received it as the dowry of Margaret of Austria, whom he has now forsaken for Anne of Brittany. July 1493 The assembly at Piotrków, Poland, of Polish szlachta (nobles) constitutes itself as the first national Sejm (parliament). It confirms noble privileges and restrictions on the peasantry, and limits noble powers. 19 August 1493 Maximilian I assumes the title of Holy Roman Emperor elect (–1519) following the death of his father, the holy Roman Emperor Frederick III, thereby confirming the hereditary claim of the Habsburgs. December 1493 The Spanish expedition led by the explorer Christopher Columbus founds the first European city in the New World, on the island now comprising Haiti and the Dominican Republic, naming it Isabella. Columbus goes on to explore Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Jamaica. 1493 Husayn Shah 'Ala' ad-Din, chief minister of Muzaffar Shah, the Abyssinian ruler of Bengal, stages a coup against his sovereign, moves the capital from Gaur to Ikdala, and executes the 12,000 palace guards. 1493 Syphilis appears in Europe for the first time, brought back from South America by sailors returning with the explorer Christopher Columbus. The disease is first reported in Barcelona, Spain. 1493 The Catholic monarchs Ferdinand V and Isabella I of Aragon and Castile take control of the 700,000-strong chivalric crusading 'Order of Santiago', gaining possession of extensive lands and an income of 60,000 ducats per annum. 7 June 1494 Under the Treaty of Tordesillas, Spain and Portugal amend the

earlier papal rulings on the division of the New World. Portugal is to have all lands east of a longitudinal line 370 leagues west of Cape Verde, and Spain is to have the rest. 1 September 1494 King Charles VIII of France invades Italy in order to claim the throne of Naples, Italy. He crosses the Alps and arrives in Turin, Italy, a week later. 17 November 1494 King Charles VIII of France enters Florence, Italy, where a popular revolution influenced by the messianic Dominican friar Savonarola expels Piero de' Medici, who had supported Ferrante of Naples. Florence returns to a republican government. November 1494 Süleyman I the Magnificent or the Law Giver, Ottoman sultan 1520–66, whose reign saw imperial expansion in Europe and the Middle East, and major achievements in Ottoman administration and culture, born (–1566). December 1494 Alfonso Fernandez de Lugo leads a Spanish invading force to victory in battle against the native Guanche at La Laguna in Tenerife, the Canary Islands, securing the island for Spain. 1494 The German Fugger merchant family establishes its first public company with a capital of 53,385 gulden, the sum being doubled in 1496 when the bishop of Brixen becomes a partner in the company. 1494 The German humanist and poet Sebastian Brandt publishes Das Narrenshiff/ The Ship of Fools, a verse satire on human folly. It is soon widely translated. The illustrations for the first edition are by the German artist Albrecht Dürer. 28 January 1495 King Charles VIII of France leaves Rome, Italy, for Naples, Pope Alexander VI having agreed to surrender the Italian coastal town of Civitavecchia and to give as a hostage his son Cesare Borgia, who escapes two days later. 31 March 1495 Pope Alexander VI forms the League of Venice with the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, Venice, and Milan, ostensibly to fight the Ottoman Turks, but actually aimed at expelling King Charles VIII of France from Italy. 12 May 1495 King Charles VIII of France is crowned king of Naples, but faced with a counteroffensive from the League of Venice, leaves for France a fortnight later. 7 August 1495 The Diet (legislative assembly) of Worms proclaims 'general peace' within the Holy Roman Empire, abolishing private warfare. The Reichskammergericht (a supreme court) is established, and an imperial tax (the Common Penny) is to be levied under the direction of the diet, for funding imperial defence. None of these measures will be effective. 1495 The Italian artist Vittore Carpaccio completes his series of paintings The Life of Saint Ursula. A typical scene, full of details of contemporary Venetian

life, is The Arrival of the Ambassadors of Britain at the Court of Brittany. 6 October 1496 The decrepit Frederick III (Federigo) succeeds his nephew Ferdinand II (Ferrante) as king of Naples (–1501). 21 October 1496 Philip ('the Handsome'), Duke of Burgundy and son of Maximilian I the Holy Roman Emperor, marries the Infanta Joanna ('the Mad'), daughter of King Ferdinand V and Queen Isabella I, an event of great importance as it leads to the union of their families' realms. December 1496–October 1497 Owing to the 'purification' condition of his marriage to the Infanta Isabella of Spain, King Manuel I of Portugal issues an edict ordering all Jews to convert to Christianity or leave Portugal within ten months. 1496 The English humanist John Colet delivers a series of lectures at Oxford University on Saint Paul's Epistle to the Romans. Opposed to scholastic readings of the gospels, Colet introduces an interpretation strongly influenced by European humanism. September 1497 Manuel I the Fortunate, king of Portugal, marries the Infanta Isabella of Spain, a marriage with which her parents King Ferdinand V and Queen Isabella I hope to unite the peninsula. 28 October 1497 King John II of Denmark, invited into Sweden by a council of the realm discontented with the power of the regent, Sten Sture, defeats the regent's forces outside Stockholm, Sweden, reviving the Scandinavian Union of Kalmar. c. 1497 The Italian artist Sandro Botticelli (Alessandro di Mariano dei Filipepi) paints Pietà. By this stage in his career Botticelli (influenced by the religious reformer Savonarola) has abandoned the sensual elegance of his earlier works to create works that are harsher and more intense. 20 May 1498 The Portuguese expedition under Vasco da Gama reaches the port of Calicut on the southwest coast of India where it is welcomed by Zamorin, the Hindu ruler, as the first European expedition to sail to India since the Romans. 23 May 1498 Girolamo Savonarola, Italian religious leader and messianic Preacher, effective ruler of Florence, Italy, (1494–98), who was excommunicated in June 1497 for disobeying a ban on his preaching and for his criticism of the pope, is strangled and burnt in Florence, Italy, for seeking the deposition of Pope Alexander VI (45). Savonarola was responsible for making Florence a democratic republic. 5 August 1498 King Louis XII of France and Ferdinand of Aragon sign the Treaty of Marcoussis, which ends the effectiveness of the League of Venice. They begin to plan a Franco-Spanish partition of the kingdom of Naples.

1498 Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci completes The Last Supper, a fresco in the refectory of the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan. His experiments with new media are unsuccessful and within a few years it begins to deteriorate. 1498 The German artist Albrecht Dürer completes his Apocalypse, a set of woodcuts. 9 September 1499 Vasco da Gama returns to Lisbon, Portugal, from India, having sailed via Malindi, Kenya, and the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean. The other half of his expeditionary force, which arrived in Lisbon a month earlier, has broken the spice trade monopoly of Venice and the Arabs. 22 September 1499 Having met defeat at Calven Gorge, and moreover seen his Swabian League allies decimated at Dornach in the Swiss Confederation, Maximilian I the Holy Roman Emperor concedes victory to the Swiss in the Swabian War, and grants them de facto independence from the Holy Roman Empire in the Peace of Basel. 24 February 1500 Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor 1519–56, King of Spain as Charles I 1516–56, and Archduke of Austria as Charles I 1519–21, born in Ghent (–1558). 2 July 1500 An edict of the Diet (legislative assembly) of Augsburg establishes the Reichsregiment, a ruling council of the Holy Roman Empire, with representatives from the three colleges of electors, princes, and cities, following the scheme of the archbishop of Mainz and imperial arch-chancellor Berthold of Henneberg. Germany is to be divided into six administrative 'circles'; this number increases in 1512. 20 July 1500 Dom Miguel, the infant heir to the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal, dies, dashing the hopes of his grandparents King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile for a union of these kingdoms and leaving Joanna ('the Mad') and Philip ('the Handsome'), Archduke of Austria and Duke of Burgundy, heirs to Spain. 10 October 1500 King Manuel I of Portugal marries the infanta Maria of Spain, sister of his dead wife and fourth daughter of King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile, whose hopes of a dynastic union of the kingdoms are thus revitalized. 1 November 1500 Benvenuto Cellini, Florentine sculptor, goldsmith and author, a leading Mannerist artist, whose best-known sculpture is Perseus, born in Florence, Italy (–1571). 11 November 1500 The secret Treaty of Granada between King Louis XII of France and King Ferdinand II of Aragon provides for the conquest and partition of the kingdom of Naples; France is to have the northern half; the Abruzzi, the Terra di Lavoro, and the city of Naples, and Spain is to have Apulia and Calabria.

1500 Dutch humanist Desiderius Erasmus publishes Adagia in Paris, France. One of the most widely read books of the century, it consists of Greek and Latin proverbs, with comments, opinions, quotations, and long commentaries by Erasmus. An English translation appears in 1539. 1500 English printer Wynkyn de Worde establishes the first press in Fleet Street, London, England. The street will become synonymous with printing and newspapers. 1500 Swiss doctor and sow gelder Jacob Nufer performs the first recorded Caesarean operation on a living woman, helping his wife to give birth safely. 1500 The anonymous Till Eulenspiegel/The Owl Mirror is first printed, in Lübeck, Germany. This is the first printed example of the German Schwank ('Farce'), a form of comic tale that developed in medieval Germany. 1500 The German artist Albrecht Dürer paints Self-portrait (the Munich selfportrait). 1500 The Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti) completes his sculptures the St Peter's Pietà and Madonna and Child (Bruges Madonna). c. 1500 The Inca town of Machu Picchu, built high in the mountains of Peru, reaches its final stage of building. 25 June 1501 Pope Alexander VI ratifies the secret Treaty of Granada (of 11 November 1500), which provides for the partition of the kingdom of Naples between France and Spain. He proclaims King Louis XII of France king of Naples and his son Cesare Borgia 'Duke of Romagna'; Louis XII recognizes Cesare Borgia's conquests in the Romagna, northern Italy. 7 July 1501 The French army under King Louis XII, aided by Cesare Borgia, captain general of the papal army, storms and sacks the city of Capua, while its Spanish allies under Gonzalo de Córdoba take control of the provinces of Apulia and Calabria. 4 August 1501 The French complete their conquest of the northern half of the kingdom of Naples; the last castles surrender. King Federigo surrenders himself and the throne to King Louis XII of France and accepts the French duchy of Anjou. Louis d'Armagnac, Duke of Nemours, becomes viceroy. 10 August 1501 The first of several treaties is made for the marriage of the infant Charles of Austria (the future emperor Charles V), son of Philip ('the Handsome'), Archduke of Austria and Duke of Burgundy, grandson of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, and the infant daughter Claude of King Louis XII of France. 1501 Spanish writer Fernando de Rojas publishes La Celestina/The Procuress,

the first great Spanish novel. It is of great importance in the development of realistic comedy in European literature. It is translated into English in 1631. c. 1501 The Italian artist Giorgione (Giorgio da Castelfranco) paints his Castelfranco Altarpiece. 2 March 1502 The imperial arch-chancellor Berthold of Henneberg is forced to resign by the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, ending the effective rule of the Reichsregiment (imperial council). 19 June 1502 King Henry VII of England agrees to pay the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I £10,000 towards his proposed crusade in return for the denial of asylum to English rebels, particularly the Earl of Suffolk, a Yorkist claimant to the throne (confirmed 28 July). 1502 Mi-lu, the female 'bandit' who has led the Lolo people's rebellion in the Chinese provinces of Guizhou and Yunnan for three years, is finally pursued to her death. 1502 Spanish printer Juan Pablos sets up a printing press in Mexico and produces the first printed book in the Americas, Christian Doctrine in the Mexican and Castilian Language. 1502 The first book of masses by the French composer Josquin des Prés is published by the Italian music printer Ottaviano dei Petrucci. Others follow in 1512 and 1516. 1502 The Songhai emperor Muhammad I Askia completes his conquests of the Mossi people of Yatenga and the Tuaregs of Aïr in northwest Africa. 1502 The Tempietto, a small chapel in Rome, Italy, designed by the Italian architect Donato Bramante, is completed. It is widely seen as the perfect expression of the new classicism of Italian Renaissance architecture. 18 August 1503 Pope Alexander VI (Rodrigo Borgia), pope 1492–1503, notorious for his corruption and worldliness, father of Cesare and Lucretia Borgia, dies in Rome, Italy (c. 72). 20 August 1503 Venice, Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire conclude a peace. Under the treaty Venice is to abandon Lepanto, Modon, Coron, and Navarino in Morea (the Peloponnese, Greece) and Durazzo in Albania, but retain Cephalonia. Hungary agrees a seven-year truce with the Turks. 22 September 1503 The Italian churchman Francesco Todeschini is elected Pope Pius III. He is pope for less than a month. 22 September–18 October 1503 After the election of Pope Pius III, rulers deposed by the Borgias return to the cities of the Romagna, Emilia, and Umbria.

The Orsini family returns to Rome and Venice invades the Romagna. 1 November 1503 Giuliano della Rovere is elected Pope Julius II, succeeding Pius III who died on 18 October. He imprisons Cesare Borgia, former captain general of the papal army, to force him to surrender his duchy of Romagna, releasing him upon Borgia's compliance. 29 December 1503 Spanish forces under Gonzalo de Córdoba defeat the French at the Battle of the River Garigliano, completing the Spanish conquest of the kingdom of Naples and domination of southern Italy. 1503 The Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci paints Mona Lisa (La Gioconda) (Louvre, Paris), a portrait of Lisa di Antonio Maria Gherardini, the wife of a leading Florentine official. It will become one of the best-known paintings in the world. 1503 The Portuguese send African slaves to Brazil. These are the first Africans to be sent as slaves by Europeans to the New World and the journey marks the start of the Atlantic slave trade. April–October 1504 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I pronounces the Imperial Ban on Rupert, son of the Elector Palatine, claimant through his wife to the duchy of Bavaria-Landshut. Though the late Duke George of Bavaria-Landshut approved this claim in his will and Rupert has already seized the duchy, Maximilian supports the claim through imperial law of dukes Albert and Wolfgang of Bavaria-Munich. The Landshut War begins. 22 September 1504 King Louis XII of France, the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, and his son Philip ('the Handsome'), Archduke of Austria and Duke of Burgundy, sign the Treaty of Blois. Louis's daughter Claude is to marry Philip's son Charles (the future emperor Charles V); if Louis dies without a son, Charles and Claude are to succeed to Milan, Blois, and Brittany. By a secret treaty Louis is allowed to retain Milan for 100,000 ducats, and agrees a joint attack on Naples with Maximilian. 26 November 1504 Isabella I the Catholic, queen of Castile 1474–1504 and Aragon 1479–1504, who ruled the two kingdoms jointly with her husband, Ferdinand from 1479, dies in Medina del Campo, Spain (53). 1504 Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti) completes his sculpture David, which is widely praised when set up in a square in Florence. He also paints his Holy Family (Doni Tondo). 1504 The Italian artist Raphael (Sanzio) paints Marriage of the Virgin. 4 April 1505 At the Diet (legislative assembly) of Cologne, the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, strengthened by his victory in the Landshut War over the duchy of Bavaria-Landshut, obtains support from the German princes for an expedition to Hungary to assist King Ladislas II against his factious nobility;

constitutional reforms are designed to further promote his aim of a universal Habsburg monarchy. Bavaria-Landshut is divided between the claimants. 1505 The German artist Michael Pacher completes the Altar of Saint Wolfgang. A huge and ornate altarpiece which brings together a host of carved and gilded figures and painted panels (not by Pacher), this work is typical of late Gothic art in Germany. 1505 The Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti) is commissioned to sculpt a vast tomb for Pope Julius II. He works on the project on and off for nearly 40 years. It is intended to have 28 individual figures. The centrepiece, the Moses of about 1513, is the outstanding achievement. 5 May 1506 Revoking the Treaty of Blois of 1504, King Louis XII of France breaks the engagement of his daughter Claude to Archduke Charles (the future Holy Roman Emperor Charles V), son of Philip ('the Handsome'), Duke of Burgundy. The Estates General (parliament) of France has declared that the duchies of Brittany and Burgundy and the county of Blois are inalienable. Claude is betrothed instead to Louis's cousin and heir presumptive, Francis of Angoulême, Duke of Valois, the future King Francis I. 21 May 1506 Christopher Columbus, Italian navigator and explorer, the first explorer of the New World to achieve long-term historical impact, dies in Valladolid, Spain (54). 25 September 1506 When King Philip I 'the Handsome' of Castile dies suddenly in Burgos, Spain, his widow, Joanna 'the Mad', is forced into a confinement (on the basis of her insanity) that is to last until her death in 1555. The Castilian aristocracy, still hostile to King Ferdinand II of Aragon, appoints Cardinal Ximénez as regent. 4 April 1507 The States-General (parliament) of the Netherlands appoints a regency council for the minority of Archduke Charles (the future Holy Roman Emperor Charles V). It is effectively headed by his aunt Margaret of Austria. 1507 German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller publishes his Cosmographia Introductio/Introduction to Cosmography, naming the new world 'America' after Amerigo Vespucci, the Florentine navigator who first argued the new lands were not part of the Indies. 1507 The west front of Troyes Cathedral, France, is completed. Designed by the French architect Chambiges, it is an example of the French late Gothic style 'flamboyant'. 6 February 1508 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I proclaims, in the cathedral of Trento (Trent) in northern Italy, that he will no longer seek coronation, but will adopt, with Pope Julius II's consent, the title 'Emperor Elect' (Latin imperator electus, German erwählter Kaiser).

1508 The mosque of Beyazit in Constantinople, Ottoman Empire, the city's earliest surviving imperial mosque, is completed. Its features include the earliest fully developed Ottoman minarets. 1 April 1509 The League of Cambrai (an alliance of Spain, France, and the Holy Roman Empire) declares war on Venice, intending to deprive the Venetian Republic of its territories on the Italian mainland. 14 May 1509 The French under King Louis XII defeat the Venetians at Agnadello. As a result, Pope Julius II annexes Faenza, Rimini, and Ravenna in the Romagna; King Ferdinand II of Aragon takes Otranto and Brindisi; and the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I annexes Verona, Vicenza, and Padua. 11 June 1509 King Henry VIII of England marries Catherine of Aragon, the daughter of King Ferdinand II of Aragon. 10 July 1509 John Calvin (French: Jean Calvin or Cauvin), leading French Protestant Reformer, whose doctrines are expressed in his Institutio Christianae religionis/Institutes of the Christian Religion, born in Noyon, Picardy, France (–1564). 12 October 1509 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, unable to take Padua from its populace, retreats from Italy for the Tirol. 1509 Dutch humanist Desiderius Erasmus makes his third and longest visit to England (staying until 1514) and lectures at Cambridge. Living much of the time with the English statesman and scholar Thomas More, he writes Encomium moriae/In Praise of Folly, which is published in 1511. 2 February 1510 In a diplomatic volte-face, Pope Julius II leaves the League of Cambrai and makes peace with Venice. He absolves Venice from excommunication and the Venetians restore his rights in their territory. 17 May 1510 Sandro Botticelli (original name Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi), Florentine painter of the early Renaissance, whose major works include The Birth of Venus (c. 1484) and Primavera/Spring (c. 1478), dies in Florence, Italy (c. 65). 7 July 1510 Pope Julius II secures King Ferdinand II of Aragon's alliance against France, whose aid Ferdinand no longer requires now that his position in Castile is secured. The Pope invests him with the crown of Naples. 1510 Spanish expeditions from the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, under Alonso de Ojeda and Diego de Nicuesa respectively, attempt to found colonies on the gulf of Uraba (Colombia) and the Panama isthmus, the first attempts at colonization of the South American mainland. 1510–1512 King John I of Denmark-Norway, allied with the county of Holland,

fights a war with and defeats the Hanseatic city of Lübeck, which has dominated Baltic trade for 350 years. By the Treaty of Malmö, navigation of the Sund is controlled from Copenhagen. 5 October 1511 Pope Julius II forms a 'Holy League' with Venice and King Ferdinand I of Aragon, on the pretext of preserving church unity, in reality to drive the French out of Italy. Ferdinand is to acquire the Spanish kingdom of Navarre, the Pope to recover the Italian cities of Bologna and Ferrara. 17 November 1511 King Henry VIII of England, having joined the Holy League of the papacy, Venice, and Spain against France on 13 November, augments it with an offensive alliance with Spain. 1511 Portuguese navigators, spreading through the Sunda Islands and the South China Sea after their recent conquest of Malacca in Malaysia, reach the Thai kingdom of Ayutthaya. 1511 The Dutch humanist Desiderius Erasmus publishes the prose satire Encomium moriae/In Praise of Folly in Paris, France. Written in Latin, it is translated into French and German in 1520, and English in 1549. 1511 The Italian artist Raphael paints The School of Philosophy, a fresco in the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican, Rome, Italy. 1511 The violin is in existence by this time – it is first mentioned in an inventory from Ferrara in Italy. 22 February 1512 Amerigo Vespucci, Italian-born Spanish explorer who participated in a number of voyages to the New World and after whom North and South America are named, dies in Seville, Spain (57). 11 April 1512 Este (Ferrarese) artillery and French cavalry under Gaston, comte de Foix, defeat the Spanish and papal forces of the anti-French Holy League in a bitter battle at Ravenna, Italy, but Gaston's death in battle mars French prospects in Italy. 28 April 1512 The Ottoman sultan Bayezid II acknowledges his hopeless position following his sons' revolts and abdicates in favour of the youngest, Selim, governor of Trebizond, who becomes Selim I. August 1512 The Congress of Mantua, held by the cities of the papal Holy League against France, restores the Italian duchy of Milan to Massimiliano Sforza and Florence to the Medici family. The papacy gains the duchies of Parma and Piacenza, and the Swiss acquire Lugano, Locarno, and Ossola. 1512 The Italian artist Raphael paints The Sistine Madonna. 20 January 1513 Christian II succeeds as king of Denmark and Norway on the

death of King John I. He continues his family's claim in Sweden, where Sten Sture the Younger, deposing the pro-Danish Erik Trolle with the aid of a peasant insurrection, achieves the regency held by his father Svante Sture. 9 March 1513 The Italian churchman Giovanni de' Medici is elected Pope Leo X, succeeding Pope Julius II, who died on 21 February. He is pope until 1521. 5 April 1513 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, King Henry VIII of England, King Ferdinand II of Spain, and Pope Leo X form an alliance (the second Holy Alliance) for a joint invasion of France, by the Treaty of Mechelin. The regent of the Netherlands, Anne of Austria, declares her territories neutral. 16 August 1513 King Henry VIII of England and the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I lead the English expeditionary force to rout a French army attempting to break their siege of the fortress city of Thérouanne on the River Scheldt, the Netherlands, in the so-called 'Battle of the Spurs'. 9 September 1513 King Henry VIII of England's northern army under Thomas Howard, Earl of Surrey, annihilates the invading Scottish army at the Battle of Flodden Field, near Branxton, Northumberland. Amongst the more than 10,000 dead is King James IV of Scotland; his infant son succeeds him as James V and the queen, Margaret Tudor, assumes the regency. 25 September 1513 The members of a Spanish expedition under Vasco Núñez Balboa, governor of Darién (the Panama isthmus), are the first Europeans to sight the Pacific Ocean; on reaching the western shore of present-day Panama, they claim it for Spain. 1513 Italian political writer Niccolò Machiavelli writes two of his best-known works: the play La mandragola/The Mandrake Root, a comedy; and Il Principe/ The Prince, a treatise on government, which is published in 1532. c. 1513 The Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti) sculpts Moses, intended as the centrepiece of the tomb of Pope Julius II. 11 April 1514 Donato Bramante, Italian chief architect of St Peter's in Rome, who introduced the High Renaissance style, dies in Rome, Italy (c. 70). May–October 1514 100,000 Hungarian peasants, gathered for a crusade, which is then cancelled by a fearful church, turn their assembly against increasing noble oppression when it is cancelled by a fearful church, and revolt under George Dózsa, the peasant leader, capturing many castles, and massacring their landlords. 10 August 1514 King Henry VIII of England and King Louis XII of France proclaim a peace between their two countries. 7 September 1514 The Ottoman sultan Selim I takes and enters Tabriz in Azerbaijan, the erstwhile capital of the Safavid Persian shah Ismail I.

1514 John Knox, Scottish religious reformer, leader of the Scottish Reformation, born near Haddington, Lothian, Scotland (–1572). 1514 The German artist Albrecht Dürer engraves Saint Jerome in his Study and Melancholia. He also draws Portrait of the Artist's Mother and paints his SelfPortrait (the Madrid self-portrait). c. 1514 The Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) paints Sacred and Profane Love. 6 January 1515 Charles, the Spanish Infante and archduke of Austria, heir to Spain and the Holy Roman Empire, comes of age and takes over from Margaret, Archduchess of Austria, as governor of the Netherlands. August 1515 King Francis I of France sets out for Italy, crossing the Alps with an army of 110,000, to recover the duchy of Milan. He rapidly defeats Milanese forces at Villafranca. Venice besieges the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I's stronghold of Verona. 13–14 September 1515 Having seized Novara, King Francis I of France's forces, decisively aided by the Venetians, defeat the Swiss armies at Marignano, south of Milan, and so conquer the duchy; the supremacy of the Swiss mercenary infantry is brought to an end. 7 November 1515 The Swiss Confederation makes peace with France by the Treaty of Geneva; the Swiss recognize King Francis I of France's right to the Italian duchy of Milan and in return are allowed to keep most of their southern conquests (equivalent to modern Ticino canton). 1515 The German artist Matthias Grünewald completes his painting of the Isenheim Altarpiece. 23 January 1516 Ferdinand the Catholic, king of Sicily (as Ferdinand II, 1468–1516), Aragon (as Ferdinand II, 1479–1516), Castile (as Ferdinand V and joint sovereign with his wife Isabella I 1474–1504), and Naples (as Ferdinand III, 1504–16), who united the Spanish kingdoms into one nation and began Spain's period of imperial expansion, dies (63). 23 January 1516 Following the death of King Ferdinand I of Aragon, his son (also grandson of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I), Archduke Charles of Austria (later the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V), succeeds as King Charles I of Spain, thereby founding the Habsburg dynasty in Spain. The regency council appoints Cardinal Jiménez de Cisnéros as regent. 18 February 1516 Mary I ('Bloody Mary'), first reigning queen of England 1553–58, daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, wife of Philip II of Spain, born in Greenwich, near London, England (–1558).

9 August 1516 Hieronymus Bosch (pseudonym of Jerome van Aeken), highly original Dutch painter, associated with complex and fantastic symbolism and allegory, whose major works include The Temptation of St Antony and The Garden of Earthly Delights, dies in 's-Hertogenbosch, Brabant, Netherlands (c. 66). 18 August 1516 Pope Leo X and the French king Francis I establish the Concordat of Bologna to resolve the long-standing conflict over the power of the church in France. The king of France is allowed to make ecclesiastical appointment, but the nominations have to be confirmed by the pope; and appeals to Rome from France are restricted. Francis also concedes that the pope is not subject to a general council of the church. 24 August 1516 Ottoman armies under Sultan Selim I rout the fractious army of the Mameluke sultan of Egypt, Kansu-al-Guari, at Marj Dabik near Aleppo, Syria, killing Kansu. The Ottomans go on to conquer Syria and Palestine before the end of the year. 13 December 1516 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I accedes to the Treaty of Noyon agreed in August between King Francis I of France and King Charles I of Spain, overturning an agreement with England reached in October in the Treaty of Brussels. He waives his claims in Italy for 200,000 ducats, handing over the city of Verona to Venice. 1516 English statesman and scholar Thomas More publishes Insula Utopiae/Island of Utopia (the original Latin text of his Utopia). The English translation appears in 1551. 1516 Italian poet Ludovico Ariosto publishes the romantic epic Orlando Furioso. A sequel to Boiardo's Orlando Innamorato of 1495, Orlando Furioso is one of the central works of Italian Renaissance literature. 23–30 January 1517 The Ottomans take the Egyptian city of Cairo from its Mameluke rulers after bitter battles culminating in four days of vicious street fighting. After a last stand in the citadel, the Mameluke sultan escapes to continue resistance to the south, but is later captured and executed (13 April). 8 September 1517–15 February 1518 The Chinese Ming dynasty emperor Zhengde leaves Beijing secretly to witness a military campaign on the frontier; this exceptional innovatory act is repeated, in spite of attempts by officials to confine him, until his death in 1521. November 1517 The German religious leader Martin Luther nails his '95 Theses' to the door of his church in Wittenberg, Germany. A challenge to debate, these theses contain a strong denunciation of the practice of selling indulgences (forgiveness for sins), which was being strongly promoted by the Dominican friar Johann Tetzel, who had just arrived in Germany.

c. 1517 The Italian artist Raphael (Sanzio) paints Pope Leo X with Cardinals Giulio de' Medici and Luigi de' Rossi. 1517–1518 The pro-Danish archbishop Gustav Trolle becomes head of the Swedish Riksråd and seeks to depose the regent, Sten Sture the Younger, in a civil war; the estates at Stockholm depose Trolle, who is subsequently imprisoned. After a papal interdict and two invasions have proved unsuccessful, King Christian II of Denmark-Norway and Sweden seek a new truce. 2 October 1518 In the Treaty of London drawn up by the English Lord Chancellor, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, King Henry VIII of England, King Francis I of France, King Charles I of Spain, the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, and Pope Leo X agree to join in a crusade against the Turks with all other European powers. 1518 Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) completes his painting The Assumption (Assunta), an altarpiece for the Church of Santa Maria dei Frari in Venice, Italy. 1518 Kasym Khan, the leader of an Uzbekh tribal federation, dies, having established Kazakh ('vagabond') rule over the steppe between the Ural and Altai mountains. 1518 The first known smallpox epidemic in the New World breaks out in the Caribbean islands. In the next hundred years, epidemics of smallpox, measles, and influenza kill over 90% of the indigenous American population. 16 February 1519 Gaspard II de Coligny, French admiral, and Huguenot leader during the early years of the Wars of Religion 1562–98, born in Châtillon-surLoing, France (–1572). 13 April 1519 Catherine de' Medici, Queen Consort of Henry II of France, regent of France 1560–74, mother of Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III of France, one of the most influential figures in the French Wars of Religion, born in Florence, Italy (–1589). 2 May 1519 Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter, sculptor, draughtsman, architect, engineer, and scientist, one of the most influential Renaissance humanists, who painted the Mona Lisa and The Last Supper, and whose science was ahead of its time, dies in Cloux, France (c. 67). 12 June 1519 Cosimo I the Great de' Medici, Duke of Florence 1537–74 and Grand Duke of Tuscany 1569–74, born in Florence, Italy (–1574). 24 June 1519 Lucretia Borgia, daughter of Pope Alexander VI and sister of Cesare Borgia, Italian noblewoman, and a central figure in the notorious Borgia family, dies in Ferrara (39). 26 June–16 July 1519 The German Catholic theologian Johann Eck debates grace, free will, the primacy of the pope, and the infallibility of the general

council, with the German church reformer Martin Luther and the more radical German reformer Andreas Carlstadt, in a public disputation at Leipzig, in the Electorate of Saxony. 28 June 1519 The Habsburg king Charles I of Spain is unanimously elected Holy Roman Emperor as Charles V in Frankfurt, having bought the electors with loans from the Fuggers of Augsburg. The electors are anyway antipathetic to the prospect of French rule, and the army of Habsburg allies, the Swabian League, is encamped close by. 8 November 1519 The Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés enters the vast Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán in the Valley of Mexico, at the head of his 500 Spanish forces and 1,000 Tlaxcalan allies, and is received by its ruler Montezuma II, who suspects him to be a reincarnation of the god Quetzalcoatl. 1519 The Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés sends the Mayan 'Dresden Codex' to Charles V of Spain – it demonstrates the elaborate Mayan calendar based on the movements of the planet Venus. 3 June 1520 Montezuma II (or Moctezuma), ninth Aztec emperor 1502–20, captured by Hernán Cortés, dies in Tenochtitlán (near modern Mexico City) (c. 54). 7–24 June 1520 King Henry VIII of England and King Francis I of France meet in ostentation at the 'Field of the Cloth of Gold' between Gravelines and Ardres in Picardy, near Calais, France, and sign the marriage contract for their children Mary Tudor and the dauphin Francis. 15 June 1520–3 January 1521 Pope Leo X excommunicates the German church reformer Martin Luther for heresy and dissent by the bulls Exsurge Domine/Rise Up, O Lord (which Luther burns at Wittenberg on 10 December) and Decet. 30 June 1520 The Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés returns, reinforced, to the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán in the Valley of Mexico to find the force he left behind under Pedro de Alvarado besieged by Aztecs under Cuitlahuoc, following Alvarez's murder of Cuitlahuoc's predecessor, the Aztec emperor Montezuma II. The Spaniards break in and out, losing a third of their army in 'the Bloody Night' as they escape the city. June 1520 The Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés, holding the huge Aztec capital city of Tenochtitlán in the Valley of Mexico with his small force, hears that Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, governor of Cuba, has sent 900 troops under Panfilo Narváez to Veracruz to depose him. He takes four-fifths of his Spanish troops back towards the coast and defeats Narváez, Cuban commander, persuading most of the newcomers to join him. 22 September 1520 Selim I, Ottoman sultan (1512–20), who extended the Ottoman Empire to Egypt, Syria, and the Hejaz, dies in Corlu, Ottoman Empire (c. 50).

21 October–28 November 1520 The Spanish expedition under the Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan negotiates the strait which now bears his name, between the South American continent and the island of Tierra del Fuego. Three ships reach the Pacific Ocean and continue northwest, the fourth having turned back. 1520 Nuremberg gunsmith August Kotter develops rifling for the barrels of firearms, cutting a spiral groove inside the barrel in order to spin the shot as it leaves the gun. 1520 The morality play Everyman, based on the Dutch morality play Elckerlijk of about 1495, appears in English. 1520 The Spanish explorer Hernán Cortés introduces chocolate, which had been used by the Aztecs in Central America, to the Spanish, who keep its existence secret for almost a century. January 1521 The county of Dalarnia, to which the Sture family of former Swedish rulers is native, revolts against the tyrannical regime of King Christian II and his pro-Danish governor Archbishop Gustav Trolle; the largely peasant army, led by Gustavus Vasa, captures the towns of Västerås and Uppsala by the end of winter. 26 March 1521 Emperor Charles V convenes the Diet (legislative assembly) of Worms. Both Pope Leo X and the emperor want to condemn the views of the German church reformer Martin Luther, but they allow him to present his case. Refusing to retract his antipapal views, Luther makes his famous remark: 'Here I stand. I can do no other' on 18 April. On 25 May Luther is condemned as the 'Devil incarnate' and his books are ordered to be destroyed. 27 April 1521 Ferdinand Magellan, the Portuguese navigator and explorer, dies in Mactan, Philippines, while leading a Spanish expedition across the Pacific Ocean (c. 41). He is killed in a skirmish on the island of Mactan while attempting to convert the Philippines to the allegiance of Spain and Christianity. His remaining two ships continue south to the Moluccas in the Malay Archipelago. 26 May 1521 The Edict of Worms outlaws the German church reformer Martin Luther by imposing on him the Ban of the (Holy Roman) Empire. He takes refuge with Frederick III, Elector of Saxony, in his castle of Wartburg. 13 August 1521 A Spanish force under the conquistador Hernán Cortés, aided by Tlaxcalan allies, completes its capture of the smouldering ruin of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán, in the Valley of Mexico, after an eight-week siege and bitter street fighting. The surrender of the Aztec ruler Cuauhtemoc hands Mexico to Spain. 1 December 1521 Pope Leo X (Giovanni de' Medici), pope 1513–21, noted for his political skill and personal extravagance, dies in Rome, Italy (56).

1521 Italian artist Pontormo (Jacopo Carucci) paints frescoes depicting mythological scenes in the Medici Villa in Poggio a Caiano in Italy. He also paints Deposition from the Cross. 1521 Italian political writer Niccolò Machiavelli publishes Dell'arte della guerra/ On the Art of War. It is translated into English in 1560 as Seven Books on the Art of War. 1521 The German artist Lucas Cranach paints Luther as Junker Jög, the first of his long series of portraits of the German religious reformer Martin Luther. 9 January 1522 Following the death of Pope Leo X on 1 December, Bishop Adrian of Utrecht, Regent of Spain, is elected Pope Adrian VI. He is the last non-Italian pope until 1978. 30 January 1522 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V cedes to his brother, Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, the Tirol, Württemberg, and the Habsburg possessions in southwest Germany, and confirms his grant of Austria of April 1521 by the Convention of Brussels. January 1522 Lübeck, the most powerful of the Hanseatic cities, allies with and funds the Swedish leader Gustavus Vasa, declaring war on King Christian II of Sweden, Denmark, and Norway and laying waste to the Danish island of Bornholm. 21 December 1522 The Order of the Knights of St John of the Hospital surrender their fortress of Rhodes to Ottoman forces under Sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent; they leave the island, accepting generous terms of capitulation after a bitter six-month siege. 1522 The Complutensian Polyglot, a multilingual edition of the Bible, is published in Spain, written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin. The project lasted from 1502 to 1517 and was edited and financed by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez (Ximénez) de Cisnéros. 1522 The German artist Hans Holbein paints The Dead Christ. 1522 The German illustrator Albrecht Dürer designs a flying machine. March 1523 Insurgent Danish nobles depose King Christian II at an assembly in Viborg, Denmark, crowning his uncle, Frederick of Schleswig-Holstein, as King Frederick I of Denmark and Norway. Christian flees to Norway and thence to exile. 1523 The Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) paints Bacchus and Ariadne. 1523 The Italian churchman Giulio de' Medici is elected Pope Clement VII. He is pope until 1534.

January 1524 The Diet (legislative assembly) of Nuremberg opens and the papal legate Lorenzo Campeggio orders the enforcement of the repressive Edict of Worms (of May 1521) banning the German church reformer Martin Luther and condemning his teachings. In response, the Lutherans, led by Frederick III, Elector of Saxony, demand that a national synod should meet to discuss church reform at Speyer in the Rhineland Palatinate in November. Frederick's cousin, Duke George, leads an attack by the imperial cities on the financial burden of the Reichsregiment (the imperial governing council) that leads to its abandonment. March–September 1524 The diet of the Baltic Estates subject to the Teutonic Knightly Orders swears to defend the 'Word of God without any additions' to the death, effectively adopting the Reformation. Iconoclastic riots take place in the cities of Riga and Reval (present-day Tallinn, Estonia). May 1524 Selim II, Ottoman sultan (1566–74), who brought peace to Europe and Asia, but during whose reign the power of the sultans began to diminish, born (–1574). June 1524 The Bauernkrieg ('Peasants' War'), the most extensive and revolutionary of European insurrections to date, begins in the Hegau at Stühlingen, against the landgrave's despotic demands that his peasants ignore the hay harvest to collect snail shells. 1524 King Frederick I of Denmark and Norway confirms the independence of Sweden under King Gustavus I Vasa in the Treaty of Malmö, mediated by the Hanseatic city of Lübeck, thus ending the Union of Kalmar (Denmark-Norway and Sweden, united in 1397). 1524 Lutheranism is adopted during the year across the Holy Roman Empire by the rulers of Sagan in Silesia, Pomerania, Brandenburg-Kulmbach, BrunswickLüneburg, Schleswig, and Holstein. 1524 The Swiss Protestant reformer Ulrich Zwingli establishes control over Zürich, and his colleagues Matthew Zell and Martin Bucer (the imperial knight Franz von Sickingen's former chaplain) establish control over Strassburg. c. 1524 Luís Vaz de Camões, national poet of Portugal, whose best-known work is Os lusíadas/The Lusiads (1572), born in Lisbon (–1580). 24 February 1525 King Francis I of France's cavalry leads a rash attack on a large Habsburg relief force under Charles, duc de Bourbon, and Fernando, Marchese di Pescara, at the Milanese posession of Pavia, Italy; Francis is captured and around 14,000 are killed (including the Yorkist claimant to the duchy of Suffolk and the English crown, Richard de la Pole). The Habsburgs now dominate Italy until 1860. 4 April 1525 Even as it spreads to Alsace and northern Swiss subject territories,

the German Bauernkrieg ('Peasants' War') revolution experiences its first defeat, by the army of the Swabian League (Habsburg allies) under the Truchesse von Waldburg, at Leipheim, on the River Danube. 10 April 1525 Albert von Hohenzollern, Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights (a German military Christian order), converts the Prussian lands of his order into the Lutheran duchy of Prussia, of which he will be duke as a vassal of King Sigismund I of Poland. 15–27 May 1525 The Thuringian and Saxon peasant armies, the most radical of the Bauernkrieg ('Peasants' War'), led by Thomas Münzer, are routed and massacred by a coalition of nobles under Philip, Margrave of Hesse, Duke George, and John, Elector of Saxony, at Frankenhausen, Thuringia; Münzer is executed, after Mülhausen falls, on 27 May. May–July 1525 The revolution of the German Bauernkrieg ('Peasants' War') is defeated by the mobilization of the noble classes at Würzburg and Königshofen in Franconia, at Zabern in Alsace, at Böblingen on the River Neckar, and at Wurzach and Sulzdorf in Swabia; all resistance drowns in blood. c. 1525 Pieter Breughel the Elder, foremost Flemish painter of the 16th century, noted for landscapes and genre scenes, whose works include The Tower of Babel (1563) and The Seasons (1565), born, probably in Breda, Brabant, Netherlands (–1569). 1525–1527 An epidemic, probably smallpox or measles, decimates the Inca Empire. It is spread via Chiriguano raiders of the Chaco from the Spanish on the Rio de la Plata. Among the dead is the Inca ruler, Huayna Capac, whose failure to nominate a successor leads to civil war. 14 January 1526 King Francis I of France is forced by his captor, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, to sign the Treaty of Madrid; he promises to surrender the duchy of Burgundy and his claims to Naples, Milan, Asti, Genoa, Flanders, and Artois, and to aid neither Henri d'Albret, claimant to the throne of Navarre, nor the rebel Charles of Egmont, Duke of Guelders. He also pledges to return the sequestered lands to Charles, duc de Bourbon. March 1526 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, King Charles I of Spain, completes the double marriage alliance that will unite the Iberian crowns under his son Philip by marrying Isabella, sister of King John III of Portugal. 23 May 1526 Pope Clement VII forms the Holy League of Cognac against the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V with Venice, Florence, and France; Duke Francesco Sforza II of Milan joins later, while King Henry VIII of England allows himself to be named 'Protector'. The League aims to restore the autonomy of the Italian states and to reverse the Treaty of Madrid of 14 January. July 1526 In the last actions of the Bauernkrieg ('Peasants' War'), which has spread from the archbishopric of Salzburg to the Habsburg lands of Carinthia,

Tirol, and Austria, the revolution is defeated at Schladming and brutally suppressed. 29 August 1526 King Louis II of Hungary leads many of the Magyar nobility in a headlong rush to destruction by the vastly superior strength of the invading Ottoman army, led by Sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent, at Mohács, Hungary; after Louis's death by drowning in the rout, Hungary loses its independence until 1918. August 1526 The Diet (legislative assembly) of Speyer, in a Germany threatened with religious war by the rival leagues of Dessau (Catholic) and Torgau (Protestant), reaches a compromise: every polity shall act 'as he hoped would enable him to justify himself in the eyes of God and the Emperor' with respect to the 1521 Edict of Worms (which banned the German church reformer Martin Luther and condemned his teachings). The diet also imposes form of censorship in the German states. 1526 The German artist Hans Holbein completes his woodcut illustrations of The Dance of Death. 6–14 May 1527 Unpaid and mutinous Habsburg Spanish and (often Protestant) Landsknecht (mercenary knight) troops, under Charles, duc de Bourbon, and Georg von Frunsberg, assault and sack Rome, Italy. Bourbon dies in the assault, and Pope Clement VII takes refuge in the Castel Sant' Angelo. 21 May 1527 Philip II, King of Spain 1556–98, and King of Portugal 1580–98, who brought Spain to the zenith of its power, born in Valladolid, Spain (–1598). 31 May 1527 After secret discussions with his Lord Chancellor Cardinal Thomas Wolsey on 17 May, King Henry VIII of England informs his wife, Catherine of Aragon, that he is seeking a divorce on the grounds that she was his brother's widow; Henry has no surviving legitimate son and Catherine is now 41 years old. 21 June 1527 Niccolò Machiavelli, Italian statesman, writer, and political theorist whose best-known work is Il principe/The Prince (1513), dies in Florence, Italy (58). 24 June 1527 At the Swedish Diet (legislative assembly) of Västerås, King Gustavus I Vasa, hard-pressed by a peasants' revolt in Dalarnia and the financial demands of the city of Lübeck, forces through a reformation of the Swedish church; its privileges are abolished, the existing structure is retained, and it is formally placed under royal control. Toleration is granted to anyone preaching the 'Word of God'. 1527 The French music publisher Jaques Attaignant publishes the first of his Chansons nouvelles/New Songs in Paris, France. Because of changes to musical notation, the scores can be published at one printing, which means that printed music becomes much cheaper.

January 1528 The Afghan Mogul leader Babur leads the storm of Chanderi, the last important centre of Rajput resistance to his rule in India; he then turns towards Bengal. 6 April 1528 Albrecht Dürer, considered to be the greatest German painter and printmaker of the Renaissance, dies in Nuremberg, Germany (56). June 1528 The economic crisis and distress in England, caused by war with the Habsburgs, leads to incipient rebellion, riots in Kent, and a general refusal to fight; the Lord Chancellor, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, is obliged to make a truce with Margaret of Austria, Duchess of Savoy, Habsburg regent of the Netherlands. 1528 Continuing its campaigns against the Habsburgs and the county of Holland, the marauding army of Charles of Egmont, Duke of Guelders, under 'Black' Maarten van Roosem, sacks The Hague. 1528 Italian writer Baldassare Castiglione publishes Il libro del cortegiano/The Book of the Courtier. Setting out the accomplishments of the ideal Renaissance courtier, it has a profound effect on manners throughout Europe. An English translation, by Thomas Moby, is published in 1561. 1528 The development of the Palace of Fontainebleau begins in France. In both its structure and its lavish decoration, the palace becomes the centrepiece of King Francis I of France's artistic programme, which is to import Italian Renaissance styles. 1528 The Inquisition claims its first victims in the New World when two Jews (one of them a companion of the conquistador Hernán Cortés) are burnt at the stake in Mexico. 1528 The Songhai ruler Muhammad I Askia is deposed by his eldest son Askia Musa after the assassination of his general, Yaya; he lives another 11 years to, see his empire wracked by the succession wars of his sons. 19 April 1529 Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria coerces another Diet (legislative assembly) of Speyer into voting to enforce the 1521 Edict of Worms, revoking the Speyer concessions of 1526; the minority – John, Elector of Saxony, George, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach, Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, the princes of Brunswick-Lüneburg and Anhalt, and Nuremberg, Strassburg, and 12 other imperial cities – read their 'Protest' against this, giving rise to the term 'Protestant'. 22 April 1529 Against the opposition of the Spanish Cortes (parliament), the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, who is also King Charles I of Spain, signs the Treaty of Zaragoza with King John III of Portugal, dividing the Pacific into respective spheres of influence; for 350,000 ducats Spain is to leave the Moluccas and any territories up to 15 degrees east of them. April 1529 The Swiss Catholic cantons of Schwyz, Unterwald, Luzern, Zug, and

Uri form a Christian Union, allying themselves with the traditional enemy, Habsburg Austria, in opposition to the Protestant Civic League formed by Zürich and the cantons of Bern, Basel, Biel, Mulhouse, Schaffhausen, Sankt Gall, and Constance. 26 June 1529 The first Peace of Kappel ends desultory hostilities in the Swiss Confederation between the Catholic cantons of the Christian Union and those of the Protestant Civic League, led by the Zürich of Ulrich Zwingli. The Union agrees to break its alliance with Habsburg Austria, and both sides agree to freedom of conscience in the common subject areas. 29 June 1529 Pope Clement VII submits to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V in the Treaty of Barcelona, by which he agrees to crown Charles V and invest him with the kingdom of Naples, and to recognize his brother Ferdinand as king of Hungary and Bohemia, and accepts that the Habsburgs will receive the Italian duchy of Milan after the death of Duke Francesco II Sforza. In return, the Pope's family, the Medici, are to be restored in Florence, taking the title of duke, and the Pope is to regain the allegiance of the papal towns of Italy. 3 August 1529 Louise of Savoy, mother of King Francis I of France, and Margaret of Austria, Duchess of Savoy, aunt of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, finalize the Treaty of Cambrai, 'The Ladies' Peace'. Francis surrenders all his claims in Italy, suzerainty over Flanders and Artois, and possession of Tournai, and undertakes to marry Eleanor of Portugal, widow of King Manuel I and sister of the emperor Charles; Charles renounces his claim to the duchy of Burgundy, and recognizes Valois acquisitions of the lands of Charles, duc de Bourbon, and the principality of Orange in Provence and Savoy. Francis ransoms his sons from Spain for 2 million crowns. 27 August 1529 King Henry VIII of England accedes to the Treaty of Cambrai of 3 August, making peace with the Habsburgs and recognizing the failure of the foreign policy of his Lord Chancellor, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey. 27 September 1529 The Ottoman army under Sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent besieges Vienna, the capital of the Habsburg archduke Ferdinand I of Austria; the march through flooded Hungary has taken over two months, allowing Ferdinand to rally veteran forces into the garrison. 14 October 1529 The Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent is forced by stiff resistance and the onset of autumn to raise the siege of Vienna, capital of Austria; he retreats with heavy losses. Despite this, his ally and Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria's rival for the Hungarian crown, Janos Zápolya, remains in possession of the Hungarian capital Buda (now Budapest) and most of the country. 1529 The German artist Albrecht Altdorfer paints The Battle of Alexander (The Battle of Issus). 25 June 1530 At the Diet (legislative assembly) of Augsburg, Philip Melanchthon, who pleads the Protestant case while the German church reformer Martin Luther

is under the Imperial Ban, presents the 'Confession of Augsburg' (a statement of the Protestant faith), agreed by seven princes and two imperial cities, to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. The conciliatory tone and content of this statement enrages the Zwinglians and annoys Luther. 25 August 1530 Ivan IV ('Ivan the Terrible'), Grand Prince of Moscow (1533–84), Tsar of Russia (1547–84), who waged war with Sweden and Livonia, and who is noted for executing at least 3,000 noblemen and boyars, born in Kolomenskoye, near Moscow, Russia (–1584). 29 November 1530 Thomas Wolsey (Cardinal Wolsey), English statesman who dominated King Henry VIII's government (1515–29), dies of a bowel disorder in Leicester, England, while under arrest as a traitor for his secret correspondence with Pope Clement VII (55). 26 December 1530 Babur (original name Zahir-ud-Din Mohammad), emperor of India 1526–30, founder of the Mogul dynasty, descendant of Genghis Khan and of Timur Leng (Tamerlane), dies in Agra, India (47). 1530 A manual of dentistry is published at Leipzig, Germany – the first methodical approach to the subject. 1530 The façade of the University of Salamanca, Spain, is completed. It is one of the finest examples of the Plateresque style, the decoration rich and finely worked. 26 January 1531 An earthquake destroys the Portuguese capital of Lisbon, killing 50,000 people. The superstitious associate the disaster with the appearance of a 'Great Comet' in the sky. 27 February 1531 Protestant polities of Germany form the Schmalkaldic League, with a common army and treasury, to defend themselves against the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his Catholic allies. The members are John, Elector of Saxony, Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, Prince Wolfgang of Anhalt, the two counts Mansfeld, four dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg, and the cities of Strassburg, Ulm, Constance, Reutlingen, Memmingen, Lindau, Biberach, Isny, Lübeck, Magdeburg, and Bremen. 11 October 1531 The Swiss Catholic Christian Union armies defeat those of the canton of Zürich, under Jörg Göldli at Kappel, killing the Protestant pastor and theologian Ulrich Zwingli in battle. 23 November 1531 The Peace of Kappel ends the war in the Swiss Confederation between the Catholic Christian Union and Protestant Civic League cantons; each canton and territory gains the right to worship as they choose, recognizing that the Confederation will be divided between Protestant and Catholic cantons. 1531 A rediscovered text by the classical Greek physician Galen, On Anatomical Procedures, is published for the first time.

1531 The Beurs opens in Antwerp in the Netherlands; it becomes the model for all subsequent stock exchanges and symbolizes the new commercial significance of the city as the chief trading centre of the Habsburg realms. 1531 The Italian humanist Andrea Alciati publishes Emblemata. A collection of images with explanations of their symbolism, the book has a profound effect on iconography of 16th- and 17th-century art. 23 July 1532 The need for unity in the face of the Ottoman invasion, approaching the Austrian capital of Vienna, forces the Habsburgs to agree secretly the Peace of Nuremberg with the German Protestants; the Edict of Augsburg outlawing them is revoked and toleration is agreed until a general council meets. 7–28 August 1532 The Ottoman invasion of Hungary under Sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent stalls before the town of Günns (Burgenland); the stubborn resistance of a small garrison so delays the Ottoman Turks that the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V can reinforce the Austrian capital of Vienna in person, and autumn approaches. The Turks retreat, devastating Carinthia and Croatia (September). 1532 Il Principe/The Prince by the Italian political writer Niccolò Machiavelli is published posthumously. Written in 1513, it analyses the ways in which political power is obtained and exercised, and provides an objective account of Renaissance politics. 1532 French writer François Rabelais publishes the first book of his Pantagruel series, a satire which includes a discussion of the merits of an educational curriculum based on the study of the sciences. Four books are attributed to Rabelais, with a doubtful fifth published in 1553 after his death. c. 1532 Italian artist Giulio Romano (Pippi) completes his frescoes in the Palazzo del Tè in Mantua, Italy. Those in the Sala dei Giganti (Room of the Giants) are among the best known. Romano also designed the building. 25 January 1533 King Henry VIII of England secretly marries his mistress Anne Boleyn; his divorce from Catherine of Aragon is still pending. 28 February 1533 Michel de Montaigne, French writer, creator of the essay as a literary genre, born in Château de Montaigne, near Bordeaux, France (–1592). 10 April 1533 King Frederick I of Denmark-Norway dies, precipitating a religious and succession crisis that leads to a three-year civil war, 'the Count's War'. The Danish diet, dominated by Catholic bishops and nobles, refuses to accept his Lutheran son Christian, stadtholder (provincial governor) of Schleswig-Holstein, as king, favouring his other (infant) son Hans.

22 June 1533 Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria and the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent conclude an interim peace in Hungary; the division of the country is to reflect the status quo, with Ferdinand taking the area west of the River Danube and the Ottoman ally and rival claimant to the throne, Janos Zápolya, having the rest; both are to pay tribute to Suleiman, who also vetoes future arrangements about Hungary. The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V is excluded from the treaty, and continues his war against the Ottoman Turks in the Mediterranean. 11 July 1533 Pope Clement VII excommunicates King Henry VIII of England for bigamy. Publication of the papal bull is deferred until October; on reading it, Henry appeals to the projected general council. 26 July 1533 The Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro executes his prisoner of eight months, Atahualpa, the Inca emperor, at Cajamarca (in modern Ecuador), despite having accepted a large ransom for his release. He then arranges to have the emperor's treacherous brother Tupac Hualpa crowned emperor, in the mistaken hope of retaining the support of Atahualpa's followers. 7 September 1533 Queen Elizabeth I, Queen of England 1558–1603, daughter of Henry VIII, whose reign saw growth in England's political and economic power, as well as major achievements in the arts, born in Greenwich, near London, England (–1603). October 1533 Henry, Duke of Orléans, second son of King Francis I of France, marries Catherine de' Medici, daughter of Duke Lorenzo II de' Medici of Urbino, and cousin of Pope Clement VII. November 1533 The Catholic League of Halle, led by Joachim I, Elector of Brandenburg, and George, Duke of Saxony, is formed in opposition to the Protestant Schmalkaldic League. Germany is split into two armed camps. 4 December 1533 Ivan IV ('the Terrible'), aged three, succeeds as Grand Prince of Moscow on the death of his father Vassily III. His mother, Yelena Glinskaya, becomes regent, assisted by her lover, Prince Obolensky-Telepniev. 1533 The German artist Hans Holbein paints The Ambassadors. 1533–1545 Nguyen Kim restores the south of Dai Viet to the Le dynasty, governing from Hue. The usurping Mac family remains in control of the north from Hanoi. 2 February 1534 The Act of Supremacy, which establishes King Henry VIII of England as the supreme head of the Church of England, completes the breach with Rome and marks the beginning of the English Reformation. 8 February–3 March 1534 Jan Matthijszoon and Jan Boekelszoon (John of Leiden) from Holland lead a tempestuous Anabaptist revolution in the German city of Münster, winning council elections on 23 February, despoiling churches,

and, from 27 February, expelling Lutherans and Catholics to incorporate Dutch Anabaptist refugees. 3 May 1534 The Inca general of the Quitan forces, Quisquis, narrowly loses the battle of Teocajas to the Spanish force under Sebastián de Belalcázar, which goes on to occupy the city before the end of June, though Inca resistance continues in the area now known as Ecuador until December. 12 May 1534 Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, leads the German Protestant Schmalkaldic League, aided by Bavaria, in defeating the army of Ferdinand I, Archduke of Austria, at Lauffen to restore the Protestant convert Ulrich as Duke of Württemberg. 3 November–18 December 1534 The seventh session of the English 'Reformation Parliament' passes the Act of Supremacy which confirms King Henry VIII as supreme head of the Church of England, making England a sovereign state in which the king is superior to all ecclesiastical and secular authorities. A second Act of Succession makes the oath of loyalty statutory, given to all successive rulers of England. Other acts grant the crown a tenth of church income and extend treason to cover defamation of the king; the former Lord Chancellor Thomas More, Bishop John Fisher of Rochester, and the Earl of Kildare are attainted. 1534 Oda Nobunaga, Japanese noble who overthrew the Ashikaga shogunate, ended feudal wars, and unified more than half of Japan, born in Owari Province, Japan (–1582). 1534 The German religious reformer Martin Luther publishes his German translation of the Bible. It has a profound influence on the development of the German language and German literature. 1534 The Italian churchman Alessandro Farnese is elected Pope Paul III. He is pope until 1549. 1534 The Laurentian Library in San Lorenzo, Florence, Italy, designed by the Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti), is completed. Work began in 1524, and the staircase, the major feature of the design, is not completed until 1559. The library is built to house the books and manuscripts of the Medici family. The Medici Chapel in the Church of San Lorenzo in Florence, Italy, is also completed to Michelangelo's design. The work includes two tombs. On the first, the figure of Giuliano de' Medici is flanked by figures representing Day and Night. On the second, Lorenzo de' Medici is flanked by Dawn and Evening. 1534 The Palazzo del Tè in Mantua, Italy, is completed to a design by the Italian artist Giulio Romano (Pippi). The design is a landmark in the development of mannerism (a 16th-century style based on the deliberate exaggeration of classical principles). Romano also painted the palace's frescoes. 24 June 1535 The coalition of nobles besieging Münster, aided by information

from deserters, assaults the city and ends Anabaptist resistance in a night of carnage. The mutilated body of the revolutionary Anabaptist leader Jan Boekelszoon (John of Leiden) hangs from the cathedral spire, after his execution by the restored bishop Franz von Waldeck in 1536, until 1848. 6 July 1535 Thomas More, English humanist and statesman, Lord Chancellor of England 1529–32, is beheaded in London, England, for treasonably refusing to take the oath of loyalty required by King Henry VIII (58). July 1535 The imperial expedition led by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his Genoese admiral Andrea Doria captures the north African city of Tunis; its Ottoman conqueror, the corsair Khair ad-Din ('Barbarossa'), flees to Algiers, and the bey (governor), Mulai Hassan, is restored, protected by a Spanish garrison at La Goletta. 24 August 1535–23 June 1537 The Spanish conquistador Pedro de Mendoza leads an expedition, commissioned by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, to La Plata (modern Argentina/Uruguay/Paraguay) in search of more Inca wealth. He founds temporary settlements on the sites of Buenos Aires, and then Asunción, but dies a failure on the return voyage (23 June 1537). 1535 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V establishes the honest and efficient Spanish statesman Antonio de Mendoza as the first viceroy of New Spain (Mexico) and the audiencia (council of state) of Panama. 1535–1545 After the failure of the revolution in Münster and the risings elsewhere, about 30,000 Anabaptists are executed in the Netherlands alone; the remainder follow the new pacifist Dutch prophet Menno Simons and cease to be a political force. February 1536 France and the Ottoman Empire sign an alliance against the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V; King Francis I of France gains important trade concessions in Ottoman territories. February–April 1536 French forces under Phillipe de Chabot, Admiral de Brion, invade Piedmont, Italy, taking Savoy, and, in April, Turin; they seek to gain the Italian duchy of Milan for the royal House of Valois, in the person of King Francis I of France's son, Henry, Duke of Orléans. 11 March 1536 King Henry VIII of England presents a bill to Parliament for the dissolution of the 376 monasteries worth less than £200 per annum; the land thus gained is worth £32,000. The Court of Augmentations is established to administer former monastic property, superseding the Exchequer. 19 May 1536 When Anne Boleyn, the second wife of King Henry VIII of England, is beheaded, having been found guilty of adultery and incest, Thomas Cranmer, the archbishop of Canterbury, declares her marriage invalid. Her brother Lord Rochford and other alleged lovers are also executed.

30 May 1536 King Henry VIII of England marries Jane Seymour, the daughter of a knight, a member of the lesser nobility. 12 July 1536 Desiderius Erasmus, Dutch humanist, considered the greatest scholar of the northern European Renaissance, dies in Basel, Swiss Confederation (66). 25 July 1536 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V leads an imperial invasion of Provence, countering the French conquest of Piedmont. The French under Anne de Montmorency, 1st Duc, retreat but stall Charles's advance, devastating the land by 'scorched earth' tactics. Charles besieges the Provençal port of Marseille. 28 July 1536 Count Christopher von Oldenburg, the mercenary general of Lübeck, surrenders Copenhagen to the forces of the Lutheran Christian III after a long siege; this ends the Danish civil war known as the 'Count's War'. 1536 French religious reformer John Calvin publishes his Institutio Christianae religionis/Institutes of the Christian Religion in Basel, Swiss Confederation. It establishes his pre-eminence among reformers throughout Europe. The definitive edition appears in 1559. 1536 Hampton Court Palace, near London, England, is completed. Commissioned by Cardinal Wolsey, but later confiscated by Henry VIII as a royal residence, it is one of the finest Tudor palaces. 1536 The Swiss physician Paracelsus (Theophrastus von Hohenheim) produces Die grosse Wundartzney/Great Surgery Book, a landmark break with Galenic medicine. 1536 Toyotomi Hideyoshi (original name Hiyo-Shimaru, also known as Hashiba Chikuzen no kami), Japanese military leader, feudal lord, and chief imperial minister 1585–98 who completed the unification of Japan, born in Owari Province, Japan (–1598). 7 January 1537 The tyrannical Alessandro de' Medici, Duke of Florence, is assassinated by a distant relative; his cousin Cosimo I the Great de' Medici succeeds him when the city fails to take the opportunity to rebel against Medici rule. March 1537–March 1540 The dissolution of the greater monasteries of England and Wales proceeds through inducement, coercion, and the trial and execution of abbots, directed by King Henry VIII's minister Thomas Cromwell. 18 April 1537 The Spanish expedition of Diego de Almagro, returning from the area of modern Chile, relieves Cuzco from its siege by the Quechua insurgents of the Inca leader Manco Inca, but then seizes the city from Hernando Pizarro, starting the civil wars between the conquistadors.

12 October 1537 Jane Seymour, the third wife of King Henry VIII of England, gives birth to Prince Edward, but dies 12 days later. 2 December 1537 An invasion army loyal to Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, including German and Bohemian troops as well as Styrian, Carinthian, and Carniolan levies, is utterly defeated by Ottoman frontier forces at Valpó. 1537 The Flemish cartographers Gemma Frisius and Gerardus Mercator collaborate to produce a celestial globe, complementary to their terrestrial globe of the previous year. 24 February 1538 Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria signs the Peace of Nagyvárad with Janos Zápolya, Voivode of Transylvania, ending their war for Hungary. Though they divide the country with the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent along the lines of the status quo, the whole is to revert to Ferdinand on the death of the currently childless Zápolya. 28 April 1538 The Spanish conquistador Hernando Pizarro, half-brother of Francisco Pizarro, leads his forces to victory over the rival faction of Diego de Almagro, capturing their leader, at Las Salinas; Almagro is subsequently executed in Cuzco (8 July). 18 June 1538 King Francis I of France and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V sign the ten-year Truce of Nice; they retain their conquests in Piedmont, Italy, the Duke of Savoy losing all his territories except Nice, France; Francis recovers Hesdin and gains Mirandola in the Romagna; the Swiss Confederation retains the canton of the Vaud. 4 September–6 November 1538 An Ottoman Egyptian fleet under Suleiman Pasha arrives to aid the Gujaratis in their blockade of the Portuguese-held fortress of Diu, northwest India; the Muslim admirals quarrel and the Egyptians return to Yemen, enabling the Portuguese to hold out. 10 September 1538 The principal Catholic German princes, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, his brother Ferdinand I, Archduke of Austria and king of the Romans and Bohemia, George, Duke of Saxony, the dukes of Brunswick, and the archbishops of Mainz and Salzburg, form the League of Nuremberg, to counter the Protestant Schmalkaldic League. Joachim II, the tolerant elector of Brandenburg, stays out. 1538 The Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) paints Venus of Urbino. 17 April 1539 Henry, a German Lutheran, becomes Duke of Saxony on the death of his brother George, a Catholic; all of northern Germany except Brunswick has now become Protestant. 1539 Nanak, Indian religious leader, first Guru of the Sikhs, dies in Kartarpur, Punjab (70).

6 January–9 July 1540 King Henry VIII of England marries Anne of Cleves, his minister Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex's German diplomatic trophy, but is repelled by her; he favours his new mistress, Catherine Howard. Cromwell falls from power. May 1540 Sher Khan, the rebel Mogul governor of Punjab, who has conquered the Indian kingdom of Bihar in his own right and now rules Delhi, again defeats the Mogul ruler Humayun at Kannauj; Humayun is forced to retreat via Lahore and Rajputana to Sind (modern Pakistan). 23 July 1540 Janos Zápolya, Voivode (governor) of Transylvania dies; his infant son John Sigismund is acclaimed king of Hungary. Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria invades on the basis that the 1538 Peace of Nagyvárad stated that he should succeed to the throne of Hungary. His siege of the capital Buda (modern Budapest) in turn provokes the intervention of the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent. 28 July 1540 King Henry VIII of England marries his young mistress, Catherine Howard, while his minister Thomas Cromwell, earl of Essex, is being executed elsewhere for having arranged his previous (fourth) marriage, to Anne of Cleves. The Lord Treasurer, Thomas Howard, duke of Norfolk, who is Catherine's uncle, becomes his principal minister. 27 September 1540 Pope Paul III approves the formation and regulation of the Jesuit Order (The Society of Jesus), as militant Catholic preachers under the Spaniard Ignatius Loyola, by the papal bull Regimini militantis ecclesiae/On the Governance of the Church Militant. 2 October 1540 Venice signs a peace treaty with the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent in Constantinople; it surrenders its last fortresses in the Morea (Peloponnese), Napoli, and Monemvasia, and acknowledges the Ottoman conquests in the Cyclades. 1540 The Flemish anatomist Andreas Vesalius performs dissections on human cadavers at the University of Bologna. His discoveries contradict the writings of the ancient Greek physician Galen, until now the highest authority. 1540 The Oromo people of the Horn of Africa begin to advance northwards in a series of eight-yearly campaigns (based on the emergence of new generations of warriors) into the Ethiopian highlands, wresting control from the Ethiopians; they also become the world's major producers of coffee as it gains a steadily wider market. c. 1540 The potato is introduced into Europe from the Spanish colonies in South America. Sir Francis Drake introduced potatoes to England a second time in 1586; the first time they didn't take. 28 January 1541 Sir Francis Drake, most famous English admiral of the Elizabethan Age, circumnavigator of the globe, born in Devonshire, England

(–1596). 26 August 1541 The Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent, having invaded Hungary to prevent a Habsburg conquest through Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria's claim to that kingdom, takes the capital Buda (now Budapest) and annexes Hungary. September 1541 French-born Protestant reformer John Calvin is invited back to Geneva from Strassburg, Germany. This marks the beginning of his pre-eminence there. By issuing his Ecclesiastical Ordinances, which sets out the role of the church in the governing of the city, he lays the foundation for a theocratic state. 1541 An English act of Parliament is passed for the maintenance of archery and the debarring of unlawful games, such as slide thrift. King Henry VIII indulges in many of these 'unlawful games' himself, but he is also keen to promote archery in England, and has a reputation as a fine archer. 1541 El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopoulos), celebrated Greco-Spanish painter, whose major works include View of Toledo (c. 1610) and The Adoration of the Shepherds (1612–14), born in Candia, now Iráklion, Crete (–1614). 1541 Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti) completes his fresco The Last Judgement, painted on the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, Italy. He began work in 1536. 1541 Italian humanist Giambattista Cinzio Giraldi writes Orbeche, the first Italian tragedy based on classical models to be performed in Renaissance Italy. 13 February 1542 King Henry VIII of England has Catherine Howard, his fifth wife, beheaded in the Tower of London for adultery. 21 May 1542 After the death of Hernando de Soto, leader of the Spanish expedition to southeastern North America, the remnants of his expedition return to New Spain (Mexico) by raft the following year. With the failure of Francisco Vázquez de Coronado's western expedition, this deters the Spanish from further exploration north of the Caribbean. July 1542 King Francis I of France signs a treaty of alliance with King Gustavus I Vasa of Sweden against the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his advancement of Dorothea, daughter of the former king Christian II, towards the Scandinavian crowns. August 1542 King Christian III of Denmark-Norway, allied with King Francis I of France against the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V's attempts to install the Catholic daughter of the former king Christian II, Dorothea, on the Danish throne, declares war and closes the Sound, and thus the Baltic, to shipping from the Netherlands.

15 October 1542 Akbar, Mogul emperor of India 1556–1605, who brought most of India under Mogul rule, born (–1605). November 1542 The peasant insurgents under the Swedish bandit Nils Dacke, rising against enforcement of the Reformation in Sweden, gain a truce from King Gustavus I Vasa by their defeat of royal forces in the Dacke War. 8 December 1542 Mary Queen of Scots, Queen of Scotland 1542–67, who was deposed because of her marital affairs and political incompetence and was forced to flee to England, born in Linlithgow Palace, Lothian, Scotland (–1587). 14 December 1542 Following the death of King James V of Scotland 'of a broken heart' on hearing the news of the bloody Scottish defeat at Solway Moss, he is succeeded by his six-day-old daughter, Mary Queen of Scots. Cardinal David Beaton claims the regency. 1542–1549 The Spanish conquistador leader Francisco de Montejo subdues bitter resistance by the Maya in the southern half of the Yucatán Peninsula in Central America. Their resistance causes him to abandon attempts to conquer the rest of the peninsula. 31 January 1543 Tokugawa Ieyasu (original name Tokugawa Takechiyo), Japanese shogun (military ruler), founder of the Tokugawa (or Edo) shogunate, born in Okazaki, Japan (–1616). 21 February 1543 The Ethiopian forces of Emperor Galawdewos (Claudius) ambush the army of Adal at Weyna Dega near Lake Tana, Ethiopia, killing its leader Ahmad Grañ; the invasion force withdraws and Adali attempts to conquer Ethiopia come to an end. February 1543 The peasant armies in Småland, Sweden, under the bandit leader Nils Dacke, are crushed by troops under King Gustavus I Vasa, ending the Dacke War over enforcement of the Reformation in Sweden. Dacke dies in battle, the other leaders are executed, and the county made to pay a fine. 24 May 1543 Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer, who put forward the theory that the Earth revolved about its axis and around the Sun, dies in Frauenberg, East Prussia, now Frombork, Poland (70). 12 July 1543 King Henry VIII of England marries Catherine Parr, widow of Lord Latimer; she is his sixth wife. 4 September 1543 Ottoman forces under Sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent assault and take the fortress of Székesfehérvár (Stuhlweissenberg), Hungary, southwest of Buda (now Budapest). The sultan returns to Constantinople, having strengthened the Danube frontier. 1543 The History of Richard the Third by the English statesman and scholar Thomas More is published posthumously. A landmark in the development of

English historical writing, it was written between 1513 and 1518. It is the source for the Shakespeare play Richard III. 1543 The Polish astronomer and priest Nicholas Copernicus has finally worked out to his satisfaction the details of the heliocentric theory, and they are published in his most important work De revolutionibus orbium coelestium/On the Revolutions of the Celestial Sphere as he lies dying of a cerebral haemorrhage. April 1544 In the Peace of Speyer, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V makes peace with Denmark-Norway, France's ally, by abandoning his support for the claim of his daughter-in-law Dorothea, wife of Frederick, Elector Palatine, to the Danish crown. 14 July 1544 King Henry VIII of England crosses to Calais, France, to campaign against King Francis I's forces in Picardy, in conjunction with the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V's invasion further east. 18 September 1544 King Francis I of France and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V sign the Peace of Crépy, in France, by which their conquests since 1538 are restored to the former rulers (except for Guelders and Zutphen which are to remain with Charles); Francis surrenders his claims to Naples, Flanders, and Artois, and Charles surrenders his claim to the duchy of Burgundy; a Habsburg marriage is planned for Francis's second surviving son, Charles, with a dowry of Milan or the Netherlands and Franche-Comté; and the Duke of Savoy is to reoccupy all his lands. The English are excluded from the Peace; both rulers pledge an alliance against Protestantism. 1544 German mineralogist Agricola (Georg Bauer) writes De ortu et causis subterraneis/On Subterranean Origin and Causes, a founding work in geology, identifying the erosive power of water, and the origin of mineral veins as depositions from solution. 22 May 1545 Sher Khan, conqueror of the Mogul ruler Humayun, is killed after a reign dominated by economic and administrative reform, at the siege of Kalinjar, on the road south from the River Ganges. June–July 1545 A French fleet under Admiral d'Annebault pursues the English under John Dudley, Viscount Lisle, Duke of Northumberland, from the Seine estuary into the Solent; though King Henry VIII of England's great flagship the Mary Rose keels over and sinks on her maiden voyage during a battle off Portsmouth, England, the French landings on the Isle of Wight fail and they retreat. 9 September 1545 Charles of Orléans, King Francis I of France's second surviving son, dies, ending the plans for a Habsburg–Valois marriage and consequent French hopes of gaining the Netherlands or Milan in accordance with the 1544 Peace of Crépy.

November 1545 Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria makes the Truce of Adrianople with the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent; he is thus able to aid his brother the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V against the German Protestant Schmalkaldic League, while Suleiman campaigns against the Safavid Empire. 1545 A smallpox epidemic devastates Mexico's native people, killing 800,000. 1545 A typhus epidemic in Spanish America kills around 500,000 people. 1545 An Aymara servant of the Spanish conquistador Diego Gualpa discovers great quantities of silver in a mountain at Potosí (modern Bolivia); mining begins and the surfeit of silver suddenly available to Spain promotes a 'Price Revolution' in Europe and speeds the onset of a world economy. 1545–1547 The first session of the Council of Trent is held in Trent, Italy. A council of the Roman Catholic Church, it is convened to formulate a response to the spread of Protestantism. Other sessions open in 1551 and 1562. 18 February 1546 Martin Luther, great German theologian, preacher, biblical translator, and instigator of the Protestant Reformation, dies in Eisleben, Saxony (now Germany), while trying to negotiate between the landgraves of Mansfeld, as Germany rushes towards religious war (62). 7 June 1546 The Peace of Ardres ends England's war with France and Scotland. The northern French port of Boulogne is to remain English for eight years and then be restored to France; King Francis I of France undertakes to pay King Henry VIII of England a 94,736-crown pension and 50,000 crowns to his successors. July 1546 The army of the German Protestant Schmalkaldic League, under Sebastian Schärtlin von Burtenbach, occupies the free city of Donauwörth; its strategy in the Schmalkaldic War is to occupy the Habsburg Tirol, thus isolating Germany from reinforcement from Italy. September–November 1546 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V takes the cities of Memmingen, Biberach, Heilbronn, Esslingen, and Reutlingen; the Protestant Schmalkaldic League in Swabia disintegrates. 14 December 1546 Tycho Brahe, leading Danish astronomer, teacher of Johannes Kepler, born in Knudstrup, Scania, Denmark-Norway (–1601). 23–29 December 1546 The Schmalkaldic cities of Ulm and Frankfurt submit to the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, bringing his forces to the border of the most powerful Protestant Schmalkaldic leader, Philip, Landgrave of Hesse. 1546 Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator states that the Earth must have a magnetic pole separate from its 'true' pole, in order to explain the deviation of a compass needle from true North.

1546 The Italian physician Girolamo Fracastoro publishes De contagione et contagiosis morbis et curatione/On Contagion and the Cure of Contagious Disease, in which he describes typhus for the first time, and also proposes that diseases are spread through microscopic bodies. 1546 The population of England is more than 4 million. 16 January 1547 Ivan IV ('the Terrible') is crowned as first 'Tsar of All the Russias' in Moscow, aged 16. He marries the princess Anastasia Romanovna the following month. 28 January 1547 Following the death of Henry VIII, king of England 1509–47, at Whitehall, London, England, he is succeeded by his son, Edward VI, aged nine. 28 January 1547 Henry VIII, king of England 1509–47, who broke with the Roman Catholic Church and had six wives, two of whom he executed and two of whom he divorced, dies in London, England (55). January 1547 A decree of the reforming Catholic Council of Trent in Tirol (present-day Trento, Italy) on the doctrine of justification by faith ends hope of reconciliation with the Lutherans. 24 February 1547 Don John of Austria, illegitimate son of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and half-brother of King Philip II of Spain, who defeated the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Lepanto (1571), born in Regensburg, Bavaria (now Germany) (–1578). 31 March 1547 Following the death of King Francis I of France, he is succeeded by his son Henry II, an outspoken Catholic. Henry is dominated by Francis, duke of Guise, and by his mistress Diane of Poitiers. Guise negotiates the marriage of the dauphin Francis to Mary Queen of Scots. 13 June 1547 The Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, king of the Romans (the German king) and of Bohemia, agrees a five-year peace with the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent; he will pay 30,000 ducats annual tribute for the title 'king of Hungary' and for control of the northern and western fringes of the kingdom. 20 June 1547 Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, the sole unconquered member of the German Protestant Schmalkaldic League, surrenders and is taken prisoner by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V at Halle, but is assured of his life. 29 September 1547 Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, celebrated Spanish novelist, dramatist, and poet, whose best-known work is Don Quixote (1605, 1615), born in Alcalá de Henares, near Madrid, Spain (–1616). 1547–1552 Tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible') of Russia mounts two unsuccessful assaults on Kazan before taking the city and deposing its khan, beginning the Russian conquest of the Tatar lands.

9 April 1548 The Spanish viceregal general Pedro de la Gasca defeats Gonzalo Pizarro at the battle of Jaquijahuana (Sacsahuaman) and executes him the following day, ending the conquistador regime in Cuzco against the authority of Lima in Spanish Peru. 15 May 1548 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V proclaims the Augsburg Interim, an attempt at compromise between Protestants and Catholics in Germany. Although clerical marriage and lay communion in both kinds are permitted, and the doctrine of justification by faith modified, it follows Catholic dogma in other matters. 1548 The Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) paints Charles V on Horseback. The picture commemorates the Holy Roman Emperor Charles's recent victory over the Lutheran princes at the Battle of Mühlberg. 12 July–27 August 1549 Robert Kett, an English Protestant tanner, leads an insurgent army of East Anglian peasants, who have been in tumult against the enclosure of common land for some months, to Norwich, England, where they establish a 'commonwealth', a great camp, 12,000 strong, on Mousehold Heath. 12 August 1549 Following King Henry II of France's declaration of war on England on 8 August, his forces capture Ambleteuse Castle, between Calais and Boulogne in northern France, besieging the latter. 1549 French poet Joachim Du Bellay publishes La Défense et illustration de la langue française/The Defence and Illustration of the French Language, the first statement of the theory of the poetic group known as La Pléiade. His intention is to revitalize French literature by basing it on the works of classical Greece and Rome. The same year he publishes the first sonnet sequence in French, L'Olive/ The Olive, which illustrates the theory. 1549 The first Book of Common Prayer is published, much of it the work of the English churchman Archbishop Thomas Cranmer. The official service book of the Church of England, its use is ordered by the Act of Uniformity of this year. 7 February 1550 After a very long conclave, Giovanni Maria Ciocchi del Monte, co-president of the Council of Trent, is elected as Pope Julius III, the successor to Pope Paul III, who died on 10 November 1549. 29 March 1550 By the Peace of Boulogne, England returns the northern French port of Boulogne to France four years earlier than specified in the 1546 Peace of Ardres, for 400,000 crowns, and withdraws from Scotland; King Henry II of France, now free to oppose the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, has a free hand there. 1550 John Napier (or Neper), Scottish mathematician and theologian who developed the concept of logarithms, born in Merchiston Castle, near Edinburgh,

Scotland (–1617). 1550 The Italian artist and art historian Giorgio Vasari publishes Vite dei più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e archittetti/Lives of the Most Excellent Artists, Sculptors, and Architects – a history of Italian Renaissance art from Giotto to his own day. An enlarged edition appears in 1568. 1550 The Portuguese establish their first trading post in Japan at Hirado, near Nagasaki. c. 1550 An English court case of 1598 refers to 'crickett' being played at the 'Free School' at Guildford, Surrey, at this time. It is the first certain reference to cricket. 1550–1600 New agricultural products are exchanged between the New and Old Worlds. The Spanish introduce potatoes, tomatoes, quinine, cocoa, tapioca, and tobacco to Europe. From Europe, the New World gains barley, oats, rye, sugar cane, cattle, pigs, poultry, rabbits, and horses. 9 March 1551 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V settles the succession to the imperial title; his brother, Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, king of the Romans (the German king) and Bohemia, is to succeed him, followed in turn by Charles's son Philip of Spain, and then Ferdinand's son Maximilian; neither Spanish nor Austrian parties are placated, and the compact is replaced in 1553. 4 April 1552 Maurice, Elector of Saxony, and Albert Alcibiades II, Margrave of Brandenburg-Kulmbach, leading the German Protestant armies, in concert with King Henry II of France in Lorraine, against the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, take Augsburg, the largest and richest German city. July–August 1552 Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, king of the Romans (the German king), organizes a princely peace congress at Passau; in the eventual treaty the Lutherans are granted free exercise of their religion in Germany, annulling the Augsburg Interim of 1548; John Frederick of Saxony and Philip of Hesse are released from imprisonment; and, on the insistence of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, a diet is to be called to make a permanent settlement. 29 December 1552 Henri I de Bourbon, second Prince of Condé, French Huguenot leader, born in La Ferté-sous-Jouarre, France (–1588). March 1553 The League of Heidelberg is formed by both Catholic and Protestant princes, led by Maurice, Elector of Saxony, to preserve peace in Germany and prevent the threatened succession of Philip of Spain, son of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, as emperor. 21 May 1553 The young king Edward VI of England, dying of tuberculosis, bestows the succession on his fellow Protestant, Lady Jane Grey, at the urging of her father-in-law John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland; the hereditary candidate, Mary Tudor, is Catholic. Dudley then marries his son Lord Guildford

Dudley to Lady Jane Grey, the 15-year-old daughter of Henry, Duke of Suffolk, and great-niece of the late king Henry VIII of England; through placing them on the throne, he hopes to retain control of the kingdom. 10 July 1553 Following the death of King Edward VI of England on 6 July, the Protestant Lady Jane Grey is unwillingly proclaimed queen of England by her father-in-law, the Duke of Northumberland, de facto regent for the late boy king. Mary Tudor, the heir apparent, a Catholic, flees Hunsdon, Hertfordshire, and, though assaulted in Protestant Cambridge, reaches Framlingham, Suffolk, and musters support. 14–20 July 1553 The Duke of Northumberland sets out in force to subdue Mary Tudor, the heir to the English throne, but she has popular and noble support in London, England, in addition to her gentry army in Suffolk. Lady Jane Grey's cause fails, she is deposed, and Mary is proclaimed queen on 19 July. Northumberland surrenders and is incarcerated. 8 August 1553 With the accession of Mary I to the throne of England, Roman Catholicism is restored in England and Roman Catholic bishops are reappointed. 13 December 1553 Henry IV, first Bourbon king of France 1589–1610, born in Pau, Béarn, France (–1610). 1553 Inca art comes to an end with the collapse of the Inca Empire in South America at the hands of Spanish conquistadors. The Inca produced a wide range of artefacts, including textiles, woven goods, painted pottery, and figurines and jewellery in gold and silver. Their major achievements were in architecture, ranging from ceremonial buildings such as pyramids and palaces, to an extensive system of canals, roads, and bridges. 12 February 1554 Following the dangerous Wyatt's Rebellion against Queen Mary I of England, Lady Jane Grey, titular queen of England for nine days (1553), her father (Henry, duke of Suffolk), her husband (Lord Guildford Dudley), and 46 commoners are beheaded in London, England (16). May 1554 King Henry II of France invades the Spanish Netherlands along the River Meuse; capturing the fortress of Marienburg, his army under Francis of Guise, Prince of Joinville, routs Habsburg imperial forces at Renty. 25 July 1554 Queen Mary I of England marries Philip of Spain (the future king Philip II) in Winchester, England. Philip is granted the kingdom of Naples by his father the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. 1554 Italian artist Benvenuto Cellini completes his sculpture Perseus, which is set up in a square in Florence, Italy. 1554 The English composer Thomas Tallis writes the Mass Puer natus est nobis/A Boy is Born to Us. Although he was the first English composer to write music for the Anglican liturgy, he returned to writing Masses during the reign of Mary I of

England, a Catholic. 1554 The Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) paints Danaë and Venus and Adonis. c. 1554 Walter Raleigh, English adventurer and colonizer of North America, born in Hayes Barton, Devon (–1618). 9 April 1555 The Italian churchman Marcello Cervini is elected as Pope Marcellus II following the death of Pope Julius III on 23 March. 23 May 1555 The Italian churchman Gian Pietro Carafa is elected Pope Paul IV following the death of Pope Marcellus II. He is pope until 1559. 25 September 1555 The Diet (legislative assembly) of Augsburg promulgates the religious Peace of Augsburg. The religious affiliations of Germany are to be decided on the principle of Curia Regis: the population must follow the religion of their ruler, or emigrate. Citizens of imperial free cities are granted freedom of conscience, as are knights, towns, and clerical territories Protestant before 2 August 1552. Any bishops subsequently converting must abandon their lands. Though none of this applies to Protestants other than Lutherans, and though it is intended as a provisional settlement, it endures until 1618. 1555 The French astrologer Michel de Nostradame publishes his Centuries, a book of predictions for the next 500 years. 1555 The Italian artist Sofonisba Anguissola (one of the few women artists of the period) paints Portrait of the Artist's Three Sisters and their Governess. 1555 The Italian artist Tintoretto (Jacopo Robusti) paints Saint George and the Dragon. c. 1555 The Dutch artist Pieter Breughel (the Elder) paints The Fall of Icarus. 16 January 1556 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V abdicates as king (Charles I) of Spain; his son succeeds him as King Philip II. 24 January 1556 A huge earthquake, the worst ever recorded, hits the Shanxi province of China, leaving more than 830,000 dead. 5 February 1556 A truce is signed at Vaucelles in the Spanish Netherlands between King Henry II of France and King Philip II of Spain, who is now governor of the Netherlands following the abdication of his father the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. 31 July 1556 St Ignatius de Loyola, highly influential Spanish theologian, founder of the Jesuits (1534), dies in Rome, Italy (c. 65).

7 September 1556 The Holy Roman Emperor Charles V abdicates from the imperial throne in favour of his brother Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, King of the Romans (the German king), Bohemia, and part of Hungary. 9 September 1556 Pope Paul IV, claiming the papal veto over the election of the Holy Roman Emperor, refuses to acknowledge Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria, king of the Romans (the German king), Bohemia, and part of Hungary as Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I. 1556 Franciscan monk André Thevet from Rio de Janeiro introduces tobacco seeds into Europe. The plant is originally grown for decorative purposes, though it is also thought to have some medicinal properties. 6 June 1557 Sebastian I, aged three, succeeds as king of Portugal on the death of his grandfather King John III; Sebastian's mother, Joanna of Austria, daughter of the former Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, acts as regent until 1562. 7 June 1557 Queen Mary I of England declares war on France, the enemy of her husband King Philip II of Spain; Pope Paul IV deprives the liberal imperialist Cardinal Reginald Pole of his office as papal legate in England. September 1557 A Spanish army under Ferdinand, Duke of Alva (or Alba), advancing on Rome, forces the virulent Hispanophobe Pope Paul IV to make peace with King Philip II of Spain. 7 January 1558 French forces under Francis, Duke of Guise, capture Calais on the north French coast from England. Guines and Ham castles fall by the end of the month. The loss of Calais, the last English possession on the continent, is regarded as a national disaster in England, and support for the Hispanophile regime of Queen Mary I plummets. 21 September 1558 Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor 1519–56, king of Spain as Charles I 1516–56, and archduke of Austria as Charles I 1519–21, dies in the monastery at San Jerónimo de Yuste, Spain (58). 17 November 1558 Mary I ('Bloody Mary'), first reigning queen of England 1553–58, daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, wife of Philip II of Spain, dies in London, England (42). 17 November 1558 The death of Queen Mary I of England brings an end to the attempt to reconvert England to Roman Catholicism. Her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth I, daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, succeeds her. The Protestant exiles in Geneva, Zürich, and the German states begin to return to England. 1558 L'Heptaméron/The Heptameron, written by the French patron and writer Margaret of Navarre (Marguerite d'Angoulême), is published posthumously. A collection of tales, it was inspired by the works of the Italian writer Giovanni Boccaccio.

1558 Scottish religious leader John Knox publishes The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women in Geneva, Swiss Confederation. It is an attack on Mary of Guise (Mary of Lorraine). 1558 The population of London, England, is around 200,000. 2–3 April 1559 England and Spain sign the peace treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis with France. Calais is to remain French for eight years, and then revert to England (or France will be liable to pay half a million crowns), provided that England makes no aggression on Scotland, France's protectorate. France restores Savoy (except Saluzzo) to its duke, the governor of the Netherlands, Emmanuel Philibert, and confirms King Philip II of Spain as ruler of Franche-Comté; the Lorraine bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun remain French. 10 July 1559 Following the death of King Henry II of France, his sickly son, Francis II, succeeds him, but Francis, duke of Guise, and his brother Charles, cardinal of Lorraine, hold the real power. They promote the claim of Francis's wife, Mary Queen of Scots, to the throne of England. 21 October 1559 The Scottish Protestant Lords of the Congregation, led by James Hamilton, Earl of Arran, Duke of Châtelherault, and heir presumptive, depose the Scottish regent Mary of Guise in Edinburgh; she has allowed French reinforcements to fortify Leith. 25 December 1559 The conclave elects Giovanni Medici as Pope Pius IV, after the death on 18 October of Pope Paul IV. 1559 German theologian Flacius (Matthias Vlacich) publishes the first volume of his Ecclesiastica historia/Ecclesiastical History, a history of the church often known as the Magdaburg Centuries. The last volume appears in 1574. 1559 Protestants at the First National Synod in Paris, France, issue the Gallican Confession, a Calvinist confession of faith. 1559 The Dutch artist Pieter Breughel paints Netherlandish Proverbs and Battle Between Carnival and Lent. 1559 The French religious reformer John Calvin publishes the definitive edition of his Institutes. The first edition appeared in 1536. 1559 The Italian churchman Giovanni Angelo Medici is elected Pope Pius IV. He is pope until 1565. 6 July 1560 The French forces in Scotland surrender under the Treaty of Edinburgh; England and France both pledge noninterference in Scottish affairs and agree to evacuate the kingdom. The government is to be a council of regents, five chosen by parliament and five by Mary Queen of Scots, who will not

use the arms and style 'of England'. 29 September 1560 Eric XIV succeeds as king of Sweden on death of Gustavus I Vasa; his half-brothers John and Karl gain autonomy in their duchies. 5 December 1560 Following the death of King Francis II of France, he is succeeded by his ten-year-old brother, Charles IX. Their mother, Catherine de' Medici, becomes regent and foils the triumvirate of Francis, duke of Guise, Anne, duke of Montmorency, and Jacques d'Albon, seigneur de St André, when she pursues a policy of religious conciliation. 1560 French poet Pierre de Ronsard publishes Les Discours/Discourses, poems about the French wars of religion. 1560 The first scientific society, Accademia Secretorum Naturae (Secret Academy of Nature) is founded in Naples, Italy, by Italian scientist and mystic Giambattista della Porta. 1560–1562 After the 'Tumult of Amboise' of 17 March 1560 (the defeat of a Huguenot conspiracy to rescue King Francis II of France from the domination of the Catholic Guise faction), religious agitation in France reaches such a pitch that outbreaks of violence are frequent and civil war becomes an increasingly likely prospect. 22 January 1561 Sir Francis Bacon, Viscount St Albans, Baron Verulam, lord chancellor of England 1618–21, philosopher, and man of letters, whose bestknown works are Novum organum/New Engine and Essays, born in London, England (–1626). 28 November 1561 In the Union of Wilno (present-day Vilnius), the last Master of the Teutonic Order (a German Christian military order) in Livonia, Gotthard Kettler, becomes the secular Duke of Courland and Senigallia and vassal of King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland. The Order's lands north of the Dvina River, largely occupied by Russia, Sweden, and Denmark-Norway, he cedes directly to Sigismund's other principality, Lithuania. 1561 Il libro del cortegiano/The Book of the Courtier, written in 1528 by the Italian diplomat Baldassare Castiglione, is translated into English by the English scholar Thomas Moby. 1561 The Colloquy of Poissy, a conference in France between French Roman Catholic bishops and Protestant leaders, is held to try to reach agreement on shared principles. It prepares the way for the Edict of St Germain in 1562. 1561 The play Gorboduc by the English dramatists Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, is first performed, in London, England. The earliest English tragedy in blank verse, it was published in 1565. 17 January 1562 The French chancellor Michel de L'Hôpital promulgates the

Edict of St Germain, which permits the existence of the Huguenot (French Protestant) Church. Francis, Duke of Guise, his brother Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine, and Anne, Duke of Montmorency form a militant league to prevent the edict from being enforced. 1 March 1562 A congregation of 1,200 Huguenots (French Protestants) is massacred by the Guise army marching on Paris at Vassy, provoking the First War of Religion in France. 1562 The Italian composer Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina composes Missa Papae Marcelli/Mass of Pope Marcellus in memory of Pope Marcellus, who died in 1555. c. 1562 The Italian artist Tintoretto (Jacopo Robusti) paints The Finding of the Body of Saint Mark and The Discovery of the Body of Saint Mark. 1562–1563 The English navigator John Hawkins leads the first English slavetrading expedition to the Caribbean, via Guinea, Africa. 1562–1563 The third and last session of the Council of Trent is held in Trento in Italy. The first session was opened in 1545. The Council of Trent has a major impact on the Catholic Church, introducing reforms, defining doctrine, and setting out strategies for fighting the spread of Protestantism. 24 February 1563 Francis, Duke of Guise and Aumale, Prince of Joinville, Lieutenant General of the Kingdom and leader of the Catholic forces in France, is assassinated by a Huguenot (French Protestant) while besieging the Huguenot stronghold of Orléans, France. 19 March 1563 The captive Louis I de Bourbon, Protestant Prince of Condé, agrees to the Pacification of Amboise ending the First War of Religion in France; the Huguenots (French Protestants) are permitted to exercise their religion in one town in each Baillage or Sénéchaussée, excepting Paris, and in noble households. Anne, Duke of Montmorency, is released by the Pacification and leads the forces that expel English troops from Le Havre. May 1563 The Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible') seizes the town and territory of Polotsk along the Dvina River in Lithuania, on the borders of King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland's recent acquisitions in Livonia. War follows. September 1563 The 'War of the Three Crowns' opens with an assault by King Frederick II of Denmark and Norway's army under Daniel Rantzau on Elfsborg (present-day Gothenburg), the fortified port on the Kattegat, Sweden's only outlet to the west. This is a territorial war, aimed also at the deposition of Erik XIV, the deranged king of Sweden. 1563 Italian physician and anatomist Gabriele Falloppio invents the condom, made of pig intestine, as a means to prevent the spread of syphilis. He describes his design in De morbo Gallico/On the French Disease.

1563 The Dutch artist Pieter Breughel paints The Tower of Babel. 1563 The English religious writer John Foxe publishes Acts and Monuments, a history of the persecution of reformers. It is soon known as Foxe's Book of Martyrs. 15 February 1564 Galileo Galilei, Italian mathematician, physicist and astronomer, who developed the astronomical telescope, born in Pisa, Italy (–1642). 18 February 1564 Michelangelo (di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni), Italian Renaissance sculptor, painter, and architect, also poet, whose best-known works include the fresco The Last Judgement (1534–41) and the sculptures Pietà (c. 1500) and David (1504), dies in Rome, Italy (89). February 1564 Christopher Marlowe, Elizabethan poet and dramatist who established blank verse as a dramatic medium in plays such as Dr Faustus and Tamburlaine the Great, born in Canterbury, Kent, England (–1593). 11 April 1564 After nine months of issuing empty threats, following the surrender of Le Havre, Queen Elizabeth I of England capitulates to French demands in the Treaty of Troyes; she renounces her claim to Calais for 120,000 crowns. 26 April 1564 William Shakespeare, English dramatist and poet, often considered the greatest playwright in history, baptized in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England (–1616). 27 May 1564 John Calvin (French: Jean Calvin or Cauvin), leading French Protestant Reformer, whose doctrines are expressed in his Institutio Christianae religionis/Institutes of the Christian Religion, dies in Geneva, Swiss Confederation (54). 25 July 1564 The Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I dies; his eldest son, the Protestant sympathizer Maximilian II, already king of Bohemia and Hungary, succeeds as Holy Roman Emperor and archduke of Austria. However, Ferdinand's will grants his younger sons, the archdukes Ferdinand and Charles, the Swabian territories, the Vorarlberg, and Tirol, and the provinces of Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola respectively. 24 November 1564 The Index librorum prohibitorum/Index of Prohibited Books of the Roman Catholic Church is published after receiving papal approval. It was first issued in 1559. 1564 The Italian artist Michelangelo (Buonarroti) sculpts The Rondanini Pietà. 23 January 1565 A coalition of the Muslim sultans of the Deccan defeats the armies of Vijayanagara at Talikota, India, effectively bringing an end to the

ancient Hindu kingdom. 1565 Italian artist Tintoretto (Jacopo Robusti) begins a large cycle of paintings in the Scuola di San Rocco in Venice, Italy, completed in 1587. One of the earliest is the Crucifixion of 1565. 1565 The Dutch artist Pieter Breughel completes a series of paintings depicting the seasons, including Hunters in the Snow, Gloomy Day, Return of the Herd, and August. 7 January 1566 Antonio Ghislieri is elected Pope Pius V, succeeding Pius IV who died on 9 December 1565. 19 June 1566 James VI of Scotland (1567–1625) and I of England (1603–1625), son of Mary Queen of Scots, born in Edinburgh Castle, Scotland (–1625). 5 September 1566 Following the death of the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I the Magnificent, he is succeeded by his son, Selim II the Drunkard. 5 September 1566 Suleiman I ('the Magnificent' or 'the Law Giver'), Ottoman sultan 1520–1566, whose reign saw imperial expansion in Europe and the Middle East, and major achievements in Ottoman administration and culture, dies near Szigetvár, Hungary, shortly after he directed his forces in the capture of the fortress of Szigetvár, Hungary, and having brought the Ottoman Empire to its apogee (71). 1566–1570 The English financier Thomas Gresham builds a 'Bourse' for the money market in London, England, which receives a charter as the Royal Exchange the year after its completion. May 1567 Claudio Monteverdi, Italian composer, key developer of secular music and particularly of opera as a musical genre with works such as Orfeo/Orpheus (1607), born in Cremona, Italy (–1643). 15–17 June 1567 The Scottish nobility, outraged by Mary Queen of Scots's marriage to the Earl of Bothwell, who is widely regarded as a murderer and usurper, rises and defeats a loyalist army at Carberry Hill. Mary is taken captive, and imprisoned in Lochleven Castle, Fife, on 17 June. Bothwell escapes to Norway. 5 September 1567 A fortnight after arriving in Brussels, the Netherlands, at the head of 10,000 Spanish and Italian veterans, the captain general Ferdinand, Duke of Alva (or Alba), establishes the Council of the Troubles, a tribunal controlled by Spanish officials to eradicate Protestant heresy and Netherlands autonomy. Its terrorist methods lead to its nickname the 'Council of Blood'. 29 September 1567 Huguenot (French Protestant) forces under Admiral Gaspard de Coligny and Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, fail in their attempt to seize the young French king Charles IX and his mother Catherine de' Medici at Meaux,

France; the royal family, guarded by Swiss mercenaries, flees to Paris, France, which the Huguenots besiege. Many provincial towns are once again under Protestant control. 1567 Separatist congregations (Puritans who seek to separate from the Church of England) meet secretly in London, England. 1567 The play Ralph Roister Doister, written by the English dramatist and schoolmaster Nicholas Udall in the 1550s, is published. It is the earliest known original English comedy. 1567 The Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible') gains his epithet when, after hearing of plots by boyars (aristocratic landowners), he allocates half of Russia to an oprichnina (a separately administered royal territory) and unleashes his royal bodyguard, the oprichniky, on the boyars, the church, and the populace. 23 March 1568 The Treaty of Longjumeau, signed by Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, against the advice of his fellow Huguenot (French Protestant) Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, ends the Second War of Religion in France; confirming the concessions of the 1563 Treaty of Amboise, it effects no more than a truce; King Charles IX pays off the German Protestant forces employed by the Huguenots. 25 April 1568 A German force in the pay of William the Silent, Prince of Orange, and led by Jean de Montigny, lord of Villers, is destroyed by the Spanish Habsburg forces at Dalheim in Limburg, the Netherlands, in a major setback to William's plans for a concerted Protestant attack on the Spanish authorities. Calvinist terrorists in Flanders (called the 'Bosgeuzen', or ' Wood Beggers') have been rounded up in February. September 1568 After Catherine de' Medici and the Guise faction have the religious toleration (granted by the treaties of Amboise and Longjumeau) rescinded, the Huguenots (French Protestants) mobilize in the Midi, as far as Beaujolais; the Third War of Religion in France breaks out in Périgord, Quercy, and Guyenne. 9 November–28 December 1568 Having swept aside Kitabatake, Miyoshi, and Rokkaku opposition, the Japanese military ruler Oda Nobunaga enters Kyoto at the head of his army, where he installs Ashikaga Yoshiaki as shogun (military ruler) on 28 December. 1568–1571 The Moriscos (nominally converted Muslims) revolt in Granada, Spain, against the anti-Arab decree of 1 January 1567 and the depredations of the Monfís (bandits of the sierras). Iñigo López de Mendoza, Marquis of Mondéjar, subdues the initial revolt by February 1569, but atrocities and robbery by his troops stimulate continued resistance. May 1569 Following the death at Jarnac of Louis de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, the Huguenot (French Protestant) estates meet in Cognac, France, electing Henri de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme, son of Jeanne d'Albret, Queen of Navarre, as

their leader, and Admiral Gaspard de Coligny as their commander in chief. 1 July 1569 King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland integrates his principality of Lithuania into Poland in the face of Russian aggression; the Union of Lublin creates a federal state with a unified diet (legislative assembly). Both polities retain their own armies, treasuries, administration, and laws. 5 September 1569 Pieter Breughel the Elder, foremost Flemish painter of the 16th century, noted for landscapes and genre scenes, whose works include The Tower of Babel (1563) and The Seasons (1565), dies in Brussels, Spanish Netherlands (c. 44). 1569 Lotteries are introduced in England under the patronage of Queen Elizabeth I. 1569–1573 James Fitzmaurice attempts to raise Ireland in Catholic rebellion against Queen Elizabeth I of England and the 'Plantations' (English colonies) in his native Munster and Leinster. Though the resistance succeeds in ejecting the colonists, he eventually surrenders to John Perrot, the English lord deputy of Ireland. 8 August 1570 By the Peace of St Germain, the concessions to the Huguenots (French Protestants) of the treaties of Amboise (1563) and Longjumeau (1568) are restored; an amnesty is granted and the Huguenots gain the French strongholds of La Rochelle, Montauban, Cognac, and La Charité as places of refuge. Catherine de' Medici, the queen mother, reverses her alliances, supporting the Huguenot admiral Gaspard de Coligny against Guise influence. 13 December 1570 In the Peace of Stettin, ending the 'War of the Three Crowns', Sweden retains Estonia and Elfsborg (present-day Gothenburg) for a stiff ransom; Denmark-Norway's increased Sund tolls are recognized, and Narva is opened to trade with Denmark-Norway and Lübeck. 1570 Guy Fawkes, soldier and best-known member of the Gunpowder Plot, born in York, England (–1606). 1570 Having secured the aid of the other Deccan sultans in his struggle against the Sultanate of Bijaipur, the Hindu leader Tirumala is crowned as ruler of the south Indian kingdom of Vijayanagara, founding the Aravidu dynasty. 1570 The English artist Nicholas Hilliard paints Portrait of Queen Elizabeth I. 1570 The Italian architect Andrea Palladio publishes Quattro libri dell'architettura/Four Books on Architecture. Based on a long study of ancient Roman architecture, this book has a profound impact on the development of European and American architecture. 1570 The Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible') suppresses resistance to the

creation of an oprichnina (royal domain) in Novgorod by laying waste to the city and massacring 60,000 of its inhabitants. 27 January 1571'Abbas I the Great, Shah of Persia 1588–1629, who expelled the Ottomans and Uzbekhs from Persia, born (–1629). August 1571 Under Don John of Austria, half-brother of King Philip II of Spain, royal troops finally eliminate the guerrilla resistance of the Moriscos (nominally converted Muslims) of Granada, Spain. The Moriscos are deported and settled across Castile amongst 'Old Christian' village neighbours. 27 December 1571 Johannes Kepler, German astronomer, who discovered the elliptical nature of orbits, born in Weil der Stadt, Württemberg (now Germany) (–1630). 1571 The Italian artist Titian (Tiziano Vecellio) paints Crowning with Thorns. 1571 The Italian physician and botanist Andrea Cesalpino publishes Quaestionum peripateticarum/Peripatetic Investigations in Venice, Italy, a work of Aristotelian natural philosophy. January 1572 John Donne, the best-known English poet of the metaphysical school, born in London, England (–1631). 1–22 April 1572 The Watergeuzen ('Sea Beggars'), Protestant rebel privateers led by Count Lumey van der Mark, capture the small ports of Brill in Holland and, on 22 April, Vlissingen in Zeeland, with the aid of an insurgent populace; these become the first permanent bases for the Dutch Revolt against Spanish Habsburg rule. 13 May 1572 Ugo Buoncompagni is elected Pope Gregory XIII, 13 days after the death of his predecessor Pius V. 11 June 1572 Ben Jonson, a leading English dramatist, lyric poet, and critic of the Jacobean age, whose works include The Alchemist (1610), born in London, England (–1637). June–September 1572 Dozens of towns in Guelders, then in Holland, Overijssel, and Limburg and, by early September, from Friesland to Brabant, revolt, declaring for William the Silent, Prince of Orange, and religious tolerance, and opposing the Spanish Habsburg governor of the Netherlands, Ferdinand, Duke of Alva (or Alba), and his rule of terror and excessive taxation. 7 July 1572 King Sigismund II Augustus of Poland dies, the last of the Jagiello dynasty; the Sejm (parliament) declares itself free to elect whomever it chooses as a successor. 19 July 1572 The assembly of the estates of Holland at Dordrecht elects William

the Silent, Prince of Orange, as stadtholder (provincial executive officer), and recognizes him as stadtholder in Zeeland, Utrecht, and Friesland. At the suggestion of William's representative, Philip Marnix, Count van der Marck, is appointed lieutenant governor; standing 'colleges' of the admiralty, finance, and the Gecommitteerde Raad (for general administration) are created, and 500,000 florins of tax voted. 18 August 1572 The Huguenot Henri de Bourbon, king of Navarre since the death of his mother Jeanne d'Albret in June, marries Marguerite de Valois, sister of King Charles IX of France – the fruit of the reconciliation between Charles and the French Huguenot commander Admiral Gaspard de Coligny. 22–25 August 1572 The agents of Henri, Duke of Guise, and Catherine de' Medici fail to assassinate the Huguenot (French Protestant) leader Admiral Gaspard de Coligny. Fearing discovery, Catherine persuades her son, King Charles IX of France, to authorize the slaughter of the Huguenots in Paris, France, on the night of 23 August; this 'St Bartholomew's Day Massacre' has some 3,000 victims, including Coligny, whom the Duke of Guise defenestrates. King Henry of Navarre and Henri de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, are spared, at the price of their conversion. 1 October–2 December 1572 The Spanish Habsburg army under Ferdinand, Duke of Alva (or Alba), successively takes the towns of Mechelen, Zutphen (14 November), and Naarden in the Netherlands from the Dutch rebels. In a reign of terror, the troops sack them with great brutality. The other rebel towns in Brabant surrender easily after Mechelen, a process repeated in the northeast after Zutphen; the utter destruction and massacre of the entire population of Naarden, however, merely strengthens resistance in Holland and Zeeland. 11 November 1572 The Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe observes a bright new star – a supernova – in the constellation Cassiopeia. It becomes known as 'Tycho's Nova'. 24 November 1572 John Knox, Scottish religious reformer, leader of the Scottish Reformation, dies in Edinburgh, Scotland (c. 58). December 1572–June 1573 In the Fourth War of Religion in France, which follows the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre of Huguenots (French Protestants), a royal and Catholic army led (after February) by Henry, Duke of Anjou, fails in a siege of and numerous assaults on the Huguenot stronghold of La Rochelle on the west coast of France. 1572 The Fortress Palace at Ajmer in India, built by the Mogul king Akbar the Great, is completed. 1572 The Portuguese poet Luís Vaz de Camões publishes Os lusíadas/The Lusiads, a national epic based on the voyages of Vasco da Gama. 1572 The Tatars burn Moscow. The Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible'),

suspecting everyone of treason, abolishes the oprichnina (royal domain) and reverses the land grants made since 1565. Many peasants have fled east and south to become free Cossacks. 1572 The Villa d'Este in Tivoli, Rome, Italy, is completed to a design by the Italian architect Pirro Ligorio. The elaborate formal gardens of the villa are among the finest of the Renaissance. 9 May 1573 The Polish Sejm (parliament) elects Henry, Duke of Anjou, as king of Poland. He is obliged by the Sejm to sign the 'Henrician Articles'; he promises to convoke the Sejm every other year, to take regular counsel with senators, and to seek their permission for marriage or war. He must also agree the religious tolerance granted by the Compact of Warsaw of 28 January. Henry was forced to accept these articles (named after him) because parliament was concerned about having a foreigner on the throne. 6 July 1573 The Peace of Boulogne ends the Fourth War of Religion in France; the Huguenots (French Protestants) are granted an amnesty and freedom of conscience, but they are free to worship only in La Rochelle, Nîmes, Sancerre, and Montauban. July 1573 The Japanese 'daimyo' Oda Nobunaga leads his forces in a descent on Kyoto, across Lake Biwa, takes the city by stealth, and deposes the last Ashikaga shogun (military ruler) Yoshiaki, who has been in contact with Nobunaga's enemies. c. 1573 Caravaggio (real name Michelangelo Merisi), outstanding Italian baroque painter, whose major works include The Supper at Emmaus (1596–98) and Death of the Virgin (1605–06), born In Caravaggio, Italy (–1610). 23 February 1574 The Fifth War of Religion breaks out in France; Henri de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, governor of Picardy, renounces his Catholicism and flees to Alsace to raise a German Protestant army. 14 April 1574 Count Louis of Nassau, brother of William the Silent, Prince of Orange, and his invading army are annihilated on the heath at Mook by the Spanish forces of Luis de Requesens, the Habsburg governor of the Netherlands. 21 April 1574 Cosimo I the Great de' Medici, Duke of Florence 1537–74 and Grand Duke of Tuscany 1569–74, dies in Castello, near Florence, Italy (54). 30 May 1574 King Charles IX of France dies. The queen mother Catherine de' Medici acts as regent until his brother, now Henry III, arrives from his kingdom of Poland. November 1574 Spanish Habsburg forces abandon the province of Holland in the Spanish Netherlands to the stadtholder (provincial executive officer) William the Silent, Prince of Orange, to the Dutch estates, and to Calvinism after their failure in the siege of Leiden.

1574 Selim II, Ottoman sultan (1566–1574), who brought peace to Europe and Asia, but during whose reign the power of the sultans began to diminish, dies in Constantinople (modern Istanbul), the capital of the Ottoman Empire (c. 50). 15 February 1575 King Henry III of France marries Louise de Vaudémont of Lorraine, thus allying himself with the Catholic House of Guise against the Huguenot (French Protestant) and Politique (moderate Catholic) parties. 15–17 August 1575 Francis, Duke of Alençon, the brother and heir to King Henry III of France, escapes from court to declare himself, at Dreux on 17 August, in league with Henri I de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, the Huguenot (French Protestant) leader, and the Palatine Calvinist army under Johann Casimir, invading from Germany. 8 November 1575 Francis, Duke of Alençon, Politique (moderate Catholic) heir to the French throne, negotiates a truce with his brother King Henry III through their mother Catherine de' Medici at Marigny. He is granted the duchy of Anjou and garrisons in Berry, Poitou, and Saintogne; his Huguenot (French Protestant) allies are to retain the concessions of the 1573 Peace of Boulogne and are allowed to keep their army, under Henri I de Bourbon, at Mézières. 1575 The English poet George Gascoigne publishes Posies, a selection of his works. It contains the play Jocasta, the second tragedy in English blank verse, paraphrased from the Phoenissae by the Greek dramatist Euripides, and 'Certain Notes of Instruction Concerning the Making of Verse', the earliest critical essay of its kind in English literature. 3 February 1576 King Henry III of Navarre escapes from Paris, and returns to Béarn in southwest France and command of the Pyrenean Huguenots (French Protestants), having formally abjured Catholicism at Tours on 5 January in favour of his former Huguenot faith. 6 May 1576 The Fifth War of Religion in France ends in the Peace of Monsieur, promulgated by the Edict of Beaulieu; the Huguenots (French Protestants) are granted freedom of worship in all places except Paris and are to garrison eight strongholds in Languedoc, Guyenne, Provence, and Dauphiné; a general (and tax) amnesty is proclaimed. Francis, Duke of Alençon, is confirmed as Duke of Anjou, and Johann Casimir, leader of the Palatine Calvinist army, is rewarded with a pension by King Henry III. 12 October 1576 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II dies and is succeeded in all his lands and titles by his son, Rudolph II. A patron of the Jesuits, Rudolph is markedly more supportive of the Catholic Counter-Reformation than the Protestant-leaning Maximilian. 4 November 1576 The renegade Spanish Habsburg army in Brabant storms and sacks Antwerp in the brutal massacre known as 'the Spanish Fury'. Some 8,000 people die; the unity of the Netherlands in opposition to the Spanish Habsburgs is

assured. December 1576 The Sixth War of Religion breaks out in France, even as the Estates General is sitting; operations are mainly in the west. 1576 French political writer Jean Bodin, duc de Alençon, publishes Six Livres de la république/Six Books on the Republic, which describes an ideal government based on a strong monarchy. Its influence can be seen in the theories of sovereignty developed by Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. 1576 Work begins on the Church of Il Redentore in Venice, Italy, to a design by the Italian architect Andrea Palladio. It is one of the finest churches of the Italian Renaissance. 12 February 1577 Don John of Austria, the new Habsburg governor of the Spanish Netherlands, issues the Perpetual Edict to settle the civil war – without consulting the Dutch stadtholder (provincial executive officer) William the Silent, Prince of Orange, or the rebel provinces of Holland and Zeeland; all Spanish troops are to leave, the states are to pay the wage arrears of the loyal Netherlandish and German troops, and the liberties and prerogatives of the Dutch communities are to be restored. 17 September 1577 By the Edict of Poitiers, King Henry III of France proclaims the Peace of Bergerac, ending the Sixth War of Religion. The Huguenots (French Protestants), negotiating from a position of weakness, are required to relinquish some concessions granted in the Peace of Monsieur of 6 May 1576: most importantly, their freedom of worship is now restricted to towns legitimately held heretofore. 22 October 1577 The Habsburg archduke Matthias, brother of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II, arrives in Brabant, the Netherlands, secretly invited to be governor by the Council of State legitimist faction of Philippe de Croy, Duke of Aerschot. William the Silent, Prince of Orange, is appointed Ruwaard (governor) by the States-General in Brussels by popular pressure. He restores the liberties of the city of Ghent, abolished in 1540. 15 November 1577–30 November 1580 The English buccaneer and explorer Francis Drake leads his expedition on the Pelican (later renamed the Golden Hind) round the world, via Cape Horn, to attack Spanish settlements and shipping along the American Pacific coast and to search for the fabled South Sea continent and the Northwest Passage. 4 August 1578 King Sebastian I of Portugal and Al Mutawakkil, his candidate for the throne of Morocco, invading Morocco on a crusade, are drowned after his forces are routed near Alcazarquivir (Ksar el Kebir) in the Battle of the Three Kings by the army of the sultan of Morocco, Abd-al-Malik (who dies the next day). Sebastian's uncle, Cardinal Henry, aged 67, succeeds as king of Portugal. August 1578 Ottoman armies under Mustafa Pasha defeat the Georgian allies of

the disordered Safavid Persian Empire, nominally ruled by Shah Muhammad Kudabanda, at Lake Çildir, and take the Georgian capital Tiflis (modern Tbilisi). 1 October 1578 Don John of Austria, illegitimate son of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and half-brother of King Philip II of Spain, who defeated the Ottoman fleet at the Battle of Lepanto (1571), dies at Bouges, near Namur, Spanish Netherlands (31). 1578 The French poet Pierre de Ronsard publishes his poetry collection Sonnets pour Hélène/Sonnets for Hélène. 25 January 1579 Deputies from the northern Dutch provinces of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Gelderland, Friesland, Oomelanden around Groningen, and Zutphen in Overijssel sign a perpetual alliance in Utrecht. The signatories are to act as a single province in war and foreign policy, but retain provincial rights and liberties in religion and other matters. The Union of Utrecht thus forms the foundation of the United Provinces of the Netherlands. 17 June 1579 After successful privateering off the coast of Chile and Peru, the English buccaneer and explorer Francis Drake sails north as far as Vancouver Island, then turns back and lands north of the site of the future city of San Francisco, where he proclaims England's sovereignty over New Albion (modern California). 1579 English cartographer Christopher Saxton publishes his County Atlas of England and Wales, the first detailed regional atlas anywhere. 1579 The English poet Edmund Spenser publishes The Shepheards Calender, twelve eclogues. 6 January 1580 John Smith, English explorer who founded Jamestown, Virginia, the first permanent English settlement in North America, born in Lincolnshire, England (–1631). 31 January 1580 Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal, dies, leaving the succession disputed between King Philip II of Spain (as grandson of Manuel I), the Duke of Braganza, and Dom Antonio, Prior of Crato. A propaganda war between Dom Antonio and Philip ensues. April 1580 Widespread confused and localized fighting flares into the Seventh War of Religion in France. The Huguenot (French Protestant) leader King Henry of Navarre takes the town of Cahors after four days of heavy street fighting. 10 June 1580 Luís Vaz de Camões, national poet of Portugal, whose best-known work is Os lusíadas/The Lusiads (1572), dies in Lisbon (c. 56). 26 November 1580 The Peace of Fleix ends the Seventh War of Religion in France, renewing the terms of the Peace of Bergerac of September 1577. Sporadic and local hostilities continue.

1580 French writer Michel de Montaigne publishes Essais/Essays, a two-volume collection of his essays. Covering a wide range of subjects, personal as well as scholarly, these reflections help to create a new literary form, the essay. A second edition appears in 1588. 1580 The English religious leader Robert Browne founds the first English Separatist congregation, in Norwich, England, in defiance of the established church. c. 1580 Cocoa, imported from the New World, becomes a popular drink in Spain. c. 1580 The Greek-born Spanish artist El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopoulos) paints The Adoration of the Name of Jesus (The Dream of Philip II). 1 April 1581 King Philip II of Spain and I of Portugal promises the Cortes (parliament) at Thomar that he will uphold Portuguese liberties and laws and administer the kingdom through the Portuguese civil service. Apart from the abolition of customs tolls on the Castilian border, Portugal and its colonies remain autonomous. 22 July 1581 The United Netherlands depose King Philip II of Spain as sovereign of the Netherlands in the Act of Abjuration (published 26 July). 1581 At the French court, the ballet Ballet comique de la reigne/The Queen's Comic Ballet by the French choreographer Baltasar de Beaujoyeux is first performed. It is the earliest surviving ballet complete with music. It was commissioned by Catherine de' Medici, who played one of the roles. 1581 The Italian poet Torquato Tasso publishes Gerusalemme liberata/ Jerusalem Liberated, an epic poem set during the First Crusade. 15 January 1582 The Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible') and King Stephen I Báthory of Poland agree the Truce of Yam-Zapolski, mediated by Pope Gregory XIII. Ivan concedes defeat in the Livonian War, abandoning Livonia and Polotsk to Poland in return for Polish-Lithuanian withdrawal from Velikiye Luki. 21 June 1582 Oda Nobunaga, the Japanese dictator who overthrew the Ashikaga shogunate, ended feudal wars, and unified more than half of Japan, is wounded in battle and dies in Kyoto, Japan (c. 48). 21–30 June 1582 The forces of Akechi Mitsuhide undertake a treacherous assault on the lodgings of the Japanese military leader Oda Nobunaga, unifier of central Japan (southern Honshu), in the Honnoji monastery in Kyoto, resulting in the death of Oda Nobunaga. Mitsuhide hesitates after taking other strongholds, and, on 30 June, the forces of the military leader Hideyoshi (later known as Toyotomi Hideyoshi) defeat and kill him at Yamazaki.

1582 Pope Gregory XIII introduces the Gregorian Calendar, correcting errors in the Julian Calendar. 5 October 1582 becomes 15 October 1582 and the new year is confirmed as starting on 1 January. Protestant countries will retain the Julian calendar until the beginning of the 18th century. 5–17 January 1583 French forces trying to enforce the authority of Francis, Duke of Anjou, in the Spanish Netherlands by coup de main seize Dunkirk, Ostend, Diksmuide, Aalst, Dendermonde, and Vilvoorde, but fail in two attempts on Bruges and Antwerp (17 January), in the 'French Fury'. July–October 1583 The Spanish forces of the Habsburg governor of the Netherlands Alessandro Farnese, Duke of Parma, now numbering some 60,000, retake the Flemish coast south of Ostend and on the Scheldt estuary, capturing the towns of Dunkirk, Ostend, Hulst, and Axel from the United Netherlands forces. 1583 The Escorial, a palace and monastery complex near Madrid, Spain, is completed. Built on the orders of King Philip II of Spain, the Escorial was designed by the Spanish architect Juan de Herrera. 1583 The Spanish composer Tomás Luis de Victoria publishes his first Requiem. 18 March 1584 Ivan IV ('the Terrible'), grand prince of Moscow (1533–84), tsar of Russia (1547–84), who waged war with Sweden and Livonia, and who is noted for executing at least 3,000 noblemen and boyars, dies in Moscow, Russia (53). 18 March 1584 When the Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible') dies and is succeeded by his feeble-minded son Fyodor I as 'Tsar of All the Russias', Russia is governed by a regency council dominated by his brother-in-law Boris Godunov. Fyodor is to be the last tsar of the Rurikid dynasty. 1584 Italian philosopher Giordano Bruno publishes La cena de le Ceneri/The Ash Wednesday Supper, in which he argues in favour of the Copernican system, De l'infinito universo e mondi/On the Infinite Universe and Worlds, the central statement of his belief in an infinite universe animated by a 'world soul', and Spaccio della bestia trionffante/Banishment of the Triumphant Beast, an ethical treatise dedicated to the English poet Philip Sidney. 1584 Sir John Hawkins introduces tobacco into England, although there are a number of other claimants, including Sir Walter Raleigh. 1584 The Flemish composer Orlando di Lasso completes his Psalmi Davidis Penitentiales/Penitential Psalms. 1584 The Gregorian calendar is adopted throughout Catholic Europe by 1584; the date advances by ten days. 1584 The Teatro Olimpico, in Vicenza, Italy, is completed to a design by the

Italian architect Andrea Palladio. This is the first permanent, purpose-built theatre in Italy since those of ancient Rome. 1584 While the Japanese military leader Hideyoshi (known as Toyotomi Hideyoshi from 1585) is defeating a rebellion by his chief lieutenant Tokugawa Ieyasu, a Spanish galleon from Manila in the Philippines reaches Hirado, breaking the Portuguese monopoly of European-Japanese trade. 24 April 1585 Felice Peretti is elected Pope Sixtus V, following the death of Gregory XIII on 10 April. He is pope until 1590. 19 May 1585 English shipping in Spanish ports is confiscated, serving as a declaration of war on England; Queen Elizabeth I of England launches a counterembargo and orders reprisals. 7 July 1585 Henri, Duke of Guise, at the head of the Catholic League, forces King Henry III of France and his mother Catherine de' Medici into signing the Treaty of Nemours, in which he capitulates to their demands for revoking all toleration of the Huguenots (French Protestants), and recognizing Cardinal Charles de Bourbon as his successor, rather than the Protestant king Henry of Navarre; this provokes the War of the Three Henries. 9 September 1585 Armand-Jean du Plessis, Cardinal et duc de Richelieu, ('Cardinal Richelieu'), chief minister (1624–42) to King Louis XIII of France, who defeated the Habsburg hegemony in Europe, born in Richelieu, Poitou, France (–1642). 1585 Italian artist Veronese (Paolo Caliari) completes his frescoes in the Sala del Maggior Consiglio in the Doge's Palace in Venice, Italy. One of the best-known images is The Triumph of Venice. 4 February 1586 The English courtier and favourite of Queen Elizabeth I of England, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, accepts the title of governor and captain general of the Netherlands, but Queen Elizabeth insists that he resign it. His efforts to centralize authority in the United Netherlands are opposed by the (relatively) more secure Dutch provinces of Holland and Zeeland. 1 July 1586 In the Treaty of Berwick, Queen Elizabeth I of England and King James VI of Scotland undertake to preserve the religious status quo and engage in mutual defence against third parties. James is to receive an annual pension from England. 1586 English explorer Sir Walter Raleigh returns to England after a second failed expedition to the New World, but his expedition brings to England a new vegetable called the potato, destined to become a staple food. The Spanish have already introduced the potato to Europe. 1586 The first British learned society, the Society of Antiquaries, is established.

1586 The Greek-born Spanish artist El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopoulos) paints Burial of Count Orgaz. 8 February 1587 Mary Queen of Scots, queen of Scotland 1542–67, who was deposed because of her marital affairs and political incompetence and was forced to flee to England, is executed in Fotheringhay Castle, Northamptonshire, England (44). 8 February 1587 When Mary Queen of Scots is executed at Fotheringhay Castle, near Northampton, England, Queen Elizabeth I of England, who has washed her hands of Mary after signing her death warrant on 1 February, feigns anger with her over-hasty officials, fining William Davidson, a secretary of state, for sending the warrant to Fotheringhay. The Lord Treasurer, William Cecil, Lord Burghley, remains in disgrace until July. 5 August 1587 The Habsburg governor of the Spanish Netherlands, Alessandro Farnese, Duke of Parma, captures the town of Sluys in the United Netherlands, completing his conquest of the south bank of the River Scheldt, while his adversaries the stadtholder (provincial executive officer) Count Maurice of Nassau and Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, English lieutenant general in the Netherlands, quarrel and Leicester plans an assault on the estates of Holland. 19 August 1587 Sigismund III Vasa, son of King John III of Sweden, is elected king of Poland; he is forced to concede further powers to the Sejm (parliament). A minority supports Maximilian, Archduke of Austria, who invades toward Kraków. 5 March 1588 Henri I de Bourbon, second Prince of Condé, French Huguenot leader, dies in Saint-Jean-d'Angély, France, of wounds received at the Battle of Coutras the previous year (36). 4 April 1588 Christian IV accedes to the throne of Denmark-Norway on the death of King Frederick II. 5 April 1588 Thomas Hobbes, major English philosopher and political theorist, whose best-known work is Leviathan (1651), born in Westport, Wiltshire, England (–1679). 11 July 1588 In the Edict of Union, King Henry III of France capitulates to the Guise Catholic League's demands; he summons the States-General (parliament) to Blois in October, and denies toleration to any Protestant, repudiating King Henry of Navarre, the Huguenot (French Protestant) heir to the throne, in favour of the aged Cardinal Charles de Bourbon, and appointing Henri, Duke of Guise, lieutenant general of the kingdom. 29 July 1588 After being forced to slip anchor when attacked by fire ships at night, the Spanish Armada is defeated by the combined English fleet under Lord Admiral Thomas Howard of Effingham off Gravelines, France. The surviving galleons take to the North Sea; many are subsequently wrecked off the Scottish and Irish coasts.

23 December 1588 King Henry III of France mounts a coup against the Catholic League. He has Henri, Duke of Guise, assassinated at Blois, followed the next day by his brother Cardinal Louis, and takes the Catholic claimant to the throne, Cardinal Charles de Bourbon, prisoner. Charles, Duke of Mayenne, the third Guise brother, assumes leadership of the League. 1588 Giovanni Paolo Gallucci's Theatrum mundi/Theatre of the World features the first star chart marked with a celestial coordinate system. 1588 The English artist Nicholas Hilliard paints the miniature A Youth Among Roses. 1588 Welsh scholar William Morgan publishes Y Beibl Cyssegrlan/The Holy Bible, the first translation of the Bible into Welsh. It has a profound influence on the development (and the survival) of the Welsh language and Welsh literature. 5 January 1589 Catherine de' Medici, Queen Consort of Henry II of France, regent of France 1560–74, mother of Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III of France, one of the most influential figures in the French Wars of Religion, dies in Blois, France (69). 1–2 August 1589 King Henry III of France is stabbed at St Cloud, Paris, France, by Jacques Clément, a fanatical Jacobin monk. On his deathbed the next day he recognizes King Henry of Navarre as his successor. This ends the reign of the House of Valois and inaugurates that of the House of Bourbon. King Philip II of Spain lays claim to the French throne for his daughter Isabella through her mother Elizabeth Valois, Henry III's sister. 1589 The English composer William Byrd publishes Songes of Sundrie Natures, a collection of secular songs. c. 1589 The play The Tragicall History of Doctor Faustus by the English dramatist Christopher Marlowe is first performed, in London, England, played by the Earl of Nottingham's Men (formerly the Admiral's Men). It is first published in 1604. 10 May 1590 Cardinal Charles de Bourbon, the Catholic candidate for the French crown, dies; a welter of contenders advance their claims in his place, including Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, who invades Provence and the Dauphiné. 4 August 1590 The Japanese regent Toyotomi Hideyoshi receives the submission of Hojo Ujimasa, his last significant rival, and completes the subjugation of the north by the end of the year, unifying Japan under his rule. August 1590 English navigator John White returns to resupply the colony he founded three years earlier on Roanoke Island (in present-day North Carolina), North America, but the only trace remaining is the word 'Croatoan' carved on a

tree. 15 September–5 December 1590 Giovanni Battista Castagna is elected as Pope Urban VII, Succeeding Sixtus V who died exactly a month earlier. Pope Urban VII, however, dies after only 13 days in office, and is succeeded in turn by Niccolo Sfondrati on 5 December. 1590 Spanish missionary José de Acosta publishes Historia natural y moral de las Indias/A Natural and Moral History of the Indies. Rich in details of the flora and fauna of the New World as well as accounts of Pre-Columbian civilization, it is read throughout Europe. An English translation appears in 1604. 1590 The dome of St Peter's in Rome, Italy, is completed. The original design of 1546 by Michelangelo (Buonarroti) has been modified by the architect Giacomo della Porta, with the assistance of the architect Domenico Fontana. The Sistine Library in Rome is also completed to Fontana's design. 1590 The English poet Edmund Spenser publishes the first three books of his vast poetic work The Faerie Queene. The final volumes appear in 1596. 1590 The first regular newspaper, the Mercurius Gallobelgicus is printed in London, England, carrying reports of news from continental Europe. 1590 The Italian churchman Nicolo Sfondrati is elected Pope Gregory XIV. He is pope until 1591. 1590 The long prose romance Arcadia by the English courtier and poet Philip Sidney is published posthumously. Most of the book was written in 1580. A new, enlarged edition appears in 1593. 1590–1600 The Chinese warlord Yang Yinglong maintains his rebellion against Ming imperial forces in the Huguang–Sichuan–Guizhou border region of China until veterans of the war in Choson (modern Korea) under Li Hualong annihilate the insurgents. 15 May 1591 Dmitri, son of the late Russian tsar Ivan IV ('the Terrible'), brother and heir of Fyodor I, dies in mysterious circumstances. His throat is cut by a group of mercenaries, and there are rumours that the deed was carried out on behalf of Boris Gudonov, a powerful aristocrat, but no arrests are made. False Dmitris will plague Russia for 20 years. 29 October 1591 Antonio Facchinetti is elected Pope Innocent IX, following the death of Gregory XIV on 16 October. 1591 Astrophel and Stella, a sonnet sequence by the English poet Philip Sidney, is published posthumously. It was probably written in the early 1580s. 1591 The French mathematician François Viète writes In artem analyticam

isagoge/Introduction to the analytical arts, in which he uses letters of the alphabet (x and y are now standard) to represent unknown quantities. Before this, equations had been written out in long descriptive sentences. 1591 The Italian churchman Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti is elected Pope Innocent IX. He is pope for only two months. 1591 The Privy Council orders all theatres in England to be closed on Thursdays because bear baitings generally take place on Thursdays and actors cannot be allowed to prejudice such entertainments by their competition. 30 January 1592 Ippolito Aldobrandini becomes Pope Clement VIII, succeeding Innocent IX who died on 30 December 1591. 15 July 1592 Invading Japanese forces under Konishi Yukinaga defeat the remnants of the royal Choson (Korean) army at the Taedong River and capture Pyongyang. However, guerrilla resistance stiffens and the control of the Japanese over most of the country is nominal as they await an order to invade China. 13 September 1592 Michel de Montaigne, French writer, creator of the essay as a literary genre, dies (59). 27 November 1592 King John III of Sweden dies; he is succeeded by his son Sigismund III Vasa, Catholic king of Poland, as King Sigismund I. The Lutheran clergy and nobility prepare to resist any attempts at re-Catholicization. 3 December 1592 When Alessandro Farnese, duke of Parma and Habsburg governor of the Spanish Netherlands, dies before his uncle King Philip II of Spain can sack Him, having failed to subdue the revolutionary regime of the United Netherlands in the north, he has, however, succeeded in reconquering the southern Netherlands (modern Belgium) for Spain and Catholicism. Ernst, archduke of Austria, is eventually appointed governor in his place. January 1593 A huge Chinese imperial army under Li Rusong enters Korea in support of the vassal Choson state; it pushes the invading Japanese forces back to Seoul. 9 May 1593 The Chinese-Japanese war in Choson (Korea) having reached stalemate in bitter fighting outside the Choson capital Seoul, Shen Weijing, the Chinese emissary, and Konishi Yukinaga, the Japanese commander, agree a ceasefire; the Japanese are to evacuate Seoul but retain a bridgehead at Pusan. 30 May 1593 Christopher Marlowe, Elizabethan poet and dramatist, who established blank verse as a dramatic medium in plays such as Dr Faustus and Tamburlaine the Great, killed in a brawl in Deptford, London, England (29). 25 July 1593 Declaring 'Paris vaut bien une messe ' ('Paris is well worth a Mass'), King Henry IV of France abjures Calvinism to become a Roman Catholic, hearing

Mass at St Denis. A truce with the Catholic League follows in five days, and Henry enters Paris. December 1593 King Henry IV of France issues the Edict of Nantes, secretly (and provisionally) granting the Huguenot (French Protestant) assembly all the concessions of the various previous edicts of pacification. A further Huguenot assembly held at Sainte-Foy in June demands rights to its enforcement in the face of continued Catholic League persecution in the provinces, and full equality in public life for Huguenots. 1593 The English dramatist William Shakespeare publishes the poem 'Venus and Adonis'. 22 March 1594 King Henry IV of France enters Paris, France. Though resistance to his rule continues for some years in the provinces, and popular rebellion against noble and royal exactions is fiercer than ever, the country gradually submits to him as the Catholic League withers. 1594 The Italian artist Tintoretto (Jacopo Robusti) completes his painting The Last Supper. 16 January 1595 The Ottoman sultan Murad III dies; he is succeeded by his son Mehmed III, though Mehmed's mother Safiye Sultan continues to hold much of the power in the Porte. 17 January 1595 King Henry IV of France declares war on Spain, King Philip II of Spain having tried to enforce the claims of a Spanish pretender to the French throne. September 1595 Wladyslaw IV Vasa, King of Poland 1632–48, who secured Poland against the Russians and Ottomans, born in Kraków, Poland (–1648). 25–27 October 1595 The allied forces of Sigismund Báthory and Michael the Brave, Princes of Transylvania and Wallachia, destroy the Ottoman army in Wallachia at Giurgiu, on the River Danube, and expel them from the province. Their Habsburg imperial allies capture the fortress of Gran (Esztergom) in Hungary. 1595 An Apologie for Poetrie (often entitled The Defence of Poetry) by the English poet Philip Sidney is published posthumously. 1595 The English poet Edmund Spenser publishes Amoretti, a sonnet sequence, 'Epithalamion', an ode on marriage, and 'Colin Clout's Come Home Again', an autobiographical poem. c. 1595 The English poet John Donne writes many of his best-known poems over the next five or six years, including 'Go and Catch a Falling Star', 'The Canonization', 'Thous Hast Made Me', and 'Death Be Not Proud'.

28 January 1596 Sir Francis Drake, most famous English admiral of the Elizabethan Age, circumnavigator of the globe, dies at sea off Puerto Belo, Panama (c. 50). 31 March 1596 René Descartes, French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, considered to be the founder of modern philosophy, whose bestknown work is Discours de la méthode/Discourse on Method (1637), born in La Haye, Touraine, France (–1650). March–July 1596 Jean Louis de Nogaret de la Valette, Duke of Epernon and former favourite of the late king Henry III of France, submits to King Henry IV; with the death of Jacques de Savoie, Duke of Nemours, in July, the Rhône Valley is secured for Henry, though Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, remains hostile in the Alps. 16 May 1596 The Dutch statesman Johan van Oldenbarneveldt, Advocaat of Holland, mediates in the formation of a triple alliance against Spain; England, France, and the United Netherlands sign a formal treaty at Greenwich, London, England, against their mutual enemy. 1596 The first wheeled vehicles are introduced to the New World by Spanish colonists. March–August 1597 Count Maurice of Nassau, stadtholder (provincial executive officer) of the Dutch provinces of Gelderland and Overijssel, with a small and highly mobile army, takes many towns on the eastern frontiers of the United Provinces from the Spanish Habsburgs, including Rheinfelden and Moers on the River Rhine and Lingen on the River Ems. 1597 English statesman and writer Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam, publishes Essays: Civil and Moral, his first book of essays. A second, enlarged edition appears in 1612. 1597 Shah Abbas I the Great of Safavid Persia's new Ghulam army (comprising slave Circassian and Georgian converts) defeats the Uzbekhs to secure the disputed province of Khorasan (in modern Afghanistan). He makes Esfahan his new capital, building magnificent new palaces and mosques and encouraging carpet manufacture. 1597 The English composer John Dowland publishes his first Book of Songs and Ayers. 9 February 1598 The English Parliament is dissolved, having enacted a Poor Law statute whose basic tenets are followed until 1834. Parish tithes for the relief of destitution through the institution of workhouses and the appointment of 'Guardians of the Poor' complement regularized punishments for 'undeserving' socalled 'Sturdy Beggars'.

17 February 1598 Boris Godunov, brother-in-law of the late tsar Fyodor I, is elected tsar of Russia by the Zemsky Sobor (council of Boyars); to strengthen his position he forces the head of the rival Romanov family into a monastery. 20 March 1598 By the Treaty of Ponts-de-Cé, Philippe-Emmanuel, Duke of Mercoeur, leader of the Catholic League in Brittany, submits to King Henry IV of France for 4 million livres and the hand of Henry's illegitimate son, the Duke of Vendôme for his daughter, ending French Catholic resistance to Henry IV. 13 April 1598 King Henry IV of France promulgates the Edict of Nantes; the Huguenots (French Protestants) are granted freedom of worship in those places permitted by the 1577 Edict of Poitiers and the treaties of 1579–80, and one other in each Sénéchaussée and Baillage, with pastors salaried by the crown. Huguenot courts, Chambres de l'édit, are established and their representation is assured in the Parlements and in public office. They are to abandon alliances with foreign powers, sectarian armies, and dissolve their provincial assemblies. The chaos of the French Wars of Religion ends. April–October 1598 The Japanese regent Toyotomi Hideyoshi, warned by Konishi Yukinaga of the futility of the Korean campaign, recalls half the forces, leaving Shimazu Yoshihiro at the head of the Satsuma levies of Kyushi to repel Chinese attacks, until Hideyoshi's death on 18 September leads to their withdrawal. 13 September 1598 Philip II, king of Spain 1556–98, and king of Portugal 1580–98, who brought Spain to the zenith of its power, dies in El Escorial, Spain (71). 18 September 1598 Toyotomi Hideyoshi (original name Hiyo-Shimaru, also known as Hashiba Chikuzen no kami), Japanese military leader, feudal lord, and chief imperial minister 1585–98 who completed the unification of Japan, dies in Fushimi, Japan (c. 61). 1598 A United Netherlands expedition lands on and claims the uninhabited island of Mauritius (named after Count Maurice of Nassau) in the Indian Ocean; it becomes the first Dutch colony. 1598 The comedy Every Man in his Humour by the English dramatist Ben Jonson is first performed, in London, England. It is presented by the Lord Chamberlain's Men, with William Shakespeare as one of the actors. It is first published in 1600. 1598 The poem Hero and Leander by the English dramatist Christopher Marlowe is published posthumously (having been completed after Marlowe's death by George Chapman). 10 April 1599 Gabrielle d'Estrées, Duchess of Etampes, the mistress of King Henry IV of France, de-facto queen, and sponsor of his conversion to Catholicism and appointment of Maximilien de Béthune, Marquis Rosny (later Duke of Sully) as superintendent of finance, dies.

25 April 1599 Oliver Cromwell, English soldier and statesman, commander of parliamentarian forces in the English Civil Wars (1642–51), Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland 1653–58, born in Huntingdon, England (–1658). 8–28 September 1599 Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, after dilatory campaigning, signs a truce with the Irish rebel Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, and, against orders, leaves Ireland, arriving at the court at Nonsuch on 28 September, where he is arrested. 22–30 June 1600 Count Maurice of Nassau leads an army to the United Netherlands enclave of Ostend (Oostende) in Flanders, for an offensive against Dunkirk (Dunkerque) and Nieupoort in the Spanish Netherlands; Archduke Albert's Army of Flanders defeats him before he attacks Nieupoort (30 June). When the Flemish fail to rise in support, Maurice retreats to Holland. 6 August 1600 King Henry IV of France leads an invasion of the duchy of Savoy following the breakdown of negotiations for the return of the town of Saluzzo, which Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, annexed in 1588. 20 October 1600 The 'Eastern Army' under Tokugawa Ieyasu, the leader of the ruling regency council in Japan, annihilates the rebel coalition, the 'Western Army', led by Ishida Matsunari, claiming to act for the underage Toyotomi Hideyori, at the pass of Sekigahara. Tokugawa hegemony is established in Japan. 19 November 1600 Charles I, King of Great Britain and Ireland 1625–49, whose authoritarian rule provoked the English Civil Wars (1642–51), born in Dunfermline Palace, Fife, Scotland (–1649). 1600 Around this time, the compound microscope, which uses two lenses to magnify objects, is invented – probably by Hans Lippershey or Hans Jansen and his son Zacharias, both spectacle makers from Middelburg in the Netherlands. c. 1600 The female Japanese dancer Okuni develops kabuki, a popular form of theatre that employs music and dancing and depicts scenes of everyday life (unlike the formal Noh theatre). c. 1600 The Italian artist Caravaggio (Michelangelo Merisi) paints The Supper at Emmaus. 17 January 1601 King Henry IV of France hurriedly ends the war in the duchy of Savoy, threatened by Spanish intervention; the Treaty of Lyons cedes Bresse, Bugey, and Gex to France, connecting it with Swiss Confederation. Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy, retains Saluzzo and the 'Spanish Road' from Italy to Flanders via Franche-Comté is secured by guarantees. 27 September 1601 Louis XIII the Just, King of France 1610–43 who, together with the Cardinal de Richelieu, greatly increased his country's political power, born in Fontainebleau, France (–1643).

24 October 1601 Tycho Brahe, leading Danish astronomer, teacher of Johannes Kepler, dies in Prague, Bohemia (54). 1 November 1601 Tokugawa Ieyasu, the leader of the ruling regency council in Japan, enters Osaka Castle on the island of Honshu, Japan, and carries out a redistribution of fiefs to ensure that no other daimyo (warlord) can challenge his hegemony. He decides to make Edo (modern Tokyo) his capital. 1601 Captain James Lancaster of the East India Company provides his crew with lemon juice and citrus fruits, avoiding an outbreak of scurvy, the deficiency disease that devastates the crews of other ships in his trade mission. 1601 The Spanish dramatist Lope Félix de Vega (Carpio) publishes the comedy El castigo del discreto/The Wise Man's Punishment. c. 1601 The Italian artist Caravaggio (Michelangelo Merisi) paints The Conversion of Saint Paul. 14 July 1602 Jules Mazarin, cardinal, diplomat, and statesman, first minister of France 1642–61, born in Pescina, Abruzzi, Italy (–1661). 1602 The Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe's Astronomia instauratae progymnasmata/Introducing Exercises toward a Restored Astronomy is published posthumously, giving accurate positions for 777 fixed stars and a description of the 1572 supernova in Cassiopeia. 24 March 1603 Following the death of Queen Elizabeth I of England, King James VI of Scotland succeeds as James I of England and Ireland, retaining Robert Cecil as secretary of state. 24 March 1603 Queen Elizabeth I, queen of England 1558–1603, daughter of Henry VIII, whose reign saw growth in England's political and economic power, as well as major achievements in the arts, dies in Richmond, Surrey, England (69). 30 March 1603 The Irish rebel Hugh O'Neill, fugitive Earl of Tyrone, finally submits to the English Lord Deputy of Ireland Charles Blount, Lord Mountjoy, at Mellifort; Kinsale, the rebellion ends, and a general amnesty follows. 1603 Triumphs of Oriana, an anthology of madrigals compiled by the English composer Thomas Morley, is published posthumously. Dedicated to Queen Elizabeth I, it was compiled in 1601. 1603 An alliance is signed between King Henry IV of France, Venice, and the Swiss peasant republic of the Graubünden (Grisons or Grey League), which controls the Valtelline passes into Italy – a strategic link in the 'Spanish Road' between the Habsburg possessions in Italy, Austria, and the Netherlands. 1603 The façade of the Church of Santa Susanna in Rome, designed by the Italian

architect Carlo Maderno, is completed. It foreshadows the baroque style. 1603 The German astronomer Johann Bayer publishes his Uranometria star atlas, the most detailed yet, including the 12 new southern constellations, and introducing the practice of giving the stars Greek identifiers. 14–16 January 1604 King James I of England and Archbishop John Whitgift hold the Hampton Court Conference to reconcile differences between Puritans and Anglican bishops. Attended by the bishops and leading Puritans it is intended to settle doctrine and practice. Though the king refuses to consider changes to these, he supports the request for a new translation of the Bible (published in 1611), Jesuits are expelled from England, and some changes are made to the Book of Common Prayer. 18 August 1604 A peace is signed between England, Spain, and the archdukes, allodial rulers of the Spanish Netherlands; King James I of England will give no further aid to the United Netherlands, will work to promote its submission to Spain and the archdukes, and will permit recruitment for the Spanish Habsburg Army of Flanders. England receives various trading privileges but undertakes not to trade in the West Indies. 17 October 1604 King James I writes his Counterblast to Tobacco, condemning the increasingly popular habit of smoking in Britain. It is published anonymously. He also imposes a heavy duty on the importing of tobacco. 1604 Italian anatomist Hieronymus Fabricius of Acquapendente publishes De formata foetu/On the Formation of the Fetus, the first important study of embryology, in which the placenta is identified for the first time. 1604 The English composer John Dowland publishes Lachrymae, or Seaven Teares Figured in Seaven Passionate Pavans, works for lute, viols, and violins. 1604 The Italian scientist Galileo Galilei discovers a law of falling bodies, proving that gravity acts with the same strength on all objects, independent of their mass. 1 April 1605 Alessandro Ottaviano de' Medici is elected Pope Leo XI following the death of Clement VIII on 5 March; however, he dies on 27 April. Camillo Borghese is elected Pope Paul V on 16 May. 13 April 1605 Boris (Fyodorovich) Godunov, tsar of Muscovy 1598–1605, whose reign saw the start of the 'Time of Troubles' (1598–1613), dies in Moscow, Russia (c. 54). 13 April 1605 Following the sudden death of Boris Godunov, tsar of Muscovy, he is succeeded by his son Fyodor II. Fyodor's mother attempts to control the situation as the chaos of the 'Time of Troubles' mounts. 10–21 June 1605 With the 'false Dmitri' (the monk Grigorii Otrepiev) at the gates

of Moscow, the Russian tsar Fyodor II Godunov is murdered by a Muscovite mob incited by the boyar (noble) faction of Vasily Shuysky. 'Dmitri' is crowned tsar by the army on 21 June and begins radical reforms. 17 October 1605 Akbar, Mogul emperor of India 1556–1605, who brought most of India under Mogul rule, dies in Agra, India (c. 63). 4 November 1605 The Catholic Gunpowder Plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament during King James I of England's state opening of Parliament is discovered; Guy Fawkes is arrested in the cellars. Robert Catesby and other conspirators are caught at Holbeche House, Staffordshire, where Catesby dies in the affray (8 November). 1605 English statesman and writer Francis Bacon, Baron Verulam, publishes The Advancement of Learning. It is the first part of his project to develop a more systematic, scientific basis for knowledge. The second part appears in 1620. 1605 The first railway in Britain is installed at Sir Francis Willoughby's mines at Woolaston, Nottinghamshire. 1605 The Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes (Saavedra) publishes part one of El ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha/The Ingenious Knight Don Quixote de la Mancha. The second part appears in 1615. c. 1605 The tragedy Othello, the Moor of Venice by the English dramatist William Shakespeare is first performed, in London, England. It is first published in 1622. 27 January 1606 The English conspirator Guy Fawkes, a veteran of the Spanish Habsburg Army of Flanders, and his accomplices in the Catholic Gunpowder Plot to blow up King James I and Parliament, are executed for treason in London, England (Guy Fawkes, c. 36). March 1606 When King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland, at war with his uncle King Charles IX of Sweden, demands a large standing army and the funds to maintain it from the Polish Sejm (parliament), resistance crystallizes around a series of congresses held by Mikolaj Zebrzydowski, governor of Kraków. Eventually, he leads his supporters into armed rebellion and civil war. 17–19 May 1606 The Russian tsar, the 'false Dmitri', is murdered in another Moscow uprising, sponsored by his erstwhile backer Vasily Shuysky returning from a banishment promoted by Dmitri's Polish wife Marina Mniszek. Shuysky usurps the throne; he gains the support of his fellow boyars (nobles) by promising rule through a duma (parliament) and is proclaimed Tsar Vasily IV on 19 May. 15 July 1606 Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn, Dutch painter, often regarded as one of the greatest in history, born in Leiden, United Netherlands (–1669).

11 November 1606 István Bocskay, Prince of Transylvania, succeeds in his mediation of a peace between the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II and the Ottoman sultan Ahmed I at the conference of Zsitvatörök; the Habsburg tribute to the Ottomans for Royal Hungary ceases after a final 'gift' of 200,000 gulden, and Ahmed recognizes the emperor as an equal. The Habsburgs abandon suzerainty over Transylvania to the Turks. 1606 The Australian aboriginal population is around 300,000. c. 1606 The comedy Volpone, or The Fox by the English dramatist Ben Jonson is first performed, in London, England, played by the King's Men. It is first published in 1607. 1606–1657 The 1606 peace treaties between the Habsburg and Ottoman empires lead to half a century of peace and stability in Hungary; no major campaigns are fought between the two, though frontier skirmishes and raids are endemic, and Transylvania develops into a rich regional power. 6 July 1607 King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland's royal forces destroy the rebel army under Mikolaj Zebrzydowski, governor of Kraków, at Guzów, though resistance continues into the following year. 1607 The Italian churchman and historian Cesare Baronius publishes the last volume of his Annales ecclesiastici a Christo nato ad annum 1198/The History of the Church from the Birth of Christ to 1198. The first critical church history, it has been written to refute the 1559 Magdeburg Centuries of the Protestants. The first volume appeared in 1588. 1607 The opera La favola d'Orfeo/The Legend of Orpheus by the Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi is first performed, in Mantua, Italy. 1607–1700 Fruits introduced to the North American colonies from England include apples, which adapt well in New England, and peaches, which grow easily in Virginia and other warmer regions. Native vegetables like pumpkins, squash, and beans are favoured over European vegetables. 25 June 1608 The Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II is compelled by the advance of an archducal army into Bohemia to cede Austria, Hungary, and Moravia to his brother Archduke Matthias of Austria and to promise him the succession to Bohemia in the Treaty of Lieben. 9 December 1608 John Milton, English poet, scholar, historian, and republican whose best-known work is Paradise Lost (1667), born in London, England (–1674). 1608 The play The Revenger's Tragedy (probably by the English dramatist Cyril Tourneur) is published. It is one of the finest of the Jacobean 'revenge tragedies'. 22 September 1609 The Duke of Lerma, chief minister of King Philip III of Spain, orders the expulsion of the Moriscos (Muslims forcibly converted to Christianity),

many of whom have continued to practice Islam; some 300,000 are made refugees to the Maghreb during the next five years. September 1609 King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland declares war on Russia, following Tsar Vasily IV Shuysky's alliance with Sweden earlier in the year, and supports his son Wladyslaw's claim to the Russian throne. Polish forces under Jan Karol Chodkiewicz, Hetman (general commander), relieve Riga, Livonia (modern Latvia), from a siege by King Charles IX of Sweden as Sigismund III leads a siege of Smolensk, Russia. 1609 Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei, having obtained a Dutch telescope, makes his own instruments, including one that magnifies objects 32 times. They are the first telescopes that can be used for astronomical observation. 1609 The Sonnets of English dramatist William Shakespeare are published. Most were written before 1600. 1609 The English composer Orlando Gibbons publishes Fantazies of Three Parts for viols, possibly the first example of engraved music in England. 1609 The German astronomer Johannes Kepler publishes his Astronomia nova/ New Astronomy, which describes the orbit of Mars accurately and includes his first two laws of planetary motion which state that all planets move in elliptical orbits around the Sun, and that they sweep out equal areas in equal times. 17 April 1610–22 June 1611 The English explorer Henry Hudson, jointly commissioned by the Muscovy and East India Companies to discover a Northwest Passage to the Pacific, explores Hudson Bay, North America, but is cast adrift by a mutinous crew after the voyage becomes aimless. 14 May 1610 François Ravaillac, a Catholic fanatic in the pay of Jean Louis de la Nogaret de la Valette, Duke of Epernon, assassinates King Henry IV of France, who is succeeded by his nine-year-old son Louis XIII, with Marie de' Medici, the queen mother, as regent. The projected war with the Habsburgs is forgotten. 14 May 1610 Henry IV, first Bourbon king of France 1589–1610, dies in Paris, France (56). 18 July 1610 Caravaggio (real name Michelangelo Merisi), outstanding Italian baroque painter, whose major works include The Supper at Emmaus (1596–98) and Death of the Virgin (1605–06), dies in Porto Ercole, Tuscany, Italy (c. 37). 19 July 1610 The Russian tsar Vasily IV Shuysky is deposed by the Muscovites, following the defeat of his Swedish allies by the Poles. The conservative boyars (nobles), fearing the rule of the second 'false Dmitri', offer the throne to Wladyslaw, son of King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland. October 1610 King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland decides on personal control of

Russia and continues his war on the boyar (noble) council in Moscow and his son Wladyslaw, whom they have installed as tsar. 1610 Dances that originated in the Spanish colonies in Central America find their way into Europe via Spain. They include the sarabande, originally a very suggestive dance that was considered obscene in Spain but that was changed to a stately slow dance popular in France. 1610 French chemist Jean Beguin publishes Tyrocinium chymicum/An introduction to chemistry, the first textbook on chemistry rather than alchemy. 1610 The Dutch theologian Jacobus Arminius issues the Remonstrance of 1610, setting out his belief that free will is compatible with the sovereignty of God. This view, which becomes known as Arminianism or the Arminian heresy, is condemned by the Synod of Dort (an assembly of the Dutch Reformed Church) in 1619. 1610 The Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei publishes Sidereus nuncius/The Starry Messenger, revealing his telescopic discoveries, including the moons of Jupiter, the phases of Venus, sunspots, and the curious shape of Saturn. c. 1610 Tea is introduced into Europe, by a Dutch East India Company ship returning from Macau, China. 4 April 1611 King Christian IV of Denmark forces the Riksråd (parliament) to declare war on Sweden (the War of Kalmar), hoping to reconquer the country. Danish forces take the Swedish port of Kalmar and the mouth of the Göta River the following month. 11 September 1611 Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne, French military leader, marshal of France 1643–68, born in Sedan, France (–1675). December 1611 The Swedish Riksdag (parliament), meeting at Nyköping, is able to extract concessions as the price of electing Gustavus II (Gustavus Adolphus), son of Charles IX, King of Sweden. Charles's brother John, Duke of Östergötland, abjures the throne. The new king appoints Axel Oxenstjerna as chancellor. 1611 The first permanent British East India Company outpost 'factory' (trading station) in India is established on the east coast at Masulipatam (modern Machilipatnam), in the sultanate of Golconda. 1611 The Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens paints The Raising of the Cross. 1611 The German astronomer Johannes Kepler publishes his Dioptrice/On Refraction, describing his investigations of light and optics. 1611 The German astronomer Simon Marius is the first to observe the Andromeda Nebula. He also discovers the four moons of Jupiter independently of Galileo,

and names them Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. October 1612 Sweden, under King Gustavus II Adolphus, fights the Danish invasion of the War of Kalmar to a halt; Sweden preserves its independence. 1612 German mystic Jakob Böhme publishes Aurora, oder, Morgenröte im Aufgang/Aurora, or the Coming of Dawn. His first book, it is condemned by the Lutherans. 1612 The English poet John Donne writes On the Progress of the Soul, an elegy. 1612 The façade of Saint Peter's, designed by the Italian architect Carlo Maderno, is completed in the Vatican, Rome. 20 January 1613 The Peace of Knäred, mediated by King James I of England, ends the War of Kalmar between Denmark and Sweden; Denmark gains acknowledgement of its claim to Finnmark and retains Älvsborg for four years as security against reparations of $1 million. 21 February 1613 After the expulsion of the Poles from Moscow, the Zemsky Sobor (council of Boyars), elects the Boyar Michael Romanov as tsar of Russia (the founder of the Romanov dynasty). 19 February 1614 Rebel French nobles led by Henri II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, supported by the Dukes of Nevers, Mayenne, Bouillon, and Longueville, raise armies in rebellion against the regime of the queen mother Marie de' Medici and her Italian favourite Concino Concini; there is widespread support for the rebels in view of the unpopularity of the projected Spanish marriage of the young Louis XIII, the evidence of maladministration, and the failure to summon the Estates General (parliament). 7 April 1614 El Greco (Domenikos Theotokopoulos), celebrated Greco-Spanish painter, whose major works include View of Toledo (c. 1610) and The Adoration of the Shepherds (1612–14), dies in Toledo, Spain (c. 73). 15 May 1614 The French rebel princes, led by Henri II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, win many of their demands from the administration in the Peace of St Menehould; the young king Louis XIII undertakes to summon the Estates General (parliament). October 1614–March 1615 The French Estates General (parliament), summoned after the rebellion of the princes against the regime of the queen mother Marie de' Medici and her Italian favourite Concino Concini, meets for the last time before 1789 in Paris, France; it dissolves in wrangling between the three estates. 1614 Italian artist Guido Reni paints the fresco Aurora in the Casino Rospigliosi in Rome.

1614 The Scottish mathematician John Napier invents logarithms, a method for doing difficult calculations quickly. His results are published in Mirifici logarithmorum canonis descriptio/Description of the Marvellous Rule of Logarithms. May–June 1615 The Tokugawa forces led by the de-facto Japanese shogun (military ruler) Tokugawa Ieyasu conduct a continuous assault, the 'Summer Siege', on Osaka Castle until the rebel leader Toyotomi Hideyori commits suicide rather than submitting. This finally secures the rule of the Edo Bakufu (shogun). 9 August 1615 Renewed civil war breaks out in France, in which Henri II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé is in league with the Huguenots (French Protestants) led by Henri, Duke of Rohan, against the queen mother Marie de' Medici and Concino Concini, Marquis of Ancre, Marshal of France. 1615 Bunraku theatre develops in Japan when puppet theatre (practised for many centuries) is combined with the music of the shamisen (a stringed instrument). 1615 The Town Hall of Augsburg, Germany, designed by the German architect Elias Holl, is completed. It is one of the first true Renaissance buildings in Germany. 22 April 1616 Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, celebrated Spanish novelist, dramatist and poet, whose best-known work is Don Quixote (1605, 1615), dies in Madrid, Spain (68). 23 April 1616 William Shakespeare, English dramatist and poet, often considered the greatest playwright in history, dies in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England (52). 3 May 1616 The Treaty of Loudun ends the French rebellion against the administration and the accompanying civil war; it grants an amnesty and large payments to the rebels, and installs Henri II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, as head of the Council, but no concessions are made to the Huguenots (French Protestants); the unpopular Concino Concini remains in power as marshal of France. 1 June 1616 The Japanese de-facto shogun (military ruler) Tokugawa Ieyasu dies, handing de-facto as well as formal rule to his son Tokugawa Hidetada, shogun in name since 1605. 1 June 1616 Tokugawa Ieyasu (original name Tokugawa Takechiyo), Japanese shogun (military ruler), founder of the Tokugawa (or Edo) shogunate, dies in Edo (now Tokyo), Japan (73). 1616 The Copernican belief in a heliocentric (Sun-centred) Solar System is declared false by the Roman Catholic Church.

1616 The Dutch painter Frans Hals paints The Banquet of the Officers of the Archers of Saint George. 1616 The pamphlet Chymische Hochzeit/The Chemical Wedding appears under the pseudonym Christian Rosenkreutz, written by the German theologian Johann Valentin Andreä. The secret (and fictitious) religious society the pamphlets describe causes a great deal of interest throughout Europe and leads to the creation of the Rosicrucian society. 27 February 1617 Russia and Sweden sign the Peace of Stolbovo. Under the peace treaty, Sweden's king Gustavus II Adolphus recognizes Tsar Michael I Romanov and surrenders his capture of Novgorod, but obtains Karelia and Ingria – turning the Gulf of Finland into a Swedish lake and cutting Russia off from the Baltic. 4 April 1617 John Napier (or Neper), Scottish mathematician and theologian who developed the concept of logarithms, dies in Merchiston Castle, near Edinburgh, Scotland (67). 24 April 1617 Concino Concini, Marquis of Ancre, the favourite of Marie de' Medici, the queen mother and regent of France, is assassinated by order of her son Louis XIII, who installs Charles d'Albret, Duke of Luynes, as chief minister. Marie de' Medici, exiled to Blois, gathers round her opponents of Luynes and is joined by the bishop of Luçon, Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu (Cardinal Richelieu from 1622). 28 February 1618 Maurice of Nassau, stadtholder of the United Netherlands, succeeds as Prince of Orange on the death of his brother, Philip William. 23 May 1618 Protestant rebels led by Count Heinrich von Thurn assault King Ferdinand II of Bohemia's councillors Jaroslav Martinic and Vilém Slawata. The councillors flee after being thrown out of a window in Hradcany Castle in Prague. The incident, known as the Defenestration of Prague, marks the beginning of the Thirty Years' War. 29 October 1618 On his return to England from his expedition to Guiana, the English courtier and navigator Walter Raleigh is beheaded in the Tower of London, England, for his alleged part in a conspiracy to overthrow King James I in 1603 (c. 64). However, Raleigh's execution comes partly because he failed to find gold on the Orinoco River and partly because he sacked a Spanish settlement in Guiana – an action for which King Philip III of Spain demanded that Raleigh be punished. 3 November 1618 Aurangzeb, Mogul emperor of India 1658–1707, born in Dhod, Malwa, India (–1707). 24 December 1618 Poland signs a two-year truce with Sweden (afterwards extended to July 1621). The Poles also sign a 14-year truce with the Ottoman Empire.

1618 King James I of England and VI of Scotland issues a 'declaration to his subjects concerning lawful sports to be used', known widely as the Book of Sports. Sports such as football are prohibited, but in permitting a number of others, he fails to quell Puritan objections to the playing of games and other recreations. 1618 The first pawn shop is set up, in Brussels, in the Spanish Netherlands. 1618 The Queen's House at Greenwich, London, England, designed by the English architect Inigo Jones, is completed. It one of the first truly Renaissance buildings in Britain. 1618 The Spanish artist Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velázquez paints Old Woman Frying Eggs and Christ in the House of Martha. 7 January 1619 Nicholas Hilliard, first great English portraitist and miniaturist of the Renaissance, dies in London, England (c. 72). 23 February 1619 The Synod of Dort, held in Dordrecht, the United Netherlands, ends. The meeting of Dutch Reformed Church ministers has condemned the 'liberal' Calvinist Remonstrants and adopted the strict Five Points of Calvinism. 6 March 1619 Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac, French satirist and dramatist, the subject of many romantic legends, whose best-known works include Histoire comique des états et empires de la lune/Comic History of the States and Empires of the Moon (1656), born in Paris, France (–1655). 20 March 1619 The Holy Roman Emperor Matthias II dies; his heir, Archduke Ferdinand of Styria, King of Bohemia, King of Hungary, is formally elected as Matthias's successor in August. 30 July 1619 Limited representative government comes to the colony of Virginia, North America, in the form of a House of Burgesses, whose decrees are subject to approval by the English crown. This is the first such assembly in North America. 19 August 1619 The Bohemian diet (legislative assembly) deposes the Habsburg heir, King Ferdinand, from the throne. 26 August 1619 The Bohemian diet (legislative assembly) elects Frederick V, the Elector Palatine, as king of Bohemia. 29 August 1619 Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Marquis de Seignelay, French statesman and controller of finance for France 1665–83, whose programme of economic reconstruction led to France becoming a dominant European power, born in Reims, France (–1683).

August 1619 Gabor Bethlen, the Protestant prince of Transylvania, invades Hungary. He is acting partly in response to pleas from the Bohemian rebels, and partly to further his own ambitions to wrest the Hungarian crown from the Habsburgs. September 1619 The Treaty of Angoulême ends the dispute between King Louis XIII of France and the queen mother Marie de' Medici. Louis grants an amnesty to his mother's supporters and restores places captured from his mother, advantageous terms secured through Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu's diplomacy. To cement his own position with the court, Richelieu arranges a marriage between his niece and the nephew of the chief minister Charles d'Albret, Duke of Luynes. July 1620 Troops from the Spanish Netherlands, under the Italian general Ambrogio di Spinola, attack the Palatinate. The attack comes in the wake of the defeat (by the Spanish viceroy in Milan) of Protestants holding the Valtelline Pass in the Alps, and marks the ascendancy of the imperial coalition. August 1620 Armand Jean du Plessis de Richelieu (Cardinal Richelieu from 1622) negotiates peace in France between the rebellious nobles and the crown. Marie de' Medici, the queen mother, is reconciled to her son, King Louis XIII. Once the rebellion, led by the Duke of Mayenne, comes to an end, Louis XIII enters Béarn, which is reunited with the French crown. 8 November 1620 King Frederick V of Bohemia flees Prague after troops of the Catholic League, led by Count Johan Tserclaus von Tilly, defeat the Bohemian army, led by Christian of Anhalt, at the Battle of the White Mountain, near Prague. After the battle, Ferdinand is restored to the Bohemian throne, leading rebels are executed, and Protestant clergymen are expelled. c. 1620 The Italian artist Artemisia Gentileschi paints Judith Beheading Holofernes. c. 1620 The Mogul artist Padarath paints the miniature The Mountain Sheep. 9 February 1621 Alessandro Ludovisi, cardinal of Bologna, is elected Pope Gregory XV, following the death of Pope Paul V on 28 January. 31 March 1621 Philip IV becomes king of Spain on the death of Philip III. He appoints Gaspar de Guzmán, Conde-Duque of Olivares and nephew of Baltazar Zuñiga, former envoy of Prague, as his chief minister. August 1621 The Twelve Years Truce (of April 1609) between the United Netherlands and Spain comes to an end and war is resumed. 8 September 1621 Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, French noble, leader of the last of the Fronde uprisings (1648–53), later an outstanding general under King Louis XIV, born (–1686).

1621 English scholar Robert Burton publishes The Anatomy of a Melancholy, a medical treatise on depression that brings together a wealth of curious lore and scholarship. 15 January 1622 Molière (real name Jean-Baptiste Poquelin), French comic dramatist, whose best-known works include Le Tartuffe, ou l'imposteur/ Tartuffe, or the Impostor (1664) and L'Avare/The Miser (1668), born in Paris, France (–1673). 18 October 1622 The Treaty of Montpellier ends the rebellion of the Huguenots (French Protestants). The 1598 Edict of Nantes is confirmed. The French towns of La Rochelle and Montauban are left under Huguenot control, but all political meetings are prohibited. 1622 English mathematician William Oughtred invents an early form of circular slide rule, adapting the principle behind Scottish mathematician John Napier's 'bones'. 19 June 1623 Blaise Pascal, French mathematician and physicist who founded the theory of probability, and invented the first digital calculator, the syringe, and hydraulic press, born in Clermont-Ferrand, France (–1662). 6 August 1623 Maffeo Barberini is elected Pope Urban VIII following the death of Pope Gregory XV on 8 July; fearing the growth of Habsburg power, he leans towards France. 6 August 1623 The army of Christian of Brunswick is annihilated by the forces of Count Johan Tserclaus von Tilly at Stadtlohn, giving the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II complete control of Austria and Bohemia. The plan by Gabor Bethlen, Prince of Transylvania, to invade Austrian territory lies in shreds. 1623 Iemitsu, the third Tokugawa shogun (military ruler) of Japan, succeeds Hidetada. Iemitsu later bars trade with the West and suppresses Christianity in Japan. 1623 Italian philosopher Tommaso di Campanella publishes La città del sole/The City of the Sun, which describes his conception of utopia. 1623 The English philosopher Francis Bacon, Baron Verulam, publishes De augmentis scientarum/On the Increase of Knowledge, an expanded version of an earlier work, dealing with the philosophy of science and the nature of scientific knowledge. June 1624 After the Virginia Company of London goes bankrupt, the English crown annuls its charter and claims Virginia, North America, as a royal colony. The limited representative government established in the summer of 1619 remains in effect.

July 1624 George Fox, English preacher and missionary, founder of the Society of Friends (Quakers), born in Drayton-in-the-Clay, Leicestershire, England (–1691). 1624 English poet John Donne publishes Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, a selection of his prayers and meditations. 1624 English settlers under Thomas Warner establish a colony on the Caribbean island of St Christopher (St Kitts). 1624 The Dutch West India Company begins to operate in South America and West Africa, largely in defiance of the Portuguese. 1624 The Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini sculpts David. 27 March 1625 James VI of Scotland (1567–1625) and I of England (1603–1625), son of Mary Queen of Scots, dies in Theobalds, Hertfordshire, England (58). 27 March 1625 Prince Charles becomes King Charles I of England, Ireland, and Scotland on the death of his father James I of England and Ireland (usually described as James I of England) and VI of Scotland. 1 May 1625 King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland marries Henrietta Maria, sister of King Louis XIII of France, by proxy; George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, stands in for the king at the ceremony in Paris, France. 23 September 1625 Johan de Witt, Dutch statesman, political leader of the United Netherlands (1653–72), who led his country during the First and Second Anglo-Dutch Wars, born in Dordrecht, United Netherlands (–1672). 9 December 1625 By the Treaty of The Hague, England and the United Netherlands join King Christian IV of Denmark and Norway in an anti-Habsburg coalition. 1625 Dutch jurist Hugo Grotius publishes De jure belli et pacis/The Law of War and Peace, which lays the foundation of modern international law. 1625 Over 40,000 people die in an outbreak of bubonic plague in London, England. 6 February 1626 The Peace of La Rochelle is signed between the Huguenot (French Protestant) rebels and the French crown, through the mediation of the English ambassador. 5 March 1626 The Treaty of Monzon between France and Spain confirms the independence of the Grisons, with guarantees for Catholic worship in this Protestant area. Spain is prohibited from sending troops through the Valtelline Pass in the Alps.

9 April 1626 Francis Bacon, Viscount St Albans, Baron Verulam, lord chancellor of England 1618–21, philosopher and man of letters, whose best-known works are Novum organum/New Engine and Essays, dies in London, England (65). 30 September 1626 Following the death of Nurhachi, the emperor who united the Manchu and Juchen peoples under his own authority, his son Abahai succeeds him as khan. 25 January 1627 Robert Boyle, Anglo-Irish chemist and natural philosopher, who conducted pioneering experiments on the properties of gases, born in Lismore, County Waterford, Ireland (–1691). April 1627 France's Cardinal Richelieu signs a treaty of alliance with Spain. 1627 The Manchu emperor Abahai of Manchuria subdues Korea whose rulers, the Yi, pay tribute to China from now on. 1627 The opera Dafne/Daphne by the German composer Heinrich Schütz is first performed, in Dresden, Germany. It is the first German opera. The score is lost in a fire in 1760. February 1628 Having beaten off competition from his brothers by killing all his male relatives, Shah Jahan becomes the Mogul emperor of India. April 1628 Sweden and Denmark sign a treaty for the defence of Stralsund against Albrecht von Wallenstein, the imperial commander in chief, which brings King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden into the Thirty Years' War. August 1628 Albrecht von Wallenstein, the imperial commander in chief, raises the siege of Stralsund (begun in June), his first reverse on the battlefield. November 1628 John Bunyan, English Puritan minister and preacher, author of The Pilgrim's Progress (1678), born in Elstow, Bedfordshire, England (–1688). 1628 English jurist Edward Coke publishes The First Part of the Institutes of the Laws of England. The last part is published in 1644. 19 January 1629'Abbas I the Great, Shah of Persia 1588–1629, who expelled the Ottomans and Uzbeks from Persia, dies (57). 6 March 1629 Savoyard forces attempting to block a Habsburg attack on Charles, duc de Nevers, the French claimant in possession of the vacant north Italian duchy of Mantua, are defeated at Susa in Savoy. This involvement of Spanish forces in the War of the Mantuan Succession nevertheless diverts vital imperial resources from the struggle against the Dutch and German Protestants. 14 April 1629 Christiaan Huygens, Dutch mathematician, astronomer, and physicist, who developed the wave theory of light, born in The Hague, United

Netherlands (–1695). 14 April 1629 The Peace of Susa ends the war between England and France. 22 May 1629 King Christian IV of Denmark and Norway is forced to sign the Peace of Lübeck with the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II, following his defeat by Albrecht von Wallenstein, the imperial commander in chief. Christian undertakes to refrain from intervening in imperial affairs. 29 June 1629 The Peace of Alais ends the Huguenot (French Protestant) revolt in the Languedoc, southern France. The Huguenots are assured of religious liberty, but are required to end all political organization. The governments of Nîmes, Montauban, and other cities are remodelled. 25 September 1629 The Truce of Altmark is signed between Sweden and Poland. By its terms, Sweden retains Livonia, Memel, Pillau, Braunsberg, and Elbing (modern Elblag, Poland). Danzig (Gdansk) is to pay two-thirds of the customs duties levied in its port to Sweden. 1629 Female actors are banned in Japan, so kabuki theatre, a popular form of theatre originated by a woman that employs music and dancing and depicts scenes of everyday life, is developed by all-male companies. c. 1629 The Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn paints Self-Portrait (Munich), one of the earliest of his many self-portraits. 29 May 1630 Charles II, King of Great Britain and Ireland 1660–85, who was restored to the throne after the Puritan Commonwealth, born in London, England (–1685). 6 July 1630 King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden lands at Usedom, Pomerania, and marches his army into Germany. He quickly occupies Pomerania and restores Mecklenburg, awarded to the imperial commander in chief Albrecht von Wallenstein, to its hereditary dukes. 17 July 1630 Mantua falls to the imperialist army in the War of the Mantuan Succession. 13 August 1630 The Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II dismisses his commander in chief Albrecht von Wallenstein. Count Johan Tserclaus von Tilly assumes command of his army. The emperor is no longer able to dictate to the Catholic League. 10 November 1630 In the 'Day of Dupes', France's Cardinal Richelieu overthrows the conspiracy of the queen mother Marie de' Medici and the heir presumptive Gaston, Duke of Orléans, against him. Marillac, the queen mother's servant, is executed and Marie, banished from Paris, France, takes refuge in Brussels. As a result Richelieu is in a stronger position than ever before, and the Spanish faction in France is vanquished.

15 November 1630 Johannes Kepler, German astronomer, who discovered the elliptical nature of orbits, dies in Regensburg, Bavaria (now Germany) (58). 1630 An epidemic of bubonic plague kills 500,000 Venetians. The Venetian Empire will never fully recover. 1630 Bohemian philosopher and educational reformer Comenius publishes Labyrint Sveta a ráj srdce/The Labyrinth of the World and the Paradise of the Heart, his most important philosophical work. 1630 French gunsmith Marin le Bougeoys perfects the flintlock, combining the striker and pan in one piece. 1630 The Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens paints The Garden of Love. 1630 The tragedy 'Tis Pity She's a Whore by the English dramatist John Ford is first performed, in London, England. It is first published in 1633. 23 January 1631 By the Treaty of Bärwalde, France undertakes to subsidize Sweden for six years with an annual 1 million livres to help liberate Germany from the control of the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II. King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden attempts to win over Saxony and Brandenburg, but the elector John George of Saxony, bent on neutrality, appeals to the emperor to revoke the Edict of Restitution (of March 1629) as the basis for a German settlement. 31 March 1631 John Donne, the best-known English poet of the metaphysical school, dies in London, England (59). 19 June 1631 The Treaty of Cherasco ends the War of the Mantuan Succession. French and imperialist armies agree to leave Italy; the French candidate Charles, Duke of Nevers, becomes Duke of Mantua; Savoy wins part of the duchy of Montferrat. By a secret agreement with Victor Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, France is to obtain Pinerolo and the Duke is betrothed to the sister of the French king Louis XIII; France thus gains a foothold in Italy. The treaty represents a great diplomatic triumph for Cardinal Richelieu. 21 June 1631 John Smith, English explorer who founded Jamestown, Virginia, the first permanent English settlement in North America, dies in London, England (51). 19 August 1631 John Dryden, outstanding English poet, playwright and critic, poet laureate, whose major works include 'Annus Mirabilis' (1667) and Marriage à la mode (1672), born in Aldwincle, Northamptonshire, England (–1700). August 1631 Count Johan Tserclaus von Tilly, with 20,000 imperialist troops freed from Italy by the ending of the War of the Mantuan Succession, invades

Saxony. 17 September 1631 King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden, supported by the Saxons, defeats the imperialist forces of Count Johan Tserclaus von Tilly at the Battle of Breitenfeld, near Leipzig, Sweden. Tilly's forces are shattered, and his defeat means that the Edict of Restitution of March 1629 cannot be enforced. 1631 The Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens paints Self-Portrait with Hélèn Fourment and his Son Nicolas in their Garden. 13 April 1632 The Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II formally reinstates the imperial commander Albrecht von Wallenstein as supreme imperial commander with an army of 50,000 men. Wallenstein is given orders to drive the Saxons from Bohemia. 14 April 1632 King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden defeats the imperialist army of Johan Tserclaes, Graf von Tilly, on the River Lech near the confluence of the rivers Lenz and Danube. Tilly is mortally wounded (he dies on 30 April). The Swedish army moves on to Ingolstadt, Bavaria, but is forced to raise the siege. 20 April 1632 Following the death of King Sigismund III Vasa of Poland, he is succeeded by his son Wladyslaw IV. 29 August 1632 John Locke, highly influential English political and educational philosopher, whose major work is Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), born in Wrington, Somerset, England (–1704). 20 October 1632 Christopher Wren, English architect, astronomer and geometrician, who designed Saint Paul's Cathedral in London, England, and over 50 other London churches, and founded the Royal Society, born in East Knoyle, Wiltshire, England (–1723). 6 November 1632 Bernhard, duke of Saxe-Weimar, succeeds King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden as general of the Swedish army when Gustavus is killed in action while defeating the army of the imperial commander Albrecht von Wallenstein at the Battle of Lützen, supported by the Saxon troops of military commander Hans Georg von Arnim. 6 November 1632 Following the death of King Gustavus II Adolphus in battle, his daughter Christina, aged six, becomes queen of Sweden. She appoints Count Axel Oxenstjerna, chancellor since 1612, as regent. 24 November 1632 Benedict de Spinoza, Dutch philosopher, leading exponent of rationalism, born in Amsterdam, United Netherlands (–1677). 1632 Russia declares war with Poland over the issue of the city of Smolensk on the River Dnieper, claimed by both countries.

1632 The Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn paints The Anatomy Lesson of Doctor Tulp. 23 February 1633 Samuel Pepys, English diarist known for his Diary, which provides a look at upper class life in England during the 1660s, born in London, England (–1703). 14 October 1633 James II, King of Great Britain 1685–88, son of Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria, deposed in the Glorious Revolution (1688), born in London, England (–1701). November 1633 The Spanish infanta Isabella dies in Brussels; henceforth the Spanish Netherlands are governed from Spain. The States-General (parliament) of the Spanish Netherlands does not meet again until 1790. 1633 The Temple: Sacred Poems and Private Ejaculations, a collection of poems by the English metaphysical poet George Herbert, is published posthumously. 25 February 1634 When General Albrecht von Wallenstein and his aides are murdered by garrison officers at Eger following his dismissal, the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II appoints his son Ferdinand, king of Hungary, as commanderin-chief of the imperial army, creating a situation in which a revival of Habsburg fortunes can occur. 4 March 1634 Samuel Cole opens the first tavern in the North American colonies, in Boston, Massachusetts. Although many New England authorities disapprove of them, taverns begin to flourish during the 1630s as gathering places for socializing and, later, for political discussions and meetings. 5 September 1634 Imperial and Spanish forces, under the command of the two cousins Ferdinand III, King of Hungary, and the cardinal-infante Ferdinand, son of King Philip III of Spain, defeat the Protestant forces of the League of Heilbronn, under Marshal Horn and Duke Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar, at the Battle of Nördlingen. The victory causes the loss of all Swedish conquests in southern Germany and ultimately leads to the dissolution of the League of Heilbronn and the entry of France into the Thirty Years' War. 1634 The Académie Française (French Academy, devoted to maintaining the purity of the French language ) is founded by France's chief minister Cardinal Richelieu. It is officially recognized by King Louis XIII in January 1635, and starts work on a French language dictionary in 1639. 1634 The German Oberammergau Passion Play is inaugurated by the people of the village of Oberammergau in Bavaria. They make a vow to perform the play every ten years after an outbreak of plague in 1633. 30 April 1635 During a visit to Paris, France, by the Swedish regent Count Axel Oxenstjerna, France and Sweden enter into a further treaty of alliance, the Treaty of Compiègne. By its terms, France recognizes Sweden as its main ally,

pledges to declare war on Spain, and promises not to make peace without Sweden's consent. Sweden will control Worms, Mainz, and Benfeld while the French gain territory on the left bank of the River Rhine between Breisach and Strasbourg. 19 May 1635 In accordance with its treaty obligations to Sweden, France formally declares war on Spain, using a Spanish raid on the southern French town of Trèves as a pretext, and opening a new phase of the Thirty Years' War. 30 May 1635 The Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II and Elector John George of Saxony sign the Peace of Prague. By its terms, the Elector of Saxony retains possession of Lusatia (part of Bohemia) and his son keeps Magdeburg. The implemention of the terms of the Edict of Restitution of March 1629 is postponed for 40 years, so that possession of ecclesiastical land in the Empire remains as it was in November 1627. The treaty is subsequently accepted by Brandenburg and most Lutheran states. Henceforward, the Thirty Years' War becomes a conflict between the Holy Roman Empire and Spain on the one hand, and the allied forces of France, United Netherlands, and Sweden on the other. June 1635 Having invaded the Spanish Netherlands and defeated Spanish forces at Namur, the French march to join Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange, at Maastricht. However, their assistance is rejected by the Dutch and before the end of the year they retreat, leaving Maastricht cut off by the Spanish. 11 July 1635 As a result of the diplomacy of France's chief minister Cardinal Richelieu, Parma, Savoy, and Mantua agree to join France in a league aimed at ousting Spain from its control of Milan. 1635 French forces under the former Huguenot (French Protestant) leader Henri, duc de Rohan, assisted by Swiss Protestants led by Pastor Jürg Jenatsch, successfully invade the Valtelline in the Alps, expelling the Spanish garrison and again disrupting the Habsburg 'Spanish Road' military communications route between Italy, Austria, and the Spanish Netherlands. 1635 The colonization of Connecticut, North America, begins in earnest. A group of refugees from Dorchester, Massachusetts, settles in the newly established trading post of Windsor and colonists from Newtown settle in the area around Hartford. John Winthrop the younger takes control of the mouth of the Connecticut River and, before March 1636, is accepted as governor of the colony by its inhabitants. 1635 The Mauritshuis, designed by the Dutch architect Jacob von Campen (Kampen), is completed in The Hague, United Netherlands. His finest work, it shows the influence of Italian architecture. 1635 The Spanish artist Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velázquez paints Surrender of Breda. c. 1635 The French artist Nicolas Poussin paints The Rape of the Sabine Women.

July 1636 Ferdinand, Cardinal-Infante of Spain, and his troops advance into Picardy, triggering a Spanish invasion of France. On 14 August he seizes Corbie, near Amiens. He is supported by Bavarian troops, under Johann von Werth, who advance to Compiègne. The progress of the allies creates panic in Paris, France, but the French army, commanded by King Louis XIII, successfully checks the invasion, retaking Corbie in November and forcing the Spanish troops to retreat from French soil. 4 October 1636 Swedish forces, under Marshal Johan Banér, defeat a combined imperial and Saxon force at the Battle of Wittstock. His success shatters the military power of the Saxons and marks a revival of Swedish power in the Thirty Years' War. 28 October 1636 A school intended as a training college for Puritan ministers is founded in New Towne (now Cambridge), Massachusetts, with Reverend Henry Dunster as its first president. A gift from the English-born American clergyman John Harvard allows it to remain in existence, and in 1639 the Massachusetts General Court issues a decree naming the school Harvard College. 1636 The tragedy Le Cid by the French dramatist Pierre Corneille is first performed, in Paris, France. It is published in the same year. c. 1636 The tragi-comedy La vida es sueño/Life is a Dream by the Spanish dramatist Pedro Calderón de la Barca is first performed. It is one of the major works of Spanish drama. 6 August 1637 Ben Jonson, a leading English dramatist, lyric poet, and critic of the Jacobean age, whose works include The Alchemist (1610), dies in London, England (65). 1637 Following a peasant revolt which is supported by Christians in revolt against the Japanese shogun (military ruler), Portuguese traders are expelled from Japan and Christians are persecuted. The Japanese are banned from leaving the country and very few foreigners are allowed in. 1637 French philosopher and mathematician René Descartes publishes Discours de la méthode/Discourse on Method. A radical approach to the theory of knowledge, it marks the beginning of modern philosophy. It contains the wellknown statement: 'Je pense, donc je suis' ('I think, therefore I am'). 1637 The English poet John Milton publishes the masque (an entertainment involving theatre, music, and dance) Comus. It was first performed in 1634 at Ludlow Castle, in celebration of the Earl of Bridgwater's appointment to the presidency of Wales. 5 September 1638 Louis XIV (the 'Sun King'), King of France 1643–1715, famous for his patronage of the arts and his embodiment of the doctrine of Absolutism, born in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France (–1715).

17 December 1638 Bernhard, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, and his army, with French support, take Breisach after a four-month siege. The victory is strategically important, securing Alsace for the French and its allies, providing a gateway into Germany along the River Rhine, cutting road links between Milan and the Spanish Netherlands, and breaking the stranglehold which the Spanish and Austrians had secured around France. 1638 The English poet John Milton publishes his elegy Lycidas. 1638 The Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens paints Hélèn Fourment in a Fur Wrap. 1638 The log cabin, which comes to epitomize the American frontier, is introduced by Swedish settlers in Delaware. 14 May 1639 Royalist and Covenanter forces engage in the Trot of Turriff, a skirmish that opens the First Bishops' War in Scotland. The Covenanter troops are driven out of Aberdeen but retake the city on 19 June 1639. May 1639 A final agreement is reached at Zuhab near Qasr-i Sirin ending the long-running war between the Ottoman Empire and Persia. Iraq is ceded to the Turks, while the area around Erwan is to be controlled by the Persians. Measures are also included to make a demarcation of the frontier between the Ottoman Empire and Persia. 18 June 1639 Due to a lack of funds, King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland is unable to attack the Scots. He signs the Pacification of Berwick, which ends the First Bishops' War, and returns to London, England. Under the terms of the agreement, Charles agrees to refer ecclesiastical affairs to a General Assembly and civil affairs to a Parliament (which is summoned for August) and to confirm the abolition of episcopacy (rule by bishops). September 1639 By the Peace of Milan, the Valtelline is returned to the Swiss canton of Grisons (modern Graubünden) by the Spanish. The treaty includes a clause guaranteeing passage for Spanish troops, though in practice the Alpine valley is no longer of any strategic importance in linking Spanish Italy and the Spanish Netherlands. 21 October 1639 The Spanish fleet under Antonio de Aquendo, bringing reinforcements to the Spanish army in Flanders, is destroyed by the Dutch under Admiral Maarten van Tromp at the Battle of the Downs. The battle is fought in English territorial waters and has the effect of cutting another means of communication between Madrid and the Spanish Netherlands. 22 December 1639 Jean Racine, French poet and dramatist known for his tragedies Briannicus, Bérénice, and Phèdre/Phaedra, baptized in La Ferté-Milon, France (–1699). 1639 The French artist Nicolas Poussin paints Et in Arcadia Ego/And I Too have

Been in Arcadia (The Arcadian Shepherds). 8 February 1640 Sultan Ibrahim succeeds the Ottoman sultan Murad IV on his death. July 1640 Aphra Behn (née Johnson), English dramatist, novelist and poet, the first Englishwoman to earn her living by writing, whose works include Oroonoko (1688) and The Rover (1678), born (–1689). 20 August 1640 A Scottish army crosses the River Tweed into England, beginning the Second Bishops' War. The war, between the Scottish Covenanters and Charles I of England, is caused by Charles' unpopular policies against the Scottish Kirk and ended in English defeats and bankruptcy for Charles. 1 December 1640 Portugal joins the revolt against Spain, which is already troubled by civil war in Catalonia. The Duke of Braganza accepts the throne of an independent Portugal and becomes King John IV. 1640 In England, the Marquis of Worcester devises a steam engine to work a fountain. Steam is used to eject water from receivers through control cocks. It is a forerunner of Savery's steam pump. 1640–1700 Literacy rates in the colonies, particularly in New England, are high relative to those in the Old World. Shipton, New England has a 95% literacy rate; males in Virginia have a literacy rate between 54% and 60%. 16 January 1641 Pau Claris, the leader of the Catalan revolt, announces that Catalonia is now an independent republic under the protection of the French. The rebels swear allegiance to King Louis XIII of France. July 1641 Having declared the 1635 Peace of Prague an unsatisfactory basis for settlement of the Holy Roman Empire at the Imperial Diet (legislative assembly) in Regensburg, Bavaria, Frederick William, Elector of Brandenburg, concludes a truce with Sweden, sparking off a growth in opposition to the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III on the part of the German princes. 23 October 1641 After a period of increasing tension in Ireland following the removal of the strong rule of Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford, the Irish Rebellion breaks out. It is accompanied by a massacre of Ulster Protestants which creates great fear in England. The Long Parliament's desire to control the armed forces that are to be raised to suppress the rebellion causes a further deterioration in relations between King Charles I and Parliament. 22 November 1641 The Grand Remonstance is carried in the English House of Commons by 11 votes but is rejected by King Charles I. It demands that the appointment of ministers be subject to parliamentary approval, that the temporal power of bishops be reduced, and that church matters be referred to a synod of Protestant divines. Its perceived extremism rallies many moderates to support Charles and causes the divide between Royalists and parliamentarians to

harden. 1641 French philosopher René Descartes publishes Meditationes de Prima Philosophia/Meditations of the First Philosophy, in Latin. The French version follows in 1647. In this major philosophical work – one of the key works of modern philosophy – Descartes attempts to demonstrate the existence of God, the possibility of knowledge, and his famous distinction between mind and body. 1641 The Dutch artist Frans Hals paints The Governors of Saint Elizabeth Hospital. 1641 The English diarist John Evelyn (friend and fellow diarist of Samuel Pepys) begins his Diary, which he keeps until his death in 1706. It is not published until 1818. 8 January 1642 Galileo Galilei, Italian mathematician, physicist and astronomer, who developed the astronomical telescope, dies in Arcetri, near Florence, Italy (77). 1 June 1642 England's Long Parliament passes the Nineteen Propositions, a list of demands, calling for parliamentary approval of the king's ministers and control of the militia, church reform, and enforcement of anti-Catholic legislation, amongst others, which is presented to King Charles I in York. He rejects them and the outbreak of the English Civil War becomes virtually inevitable. 22 August 1642 The English Civil War officially begins when King Charles I raises his standard at Nottingham, England. November 1642–February 1643 Abel Janszoon Tasman, an explorer in the service of the Dutch East India Company, discovers Van Dieman's Land (now Tasmania) and, in December, New Zealand. In January 1643 he sights Tonga and in February he sees the Fiji Islands. 4 December 1642 Armand-Jean du Plessis, French cardinal and duc de Richelieu, ('Cardinal Richelieu'), chief minister (1624–42) to King Louis XIII of France, who defeated the Habsburg hegemony in Europe, dies in Paris, France (57). 4 December 1642 Following the death of Cardinal Richelieu, chief minister of King Louis XIII of France, he is succeeded by Cardinal Jules Mazarin. 25 December 1642 Isaac Newton, English physicist and mathematician who laid the foundations of calculus and gravitation theory, born in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England (–1727). 1642 A decree is issued by the French government which consolidates the trend towards centralization of government functions by ordering the transfer of all duties undertaken by local government finance officers to the intendants, who are given wide powers of punishment. The decree is reinforced by a declaration

issued on 16 April 1643. 1642 French mathematician Blaise Pascal, aged only 19, builds the first calculating machine to help his father, the Intendant of Rouen, with tax calculations. It performs only additions. 1642 In an attempt to establish his supremacy in northern Italy, Pope Urban VIII excommunicates Odoardo I Farnese, Duke of Parma. His actions spark off the War of Castro and prompt the formation of an antipapal league, including Venice, Tuscany, and Modena, in defence of Parma. 1642 The Briare Canal linking the Loire and Seine rivers (begun in 1604) is completed. A staircase of seven locks in sequence is the most advanced piece of canal engineering in Europe. 1642 The Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn paints The Company of Frans Banning Cocq and Willem van Ruytenburch, better known as The Night Watch. 14 May 1643 Louis XIII the Just, king of France 1610–43 who together with Cardinal de Richelieu greatly increased his country's political power, dies in SaintGermain-en-Laye, France (41). 19 May 1643 The French army, under Marshal Enghien, defeats the Spanish at Rocroi on the border of the Spanish Netherlands. The battle marks the end of the superiority enjoyed by the Spanish infantry in Europe after more than a century. 25 September 1643 The Assembly of Westminster, summoned by the Long Parliament in England, adopts the Solemn League and Covenant, which inaugurates a Presbyterian establishment for England and Scotland. 29 November 1643 Claudio Monteverdi, Italian composer, key developer of opera as a musical genre with works such as Orfeo/Orpheus (1607), dies in Venice (76). 1643 Religio Medici/Religion of a Doctor by the English writer on science and religion Thomas Browne is published in an authorized edition. (An unauthorized edition appeared in 1642.) Reflections on his religious beliefs, the book contains a wealth of contemporary lore and learning. 1643 English poet John Milton publishes The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, the first of his tracts defending the legitimacy of divorce. January 1644 Having launched their planned attack on Denmark in December 1643 by invading Holstein, Swedish forces cross the border into Jutland and establish control over the province by the end of January. 31 March 1644 The Peace of Ferrara is signed in Venice by Pope Urban VIII and the Duke of Parma and his allies, Venice, Modena, and Tuscany. The treaty ends

the war of Castro, ongoing since 1642. 2 July 1644 A combined English parliamentarian army under Oliver Cromwell, the Earl of Manchester, and Thomas Fairfax decisively defeats the Royalists, led by Prince Rupert, nephew of King Charles I, at the Battle of Marston Moor near York. The Royalists suffer heavy losses and the defeat consolidates Parliament's control of the north of England. 4 August 1644 A three-day battle takes place at Freiburg between French troops under the Duke of Enghien and the Bavarian-imperialist army under Franz von Mercy. Mercy is forced to retreat, leaving the French to occupy a substantial portion of the left bank of the River Rhine. 2 September 1644 The Earl of Essex's 6,000-strong infantry force surrenders to the Royalist army under King Charles I at Lostwithiel, Cornwall, England, during the English Civil War. Essex is forced to escape by sea. The victory, along with others in 1644, puts Charles in a good position to launch an attack on London, England. 15 September 1644 Giovanni Battista Pamfili is elected Pope Innocent X in succession to Urban VIII. 27 October 1644 Parliamentarian forces under Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester, William Waller, and Oliver Cromwell fail to capture a small Royalist force under King Charles I at the second Battle of Newbury of the English Civil War, allowing it to escape to Oxford instead. The failure leads directly to the formation of the New Model Army in an attempt to raise standards and create better coordination between various parts of the parliamentarian army. 4 December 1644 A peace conference formally opens in the two towns of Münster and Osnabrück, aimed at securing an agreement between the opposing sides in the Thirty Years' War. Ferdinand III, Holy Roman Emperor, initiates and opens negotiations, however, full discussions do not get under way until mid1645. The negotiations ultimately lead to the Peace of Westphalia of 1648. 8 December 1644 Queen Christina, at the age of 18, becomes the active ruler of Sweden. She pursues a policy aimed at peace in Europe rather than territorial expansion and national aggrandisement. 1644 Following the crumbling of Ming authority in China, the Manchus take control of the city of Beijing and expel a rival claimant for power, Li Zucheng. They proclaim Shunzhi as the first emperor of the Qing dynasty, with his uncle Dorgun acting as regent. 1644 French philosopher René Descartes publishes Principia philosophiae/ Principles of Philosophy in Latin (a French version follows in 1647). This work brings together his philosophy and his scientific theories. 1644 The Italian churchman Giovanni Battista Pamphili is elected Pope Innocent

X. He is pope until 1655. February 1645 The parliamentarian New Model Army is established to replace the individual association armies (county and regional armies) organized on a regional basis between 1642 and 1643. The new army has a force of about 22,000 men and a unified command structure, with Thomas Fairfax as captain general and Philip Skippon as major general. It officially enters the field for combat in the English Civil War in May. 24 March 1645 A combined imperial and Bavarian army is defeated by the Swedes, under the command of Marshal Lennart Torstensson, at Jankov in Bohemia. The cavalry commander General Goetz is killed and the Bavarian cavalry is destroyed. Prague is laid open to the Swedes, forcing the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III to abandon the city and move his court to Vienna. 11 June 1645 The first news publication in the American colonies is a sevenpage pamphlet printed at Cambridge, Massachusetts. 14 June 1645 The English parliamentarian New Model Army has its first major success when, commanded by Thomas Fairfax and Oliver Cromwell, it decisively defeats Royalist forces under King Charles I and his nephew Prince Rupert at the Battle of Naseby, Northamptonshire. Around 5,000 Royalists are taken prisoner. 12 July 1645 On the death of his father Michael I Romanov, Alexis I becomes the second Romanov tsar of Russia. August 1645 The war between Sweden and Denmark comes to an end when the Treaty of Brömsebro is signed. By its terms, Sweden gains the islands of Ösel and Gotland in the eastern Baltic and the Norwegian provinces of Jämtland and Härjedalen. It also retains possession of Bremen and Verdun and gains the right to occupy Halland, to the north of the Sound (Öresund), for a period of 30 years. Denmark is forced to recognize Sweden's exemption from the payment of Sound tolls. As a result, Sweden takes the place of Denmark as the foremost power in northern Europe. 1645 The English poet Edmund Waller publishes his Poems. Many of these poems – such as the famous 'Go, Lovely Rose!' – have been in circulation for many years. 1645 The English poet John Milton publishes his Poems. It contains several major works including L'Allegro and Il Penseroso (both written in the early 1630s). 5 May 1646 Having left Oxford in disguise on 27 April, following Parliament's success in mopping up the final Royalist pockets of resistance in England, King Charles I surrenders to the Scots at Southwall, near Newark, Nottinghamshire. 13 July 1646 Parliamentary commissioners present King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland with the Newcastle Propositions, asking for his acceptance of the Solemn League and Covenant (an alliance between the English parliament and the Scottish rebels, agreed in September 1643), the abolition of episcopacy,

reformation of religion according to the wishes of Parliament and the Westminster Assembly of Divines, parliamentary control over the army for a period of 20 years, and punishment of leading Royalists. Charles does not reject the proposals immediately, but delays his answer until 1 August. 26 December 1646 Henry II de Bourbon, 3rd Prince of Condé, French army commander and former rebel against the late kings Henry IV and Louis XIII, dies. 6 August 1647 The New Model Army, under Oliver Cromwell, enters London, England, and takes control of Parliament and the City of London. 26 December 1647 King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland signs the 'Engagement' with the Scots in which he pledges to confirm the Solemn League and Covenant, to establish the Presbyterian Church in England for three years, and to unify England and Scotland more closely in return for Scottish support in restoring him to power. 1647 The French philosopher René Descartes publishes Méditations Métaphysiques/Metaphysical Meditations, the French translation of his Meditationes de Prima Philosophia/Meditations of the First Philosophy, originally published in 1641. He also publishes Principes de la philosophie/ Principles of Philosophy, a French version of his Principia philosophiae, originally published in 1644. 3 January 1648 After a long debate in the English House of Commons, the 'Vote of No Addresses' is passed, which pledges to discontinue all negotiations with King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland. 30 January 1648 Following the French capture of Dunkirk and the advance of French forces into the northern Spanish Netherlands, a separate peace is signed between Spain and the United Netherlands at Münster in the Holy Roman Empire, thereby ending the alliance between France and the Dutch. The treaty thwarts the French chief minister Cardinal Jules Mazarin's plan of securing possession of the entire Spanish Netherlands and also secures the future commercial dominance of Amsterdam by providing for the closure of the River Scheldt, the main water route into Antwerp, the Dutch city's trading rival in northwestern Europe. 17 May 1648 Swedish and French forces, under Karl Gustaf Wrangel and Marshal Turenne, defeat a Bavarian-imperial army at the Battle of Zusmarshausen, near Augsburg. Bavaria is overrun once again. 20 May 1648 Wladyslaw IV Vasa, king of Poland 1632–48, who secured Poland against the Russians and Turks, dies in Merecz, Poland (52). May 1648 Following a period of colonization of their lands by Polish noblemen, the Zaporog and Dneiper Cossacks, led by Bohdan Khmel'nitsky, rise in revolt against Poland. Polish rule collapses in the southeastern districts of Poland and it is never restored.

June 1648 A violent rebellion in Moscow forces Tsar Alexis I Romanov of Russia to exile his tutor and chief minister B I Morozov in order to save his life. He also calles a Zemskii Sobor (parliament) to satisfy grievances, which sits between September 1648 and January 1649. The body produces a new Ulozhenie (Code of Law) which bolsters the privileges of the middle classes at the expense of the clergy, boyars (gentry), and peasants. 8 July 1648 A Scottish army under James, Duke of Hamilton, crosses the border and invades England in support of King Charles I (who is still captive in Carisbrooke Castle on the Isle of Wight). July 1648 A Swedish army under the Count von Königsmarck invades Bohemia and calls for Prague to surrender. Despite the spirited defence of the city by its inhabitants, the siege becomes an important factor in the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III's decision to accept the Peace of Westphalia. 8 August 1648 The Ottoman sultan Ibrahim is deposed in a revolt by the Janissaries (infantry) and Ulama (religious notables). He is executed ten days later on 18 August and is succeeded by Mehmed IV. 17 August 1648 The English parliamentarian commander Oliver Cromwell and the New Model Army defeat the invading Scottish forces, under James, 3rd Marquis and 1st Duke of Hamilton, at the Battle of Preston. 20 August 1648 French forces prevent an Austro-Spanish invasion of Paris, France, when they defeat the allied armies at Lens, Artois. The failure of the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III's plans quickens the pace of the peace negotiations in Münster and Osnabrück. 28 August 1648 After a siege that started on 14 June, parliamentarian forces under General Thomas Fairfax take the town of Colchester, Essex, England, from its Royalist governor Charles Lucas, together with 4,000 troops. The surrender marks the end of the second Civil War in Essex and southeast England. 2 October 1648 At the Newport (Isle of Wight) Treaty negotiations, King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland agrees to accept Parliament's demands on the issue of church government, on condition that episcopacy will not be completely abolished. He also agrees to surrender the militia for 20 years, as well as the government of Ireland. 24 October 1648 The Peace of Westphalia is signed, ending the Thirty Years' War and marking the failure of the Holy Roman Emperor's attempt to turn Germany into an absolute monarchy. By its terms: (1) France gains Metz, Toul, and Verdun, and Breisach and Phillipsburg on the east side of the Rhine, Pinerolo in Piedmont, Italy, and rights in Alsace which sow the seeds of later disagreements; (2) Sweden gains western Pomerania, including Stettin (modern Szczecin) and the Oder estuary, Wismar in Mecklenburg, Bremen and Verdun, which gives it control of the Elbe and Weser estuaries, and 5 million taler; (3)

Bavaria retains the Upper Palatinate and the electoral dignity; (4) Brandenburg gains East Pomerania, Kammin, Halberstadt, Minden, and the succession to the archbishopric of Magdeburg; (5) the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III repeals the Edict of Restitution of 1629 and the Peace of Prague of 1635, agrees that all ecclesiastical disputes are to be settled in accordance with the situation on 1 January 1624, and grants the same rights to Calvinists as Lutherans possess, in effect giving full independent sovereignty to all German princes and cities; (6) the Swiss confederation is separated from the Holy Roman Empire; (7) Saxony keeps Lusatia (part of Bohemia). 6 December 1648'Pride's purge' of the English House of Commons takes place under the auspices of the English parliamentarian Col Thomas Pride. Many Presbyterian members of Parliament are prevented from sitting. The remainder, about 60 independent radical members, continue to sit as the Rump Parliament. Subsequently, they reinstate the 'Vote of No Addresses' of 3 January and discontinue the Newport Treaty negotiations with King Charles I. The action transforms the political situation in England. 1648 A series of regional uprisings occur in England against the New Model Army and radicals in Parliament. These take place in Wales in March, Kent in May, and Essex in June. A naval mutiny also takes place on 27 May 1648 in the Downs and a Leveller officer is removed. In addition, a Royalist revival takes place when the town of Pembroke declares for King Charles I in March and Berwick and Carlisle are taken by Royalist supporters in April. The scene is set for a second Civil War in England. 1648 At the end of the Thirty Years' War, the population of the German states has gone down from 21 million to less than 14 million. 1648 French artist Nicolas Poussin paints The Burial of Phocion. 1648 French mathematician Blaise Pascal proves, with his brother-in-law, that the pressure of air decreases with increasing height, by measuring the column of height of a mercury barometer carried up a mountain. 1648 The Bohemian philosopher and educationalist Comenius publishes his reflections on the religious consequences of the Thirty Years' War: Kšaft Umírající Matky Jednoty Bratrské/Testament of the Dying Mother, the Unity of Brethren. 1648 The Dutch artist Paulus Potter paints Cow Reflected in the Water 1648 The Taj Mahal, at Agra, India, is completed. Built by Shah Jahan as a monument to his wife, it is meant to be an image of Paradise as described in the Koran. It was probably designed by the mogul architect Ustad Ahmad Lahori. 20 January 1649 The trial of King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland takes place in Westminster Hall, London, England. He is charged with levying war on Parliament and acting as a tyrant and traitor, but refuses to plead before what

he regards as an illegal court. 30 January 1649 Charles I, king of Great Britain and Ireland 1625–49, whose authoritarian rule provoked the English Civil Wars (1642–51), is executed in London, England (48). 30 January 1649 Following the beheading of King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland for being a 'tyrant, traitor, murderer, and enemy of the people' in the Banqueting Hall at Whitehall, London, England, the prince of Wales, in exile in The Hague, United Netherlands, takes the title Charles II. 17 March 1649 The Rump Parliament in England officially abolishes the monarchy and two days later, as a result of its opposition to the trial of King Charles I, also abolishes the House of Lords. 19 May 1649 England is declared to be a 'Commonwealth or Free State' by the Rump Parliament. Supreme authority is placed in the hands of the House of Commons and the executive powers of the monarchy are entrusted to a 40member Council of State. 2 August 1649 Irish Royalists under the Earl of Ormonde, who have risen in support of Charles II, the son and heir of the late King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland, are defeated by parliamentarian forces at the Battle of Rathmines, near Dublin, Ireland. 1649 The English poet Richard Lovelace publishes his poetry collection Lucasta. One of the poems contains the well-known lines 'Stone walls do not a prison make/Nor iron bars a cage'. 11 February 1650 René Descartes, French philosopher, scientist and mathematician, considered to be the founder of modern philosophy, whose bestknown work is Discours de la méthode/Discourse on Method (1637), dies in Stockholm, Sweden (53). 26 May 1650 John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, English general famed for his victories over the French at Blenheim (1704), Ramillies (1706), and Oudenaarde (1708), born in Ashe, Devonshire, England (–1722). 10 June 1650 Charles II, the son and heir of the late King Charles I of Great Britain and Ireland, sails for Scotland. Before he arrives at Speymouth, he swears the Covenant, abandoning his anti-Presbyterian Royalist supporters and throwing in his lot with the Scottish Presbyterians who have the resources and support to assist him in his bid for the restoration of his throne. 6 November 1650 The stadtholder (provincial governor) William II dies in the United Netherlands of smallpox, eight days before his heir, the future king William III of England, is born. By 1653, the Dutch statesman Johan de Witt assumes power in his role as Grand Pensionary.

14 November 1650 William III, stadtholder (provincial governor) of the United Netherlands 1672–1702, King of England 1689–1702, born in The Hague, United Netherlands (–1702). 1650 A judge in Derby, England is the first to use the term 'Quakers' to describe the religious leader George Fox and his followers, after Fox says in court: 'I bid them Tremble at the word of the Lord'. 6 February 1651 Cardinal Jules Mazarin is dismissed and a few days later flees from Paris, France, after a fortnight-long siege of the Palais-Royal by the mob, motivated by the demands of the Parlement for his dismissal and the release of Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, and other Fronde leaders. Condé is subsequently released. 3 September 1651 English supreme commander Oliver Cromwell defeats King Charles II at the battle of Worcester, England. Charles subsequently escapes, arriving in France in mid-October. 5 September 1651 Louis XIV of France attains his majority. At the same time, the charges against Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, are withdrawn. However, Condé leaves Paris, France, and forges an alliance with Spain, while Marshal Henri de Turenne, previously in the service of the Spanish, now refuses to fight the French king and, in March 1652, takes command of his army. 1651 English philosopher Thomas Hobbes publishes Leviathan, his major philosophical work. 1651 English poet John Milton publishes his pamphlet Pro populo Anglicano defensio/In Defence of the English People, a reply to those who condemned the execution of Charles I of Britain. 1651 The English scientist William Gilbert's book A New Philosophy of Our Sublunar World is published posthumously, proposing theories that the fixed stars are not all at the same distance from Earth. 1651 Tokugawa Ietsuna, the son of Tokugawa Iemitsu and a minor, becomes shogun (military ruler) of Japan. May 1652 The surrender of Galway to the English parliamentarian army marks the end of Royalist resistance to the English supreme commander Oliver Cromwell and the completion of the pacification of Ireland. 29 June 1652 The Puritan leadership of Massachusetts declares the colony a selfgoverning independent commonwealth, the culmination of a long political struggle over the degree of independence allowed by its 1629 royal charter. The colony's de facto independence lasts until the restoration of King Charles II of England in 1660 and the issue of a new charter.

30 June 1652 After a period of growing tension, triggered by the passing of the first Navigation Act, England declares war on the United Netherlands. 2 July 1652 The royalist marshal Vicomte Henri de Turenne defeats Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, in the Faubourg St Antoine, Paris, France, but strategically withdraws. A provisional Fronde government is set up in Paris. 4 July 1652 The forces of Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, massacre the Fronde parliamentary deputies. This discredits the new government and creates a desire for peace in the civil war. 13 October 1652 Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, leaves Paris, France, and flees to the Spanish Netherlands after losing the support of the people and the Parlement. 21 October 1652 King Louis XIV of France returns to Paris, France, in triumph, re-establishing the government and exiling leading Frondeurs. October 1652 Following a decade under French control, Barcelona, Spain, falls after a lengthy siege, enabling Don John, viceroy of Naples, to complete the reconquest of Catalonia for the Spanish. 1652 Christopher Bowman opens the first coffee house in London, England, in St Michael's Alley, Cornhill. Coffee houses will quickly become fashionable and later develop into a forum for political and literary discussion. 1652 English political radical Gerrard Winstanley publishes The Law of Freedom in a Platform, which argues for a system of communism. 1652 Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini completes his sculpture Vision of Saint Teresa, in the Cornaro Chapel in the Church of Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome, Italy. This work becomes one of the highpoints of Italian baroque art. 1 September 1653 Johann Pachelbel, German organ composer, known particularly for his Canon in D Major, baptized in Nuremberg, Germany (–1706). 26 September 1653 The Act of Satisfaction is passed by the English Parliament, distributing large tracts of forfeited land in Ireland in order to settle the claims of those who had advanced money to meet army pay arrears, to discharge other military pay demands, and to encourage Protestants to settle in Ireland. 1653 The ballet La Nuit/Night by the French choreographer Isaac de Bensarade (with music by French composer Jean-Baptiste Lully) is first performed, at the French court. King Louis XIV dances the part of Le Roi Soleil (the Sun King). 1653 The first edition of English author Isaak Walton's The Compleat Angler, or The Contemplative Man's Recreation is published.

1653 The first postage stamps are produced, in Paris, France, enabling the sender rather than the receiver to pay the cost of postage. 1653 The French composer Jean-Baptiste Dr. writes music for the ballet La Nuit/ Night by Isaac de Bensarade, and is appointed court composer to Louis XIV. 1653 The French mathematician Blaise Pascal publishes his 'triangle' of numbers. This has many applications in arithmetic, algebra, and combinatorics (the study of counting combinations). 8 January 1654 By the agreement of Peryslavl, the Cossacks accept Tsar Alexis as their supreme leader, while maintaining their traditional rights to elect their own hetmen (headmen), maintain an army, and operate their own courts. Russian influence is thereby consolidated in the Ukraine. April 1654 By the Treaty of Westminster the first Anglo-Dutch war ends and the Dutch agree to accept the terms of the Navigation Act and to respect the English right of salute. 16 June 1654 Queen Christina of Sweden abdicates and is succeeded by Charles X. She subsequently converts to Catholicism on 3 November 1655. 24 August 1654 A turning point in the Franco-Spanish war occurs when French forces under Marshal Henri de Turenne storm three lines of trenches and expel the Spanish army besieging Arras. Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, retreats to Cambrai in the Spanish Netherlands. 1654 The Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn paints Portrait of Jan Six and Woman Bathing in a Stream. 1654 The French scientist and mathematician Blaise Pascal publishes a treatise on hydrostatics, in which he recognizes that force is transmitted equally in all directions through a fluid, the principle that is named after him. 7 April 1655 Pope Alexander VII is elected following the death of Innocent X. 28 July 1655 Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac, French satirist and dramatist, the subject of many romantic legends, whose best-known works include Histoire comique des états et empires de la lune/Comic History of the States and Empires of the Moon (1656), dies in Paris, France (36). July 1655 The first Northern War breaks out when King Charles X of Sweden invades Poland from two directions. The invasion is prompted by the threat created by Russia's recent invasion of Lithuania. 26 September 1655 The Dutch governor of New Amsterdam (modern New York City), Peter Stuyvesant, captures Fort Casimir (later Newcastle) in Delaware, thereby ending Swedish rule in North America.

1655 English philosopher Thomas Hobbes publishes De corpore/On the Body, which attempts to explain all phenomena through mechanics, the first part of his work Elementorum philosophiae/Elements of Philosophy. c. 1655 Bacon's Castle in Surrey County, Virginia, is built. Made of brick, it is in the style of an English mansion and includes features (such as Flemish gables) only recently introduced into English architecture. 17 January 1656 Sweden's threat to invade East Prussia forces the Great Elector of Brandenburg Frederick William to agree to the Treaty of Königsberg. The Elector accepts King Charles X of Sweden as feudal overlord of East Prussia, thereby removing the area from Polish sovereignty, and agrees to stay neutral in the Northern War. 8 November 1656 Edmond Halley, English astronomer and mathematician, born in Haggerston, Shoreditch, London, England (–1742). 20 November 1656 By the Treaty of Labiau, Sweden cedes East Prussia to Frederick William, the Great Elector of Brandenburg, making him sovereign of the area. November 1656 King John IV of Portugal dies, leaving his underage son Afonso VI to assume the crown. A regency is established. 1656 The Spanish artist Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velázquez paints Las meninas/ Maids of Honour. 1656–1657 The French mathematician and religious thinker Blaise Pascal publishes Lettres provinciales/Provincial Letters, a series of 18 anonymous pamphlets written in support of Jansenist views. 22 January–31 July 1657 György II Rákóczy, Prince of Transylvania, invades Poland but is forced to withdraw in July 1657 when King Charles X of Sweden deserts him and the Ottoman Empire takes military action against him. The remainder of his troops in Poland, under János Kemény, are defeated by a combined Ottoman and Tatar force at the battle of Trembowla on 31 July. Kemény is taken and imprisoned in the Crimea. 2 April 1657 The death of the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III inaugurates an interregnum in the Holy Roman Empire. August 1657 The Ottoman Turks re-capture the island of Tenedos from the Venetians. In November they also gain Lemnos. The two victories free the Dardanelles from the Venetian threat and reestablish the preeminence of the Ottoman navy in the Aegean Sea. 6 November 1657 By the Treaty of Bromberg, Brandenburg allies with Poland against Sweden. Faced with the loss of his ally and a strengthened Austro-Polish

alliance, King Charles X of Sweden withdraws from Poland, occupying Danish Jutland instead. November 1657 Following the loss of Brazil in 1654 and seeing the trading privileges granted to Britain by the Portuguese in the same year, the Dutch declare war on Portugal. 1657 Drinking chocolate and coffee are first sold in London, England. Coffee is promoted as a patent medicine, capable of curing a variety of ailments. 1657 The Great Mogul Shah Jahan, conqueror of South India and builder of the Taj Mahal, falls ill and makes a will bequeathing the empire to his eldest son. This is disputed by his other sons, causing civil war to break out. 1657 When tea goes on sale in England it is claimed to have medicinal properties. 12 February 1658 Having marched his forces across the frozen sea of the Little Belt to Fyn and the Great Belt to Zealand, King Charles X of Sweden besieges the Danish capital, Copenhagen; Denmark surrenders, effectively ending the (First) Northern War. 26 February 1658 The Treaty of Roskild ends the first Swedish-Danish war. Denmark loses possession of land in southern Sweden and Tröndheim in Norway. 25 June 1658 Aurangzeb proclaims himself Mogul emperor, after imprisoning his sick father and slaughtering his two elder brothers, his son, and several nephews. 18 July 1658 Leopold I, second son of Ferdinand III, is elected Holy Roman Emperor, defeating the candidature of King Louis XIV of France and ending the short interregnum. 15 August 1658 The Protestant League of Hildesheim joins with the Catholic Rhine League to form the League of the Rhine, the first nondenominational grouping of states within Germany, aimed at securing a balance of power between France and the Holy Roman Empire. It is a triumph for French diplomacy after King Louis XIV had failed to be elected Holy Roman Emperor. August 1658 King Charles X of Sweden begins a second war with Denmark. He lands on Zealand and besieges Copenhagen. 3 September 1658 Following the death of Oliver Cromwell, he is succeeded as Lord Protector of England by his son Richard. 3 September 1658 Oliver Cromwell, English soldier and statesman, commander of Parliamentarian forces in the English Civil Wars (1642–51), Lord Protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland 1653–58, dies (59). September 1658 An army of allied forces from Poland, Brandenburg, and Austria

march to the aid of Denmark. By the end of the year, they have cleared Swedish forces from Jutland, Schleswig, and Holstein. Additionally, in October a Dutch fleet breaks through the blockade of Copenhagen in the Sound. 1658 Dutch microscopist Jan Swammerdam records oval particles in the blood of frogs – the first observation of red blood cells. 1658 The English writer on science and religion Thomas Browne publishes Hydriotaphia, or Urn Burial, a reflection on mortality in which he advocates cremation, and a companion work The Garden of Cyrus. 1658 The Friday Mosque (Jami Masjid) in Delhi, India, one of the largest mosques in India, is completed. Built on the orders of Shah Jahan, it was probably designed by the Mogul architect Ustad Ahmaed Lahor. c. 1658 The Dutch artist Jan Vermeer paints Kitchen Maid. 25 May 1659 Richard Cromwell resigns as Lord Protector of England and the Commonwealth is re-established by the Rump Parliament. 7 November 1659 The Peace of the Pyrenees ends the long-running war between Spain and France. France obtains Roussillon, Cerdagne, most of Artois, Gravelines, and several fortresses in Hainault and the Duchy of Luxembourg. Spain resigns her claims to Alsace, but has her sovereignty in Franche-Comté confirmed and retains the rest of her possessions in the Spanish Netherlands. Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, is pardoned and a marriage alliance is negotiated between King Louis XIV of France and Maria Theresa, King Philip IV of Spain's eldest daughter. She renounces her claim to the Spanish throne in return for a dowry. 1659 The comedy Les Précieuses ridicules/The Affected Young Ladies by the French dramatist Molière (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) is first performed. 1659 The Spanish infanta Maria Theresa introduces cocoa into France, where it is regarded variously as a medicinal potion and an aphrodisiac. c. 1659 Henry Purcell, English composer, born in London, England (–1695). 1 January 1660 English diarist Samuel Pepys begins his Diary, which he keeps until May 1669. 23 February 1660 A regency is established in Sweden when, after the death of his father Charles X, the four-year-old Charles XI becomes king. 25 April–29 December 1660 The Convention Parliament assembles and on 8 May the accession of Charles II as king of England is proclaimed in London, England. 3 May 1660 Assisted by French mediation, the Peace of Oliwa is signed. It ends

the war between Sweden and the allied forces of Brandenburg, Poland, and Denmark. Under its terms, the Elector of Brandenburg Frederick William's sovereignty in East Prussia is recognized, King John II Casimir of Poland renounces his claim to the Swedish throne, Sweden retains Estonia and Livonia, and Sweden and Poland recognize Russian claims to Lithuania and Courland. 28 May 1660 George I, Elector of Hanover 1698–1727 and first Hanoverian king of Great Britain 1714–27, born in Osnabrück, Hanover, Germany (–1727). May 1660 Despite his appeal to the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I for assistance in his fight against the Ottoman Turks, the ousted György II Rákóczy, Prince of Transylvania, is left to fight on alone for his crown. He is defeated and seriously wounded in a battle at Fenes, near Koloszvár, and dies a fortnight later. 6 June 1660 The Peace of Copenhagen formally ends the second war between Sweden and Denmark. Denmark's loss of lands in southern Sweden is confirmed and the Concert of The Hague successfully negotiates for the Baltic to be reopened to foreign ships. 1660 Asser Levy, whose shop is on Wall Street in New Amsterdam (modern New York City), is the first kosher butcher in the Americas. 1660 Daniel Defoe, English novelist and journalist, author of Robinson Crusoe (1719–22) and Moll Flanders (1722), born in London, England (–1731). 1660 English poet John Milton publishes The Readie and Easie Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth, a tract in favour of Republicanism. After the Restoration later this year his books are publicly burnt. 1660 The Chapel San Ivo della Sapienza (attached to Rome University), designed by the Italian architect Francesco Borromini, is completed in Rome, Italy. 1660 The German scientist Otto von Guericke discovers the sudden drop in air pressure preceding a violent storm – a discovery that will revolutionize weather forecasting. He also suggests comets might return periodically, pre-empting Edmond Halley's work on this subject by 45 years. c. 1660 The Dutch artist Jan Vermeer paints View of Delft. 5 February 1661 K'ang-Hsi becomes the second emperor of the Manchu dynasty in China at the age of six after the death of Shun-chih. He begins his personal rule in 1669 at the age of fifteen. 9 March 1661 Jules Mazarin, cardinal, diplomat and statesman, first minister of France 1642–61, dies in Vincennes, France (58). 21 June 1661 The Peace of Kardis is signed between Russia and Sweden, thereby ending the Northern War. By its terms, Russia recognizes the existing Russo-

Swedish frontier, while Sweden undertakes not to intervene in the Russo-Polish war. July 1661 The four year war between the United Netherlands and Portugal is ended when a treaty is signed giving the Dutch financial compensation and access to the Portuguese empire on equal terms with the British. In addition, the agreement allows the Portuguese to retain Brazil, Angola, and São Tomé, and the Dutch to keep Ceylon. The Portuguese postpone ratification until 1663 because of British hostility to the terms of the treaty. 1661 The English composer Matthew Locke is appointed composer to King Charles II of England. 22 January 1662 Having been failed by his Austrian allies, Prince János Kemény of Transylvania is defeated and killed at the Battle of Nagyszöllös. The defeat completes the Ottoman conquest of Transylvania and leaves Hungary open to Ottoman invasion. 21 May 1662 King Charles II of England marries Catherine of Braganza, daughter of King John IV of Portugal, at Portsmouth, England. 19 August 1662 Blaise Pascal, French mathematician and physicist who founded the theory of probability, and invented the first digital calculator, the syringe, and hydraulic press, dies in Paris, France (39). 1662 Anglo-Irish chemist and physicist Robert Boyle describes the law that will bear his name, stating that, for a fixed mass of gas in a container, the volume occupied by the gas is inversely proportional to the pressure it exerts. 12 February 1663 Cotton Mather, New England author, educator, and Congregational minister, son of Increase Mather, born in Boston, Massachusetts (–1728). 8 July 1663 King Charles II of England grants a royal charter to Rhode Island. The charter gives the colony the right to elect its own governor and it also contains a guarantee of religious freedom. 1663 German philosopher and mathematician Gottfried von Leibniz publishes De Principio individui/On the Principle of the Individual, a defence of nominalism (the view that names are merely conventions and do not imply the existence of universals). 1663 The English poet Samuel Butler publishes the first part of his satire Hudibras, written in 'Hudibrastics' (eight-syllable rhyming couplets). Part two appears in 1664, part three in 1678. c. 1663 The Dutch artist Pieter de Hooch paints At the Linen Closet.

10 August 1664 The Treaty of Vasvár ends the war between the Ottoman Empire and the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I. The Ottoman Turks are confirmed in their occupation of Neuhäusel and Grosswardein, Mihály Apafi, the Ottoman nominee, is recognized as Prince of Transylvania, both sides agree to remove their armies from Transylvania, and financial compensation is to be paid. 1664 English physician Thomas Willis, professor of natural philosophy at Oxford, England, publishes Anatome cerebri nervorumque descriptio et usus/Use and Description of the Anatomy of the Brain and Nerves, the most complete description of the brain yet written. It identifies the arteries which supply blood to the base of the brain. 1664 Growing commercial rivalry between England and the United Netherlands causes a number of preliminary skirmishes to occur between the two countries in the colonies and at sea. The tension generated eventually leads to the outbreak of the second Anglo-Dutch war. 1664 Organized sport begins in the North American colonies with the establishment by New York's first governor, Richard Nicholls, of the Newmarket horse racing course at Hempstead Plains, Long Island. 1664 The English physicist Robert Hooke suggests that planetary orbits may be maintained by the constant attractive force of gravity between two bodies. 1664 The French composer Jean-Baptiste Lully completes his choral work Miserere/Have Mercy. 1664 Two comedies, Le Tartuffe, ou l'imposteur/Tartuffe, or the Impostor (first published in 1669) and Le Mariage forcé/The Enforced Marriage, by the French dramatist Molière (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) are first performed. 6 February 1665 Queen Anne, last Stuart monarch of Great Britain and Ireland 1702–14, born in London, England (–1714). 4 March 1665 Prompted by attacks by the Dutch and the British on each other's colonial possessions, the second Anglo-Dutch war begins. 17 September 1665 King Philip IV of Spain dies and is succeeded by his underage son Charles II. A regency is established under Philip's widow Mariana. 1665 English scientist Robert Hooke publishes Micrographia, the first serious scientific work on microscopy, describing the function of the microscope, and coining the name 'cells' to describe cavities he has found in the structure of cork. 1665 The Anglo-Irish scientist Robert Boyle constructs a small, portable camera obscura, an early form of the pinhole camera. 1665 The French author François VI, duc de La Rochefoucauld, publishes

Réflexions, ou Sentences et maximes morales/Reflections, or Axioms and Moral Maxims, a collection of witty epigrams on social and psychological themes. The book becomes known simply as his Maximes. 1665 The last major outbreak of the Black Death (a form of bubonic plague) affects London, England, in an epidemic known as the 'Great Plague', which reaches a peak in September, and around 70,000 people die. Infected houses are shut up and marked with a red cross, and the inhabitants are left to die. Other towns, including Newcastle and Southampton, are also affected. 1665 Using vacuum pumps, Anglo-Irish chemist and physicist Robert Boyle proves that air is necessary for candles to burn and for animals to live. 16 January 1666 By the terms of the treaty of 1662, France declares war against Britain in support of the United Netherlands. The French send an army against the bishop of Münster in the Holy Roman Empire, Britain's sole ally, whose forces have invaded the eastern provinces of the United Netherlands. 19 April 1666 Britain's sole ally in the war against the Dutch and French, the bishop of Münster in the Holy Roman Empire, sues for peace and a treaty is signed providing for a virtual total disarmament of his forces. 2–5 September 1666 The Great Fire devastates the city of London, England. Many buildings are destroyed, including St Paul's Cathedral and the Guildhall. 1666 In order to calculate the Moon's orbit accurately, English mathematician and physicist Isaac Newton completes the development of a new type of mathematics, calculus or 'fluxions', to add infinitesimally small elements of the orbit together. 1666 Safi II succeeds his father Abbas II as Shah of Persia. He is crowned again as Suleiman I in 1668. 1666 The Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn paints The Jewish Bride and Portrait of Titus. 1666 The German chemist Otto Tachenius publishes his Hippocrates chimicus/ Chemistry of Hippocrates, proposing that all salts arise from the combination of an acid with a base. 30 January 1667 The Truce of Andrussovo is signed by Russia and Poland, thereby ending the Thirteen Years' War. Russia gives up many of the gains made in the Treaty of Vilna but retains Smolensk, Kiev, and the east bank of the River Dnieper. Both countries commit themselves to a joint defence against the Ottoman Turks. 24 May 1667 After issuing a justificatory essay, King Louis XIV of France makes a call to arms and French troops invade the Spanish Netherlands to begin the War of Devolution. His pretext is that under Brabant law his wife Maria Theresa, as a

child of King Philip IV of Spain's first marriage, has a much better claim to Spanish territories in the Netherlands than her half brother King Charles II of Spain. 20 June 1667 Pope Clement IX is elected, with French support, following the death of Pope Alexander VII. 21 July 1667 The Peace of Breda ends the second Anglo-Dutch war. England makes a treaty with France to cede Acadia in North America and recover Antigua, Montserrat, and St Kitts in the West Indies. A second treaty between England and the United Netherlands allows the Dutch to retain Surinam in the West Indies and England the Dutch colonies of New Netherland, Cape Coast Castle, and Fort James. 30 November 1667 Jonathan Swift, Irish author and satirist, author of Gulliver's Travels, born in Dublin, Ireland (–1745). 1667 The English poet John Milton publishes his epic poem Paradise Lost. A revised edition appears in 1674. 1667 The Piazza of Saint Peter's in the Vatican, Rome, Italy, designed by the Italian artist Gian Lorenzo Bernini, is completed. 1667 The tragedy Andromaque/Andromache by the French dramatist Jean Racine is first performed. c. 1667 The Dutch artist Jan Vermeer paints The Painter in His Studio. 1667–1685 A substantial reform of French law takes place with the introduction of a new Civil Code, the Code Louis, in 1667. It is followed by the Criminal Code in 1670, the Maritime Code in 1672, the Commercial Code in 1673, and the Code Noir in 1685, which caters for slaves in the colonies. It remains the basis of French law until the Code Napoléon is introduced in 1804. 13 January 1668 The United Netherlands and Britain sign the Alliance of The Hague, whereby each promises to provide armed assistance if the other is attacked. They undertake to attempt to bring about a peace between France and Spain and, by a secret clause, aim to create peace between Spain and Portugal. The Triple Alliance is formed when Sweden signs up to the terms of the treaty. King Louis XIV of France views the Alliance as a betrayal by the Dutch, creating tension between the two countries and sowing the seeds of ill relations in the following years. 19 January 1668 King Louis XIV of France signs a partition treaty with the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I preparing for the future division of the Spanish kingdom in the event of the death of the sickly seven year old Charles II of Spain without heirs. It is agreed that France will take the Spanish Netherlands, the Franche-Comté, Naples, Sicily, Navarre, the Philippines, and Spanish possessions

in Africa, while the Emperor will gain Spain, Spanish America, Milan, Sardinia, and the Balearic and Canary Islands. 13 February 1668 After a twenty-eight year struggle, Spain finally recognizes the independence of Portugal in the Treaty of Lisbon. The sovereignty of the Braganza family is secured. 2 May 1668 The Peace of Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) is signed between France and Spain, ending the War of Devolution. King Louis XIV of France is compelled to restore the Franche-Comté to Spain but he retains Lille and the 11 other fortresses in Flanders that surrendered to French forces during the war. 1668 The English poet and dramatist John Dryden publishes his essay 'Essay of Dramatic Poesy', a dialogue on the development of English theatre. 1668 The French poet Jean de La Fontaine publishes the first volume of his Fables choisies mises en vers/Selected Fables Put Into Verse, his best-known work. A second volume appears in 1678, a third in 1693. 19 June 1669 Michal Wisniowiecki, a Lithuanian, is elected king of Poland after a nine-month struggle over the succession. His victory prevents French attempts to extend their influence in Poland. 4 October 1669 Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn, Dutch painter, often regarded as one of the greatest in history, dies in Amsterdam, United Netherlands (63). 1669 A famine kills three million people in Bengal (modern Bangladesh). 1669 Italian anatomist Marcello Malpighi publishes a treatise on the anatomy and development of the silkworm, the first description of the anatomy of an invertebrate. 1669 The Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn paints his last Self-Portrait (The Hague). 1669 The English mathematician John Wallis publishes his Mechanica/Mechanics, a detailed mathematical study of mechanics. 1669 The German writer Hans Jakob Christoph von Grimmelshausen publishes his novels: Der Abentheurliche Simplicissimus/The Adventurous Simplicissimus. Picaresque novels, they are a satire on the Thirty Years' War. Further volumes appear in 1670 and 1672. 9 February 1670 Following his death of Frederick III, Christian V succeeds his father as king of Denmark. 29 April 1670 Emilio Altieri is elected Pope Clement X following the death of Pope Clement IX.

22 May 1670 The secret Treaty of Dover between Britain and France is signed. King Charles II of England promises to declare himself a Catholic in return for a subsidy. He also engages to support King Louis XIV of France against Spain and to provide naval assistance in a joint war against the United Netherlands. 1670 Pensées/Thoughts, a collection of religious meditations by the French mathematician and religious thinker Blaise Pascal, is published posthumously. 1670 Anglo-Irish chemist and physicist Robert Boyle discovers hydrogen (atomic number 1), produced when certain metals react with acid, although he does not identify it as an element. 1670 The comedy Le Bourgeois gentilhomme/The Bourgeois Gentleman by the French dramatist Molière (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) is first performed. The music is by the French composer Jean-Baptiste Lully. The play is first published in 1671. 1670 The Palace of Versailles, near Paris, France, designed by the French architect Louis Le Vau, is completed. The French architect Jules HardouinMansart will begin extensive additions in 1678. c. 1670 The Dutch artist Jan Vermeer paints The Lace-maker, The Letter, and Lady Writing a Letter. 1671 Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, Marquise de Sévigné begins a long series of letters to her daughter. In total she writes over a thousand letters, creating a vivid and detailed picture of French society in the second half of the 17th century. 1671 The English poet John Milton publishes the epic in four books Paradise Regained, a sequel to Paradise Lost (1667). 1671 The English poet John Milton publishes the verse tragedy Samson Agonistes. 1671 The Ottoman Empire declares war on Poland, invading in 1672, taking Kamieniec Podolski (now Kamenets Podolsky, Ukraine), and advancing towards Lvov (modern Lviv, Ukraine). 17 March 1672 An engagement between the British navy and the Dutch Smyrna fleet off the Isle of Wight on 13 March is used as a pretext for Britain to declare war on the United Netherlands. The declaration fulfils British obligations to the French expressed in the secret Treaty of Dover and begins the third Anglo-Dutch war. Subsequently, on 6 April, the French also declare war on the Dutch. 9 June 1672 Peter I the Great, Tsar of Russia with his brother Ivan V 1682–96 and then alone 1696–1725, who westernized Russia, born in Moscow, Russia (–1725). 20 August 1672 Having been held responsible for Dutch failures in the war

against France and having resigned as Grand Pensionary earlier in the month, Johan de Witt, political leader of the United Netherlands (1653–72), who led his country during the First and Second Anglo-Dutch Wars, and his brother Cornelius are assassinated by a large mob at The Hague in the United Netherlands (47). 18 October 1672 The Treaty of Buczacz is signed between Poland and the Ottoman Turks. Poland cedes Podolia and Kamieniec Podolski (now Kamenets Podolsky, Ukraine) to the Ottoman Empire and promises to pay an annual tribute to the Sultan. The treaty also secures most of the Ukraine to the east of the Dnieper for the Cossack hetman ('headman') Peter Doroshenko. However, it is never ratified by the Polish Sejm (parliament). 1 January 1673 The first regular mounted mail service is begun, between New York City and Boston, Massachusetts. The trip takes three weeks, with the rider changing horses along the way at scattered posts. This road, the Boston Post Road, is the first of many post roads in the North American colonies. 17 February 1673 Molière (real name Jean-Baptiste Poquelin), French comic dramatist, whose best-known works include Le Tartuffe, ou l'imposteur/ Tartuffe, or the Impostor (1664) and L'Avare/The Miser (1668), dies in Paris, France (51). March 1673 Frederick William, the Great Elector of Brandenburg, breaks his alliance with the United Netherlands when, prompted partly by the fact that Dutch subsidy payments have fallen into arrears, he makes a preliminary peace with King Louis XIV of France. 11 August 1673 The last important engagement of the third Anglo-Dutch war takes place between the allied British and French navies and the Dutch fleet off Texel in the United Netherlands. The result is inconclusive but it marks the end of allied efforts to land troops in the United Netherlands. 1673 German mathematician Gottfried von Leibniz presents a calculating machine to the Royal Society. It is the most advanced yet, capable of multiplication, division, and extracting roots. 1673 The English poet John Milton publishes Poems Upon Various Occasions. 1673 The opera Cadmus and Hermione by the French composer Jean Baptiste Lully is first performed, in Paris, France. 9 February 1674 Owing to parliamentary pressure, King Charles II of England is forced to negotiate the Treaty of Westminster, thereby bringing the third AngloDutch war to an end. The Dutch accept the British right of salute in the Channel and agree to pay a small indemnity. New York City is returned to Britain but the Dutch monopoly of trade in the East Indies is preserved. 21 May 1674 Following his victory over the Ottoman Turks at Chocim, John Sobieski is elected king of Poland as John III.

28 May 1674 The Imperial German diet (assembly) at Ratisbon (modern Regensburg) declares war on France. 11 August 1674 The important Battle of Seneffe, near Charleroi in the Spanish Netherlands, takes place between French and allied Dutch, Imperial, and Spanish forces. Though the two sides fight to a stalemate, the Dutch Captain-General William of Orange emerges with an enhanced reputation as a military leader. 8 November 1674 John Milton, English poet, scholar, historian, and republican whose best-known work is Paradise Lost (1667), dies in Chalfont St Giles, Buckinghamshire, England (66). 1674 English-born North American judge Samuel Sewall (one of the judges in the Salem witch trials) starts his Diary, covering both his private life and the public affairs of Massachusetts, which he keeps (with some long gaps) until 1729. It is first published in 1878. 1674 French philosopher Nicolas Malebranche publishes De La Recherche de la vérité/On the Search for Truth, his major work. An English translation, The Search for Truth, appears in 1694. 1674 French poet and critic Nicolas Boileau Despréaux publishes L'Art poétique/ The Art of Poetry, a defence of the classical tradition. 1674 The Dutch microscopist Anton van Leeuwenhoek uses single-lens microscopes to study the composition of organisms. He discovers an extensive fauna of minute organisms, which he describes as 'very little animalcules'. 1674 The Dutch scientist and instrumentmaker Christiaan Huygens makes a watch using a balance wheel controlled by the oscillations of a spring to keep time. c. 1674 An anonymous North American artist paints two portraits of a young Boston family: John Freake and Elizabeth Freake and Baby Mary. The second of these portraits is widely considered one of the finest paintings of the Colonial period. 27 July 1675 Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne, French military leader, marshal of France 1643–68, is killed in battle at Sasbach, Baden-Baden, Germany (63). August 1675 The Royal Greenwich Observatory is established by British king Charles II on the outskirts of London, England. English astronomer John Flamsteed is appointed Astronomical Observator (later Astronomer Royal). October 1675 In fulfilment of treaty obligations of 1674, Denmark enters the Franco-Dutch war on the side of the United Netherlands after Sweden invades

Brandenburg. Denmark invades the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp's lands, which deprives Sweden of a base on Denmark's southern border. 1675 The comedy The Country-Wife by the English dramatist William Wycherley is first performed, in London, England. March 1676 English physician Thomas Sydenham publishes Observationes medicae/Medical Observations, which will be a standard medical text for two centuries. In it, he analyses fevers and suggests cooling treatment for smallpox. 26 August 1676 Robert Walpole, prime minister of Britain 1721–42, a Whig, born in Houghton Hall, Norfolk, England (–1745). 21 September 1676 Benedetto Odescalchi is elected Pope Innocent XI following the death of Pope Clement X. 18 October 1676 Nathaniel Bacon, leader of the rebellion in Virginia, dies unexpectedly. His forces surrender to the governor Sir William Berkeley with the promise of amnesty. 3 November 1676 Ahmed Köprülü dies and is succeeded by his brother-in-law Kara Mustafa as Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire. 3 December 1676 King Charles XI of Sweden defeats an invading Danish army at Lund in southern Sweden. 1676 The Church of San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane in Rome, Italy, designed by the Italian architect Francesco Borromini, is completed. It becomes a key work in the development of baroque architecture. 21 February 1677 Baruch (Benedict) de Spinoza, Dutch philosopher, leading exponent of rationalism, dies in The Hague, United Netherlands (44). 1677 Ethica ordine geometrico demonstrata/Ethics Demonstrated According to the Geometrical Order by the Dutch philosopher Baruch (Benedict de) Spinoza is published posthumously. One of the major works of Western philosophy, it attempts to construct a comprehensive world-view in which there is a single substance (God) with infinite attributes. 1677 North American preacher Increase Mather publishes The Troubles That Have Happened in New England by Reason of the Indians There. 1677 The Church of St Mary-le-Bow, in Cheapside, London, England, designed by the English architect Christopher Wren, is completed. 1677 The play The Rover by the English writer Aphra Behn is first performed, in London, England.

1677 The tragedy Phèdre/Phaedra by the French dramatist Jean Racine is first performed, in Paris, France, and first printed. 4 March 1678 Antonio Vivaldi, important Italian composer during the baroque period, born in Venice, Italy (–1741). 10 August 1678 The first of the Peace Treaties of Nijmegen is signed by France and the United Netherlands. Under its terms, France restores Maastricht and other conquests to the United Netherlands and the unfavourable tariff erected against the Dutch by the French chief finance minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert in 1667 is cancelled. The treaty is ratified by the Dutch on 17 September. 17 September 1678 The second Peace Treaty of Nijmegen is signed by the French and the Spanish. By its terms, Spain cedes Franche-Comté and exchanges some of her fortresses in the Spanish Netherlands with France. These include St Omer, Aire, Ypres, Valenciennes, Cambrai, and Mauberge. October 1678 Count Imre Thököly emerges as leader of another Hungarian rebellion against Habsburg rule when he launches a series of attacks on mining towns in northern Hungary. By 1680 he occupies nearly all the counties in northern and western Hungary. 1678 British colonist Thomas Thatcher publishes A Brief Rule... in Small Pocks or Measles, the first medical publication in North America. 1678 Dutch physicist and astronomer Christiaan Huygens records his discovery of the polarization of light in his Traité de la lumière/Treatise on Light. 1678 The English physicist Robert Hooke discovers the law now named after him – that the extension of an elastic material such as a spring is in proportion to the force exerted on it. 1678 The English-born American poet Anne Bradstreet publishes Several Poems Compiled with Great Variety of Wit and Learning, the first American edition of her poems (an unauthorized edition appeared in London, England, in 1650). 1678 The French writer Marie-Madeleine (Madame) de La Fayette anonymously publishes the novel La Princesse de Clèves/The Princess of Clèves, a landmark in the development of the French novel. 5 February 1679 The final Peace Treaty of Nijmegen is signed by the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I and King Louis XIV of France. By its terms, France gives up the fortress of Philippsburg but retains Freiburg. Additionally, Duke Charles of Lorraine is restored to his territories in Lorraine. However, the French retain Longwy and Nancy as well as military access roads in the territory. Charles refuses to accept these terms and as a result Lorraine remains under French occupation. 29 June 1679 As a result of the European peace wrought by the Nijmegen

treaties and to avoid a French invasion of his territories, Frederick William, the Great Elector of Brandenburg is forced to sign the Peace of St Germain. It ends the war with Sweden and by its terms Brandenburg loses all conquests in Swedish Pomerania, except some insubstantial territories on the right bank of the River Oder. 26 September 1679 The Treaty of Lund concludes the war between Denmark and Sweden. Its terms reiterate an earlier peace imposed on the Danes by King Louis XIV of France at Fontainebleau, France, on 29 June, by which all conquered territories are returned to their original owners. The treaty also contains secret articles in which both partners promise not to make any alliances without the other's knowledge. 4 December 1679 Thomas Hobbes, major English philosopher and political theorist, whose best-known work is Leviathan (1651), dies at Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, England (91). 1679 A period of intense persecution of Hindus in India is ushered in when the Mogul Emperor Aurangzeb re-imposes a poll tax on non-Muslims. Subsequently, he tries to oust all non-Muslims from central and local government and destroys many Hindu places of worship. He also launches a jihad (holy war) against the Maratha kingdom. 1679 French Huguenot refugee Denis Papin makes a 'steam digester' – an early form of pressure cooker – for softening bones, and demonstrates it to the Royal Society in England. A weighted valve allows pressure to build up to a predetermined level and is the forerunner of the later safety valve. The sytem is also used for the autoclave. 1679 German mathematician Gottfried von Leibniz introduces binary arithmetic (a number system to the base two), in which only two symbols are used to represent all numbers. It will eventually be adopted for use in digital computers. 1680 English mathematician and physicist Isaac Newton calculates that an inverse-square law of gravitational attraction between the Sun and planets would explain the elliptical orbits discovered by Kepler. He also puts forward a theory that the air resistance encountered by a body increases in proportion to the square of its speed. 1680 The French philosopher Nicolas Malebranche publishes Traité de la nature et de la grâce/A Treatise on Nature and Grace. 1680 Tokugawa Tsunayoshi becomes shogun (military ruler) of Japan, ushering in one of the most tranquil and successful periods of Japanese history. 1681 The Galerie des Glaces (Hall of Mirrors) at the Palace of Versailles, near Paris, France, designed by the French architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart, is completed. His extensions to Versailles are completed in 1689.

1681 The dodo, a type of large flightless bird inhabiting the island of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, is driven to extinction by the arrival of Europeans who hunt it for food. 1681 The English poet and dramatist John Dryden publishes part one of his satirical allegory Absalom and Achitophel. Part two appears in 1682. 1681 The Old Ship Meeting house in Hingham, Massachusetts, is built. 9 April 1682 René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle, reaches the mouth of the Mississippi and takes possession of the entire Mississippi Valley for France, naming it Louisiana in honour of King Louis XIV of France. 27 April 1682 Following the death of Tsar Fyodor III of Russia, a faction led by the family of his stepmother, Natalia Naryshkin, proclaims her son Peter I the Great as tsar. May 1682–August 1689 After several days of unrest, the newly proclaimed Tsar Peter I the Great of Russia is overthrown by a faction led by the family of Tsar Alexis's first wife, Maria Miloslavsky, and backed by the Moscow Streltsy (musketeers). Peter and his mentally disabled half-brother Ivan V are proclaimed as joint tsars, with his half-sister Sofia as regent. 1682 English botanist Nehemiah Grew's Anatomy of Plants, identifies the stamens and pistils as male and female sex organs for the first time. 1682 The English astronomer Edmond Halley observes the comet that he later concludes (in 1705) returns every 76 years, and which now bears his name. 1682 The English naturalist John Ray's Methodus plantarum nova/New Method for Plants is published, in which he makes a fundamental distinction between monocotyledons and dicotyledons. 1682 The Ottoman Turks recognize Imre Thököly as king of Hungary. They send a small force to assist him, allowing Thököly to capure two fortresses from the Austrians. Attempts are made by the Austrians to renew the Treaty of Vasvár of August 1664 which is due to expire in August 1682. However, their proposals are rejected by the Ottoman Turks and war becomes inevitable. 6 September 1683 Jean-Baptiste Colbert, marquis de Seignelay, French statesman and controller of finance for France 1665–83, whose programme of economic reconstruction led to France becoming a dominant European power, dies in Paris, France (64). 12 September 1683 Allied Austro-Polish forces under King John III Sobieski and Duke Charles of Lorraine, assisted by forces from Bavaria and Saxony, raise the Ottoman siege of Vienna. The Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa is made a scapegoat for the defeat and is executed on 25 December. The victory is a preliminary to the

Habsburg reconquest of Hungary. 12 September 1683 Pedro II accedes to the throne of Portugal on the death of his brother King Afonso VI. He has acted as Prince Regent since 1668. 1683 Dutch microscopist Anton van Leeuwenhoek is the first to observe bacteria. 1683 The Chinese Manchu dynasty gains control of the previously autonomous island of Formosa, incorporating it into Fukien province. It remains a Chinese possession until 1895. 1683 The Japanese artist Hishikawa Moronobu paints A Riverboat Part. 15 April 1684 Catherine I (original name Marta Skowronska), ruling empress of Russia 1725–27, wife of Peter I the Great of Russia, born (–1727). 15 August 1684 The Truce of Ratisbon (Regensburg) is reluctantly signed by the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, preoccupied with the Ottoman War and under pressure from the Dutch. He recognizes King Louis XIV of France's possession of the territories seized as a result of the Chambres de Réunions policy, including Strasbourg and Luxembourg, for a period of 20 years. By this agreement, the territories of France reach their greatest geographical extent to date. 1684 Dutch microscopist Anton van Leeuwenhoek first describes red blood cells accurately. 1684 The German philosopher and physicist Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz invents the differential calculus, a fundamental tool in studying rates of change, independently of Newton. 6 February 1685 Charles II, King of Great Britain and Ireland 1660–85, who was restored to the throne after the Puritan Commonwealth, dies in London, England (54). 6 February 1685 James II succeeds as king of England on the death of his brother Charles II. 23 February 1685 George Frideric Handel, German-born English baroque composer, whose best-known works include the oratorio Messiah (1741), born in Halle, Germany (–1759). 21 March 1685 Johann Sebastian Bach, leading German composer of the baroque period, born in Eisenach, Thuringia, Germany (–1750). 30 June 1685 John Gay, English poet and dramatist, author of The Beggar's Opera (1728), born in Barnstaple, Devonshire, England (–1732). 18 October 1685 After a period of increasing persecution, King Louis XIV of

France issues the Edict of Fontainebleau which revokes the Edict of Nantes of 1598 and makes it illegal to be a Protestant in France. As a result, thousands of Huguenot refugees flee to Britain, the United Netherlands, and Brandenburg. 8 November 1685 A breakdown of the Franco-Brandenburg alliance occurs when, in response to King Louis XIV of France's revocation of the Edict of Nantes, Frederick William, the Great Elector of Brandenburg, issues the Edict of Potsdam, offering refuge to Huguenots in his dominions. Subsequently the Great Elector pursues an anti-French foreign policy. c. 1685 The opera Venus and Adonis, with music by the English composer John Blow, is first performed, in London, England. 1 April 1686 An alliance between the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I and Frederick William, the Great Elector of Brandenburg, is signed. By its terms, Brandenburg promises to support Habsburg claims in Spain and to provide assistance against French aggression. In return for the territory of Schwiebus, Brandenburg also renounces her claims to Silesia. 9 July 1686 In response to King Louis XIV of France 's claims to the Palatinate, the defensive League of Augsburg is formed to protect against encroachments on German soil. It includes the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, the Electors of Bavaria, Saxony, and the Palatinate, the kings of Spain and Sweden by virtue of their German territories, and other minor German princes. 11 December 1686 Louis II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, French noble, leader of the last of the Fronde uprisings (1648–53), later an outstanding general under King Louis XIV, dies in Fontainebleu, France (65). 1686 After annulling the charter of Massachusetts, King James II of England creates the Dominion of New England in North America, which includes New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, and East and West Jersey. The king appoints Edmund Andros to govern the dominion. 1686 The English mathematician and physicist Isaac Newton presents his great work the Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica/Mathematical Principles and Natural Philosophy to the Royal Society, but they are short of funds and unable to finance its publication. They recommend he approach his friend the English astronomer Edmond Halley. The work is published in 1687. 12 August 1687 Imperial forces under Charles, Duke of Lorraine, unexpectedly defeat an Ottoman army, led by Süleyman Pasha, at Nagyharsány (Berg Hasan), near Mohács. For the first time in 150 years Hungary is free from Ottoman influence. August 1687 Venetian forces take Corinth from the Ottoman Turks and lay siege to Athens. A bombardment seriously damages the Parthenon after a powder magazine explodes. The Ottomans surrender the city and are driven out of the Morea.

7 November 1687 As a result of Ottoman defeats in the war with Austria, an army mutiny takes place in Constantinople, in which Mehmed IV is deposed in favour of Süleyman II. Fazil Mustafa Pasa Köprülü becomes second Vizier and is promoted, in 1689, to Grand Vizier. 9 December 1687 The Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I's son Archduke Joseph is crowned as king of Hungary. The coronation brings to an end the negotiations at Pressburg in which a diet (assembly) of the Hungarian Estates has renounced its rights of resistance and recognized the Hungarian crown as a hereditary possession of the male line of Habsburgs. 1687 The English mathematician Isaac Newton publishes Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica/The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, his most important work. It presents his theories of motion, gravity, and mechanics, which form the basis of much of modern physics. 1687 The English poet and dramatist John Dryden publishes his religious allegory The Hind and the Panther. 9 May 1688 Frederick III succeeds as Elector of Brandenburg on the death of Frederick William, the Great Elector. He becomes King Frederick I of Prussia in 1701. 21 May 1688 Alexander Pope, English poet and satirist, author of 'Essay on Man', born in London, England (–1744). 31 August 1688 John Bunyan, English Puritan minister and preacher, author of The Pilgrim's Progress (1678), dies in London, England (59). 30 September 1688 The Dutch stadtholder William of Orange accepts the Whig lords' invitation to intervene in British affairs. He issues a manifesto denouncing evil counsellors, who he claimed had subjected the country to arbitrary government, and calling for a free Parliament. 26 November 1688 King Louis XIV of France declares war on the United Netherlands. 11 December 1688 An assembly of peers and bishops meets at the Guildhall to secure order and take on the government of London, England. They invite the Dutch stadtholder William of Orange to enter the city. Many other provincial centres have already fallen to William's supporters. 1688 French writer Jean de la Bruyère publishes his collection of satirical sketches Les Caractères de Théophraste traduits de Grec avec les caractères ou les moeurs de ce siècle/The Characters of Theophrastus Translated from Greek, with the Characters or Manners of the Age.

1688 The English writer Aphra Behn publishes her novel Oroonoko. She is the first English woman to earn her living as a writer. 13 February 1689 The Convention Parliament offers the crown of England to the Dutch stadtholder William of Orange and his wife Mary, the daughter of King James II who has been declared as having abdicated, an act known as the 'Glorious Revolution'. They also present a Declaration of Rights which states that parliamentary consent is needed to make or suspend laws, to levy taxes, or to maintain a standing army, that the dispensing power is illegal, that petitioning is lawful, and that free elections should be held for frequent parliaments. A Committee of Parliament is created to convert this Declaration into a Bill of Rights. 12 March 1689–3 July 1690 The dispossessed James II arrives at Kinsale in Ireland with French arms and assistance. In the space of a month he gains control of the entire country, with the exception of Londonderry and Enniskillen. 15 April 1689 King Louis XIV of France declares war on Spain, opening up another theatre of warfare in Europe. 16 April 1689 Aphra Behn (maiden name unknown), English dramatist, novelist and poet, the first Englishwoman to earn her living by writing, whose works include The Rover (1678) and Oroonoko (1688), dies in London, England (48). 27 July 1689 Scottish Jacobites led by John Graham of Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee, defeat troops loyal to King William III of Britain under Gen Hugh Mackay at Killiecrankie, Scotland. However, when Dundee is killed, resistance to the 'Glorious Revolution' in Scotland is effectively ended. August 1689 Peter I the Great and his supporters engineer a coup against the regent, his half-sister Sofia, which deposes his half-brother Ivan V and makes him sole tsar of Russia. His mother Natalia Naryshkin becomes regent until he comes of age on 30 May 1693. 6 October 1689 Pope Alexander VIII is elected following the death of Pope Innocent XI. 19 December 1689 Britain accedes to the Grand Alliance, joining the Dutch and the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I in a coalition against France. 1689 Miscellaneous Poems by Andrew Marvell Esq, the first collection of poems by the English poet Andrew Marvell, is published posthumously. It contains his famous poem 'To His Coy Mistress'. 1689 English coffee house proprietor Edward Lloyd opens a coffee house in Tower Street, London, England; frequented by merchants, it develops into a forum for insuring commodities bound for the East and West Indies, and eventually into the most famous insurance house in the world, Lloyd's of London.

1689 English philosopher John Locke publishes his first Letter Concerning Toleration, arguing for religious toleration. The second appears in 1690, the third in 1692. 1689 The Dutch artist Meindert Hobbema paints Avenue at Middleharnis. 1689 The opera Dido and Aeneas by the English composer Henry Purcell with a libretto by English dramatist Nathan Tate is first performed, by Josias Priest's School for Young Women in Chelsea, London, England. 1689–1724 The Byerley Turk, the Darley Arabian, and the Godolphin Arab, the horses from which all modern thoroughbreds are descended in the male line, are imported to England from the Middle East and north Africa. 6 June 1690 Spain joins the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, the United Netherlands, and Britain in the Grand Alliance against France. 1 July 1690 King William III of England defeats the dispossessed king James II at the battle of the Boyne in Ireland. James flees to France. 1690 English philosopher John Locke publishes Two Treatises on Civil Government, a book that has a profound effect on the development of political philosophy. The first attacks the theory of the divine right of kings set out in Filmer's Patriarcha, published in 1680. The second expounds Locke's theory of the social contract between society and its ruler. 1690 English philosopher John Locke publishes An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. A major work in the theory of knowledge, it lays the foundation of British empiricism. 1690–1692 King William III and Queen Mary II of Britain slowly establish their authority over the British colonies by issuing new charters. James II's policy of centralization and unification in North America is greatly watered down. 13 January 1691 George Fox, English preacher and missionary, founder of the Society of Friends (Quakers), dies in London, England (66). 23 June 1691 Ahmad II succeeds Süleyman III as sultan of the Ottoman Empire. 12 July 1691 Pope Innocent XII is elected following the death of Pope Alexander VIII. 19 August 1691 Imperial forces under Louis, Margrave of Baden, defeat the Ottoman Turks under Imre Thököly at Zalánkemén, completing the re-conquest of Transylvania. Mustafa Köprülü, the Grand Vizier, is killed in action. 4 December 1691 After the battle of Zalánkemén, the Estates of Transylvania recognize the Habsburg kings as their ruler. The principality is not reincorporated

into Hungary but is controlled directly from Vienna, in Austria. It is administered by an appointed governor and council, a situation that continues until 1848. 30 December 1691 Robert Boyle, Anglo-Irish chemist and natural philosopher, who conducted pioneering experiments on the properties of gases, dies in London, England (64). 1691 A ducking stool is used in New York City to punish scolds by plunging them into water. It is not used often there although it is a common punishment in the Southern United States. 1691 The Italian churchman Antonio Pignatelli is elected Pope Innocent XII. He is pope until 1700. May–October 1692 A witch-hunt takes place in Salem, Massachusetts. Amongst mounting public hysteria, the civil magistrates, encouraged by the clergy, set up a special court to try the 150 accused. 19 convicted witches are hanged and others are imprisoned. The scare begins to die down in September, the special court is dissolved in October, and the remaining prisoners released. Later, the Massachusetts's General Court annuls the convictions. 16 August–12 September 1692 Allied troops launch an invasion of France from Savoy. They converge on Embrun in Dauphiné, which capitulates on 16 August. However, because of supply problems they decide to withdraw on 12 September. France remains free from foreign troops for the rest of the Nine Years' War (also known as the War of the League of Augsburg). 1693 English-born North American religious leader and colonialist William Penn publishes An Essay on the Present and Future Peace of Europe and Some Fruits of Solitude, a collection of aphorisms. 21 November 1694 Voltaire (original name François-Marie Arouet), celebrated French philosopher and writer, whose major works include Candide (1758) and the Dictionnaire philosophique/Philosophical Dictionary (1764), born in Paris, France (–1778). 1694 Husayn I becomes shah of Persia. He is the last independent ruler of the Safavid dynasty. 1694 The Journal of the English Quaker George Fox is published posthumously, edited by Thomas Ellwood. 6 February 1695 Mustafa II succeeds as sultan of the Ottoman Empire on the death of Ahmad II. 8 July 1695 Christiaan Huygens, Dutch mathematician, astronomer, and physicist, who developed the wave theory of light, dies in The Hague, United Netherlands (66).

21 November 1695 Henry Purcell, English baroque composer, dies in London, England (36). 1695 The English composer Henry Purcell completes his choral work Elegy on the Death of Queen Mary. His opera The Indian Queen is first performed, in London, England, with a libretto by the poet John Dryden. August 1696 King Louis XIV of France signs a peace treaty with Victor II Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, detaching the Duke from the Grand Alliance, which has alienated him by refusing to give him Milan, thus ending the war in Italy. By its terms the Duke regains Savoy, Nice, Susa, Casale, and Pinerolo, and his daughter is to be betrothed to the French king's grandson, Louis, Duke of Burgundy. 5 April 1697 On the death of Charles XI, Charles XII succeeds as king of Sweden. 3 September 1697 The Treaty of Rijswijk ends King William's War in North America, restoring French and British colonial possessions to their pre-war status. 10 September 1697 The Nine Years' War or the War of the League of Augsburg comes to an end when France and Britain, the United Netherlands, and Spain sign the Treaty of Ryswick. By its terms all conquests since 1678 except Strasbourg, both on the continent and in the colonies, are returned to their previous owners. King Louis XIV of France retains Strasbourg but Lux, Mons, and Catalonia are returned to Spain and Lorraine is returned to Charles, Duke of Lorraine. William III is recognized as king of England, the Duchess of Orléans's claim to the Palatinate is given up, and support for a French candidate for the Electorate of Cologne is abandoned. In a separate agreement, a Dutch 'Barrier' is established. The Dutch are allowed to establish garrisons in eight fortresses in the Spanish Netherlands, including Mons, Courtrai, Charleroi, Namur, and Luxembourg. 11 September 1697 Austrian forces under Prince Eugène of Savoy defeat an Ottoman army under Elmas Mehmed Pasha at Zenta, effectively ending the Ottoman sultan Mustafa II's campaign to recover Hungary. Ottoman losses in the battle amount to nearly 30,000 men. 18 November 1697 William Hogarth, celebrated English satirical painter and engraver, whose works include the series A Rake's Progress (from 1732), born in London, England (–1764). 1697 French philosopher Pierre Bayle publishes his two-volume Dictionnaire historique et critique/Historical and Critical Dictionary, which offers a critical guide to a wide range of religious and philosophical arguments. 1697 The first gold rush of modern times begins after gold is found in a region 200 miles inland from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The area becomes known as Minas Gerais ('General Mines') province. 1697 The French writer Charles Perrault publishes Contes de ma mère l'oye/

Mother Goose Stories. This famous collection of fairy stories contains such classics as 'Sleeping Beauty', 'Little Red Riding Hood', 'Cinderella', and 'Bluebeard'. 11 October 1698 Because of the bad health of Charles II of Spain, King Louis XIV of France and King William III of Britain sign the first Partition Treaty which aims to avoid war in Europe on Charles's death by dividing the Spanish kingdom between the three principal claimants. Prince Joseph Ferdinand of Bavaria, the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I's grandson, is to receive Spain, the Spanish Netherlands, Sardinia, and Spanish America, Louis's son, Louis the Dauphin, is to gain Naples, Sicily, and the Tuscan ports, and Archduke Charles of Austria, second son of Emperor Leopold, is to receive Milan. 1698 English churchman Doctor Thomas Bray founds The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (SPCK) in London, England. 1698 The Wren Building at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, is completed. As its name suggests, its neoclassical style shows the strong influence of the English architect Christopher Wren. 26 January 1699 The Peace of Carlowitz is signed by Austria, Russia, Poland, and Venice with the Ottoman Empire. By its terms, all of the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I's conquests during the war, including Hungary, Transylvania, Croatia, and Slavonia, are confirmed. Poland gains Podolia and the Ukraine. Venice gains the Morea. Russia retains its conquest of Azov, but only consents to a two-year armistice. 15 April 1699 The tenth and last Sikh Guru Gobind Singh forms the Sikh people into Khalsa Panth. The organization is the foundation of modern Sikhism. 21 April 1699 Jean Racine, French poet and dramatist known for his tragedies Briannicus, Bérénice, and Phèdre/Phaedra, dies in Paris, France (59). 1 June 1699 A second Partition Treaty between King Louis XIV of France and King William III of Britain is signed, which amends the division of the Spanish kingdom established in its predecessor of October 1698. Archduke Charles of Austria is to receive Spain, Spanish America, and the Spanish Netherlands; Louis's son, Louis the Dauphin, is to get Naples, Sicily, and Lorraine; and Charles, Duke of Lorraine, is to receive Milan as compensation. 1699 English church historian Gilbert Burnet publishes Exposition of the ThirtyNine Articles, a classic exposition of Church of England beliefs. 1699 The English philosopher Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury, publishes An Enquiry Concerning Virtue. February 1700 Forces under Frederick I Augustus of Saxony-Poland invade Swedish Livonia (part of present-day Latvia and Estonia) and attack Riga as part of the three-pronged attack on Sweden agreed with Tsar Peter I the Great of Russia and King Frederick IV of Denmark in 1699. The attack marks the beginning

of the Great Northern War between King Charles XII of Sweden and a coalition of, at various times, Hanover, Brandenburg, Denmark, Poland, and Russia. The war runs concurrently with the War of the Spanish Succession but does not merge with it. 1 May 1700 John Dryden, outstanding English poet, playwright, and critic, poet laureate, whose major works include 'Annus Mirabilis' (1667) and Marriage à la mode (1672), dies (68). 8 August 1700 The Treaty of Constantinople between Russia and the Ottoman Empire converts the two-year armistice agreed at Carlowitz in January 1699 to a 30-year truce between the two powers. The Ottoman Empire cedes the fortress of Azov, captured by Tsar Peter I the Great in July 1696, and grants Russia the right to keep a permanent ambassador in Constantinople. Russian tributes to the Tatars are also waived. 18 August 1700 Denmark's invasion of the Duchy of Holstein-Gottorp, fulfilling its 1699 treaty obligations to Saxony-Poland and Russia, prompts a Swedish invasion of Denmark and a march on the capital, Copenhagen. After intervention by the United Netherlands and Great Britain, King Charles XII of Sweden and King Frederick IV of Denmark sign the Peace of Traventhal which removes Denmark from the Great Northern War for a period of nine years, and allows the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, brother-in-law of King Charles XII of Sweden, to build fortifications and to maintain a standing army. 1 November 1700 After a long period of failing health, King Charles II of Spain dies. His death brings to a head the developing crisis over the Spanish succession. 30 November 1700 The Italian churchman Giovanni Francesco Albani is elected Pope Clement XI, following the death of Pope Innocent XII. 1700 The comedy The Way of the World by the English dramatist William Congreve is first performed, in London, England. 1700 The new Gregorian calendar is introduced in Germany and other Protestant European states, replacing the older, less accurate, Julian calendar. c. 1700 North American merchant Thomas Brattles writes A Full and Candid Account of the Delusion Called Witchcraft, an attack on the Salem witch trials. It is not published until 1798. c. 1700 The art of the Benin culture in Nigeria reaches its high point. From at least the mid-16th century fine sculptures in ivory and bronze have been produced, creating one of richest extant traditions of African art. 2 February 1701 The French prince Philippe d'Anjou, grandson of Louis XIV and the nominated heir of the late king Charles II of Spain, enters the Spanish capital, Madrid, as King Philip V of Spain, while French troops also occupy the southern part of the Spanish Netherlands (modern Belgium); this may be said to

mark the effective outbreak of the War of the Spanish Succession, although hostilities in the first year are largely confined to Italy. 17 June 1701 Having invaded Livonia (part of present-day Latvia and Estonia), King Charles XII of Sweden relieves the port of Riga from Russian occupation and subsequently invades Courland (or Kurland, in present-day Latvia) and Poland. The Great Northern War is to be largely centred in Poland until 1705–06. 27 August 1701 The Treaty of The Hague is signed between Britain, the United Netherlands, and Austria, creating the 'Grand Alliance' of the three chief partners in the anti-French coalition in the War of the Spanish Succession. 16 September 1701 Following the death of King James II of England and VII of Scotland at Saint-Germain in France, where he has lived in exile since being deposed from the British throne in 1688, King Louis XIV of France recognizes James II's heir as James III. James III is also known, by those who do not recognize his royal claims, as James Edward Stuart or the 'Old Pretender'. 16 September 1701 James II, king of Great Britain 1685–88, son of Charles I, deposed in the 'Glorious Revolution' (1688), dies in Saint-Germain, France (67). 1701 English agriculturalist Jethro Tull invents a mechanical seed drill capable of sowing three rows at a time, and reducing seed wastage. 1701 The French artist Hyacinthe Rigaud paints Portrait of Louis XIV. 8 March 1702 When King William III of Britain dies at Hampton Court Palace, outside London, England, after a fall from his horse, he is succeeded by his sisterin-law, Queen Anne. She has no claim to be stadtholder (ruler, with limited powers) in the United Netherlands, as William had been, and control of Dutch affairs passes to the States General (parliament) under Anthony Heinsius. 8 March 1702 William III, stadtholder (provincial governor) of the United Netherlands 1672–1702, king of England 1689–1702, dies in London, England (51). 23 April–4 May 1702 Britain, the United Netherlands, and Austria declare war on France, marking the formal opening of the War of the Spanish Succession. 26 September 1702 Allied forces under the English general John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, take the town of Roermond in the Spanish Netherlands from the occupying French forces. 1702 English writer Daniel Defoe publishes his pamphlet 'The Shortest Way with the Dissenters', a satire on religious intolerance in the form of a spoof of bigotry, which some readers take seriously. Defoe is imprisoned and pilloried. 21 April 1703 Portugal concludes a treaty with Britain and joins the Grand Alliance (Britain, the United Netherlands, and Austria) against France.

7 May 1703 Allied forces under the English general John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, occupy the territory of France's ally the Imperial electorate of Cologne, and subsequently take Bonn, Limburg, Huy, and Guelders, clearing French forces from the lower Rhine. The Austrian general Prince Eugène of Savoy conducts a vigorous simultaneous campaign against French forces in the Rhineland and southern Germany. 25 May 1703 Samuel Pepys, English diarist whose diary provides a look at upper class life during the 1660s, dies in London, England (70). 17 June 1703 John Wesley, Anglican clergyman and evangelist who, with his brother Charles Wesley, founded the Methodist movement in the Church of England, born in Epworth, Lincolnshire, England (–1791). 30 December 1703 An earthquake and resulting fire kills around 200,000 people and destroys the city of Edo (modern Tokyo), Japan. 1703 The play Sonezaki Shinyu/Love Suicides at Sonezaki, one of the first great works of bunraku (puppet) theatre, is performed, in Japan. Around this time its author, Chikamatsu Monzaemon, helps to turn bunraku into a major art form, often writing specifically for the famous singer Takemoto Gidayu. 1 January 1704 King Augustus II of Poland, known to history as Augustus the Strong, who is also the hereditary elector of Saxony as Frederick Augustus I and the occupant of the Polish throne supported by the anti-Swedish coalition, is deposed because of Swedish military success in Poland. 13 August 1704 The allied army commanded by the English general John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, and the Austrian general Prince Eugène of Savoy defeats the Franco-Bavarian army of the French marshal Camille, comte de Tallart, at Blenheim (Blindheim), Bavaria, on the River Danube. The first major French military defeat for 50 years, the allied victory ends the danger of a Franco-Bavarian advance on Vienna, the Austrian capital, and removes Bavaria, France's last German ally, from the War of the Spanish Succession. 28 October 1704 John Locke, highly influential English political and educational philosopher, whose major work is Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), dies in Oates, Essex, England (72). 1704 English physicist Isaac Newton publishes Optics, the result of decades of research, delayed until after the death of English physicist Robert Hooke to avoid a priority argument. In the book, Newton strongly defends the corpuscular theory of light as a particle rather than a wave. 1704 The Dreifaltigkeitskirche (Church of the Holy Trinity), in Salzburg in the Holy Roman Empire, designed by the Austrian architect Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach, is completed.

1704 The English naturalist John Ray completes publication of his three-volume Historia generalis plantarum/General Study of Plants, a classification of over 18,000 different plant species. 1704 The Irish writer Jonathan Swift publishes A Tale of a Tub and The Battle of the Books, both satires on contemporary intellectual disputes. 5 May 1705 Following the death of the Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I of Austria, he is succeeded by his son Joseph I. 1705 Dutch-born English writer Bernard de Mandeville publishes his verse satire The Grumbling Hive, or Knaves Turned Honest. A revised version appears as The Fable of the Bees in 1714. 1705 Hussein ibn Ali, bey (leader) of the janissaries (Ottoman bodyguard) of Tunis, seizes power in Tunisia. Ottoman sovereignty becomes purely nominal from this time and Hussein's descendants, known as the Husseinite dynasty, remain in power until the 20th century. 1705 Massachusetts declares mixed marriages illegal, and sets a fine of $50 to any minister who marries a white person and a black person. The law is repealed in 1843. 17 January 1706 Benjamin Franklin, North American printer, publisher, and inventor who helped to draft the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, born in Boston, Massachusetts (–1790). 3 March 1706 Johann Pachelbel, German organ composer, known particularly for his Canon in D Major, dies in Nuremberg, Germany (53). 27 June 1706 British and Portuguese forces enter the Spanish capital, Madrid, marking a high point of success for the Grand Alliance (Britain, the United Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, and Savoy) in the War of the Spanish Succession in the Iberian Peninsula, but the occupation is to be short-lived. 24 September 1706 The Peace of Altrandstädt is made between Sweden and Saxony; King Augustus II the Strong of Sweden renounces the Polish throne and recognizes Stanislaw Leszczynski, the pro-Swedish nominee, as king. 1 January 1707 João V, regent of Portugal in 1704 and 1705, succeeds to the throne following the death of his father Pedro II. 3 March 1707 Aurangzeb, Mogul emperor of India 1658–1707, dies in India (88). 3 March 1707 The death of the Mogul emperor Aurangzeb, whose formerly successful rule in India has been increasingly challenged by the Marathas and other enemies, leads to the succession of Bahadur, who oversees the further crumbling of the empire.

1 May 1707 The Act of Union unites England and Scotland as the United Kingdom of Great Britain. The terms of the act provide for: (a) the Hanoverian succession; (b) one Parliament, to which Scotland is to send members; (c) the churches remaining as before; and (d) adoption of one flag, the Union Jack. 1707 English grocers William Fortnum and Hugh Mason open Fortnum and Mason's, a high-quality grocery shop, in Piccadilly, London, England. 1707 The comedy The Beaux Stratagem by the Irish dramatist George Farquhar is first performed, in London, England. 1707 The French mathematician Abraham de Moivre uses trigonometric functions to represent complex numbers for the first time, in the form cos z + i(sin nx) where cos x is the real part of the complex number, i(sin x) is the imaginary part, and i is the square root of -1. 1708 The Italian composer and violinist Antonio Vivaldi publishes his oratorio Gloria in D. 8 July 1709 Russian forces commanded by Tsar Peter I the Great defeat the army of King Charles XII of Sweden at Poltava in southern Russia, the decisive battle that finally ends Sweden's period as a great power in Europe. 31 August–11 September 1709 An allied (British, Dutch, and Austrian) army under the English general John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, and the Austrian general Prince Eugène of Savoy defeat the French army of marshals Claude-LouisHector, duc de Villars, and Louis-François, duc de Boufflers, at Malplaquet in the Spanish Netherlands. The battle causes very heavy casualties (22,000 allied and 12,000 French), causing the Tories in Britain to nickname Marlborough 'the Butcher'. 18 September 1709 Samuel Johnson, English essayist, critic, and lexicographer, author of the Dictionary of the English Language, born in Lichfield, Staffordshire, England (–1784). 1709 The German physicist Gabriel Fahrenheit creates a thermometer using the expansion of alcohol with temperature. 1709 William Warren sets up the first scheduled mail service between Britain and North America. 30 November 1710 The Ottoman Empire declares war on Russia at the instigation of King Charles XII of Sweden, Sultan Ahmed III's guest and new-found ally, who has recently been defeated by Tsar Peter I the Great at the battle of Poltava. 1710 French forces defeat Austrian troops under Count Guido von Starhemberg at Villaviciosa in Spain, forcing Charles, Archduke of Austria (Charles III, King of

Spain) to abandon Madrid and making Philip, Duke of Anjou (Philip V, King of Spain) Spain's first Bourbon king. 1710 German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz publishes Théodicée/ Theodicy, an attempt to show that the existence of evil and the creation of the world by a loving God are compatible. His argument that (philosophically) this world is the 'best of all possible worlds' is ridiculed by Voltaire in Candide, which is published in 1759. 1710 Irish philosopher and churchman George Berkeley publishes A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge. His major philosophical work, it is a classic of idealism, the view that objects are representations in the mind. 1710 The Irish philosopher George Berkeley publishes a treatise concerning sense perceptions, suggesting all knowledge is acquired by direct experience – the foundation of scientific empiricism. 1710 The most popular nonalcoholic beverage in the North American colonies is chocolate. 1710 The new St Paul's Cathedral, built to replace the Gothic cathedral destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666, is completed in London, England. It has been designed by the English architect Christopher Wren and is one of the greatest baroque buildings in Europe. Marlborough House in Westminster, London, England, designed by the English architect Christopher Wren, is also completed. 17 April 1711 When the Holy Roman Emperor Joseph I of Austria, dies, aged 33, he is ultimately succeeded by his brother, Charles III of Spain, as Emperor Charles VI, who thus becomes heir to all the Spanish Habsburg and Austrian Habsburg possessions, but Charles does not leave Spain until September. 7 May 1711 David Hume, Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, born in Edinburgh, Scotland (–1776). 12 August 1711 The Russian Tsar Peter I the Great, surrounded by a much larger Ottoman army on the River Prut in Moldavia, makes peace with the Ottoman Empire. The Black Sea fortress of Azov and fortress and harbour of Taganrog are to be returned to Ottoman control. Russia is to withdraw from the Black Sea and to demolish its forts on the lower River Dnieper. Russian troops are also to evacuate Poland, and King Charles XII, a guest of Sultan Ahmed III following his defeat at the battle of Poltava, is granted free passage home to Sweden. 1711 Bubonic plague kills half a million people in Europe. 1711 The English poet Alexander Pope publishes Essay on Criticism, an essay on literary criticism written in verse. 24 January 1712 Frederick II the Great, King of Prussia 1740–86, born in

Potsdam, near Berlin, Prussia (–1786). 28 June 1712 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, French philosopher whose writings provided inspiration to the leaders of the French Revolution, born in Geneva, Swiss Confederation (–1778). 25 July 1712 The Battle of Villmergen (the 'Second Villmergen War') between the Catholic and Protestant cantons, largely over the disproportionate Catholic supremacy in the diet of the Swiss Confederation, is won by the Protestant cantons, led by the prosperous industrial centres of Bern and Zürich. This firmly establishes their dominance. 1712 The Bambara kingdom of Segu, southwest of Timbuktu on the River Niger in West Africa (modern Mali), emerges as a major regional power under its king Mamari Kulibali. 1712 The English poet Alexander Pope publishes his mock-epic comic poem The Rape of the Lock. An expanded version appears in 1714. 1712 The first recorded practical steam engine to use a piston and cylinder, constructed by English inventor Thomas Newcomen, is installed at Dudley Castle, near Wolverhampton, England, where it is used for pumping out underground mineworkings. 11 April 1713 The Peace of Utrecht, the treaty ending the War of the Spanish Succession, is agreed and signed by France, Britain, the United Netherlands, Prussia, Portugal, and Savoy. Philip V, a Bourbon, is recognized as king of Spain, but Spain and France are never to be united under one king. France agrees to dismantle the naval base at Dunkirk, to recognize the Protestant succession in Britain, and to cede Newfoundland, Acadia, and Hudson Bay to Britain, but gains fortresses on the Canadian frontier. Spain cedes San Sacramento north of the River Plate to Portugal and cedes the Spanish Netherlands (now Belgium) to the United Netherlands, to be given to the Holy Roman Emperor once the United Netherlands has established a fortified barrier against French expansion. Sicily is to be united under Savoy as a kingdom. The elector of Brandenburg, in his new capacity as king of Prussia, receives recognition of the royal title and gains Neuchâtel (a canton in Swiss Confederation) and the upper quarter of Gelderland (Guelders), Austrian Netherlands. Prussia's claim upon the principality of Orange, on the River Rhône, is transferred to France. 27 July 1713 The Peace of Adrianople is agreed between the Ottoman Empire and Russia, ending the hostilities largely instigated by King Charles XII of Sweden. The terms of the Treaty of Prut (1711) are repeated, with changes connected with Charles XII's interests. Tsar Peter I the Great agrees to guarantee the independence of Poland and not to hinder Charles's return to Sweden. The independence of the Cossacks is also recognized (thus forming a buffer of neutral territory between the Ottoman Empire and Russia). Ultimately, however, the Peace of Adrianople makes it impossible for Charles to remain in the Ottoman Empire.

15 October 1713 Denis Diderot, French philosopher of the Enlightenment, editor of the Encyclopédie/Encyclopedia, born in Langres, France (–1784). 24 November 1713 Laurence Sterne, Irish-born English novelist, born in Clonmel, County Tipperary, Ireland (–1768). 1713 Irish philosopher and churchman George Berkeley publishes Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous. 1713 The German-born English composer George Frideric Handel completes his choral work Utrecht Te Deum and Jubilate to commemorate the Peace of Utrecht. 7 March 1714 The Peace of Rastatt is agreed between King Louis XIV of France and Charles VI, the Holy Roman Emperor, by which France recognizes the Habsburg possessions in Italy, the electors of Bavaria and Cologne are restored, and the Habsburg Monarchy takes possession of the Spanish Netherlands. 1 August 1714 Following the death of Queen Anne of England, she is succeeded by George Ludwig, elector of Hanover and great-grandson of James I of England, as George I (the electress Sophia having died on 8 June). 1 August 1714 Queen Anne, last Stuart monarch of Great Britain and Ireland 1702–14, dies in London, England (49). 1714 An act of Parliament establishes a Board of Longitude in Britain, with the aim of finding a solution to the establishment of longitude at sea. A £20,000 prize is offered for an accurate method. 7–14 April 1715 Prussia, Saxony, Poland, Hanover, and Denmark form an alliance against Sweden and war is declared. As part of this pact, Prussia and Denmark agree that Strausund and Rugen should become Danish in compensation for Bremen and Verdun going to Hanover. 1 September 1715 Following the death of King Louis XIV of France in Versailles, France, aged 76, he is succeeded by Louis XV, his five-year-old great-grandson, under the regency of his nephew Philippe, duc d'Orléans, until 1723. Louis XIV had decreed that power was to be shared between the duc d'Orléans and the duc de Maine, his illegitimate son. Philip V of Spain, the rightful heir to the French throne, had previously (under the Treaty of Utrecht) surrendered his right of succession to accede to the Spanish throne. 1 September 1715 Louis XIV (the 'Sun King'), king of France 1643–1715, famous for his patronage of the arts and his embodiment of the doctrine of Absolutism, dies in Versailles, France (76). 13 November 1715 The Scottish Jacobite rising known as the 'Fifteen Rebellion', in support of James Francis Edward Stuart (the 'Old Pretender'), is defeated at

Sheriffmuir, Scotland, and the revolt subsequently collapses. 1715 The English mathematician Brook Taylor publishes Methodus incrementorum directa et inversa/Direct and Indirect Methods of Incrementation, an important contribution to Scottish mathematician Colin Maclaurin's 'fluxions' and to Isaac Newton's calculus. 12 October 1716 Austrian forces under Prince Eugène of Savoy take Temesvár (now Timisoara, Romania), the fortress that has resisted Habsburg advances for 164 years in the Banat, the last Ottoman possession in Hungary. 1716–1745 Yoshimune, of the Tokugawa house of Kii, succeeds Ienobu as shogun (military ruler) of Japan. 16 August 1717 The Austrian general Prince Eugène of Savoy defeats an Ottoman army of 200,000 men under Halil Pasha, at Peterwardein, Hungary. Halil had been ordered to relieve Belgrade, on the right bank of the River Danube in Serbia, which had been under Austrian siege since May. Belgrade surrenders on 22 August. 1717 Lady Mary Wortley Montagu writes Inoculation Against Smallpox, reporting the method of immunization known in the East for centuries and introducing the practice of inoculation for smallpox into England; the inoculation of the Princess of Wales makes it fashionable. 1717 Mir Abdullah, ruler of the Afghan state of Kandahar, is succeeded by Mir Mahmud. In the same year, Abdalis of Herat leads a revolt against Persia, and sets up another separate Afghan state. Afghanistan had been divided between the empires of Persia and Hindustan since 1523. 1717 The French artist Antoine Watteau paints Embarkation for the Isle of Cythera (Louvre version). This and similar works create a new category in art, the fête galante, a scene of amorous dalliance in an ideal landscape or romantic garden. c. 1717 The German-born English composer George Frideric Handel writes his Water Music, a set of instrumental pieces. It is first performed, by a band of 50 musicians in a barge alongside King George's barge at a concert on the River Thames in London, England. 6 June–7 July 1718 A Spanish army sails for Sicily. The property of the Spanish crown since the 16th century, Sicily had been given to the Duke of Savoy, under the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht, in return for his services in the Allied cause during the War of the Spanish Succession. The Spanish government hopes to use Sicily as a base for the invasion of Italy, and its troops conquer the island by July. 26 June 1718 Tsarevich Aleksey Petrovich, heir to Tsar Peter I the Great of Russia and focus for opposition to the Tsar's sweeping economic and social reforms, dies (or is put to death) in St Petersburg, aged 28, after repeated

interrogation under torture. 21 July 1718 The Peace of Passarowitz ends the war between the Habsburg Monarchy and the Ottoman Empire. By its terms, signed through British and Dutch mediation (the eastern trade of both states had been disrupted by the war), Austria completes its occupation of Hungary, and gains Belgrade and a strip of Serbia and Bosnia, the Banat of Temesvár (now part of Hungary), and Little Wallachia; Venice, in alliance with Austria since 1716, retains Corfu and its conquests in Albania and Dalmatia; the Ottoman Empire keeps the Morea (the Peloponnese) and the island of Aegina, in Greece. The parties agree to adhere to this agreement for at least 25 years. 11 December 1718 When King Charles XII of Sweden, having renewed his attack against Norway, is killed by a musket ball through the head while besieging the fortress of Frederikshald, Norway, he is succeeded by his sister Ulrica Eleanor. The Russo-Swedish peace conference at Lövö on the Åland Islands, in the Gulf of Bothnia, is abandoned. 6 February 1720 A peace treaty is signed between the Quadruple Alliance (France, the Holy Roman Empire, Britain, and the United Netherlands) and Spain. The Holy Roman Emperor, Charles VI, gives up his claim to Spain while King Philip V of Spain renounces his claim to Italy, provided the Emperor allows Charles, Philip and Elizabeth Farnese's son, to succeed to the Italian dukedoms of Parma and Tuscany (including the city of Piacenza). The Duke of Savoy obtains Sardinia from the Emperor in exchange for Sicily. 10 September 1720 The 'South Sea Bubble' (financial crisis in Britain) bursts. The South Sea Company, holding a monopoly over trade with South America, had offered in January to take over the national debt and this had led to financial speculation, especially in August, resulting in disastrous panic and ruining thousands of people by December. 27 March 1721 The Treaty of Madrid, a treaty of mutual defence and guarantee, is signed between France and Spain. France promises to assist in the restoration of Gibraltar, captured from Spain by the British in 1704 and confirmed as a British possession by the Treaty of Utrecht, and in the regulation in Spain's favour of questions concerning claims to the Italian duchies of Parma, Naples, and Sicily. 8 May 1721–7 March 1724 Following the death of Pope Clement XI, and after a long and contentious conclave, Michelangelo dei Conti, son of the Duke of Poli, near Palestrina, Italy, is unanimously elected pope as Innocent XIII. 10 September 1721 The Treaty of Rystad is signed by Sweden and Russia; the latter acquires Livonia, Estonia, Ingria, and East Karelia, but restores Finland. Essentially, Russia acquires the best part of Sweden's Baltic provinces. This treaty confirms Russia's supremacy in northern Europe. 1721 The first smallpox inoculations are performed in America by Dr Zabdiel Boylston in Boston, Massachusetts. Smallpox epidemics are a constant threat to

colonial cities, and while some fear and mistrust the inoculation, most who have it administered survive. .

1721 The French writer Charles-Louis de Secondat, baron de la Brède et de Montesquieu, publishes his satirical novel Lettres Persanes/Persian Letters, anonymously. 1721 The German composer Johann Sebastian Bach completes The Brandenburg Concertos. 1721 There are 300 cafés in Paris, France. By 1789, there will be 2,000. 16 June 1722 John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, English general famed for his victories over the French at Blenheim (1704), Ramillies (1706), and Oudenaarde (1708), dies in Windsor, England (72). September 1722 Afghan forces defeat the demoralized Safavid Persian army of Shah Hussein at Gulnabad, central Persia, after which Mir Mahmud, the Afghan ruler of Kandahar, takes Isfahan and becomes shah of Persia. 1722 The English writer Daniel Defoe publishes the partly factual A Journal of the Plague Year and the novel Moll Flanders. 25 February 1723 Christopher Wren, English architect, astronomer, and geometrician, who designed Saint Paul's Cathedral in London, England, and over 50 other London churches, and founded the Royal Society, dies in London, England (91). 5 June 1723 Adam Smith, Scottish social philosopher known for his An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations on laissez-faire economics, born in Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland (–1790). 1723 Chambers' Cyclopedia, one of the first encyclopedias and the result of many years work by the English encyclopedist Ephraim Chambers, is published. 1723 A house with running water is built for the first time in North America. It belongs to John Headly in Newport, Rhode Island. 1723 Georg Ernst Stahl develops his phlogiston theory and discusses its concepts in his Fundamenta Chemiae Dogmaticae et Experimertalis. He theorizes that all combustible substances contain a material called phlogiston, which escapes during burning and is replaced by contact with combustible materials. 22 April 1724 Immanuel Kant, German philosopher whose work had a major influence on subsequent philosophy, born in Königsberg, Prussia (–1804). 29 May 1724–21 February 1730 Pietro Francesco Vincenzo Maria Orsini, eldest son of the Duke of Gravina, is elected Pope Benedict XIII, after the death on 7

March of Pope Innocent XIII. 1724 Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire, England, designed by the English architects John Vanbrugh and Nicholas Hawksmoor, is completed. It marks one of the highpoints of English secular baroque architecture. 1724 English antiquarian William Stukeley publishes Stonehenge: A Temple Restored to the British Druids, one of the earliest studies of Stonehenge. His works mark the growing interest in Druids and in Celtic myths. 8 February 1725 Following the death of Tsar Peter I the Great of Russia, he is succeeded by his widow, Catherine I. The real ruler of the state during Catherine's reign is Tsar Peter's talented collaborator, Field Marshal Prince Alexander Danilovich Menshikov. 8 February 1725 Peter I the Great, tsar of Russia with his brother Ivan V 1682–96 and then alone 1696–1725, who westernized Russia, dies in St Petersburg, Russia (62). 30 April 1725 The diplomatic efforts of the Spanish statesman Johan Willem Ripperdá (a native of the United Netherlands but of Castilian origin) result in the Treaty of Vienna between the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI and King Philip V of Spain. This guarantees the Pragmatic Sanction (the proclaimed right of the emperor's daughter Maria Theresa to succeed him as ruler of all the Habsburg domains) and the Emperor's rule in his Italian provinces, and represents a reconciliation of the two powers. 17 October 1725 John Wilkes, outspoken English journalist and politician who championed radical principles of political and civil liberty, born in London, England (–1797). 1725 French weaver Basile Bouchon invents the punched card system to operate weaving looms. Holes in the card, unrolled slowly from a drum, determine whether needles on the loom are raised or lowered. 1725 Italian philosopher Gianbattista Vico publishes Scienza nuova/The New Science, in which, applying the laws of science to history, he charts the growth, maturity and decay of civilization. A revised edition appears in 1730. 1725 The Italian artist Rosalba Carriera paints Self-Portrait with an Image of the Artist's Sister. 1725 The Italian composer and violinist Antonio Vivaldi publishes Le quattro stagioni/The Four Seasons (opus 8), a set of four violin concertos. c. 1725–c. 1740 Bullfighting grows in popularity in Spain, with Francisco Romero becoming the first famous matador.

17 October 1726 By the Treaty of Wusterhausen with the Habsburg Monarchy, Prussia leaves the alliance of Herrenhausen (of 23 August 1725) and guarantees the Pragmatic Sanction, which sets out the right of Maria Theresa of Austria to succeed her father, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI, as ruler of all the Habsburg domains. Prussia undertakes to aid Austria with 10,000 troops in any resulting war. 1726 The Irish churchman and writer Jonathan Swift publishes the prose satire Gulliver's Travels: Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, anonymously. 2 February 1727 Without a formal declaration, war begins between Britain and Spain. Spain lays siege to Gibraltar until 24 February. In addition, Spain issues commissions for attacks against British islands and against British shipping. 20 March 1727 Isaac Newton, English physicist and mathematician who laid the foundations of calculus and gravitation theory, dies in London, England (84). 14 May 1727 Thomas Gainsborough, English portrait and landscape painter, baptized in Sudbury, Suffolk, England (–1788). 17 May 1727 Catherine I (original name Marta Skowronska), ruling empress of Russia 1725–27, wife of Peter I the Great of Russia, dies in St Petersburg, Russia (43). 17 May 1727 The young Grand Duke Peter Alexeyvich (Tsar Peter II), son of the murdered Tsarevich Alexey Petrovich, is named by Catherine I, empress of Russia, as her successor, with the entire Supreme Privy Council to act as regents. 11 June 1727 Following the death of King George I of Great Britain and Ireland, and elector of Hanover, at Osnabrück, Hanover, he is succeeded by his son, George II. 11 June 1727 George I, elector of Hanover 1698–1727 and first Hanoverian king of Great Britain 1714–27, dies in Osnabrück, Hanover (now Germany) (67). 1727 The Church of St Mary Woolnoth, London, England, designed by the English architect Nicholas Hawksmoor, is completed. 1727 The German composer Johann Sebastian Bach's choral work Matthäuspassion/Saint Matthew Passion is first performed, either this year or in 1729. 13 February 1728 Cotton Mather, New England author, educator, and Congregational minister, son of Increase Mather, dies in Boston, Massachusetts (65). 28 October 1728 James Cook, English naval captain and navigator who explored

Canada's coasts and the Pacific, born in Marton-in-Cleveland, Yorkshire, England (–1779). 23 December 1728 The Treaty of Berlin is agreed between the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI and Frederick William of Prussia, by which the emperor recognizes Prussia's claim to the duchies of Berg and Ravenstein in the Holy Roman Empire, while Prussia guarantees the Pragmatic Sanction, accepting the right of the Emperor's daughter, Maria Theresa, to succeed him as ruler of all the Habsburg domains. 1728 Danish navigator Vitus Bering discovers the strait between Siberia and Alaska that now bears his name. 1728 French artist Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin paints The Rayfish, Cat, and Kitchen Utensils. 1728 Heavy drinking is common in the North American colonies. In this year alone 2,124,500 gallons of rum is imported. 1728 Irish churchman and writer Jonathan Swift publishes A Short View of the State of Ireland. 1728 The ballad opera The Beggar's Opera by the English poet and dramatist John Gay is first performed, in Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, London, England. The music is by the German composer Johann Christoph Pepusch. It is first performed in New York City in 1750. 1728 The comedy The Provoked Husband, left unfinished by the English dramatist and architect John Vanbrugh and completed by the English dramatist Colly Cibber, is first performed, in London, England. 1728 The English poet Alexander Pope publishes the satire The Dunciad anonymously. He acknowledges its authorship in 1735. 2 May 1729 Catherine the Great, German-born empress of Russia 1762–96 who brings Russia into the political and cultural life of Europe, born in Szczecin, Prussia (–1796). November 1729 The Treaty of Seville between Spain, France, and Britain weans Spain away from its alliance with the Habsburg Monarchy; it provides for the suppression of the Austrian East India Company and for the accession of Don Carlos, the eldest son of King Philip V of Spain and Elizabeth Farnese, to Parma and Tuscany, and is subsequently joined on 10 November by the United Netherlands. 1729 Jews in New York City establish the first permanent congregation of the Jewish religion in North America. By the time of the American Revolution, between two and three thousand Jews have settled in the colonies, where they find greater religious freedom than anywhere else.

1729 The Irish churchman and writer Jonathan Swift publishes A Modest Proposal, a savage satire suggesting that poverty in Ireland could be remedied if children were reared to be eaten. c. 1729 Italian artist Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal) paints The Rialto Bridge from the South. 11 February 1730 Tsar Peter II of Russia dies and is succeeded by Anna, the daughter of Ivan V, Tsar Peter I the Great's half-brother and co-tsar 1682–96. July 1730 After an exceptionally contentious four-month conclave, the Florentine churchman Lorenzo Corsini, aged 79, is elected as Pope Clement XII, following the death of Benedict XIII. Frequently bedridden with gout, and blind from 1732, he will make great efforts to remedy the maladministration of his predecessor's pontificate. 17 September 1730 Sultan Ahmed III of the Ottoman Empire resigns the throne to his nephew Mahmud I, a prisoner in the Seraglio since his father's own abdication in 1703, following the bloody uprising led by Patrona Halil and precipitated by high taxes, unemployment, and Ottoman defeats by Persia. c. 1730 The popularity of coffee drinking declines in England, as it is replaced by a vogue for tea. 26 April 1731 Daniel Defoe, English novelist and journalist, author of Robinson Crusoe (1719–22) and Moll Flanders (1722), dies in London, England (70). 11 July 1731 A general war over the Italian duchies is averted by the Treaty of Vienna between Britain, the United Netherlands, Spain, and the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles VI. Under the terms of the treaty, the maritime powers (Britain and the United Netherlands) guarantee the Pragmatic Sanction (which sets out the rights of the Emperor's daughter, Maria Theresa, to succeed him as ruler of all the Habsburg domains), Spain obtains the Italian duchies of Parma and Piacenza, and the Austrian East India Company is finally abolished. By a secret clause, Britain insists that Maria Theresa shall not marry a member of the Bourbon family. 1731 Following defeats in battle, the slave-trading kingdom of Dahomey, in west Africa, accepts the suzerainty of the Oyo empire (Yoruba people). 1731 Having cleared Persia of Afghans, Nadir Kuli dethrones Tahmasp II, and elevates Tahmasp's eight-month son, Abbas III, as another Safavid puppet. He is to be the last of the Safavid dynasty. 1731 The pilgrimage church of Steinhausen, Germany, designed by the German architect Domenikus Zimmermann, is completed, an early example of the rococo church. His brother Johann Baptist decorates the church.

1731 The Superga, a church designed by the Italian architect Filippo Juvarra, is completed in Turin, Italy. 22 February 1732 George Washington, commander in chief during the American Revolution, and first president of the USA 1789–97, born in Westmoreland County, Virginia (–1799). 31 March 1732 Franz Joseph Haydn, Austrian classical composer, born in Rohrau, Austria (–1809). 6 October 1732 Nevil Maskelyne, English astronomer who developed a method of determining longitude by observing the Moon, and published The British Mariner's Guide (1763) and the Nautical Almanac (1766), born in London, England (–1811). 6 December 1732 Warren Hastings, British statesman and the first governor general of India, born in Churchill, Oxfordshire, England (–1818). 1732 The Trasparente (a sculptural and architectural complex built around an altar) in Toledo Cathedral in Spain, designed by the Spanish architect Narsico Tomé, is completed. It is one of the most exuberant expressions of Spanish baroque. 1732 The oratorios Esther and Acis and Galatea by the German-born English composer George Frideric Handel are first performed, in London, England, both based on earlier written masques, Acis and Galatea, first performed in 1718, and Esther, first performed in 1720. Esther is the first British oratorio. February 1733 On the death of Augustus II the Strong, King of Poland (Frederick Augustus I, Elector of Saxony), Austria and Russia, abandoning the Treaty of Loewenwolde, agree to recognize his son, Frederick Augustus II, Elector of Saxony, as King Augustus III of Poland. Prussia, ignored in these agreements, allows Stanislaw Leszczynski, the popular deposed king of Poland, to pass through Prussia to Poland. 26 May 1733 English inventor John Kay patents his flying shuttle, a loom shuttle carrying the weft thread through the weave. Previously the shuttle was thrown from side to side by hand, which required two people for broad cloth. 14 August 1733 The War of the Polish Succession begins. Russia and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI recognize the elector Augustus III of Saxony as ruler of Poland whereas France supports the claim of former king Stanislaw Leszczynski. 1733 French mathematician Abraham de Moivre first describes the normal ('bellshaped') distribution curve. Later, in 1820, the discovery is credited also to the German mathematician and physicist Carl Friedrich Gauss. 1733 The opera buffa (comic opera) La serva padrona/The Servant as Mistress

by the Italian composer Giovanni Battista Pergolesi is first performed, in Naples, Italy. 1733 The English poet Alexander Pope publishes the first part of his long poem Essay on Man anonymously. The second part appears in 1734 under his own name. 1733 The French writer Antoine François Prévost d'Exiles publishes his sentimental novel Manon Lescaut, his best-known work. It is the last volume of his seven-volume novel Mémoires et aventures d'un homme de qualité qui s'est retiré de monde/Memoirs of a Man of Quality Who Has Retired from the World. 1733 The French writer Voltaire publishes Lettres philosophiques sur les Anglais/ Philosophical Letters on the English, in which, admiring liberal democracy, he expresses criticisms of the French monarchy. 1733 The Pennsylvania State House (later known as Independence Hall), largely designed by the North American attorney Andrew Hamilton, is completed. 30 June 1734 In the War of the Polish Succession, Russian troops take the Polish city of Danzig (modern Gdansk), which has been besieged by them since October 1733. Danzig is captured after the failure of a French expedition to relieve the city. 1734 French scientist René-Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur publishes History of Insects, a founding work of entomology. 1734 The German composer Johann Sebastian Bach completes his Weihnachtsoratorium/Christmas Oratorio. 3 October 1735 A preliminary peace accord in the War of the Polish Succession is negotiated in Vienna, Austria. The Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI receives the Italian duchies of Parma and Piacenza; Don Carlos, son of King Philip V of Spain and Elizabeth Farnese, is to succeed as Charles III to Naples and Sicily – which are, however, not to be united under one crown with Spain; Charles Emmanuel III of Savoy is to hold Novara and Tortona (in Piedmont, northwestern Italy); France guarantees the Pragmatic Sanction (which sets out the right of the emperor's daughter, Maria Theresa of Austria, to succeed him as ruler of all the Habsburg domains); Stanislaw Leszczynski renounces his claims to Poland and is to receive the duchy of Lorraine (now in France), on the death of the Grand Duke of Tuscany (the duchy is to revert to France on Stanislaw's death); and the Duke of Lorraine, as compensation for the loss of his ducal patrimony, is to receive the duchy of Tuscany when the Grand Duke dies. 30 October 1735 John Adams, first vice-president 1778–97 and second president 1797–1801 of the USA, a Federalist, born in Braintree, Massachusetts (–1826). 1735 Ch'ien Lung becomes emperor of China.

1735 English artist William Hogarth completes his cycle of eight paintings The Rake's Progress, made popular by subsequent widely-circulated engravings. 1735 In his Systema Naturae/System of Nature, Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus (Carl von Linné) introduces a system for classifying plants based on their reproductive anatomy. In later editions be makes use of binomial nomenclature as a way to simply and stabilize the naming of species. 19 January 1736 James Watt, Scottish inventor whose improved steam engine had a major impact on the Industrial Revolution, born in Greenock, Renfrewshire, Scotland (–1819). 2 February 1736 Nadir Shah becomes king of Persia, succeeding Abbas III, the last member of the Safavid dynasty. 14 June 1736 Charles-Augustin de Coulomb, French physicist who formulated Coulomb's law which relates the forces of electrical charges to the distance between them, born in Angoulême, France (–1806). 1736 The laws against witchcraft are repealed in England. The last person executed under them was Jane Wenham from the village of Walkern, Hertfordshire, in 1712. 29 January 1737 Thomas Paine, British-born American political pamphleteer whose writings influenced the American Revolution, born in Thetford, Norfolk, England (–1809). 27 April 1737 Edward Gibbon, English historian, author of The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire, born in Putney, England (–1794). 9 September 1737 Luigi Galvani, Italian physician who investigated electrical conduction in living tissues, born in Bologna, Papal States, Italy (–1798). 18 December 1737 Antonio Stradivari, Italian violin-maker, dies in Cremona, Duchy of Milan (c. 93). 4 June 1738 George III, King of Great Britain and Ireland 1760–1820, born in London, England (–1820). 15 November 1738 William Herschel, German-born English astronomer who discovered Uranus and developed a theory of stellar evolution, born in Hanover, Germany (–1822). 1738 French artist Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin paints The Governess. 1738 King Nadir Shah of Persia, having driven the Afghans out of Persia, carries his offensive eastwards and subjects all of Afghanistan to his rule.

1738 The Imperial Ballet School is founded in St Petersburg, Russia. 3 January 1739 The Convention of the Pardo attempts to settle Anglo-Spanish disputes over the asiento (monopoly) trade with South America and maritime quarrels: Spain agrees to pay certain damages but refuses to give up its right to search British vessels for smuggled goods and also demands unpaid royalties from the English South Sea Company. The British representative at the Convention agrees to recall the fleet from Spanish waters but subsequently this order is revoked, causing consternation in Spain. 8 October 1739 Britain declares war against Spain after Spain refuses to adhere to the Convention of Pardo of 3 January. 1739 King Shah Nadir of Persia sacks the Indian city of Delhi, northeastern India, and conquers the Punjab (now eastern Pakistan). 1739 Scottish philosopher David Hume publishes the first volume of his threevolume A Treatise of Human Nature. The work is completed in 1740. A major work of modern philosophy, it plays a central role in the tradition of British empiricism. Largely ignored at the time, it is reworked as his Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding in 1751. 1739 The Amalienburg at the Schloss Nymphenburg in Munich, Germany, designed by the French architect François Cuvilliés, is completed, one of the finest examples of the rococo style. It is decorated by the French architect Gabriel Germain Boffrand. 1739 The opera Dardanus by the French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau is first performed, in Paris, France. 31 May 1740 Following the death of Frederick William I of Prussia, he is succeeded by his son Frederick II (the Great). 17 August 1740 The Italian churchman Prospero Lambertini is elected Pope Benedict XIV following the death of Pope Clement XII 26 August 1740 Joseph-Michel Montgolfier, French aeronaut who, with his brother Jacques-Etienne, developed the hot-air balloon, born in Annonay, France (–1810). 20 October 1740 Following the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI, the last Habsburg emperor, he is succeeded in the Habsburg domains (by virtue of the Pragmatic Sanction) by his daughter Maria Theresa. She becomes queen of Bohemia and Hungary and archduchess of Austria. The succession is disputed three times. The first instance is by Charles Albert, elector of Bavaria, who is married to a daughter of Joseph I, the former emperor and older brother of Charles VI, and who is a claimant by the will of the earlier emperor Ferdinand I. The second claim is made by Frederick Augustus II, elector of Saxony (and King Augustus III of Poland), through his wife, the eldest daughter of Joseph I. King

Philip V of Spain also disputes the succession, as heir of the Spanish Habsburgs, with a particular interest in the Italian provinces. Britain and the United Netherlands support Maria Theresa while Russia remains neutral. 28 October 1740 Following the death of Empress Anna of Russia, she is succeeded by Ivan VI, the Grandson of Anna's sister Catherine. Ivan's mother acts as regent, but the real power is in the hands of Count Burkhard Christoph von Münnich, who succeeds in banishing Anna's favourite, Ernst Biron, duke of Courland, from Russia. 29 October 1740 James Boswell, Scottish diarist, friend and biographer of Samuel Johnson, born in Edinburgh, Scotland (–1795). 16 December 1740 King Frederick (II) the Great of Prussia enters Silesia and begins the first Silesian War. 1740 English artist William Hogarth paints Portrait of Captain Coram and Portrait of Mary Edwards. 1740 English clockmaker Benjamin Huntsman rediscovers the principle of producing steel in a crucible. Huntsman's Sheffield steel is far superior to any other cast steel being made. 1740 The English writer Samuel Richardson publishes Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded, generally considered the first English novel. 1740 The estimated total nonindigenous population of the European colonies in North America reaches 889,000. 5 June 1741 The Treaty of Breslau is signed between France and Prussia to partition the Holy Roman Empire, following the breakdown of King Frederick II (the Great) of Prussia's negotiations with the archduchess of Austria Maria Theresa. Prussia is to receive Breslau (now Wroclaw, Poland) and Lower Silesia and, in return, to recognize the elector Charles Albert of Bavaria as emperor and to recognize the Sulzbach family in the duchies of Jülich and Berg. 28 July 1741 Antonio Vivaldi, important Italian composer during the baroque period, dies in Vienna (now in Austria) (63). 12 December 1741 Elizabeth, the surviving daughter of the former tsar Peter I the Great, becomes empress of Russia after a bloodless coup d'etat, ousting the infant Ivan VI and the regent Anna Leopoldovna (Princess Anna Leopoldovna of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel). 12 December 1741 Spanish troops land in Tuscany. King Philip V of Spain is ambitious to acquire for Philip, his second son by Elizabeth Farnese, the major part of the lands of Maria Theresa, Archduchess of Austria, in Italy and, if possible, those of her consort Francis Stephen, Grand Duke of Tuscany.

1741 The English writer Henry Fielding anonymously publishes Shamela, a satirical parody of Samuel Richardson's Pamela (1740). 14 January 1742 Edmond Halley, English astronomer and mathematician, dies in Greenwich, London, England (85). 24 January 1742 With French support, Charles Albert, Elector of Bavaria, is elected Holy Roman Emperor, as Charles VII. He receives eight votes (all that were cast). 28 July 1742 The Peace of Berlin between Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria and King Frederick II (the Great) of Prussia ends the First Silesian War. The treaty confirms the provisions of the preliminary Peace of Breslau: Austria cedes to Prussia the duchy of Glatz, previously part of the Bohemian patrimony, the Moravian (formerly Jägerndorf) enclave of Katscher and, most notably, the greater part of the duchy of Silesia (with the exception of the principality of Teschen, the lordship of Hennersdorf, part of Jägerndorf, and the town of Troppau). Prussia takes over the Silesian debt to Great Britain and the United Netherlands and, in the War of the Austrian Succession, Prussia and Poland withdraw from the coalition against Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria. 1742 Swedish scientist Anders Celsius proposes an international fixed temperature scale to the Swedish Academy of Sciences, with 100° set as the freezing point of water, and 0° set as the boiling point; this is later reversed. 1742 The English writer Henry Fielding publishes his novel Joseph Andrews. 1742 The first cotton factories are opened in England, in Birmingham and Wolverhampton. 1742 The German composer Johann Sebastian Bach completes his Goldberg Variations and his cantata No. 212, Mer Hahn en neue Oberkeet/The 'Peasant Cantata'. 1742 The oratorio Messiah by the German-born English composer George Frideric Handel is first performed, in Dublin, Ireland. 13 April 1743 Thomas Jefferson, third president of the USA 1801–09, a Democratic-Republican, born in Shadwell, Virginia (–1826). 17 August 1743 The Peace of Åbo ends the territorial war between Russia and Sweden. The treaty cedes south Finland as far as the River Kiümen to Russia. 13 September 1743 The Treaty of Worms is agreed between Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, Great Britain, and Sardinia to expel the Bourbons from Italy, to obtain part of Milan for the Kingdom of Sardinia, and guaranteeing British subsidies to its allies in the War of the Austrian Succession.

25 October 1743 The Treaty of Fontainebleau (the 'Second Family Compact') between France and Spain is established. Gibraltar and Port Mahón, Minorca, are to be wrested from Great Britain; King Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia is to surrender his recent acquisitions in Italy; and the Italian duchies of Milan, Parma, and Piacenza are to pass to Don Philip, the second son of King Philip V of Spain and Elizabeth Farnese. 1743 Claude Moët sets up his champagne production company in France, which, as Moët et Chandon, will become France's largest producer of champagne. 1743 French mathematician Jean d'Alembert expands Newton's work on dynamics in his Traité de dynamique/Treatise on Dynamics. He states a principle that the external and inertial forces acting on a solid object in motion are in equilibrium. 1743 Jack Broughton, the champion prizefighter of England, drafts his Rules on Boxing, which are in part designed to lessen the brutality of the sport. They remain in force until 1838, when they are superseded by the London Prize Ring Rules. 1743 The Capo-di-Monte porcelain factory is set up in Naples, Italy. It specializes in soft-paste figurines. 1743–1760 Paving city streets in the North American colonies becomes common, making the colonial streets drier and smoother than those in Britain. 5 May 1744 The Union of Frankfurt is agreed between King Frederick II (the Great) of Prussia, Holy Roman Emperor Charles VII (Charles Albert of Bavaria), the Elector Palatine, and the Landgrave of Hesse, to force Maria Theresa of Austria to restore Bavaria, make peace, and restore the constitution of the Holy Roman Empire. 30 May 1744 Alexander Pope, English poet and satirist, author of 'Essay on Man', dies in Twickenham, near London, England (66). 28 December 1744 The Quadruple Alliance of Great Britain, Austria, Saxony and Poland (under the same ruler), and the United Netherlands is formed against Prussia. 1744 French mathematician Jean d'Alembert publishes Traite de l'equilibre et du mouvement des fluides/Treatise on Equilibrium and on Movement of Fluids, applying his principle to the motion of fluids. 1744 The children's book A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, published in England by John Newbery, contains the earliest known reference to baseball, a name synonymous with the English game of rounders at this time. The letter 'B' is represented by baseball, with an illustration of the game being played. The book is reprinted in North America in 1762 and 1787.

20 January 1745 Following the death of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles VII (Charles Albert, elector of Bavaria), his son Maximilian Joseph of Bavaria subsequently agrees to support the candidature of Grand Duke Francis Stephen, consort of Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, as emperor. 18 March 1745 Robert Walpole, first prime minister of Britain 1721–42, a Whig, dies in London, England (68). 30 April 1745 French forces under Marshal Maurice de Saxe defeat an allied army (from Britain, Hanover, and the United Netherlands) under the English general William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, at Fontenoy (in modern Belgium) and conquer the Austrian Netherlands. 14–23 July 1745 The British prince Charles Edward Stuart ('Bonnie Prince Charlie'), the 'Young Pretender', son of Charles Francis Edward Stuart, the 'Old Pretender', sails from St Nazaire, France, with some Scottish partisans in his campaign ('the Forty-Five') to regain the Scottish and English thrones, and lands on Eriskay Island in the Hebrides, Scotland. 19 October 1745 Jonathan Swift, Irish author and satirist, author of Gulliver's Travels, dies in Dublin, Ireland (77). 4–6 December 1745 The Jacobite army of Charles Edward Stuart ('Bonnie Prince Charlie'), the 'Young Pretender', advances as far south as Derby, England, in his attempt to regain the Scottish and English thrones, but with three Hanoverian British armies in the field against him he is forced to retreat. 25 December 1745 By the Peace of Dresden with Austria and Saxony, Prussia retains the conquered Austrian province of Silesia and in return recognizes the Pragmatic Sanction (the legitimacy of Maria Theresa's accession to the Habsburg domains) and Francis I as Holy Roman Emperor. 1745 German scientist and dean of the cathedral of Camin, Ewald Georg von Kleist, invents the Leyden jar, a simple capacitor that accumulates and preserves electricity. The following year Dutch scientist Pieter von Musschenbroek makes the same discovery independently. c. 1745 The coffee house becomes popular in North America as an alternative gathering place to the boisterous and lawless taverns. Tea, coffee, and chocolate are served along with magazines and newspapers. Business meetings are held here, and notices of ship sailings, sales, and other business displayed. 30 March 1746 Francisco Goya y Lucientes, Spanish painter and engraver known for his depiction of contemporary events, born in Fuendetodos, Spain (–1828). 16 April 1746 The Jacobite army under Prince Charles Edward Stuart ('Bonnie Prince Charlie'), the 'Young Pretender', is totally defeated in the Battle of Culloden in Scotland by the English military commander William Augustus, Duke

of Cumberland, who subsequently abolishes the Scottish clan organization. He earns the nickname 'Butcher' for his ruthlessness in hunting down the Jacobite rebels. Stuart escapes from the aftermath of the battle. 16 June 1746 Victorious at the Battle of Piacenza, Austria and Sardinia are able to expel the French and Spanish forces from the Italian kingdoms of Lombardy and Sardinia. 1746 French mathematician Jean d'Alembert further develops the theory of complex numbers. 1746 French writer and encyclopedist Denis Diderot publishes Pensées philosophiques/Philosophical Thoughts. 4 May 1747 William IV of Orange-Nassau, grand-nephew of King William III of Great Britain and Ireland, is elected hereditary stadtholder (chief magistrate) and captain and admiral general (commander in chief of forces) of the United Netherlands. 1747 After the assassination of King Nadir Shah of Persia, Ahmad Shah, one of Nadir Shah's generals, proclaims himself king of Afghanistan, which becomes independent of Persia. 18 October 1748 By the Peace of Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle), ending the War of the Austrian Succession, there is a general recognition of Francis I as Holy Roman Emperor and of King Frederick II the Great of Prussia's conquest of Silesia. The Pragmatic Sanction, setting out the legitimacy of Maria Theresa of Austria's succession to the Habsburg domains, is also generally recognized. The French evacuate the Austrian Netherlands, recognize George II as king of Great Britain and Ireland, and transfer the Indian city of Madras (now Chennai) to Britain in exchange for Louisbourg (on Cape Breton Island), Nova Scotia. The Spanish Bourbons achieve the ambitions of their mother Elizabeth Farnese: Don Philip acquires the Italian duchies of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla, while King Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia receives the Upper Novara and Vigevano in Milan. All other conquests are restored. 1748 Excavations unearth Pompeii, a Roman city buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79. Sponsored by King Charles III of Naples, the excavations are more systematic than any before. 1748 French social philosopher Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de la Brède et de Montesquieu, publishes De l'Esprit des lois/The Spirit of the Laws. His major work, it has a profound effect on the development of political thinking. 1748 Maria Gaetana Agnesi of Italy writes Instituzioni analitiche/Analytical Institutions. It contains an analysis of a curve that becomes known as 'the witch of Agnesi'. 1748 The kabuki play Chushingura by the dramatist Takeda Izumo is first

performed, in Japan. Based on an ancient legend, it becomes one of the best loved kabuki plays. 1748 The English writer John Cleland publishes part of his novel The Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (better known as Fanny Hill). The remainder is published in 1749. 1748 The Scottish writer Tobias George Smollett publishes his novel The Adventures of Roderick Random. 24 January 1749 Charles James Fox, first foreign secretary of Britain (1782, 1783, and 1806), born in London, England (–1806). 17 May 1749 Edward Jenner, English surgeon who discovered and developed a smallpox vaccination, born in Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England (–1823). 28 August 1749 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German poet, novelist, dramatist, and philosopher, born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany (–1832). 1749 Music for Royal Fireworks by the German-born English composer George Frideric Handel is performed in Green Park, London, England, to celebrate the Peace of Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle). 1749 English artist Thomas Gainsborough paints Mr and Mrs Robert Andrews. 1749 French naturalist Georges-Louis de Buffon publishes the first book of his 36volume Histoire naturelle, genérale et particulière/Natural History, General and Particular, the first attempt to bring together the various fields of natural history. 1749 French philosopher Etienne Bonnot, Abbé de Condillac, publishes Traité des systèmes/Treatise on Systems. 1749 Sweden is the first country to introduce a regular national census: it will be taken every three years. 1749 The English writer Henry Fielding publishes his novel The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling, widely considered one of the finest novels of the century. 1749 The English writer Samuel Johnson publishes his long poem The Vanity of Human Wishes. 1749 The German composer Johann Sebastian Bach completes Die Kunst der Fuge/The Art of Fugue. 28 July 1750 Johann Sebastian Bach, leading German composer of the baroque period, dies in Leipzig (now Germany) (65).

31 July 1750 Joseph I succeeds as king of Portugal on the death of John V. 1750 English physicist John Michell describes magnetic induction and the inversesquare law for magnetic attraction in A Treatise on Artificial Magnets. 1750 Italian artist Giovanni Battista Tiepolo completes his frescoes Antony and Cleopatra in the Labia Palace in Venice, Italy. 1750 Swiss-born French thinker Jean-Jacques Rousseau publishes Discours sur les lettres et les sciences/Discourse on the Sciences and the Arts, which establishes his reputation. 1750 The population of the world is around 750 million. In Europe it is 140 million. 1750 The Scandinavian physicist Martin Stromer modifies the temperature scale devised by his mentor, the Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius. He inverts it, setting freezing point as 0°C and boiling point as 100°C, creating the Celsius scale still used today. c. 1750 As the grand tour of Europe grows in popularity, the influence of European fashions in clothes and furnishings is seen in Britain. Men increasingly wear gold buttons and buckles, and ruffles and embroidered waistcoats are also popular. c. 1750 The English landscape gardener Lancelot 'Capability' Brown lays out Warwick Castle Gardens in Warwickshire, England. c. 1750 The French mathematician Jean d'Alembert works with other mathematicians, including Leonhard Euler, Joseph, comte de Lagrange, and Pierre, marquis de Laplace, on the 'three-body problem', applying calculus to problems of celestial mechanics. c. 1750 The Jockey Club is founded in England. 1750–1777 Sebastião José de Carvalho e Mello, the Marquis of Pombal, virtual ruler of Portugal during the reign of José I, carries out a series of extensive reforms aimed at breaking the power of the nobility and revitalizing Portugal's finances, industry, agriculture, and education system. 5 April 1751 King Frederick II of Sweden dies and is succeeded by Adolphus Frederick of Holstein-Gottorp, his brother-in-law. 31 August 1751 The English soldier and colonial administrator Robert Clive takes the Indian town of Arcot, capital of the Carnatic, defeating the territorial ambitions (on behalf of France) of the French governor general Joseph, Marquis de Dupleix.

4 November 1751 Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Irish-born British playwright, orator, and Whig politician, baptized in Dublin, Ireland (–1816). 1751 Scottish philosopher David Hume publishes Philosophical Essays Concerning Human Understanding, a reworking of part of his Treatise of Human Nature. A revised version appears in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, which is published in 1758. He also publishes Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, another reworking of part of the Treatise of Human Nature. 1751 The English poet Thomas Gray publishes An Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, his best-known poem. 1751 The Scottish writer Tobias George Smollett publishes The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle. June 1752 North American scientist and politician Benjamin Franklin performs his most famous experiment, flying a kite during a thunderstorm and charging a Leyden jar to which it is connected. He thereby demonstrates the electrical nature of lightning. 1752 A major fire in Moscow, Russia, destroys 18,000 houses. 1752 North American scientist and statesman Benjamin Franklin describes the principle of the pointed lightning conductor to attract electricity from the atmosphere, and protect buildings from lightning. His 'sentry box' experiment is conducted for the first time, in France, generating large sparks between an insulated lightning rod and an earthed wire. 1753 French cartographer Nicolas Desmarest suggests the construction of a Channel Tunnel linking Britain to mainland Europe. 1753 French scientist Georges-Louis Leclerc, comte de Buffon, delivers the lecture Discours sur le style/Discourse on Style on his admission to the Académie Française. It contains his celebrated line: 'Le style est l'homme même' ('Style is the man himself'). 23 August 1754 Louis XVI, King of France 1774–93, born in Versailles, France (–1793). 1754 English furniture maker Thomas Chippendale publishes The Gentleman and Cabinetmaker's Directory. 1754 North American philosopher Jonathan Edwards publishes A Careful and Strict Enquiry into the Modern Prevailing Notions of Freedom of the Will, his most important work, an attack on Arminianism, a doctrine that that is ascendant in North American theology and departs from strict Calvinist predestination, allowing for salvation by good works.

1754 North American Quaker preacher John Woolman publishes Some Considerations on the Keeping of Negroes, one of the earliest antislavery tracts. 5 July 1755 Sarah Siddons, English tragic actor, born in Brecon, Brecknockshire, Wales (–1831). 1 November 1755 A massive earthquake, the largest ever known in Europe, destroys Lisbon, Portugal, and over 30,000 people are killed in the quake itself, and the tidal wave and fire which follow it. 2 November 1755 Marie-Antoinette (Maria Antonia Josepha Joanna von Österreich-Lothringen), Queen Consort of King Louis XVI of France, 11th daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Maria Theresa, born in Vienna (now in Austria) (–1793). 1755 English writer and critic Samuel Johnson publishes his Dictionary of the English Language. A revised edition appears in 1773. 1755 In his Allgemeine Naturgeschichte und Theorie des Himmels/Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant proposes a theory for the formation of the Solar System from a primordial nebula, predicts the existence of Uranus, and proposes that our Galaxy is just one of many in the universe. 1755 North American writer and statesman Benjamin Franklin publishes Observations concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc. 1755 Scottish chemist Joseph Black identifies carbon dioxide, which he calls 'fixed air'. 1755 The Golden Horn around Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire freezes over in one of the coldest winters on record – the beginning of a 'mini Ice Age' that will last several decades. 16 January 1756 The Treaty of Westminster is signed by Britain and Prussia, by which King Frederick II the Great of Prussia guarantees the neutrality of Hanover, which is designed to frustrate French attempts to seize King George II of Britain's German provinces. This precipitates the Franco-Austrian rapprochement. 27 January 1756 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, considered one of the world's greatest composers, born in Salzburg, Austria (–1791). 1 May 1756 The Treaty of Versailles between France and Austria constitutes the Diplomatic Revolution, achieved by the Austrian chancellor Prince KaunitzRietberg. The Habsburg Monarchy is to be neutral in an Anglo-French war but either party is to aid the other if attacked by Prussia. In addition, France is to recognize the Austrian Netherlands and to aid Austria if the latter is attacked by the Ottoman Empire.

17 May 1756 Following the Diplomatic Revolution of 1 May, which created two opposing power blocs in Europe (Austria, France, Russia, Sweden, and Saxony opposed to Prussia, Great Britain, and Portugal), Britain formally declares war on France (the challenge is accepted on 9 June). 20 June 1756 In the incident known as the 'Black Hole of Calcutta', following the capture of the city of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta), India, from the British by Siraj ud-Daula, nawab (ruler) of Bengal, surviving British defenders are imprisoned in a small dungeon in the city. It is subsequently claimed that only 23 out of 146 prisoners survive, though the circumstances of the incident remain controversial. 29 August 1756 King Frederick II the Great of Prussia invades the German electorate of Saxony, marking the outbreak of the Seven Years' War. Frederick uses the pretext of having learned of the Franco-Austrian alliance and subsequently takes Dresden, the capital of Saxony. The United Netherlands and Sweden decide to remain neutral. 1756 English engineer John Smeaton begins to rebuild the Eddystone Lighthouse, near Plymouth, England. 1 May 1757 The second Treaty of Versailles against Prussia is negotiated between France and the Holy Roman Empire, by which Prussia is to be partitioned, losing Silesia and Glatz to Austria. King Louis XV of France agrees to increase annual subsidies to Maria Theresa of Austria until she has recovered Silesia. In return, she promises Louis XV full sovereignty in some cities in the Austrian Netherlands; the remainder are to pass to Don Philip, Farnesan prince of Spain, in exchange for the Italian duchies of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla, when these are returned to Austria. 18 June 1757 The forces of the Holy Roman Emperor Francis I defeat King Frederick II the Great of Prussia at Kolin in Bohemia; Frederick loses 13,000 of his 33,000 troops. 23 June 1757 The English soldier and colonial administrator Robert Clive marches against Siraj ud-Daula, the nawab (ruler) of Bengal, India, and wins the Battle of Plassey. Clive installs Mir Jaffer as nawab and brings Bengal under British control. 6 September 1757 Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert de Motier, marquis de Lafayette, French aristocrat and political leader who fought against the British during the American Revolution, born in Chavaniac, France (–1834). 28 November 1757 William Blake, English poet, painter, engraver, and mystic, born in London, England (–1828). 1757 Croatian-born Italian astronomer and mathematician Roger Boscovich, in Theoris philosophiae naturalis redacta ad unicam legem virium in natura existentium/Theory of Natural Philosophy Reduced to a Single Law of the

Strength Existing in Nature, propounds an atomic theory of matter for the first time in modern Europe. 1757 Italian artist Pietro Longhi paints The Rhinoceros. 1757 Scottish sailor John Campbell invents the sextant – a modification of the marine quadrant that makes measuring angular separations to determine a ship's position easier. 6 May 1758 Maximilien François Robespierre, French Jacobin leader during the French Revolution, born in Arras, France (–1794). 25 August 1758 The Battle of Zorndorf (in the Prussian province of Neumark) is fought between the Prussians, led by King Frederick II the Great, and Russian troops under the Russian general Count William Fermor. Here Frederick defeats the Russians: it is one of the bloodiest encounters of the Seven Years' War and Fermor withdraws by stages into Poland; Brandenburg Prussia is saved. 29 September 1758 Horatio Nelson, British naval commander who won decisive battles against France in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, born in Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk, England (–1805). 14 October 1758 The Austrians gain a victory at Hochkirch, Saxony, against Prussia, in thick fog. James Keith, King Frederick II the Great of Prussia's brotherin-law, Ferdinand, Prince of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, five other generals, and more than a quarter of the Prussian army are killed. 1758 English artist Thomas Gainsborough paints The Artist's Daughter with a Cat. 1758 Scottish artist Allan Ramsay paints Portrait of Dr William Hunter. c. 1758 The North American artist John Singleton Copley – America's first major artist – paints Portrait of Mary and Elizabeth Royall. 15 January 1759 The British Museum opens, on the site of Montagu House, in Bloomsbury, London, England, partly funded by a government-sponsored lottery. 25 January 1759 Robert Burns, national poet of Scotland, born in Alloway, Ayrshire, Scotland (–1796). 8 April 1759 An expedition dispatched by Robert Clive, governor of the British East India Company's Bengal possessions, and led by Colonel Francis Forde, second in command to Clive in Bengal, seizes Masulipatam, southeast India, with a small force and drives the French from the Deccan, South India. 14 April 1759 George Frideric Handel, German-born English baroque composer, whose best-known works include the oratorio Messiah (1741), dies in London, England (74).

28 May 1759 William Pitt the Younger, prime minister of Britain 1783–1801 and 1804–06, a Tory, born in Hayes, Kent, England (–1806). 1 August 1759 French forces are decisively defeated by a Prussian army under Ferdinand, Prince of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, King Frederick II the Great of Prussia's most experienced general, and Lord George Sackville, commander of the British contingent, at Minden, Germany. 10 August 1759 King Ferdinand VI of Spain dies and is succeeded by Charles III (formerly Charles IV of the Italian kingdom of Naples, which passes to his nineyear-old son Ferdinand). 13 September 1759 British forces under the English major-general James Wolfe bypass the French defences of the city of Quebec by scaling the Heights of Abraham from the St Lawrence River and defeating the French on the plains above the city. Both Wolfe and the French commander, Louis-Joseph, marquis de Montcalm, are killed, but French Canada falls into British hands with the capture of the city. 26 October 1759 Georges-Jacques Danton, leader in the French Revolution instrumental in overthrowing the monarchy and establishing France's First Republic, born in Arcis-sur-Aube, France (–1794). 10 November 1759 Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller, German dramatist and poet, born in Marbach, Württemberg (now Germany) (–1805). 1759 English artist Joshua Reynolds paints Portrait of James, 7th Earl of Lauderdale. 1759 English pottery manufacturer Josiah Wedgwood leases the Ivy House works in Burslem, Staffordshire, where he will perfect and pioneer many new pottery techniques. 1759 The English writer and critic Samuel Johnson publishes his philosophical romance The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia. 1759 The French writer Voltaire publishes his novel Candide, ou L'Optimisme/ Candide, or Optimism, a satire on the thinkers and institutions he considers a hindrance to human progress. It becomes his most widely read work and is soon translated. 1759 The Irish brewer Arthur Guinness opens a brewery in Dublin, Ireland. It will grow to become the world's largest brewery. 1759 The redesigning of the interiors of Kedleston Hall, England, to schemes by the Scottish architects John and Robert Adams, is completed. 23 June 1760 The Prussian army under General Fouqué at Landshut, Silesia,

guarding the passes into Silesia, suffers a crushing defeat at the hands of the Austrians under Baron Gideon Ernst von Laudon. 9 September 1760 Russian and Swedish troops ravage the Prussian province of Pomerania while imperial troops occupy the German electorate of Saxony and town of Halle. 9–13 October 1760 The Russians burn the Prussian capital, Berlin, which they and imperial troops occupy, until King Frederick II the Great of Prussia's advance from Silesia. However, Frederick is forced to allow them to retreat unmolested. 17 October 1760 Following the death of King George II of Britain, he is succeeded by his grandson George III, aged 22. 3 November 1760 King Frederick II the Great of Prussia defeats the Austrian troops under their commander in chief Leopold, Graf von Daun, at Torgau, Saxony. The Austrians evacuate the electorate of Saxony except for the capital Dresden. 1760 English artist Thomas Gainsborough paints Portrait of Mrs Philip Thicknesse. 1760 The English writer Laurence Sterne publishes the first two volumes of his novel The Life and Adventure of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. Volumes three and four appear in 1761, volumes five and six in 1762, volumes seven and eight in 1765, and volume nine in 1767. He also publishes his first volume of sermons under the title The Sermons of Mr Yorick (the name of the parson in his novel). 1760–1770 The estimated population of the North American colonies is 1,593,625 including 325,806 black slaves. 14 January 1761 A coalition of Afghan forces under Ahmad Shah Durrani defeats the Maratha army at Panipat, ending any prospect of Maratha succession to the Mogul empire. 16 January 1761 The Irish-born British general Sir Eyre Coote takes the French base of Pondicherry after a three-month siege, ending French supremacy in southern India. 1761 English engineer James Brindley completes the Duke of Bridgewater's Canal between Manchester and the Worsley collieries in northern England; it is the first British canal of major economic importance. 1761 The French philosopher Baron d'Holbach (Paul Heinrich Dietrich) publishes Le Christianisme dévoilé/Christianity Unveiled, an attack on Christian belief. D'Holbach is one of the leading contributors to Diderot's Encyclopédie/ Encyclopedia. 1761 The German neoclassical artist Anton Mengs paints the ceiling fresco

Parnassus at the Villa Albani in Rome, Italy. Breaking with the grandiose baroque tradition of fresco painting, it becomes a central early work of neoclassicism. 5 January 1762 Elizabeth, empress of Russia, daughter of Peter the Great, dies in St Petersburg, Russia. Her successor is her nephew, Peter, Duke of HolsteinGottorp (Tsar Peter III). 5 May 1762 Tsar Peter III, an admirer of Frederick II the Great of Prussia, ends hostilities between Russia and Prussia, by the Treaty of St Petersburg. Russia restores all conquests made during the Seven Years' War and agrees to a military alliance with Prussia. 22 May 1762 The Treaty of Hamburg ends hostilities between Sweden and Prussia, restoring all conquests made during the Seven Years' War. 1762 English inventor John Harrison claims the Board of Longitude's prize for an accurate chronometer for use at sea; it can determine the longitude to within 5.5 m/18 ft (he is paid £20,000 in 1773). 1762 John Montagu, Earl of Sandwich, invents the sandwich (meat between two slices of bread) to stave off hunger while he is at the gaming table in London, England. 1762 The comedy Le baruffe chiozzotte/Quarrels at Chioggia by the Italian writer Carlo Goldoni is performed, in Venice, Italy. One of his finest works, it is a comedy of the lower classes. 1762 The English artist George Stubbs paints Mares and Foals Without a Background and Whistlejacket. 1762 The English writer Oliver Goldsmith publishes The Citizen of the World; or, Letters from a Chinese Philosopher. Written as a series of letters from a Chinese visitor to England, it satirizes contemporary society. 1762 The French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau publishes Émile, ou l'Education/Émile, or Education, a romance that sets out his ideas on education. His central claim is that education is not about simply imposing knowledge, but about allowing a child to develop naturally. It will have a profound influence on the theory and practice of education. 1762 The French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau writes that women should be passive and weak, and their education should be directed towards pleasing the man and raising the children. According to him, a wife should not only be faithful, but also ensure that others acknowledge her fidelity. 1762 The French writer and encyclopedist Denis Diderot begins his satirical novel Le Neveu de Rameau/Rameau's Nephew, completing it in 1774. It is not published in France until 1821.

1762 The opera Orfeo ed Euridice/Orpheus and Eurydice by the German composer Christoph Gluck is first performed, in Vienna, Austria. Incorporating elements of French opera, it is written with a simplicity and directness of emotional expression that make it a landmark in the development of opera; the first so-called 'reform' opera. 1762 The Scottish poet and translator James Macpherson publishes Fingal: An Ancient Poem. Macpherson claims that this is based on a long-lost epic by the Gaelic poet Ossian, 'the Homer of the North'. The work arouses great interest throughout Europe and becomes an important element in early Romanticism. It is later discovered that much of the text had been written by Macpherson himself. 1762 The Winter Palace in St Petersburg, Russia, designed by the Italian architect Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli, is completed. 10 February 1763 The Treaty of Paris between Britain, France, and Spain ends the Seven Years' War. By its terms, Britain secures Canada, Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, St Vincent, Tobago, Dominica, Grenada, Senegal, and Minorca from France. France regains Martinique, Guadeloupe, St Lucia, Gorée, and the French settlements in India, and is guaranteed fishing rights off Newfoundland. Spain acquires Louisiana from France, and cedes Florida to Britain in exchange for the restoration of Cuba and the Philippines. 15 February 1763 The Treaty of Hubertusburg between Prussia and Austria restores the status quo before the Seven Years' War, returning Glatz and Silesia to Prussia. Prussia agrees to support the candidature of the Archduke Joseph of Austria as 'king of the Romans' (effective heir to his father's title of Holy Roman Emperor). 7 May 1763–24 July 1766 The Ottawa chief Pontiac leads a loose confederation of Indian tribes in an assault against British forts and settlements all along the western frontier of the American colonies. Before the Treaty of Oswego ends the rebellion three years later, 2,000 Americans die, impressing royal authorities with the need for regular troops in the colonies. 23 June 1763 Joséphine de Beauharnais, Empress of France 1804–10 and consort of Napoleon I, born in Trois-Ilets, Martinique (–1814). 1763 English clergyman Edmund Stone describes the effective treatment of fever using willow bark, from which the active ingredient of aspirin is later derived. 1763 French surgeon Claudius Aymand performs the first successful appendectomy, in Paris, France. 1763 The synagogue at Newport, Rhode Island, designed by the American architect Peter Harrison, is completed. This is the first synagogue in America; its design, particularly the interior, is one of the best examples of American architecture of the period.

1763 Thomas Bayes, the English mathematician and theologian, publishes 'An Essay Towards Solving a Problem in the Doctrine of Chances'. This includes Bayes' theorem, which is important in statistics. 5 April 1764 The British Parliament passes the Sugar Act to help defray the cost of protecting Britain's expanded American empire. The act levies duties on molasses, sugar, indigo, pimento, wine, and textiles. It mandates an elaborate system of paperwork to aid enforcement. It also denies a jury trial to those accused of violating its decrees. May 1764 Boston lawyer James Otis repudiates the Sugar Act as 'taxation without representation'. He declares 'absurd' the notion that a parliament sitting in England can 'virtually' represent colonial interests. 7 September 1764 Stanislas Augustus Poniatowski, the protégé of Russia and former lover of Catherine the Great, is elected king of Poland. 22 October 1764 The victory of British East India Company forces at Buxar, in Bihar, eastern India, over the forces of Mir Kasim (the deposed nawab of Bengal), the nawab of Oudh, and the titular Mogul emperor, leads to the establishment of British control over the Indian provinces of Bengal and Bihar. 26 October 1764 William Hogarth, celebrated English satirical painter and engraver, whose works include the series A Rake's Progress (from 1732), dies in London, England (67). 1764 English inventor James Hargreaves invents the spinning jenny, which allows one individual to spin several threads simultaneously. The first model can spin 8 yarns at once but later models could spin 80. 1764 The Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completes his Symphonies No. 1 (K 16), No. 2 (lost), No. 3 (lost), and No. 4 (K 19), and his Sonatas for Piano and Violin Nos. 1 to 4 (K 6 to K 9). 1764 The French writer and satirist Voltaire publishes his Dictionnaire philosophique/Philosophical Dictionary. 1764 The German archaeologist and art historian Johann Joachim Winckelmann publishes Geschichte der Kunst des Altertums/A History of the Art of Antiquity, the last of his pioneering studies of Greek art. His ideal of 'noble simplicity and calm grandeur' becomes one of the key principles of 18th-century neoclassicism. 1764 The Italian jurist and philosopher Cesare Beccaria publishes Dei delitti e delle pene/On Crimes and Punishments. A denunciation of capital punishment and torture, it has a wide influence on penal reform. 22 March 1765 The British Parliament passes the Stamp Act, levying a direct tax on all colonial legal documents, newspapers, pamphlets, playing cards, dice, and

almanacs. Designed to defray the cost of defending the colonies, the tax provokes widespread protest in colonial America. 18 August 1765 The Habsburg heir Joseph II becomes Holy Roman Emperor. His mother, Maria Theresa, ruler of the hereditary Habsburg lands, accepts Joseph as co-regent in the Habsburg Monarchy as a means of maintaining her dominance over him. 1765 At the Promenade House in Baden-Baden, Germany, M Chevilly opens the world's first legal casino. 1765 John Harmon makes the first chocolate in America, in Dorchester Lower Mills, Massachusetts. 1765 The English writer Horace Walpole publishes the novel The Castle of Otranto. A horror story set in the Middle Ages, it starts the vogue for Gothic romances. 1765 The potato becomes the most popular European foodstuff. c. 1765 The Japanese artist Suzuki Harunobu publishes his woodblock print Interior With a Girl and Her Maid. Harunobu develops multicoloured printing, which brings a greater sophistication to Japanese woodblock art. 17 February 1766 Thomas Malthus, English economist and demographer who theorized that population growth, unless checked, would always outstrip the food supply, born near Guildford, England (–1834). 1766 English scientist Henry Cavendish discovers the element hydrogen (atomic number 1) and delivers papers to the Royal Society of London, England, on the chemistry of gases. 1766 Swiss biologist Albrecht von Haller shows that nerves stimulate muscles to contract, and that all nerves lead to the spinal column and brain. His work lays the foundation of modern neurology. 1766 The Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn completes his Mass No 2, the Grosse Orgelmesse/Great Mass with Organ. 1766 The English artist George Stubbs publishes his book of engravings The Anatomy of the Horse. 1766 The English writer Oliver Goldsmith publishes The Vicar of Wakefield, a comic novel that becomes one of his best-known works. 1766 The Swedish scientist and religious thinker Emanuel Swedenborg publishes The Apocalypse Revealed, expounding his highly individual blend of science and mysticism. His works influence, among others, the English poet and artist William

Blake. 26 June–2 July 1767 The British Parliament adopts the Townshend Acts, taxing all glass, lead, paper, paints, and tea imported to the American colonies. To ensure compliance, the acts establish a Board of Customs Commissioners in Boston, a city becoming notorious for its recalcitrance. 1767 English surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon complete their demarcation of the Pennsylvania–Maryland border. Hereafter known as the Mason–Dixon line, the border will distinguish slave states from free. 1767 Italian biologist Lazzaro Spallanzani disproves Georges Buffon's theories of the spontaneous generation of life by preserving organic material in vials sealed by fusing the glass. 1767 The English artist Joseph Wright of Derby paints An Experiment on a Bird in an Air Pump. 18 March 1768 Laurence Sterne, Irish-born English novelist, dies in London, England (55). October 1768 The Ottoman Empire, prompted by France, declares war on Russia to counter its increasing influence in Poland. 1768 Scottish engineer James Watt builds a small steam engine with his condenser and the following year takes out a patent on it. This is the first true steam engine. 1768 The Encyclopaedia Britannica, the oldest English language encyclopaedia, begins publication, in weekly numbers. The first edition will be published in 1771. 1768 The English novelist Laurence Sterne publishes A Sentimental Journey. An account of a tour through France and Italy, it is a satire on the sentimentality of many contemporary novels. Ironically, it is taken seriously by many of his readers and becomes very popular. 10 January 1769 Michel Ney, French marshal during the Napoleonic Wars, born in Paris, France (–1815). 1 May 1769 Arthur Wellesley (later Duke of Wellington), British army commander and Tory prime minister 1828–30, born in Dublin, Ireland (–1852). 19 May 1769 Lorenzo Ganganelli is elected as Pope Clement XIV after a threemonth struggle in the College of Cardinals between those who supported the Jesuits, and those who opposed them (his supporters). 1 August 1769 Napoleon I (Napoleon Bonaparte), French general, First Consul 1799–1804, and emperor of France 1804–15, born in Ajaccio, Corsica (–1821).

November 1769 Russian troops overrun the Ottoman client-states of Moldavia and Wallachia (modern Romania), occupying the Wallachian capital, Bucharest. 1769 English inventor Richard Arkwright patents a spinning machine (or 'water frame' because it operates by water) that produces cotton yarn suitable for warp; it is one of the key inventions of Britain's Industrial Revolution. 1769 French engineer Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot designs a steam tractor intended for pulling artillery. It is never developed. c. 1769 The Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn completes his Symphony No. 48, the Maria Theresa. 1769–1770 Famine kills 10 million in Bengal, India; it is the worst famine to date. 7 April 1770 William Wordsworth, English Romantic poet, and poet laureate 1843–50, born in Cockermouth, Cumbria, England (–1850). 27 August 1770 Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, German philosopher of the idealist school, born in Stuttgart, Germany (–1831). 17 December 1770 Ludwig van Beethoven, German classical Romantic composer, born in Bonn, Germany (–1827). 1770 English designer Jesse Ramsden invents a screw-cutting lathe. 1770 The American artist Benjamin West paints The Death of General Wolfe, which is an important break with tradition. Instead of representing an important recent event through an event in Greek or Roman mythology or history, he depicts the death of the British conqueror of Quebec in contemporary terms. 1770 The American preacher John Woolman publishes Considerations on the True Harmony of Mankind. 1770 The French philosopher Baron d'Holbach (Paul Heinrich Dietrich) publishes Système de la nature/System of Nature under the name J B Mirabaud. Its outspoken attack on Christianity provokes critical responses from Voltaire and Frederick the Great. 1770 The Irish-born Britsh writer and statesman Edmund Burke publishes Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Discontents, a pamphlet on the role of the monarch and of political parties in Britain's constitution. 1770 The population of Britain's 13 American colonies has risen from 1.6 million to an estimated 2.2 million in a decade. c. 1770 Britain imports around 3 million kg/6.6 million lb of tea leaves a year.

c. 1770 English inventor Richard Arkwright tries his cotton spinning machinery at a mill in Nottingham. The following year he goes into full-scale production in a new water-powered mill at Cromford, Derbyshire, and builds houses for the workers, creating the first factory town. 1770–1780 The estimated population of the American colonies is 2,780,369 including 575,420 black slaves. 19 January 1771 The French chancellor, René de Maupéou, abolishes the country's parlements, replacing them with an alternative system of courts under royal control. This coup d'état is fiercely controversial. 15 August 1771 Walter Scott, Scottish novelist, poet, historian, and biographer who developed the historical novel, born in Edinburgh, Scotland (–1832). 1771 The American artist Benjamin West paints William Penn's Treaty with the Indians. 1771 The first edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the oldest Englishlanguage encyclopedia, is published. Parts appeared in 1768. 5 August 1772 Frederick II (the Great) of Prussia engineers the First Partition of Poland, dividing one-third of Polish territory between Prussia, Austria, and Russia. Prussia takes west Prussia (except Danzig, modern Gdansk) and Ermeland in the north, Austria takes Little Poland south of the Vistula, and Russia takes lands east of the Dvina and Dnieper rivers. 21 October 1772 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, English Romantic poet, literary critic, and philosopher, born in Ottery St Mary, Devon, England (–1834). 1 November 1772 French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier disproves the phlogiston theory by demonstrating that combustion is caused by a reaction with a component of air. 1772 German astronomer Johann Elert Bode publicizes the Titius–Bode law, first proposed in 1766 by Johann Titius, which states that the distances to the planets are proportional to the terms of the series 0, 3, 6, 12, 24, … 1772 Scottish explorer James Bruce explores Abyssinia (Ethiopia) and traces the Blue Nile to its confluence with the White Nile. 0–1772 A total of 9,784 slaves are imported from Africa and the West Indies to the British colonies in America, while 495 are exported from the American colonies to the West Indies or between colonies. 1773 Fashionable colonial women wear corsets. 1773 The American writer, scientist, and politician Benjamin Franklin publishes

his satirical political tract Rules by Which a Great Empire May Be Reduced to a Small One. 1773 The comedy She Stoops to Conquer, by the English writer Oliver Goldsmith, is first performed, in London, England. 31 March 1774 In the Boston Port Act, the British Parliament responds to the Boston Tea Party by closing the port of Boston. Americans regard this as the first of the so-called Intolerable Acts. 21 July 1774 Under the Treaty of Kuchuk-Kainardzhi, the Ottoman Empire cedes the Black Sea coast from the River Bug to the River Dnieper to Russia, and also the Crimean ports of Yenikale and Kertch. Moldavia and Wallachia are returned to the Ottoman Empire, and the Khanate of the Crimea is recognized as independent. 1 August 1774 English chemist Joseph Priestley discovers the element oxygen (atomic number 8). 1774 French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier demonstrates the conservation of mass in chemical reactions. 1774 The English writer and statesman Lord Chesterfield publishes Letters to his Son, a guide to good manners and success in society. 1774 The German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe publishes Die Leiden des jungen Werther/The Sorrows of Young Werther, a short novel about a tragic love affair and suicide that embodies the mood of early Romanticism. 22 January 1775 André Marie Ampère, French physicist who founded the science of electromagnetism, born in Lyon, France (–1836). 23 March 1775 J(oseph) M(allord) W(illiam) Turner, English Romantic landscape painter, born in London, England (–1851). 19 April 1775 Military action in the American Revolution begins with the skirmishes between colonials and British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts; the British force withdraws to Boston. 25 July 1775 English explorer James Cook returns to England after a second voyage in the South Seas, having completed the first successful west–east circumnavigation of the world. 16 December 1775 Jane Austen, English novelist, born in Steventon, Hampshire, England (–1817). 1775 French engineer Pierre-Marie-Jérôme Trésaguet describes his three-tier

method of road building which separates the hard-stone surface from the rubble base and provides good drainage. 1775 The comedy The Rivals, by the Irish dramatist Richard Brinsley Sheridan, is first performed, in London, England. 1775 The Italian churchman Giannangelo Braschi is elected Pope Pius VI. He is pope until 1799. 1775 The play The Barber of Seville by the French writer Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais is produced in Paris, France, after two years' prohibition on the grounds that it was seditious. 11 June 1776 John Constable, English landscape painter, born in East Bergholt, Suffolk, England (–1837). 4 July 1776 The American Declaration of Independence, drafted by Thomas Jefferson with revisions by Benjamin Franklin and John Adams, is approved by the Continental Congress. It announces the separation of the 13 North American British colonies from Britain. 25 August 1776 David Hume, Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, dies in Edinburgh, Scotland (65). 25 December 1776 American forces under George Washington cross the icestrewn Delaware River in a surprise raid on Christmas night, and defeat a corps of British Hessian mercenaries at the Battle of Trenton. 1776 American engineer David Bushnell builds a hand-powered wooden-hulled submarine named the Turtle. It is used in an unsuccessful attempt to attach an explosive device to a British ship, HMS Eagle. 1776 The English historian Edward Gibbon publishes the first volume of his major work The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, the most important historical work of the period. It is soon popular and controversial, with its criticisms of early Christians seen as scandalous. The eight-volume work is completed in 1788. 1776–1779 English explorer James Cook explores the Pacific Ocean. In 1778, he discovers Hawaii, where the indigenous population treat him as a god. Later that year, he passes through the Bering Strait into the Arctic Ocean, searching for the northwest passage to the Atlantic. 24 February 1777 Maria I becomes queen regnant of Portugal on the death of her husband, José I. She frees the Marquis of Pombal's political prisoners and banishes him. 14 June 1777 The Continental Congress votes to adopt a flag (designed, according to legend, by the seamstress Betsy Ross at the request of George

Washington) as the national emblem of the new United States of America. 1777 French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier presents his 'Memoir' paper to the French Academy of Sciences in which he refutes the phlogiston theory of combustion and forwards the idea oxygen-based combustion. 1777 French scientist Charles Coulomb invents the torsion balance, in which weights are measured by the amount of twist induced in a metal wire. 1777 New York adopts a constitution denying women, even those with property, the right to vote. 1777 Spain and Portugal sign the Treaty of San Ildefonso, confirming Portugal's colonial claims to large areas in the Amazon and Paraná plains in South America. 1777 Swedish chemist Karl Scheele discovers that silver nitrate, when exposed to light, results in a blackening effect. This is an important discovery for the development of photography. 1777 The bulk of the text of the first edition of the French Encyclopédie/ Encyclopedia, largely the creation of the French philosopher Denis Diderot, is completed. Publication began in 1751. The entire work (with illustrations and index) is completed in 1780. 30 May 1778 Voltaire, celebrated French philosopher and writer, whose major works include Candide (1758) and the Dictionnaire philosophique/Philosophical Dictionary (1764), dies in Paris, France (83). 2 July 1778 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, French philosopher whose writings provided inspiration to the leaders of the French Revolution, dies in Ermenonville, France (66). 3 July 1778 Prussia, in alliance with Saxony, declares war on the Habsburg Monarchy following the Austrian occupation of Lower Bavaria. Skirmishes between Prussia and Austria continue until May 1779. 27 July 1778 A French fleet under Louis Guillouet, comte d'Orvilliers, wins a narrow victory over a British fleet under Augustus Keppel off Ushant, in the English Channel. This crucial British defeat enables units of the French Brest fleet to be sent to America and the West Indies. 1778 In Epoques de la nature/Epochs of Nature, French scientist George-Louis Leclerc, Compte de Buffon, reconstructs geological history as a series of stages – the first to recognize such stages. It contradicts the doctrine that the Earth is only 6,000 years old. 1778 The British governor-general in India, Warren Hastings, captures the French base of Chandernagore in Bengal, and an expedition under Hector Munro takes

Pondicherry in the Carnatic. 1778 The comedy School for Scandal by the Irish writer Richard Brinsley Sheridan is performed, in London, England. 1778 The English writer Fanny Burney publishes anonymously Evelina, her first and best novel. 1778 The French government sets up state control of brothels, with compulsory registration and medical inspection of prostitutes. 1778 The Japanese artist and poet Yosa Buson paints the hand scroll The Narrow Path into the Back Country. 13 February 1779 English explorer James Cook returns to Hawaii, where his crew have a disagreement with some of the indigenous population. After a hasty departure, Cook's ship, the Resolution, is damaged, and he is forced to land again, where he is killed in an argument over a stolen boat. 13 February 1779 James Cook, the English naval captain and navigator who explored Canada's coasts and the Pacific, is killed in Hawaii (50). 13 May 1779 The Treaty of Teschen ends the War of the Bavarian Succession. The Habsburg Monarchy obtains the Inn district of Bavaria and agrees to support the reversion of the Hohenzollern principalities of Ansbach and Bayreuth to Prussia. 16 June 1779 Spain declares war on Britain, following an undertaking by France to assist in recovering Gibraltar and Florida. Spanish forces begin a siege of Gibraltar. 1779 Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion by the Scottish philosopher David Hume are published posthumously. Though he wrote them in the 1750s, Hume was unwilling during his lifetime to publish these attacks on the arguments for God's existence. 1779 English inventor Samuel Crompton devises the spinning mule, a cross between a spinning jenny and a water-frame spinning machine. It makes possible the large-scale manufacture of thread. 1779 French inventors Jean Blanchard and M Masurier construct a velocipede, a type of early bicycle (but with four wheels), in Paris, France. 1779 The comedy The Critic by the Irish writer Richard Brinsley Sheridan is performed, in London, England. 1779 The German writer Gotthold Ephraim Lessing publishes his verse play Nathan der Weise/Nathan the Wise, a plea for religious tolerance.

1779 The Italian-born British composer Muzio Clementi publishes his early keyboard sonatas (Opus 2). 1779 The opera Iphigénia en Tauride/Iphigenia in Tauris by the German composer Christoph Gluck is first performed, in Paris, France. The success of this opera settles the heated debate between the supporters of Gluck's French style of opera and the supporters of Nicola Puccini's Italian style in favour of Gluck. 1779 Work begins on the first iron bridge to cross the River Severn near Coalbrookdale, Shropshire, England. Final design and construction are the work of English iron master Abraham Darby III. 10 March 1780 Russia creates the League of Armed Neutrality to prevent British ships from searching neutral vessels for contraband of war. The confederacy is subsequently joined by France, Spain, Austria, Prussia, Denmark, and Sweden. October 1780 Personal serfdom is abolished in the Habsburg Monarchy by the Holy Roman Emperor, Joseph II. 20 November 1780 Britain declares war on the United Netherlands to prevent it joining the League of Armed Neutrality created by Russia on 10 March. 29 November 1780 Maria-Theresa, wife and empress of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I 1745–65 and co-ruler of the Habsburg Monarchy, dies in Vienna, Austria. Her son, the Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II, becomes sole ruler of the Habsburg lands. 13 March 1781 German-born English astronomer William Herschel discovers the planet Uranus. 9 June 1781 George Stephenson, English engineer, inventor of the railway locomotive, born in Wylam, Northumberland, England (–1848). 1 July 1781 Sir Eyre Coote, Irish-born British commander in chief in India, defeats Hyder Ali, Sultan of Mysore, at Porto Novo, establishing British hegemony over southern India. 5 September 1781 In perhaps the decisive battle of the American Revolution, the French fleet under François, comte de Grasse, defeats off the Virginia Capes the attempt of a British fleet from New York under Admiral Thomas Graves to drive it from Chesapeake Bay. Continued French occupation of the Bay seals the fate of the British forces under Charles, Lord Cornwallis, in Yorktown. 19 October 1781 British forces under Charles, Lord Cornwallis, surrender to the besieging American and French forces at Yorktown, Virginia, after a three-week siege. The British also evacuate Charleston in South Carolina and Savannah in Georgia.

1781 Scottish engineer James Watt discovers how to convert the up-and-down motion of his steam engine into rotary motion, which can then turn a shaft. 1781 The German philosopher Immanuel Kant publishes the first of his major works, the Critique of Pure Reason, which explores the theory of knowledge. It will become one of the central works of modern philosophy. 1781 The population of America is around 3.5 million. The majority live on the east coast and there is very little settlement of the rest of the country. 1781 The Swiss-born British artist Henry Fuseli (Johann Heinrich Füssli) paints The Nightmare. Capturing the Gothic mood of the period, it is one of the most vivid and macabre images of early Romanticism. 27 February 1782 The British Parliament orders a halt to British military campaigns in North America. 17 May 1782 After a British defeat at Wadgaon, India, in January 1779 and largely inconclusive warfare since, the Treaty of Salbai ends the first AngloMaratha war with minimal British gains. 1782 Scottish engineer James Watt patents the double-acting steam engine, which provides power on both the upstroke and the downstroke of the piston. 1782 The first part of the Confessions of the French writer Jean-Jacques Rousseau (written 1765–70) are published posthumously. A very frank (and often unreliable) account of his unusual life, it is a masterpiece of autobiography. The last part appears in 1789. 30 May 1783 The first daily newspaper in colonial America, the Pennsylvania Evening Post, is published. 24 July 1783 Simón Bolívar, Venezuelan soldier who liberated Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Bolivia from Spanish rule, born in Caracas, New Granada (in modern Venezuela) (–1830). 3 September 1783 The Peace of Paris is signed between Britain on one side and France, Spain, and America on the other, ending the American Revolution. Britain recognizes the independence of the American colonies, cedes Florida to Spain, and recovers its West Indian possessions. France recovers St Lucia, Tobago, Senegal, Gorée, and its East Indian possessions. France regains the right to fortify Dunkirk. 21 November 1783 Using a hot-air balloon made by Joseph and Etienne Montgolfier, Jean F Pilâtre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Arlandes make the first human flight, in Paris, France. 1783 Churchman Junipero Serra makes the first wine in America from grape

cuttings brought from Spain and replanted at the California mission San Juan Capistrano. 1783 English iron manufacturer Henry Cort develops a rolling mill with grooved rollers for making iron bars. With this machine he can produce 15 tonnes of iron bars in 12 hours, where a traditional forge hammer could only produce 1 tonne. 1783 The Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completes his Symphony No. 36 (K 425), the Linz, part of No. 37 (K 444), and his Piano Concertos No. 11 (K 413) and No. 13 (K 415). He leaves his Mass in C minor (No. 18) (K 427) unfinished. 1783 The English poet Thomas Crabbe publishes The Village, a long poem in couplets that gives a realistic view of the harshness of rural life in East Anglia, England. 1783 The German Jewish scholar Moses Mendelssohn publishes Jerusalem, oder über religiöse Macht und Judentum/Jerusalem, or On Religious Power and Judaism, a plea for freedom of conscience. 6 January 1784 By the terms of the Treaty of Constantinople, the Ottoman Empire acquiesces in Russia's annexation of the Crimea and the Caucasian region of Kuban. 28 February 1784 The English evangelist John Wesley signs a deed of declaration as the charter of Wesleyan Methodism and ordains two 'Presbyters' for the American Mission. 11 March 1784 Britain signs a peace treaty with Tippu Sultan of Mysore, India, ending the Second Mysore War. 4 July 1784 The Habsburg monarch and Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II of Austria repeals the constitution of Hungary as part of his campaign to create a unified Habsburg empire and to break the power of the local Hungarian nobility. 30 July 1784 Denis Diderot, French philosopher of the Enlightenment, editor of the Encyclopédie/Encyclopedia, dies in Paris, France (71). 13 December 1784 Samuel Johnson, English essayist, critic, and lexicographer, author of the Dictionary of the English Language, dies in London, England (74). 1784 English chemist and physicist Henry Cavendish discovers that water is a compound of hydrogen and oxygen. 1784 English engineer and inventor Joseph Bramah invents an improved 'pickproof' lock. 1784 English iron manufacturer Henry Cort discovers the 'puddling process' of

converting pig iron into wrought iron. It revolutionizes the manufacture of iron, production of which quadruples over the next 20 years. 1784 Swiss inventor Aimé Argand invents an oil-burner consisting of a cylindrical wick, two concentric metal tubes to provide air, and a glass chimney to increase the draught. It gives a light ten times brighter than previous lamps and the principle is later used in gas-burners. 1784 The American states of Connecticut and Rhode Island abolish slavery. 1784 The English artist Joshua Reynolds paints his portrait of Sarah Siddons (a well-known actor) as The Tragic Muse. 1784 The French architect Etienne-Louis Boullé designs his Monument for Isaac Newton, in the form of a planetarium. It is never built. 1784 The French neoclassical artist Jacques-Louis David paints one of his bestknown works, The Oath of the Horatii. 1784 The German River Eider is linked to the Baltic by canal; it becomes the prototype canal for international ship traffic. 1784 The play Le Mariage de Figaro/The Marriage of Figaro by the French writer Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais is performed, in Paris, France. An unparalleled success, it is used in 1786 as the basis of Mozart's opera. 1784 US engineer Oliver Evans invents an automated process for grinding grain and sifting flour; it marks the beginning of automation in America. 1784 US scientist and statesman Benjamin Franklin invents glasses with bifocal lenses. 23 July 1785 Frederick II the Great of Prussia forms the Fürstenbund (League of Princes) to oppose Habsburg monarch Joseph II's Bavarian exchange scheme and preserve the status quo among German states. 1785 English journalist John Walter starts publication of the Daily Universal Register in London, England. In 1788 the newspaper will change its name to The Times. 1785 French Enlightenment philosopher Jean-Marie-Antoine-Nicolas Caritat, marquis de Condorcet, publishes 'Essai sur l'application de l'analyse à la probabilité des décisions rendues à la pluralité des voix/Essay on the Application of the Analysis to the Probability of Decisions Made to the Plurality of Voters', a major advance in the study of probability in the social sciences. 1785 French scientist Charles Augustin Coulomb publishes Recherches théoriques et expérimentales sur la force de torsion et sur l'élasticité des fils de métal/

Theoretical and Experimental Research on the Force of Torsion and on the Elasticity of Iron Threads, in which he makes the first precise measurements of the electric forces of attraction and repulsion between charged bodies. 1785 German-born English astronomer William Herschel argues in his work On the Construction of the Heavens that the Milky Way galaxy is composed of individual stars and is not some luminous fluid. 1785 The Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn completes his Symphonies No. 83, La Poule/The Hen, and No. 85, La Reine/The Queen. He also completes his String Quartets Nos. 50 to 56 (Opus 51). 17 August 1786 Frederick II the Great, King of Prussia 1740–86, dies in Potsdam, near Berlin, Prussia (74). 1786 German-born English astronomer William Herschel's Catalogue of Nebulae is published. It is a catalogue of nearly 2,500 nebulae. 1786 The Scottish poet Robert Burns publishes Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, his first collection. 1786 US inventor Ezekiel Reed invents a nail-making machine. January 1787 The Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II introduces a series of radical political reforms in the Austrian Netherlands, provoking riots in Louvain and Brussels. 16 March 1787 Georg Simon Ohm, German physicist who discovered Ohm's law, which relates electric current to voltage, born in Erlangen, Bavaria, Germany (–1854). 25 May–17 September 1787 The Constitutional Convention opens in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with participants including George Washington (president), Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, and Edmund Randolph. The new constitution establishes a bicameral legislature whose power is counterbalanced by an executive officer, an independent judiciary, and the authority of individual states. 10 August 1787 The Ottoman Empire declares war on Russia, in an attempt to regain the Crimea. 1787 French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, with collaborators, publishes Méthode de nomenclature chimie/Method of Chemical Nomenclature, a system for naming chemicals based on scientific principles. 1787 French physicist Jacques-Alexandre Charles demonstrates that different gases expand by the same amount for the same increase in temperature.

20 January 1788 The Parlement of Paris presents a list of grievances against the French government to the king, Louis XVI, in effect declaring itself the defender of French liberties. 22 January 1788 George Gordon, Lord Byron, English Romantic poet, born in London, England (–1824). 5 February 1788 Robert Peel, British prime minister 1834–35 and 1841–46, founder of the Conservative Party, born in Bury, Lancashire, England (–1850). 9 February 1788 The Habsburg monarch and Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II declares war on the Ottoman Empire. 21 March 1788 A great fire in New Orleans, Louisiana, destroys nearly the entire city. 30 May 1788 The Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in London, England, codifies the laws of cricket in England. June 1788 Sweden declares war on Russia, invading Russian Finland and aiming to recover the Baltic provinces lost to Tsar Peter the Great at the beginning of the century. 2 August 1788 Thomas Gainsborough, English portrait and landscape painter, dies in London, England (61). 22 August 1788 A British settlement is founded in Sierra Leone, West Africa, for freed slaves. 1788 Scottish geologist James Hutton's paper 'Theory of the Earth' expounds his uniformitarian theory of continual change in the Earth's geological features and marks a turning point in geology. 1788 The German philosopher Immanuel Kant publishes the second of his major works, Kritik der practischen Vernunft/Critique of Practical Reason, which deals with ethics. 1788 The Japanese artist Kitagawa Utamaro publishes his series of woodblock prints Poem of the Pillow. Among the best-known of these erotic scenes is Lovers on a Balcony. 4 March 1789 The US Congress meets under the Constitution for the first time. Proponents of the Constitution (federalists) outnumber opponents (antifederalists) 17–9 in the Senate and 38–26 in the House of Representatives. 3 April 1789 King Gustav III's act of unity and security in Sweden, granting him absolute powers, becomes law.

17 June 1789 The Third Estate (representing the common people) of the Estates General (parliament) in France declares itself a National Assembly. 20 June 1789 The National Assembly in France takes the 'Tennis Court Oath', undertaking not to disband until a new constitution is drawn up. 14 July 1789 A large crowd of the common people of Paris, France, (including some 5,000 women led by Théroigne de Méricourt) storms and captures the Bastille (a medieval fortress, symbol of the ancien régime) in Paris. The emigration of French aristocrats begins. 15 July 1789 The Commune de Paris (municipal government) is formed in Paris, France. It appoints Jean Bailly as mayor, sets up the National Guard under the Marquis de Lafayette, and is responsible for municipal administration. 4 August 1789 The French National Assembly in Paris removes the feudal privileges of the nobility – including seigneurial rights and hunting rights. 26 August 1789 The French National Assembly adopts the Declaration of the Rights of Man. 15 September 1789 James Fenimore Cooper, US novelist who wrote of life on the frontier, born in Burlington, New Jersey (–1851). 15 September 1789 Louis Daguerre, French painter and physicist who invented the first practical method of photography, the daguerreotype, born in Cormeilles, near Paris, France (–1851). 2 November 1789 Following a proposal by Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, the bishop of Autun, church property in France is placed 'at the disposal of the nation' with the aim of selling it off to the public. 13 December 1789 The Austrian Netherlands declare their independence as 'the United States of Belgium'. 1789 English-born US industrialist Samuel Slater memorizes the plans of Richard Arkwright's spinning machine and brings the technology to the USA. 1789 The English philosopher Jeremy Bentham publishes Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation, which sets out his case for utilitarianism. 1789 The US writer Benjamin Franklin publishes part of The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, a work he began in 1771. The first complete edition appears in 1868. 1789 The Virginia State Capitol in Richmond, Virginia, designed by US statesman Thomas Jefferson, is completed. His 'federal' style marks a return to Roman architecture, which symbolically establishes a link between US and Roman

republicanism.

The European ascendancy (1790–1945) 20 February 1790 Archduke Leopold, the Grand Duke of Tuscany, becomes ruler of the Habsburg Monarchy on the death of his brother, Joseph II; in July he is elected Holy Roman Emperor as Leopold II. 17 April 1790 Benjamin Franklin, American printer, publisher, and inventor who helped to draft the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, dies in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (84). 12 July 1790 The Civil Constitution of the Clergy is established by the French National Constituent Assembly, reorganizing the church on national lines. It is to be state funded and its priests democratically elected. Jews in France are admitted to civil liberties. 14 July 1790 A vast rally (the Fête de la Fédération) is held in the Champ de Mars, Paris, France, on the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille. King Louis XVI accepts the new constitution drawn up by the National Assembly. 17 July 1790 Adam Smith, Scottish social philosopher known for his An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations on laissez-faire economics, dies in Edinburgh, Scotland (63). 18 September 1790 The city of Washington, DC, is founded as the US capital, when President George Washington lays the foundation stone of the Capitol building. 2 December 1790 Austrian forces reconquer Belgium, restoring it as the Austrian Netherlands. 1790 French chemist Nicolas Leblanc invents an inexpensive process for the manufacture of soda (sodium hydroxide and sodium carbonate) from salt (sodium chloride). This leads to the development of the soap industry in France and provides raw materials for the glass, porcelain, and paper-pulp industries. 1790 French farmer Marie Harel produces the first Camembert cheese, in Orne, France. The recipe may have come from a priest from Brie, whom she sheltered during the French Revolution. 1790 The Church of Ste Geneviève (called Panthéon since the French Revolution), designed by the French architect Jacques-Germain Soufflot, is completed in Paris, France. It is one of the earliest and finest expressions of French neoclassicism. 1790 The distribution of the white population by origin in the USA is: 61% English; 8% Scottish; 10% Irish; 9% German; 3% Dutch; 2% French; 0.7% Swedish.

1790 The German philosopher Immanuel Kant publishes the third of his three major works, Critique of Judgment, which deals with aesthetics. 1790 The population of the city of New York City reaches 30,000. 1790 The Scottish poet Robert Burns publishes Tam O'Shanter, a narrative poem based on a folk legend. 1790 Women's hairstyles in France become elaborate. Some shapes are known as 'a reclining dog of a hair cushion' and incorporate flowers and fruit baskets. February 1791 The British-born US revolutionary Thomas Paine publishes the first part of his Rights of Man. The second part will appear in 1792. A response to Edmund Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution, published in 1790, it is a vigorous defense of the French Revolution and a call for the overthrow of the British monarchy. 2 March 1791 John Wesley, Anglican clergyman and evangelist who, with his brother Charles Wesley, founded the Methodist movement in the Church of England, dies in London, England (87). 27 April 1791 Samuel Finley Breese Morse, US painter and inventor of Morse Code, born in Charlestown, Massachusetts (–1872). 3 May 1791 Poland's Four Year Sejm (parliament), in power 1788–92, introduces a new constitution, converting Poland's long-established electoral monarchy into a hereditary monarchy, giving executive power to the king and a council of state, and placing legislative power in the hands of a two-chamber Sejm. Russia opposes the changes, and promotes agitation in Poland in defence of the old constitution. 22 September 1791 Michael Faraday, English physicist and chemist whose work contributed to a basic understanding of electromagnetism, born in Newington, Surrey, England (–1867). 5 December 1791 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian composer, considered one of the world's greatest composers, dies in Vienna, Austria (35). 1791 Italian physiologist Luigi Galvani announces his observations on the muscular contraction of dead frogs, which he argues are caused by electricity. 1791 The French writer and philosopher the Marquis de Sade publishes Justine, a novel whose eroticism and sadomasochism cause an outcry. The word 'sadism' is derived from his name. 9 January 1792 Russia, deserted by the Habsburg Monarchy and concerned over Prussian intrigues in Poland, ends the Russo-Ottoman War by the Treaty of Jassy, obtaining the Black Sea port of Ochakov and a boundary on the River Dniester,

but restoring Moldavia, Bessarabia, and Wallachia to the Ottomans. 5 February 1792 Tippu, sultan of Mysore, India, is defeated in his war with the British and Hyderabad. He cedes half of Mysore to Britain. 29 February 1792 Gioacchino Rossini, Italian composer, born in Pesaro, Papal States (–1868). 29 March 1792 King Gustav III of Sweden is assassinated in the course of an aristocratic coup. 19 May 1792 Russian forces invade Poland, to forestall constitutional changes designed to stabilize the Polish monarchy and thus weaken Russian influence in the country. 8 July 1792 France declares war on Prussia, in response to the Austro-Prussian alliance of 7 February 1792. 4 August 1792 Percy Bysshe Shelley, English Romantic lyric poet, born in Field Place, near Horsham, Sussex, England (–1822). 10 August 1792 A huge mob storms the royal palace in the Tuileries, Paris, France, massacring the Swiss Guard. The Legislative Assembly declares the king's authority suspended. A new revolutionary Commune de Paris (municipal government) replaces the original body set up in 1789, sharing power in the French capital with a Provisional Executive Council and the Legislative Assembly. 21 September 1792 The French National Convention convenes in Paris, replacing the Legislative Assembly. 22 September 1792 The National Convention in Paris proclaims France a republic, and the revolutionary calendar (although not established until 5 October 1793) comes into force. It comprises 12 months of 30 days, plus 5 days (6 in a leap year); each month has 3 decades of 10 days. The extra days are added at the end of the year. 6 November 1792 French forces under General Charles-François Dumouriez defeat an Austrian army at Jemappes, after which they take Brussels and overrun the Austrian Netherlands (Belgium). 27 November 1792 France annexes Savoy and Nice from the Kingdom of SavoyPiedmont and opens the River Scheldt in the Austrian Netherlands to commerce. 5 December 1792 George Washington is re-elected president of the USA. John Adams, the runner-up, returns to the office of vice-president. 26 December 1792 Charles Babbage, English inventor who designed the first digital computer, born in Teignmouth, Devon, England (–1871).

1792 The English writer and feminist Mary Wollstonecraft publishes her Vindication of the Rights of Woman. 21 January 1793 Louis XVI, King of France 1774–92, now known as 'Citizen Capet', is guillotined in Paris, France (38). 1 February 1793 France declares war on Britain and the Dutch Republic. 13 February 1793 The First Coalition against France is formed by Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, the Dutch Republic, Spain, and Sardinia. 7 March 1793 France declares war on Spain. Spanish forces invade the Frenchoccupied territories of Roussillon and Navarre on the border between the two countries. 13 March 1793 French royalists revolt in the Vendée, west France, against the revolutionary government. 18 March 1793 French forces under General Charles-François Dumouriez are defeated at Neerwinden in the Netherlands by Austrian forces under Friedrich Josias, Prince of Saxe-Coburg, leading to the Austrian reconquest of the Austrian Netherlands. 6 April 1793 The Committee of Public Safety is established in France as the executive organ of the revolutionary government, effectively headed by the Jacobin leader Georges Danton. 7 May 1793 The Second Partition of Poland is effected, with half of Poland's remaining territory being divided between Russia and Prussia. Russia takes Lithuania and west Ukraine; Prussia takes Danzig (Gdansk), Thorn (Torun), Posen (Poznan), Gnesen (Gniezno), and Kalisch (Kalisz). 2 June 1793 The final overthrow of the Girondins by the Jacobins, and the arrest of the Girondin leader, Jacques Brissot, begins the Reign of Terror in France. 10 June 1793 The world's first public zoo opens in Paris, France. 1 August 1793 The first metric weight system is introduced, in France. 5 October 1793 The revolutionary government in France abolishes Christianity. 16 October 1793 Marie-Antoinette, Queen Consort of King Louis XVI of France, 11th daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Maria Theresa, is guillotined on the orders of the Committee of Public Safety in Paris, France (37). 1 November 1793 Lord George Gordon, English lord who in 1780 instigated the Gordon riots against the Catholic Relief Act, dies in Newgate prison, London,

England (41). 1793 French inventor Claude Chappe originates semaphore and builds a longdistance signalling system in France. 1793 Johann Friedrich Guts Muth's Gymnastik für die Jugend/Gymnastics for the Young, a pioneering work on physical education, is published. 1793 Russia annexes the Khanate of the Crimea – including the Kuban region of the western Caucasus – following the steady growth of Russian influence in the Khanate after the 1774 Treaty of Kuchuk-Kainardzhi had confirmed its independence from the Ottoman Empire. 1793 The English writer and artist William Blake publishes his Marriage of Heaven and Hell. His major prose work with his own engravings, it is a satire on conventional religion and morality. 1793 The French artist Jacques-Louis David paints The Death of Marat, depicting the assassinated revolutionary leader Jean-Paul Marat dead in his bath. 1793 The German philosopher Immanuel Kant publishes Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen des blossen Vernunft/Religion within the Boundaries of Reason, in which he argues that although belief in God cannot be established by reason, it is acceptably based on 'practical reason'. 1793 The Spanish artist Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes paints Burial of the Sardine. 16 January 1794 Edward Gibbon, English historian, author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, dies in London, England (57). 5 April 1794 Georges-Jacques Danton, Jacobin leader in the French Revolution, instrumental in overthrowing the monarchy and establishing France's First Republic, is guillotined in Paris, France, during the 'Reign of Terror', following a show trial organized by Maximilien Robespierre, the leader of the Committee of Public Safety (35). 1 June 1794 The British admiral Richard, Lord Howe, defeats a French fleet in the English Channel in a battle subsequently known in Britain as 'The Glorious First of June'. 26 June 1794 A French army under General Jean-Baptiste Jourdan defeats Austrian forces at Fleurus in the Austrian Netherlands. The Austrian commander, Freidrich Josias, Prince of Saxe-Coburg, evacuates the Austrian Netherlands. 28 July 1794 In France, a conspiracy by Montagnard moderates and Dantonists against the leader of the Committee of Public Safety, Maximilien Robespierre, succeeds in abolishing the Commune de Paris (municipal government).

Robespierre and Louis St-Just are executed. 28 July 1794 Maximilien François Robespierre, French Jacobin leader during the French Revolution, is guillotined in Paris, France (36). 1794 English engineer Robert Street patents the first practical internal combustion engine. 1794 Powdering of men's hair goes out of fashion, after over 100 years of popularity in Europe. 1794 The Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn completes his Symphony No. 100, the Military; and No. 101, the Clock. 1794 The English poet and artist William Blake publishes Songs of Innocence and Experience: Shewing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul. Songs of Innocence had appeared in 1789. 1794 The English theologian William Paley publishes A View of the Evidences of Christianity, a defence of Christian belief which will achieve great popularity. 1794 The English writer Anne Radcliffe publishes The Mysteries of Udolpho, a best-selling Gothic romance. 1794 The English-born US revolutionary Thomas Paine publishes the first volume of his work The Age of Reason. An outspoken attack on traditional religious belief and practices, it is widely condemned as immoral. The last volume appears in 1796. 1794 The tricolor is adopted as the national flag of France. 1794 US inventor Eli Whitney patents the cotton gin, which separates the cotton seeds from the fibre, facilitating the production of short staple cotton, which can be grown throughout the southeastern USA. Over the next decade, US cotton production will soar from £140,000 to £35 million. 5 April 1795 France and Prussia sign the Peace of Basel, under which France retains its conquests on the left bank of the Rhine pending the conclusion of a peace with the Holy Roman Empire, while Prussia receives territories on the right bank. Saxony, Hanover, the Bavarian Palatinate, and Hesse-Cassel also agree terms with France. 16 May 1795 The Dutch Republic is reorganized under French control as the Batavian Republic, and signs an offensive and defensive alliance with France. 19 May 1795 James Boswell, Scottish diarist, friend and biographer of the English writer and critic Samuel Johnson, dies in London, England (56).

20 May 1795 On 'Prairial 1' of the revolutionary calendar, popular unrest again threatens the National Convention in Paris, France, leading to the 'White Terror' purge of extreme revolutionaries and the end of Montagnard influence in the Convention. 14 July 1795 In France, 'La Marseillaise', originally written as a royalist rallying song, is adopted as the national anthem. 22 August 1795 A third French constitution is approved by the National Convention, vesting executive power in five directors (the Directory). 24 October 1795 Prussia, Austria, and Russia occupy the remaining Polish territory in the so-called 'Third Partition'; Prussia takes Warsaw and lands between the Bug and the Niemen rivers, Austria takes Kraków and Galicia, and Russia the area between Galicia and the River Dvina. 31 October 1795 John Keats, English Romantic lyric poet, born in London, England (–1821). 1795 English engineer and inventor Joseph Bramah invents a hydraulic press capable of exerting a force of several thousand tonnes. 1795–1796 The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe publishes Wilhelm Meister's Lehrjahre/Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, a novel charting a young man's journey to emotional and intellectual maturity. 15 May 1796 The Italian kingdom of Sardinia signs the Peace of Cherasco with France, ceding Savoy and Nice to France. 16 May 1796 The northern Italian region of Lombardy is declared a republic, under French rule. 31 July 1796 Robert Burns, national poet of Scotland, dies in Dumfries, Scotland (37). 19 August 1796 An alliance is signed at San Ildefonso, Spain, between France and Spain against Britain. It is virtually a renewal of the 1761 Family Compact between the Bourbon rulers of the two countries. 5 October 1796 Spain declares war on Britain. 17 November 1796 Catherine the Great, German-born empress of Russia 1762–96 who brings Russia into the political and cultural life of Europe, dies in Tsarskoye Selo, near St Petersburg, Russia (67). 17 November 1796 Paul I becomes emperor of Russia on the death of his mother, Catherine II the Great.

7 December 1796 John Adams defeats Thomas Jefferson in the US presidential election by three electoral votes to become the second president of the USA. Jefferson is elected vice-president. 1796 English physician Edward Jenner performs the first vaccination against smallpox. 1796 French mathematician and physicist Pierre-Simon Laplace publishes Exposition du système du monde/Account of the System of the World, in which he enunciates the 'nebular hypothesis' which forms the basis of modern theory, proposing that the Solar System formed from a cloud of gas. 1796 The English writer Matthew 'Monk' Lewis publishes his Gothic horror novel, The Monk. 1796 The French royalist diplomat Joseph de Maistre publishes Considérations sur la France/Thoughts on France. A fervent opponent of the French Revolution, de Maistre is the most eloquent critic of 18th-century rationalism. 31 January 1797 Franz Schubert, Austrian composer, born in Vienna, Austria (–1828). 6 June 1797 Napoleon Bonaparte establishes the French-dominated Ligurian Republic in Genoa, Italy. 30 August 1797 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, English writer, author of Frankenstein, born in London, England (–1851). 17 October 1797 The Treaty of Campo Formio is signed by France and Austria after Napoleon Bonaparte's successful campaign in Italy and Tyrol. The Cisalpine and Ligurian republics are recognized, as is French possession of the Ionian Islands off the Greek coast. Austria occupies the Venetian lands east of the River Adige, including Istria, Dalmatia, and Venice, and cedes the Austrian Netherlands to France. Peace between the Holy Roman Empire and France is to be negotiated at a conference to be held at Rastatt, Germany. 16 November 1797 Frederick William III succeeds his father, Frederick William II, as king of Prussia and continues his father's policy of neutrality in the war against revolutionary France. 1797 English bone china is developed by English pottery manufacturer Josiah Spode. 1797 English engineer Richard Trevithick builds high-pressure working models of stationary and moving steam locomotives. 1797 Sojourner Truth, freed slave turned orator, famous for her 'Ain't I a Woman?' speech, born in Ulster County, New York (–1883).

1797 The English wood engraver Thomas Bewick publishes Land Birds, one of his finest set of engravings. It is the first part of his work A History of British Birds. The second part appears in 1804. 1797 The Swiss educationalist Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi publishes Meine Nachforschungen über den Gang der Natur in der Entwicklung des Menschengeschlechts/My Inquiry into the Course of Nature in the Development of Mankind. 1797 The US artist John Trumbull completes his painting The Declaration of Independence, one of the best-known images of the period. 15 February 1798 The French-dominated Roman Republic is proclaimed in central Italy. Pope Pius VI refuses to surrender his temporal power and leaves Rome for Valence, France. March 1798 The influential Spanish prime minister and mastermind of the Franco-Spanish Treaty of San Ildefonso against Britain, Manuel de Godoy, is forced to resign, following the Spanish naval defeat by Britain off Cape St Vincent. 23 May 1798 A rebellion of United Irishmen and Catholic Irish nationalists against British rule breaks out in Ireland. 21 July 1798 Napoleon Bonaparte's French army in Egypt, having occupied Alexandria, defeats Mameluke forces at the Battle of the Pyramids. French domination of Egypt is established. 1 August 1798 A British fleet under the English admiral Horatio Nelson destroys the French Toulon fleet in Aboukir Bay, Egypt, ('the Battle of the Nile') cutting the French army's communications with Europe and establishing British naval supremacy in the Mediterranean. 29 November 1798 King Ferdinand IV of the Italian kingdom of Naples declares war against France and occupies Rome. 4 December 1798 Luigi Galvani, Italian physician who investigated electrical conduction in living tissues, dies in Bologna, Italy (61). 1798 German printer Alois Senefelder invents lithography. 1798 The English poets William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge publish Lyrical Ballads. A collaboration that marks the true beginning of English Romantic poetry, it includes Coleridge's 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'. 1798 The invention of a smallpox vaccination causes the decline of beauty patches – stars, moons, and hearts of black velvet or silk – worn by women in Europe to hide pock marks. The location of the patches had taken on meaning;

for example, worn at the corner of the mouth, the patch meant the women was willing to flirt; on the right cheek, that she was married, and so on. 4 May 1799 Following the death of Tippu, sultan of Mysore, India, at Seringapatam after its capture by the British, his kingdom is divided between Britain and the nizam of Hyderabad. 20 May 1799 Honoré de Balzac, French novelist whose writings helped establish the modern form of the novel, born in Tours, France (–1850). 1 June 1799 The British prime minister, William Pitt the Younger, concludes the formation of the Second Coalition of Britain, Russia, Austria, the Ottoman Empire, Portugal, and Naples against France. 25–27 September 1799 French forces under General André Masséna defeat a Russian army under Alexander Korsakov at Zürich, Switzerland; the main Russian force under Field Marshal Count Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov arrives too late, and is forced to retreat across the Alps. Austrian forces under the Archduke Charles retreat to the River Danube. 9 November 1799 Napoleon Bonaparte overthrows the ruling Directory (ruling executive) in France in the coup d'état of 18 Brumaire (revolutionary calendar). 14 December 1799 George Washington, commander in chief during the American Revolution, and first president of the USA 1789–97, dies and is buried in Mount Vernon, Virginia (67). 1799 French mathematician and physicist Pierre-Simon Laplace discovers the invariability of planetary mean motions, and proves that the eccentricities and inclinations of planetary orbits to each other always remain small, constant, and self-correcting. 1799 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Piano Sonata No. 8 (Opus 13), the Pathétique. 1799 The German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss proves the fundamental theorem of algebra: that every algebraic equation has as many solutions as the exponent of the highest term. 1799 The German theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher publishes his Über die Religion: Reden an die Bebildeten unter ihren Verächtern/Religion: Speeches to its Cultured Despisers. Seeking to locate a belief in God in intuition and feeling rather than dogma, Schleiermacher's works will be one of the profoundest influences on modern Protestant theology. 1799 The Spanish artist Francesco de Goya publishes Los caprichos, a set of etchings that bitterly satirize Spanish society and the church. They are seized by the Inquisition.

1799–1825 The French mathematician and physicist Pierre-Simon Laplace publishes the five-volume Traité de mécanique céleste/Celestial Mechanics, which applies calculus to the motions of celestial bodies and Isaac Newton's theories of the Solar System to show how its stability is implicit in the law of gravitation. 17 January 1800 The Treaty of Montluçon ends royalist disaffection in the Vendée, western France, and releases troops for a new French offensive in Europe. 14 March 1800 The Italian cardinal Luigi Chiaramonti, backed by the influential French cardinal Jean Maury, is elected as Pope Pius VII. 14 June 1800 French forces under Napoleon Bonaparte defeat the Austrians under Baron Michel Melas at the Battle of Marengo, northwest Italy, ensuring the French reconquest of Italy. November 1800 In the US presidential election, the Republicans Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr each receive 73 electoral votes. Federalists John Adams and Charles Pinckney secure 65 and 64 votes respectively. As stipulated by the US Constitution, the election goes to the House of Representatives, where Jefferson is elected president. 25 December 1800 King George III's wife, Queen Charlotte, introduces the Christmas tree to the British court. 1800 German-born English astronomer William Herschel discovers the existence of infrared solar rays. 1800 Italian physicist Alessandro Volta invents the voltaic pile made of discs of silver and zinc – the first electric battery. 1800 The birth rate in the USA is over seven per woman, which is the highest in the world. 1800 The English artist George Stubbs paints Hambletonian, Rubbing Down. 1800 The first shoes in the USA designed specifically for the left and right feet are made by shoemaker William Young, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 1800 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Symphony No. 1 in C major (Opus 21). 1800 The German writer Novalis (pseudonym of Friedrich Leopold, Baron von Hardenberg) publishes the prose lyrics 'Hymnen an die Nacht '/'Hymns to the Night'. 1800 The population of the world is estimated at 870 million, with over 20% of

people living in Europe. 1800 US census data show a 35.1% increase in the population, which has climbed to 5.3 million since 1790. c. 1800 Belgian textile manufacturer Lieven Bauwens smuggles a Crompton spinning mule out of England, spreading the Industrial Revolution in the textile industry from Britain to the rest of Europe. c. 1800 Schoolgirls in Europe are deprived of food, exercise, and fresh air to achieve the fashionable look of pallor and thinness. 1800–1850 A revolution in retail and wholesale trade occurs: specialization transforms the urban retail market, replacing the general store with individual stores for hardware, groceries, dry goods, furnishing, books, tobacco, and so on. Cash-only sales policies are instituted around 1806. 1 January 1801 The Act of Union creates the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, bringing Ireland under direct control of the Parliament in Westminster. 9 February 1801 The Treaty of Lunéville, following the French defeat of Austria in Napoleon Bonaparte's campaign of 1800–01, marks the virtual destruction of the Holy Roman Empire. France gains all territory west of the Rhine, including Belgium and Luxembourg. The grand duchy of Tuscany is ceded to the duchy of Parma to form the new kingdom of Etruria, and recognition is given to the Batavian, Cisalpine, Helvetian, and Ligurian republics. 21 March 1801 The Treaty of Aranjuez is signed between France and Spain, formalizing their ultimatum to Portugal to break its traditional allegiance to Britain. Spain also agrees to cede the North American territory of Louisiana to France. 23 March 1801 Tsar Paul I of Russia is assassinated by military officers concerned by his dangerous mental instability. He is succeeded by his son, Alexander I. 2 April 1801 British vice admiral Horatio Nelson is victorious against the Danish fleet in the Battle of Copenhagen, fought in retaliation for Danish actions against Britain in closing the River Elbe. 1 June 1801 Brigham Young, US religious leader of the Mormon Church who leads converts to colonize the US West and establishes a base at Salt Lake City, born in Whitingham, Vermont (–1877). 6 June 1801 The Treaty of Badajoz formally ends the war between Spain and Portugal over Portugal's traditional allegiance to Britain. Portugal cedes the province of Olivenza and agrees to close its ports to British ships.

17 June 1801 The Armed Neutrality of the North (the confederation of Russia, Sweden, Denmark, and Prussia, formed to defend their right to export goods to Napoleonic France) breaks up with the signing of the Treaty of St Petersburg between Britain, Russia, and Prussia, which recognizes British right of search of merchant vessels. 15 July 1801 A concordat with the papacy drawn up by Napoleon Bonaparte effectively places the church in France under state control. The pope is allowed to keep the Papal States, with the exception of Ferrara, Bologna, and Romagna, which are annexed by France. 2 September 1801 French forces in Egypt under General Jean Menou surrender to the British and are immediately offered free passage home, ending Napoleon Bonaparte's hopes of oriental conquest. 12 September 1801 Tsar Alexander I of Russia announces the annexation of the kingdom of Georgia and George XIII, Regent of Georgia, recognizes the Russian decision instead of accepting the traditional suzerainty of Persia. 1 October 1801 Preliminaries of peace are signed between Britain and France; Britain is to restore all maritime conquests, except Trinidad and Ceylon, to France, Spain, and the Netherlands; France agrees to evacuate Naples and the Papal States; the integrity of Portugal is recognized; the independence of the Ionian Islands is agreed upon; both French and British armies are to evacuate Egypt, which is to be restored to the Ottoman Empire, and Malta is to be restored to the Knights of St John by Britain. 24 December 1801 English engineer Richard Trevithick builds a steam-powered carriage, which he successfully drives up a hill in Camborne, Cornwall, England. 1801 English chemist and physicist John Dalton formulates the law of partial pressure of gases. 1801 English physician and physicist Thomas Young discovers the interference of light when he observes that light passing through two closely spaced pinholes produces alternating bands of light and dark in the area of overlap. He thereby establishes the wave theory of light. 1801 French engineer Philippe Lebon lights the Hotel Seignelay in Paris, France, with 'thermolampes'. It is the first public building to be lit with gas. 1801 Frontier culture evolves in the western USA. Forms of entertainment – logrolling, barbecuing, whiskey drinking, gambling on horses or card playing, hunting, shooting, and dancing country reels and jigs – reflect the character of the frontier. 1801 German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss publishes Disquisitiones Arithmeticae/Discourses on Arithmetic, which deals with relationships and

properties of integers and leads to the modern theory of algebraic equations. 1801 Populations in millions: China, 295; India, 130; Japan, 15; France, 27; the German states, 14; Britain, 10; Spain, 10; USA, 5. 1801 The Act of Union, formally uniting Britain and Ireland, is marked with the incorporation of the cross of St Patrick into the design of the British flag. 1801 The first accurate censuses, taken in 1800 and 1801, provide population statistics for: Italy, 17.2 million; Spain, 10.5 million; Great Britain, 10.4 million; Ireland, 5.2 million; the USA, 5.3 million; also for London, England, 864,000; Paris, France, 547,756; Vienna, Austria, 231,050; Berlin, Germany, 183,294, and New York City, 60,515. 26 February 1802 Victor Hugo, French Romantic novelist, born in Besançon, France (–1885). 27 March 1802 The Treaty of Amiens is signed between Britain and France, based on the preliminaries agreed on 1 October 1801; it achieves (briefly) the complete pacification of Europe. March 1802 English engineer Richard Trevithick takes out a patent for a highpressure steam engine for 'driving carriages'. 24 July 1802 Alexandre Dumas (père), French novelist best known for The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers (both 1844), born in Villers-Cotterêts, France (–1870). 15 October 1802 Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of France, intervenes in the civil war in Switzerland between the towns and the forest cantons. Using his newly-won authority in the region, he styles himself 'Mediator of the Helvetic League' and imposes a settlement. 23 October 1802 At Poona in India, the maharaja Jaswant Rao Holkar of Indore defeats both Baji Rao, the peshwa of Poona, head of the Maratha confederacy and sympathetic to the British, and Madhoji Rao Sindhia of Gwalior, the most powerful figure in central India. 1802 English astronomer William Herschel discovers that some stars revolve around others, forming binary pairs. He catalogues 848 of them. 1802 English physicist Thomas Wedgwood announces to the British Royal Institution that he can create photographic images projected on paper saturated with silver nitrate. 1802 French chemist and physicist Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac demonstrates that all gases expand by the same fraction of their volume when their temperature is increased by the same amount.

1802 Scottish engineer William Symington launches the world's first paddlewheel steamer, the Charlotte Dundas, which acts as a tug on the Forth and Clyde Canal. The 17-m/56-ft long steam-driven vessel runs at 13 kph/8 mph and uses a piston rod connected directly to the crankshaft. 1802 The English theologian and philosopher William Paley publishes his major work Natural Theology. Paley argues that the natural world shows clear evidence of design and purpose and that, therefore, a creator God exists. 1802 The French writer François-Auguste-René, vicomte de Chateaubriand, publishes his defence of religion Le Génie du Christianisme/The Genius of Christianity. 1802 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Moonlight Piano Sonata (Opus 27, no. 2); his Symphony No. 2 in D (Opus 36); and his piano work 7 Bagatelles (Opus 33). 1802 US mathematician and astronomer Nathaniel Bowditch publishes The New American Practical Navigator. Based on corrected tables from J H Moore's The Practical Navigator, Bowditch's book goes through 60 editions and sets the standards for maritime navigation. 25 February 1803 The Enactment of Delegates of the Empire (Reichdeputationshauptschluss) at the Diet (legislative assembly) of Regensburg, Oberpfalz, reconstructs the German states. Most of the ecclesiastical estates, free imperial cities, and smaller princes lose their independence, while Bavaria and Prussia greatly improve their positions in a reorganization that proves to be a step towards eventual German unification. Under the Treaty of Lunéville (February 1802) those states and rulers who lost territory on the west bank of the Rhine were to be compensated with indemnities and territory east of the Rhine. In practice this means that the highly complex medieval arrangements are more practically reconfigured to the satisfaction of the leading rulers. 30 April 1803 The USA purchases Louisiana and New Orleans from the French, in contravention of the terms of the Treaty of San Ildefonso of 1 October 1800. Including in effect the entire western half of the drainage basin of the River Mississippi, the purchase, for a total sum (including interest) of $27,267,622, roughly doubles the land area of the USA. 3 August 1803 The second Anglo-Maratha War begins in India when British troops take the offensive against the Sindhia dynasty of Gwalior. 1803 English chemist and physicist John Dalton proposes his atomic theory of matter. He revives the theory put forward by the Greek philosopher Democritus (460–370 BC) that elements are made up of minute indestructible particles, called atoms. 1803 The English economist Thomas Robert Malthus publishes An Essay on the

Principle of Population; or, a View of its Past and Present Effects on Human Happiness. This is a much expanded version of his 1798 tract. 12 February 1804 Immanuel Kant, German philosopher whose work had a major influence on subsequent philosophy, dies in Königsberg, Prussia (80). 21 February 1804 English engineer Richard Trevithick builds the first steam railway locomotive, and on a wager runs it on a 16 km/10 mi track at the Pen-ydarren ironworks in South Wales carrying 10 tons of iron and 70 passengers. Further development is hindered because the engine cracks the cast iron rails. 21 March 1804 The Civil Code (renamed the Code Napoleon in 1807) is promulgated in France, providing a uniform civil law (previously French law was split between Roman law in the south and custom law in the north). 1 December 1804 English aviation pioneer George Cayley develops an instrument to measure wind resistance. About this time he also begins to construct models of gliders with fixed wings, fuselage, elevators and a rudder – the basic configuration of the modern aeroplane. 2 December 1804 Napoleon Bonaparte crowns himself emperor as Napoleon I in Paris, France. Pope Pius VII officiates at the coronation. 21 December 1804 Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, British prime minister 1868 and 1874–80, a Conservative, born in London, England (–1881). December 1804 Americans re-elect Thomas Jefferson as US president and elect former New York governor George Clinton as vice-president. 1804 Boys as young as five or six are being used to clean chimneys in Britain. Legislation is passed preventing the apprenticing of boys under nine and limiting the working day to a maximum of eight hours; these laws are often broken. 1804 The first recorded shipment of bananas to the USA arrives from Cuba aboard the merchant ship Reynard. An organized fruit trade does not begin until 1885. 1804 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Piano Sonata No. 21 (Opus 53), the Waldstein; and his three Violin Sonatas (Opus 30). 1804 The play Wilhelm Tell by the German writer Friedrich Johann Christoph von Schiller is first performed, in Weimar, Germany. 1804 The US inventor Oliver Evans builds a five-horsepower steam engine, which he drives 2.4 km/1.5 mi through Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Its original purpose is to propel a scow, a water vehicle for dredging and cleaning docks. 2 April 1805 Hans Christian Andersen, Danish storyteller, born in Odense,

Denmark (–1875). 9 May 1805 Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller, German dramatist and poet, dies in Weimar, Saxe-Weimar (45). 22 June 1805 Giuseppe Mazzini, Italian revolutionary and founder of Young Italy, a secret revolutionary society which strove for Italian unity, born in Genoa, Italy (–1872). 9 August 1805 Austria joins Britain, Russia, and Sweden as the signatories of the Treaty of St Petersburg in alliance against France and receives a £3 million subsidy. 21 October 1805 A Royal Navy fleet commanded by the English admiral Horatio Nelson defeats the combined Franco-Spanish fleet under Vice Admiral Pierre Villeneuve in the Battle of Trafalgar. Nelson is mortally wounded in the action, but the battle confirms Britain's naval superiority and removes any possibility of a French invasion of Britain. 21 October 1805 Horatio Nelson, British naval commander who won decisive battles against France in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, is killed at sea off Cape Trafalgar, Spain (46). 2 December 1805 The French emperor Napoleon I entices the much larger RussoAustrian forces ranged against him to overextend themselves before effecting a crushing defeat upon them in the Battle of Austerlitz, in Moravia. 15 December 1805 By the Treaty of Schönbrunn with France, Prussia cedes Cleves, Neuchâtel, and Ansbach, and accepts French territorial gains in Germany and Italy. In return Prussia is allowed to occupy Hanover in order to prevent it joining the coalition against the French emperor Napoleon I. 1805 British artillery officer William Congreve invents the Congreve rocket. Consisting of a rocket 103 cm/40.5 in long, and a stabilizing stick 4.9 m/16 ft long, it has a range of 1.8 km/1.1 mi, and is used during the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812. It is immortalized in the song 'The Star-Spangled Banner'. 1805 French inventor Joseph-Marie Jacquard develops a loom that uses punched cards to control the weaving of cloth. 1805 Internal customs duties in Prussia are abolished under the minister of trade, Baron Heinrich vom Stein, while the rest of central Europe preserves anticompetitive legislation. 1805 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Piano Sonata No. 23 (Opus 57), the Appassionata and his overture Leonora No. 1 (Opus 138). 1805 The opera Fidelio, oder der Triumph der ehelichen Liebe/Fidelio, or the

Triumph of Married Love by the German composer Ludwig van Beethoven is first performed, in Vienna, Austria. 1805 The Spanish artist Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes paints The Clothed Maja and The Nude Maja. He is summoned by the Inquisition and asked to explain why he has painted a nude (a rare subject in Spanish art). 15 February 1806 French troops enter Naples, Italy. Napoleon I's brother, Joseph Bonaparte, immediately begins administrative reform in the Italian kingdom. 9 April 1806 Isambard Kingdom Brunel, British marine engineer who builds the first transatlantic steamer the Great Western (1838), and the Great Eastern (1858), the largest ship in the world for 40 years, born in Portsmouth, England (–1859). 6 August 1806 The Holy Roman Empire comes to an end; Francis II formally resigns as Holy Roman Emperor and becomes Francis I, Emperor of Austria. 23 August 1806 Charles-Augustin de Coulomb, French physicist who formulated Coulomb's law which relates the forces of electrical charges to the distance between them, dies in Paris, France (69). 14 October 1806 The French emperor Napoleon I decisively defeats the Prussians under Prince Hohenlohe at Jena in Saxony; Marshal Louis Davout simultaneously defeats the Saxons under the Duke of Brunswick at Auerstadt, also in Saxony. 1806 British navy commander Francis Beaufort devises the Beaufort wind force scale. 19 January 1807 Robert E Lee, Confederate general who commands the Southern armies during the American Civil War, born in Stratford, Westmoreland County, Virginia (–1870). 8 February 1807 The French emperor Napoleon I's army catches up with the retreating Russian and Prussian forces at Eylau in eastern Prussia; an indecisive battle causes heavy losses to both sides. 29 May 1807 The Ottoman sultan Selim III is deposed by janissaries (members of his bodyguard) opposed to his reforms and is replaced by Mustafa IV. 4 July 1807 Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian soldier whose conquest of Sicily and Naples helps to unify Italy, born in Nice, France (–1882). 7 July 1807 The Treaty of Tilsit (Prussia) ends the war between France and Russia. The French emperor Napoleon I, having defeated Austria and now Russia and Prussia, is the master of continental Europe. Russia agrees to the

establishment of a Grand Duchy of Warsaw (as a French satellite in eastern Europe), recognizes the Confederation of the Rhine (association of German states under French protection), agrees to close all ports to British ships, and, by a secret agreement, Tsar Alexander I agrees to coerce Denmark, Sweden, and Portugal into joining the alliance against Britain. In return he is given a free hand against Sweden in Finland and the Ottoman Empire in the Danubian provinces (Moldavia and Wallachia). 17–18 August 1807 US engineer Robert Fulton's paddleboat Steamboat, the first commercial paddle steamer, makes a 240 km/150 mi trial run on the Hudson River from Albany to New York City. Completed in 32 hours (sailing ships take 4 days), averaging 7.6 kph/4.7 mph, it is equipped with side paddles and a Boulton and Watt engine. The following year it is refurbished and renamed the Clermont and begins to ply the Hudson River. 14 October 1807 In an attempt to modernize Prussian agriculture, the medieval feudal system of tenure, in which peasants are tied to their landlords and the land they work, is ended by an Act of Emancipation. 1807 English inventors Henry and Sealy Fourdrinier receive a patent for an improved version of Nicolas-Louis Robert's papermaking machine. Their new 'Fourdrinier machine' allows production of paper in continuous sheets. 1807 French inventor Nicéphore Niépce makes two heliotrope (sundrawing) prints of an engraved portrait – the first photomechanical reproduction process. 1807 German promoter Frederick Winsor's National Light and Heat Company lights one side of Pall Mall, London, England, with gas lamps – the first streetlighting in the world. 1807 Scottish clergyman Alexander Forsyth invents the percussion ignition for guns; he uses an explosive chemical charge which detonates when struck by a hammer. It allows operation in wet weather and leads to the development of breech loaders. 1807 The English poet William Wordsworth publishes Ode: Intimations of Immortality, and Poems, in Two Volumes. 1807 The German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel publishes Phänomenologie des Geistes/Phenomenology of Spirit. His first major work, it gives a sketch of his elaborate metaphysical system. c. 1807 English chemist Humphry Davy develops the first useable arc lamp; a 2,000-cell battery creates an electric arc across a gap of 100 mm/4 in between two charcoal conductors. 2 February 1808 A French force under General Sextius Miollis occupies Rome after Pope Pius VII refuses to recognize the Kingdom of Naples, grant a concordat with the Confederation of the Rhine (association of German states under French

protection) on the same lines as that agreed with France, or join in the alliance against Britain. 28 February 1808 Austria joins the French emperor Napoleon I's Continental System and supports the closure of European ports to Britain. 19 March 1808 Charles IV of Spain abdicates in favour of his son, Ferdinand, being too closely associated with the francophile policy of his ousted chief minister, Manuel de Godoy. 20 April 1808 Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (Napoleon III), emperor of France 1852–71, born in Paris, France (–1873). 31 December 1808 French chemist Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac publishes The Combination of Gases, in which he announces that gases combine chemically in simple proportions of volumes. December 1808 Americans elect James Madison of the Democratic-Republican Party as US president and George Clinton as vice-president. 1808 The comedy Der zerbrochene Krug/The Broken Jug by the German dramatist Heinrich Wilhelm von Kleist is first performed, produced by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, in Weimar, Germany. 1808 The French artist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres paints The Valpinçon Bather and Oedipus and the Sphinx. 1808 The German artist Caspar David Friedrich paints The Cross on the Mountains and becomes one of the leading exponents of German Romanticism. 1808 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Symphonies No. 5 in C minor (Opus 67) and No. 6 in F, the Pastoral (Opus 68) and his Cello Sonata in A major (Opus 69). 1808 The German philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte publishes Reden an die deutsche Nation/Addresses to the German Nation. This work plays an important role in the development of German nationalism. 19 January 1809 Edgar Allan Poe, US poet, critic and short-story writer, born in Boston, Massachusetts (–1849). 12 February 1809 Abraham Lincoln, sixteenth president of the USA 1861–65, a Republican, born in Hodgenville, Kentucky (–1865). 12 February 1809 Charles Robert Darwin, English naturalist who develops the theory of evolution through natural selection, born in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England (–1882).

29 March 1809 King Gustavus IV Adolphus of Sweden is forced to abdicate after military defeats in war with Denmark. 12 May 1809 British forces under Arthur Wellesley (later Duke of Wellington) defeat the French under Marshal Nicolas-Jean Soult at Oporto and force them to retreat from Portugal. 17 May 1809 The French emperor Napoleon I issues an imperial decree annexing the Papal States, following their occupation by France in February 1808. 31 May 1809 Franz Josef Haydn, Austrian classical composer, dies in Vienna, Austria (77). 8 June 1809 Thomas Paine, British-born American political pamphleteer whose writings influenced the American Revolution, dies in Boston, Massachusetts (72). 5–6 July 1809 The French emperor Napoleon I defeats the Austrian army under Archduke Charles in the Battle of Wagram, near Vienna, although the Austrian army retreats in good order. 28 July 1809 The British soldier and statesman Arthur Wellesley is victorious at the Battle of Talavera in Spain over the French who afterwards fall back to Madrid. Wellesley is subsequently created Duke of Wellington. 29 December 1809 William Ewart Gladstone, prime minister of Britain 1868–74, 1880–85, 1886, and 1892–94, a Liberal, born in Liverpool, England (–1898). 1809 French biologist Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck publishes Philosophie zoologique/Zoological Philosophy in which he theorizes that organs improve with use and degenerate with disuse and that these environmentally adapted traits are inheritable. He also proposes a progressive theory of evolution. 1809 The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe publishes his novel Wahlverwandtschaften/The Elective Affinities. 1 March 1810 Frédéric Chopin, French composer known for his works for piano, born in Zelazowa, Poland (–1849). 19 April 1810 Under the influence of the South American nationalist Simón Bolívar, the Junta in Venezuela breaks away from Napoleonic Spain, refusing to recognize Joseph Bonaparte and proclaiming allegiance to Ferdinand VII, the hereditary king of Spain. 22 May 1810 A revolt breaks out in the Spanish viceroyalty of New Granada against Spanish authority. 25 May 1810 A revolt breaks out in the Spanish viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata, South America, against Joseph Bonaparte's regime.

26 June 1810 Joseph-Michel Montgolfier, French aeronaut who, with his brother Jacques-Etienne, developed the hot-air balloon, dies in Balaruc-les-bains, France (69). 5 July 1810 P(hineas) T(aylor) Barnum, US showman and promoter who popularizes the three-ring circus, born in Bethel, Connecticut (–1891). 9 July 1810 Emperor Napoleon I annexes the Netherlands, making it part of the Empire of the French. 1810 Donkin & Hall establish the world's first cannery in London, England, using tin cans to package food for British naval and miltary forces. 1810 German physicist Thomas Johann Seebeck discovers that silver chloride takes on the colour of the incident light it is exposed to. 1810 Ireland is in economic crisis as its population increases to around 6 million, and poverty increasingly results from archaic inheritance laws that encourage the subdivision of ever-smaller family agricultural plots. 1810–1859 US cotton production, the vast majority of which is grown in the southern states, rises from 171,000 bales in 1810 to just under 5.4 million in 1859. 9 February 1811 Nevil Maskelyne, English astronomer who developed a method of determining longitude by observing the Moon, and published The British Mariner's Guide (1763) and the Nautical Almanac (1766), dies in Greenwich, London, England (78). 14 June 1811 Harriet Beecher Stowe, US writer, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, born in Litchfield, Connecticut (–1896). 22 October 1811 Franz (Ferencz) Liszt, Hungarian pianist and composer, born in Raiding, Hungary (–1886). 16 December 1811 The first, and largest, earthquake recorded in the USA destroys the city of New Madrid, Missouri. Two other earthquakes hit the town on 23 January and 7 February 1812. 1811 The English artist John Constable paints Dedham Vale, Morning. 1811 The English writer Jane Austen publishes her novel Sense and Sensibility. She began work on it in 1797. 1811 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Piano Trio in B flat (Opus 97), the Archduke and his overture and incidental music for August von Kotzebue's play König Stephan/King Stephen, written for the opening night of the German Theatre in Budapest in 1812.

1811 The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe publishes the first part of his autobiography Dichtung und Wahrheit/Poetry and Truth. 1811 The population of Great Britain is 12.5 million, an increase of 2.1 million during the previous decade. The population of London, England, exceeds 1 million. 1811 The Prussian educator Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, a founding father of modern gymnastics, establishes the Turnverein gymnastic society in Berlin, the Prussian capital. 1811 US inventor John Hall patents a breech-loading rifle. 7 February 1812 Charles Dickens, English novelist of the Victorian era, born in Portsmouth, England (–1870). 28 May 1812 The Treaty of Bucharest ends the war between Russia and the Ottoman Empire. Russia obtains Bessarabia, (an area of southeast Europe bordered by the rivers Dniester and Prut) and withdraws its demand for the provinces of Moldavia and Wallachia. The peace enables Tsar Alexander I to act against the French emperor Napoleon I. 22 July 1812 British forces, under Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, decisively defeat the French, under Marshal Auguste Marmont, on the Spanish–Portuguese border at Salamanca, and subsequently advance into Spain. 7 September 1812 The Russian army, now under the command of Marshal Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov are defeated by the French Grande Armée at the Battle of Borodino, and are obliged to retreat and abandon the Russian capital, Moscow. Emperor Napoleon I makes a significant mistake in failing to mobilize his reserves and destroy the retreating army. 5 December 1812 Hearing news of the coup against him, the French emperor Napoleon I leaves his troops under the command of Marshal Joachim Murat in Russia and sets out for Paris (where he arrives on 18 December). The remnants of his Grande Armée struggle back to France, a bare 10,000 effective troops remaining from the 500,000 who set out for Moscow. 1812 French zoologist Georges Cuvier, publishes Recherches sur les ossements fossiles de quadrupèdes/Research on the Fossil Bones of Quadrupeds, and establishes comparative vertebrate palaeontology. He theorizes that the extinction of species has been caused by great catastrophes such as sudden land upheavals and floods. 1812 The Austrian composer Franz Schubert completes his Salve Regina for voice and orchestra (D 27); his Kyrie in D minor (D 31); and his String Quartets No. 1 (D 18) and No. 2 (D 32).

1812 The English poet George Gordon, Lord Byron, publishes the first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. Further cantos appear in 1816 and 1818. Based on the wanderings of a typical 'Byronic hero', it becomes an immediate success. 1812 The German folklorists and philologists Jakob Ludwig Carl Grimm and his brother Wilhelm Carl Grimm publish the first volume of their famous Kinder and Hausmärchen/Fairy Tales. A second volume appears in 1815 and a third in 1822. 1812 The German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel publishes the first part of his Wissenschaft der Logic/The Science of Logic. In this work he sets out his famous three-part 'dialectic' of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. The second part appears in 1816. 1812 The world's first steam threshing machine is powered by one of Richard Trevithick's high-pressure steam engines. c. 1812 During the War of 1812, the term 'Uncle Sam' is first used to refer to the US federal government. First printed in the Troy, New York, Post on September 3, 1813, the term may have originated from Samuel Wilson, a US Army supply inspector known as Uncle Sam. c. 1812 The English artist J M W Turner paints Snowstorm: Hannibal Crossing the Alps. 28 February 1813 Prussia agrees, by the Alliance of Kalisz with Russia, to conduct a joint campaign in Saxony and Silesia against the French emperor Napoleon I and the Confederation of the Rhine (association of German states under French protection). Prussia is to regain all territory lost since 1806. An invitation to join the war is extended to Britain and Austria, and the agreement becomes the genesis of the Fourth Coalition against France. 19 March 1813 David Livingstone, Scottish missionary and explorer who explores much of East Africa in search of the source of the Nile, born in Blantyre, Lancashire, Scotland (–1873). 22 May 1813 (Wilhelm) Richard Wagner, German dramatic composer and theorist who writes the operatic sequence Der Ring des Nibelungen/The Ring of the Nibelung, born in Leipzig, Germany (–1883). 21 June 1813 British forces under the Duke of Wellington (Arthur Wellesley) completely rout the French army of Marshal Jean-Baptiste Jourdain at Vittoria in northern Spain, forcing Joseph Bonaparte to flee back to France. 10 October 1813 Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi, Italian operatic composer, born in Le Roncole, near Busseto, Duchy of Parma (–1901). 12 October 1813 By the peace of the Treaty of Gulistan, Persia cedes the Caucasus region to Russia, continuing the extension of Russian influence

southwards. 16–19 October 1813 Opposed by the Prussian army in the northwest and AustroRussian forces in the south, the French army under the emperor Napoleon I is heavily defeated in the 'Battle of the Nations' at Leipzig in Saxony, and retreats. Allied victory leads to the dissolution of the Confederation of the Rhine (the association of German states under French protection) and of the kingdom of Westphalia. 6 November 1813 Mexico declares itself independent of Spain. 1813 Austrian composer Franz Schubert completes his Symphony No 1 in D (D 82) and his String Quartets No 3 (D 36), No 4 (D 46), No 5 (D 68), and No 6 (D 74). 1813 Swedish chemist Jöns Jakob Berzelius introduces the modern system of chemical symbols. 1813 The English writer Jane Austen publishes her novel Pride and Prejudice. She completed it in 1797 under the title First Impressions. 1813 The German writer Adelbert von Chamisso (Louis-Charles-Adélaïde Chamisso de Boncourt) publishes his tale Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte/Peter Schlemihl's Remarkable Story. 1813 The Welsh social reformer Robert Owen publishes A New View of Society. 11 April 1814 By the Treaty of Fontainebleau, the French emperor Napoleon I abdicates unconditionally and is banished to the principality of Elba, an island off the west coast of Italy, on an annuity of 2,000,000 francs. Queen Marie-Louise is given the duchies of Gustalla, Parma, and Piacenza. 4 May 1814 King Ferdinand VII of Spain annuls the liberal constitution of the cortes (national assembly), one of the first of a wave of antidemocratic acts performed by royalty returning to office after Emperor Napoleon I's defeat. 29 May 1814 Joséphine de Beauharnais, empress of France 1804–10 and consort of Napoleon I, dies in Malmaison, France (50). 25 July 1814 English engineer George Stephenson constructs his first steam locomotive, called Bulcher. It is the first engine to be built with flanged wheels running on edge rails, as all later locomotives will do. 25 July 1814 German physicist Joseph von Fraunhöfer plots more than 500 absorption lines (Fraunhöfer lines) and discovers that the relative positions of the lines are constant for each element. His work forms the basis of modern spectroscopy. December 1814 The USA and Britain sign the Treaty of Ghent, ending the War of

1812. The most contested issues – Britain's impressment of US sailors, US commercial rights, and the Northwest boundary dispute – remain unresolved. 1814 Swedish chemist Jöns Jakob Berzelius publishes his An Attempt to Establish a Pure Scientific System of Mineralogy through the Use of the Electrochemical Theory of Chemical Proportions, an extensive chemical classification of minerals in which he classifies over two thousand chemical compounds. 1814 The Austrian composer Franz Schubert writes the song 'Gretchen am Spinnrade'/'Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel' (D 118). The text is from Goethe's Faust, published in 1808. He also completes his Mass in F major (D 105); and his String Quartets No. 7 (D 94) and No. 8 (D 112). 1814 The English writer Jane Austen publishes her novel Mansfield Park. 1814 The French government introduces legislation which makes abortion illegal, unless the mother's life is at risk. 1814 The French social thinker Claude-Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon, publishes De la Réorganisation de la société européenne/On the Reorganization of European Society. 1814 The Scottish poet and novelist Walter Scott anonymously publishes his first novel, Waverley. Its popularity encourages him to turn from narrative verse to novels. 1814 The Spanish artist Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes paints The 2nd of May, 1808 and The 3rd of May, 1808. Both pictures depict atrocities carried out by the French during their invasion of Spain. He also paints Portrait of King Ferdinand VII of Spain in the Uniform of a General 1 March 1815 Napoleon I, having escaped from the island of Elba, lands in the south of France at Cannes and marches on the capital, Paris, with growing support. 25 March 1815 Austria, Britain, Prussia, and Russia form the Fifth Coalition against Napoleon I to maintain the established order in Europe. Each agrees to send 150,000 men into the field. 1 April 1815 Otto von Bismarck, founder and first chancellor of the German Empire 1871–90, born in Schönhausen, Brandenburg (–1898). 5 April 1815 Tambora volcano, on Sumbawa island in the Netherlands East Indies, erupts violently, killing 50,000 people. Its height diminishes by 1,220 m/4,000 ft, while dust clouds affect the world's climate. 9 June 1815 The Congress of Vienna closes after its Final Act is passed. The Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg are united to form the United

Netherlands (by an act of 31 May), Switzerland is to be neutral, East Poland is ceded to Russia and the Western Provinces of Poland to Prussia, Kraków becomes an independent republic, Lombardy and Venetia are restored to Austria, Prussia gains the Rhineland and the northern region of Saxony, Hanover obtains East Friesland and Hildesheim, the German Confederation is established under the presidency of Austria (by an act of 8 June), the Bourbon monarch Ferdinand VII is restored in Spain, the Braganza dynasty returns to the Portuguese throne, Ferdinand IV is recognized as king of the Two Sicilies, the pope and the minor Italian princes are restored, and Britain retains the majority of its overseas conquests, including Malta and Heligoland. 18 June 1815 Napoleon I of France, having pursued the Anglo-Dutch army of Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, engages it in the decisive Battle of Waterloo, near the Belgian village of that name, south of Brussels. Wellington manages to hold back the French attack until the Prussian army under General Gebhard von Blücher, having avoided pursuit by a French detachment under Marshal Emmanuel de Grouchy, begins to arrive in the late afternoon. As the Prussians begin to attack the French right flank, Wellington orders a counterattack, forcing the French into a retreat which soon turns into a rout. 7 July 1815 The 'White Terror' begins in southern France, as fanatical royalists attack revolutionary elements, Bonapartists, and Protestants. 2 November 1815 George Boole, English mathematician who develops Boolean algebra which is central to computer operations, born in Lincoln, England (–1864). 20 November 1815 By the Second Treaty of Paris, France's borders are reduced to those of 1789. It yields territory to Savoy and to Switzerland, and agrees to restore captured art treasures and pay an indemnity, while the Quadruple Alliance between Austria, Prussia, Russia, and Britain is renewed. 1815 Scottish inventor John Loudon McAdam begins building roads around Bristol, England. Comprised of two grades of large crushed stone for good drainage and to support the load, and covered by a surface of compacted smaller stones to form a pavement to withstand wear and tear and to shed water to the drainage ditches, they are the most advanced roads built to date. 1815 The English physician and philologist Peter Roget invents the 'log-log' slide rule, although he will always be best remembered as the author of Roget's Thesaurus. c. 1815 Women's fashions adopt the stiff corset, leg-of-mutton sleeves, and full skirts, leading to the hoop skirt later in the century. 20 March 1816 Maria I, the insane queen of Portugal, dies. She is succeeded by her son, John VI. 21 April 1816 Charlotte Brontë, English novelist who writes Jane Eyre (1847), born in Thornton, Yorkshire, England (–1855).

9 July 1816 At the Congress of Tucuman, the United Provinces of La Plata (Argentina) declare independence from Spain. 1816 French photography pioneer and inventor Nicéphore Niépce invents the 'celeripede'. A two-wheeled ancestor of the bicycle, it is propelled by pushing the feet against the ground, but cannot be steered. 1816 Scottish clergyman Robert Stirling patents the Stirling hot-air engine. It utilizes the fact that air in a cylinder heats when compressed and cools when it expands. 1816 The English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge publishes his poetry collection Christabel and Other Poems. Its best-known poem is the fragment 'Kubla Khan, or A Vision in a Dream', written in 1797. 1816 The English writer Jane Austen publishes her novel Emma. 1816 The Franco-Swiss writer Benjamin Constant (Henri-Benjamin Constant de Rebecque) publishes his autobiographical novel Adolphe, a thinly disguised account of his relationship with the writer Madame de Staël. 1816 The opera Il barbiere di Siviglia/The Barber of Seville, by the Italian composer Gioachino Antonio Rossini, is first performed in Rome, Italy. It is first performed in Britain in 1818 (in London, England), and in the USA in 1819 (in New York City). 1816 There is a serious famine in Ireland with the failure of the potato crop. 18 July 1817 Jane Austen, English novelist, dies in Winchester, England (41). 18 October 1817 At the Wartburg festival in Jena, German students gather to celebrate the anniversaries of the death of the German Protestant reformer Martin Luther and the Battle of Leipzig (the defeat of Napoleon I), demonstrating the growing popularity of nationalism in Germany. 1817 The English artist John Constable paints Flatford Mill. 1817 The English economist David Ricardo publishes his most important work, Principles of Political Economy and Taxation. 1817 The English poet George Gordon, Lord Byron, publishes his dramatic poem Manfred. 6 January 1818 Under the Treaty of Mundoseer, the dominions of the Maratha Holkar dynasty of Indore are combined administratively with the Rajput states of northwest India, and come under British protection.

12 February 1818 The Spanish colony of Chile proclaims itself independent. 6 April 1818 German inventor Karl von Drais de Sauerbrun exhibits his draisienne, a two-wheeled bicycle propelled by pushing the feet along the ground, with a padded seat and a swivelling steering mechanism. It becomes popular in Britain the following year and is known as the 'hobby horse'. 29 April 1818 Alexander II, Tsar of Russia 1855–81 who is responsible for emancipating the Russian serfs, born in Moscow, Russia (–1881). 5 May 1818 Karl Marx, Prussian political theorist, economist, and sociologist whose ideas formed the basis of communism, born in Trier, Prussia (–1883). 2 June 1818 The leader of the Maratha confederacy in India, Baji Rao, the Peshwa of Poona, surrenders to the British forces of Francis Rawdon-Hastings, Marquess of Hastings and governor-general of Bengal. Britain annexes the Peshwa's lands, effectively destroying the Maratha Confederacy, the last significant rival to British domination of the subcontinent. 30 July 1818 Emily Brontë, English novelist known for Wuthering Heights (1847), born in Thornton, Yorkshire (now West Yorkshire), England (–1848). 21 December 1818 Armand du Plessis, duc de Richelieu, resigns as prime minister in France and is succeeded by Elie, duc de Decazes, after the October elections show increasing support for the left. 1818 The English poet John Keats publishes Endymion: A Poetic Romance. 1818 The English writer Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley publishes the Gothic novel Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus. The novel is published anonymously, although the authorship becomes known in 1823. 1818 The Scottish poet and novelist Walter Scott publishes the novels Heart of Midlothian and Rob Roy. 1818 Two novels by the English writer Jane Austen are published posthumously: Northanger Abbey (an early Austen novel that makes fun of the taste for gothic novels) and Persuasion. c. 1818 The German artist Caspar David Friedrich paints Wanderer above the Sea of Fog. February 1819 The USA and Spain sign the Transcontinental Treaty, by which Spain cedes East Florida to the USA in exchange for US recognition that West Texas was not part of the Louisiana Purchase. The treaty also extends US territorial claims to the Pacific. 24 May 1819 Victoria, Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

1837–1901, empress of India 1876–1901, born in London, England (–1901). 31 May 1819 Walt Whitman, US journalist, essayist, and poet, born in West Hills, New York (–1892). 1 August 1819 Herman Melville, US novelist, short-story writer, and poet who writes Moby Dick, born in New York City (–1891). 16 August 1819 The 'Peterloo Massacre' takes place in England when a crowd of 60,000 people gathered in St Peter's Fields, Manchester, to listen to speeches on parliamentary reform and repeal of the Corn Laws, is charged on by the yeomanry. Eleven people are killed and 400 injured. 22 November 1819 George Eliot (pseudonym of Mary Anne Evans), English novelist, born in Chilvers Coton, Warwickshire, England (–1880). 17 December 1819 After a successful military campaign in New Granada against the Spanish colonial forces, the South American revolutionary leader Simón Bolívar becomes president of the newly formed Republic of Great Colombia, nominally consisting of the Spanish colonies of New Granada, Quito, and Venezuela. 1819 François-Louis Cailler sets up a chocolate factory in Vevey, Switzerland. It is the first to produce chocolate in bars. 1819 The English poet George Gordon, Lord Byron, publishes the first part of his 'epic satire'Don Juan, one of his most important works. Other parts appear in 1821, 1823, and 1824. He also publishes his narrative poem Mazeppa. 1819 The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer publishes Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung/The World as Will and Idea. His major work, it has a profound influence on German culture. 1819 The world's first omnibus service begins in Paris, France; within a decade the idea spreads to other major cities. 1819–1826 Scottish engineer Thomas Telford constructs the 177 m/580 ft Menai suspension bridge over the Menai Straits between Bangor, Wales and the island of Anglesey. The first modern suspension bridge, it uses chains of wrought-iron links suspended from masonry towers at either end. Lacking stiffening girders it is vulnerable to high winds. 1 January 1820 A revolution begins in Spain due to King Ferdinand VII's failure to adhere to the constitution of 1812 and his sending of troops to South America to put down risings in the Spanish colonies that have attracted much popular support in Spain itself. 14 January 1820 English naval officer Edward Bransfield lands on Deception

Island in Antarctica, and plants the Union Jack and buries a bottle containing coins there. He sights high, snow-covered mountains to the south on 20 January – the first sighting of mainland Antarctica. 29 January 1820 George III, king of Great Britain and Ireland 1760–1820, dies in Windsor Castle, England (81). 15 February 1820 Susan B(rownell) Anthony, US suffragette whose work eventually leads to women's suffrage in the USA (1920), born in Adams, Massachusetts (–1906). 20 February 1820 Elie, duc de Decazes, is dismissed as prime minister of France after the assassination of Charles-Ferdinand d'Artois, duc de Berry, and is succeeded by his predecessor, the more right-wing Armand du Plessis, duc de Richelieu. 6 March 1820 The 'Missouri Compromise' is decided by the US Congress, allowing Missouri to enter the Union as a slave state and Maine as a nonslave state, and banning slavery in all Louisiana Purchase territories north of Missouri's southern border. 7 March 1820 King Ferdinand VII of Spain is forced by popular pressure to restore the constitution of 1812 and to abolish the Inquisition, the body responsible for upholding Catholicism in Spain. 12 May 1820 Florence Nightingale, 'Lady of the Lamp', English nurse who is in charge of nursing the British troops during the Crimean War and who establishes nursing as a profession for women, born in Florence, Italy (–1910). 28 November 1820 Friedrich Engels, German socialist philosopher who, with Karl Marx, writes The Communist Manifesto (1848) which lays the foundations of modern communism, born in Barmen, Prussia (now Germany) (–1895). December 1820 James Monroe and Daniel D Tompkins are re-elected as US president and vice-president respectively. 1820 German inventor Johann Schweigger develops the first galvanometer for measuring the intensity and direction of an electric current. 1820 The English poet John Keats publishes the first version of his epic poem Hyperion. A second version appears posthumously in 1856. He also publishes the poems The Eve of Saint Agnes and Ode to a Nightingale. 1820 The English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley publishes the poems Prometheus Unbound and Ode to the West Wind. 1820 The first football games are played in US colleges. The game is a form of hazing by sophomores inflicted on freshmen by kicking the freshmen instead of

the ball. The game is banned in the 1830s because of the high number of injuries. 1820 The French artist Théodore Géricault completes his painting The Raft of the Medusa, a grim depiction of a recent shipwreck. It becomes one of the major works of Romanticism. 1820 The Spanish artist Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes paints Saturn Devouring One of His Children. This is one of the 'Black Pictures' he paints on the walls of his own house, private works that are dark, savage, and violent. c. 1820 French physicist André Ampère develops an instrument that uses a needle to measure the flow of electricity. It is the first measurement of electricity. c. 1820 Squash rackets, a version of rackets with a softer ball, is invented and developed at Harrow School, London, England. c. 1820 The German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss reintroduces the normal distribution curve ('Gausian distribution') – a basic statistical tool. 23 February 1821 John Keats, English Romantic lyric poet, dies in Rome, Italy (26). 6 March 1821 A revolt occurs in the Ottoman province of Moldavia against Turkish rule. The rebels appeal to Tsar Alexander I of Russia for help, and the prospect of a successful Russian-supported revolt while the Ottoman authorities are preoccupied with defeating regional warlords prompts a first (unsuccessful) rebellion in Greece. 5 May 1821 Napoleon I (Napoleon Bonaparte), French general, First Consul 1799–1804, and emperor of France 1804–15, dies in exile on the island of St Helena in the South Atlantic (52). 24 June 1821 The South American revolutionary leader Simón Bolívar ensures the independence of Venezuela from Spain by defeating the Spanish army of General Miguel de la Torre at Carabobo, near Caracas. A subsequent congress of the republic of Great Colombia (to which Venezuela is now added) at Cúcuta, Colombia, reorganizes the administration of the new republic, constitutionally limiting Bolívar's powers as president. 15 September 1821 Guatemala declares itself independent of Spain and aligns itself with Mexico. 11 October 1821 Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky, Russian novelist best known for Crime and Punishment (1866) and The Brothers Karamazov (1879–80), born in Moscow, Russia (–1881). 28 November 1821 Panama declares itself independent of Spain and joins the

Republic of Colombia. 1 December 1821 The West Indian colony of San Domingo establishes itself as a republic independent of Spain. 12 December 1821 Armand du Plessis, duc de Richelieu, is succeeded as French prime minister by Jean Villèle, ending the rule of the right centre and leading to a period of reaction under the ultra-conservatives. 12 December 1821 Gustave Flaubert, French realist novelist best known for Madame Bovary (1857), born in Rouen, France (–1880). 1821 English physicist Michael Faraday builds an apparatus that transforms electrical energy into mechanical energy – the principle of the electric motor. An armature wrapped in wire is placed between the poles of a magnet. When a current is passed though the coils, the armature spins. 1821 France has a population of 30.4 million; Britain, 20.8 million (of which Ireland comprises 6.8 million); the Italian states, 18 million; the Austrian Empire, 12 million; the USA, 9.6 million; and the combined populations of Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and the duchies, principalities and free cities of Germany, 26.1 million. 1821 German physicist Thomas Seebeck discovers thermoelectricity – the conversion of heat into electricity – when he generates a current by heating one end of a metal strip comprising two metals joined together. 1821 The Brighton Pavilion in England, designed by the English architect John Nash, is completed. Combining Indian and Chinese elements, it epitomizes the Picturesque style. 1821 The English artist John Constable paints The Hay Wain, one of his bestknown works, and Salisbury Cathedral from the Bishop's Grounds. 1821 The English writer Thomas De Quincey publishes his autobiographical Confessions of an English Opium Eater in the The London Magazine. 1821 The world's first natural gas well is sunk at Fredonia, New York. Lead pipes distribute the gas to consumers for lighting and cooking. c. 1821 Coffee is used generally throughout the USA, although it is criticized by temperance advocates and some who believe it to be an aphrodisiac. 1821–1822 French Egyptologist Jean-François Champollion deciphers the Egyptian hieroglyphics on the Rosetta Stone. 1821–1830 Emigration to the USA from Britain is 27,489, and from Ireland, 54,338.

27 April 1822 Ulysses S Grant, US general who commands the Union army during the last two years of the American Civil War and president 1863–77, born in Point Pleasant, Ohio (–1885). 25 June 1822 E(rnst) T(heodor) A(madeus) Hoffmann, German writer, composer, and painter, dies in Berlin, Germany (46). 8 July 1822 Percy Bysshe Shelley, English Romantic lyric poet, dies at sea off Livorno, Tuscany, Italy (29). 22 July 1822 Gregor Mendel, Austrian monk and botanist who lays the mathematical foundations of genetics, born in Heinzendorf, Austria (–1884). 23 September 1822 A Portuguese constitution is decreed, providing for liberty, legal equality, a single chamber which the king may not dissolve until its period of four years has expired, and a constitutional monarchy. 28 September 1822 Louis Pasteur, French microbiologist who proves that microorganisms cause disease and fermentation and develops the process of pasteurization, born in Dole, France (–1895). 12 October 1822 Brazil becomes formally independent of Portugal and Dom Pedro is proclaimed Emperor Pedro I. 20 December 1822 The Sunday Times is founded in London, England, by its parent organization The Times, but with an independent editorial policy. 1822 French mathematician Augustin-Louis Cauchy formulates the basic mathematical theory of elasticity; he defines stress as the load per unit area of the cross-section of a material, agreeing with Poisson's conclusions of 1811. 1822 Mary Anning discovers the first fossil to be recognized as that of a dinosaur – an Iguanodon – in Devon, England. 1822 St Pancras Church in London, England, designed by the English architects Henry William Inwood and his father William Inwood, is completed, one of the finest examples of the Gothic Revival style. 1822 The Austrian composer Franz Schubert stops work on his Symphony No. 8 in B minor (D 759), the Unfinished, but completes his Mass in A flat (D 678). He also completes his opera Alfonso und Estrella (D 732). It is first performed in 1854, in Weimar, Germany. In this year, he also writes his Wanderer Fantasy (D 760). 12 May 1823 The Catholic Association is established in Ireland by the nationalist Daniel O'Connell to agitate for Catholic Emancipation (the removal of legal restrictions on Catholics) and independence. 18 June 1823 King John VI annuls the Portuguese constitution of 1822 after

risings against his rule and against the loss of Brazil. 1 July 1823 The former Spanish colonies of Guatemala, San Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, and Costa Rica form the Confederation of the United Provinces of Central America. 28 September 1823 After the death of Pope Pius VII on 20 August, the Italian clergyman Annibale Sermattei Della Genga is elected Pope Leo XII. He is pope until 1829. 1 October 1823 King Ferdinand VII of Spain, having been restored by the French who have crushed the Spanish rebellion, issues a decree for the execution of his enemies, and a reign of tyranny begins. November 1823 During a game of football at Rugby School, England, William Webb Ellis, a pupil, picks up the ball and runs with it. This is traditionally regarded as the origin of the game of rugby, but it is several years before football at the school becomes predominantly a handling as opposed to a kicking game. 2 December 1823 The 'Monroe Doctrine' is announced by the US president James Monroe. It excludes European powers from interfering in the politics of any of the American republics and closes the entire American continent to colonial settlements by them. 1823 Austrian composer Franz Schubert completes his opera Fierrabras (D 796). It is first performed in 1835, in Vienna, Austrian Empire. He also completes completes his incidental music (D 797) for the play Rosamunde, Fürstin von Cypern/Rosamund, Princess of Cyprus by Helmina von Chézy; his Piano Sonata No 12 (D 784); and his song cycle Die schöne Müllerin/The Fair Maid of the Mill (D 795). 1823 English mathematician Charles Babbage begins construction of the 'difference engine', a machine for calculating logarithms and trigonometric functions. 1823 The German composer Ludwig van Beethoven completes his Symphony No. 9 in D minor, the Choral (Opus 125) and his variations on a waltz theme suggested by the Austrian music publisher Anton Diabelli (Opus 120). 1823 The US writer James Fenimore Cooper publishes The Pioneers, the first of the 'Leatherstocking' novels. 21 January 1824 Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson, one of the ablest Confederate generals in the American Civil War, born in Clarksburg, Virginia (–1863). 10 February 1824 The South American revolutionary leader Simón Bolívar is proclaimed emperor of Peru.

24 February 1824 The British governor general of India, Lord Amherst, declares war against the Burmese as the latter have violated the territory of the British East India Company by capturing the island of Shahpuri. 19 April 1824 George Gordon, Lord Byron, English Romantic poet, dies in Missolonghi, Greece (36). April 1824 The USA and Russia settle the controversy over the northernmost coast of North America. Russia is granted the territory north of latitude 54° 40', in exchange for Russia's lifting of a fishing ban off its North American territorial waters. 16 September 1824 Following the death of King Louis XVIII of France, he is succeeded by his brother, Charles X. 1824 English Quaker John Cadbury opens a tea and coffee shop in Birmingham, England, the beginnings of the Cadbury confectionery company. 1824 French scientist Sadi Carnot publishes Réflexions sur la puissance motrice du feu et sur les machines propres à développer cette puissance/Thoughts on the Motive Power of Fire, and on Machines Suitable for Developing that Power, a pioneering study of thermodynamics in which he explains that a steam engine's power results from the decrease in temperature from the boiler to the condenser. He also describes the 'Carnot cycle' whereby heat is converted into mechanical motion and mechanical motion converted into heat – the basis of the second law of thermodynamics. 1824 The Austrian composer Franz Schubert completes his String Quartets No. 13 (D 804) and No. 14 (D 810), Der Tot und das Mädchen/Death and the Maiden. 1824 The English writer Mary Mitford publishes the first volume of her account of village life Our Village: Sketches of Rural Life, Character and Scenery. The final volume appears in 1832. The sketches began to appear in Lady Magazine in 1819. 1824 The French artist Eugène Delacroix paints The Massacre at Chios, a depiction of a contemporary event from the Great War of Independence. 1824 The German artist Caspar David Friedrich paints Arctic Shipwreck. 1824 The German historian Leopold von Ranke publishes Geschichten der romanischen und germanischen Völker, 1494–1535/History of the Roman and Teutonic People, 1494–1535. 1824 The Italian poet Giacomo Leopardi publishes his poetry collection Canzoni e versi/Songs and Verses. 25 August 1825 Uruguay declares itself independent of Brazil.

27 September 1825 The Stockton to Darlington railway line in England opens. Built by George Stephenson, it is the world's first public railway to carry steam trains. 10 October 1825 Paul Kruger, Boer statesman who founds the Afrikaaner nation and is instrumental in initiating the Second Anglo-Boer War, born in Cradock district, Cape Colony, Southern Africa (–1904). 25 October 1825 Johann Strauss, Austrian composer of Viennese waltzes and operettas, born in Vienna, Austria (–1899). 25 October 1825 The canal boat Seneca Chief opens the Erie Canal. Linking the Great Lakes with the Hudson River, it opens the Midwest to settlement. 1 December 1825 Alexander I, emperor of Russia 1801–25 who was instrumental in defeating the French emperor Napoleon I, dies in Taganrog, Russia, and is succeeded by Nicholas I, his younger brother. 1825 French physicist André Ampère publishes Electrodynamics, in which he formulates the mathematical laws governing electric currents and magnetic fields. It lays the foundation for electromagnetic theory. 1825 The English artist John Constable paints Leaping Horse. 1825 US engineer John Stevens constructs the first steam locomotive to run on rails in the USA. It runs on a short circular track at his home in Hoboken, New Jersey. 24 February 1826 By the Treaty of Yandabu, ending the Burmese War, the British gain Assam, Arakan, and Terasserim, while the Burmese pay an indemnity and come under British influence. 10 March 1826 King John VI of Portugal dies and is succeeded by his son, Emperor Pedro I of Brazil, as King Pedro IV. 4 July 1826 Thomas Jefferson, third president of the USA 1801–09, a DemocraticRepublican, dies in Monticello, Virginia (83). 7 October 1826 The Akkerman Convention settles the problem of the Danubian provinces (Moldavia and Wallachia) and Serbia, with the Turks evacuating key fortresses and allowing Russia full access to the Dardanelles. 1826 French physiologist René Joachim Henri Dutrochet carries out the first quantitative experiments on osmosis – the passage of a solvent through a semipermeable membrane. 1826 The English radical thinker Richard Carlile writes Every Woman's Book, a birth control manual.

1826 The US writer James Fenimore Cooper publishes his novel The Last of the Mohicans. 1826 Using a camera obscura and an eight-hour exposure, French inventor Joseph Niépce takes a crude photograph of his barnyard from a window on his estate. It is the world's first photograph. He uses light-sensitive bitumen of Judea (a type of asphalt) to fix the image on a pewter plate. 28 February 1827 The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad becomes the first railway in the USA to be chartered to carry freight and passengers. The railway is built to compete with the Erie Canal, which is taking business away from Baltimore, Maryland. 26 March 1827 Ludwig van Beethoven, German classical Romantic composer, dies in Vienna, Austria (56). 10 April 1827 The Tory foreign secretary, George Canning, becomes prime minister of Britain, forming a government of liberal Tories and moderate Whigs. 6 July 1827 The Treaty of London is signed by which Russia, Britain, and France agree to recognize the autonomy of Greece and so force Sultan Mahmud II of the Ottoman Empire to make peace with the Greeks. 1827 English clergyman Thomas Malthus's sixth edition of his 1798 pamphlet An Essay on the Principle of Population expresses the view that the poor laws only encourage large families; he encourages people to marry late and to exercise 'moral restrain' as a means of economic control. 1827 German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss introduces the subject of differential geometry that describes features of surfaces by analyzing curves that lie on it – the intrinsic-surface theory. 1827 German physicist Georg Ohm formulates Ohm's law, which states that the current flowing through an electric circuit is directly proportional to the voltage, and indirectly proportional to the resistance. 1827 Scottish botanist Robert Brown is the first to report the observation of the continuous motion of tiny particles in a liquid solution – now known as Brownian motion. 1827 The first Mardi Gras celebrations take place in New Orleans, Louisiana, introduced by French students. 1827 The French artist Eugène Delacroix paints The Death of Sardanapalus. 1827 The German poet Heinrich Heine publishes his poetry collection Buch der Lieder/Book of Songs.

1827–1838 A period of Irish and German migration to the USA begins due to a severe winter in 1829, increased legislation against German Jews, economic stress in Ireland, and Irish factionalism. 1827–1838 US ornithologist John James Audubon publishes the first volume of his multi-volume work Birds of America. 5 January 1828 Jean-Baptiste, Vicomte de Martignac, becomes prime minister of a moderate administration in France. 8 February 1828 Jules Verne, French author who pioneers modern science fiction writing, born in Nantes, France (–1905). 20 March 1828 Henrik Johan Ibsen, Norwegian poet and playwright whose works include Peer Gynt (1867) and A Doll's House (1879), born in Skien, Norway (–1906). 16 April 1828 Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes, Spanish painter and engraver known for his depiction of contemporary events, dies in Bordeaux, France (81). 23 June 1828 Dom Miguel is proclaimed king of Portugal, following a peaceful coup d'état. 12 August 1828 William Blake, English poet and engraver, dies in London, England (70). 27 August 1828 Uruguay is formally proclaimed independent at the preliminary peace ending the war between Brazil and Argentina. 9 September 1828 Lev Nikolayevich ('Leo') Tolstoy, Russian author best known for War and Peace and Anna Karenina, born in Yasnaya Polyana, Russia (–1910). 19 November 1828 Franz Schubert, Austrian composer, dies in Vienna, Austria (31). 1828 Estonian embryologist Karl von Baer describes the notochord, the development of the neural folds into the nervous system, and the main brain vesicles in Über die Entwicklungsgeschichte der Thiere/On the Development of Animals. In doing so he establishes the science of comparative embryology. 1828 German chemist Friedrich Wöhler synthesizes urea from ammonium cyanate. It is the first synthesis of an organic substance from an inorganic compound. 31 March 1829 After the death of Pope Leo XII on 10 February, the Italian clergyman Francesco Saverio Castiglioni is elected Pope Pius VIII. He is pope until 1830.

13 April 1829 The Roman Catholic Relief Bill passes the Lords, in Britain, allowing Catholics to sit and vote in Parliament, giving them the right to vote, and making them eligible for all military, civil, and corporate offices except those of Regent, Lord Chancellor of England, and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. They are to take an oath denying the pope has the power to interfere in domestic affairs and recognizing the legitimacy of Britain's protestant monarchs. 8 August 1829 King Charles X of France appoints Auguste, Prince de Polignac, prime minister, an ultra-conservative who does not possess the confidence of the Chamber, in a move away from responsible government. 14 September 1829 The Treaty of Adrianople ends the Russo-Ottoman War and the Greek War of Independence. Sultan Mahmud II of the Ottoman Empire recognizes the London Protocol of March 1829 which guarantees the territory of Greece and the independence of the Danubian provinces (Moldavia and Wallachia) and of Serbia. Russia obtains land south of the Caucasus. 10–14 October 1829 George and Robert Stephenson's Rocket wins the Liverpool and Manchester Railway competition with an average speed of 58 kph/36 mph without a load, and 26 kph/16 mph with a 40 tonne load. Using a multiple firetube boiler, rather than the single flue boiler other contestants use, its design sets the pattern for future railway locomotives. 1829 Russian mathematician Nikolay Ivanovich Lobachevsky develops hyperbolic geometry, in which a plane is regarded as part of a hyperbolic surface shaped like a saddle. Austrian mathematician János Bolyai publishes a treatise on nonEuclidean geometry in 1832. It is the beginning of non-Euclidean geometry. 1829 The French educator Louis Braille's Procédé pour écrire les paroles/A System for Writing Words is the first book in braille to be published. 1829 The US inventor William Austin Burt patents the Typographer, the first patented typewriter. A handle is used to select the letter which is then inked on a pad and pressed on the paper. 1829 The White House in Washington, DC, is completed. Work began on the 'President's House' in the 1790s to a design by the Irish-born architect James Hoban, the style a refined neoclassicism. The building was burnt down by the British in 1814 and work began again. Alterations to Hoban's designs were made by President Thomas Jefferson and the architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe. 3 February 1830 Greece is declared independent of the Ottoman Empire at the London Conference and granted the protection of France, Russia, and Britain. 26 June 1830 Following the death of King George IV of Britain, he is succeeded by his brother William IV, duke of Clarence. 25 July 1830 King Charles X of France issues the three ordinances of St-Cloud for controlling the press, dissolving the Chamber of Deputies, and having

antigovernment voters removed from the electoral lists following the victory of the Liberal opposition in the elections. 27–29 July 1830 Revolutionary action known as the 'Three Glorious Days' flares up in Paris and other areas of France following the publication of the ordinances of St-Cloud by King Charles X. July 1830–April 1833 Scottish geologist Charles Lyell publishes the first volume of his three-volume work Principles of Geology in which he argues that geological formations are the result of presently observable processes acting over millions of years. It creates a new time frame for other sciences such as biology and palaeontology. 2 August 1830 Charles X abdicates as king of France following continued opposition to his rule. 11 August 1830 The first ministry of King Louis-Phillipe's reign in France is formed, comprising a range of moderate and progressive liberals led by Jacques Lafitte, Casimir Périer, and François Guizot. 11 September 1830 Ecuador is recognized as an independent republic and granted a constitution by Colombia, under which it is to be part of the Confederation of Colombia. 15 September 1830 The Liverpool and Manchester Railway opens in England. The first railway to carry both passengers and freight, its success sparks widespread railway building in Britain and the USA. 22 November 1830 Charles, Earl Grey, becomes prime minister of a Whig government in Britain, with Viscount Palmerston as foreign secretary, following the resignation of the Tory Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington. 10 December 1830 Emily Dickinson, US poet, born in Amherst, Massachusetts (–1886). 17 December 1830 Simón Bolívar, Venezuelan soldier who liberated Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, and Bolivia from Spanish rule, dies in Santa Marta, Colombia (47). 20 December 1830 At the London Conference, Britain, France, the Austrian Empire, Prussia, and Russia support Belgium's decision to separate from the Netherlands. 1830 The English artist Samuel Palmer paints Coming from Evening Church. 1830 The English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, publishes Poems Chiefly Lyrical. Among its best-known poems is 'Mariana'.

1830 The French artist Eugène Delacroix paints Liberty Leading the People and Portrait of Baron Schwitters. 1830 The French inventor Barthélemy Thimonnier patents the first sewing machine. Eighty are constructed to make French army uniforms but are destroyed the following year by a mob of tailors fearing unemployment. 1830 The French sociologist Auguste Comte publishes the first part of his Cours de philosophie positive/Course of Positive Philosophy. The final part appears in 1842. 1830 The French writer Stendhal publishes his novel Le Rouge et le noir/The Scarlet and the Black. 1830 The world population is around 1 billion. 1830 US inventor Peter Cooper constructs the Tom Thumb, the first steam locomotive built in the USA. c. 1830 The English artist J M W Turner paints Music at Petworth. 25 January 1831 The Polish diet (national assembly) declares Poland independent of Russia and the rule of the Russian tsars. 2 February 1831 Pope Gregory XVI is elected. He is believed by many to have liberal sympathies. 7 April 1831 Emperor Pedro I of Brazil abdicates in favour of his son, in order to return to Portugal to aid his daughter, Oueen Maria II, who is being challenged by his brother, Dom Miguel, for the throne. 29 August 1831 English physicist Michael Faraday discovers electromagnetic induction – the production of an electric current by change in magnetic intensity (and also the principle of the electric generator). US scientist Joseph Henry makes the same discovery independently of Faraday, and shortly before him, but does not publish his work. 8 September 1831 Russia takes the Polish capital, Warsaw, after a two-day battle and the Polish revolt for independence collapses. 14 November 1831 Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, German philosopher of the idealist school, dies in Berlin, Germany (61). 17 November 1831 Venezuela, Ecuador, and New Granada (now Colombia) dissolve the Union of Colombia (of 1819) and New Granada becomes an independent state. 27 December 1831–2 October 1836 The English naturalist Charles Darwin

undertakes a five-year voyage, to South America and the Pacific, as naturalist on the Beagle. The voyage convinces him that species have evolved gradually but he waits over 20 years to publish his findings. 1831 Cholera and famine lead to 900,000 deaths in Europe. 1831 London Bridge, designed by the British architects George and John Rennie, is completed in London, England. 1831 Scottish botanist Robert Brown discovers the nucleus in plant cells. 1831 The French composer Hector Berlioz completes his Symphonie fantastique/ Fantastic Symphony. 1831 The population of Britain is 12.2 million, Ireland, 7.7 million, and the USA, 12.8 million. 1831 The US engineer Matthias William Baldwin develops a steam-tight boiler that doubles the pressure of previous steam engines and allows locomotives to reach speeds of 96 kph/60 mph. 1831 US industrialist Cyrus Hall McCormick invents the mechanical reaper (patented in 1834) permitting one person to do the work of five. 1831–1840 Emigration to the USA is 75,810 from Britain and 207,381 from Ireland. 23 January 1832 Edouard Manet, French realist painter and important 19thcentury artist, born (–1883). 27 January 1832 Lewis Carroll (pen-name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), English novelist who writes Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), born in Daresbury, Cheshire, England (–1898). 22 March 1832 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German poet, novelist, dramatist, and philosopher, dies in Weimar, Saxe-Weimar (now Germany) (82). 10 April 1832 The Ottoman Empire declares war on Mehmet Ali, its representative in Egypt, who is in effect independent. He is demanding the Ottoman province of Syria as his reward for aiding the Ottoman Empire in the Greek War of Independence. 21 September 1832 Walter Scott, Scottish novelist, poet, historian, and biographer who developed the historical novel, dies in Abbotsford, Roxburgh, Scotland (61). 11 October 1832 The former Napoleonic marshal Nicholas-Jean Soult, duc de Dalmie, becomes prime minister of France in an administration containing

François Guizot, Adolphe Thiers, and Achille, duc de Broglie, which stabilizes French politics. 29 November 1832 Louisa May Alcott, US author of children's books, best known for Little Women (1869), born in Germantown, Pennsylvania (–1888). 1832 John Matthews creates the soda fountain, a machine for carbonating water that he then sells at his shop in New York City. 1832 The Belgian inventor Joseph Plateau develops the phenakistoscope, a device which creates the illusion of motion. It consists of a disc, with images in reverse, located around the centre, and which is rotated in front of a mirror. The illusion of motion is created by observing the images in the mirror through slits on the disc. 1832 The English physicist William Sturgeon constructs an electric motor. 1832 The English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, publishes Poems. Among its bestknown poems are 'The Lotus-Eaters' and 'The Lady of Shalott'. 1832 The French inventor Hippolyte Pixii builds the first magneto or magnetoelectric generator. A magnet rotates in front of two coils to produce an alternating current, making it the first induction electric generator, and the first machine to convert mechanical energy into electrical energy. 1832 The tragedy Le Roi s'amuse/The King Amuses Himself by the French writer Victor Hugo is first performed, in Paris, France. It later provides the basis for the opera Rigoletto, which is written in 1851 by the Italian composer Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi. 23 March 1833 Prussia establishes a Zollverein (customs union) in Germany, incorporating Bavaria, Hesse-Darmstadt, and Württemberg, from which Austria is excluded. 3 May 1833 The Ottoman Empire recognizes the independence of Egypt (ostensibly a part of the Ottoman Empire but in fact already autonomous) and cedes the provinces of Syria and Aden to its ruler, Mehmet Ali. 22 May 1833 A constitution in Chile ends internal unrest and creates an oligarchic, conservative regime, giving greater power to the president and establishing Roman Catholicism as the state religion. 8 July 1833 By the Treaty of Unkiar-Skelessi, a defensive alliance between the Ottoman Empire and Russia, Sultan Mahmud II of the Ottoman Empire agrees to close the Dardanelles to all but Russian ships. 29 September 1833 King Ferdinand VII of Spain dies and is succeeded by his infant daughter Queen Isabella II.

1833 Charles Babbage creates his 'analytical engine' in England; it is a prototype of the modern computer, using levers, rods, and gears to perform calculations. 1833 English physicist Michael Faraday announces the basic laws of electrolysis: that the amount of a substance deposited on an electrode is proportional to the amount of electric current passed through the cell, and that the amounts of different elements are proportional to their atomic weights. 1833 German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss, and German physicist Wilhelm Eduard Weber, construct an electromagnetic telegraph. It uses two copper wires and a compasslike mechanism for detecting the electric current, and carries messages 2.3 km/1.4 mi over housetops in Göttingen. 1833 The English churchman John Henry Newman publishes the first of his Tracts for the Times, pamphlets on religious subjects that become an important expression of the Oxford Movement (a reform movement within the Anglican Church). They appear until 1841, written also by John Keble, Isaac Williams, and Edward Bouverie Pusey. 1833 The French historian Jules Michelet publishes the first volume of his 24volume Histoire de France/History of France. The last volume appears in 1867. 1833 The French writer Honoré de Balzac publishes the novel Eugénie Grandet. 1833 The German composer Felix Mendelssohn completes his Symphony No. 4 (Opus 90), the Italian. 1833 The Russian poet Alexander Pushkin publishes his novel in verse Yevgeny Onegin/Eugene Onegin, his major work. He began writing it in 1823. It quickly becomes one of the best-known works of Russian literature and is used as the basis for the 1879 opera by the Russian composer Peter Illich Tchaikovsky. 1833 The Scottish essayist and social historian Thomas Carlyle publishes Sartor Resartus, the Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdröckh, a philosophical satire, in Fraser's Magazine. It appears as a book in 1836. 1833 The US army surgeon William Beaumont publishes Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice and the Physiology of Digestion – the first detailed book on human digestion. 17 March 1834 Gottlieb Daimler, German mechanical engineer who builds one of the first successful cars powered by an internal combustion engine, born in Schorndorf, Württemberg (now Germany) (–1900). 20 May 1834 Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert de Motier, marquis de Lafayette, French aristocrat and political leader who fought against the British during the American Revolution, dies in Paris, France (76).

7 July 1834 A civil war begins in Spain as Don Carlos, brother of the late King Ferdinand VII of Spain, claims the throne occupied by the infant queen, Isabella II. The Carlists are supported by the Catholic Church, the Basques, and other conservative elements, and are opposed by Britain and France. 19 July 1834 Edgar Degas, French artist known for his paintings, drawings, and bronzes of the human figure in motion, born in Paris, France (–1917). 25 July 1834 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, English Romantic poet, literary critic, and philosopher, dies in Highgate, London, England (61). 1 August 1834 Slavery is abolished throughout the British Empire, thanks largely to the efforts of the English philanthropist and politician William Wilberforce. 16 October 1834 The Houses of Parliament in London, England, are destroyed by fire. 23 December 1834 Thomas Malthus, English economist and demographer who theorized that population growth, unless checked, would always outstrip the food supply, dies in St Catherine, near Bath, England (68). 1834 Dimitry Ivanovich Mendeleyev, Russian chemist who develops the periodic table of the elements, born in Tobolsk, Siberia, Russia (–1907). 1834 French physicist Benoît-Pierre Clapeyron develops the second law of thermodynamics: entropy always increases in a closed system. 1834 The English mathematician William George Horner develops the zoetrope, a motion picture device that is an improvement over the phenakistoscope. It consists of two discs with images on one side observed through slits on the other. 1834 The French artist and caricaturist Honoré Daumier publishes his lithograph Rue Transnonain, 14 April 1834. 1834 The Russian poet Alexander Pushkin publishes the short story 'Pikovaya dama'/'Queen of Spades'. 1834 Tomatoes begin to catch on in the USA (despite their 300-year presence), but will not become popular until 1900 as they are commonly believed to be poisonous. 1834 US blacksmith Thomas Davenport constructs the first battery-powered electric motor. He uses it to operate a small car on a short section of track – the first streetcar. c. 1834 The US artist Edward Hicks paints The Peaceable Kingdom, one of the best-known images of US naive art. He paints this scene several times.

2 March 1835 Emperor Francis I of Austria dies and is succeeded by his son Ferdinand I. 25 November 1835 Andrew Carnegie, US steel magnate and philanthropist, born in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland (–1919). 30 November 1835 Mark Twain (pseudonym of Samuel Langhorne Clemens), US author who creates the characters Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, born in Florida, Missouri (–1910). 1835 English pioneer of photography William Henry Fox Talbot creates Picture of a Latticed Window, the oldest existing photographic paper negative. 1835 The French historian Alexis Charles-Henri-Clérel de Tocqueville publishes the first part of his De la démocratie en Amérique/Democracy in America. The last part appears in 1840. 1835 The French writer Honoré de Balzac publishes the novel Le Père Goriot/ Father Goriot. 1835 The French writer Théophile Gautier publishes his novel Mademoiselle de Maupin. 1835 The German theologian David Friedrich Strauss publishes Das Leben Jesu kritisch bearbeitet/The Life of Jesus Critically Examined. Asserting that many elements of the life of Jesus are to be understood as 'myth' rather than literal fact, the book is highly controversial. 1835 The German writer Georg Büchner writes his play Dantons Tod/Danton's Death. It is published in 1850 and first performed in 1902. 1835 The opera Lucia di Lammermoor by the Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti, is first performed, in Naples, Italy. It is based on a story by Walter Scott. 1835 The Russian writer Nikolay (Vasilyevich) Gogol publishes his novel Myortvye dushi/Dead Souls, and his short story 'Shinel'/'The Overcoat' – both major works of Russian literature. 1835 US manufacturer Samuel Colt patents a six-shot revolver with a rotating cartridge cylinder. Each time the trigger is pulled a new bullet moves in front of the barrel. Its effective range is 23 m/75 ft. 22 February 1836 The first ministry of the moderate liberal Adolphe Thiers is formed in France, temporarily stabilizing French politics. 2 March 1836 Texas declares its independence from Mexico, but the USA does not recognize the Republic of Texas.

6 March 1836 Two hundred Texans are killed at the isolated fortress of Alamo in San Antonio, Texas, when 3,000 Mexican troops commanded by Gen Antonio Lopes de Santa Anna overrun the Republic of Texas garrison. 21 April 1836 Republic of Texas general Sam Houston defeats his Mexican counterpart General Antonio Lopes de Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto, thereby securing the independence of Texas and ending the Texas-Mexican War. 10 June 1836 André Marie Ampère, French physicist who founded the science of electromagnetism, dies in Marseille, France (61). 17 August 1836 The Federation of Peru and Bolivia is proclaimed by the Bolivian dictator Andrés de Santa Cruz, creating a more powerful political unit under his control. 11 November 1836 Chile, threatened by the increase in power of its neighbours by confederation, declares war on the Peru–Bolivia Federation. 18 November 1836 William Schwenk Gilbert, English playwright known for his works produced with Arthur Seymour Sullivan, born in London, England (–1911). 7 December 1836 Americans elect Martin Van Buren president. No vicepresidential candidate wins a majority, compelling the Senate to select the vice president for the first time in US history. The Senate chooses Kentucky politician Richard M Johnson. 1836 German physiologist Theodor Schwann discovers pepsin, the first known animal enzyme to be isolated. 1836 Swedish engineer John Ericsson patents a screw propeller. Other screw propellers are patented about this time by British engineer Francis Pettit Smith (1836), Austrian engineer Joseph Ressel (1832), Scottish engineer Robert Wilson (1832), and US engineer John Stevens (1826). 1836 The Communist League is founded in Paris, France, by emigré German intellectuals. Originally called the League of the Just, it becomes the Communist League after Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels join in 1847. 1836 The English chemist Edward Davy designs an electromagnetic repeater for amplifying and relaying telegraphic signals. 1836 The German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer publishes Über den Willen in der Natur/On the Will in Nature. 1836 The satire Revizor/The Government Inspector by the Russian writer Nikolay (Vasilyevich) Gogol is first performed, in Moscow, Russia. 1836 The US Unitarian minister, philosopher, and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson

publishes his essay 'Nature', one of the central works of the US literary and philosophical movement Transcendentalism. 3 March 1837 In one of his last acts in office, US president Andrew Jackson recognizes the Republic of Texas. 31 March 1837 John Constable, English landscape painter, dies in London, England (59). 6 June 1837 The Republic of Natal is formally established by Dutch settlers in southern Africa and a constitution is proclaimed. 18 June 1837 A progressive constitution is proclaimed in Spain providing for national sovereignty, a representative house of two chambers, the absolute veto of the crown over legislation, and restricted suffrage. 20 June 1837 On the death of King William IV of Britain his niece, Queen Victoria, succeeds to the throne. 20 June 1837 The German kingdom of Hanover is automatically separated from Britain when Queen Victoria comes to the British throne because Salic Law forbids female monarchs, and the conservative Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, the eldest surviving son of George III of Britain, becomes king. 11 November 1837 Louis Joseph Papineau, the speaker in the Legislative Assembly, leads a rebellion in French-speaking Lower Canada. This is the result of conflicts between the British governor and the legislative councils on the one hand and the popularly elected assemblies on the other, and of friction between French and British settlers. 24 November 1837 The rebels in Lower Canada attempting to break away from British rule are decisively defeated at St Charles, Lower Canada. 13 December 1837 William Lyon Mackenzie, leader of the revolt against British rule in Upper Canada, sets up a provisional government for Upper Canada from headquarters on Navy Island in the Niagara River, and prepares for an invasion of Canada. 1837 Charles Lewis Tiffany opens a shop selling stationery and fancy goods in New York City: this will grow into the world's most famous jewellery store, Tiffany's. 1837 French chemist René Joachim Henri Dutrochet proves that chlorophyll is essential for photosynthesis in plants. 1837 German chemist Karl Friedrich Mohr enunciates the theory of conservation of energy.

1837 The English writer Charles Dickens publishes his first novel, The Pickwick Papers, and begins to publish his novel Oliver Twist in the magazine Bentley's Miscellany. It is published as a book in 1838. 1837 The French artist Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre produces a detailed photograph of his studio on a silvered copper plate. 1837 The French mathematician Siméon-Denis Poisson publishes Recherches sur la probabilité des jugements/Researches on the Probabilities of Opinions, in which he establishes the rules of probability and describes the Poisson distribution for a discrete random variable. 1837 The German teacher Georg Friedrich Grotefend publishes New Contributions to a Commentary on the Persepolitan Cuneiform Writing in which he deciphers Persian cuneiform script. 1837 The Scottish essayist and social historian Thomas Carlyle publishes French Revolution, a colourful history that establishes his reputation. 1837 The US financier Alfred Lewis Vail devises 'Morse Code' for use with the telegraph system designed by US artist and inventor Samuel Finley Breese Morse, using dots and dashes to represent letters and numbers. 6 January 1838 The US artist and inventor Samuel Finley Breese Morse and financier Alfred Louis Vail make the first successful public demonstration of an electric telegraph. 8 April 1838 English engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel's ship Great Western is launched. The largest ship in the world (65m/212 ft long), and the first steamship built specifically for oceanic service, it crosses the Atlantic in half the time (15 days) sailing ships take. 8 July 1838 Ferdinand (Adolf August Heinrich) Graf von Zeppelin, German builder of rigid dirigible airships, born in Konstanz, Baden, Germany (–1917). 1 October 1838 Britain begins the First Anglo-Afghan War to consolidate its influence over the Afghans and to prevent Russia increasing its power in the region, which constitutes a threat to British interests in India. 11 October 1838 Using the method of parallax, German astronomer Friedrich Bessel calculates the star 61 Cygni to be 10.3 light years away from Earth. It is the first determination of the distance of a star other than the Sun. 27 November 1838 A French force occupies the Mexican port of Veracruz in support of the claims for compensation of French victims of civil unrest in Mexico. 16 December 1838 The Boers (Dutch settlers) decisively defeat a Zulu army at Blood River, in retaliation for the attack on Pieter Retief's force on 6 February,

and secure their position in Natal, southern Africa. 1838 German botanist Matthias Jakob Schleiden publishes the article 'Contributions to Phytogenesis', in which he recognizes that cells are the fundamental units of all plant life. He is thus the first to formulate cell theory. 1838 German physician Friedrich Wilde develops the contraceptive rubber cap. This is the first use of rubber for medical purposes. 1838 The English writer Charles Dickens begins publishing The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby in serial form. It appears as a book in 1839. c. 1838 The English artist J M W Turner paints The Fighting Téméraire. 9 January 1839 French physicist Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre announces to the French Academy of Arts and Science that he can produce permanent positive images on a copper plate coated with silver iodide that is exposed to bright sunlight for 20–30 minutes. The image is developed with mercury vapour, and fixed in a salt solution. His 'daguerreotype' proves to be a dead end, overtaken by William Henry Fox Talbot's production of a photographic negative a few weeks later. 19 January 1839 Paul Cézanne, French post-Impressionist painter whose work leads to the development of cubism, born in Aix-en-Provence, France (–1906). 20 January 1839 The Battle of Yungay, resulting in a victory for Chile against the Peru–Bolivia Federation, leads to the dissolution of the Federation. 24 February 1839 Uruguay declares war against Argentina, following Argentine attempts to subvert the government of Uruguay. 19 April 1839 The Treaty of London is signed, agreeing the territorial arrangements for the separation of Belgium and the Netherlands. Luxembourg, disputed between the two, becomes an independent grand duchy, and the River Scheldt is opened to the ships of both the Netherlands and Belgium. 1 July 1839 Sultan Mahmud II of the Ottoman Empire dies and is succeeded by his 16-year-old son, Abdul Mejid. 7 July 1839 The First Opium War between China and Britain begins after the Chinese authorities seize and burn cargoes of opium due to be exported from China by British merchants, in an attempt to combat smuggling of the drug. 8 July 1839 John D(avison) Rockefeller, US industrialist who founds Standard Oil, and philanthropist who founded the Rockefeller Foundation, born in Richford, New York (–1937). 3 November 1839 The First Opium War between Britain and China gains

momentum when a British frigate sinks a Chinese fleet of junks. 3 December 1839 King Frederick VI of Denmark dies and is succeeded by his nephew, Christian VIII. 1839 British engineer James Nasmyth designs the steam hammer; an important tool for forging heavy machinery. He patents it 24 November 1842. 1839 English pioneer of photography William Fox Talbot publishes a paper describing the paper negative. 1839 German physiologist Theodor Schwann publishes Microscopic Investigations on the Accordance in the Structure and Growth of Plants and Animals, in which he argues that all animals and plants are composed of cells. Along with Matthias Schleiden, he thus founds modern cell theory. 1839 The French composer Hector Berlioz completes his dramatic symphony Roméo et Juliette/Romeo and Juliet. 1839 The French physicist Edmund Becquerel discovers the photovoltaic effect when he observes the creation of a voltage between two electrodes, one of which is exposed to light. 1839 The French writer Stendhal publishes his novel La Chartreuse de Parme/ The Charterhouse of Parma. 1839 US inventor Charles Goodyear invents vulcanized rubber by adding sulphur and white lead and then heating it. 5 February 1840 By the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand Maori chiefs surrender their sovereignty to the British government. 2 April 1840 Emile Zola, French novelist and critic who founds the Naturalist movement, born in Paris, France (–1902). 1 May 1840 The world's first postage stamp, the Penny Black, is issued in Britain, the first adhesive stamp to be used commercially. 7 May 1840 Peter Illich Tchaikovsky, leading 19th-century Russian composer who, amongst a great variety of works, composes the music for the ballets Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, and Sleeping Beauty, born in Votkinsk, Russia (–1893). 2 June 1840 Thomas Hardy, English novelist and poet, born in Bockhampton, Dorset, England (–1928). 15 July 1840 Russia, Britain, Prussia, and Austria form the Quadruple Alliance in support of the Ottoman Empire and by the Treaty of London offer Egypt to its ruler and Ottoman opponent, Mehmet Ali, as a hereditary possession and also

southern Syria for life, provided he gives up Crete and northern Syria. He refuses, in the hope of French aid. 5 November 1840 By the Convention of Alexandria the Egyptian viceroy Mehmet Ali agrees to the terms of the Treaty of London of 15 July, ending the OttomanEgyptian war. 5 November 1840 The First Anglo-Afghan War ends when Afghan forces surrender to the British in Afghanistan. 12 November 1840 Auguste Rodin, French sculptor reknowned for his realistic treatment of the human figure, born in Paris, France (–1917). 14 November 1840 Claude Monet, French Impressionist painter, born in Paris, France (–1926). 2 December 1840 Americans elect William Henry Harrison president and John Tyler vice president. 1840 A second worldwide cholera epidemic begins. 1840 Cotton textiles become the leading US industry, with 1,778,000 spindles and 75,000 workers. 1840 English microscopist John Dancer takes the first photographs of microscopic objects; they are magnified up to twenty times. 1840 English philosopher William Whewell publishes The Philosophy of Inductive Sciences, Founded upon Their History, in which he describes how the sciences use induction to arrive at general propositions. 1840 English scientist William Fox Talbot improves his earlier photographic process. Paper is treated with silver nitrate, potassium iodide, and gallic acid. After exposure the image is fixed with a solution of potassium bromide, later replaced by sodium hyposulphite. 1840 The English writer Charles Dickens begins publishing his novel The Old Curiosity Shop in serial form. It appears as a book in 1841. 1840 The French socialist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon publishes Qu'est-ce-que La Propriété?/What is Property? It contains the famous proposition: 'Property is theft.' 1840 The German composer Robert Schumann completes his Liederkreis/Song Cycle (Opus 39), settings of poems by the German poet Joseph, Baron von Eichendorff; and Frauenliebe und Leben/Woman's Love and Life (Opus 42). He also completes his Liederkreis/Song Cycle (Opus 24) and Dichterliebe/Poet's Love (Opus 48), both settings of poems by the German poet Heinrich Heine.

1840 The Russian writer Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov publishes his novel Geroy nashego vremeni/A Hero of Our Time. 1840–1850 Wheat becomes an increasingly important cash crop in the USA; production in 1839 is nearly 85 million bushels and climbs to over 100 million bushels in 10 years. 1840–1860 A cholera pandemic kills millions of people worldwide. 20 January 1841 British sovereignty is proclaimed over the Chinese port of Hong Kong. 25 February 1841 Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French Impressionist painter, born in Limoges, France (–1919). 3 May 1841 New Zealand is formally proclaimed a British colony. 13 July 1841 By the Convention of the Straits, the European powers guarantee Ottoman independence and the Dardanelles and Bosporus are closed to warships of all nations in peacetime (thus overthrowing the 1833 Treaty of UnkiarSkelessi). 2 November 1841 The Second Anglo-Afghan War begins when the Afghans rise and massacre British army officers. 1841 English mechanical engineer Joseph Whitworth standardizes the size of threads on screws, which becomes internationally accepted. 1841 German chemist Robert Wilhelm von Bunsen invents the carbon–zinc battery. 1841 Populations: Great Britain 18,534,000; Ireland 8,175,000; USA 17,063,000. Principal cities: London, England 2,235,000; Paris, France 935,000; Vienna, Austria 357,000; Berlin, Germany 300,000; New York City 313,000. 1841 The ballet Giselle, by the Italian choreographer Jean Coralli and the French choreographer Jules Joseph Perrot, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1841 The US poet and essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson publishes his first volume of Essays. Among the essays are 'The Over-Soul', 'Self-Reliance', and 'Friendship'. 1841 The US writer Edgar Allan Poe publishes the short stories 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue' and 'Descent into the Maelström' in Graham's Magazine. 1841–1850 Emigration to the USA is 267,044 from Britain and 780,719 from Ireland.

13 January 1842 Most of General William Elphinstone's British forces are massacred by Afghan troops at Gandalak, Afghanistan, in the Second Afghan War. 8 May 1842 The Paris–Versailles train jumps the track and catches fire trapping passengers inside the wooden carriages; 100 people die. It is the world's first serious train accident. 13 May 1842 Arthur Seymour Sullivan, British composer of operettas with William Schwenk Gilbert, born in London, England (–1900). 29 August 1842 By the Treaty of Nanjing ending the First Opium War between Britain and China, Canton, Shanghai, and other Chinese ports are opened to Britain, which is permitted to establish consular facilities and obtains a large indemnity. 10 October 1842 The First Anglo-Afghan War, begun by a British invasion in 1839 to counter perceived Russian and Persian expansionism in the region, ends in British defeat. After the massacre of over 3,000 British and Indian troops retreating from a popular revolt in Kabul in January, a punitive expedition reoccupying the country is withdrawn by the British government. 1842 Austrian physicist Christian Doppler publishes Über das farbige Licht der Doppelsterne/On the Coloured Light of Double Stars, in which he describes how the frequency of sound and light waves changes with the motion of their source relative to the observer – the 'Doppler effect'. He also theorizes that the wavelength of light from a star will vary according to the star's velocity relative to Earth. 1842 German composer Felix Mendelssohn completes his Symphony No 3 (Opus 56), the Scotch. He began work on it in 1830. 1842 The English writer Alfred, Lord Tennyson, publishes Poems, which contains revised versions of 'The Lotus-Eaters' and 'The Lady of Shalott', and new works such as 'Morte d'Arthur', 'Locksley Hall', and 'Ulysses'. 1842 The first photograph to be printed in a newspaper appears in the London, England, newspaper The Times. 1842 The German astronomer Friedrich Bessel suggests that perturbations to the motion of Sirius are due to the existence of a companion star. 1842 The opera Nabucodonosor (later known as Nabucco) by the Italian composer Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi is first performed, in Milan, Italy. It is first performed in Great Britain in 1846 (in London, England), and in the USA in 1848 (in New York City). 1842–1845 Irish astronomer William Parsons (later Lord Rosse) builds the 180 cm/72 in reflecting telescope 'Leviathan'.

11 April 1843 A British act of Parliament separates Gambia from Sierra Leone, west Africa, as a crown colony. 15 April 1843 Henry James, US-born British novelist and playwright, born in New York City (–1916). 4 May 1843 Natal in southern Africa is proclaimed a British colony. 19 July 1843 English engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel's ship Great Britain is launched at Bristol, England. It is the world's largest ship (98 m/322ft long; weighing 3,332 tonnes/3,270 tons), with six masts and a screw propeller, and becomes the first propeller-driven iron ship to cross the Atlantic. It sets a pattern for ocean liners for the rest of the century. 8 August 1843 Britain formally annexes the Indian province of Sind (in modernday Pakistan), having militarily subdued its inhabitants. 19 September 1843 Gustave-Gaspard Coriolis, French engineer who was the first to describe the Coriolis force, dies in Paris, France (50). 1843 English mathematician Ada Byron, Countess Lovelace, writes a programme for Charles Babbage's analytical engine – the first computer programme. 1843 English physicist James Joule determines the value for the mechanical equivalent of heat (now known as the joule), that is the amount of work required to produce a unit of heat. 1843 The Danish philosopher Søren Aabye Kierkegaard publishes Enten-Eller/ Either/Or, his first major philosophical work, and Frygt og baeven/Fear and Trembling. His analysis of choice makes this work one of the early classics of existentialism. 1843 The English philosopher John Stuart Mill publishes The System of Logic. 1843 The opera Die fliegende Holländer/Flying Dutchman by the German composer Richard Wagner is first performed, in Dresden, Germany. It is first performed in Britain in 1870 (in London, England), and in the USA in 1876 (in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania). 1843 The Scottish essayist and social historian Thomas Carlyle publishes Past and Present, in which he compares life in the Middle Ages to life in Victorian England. 8 March 1844 King Oscar I of Sweden accedes to the throne on the death of his father, Charles XIV (the former Napoleonic marshal Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte). 16 March 1844 A constitution is granted by King Otto I of Greece, establishing a representative system of two chambers, the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies.

12 April 1844 The US and the Republic of Texas sign the Texas Annexation Treaty, making Texas a US territory. 24 May 1844 The first public telegraph line is strung 60 km/37 mi between Washington, DC, and Baltimore, Maryland. The first message is transmitted by US artist and inventor Samuel Finley Breese Morse who asks 'What hath God wrought?' 15 October 1844 Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, German philosopher and critic, especially of Christianity, born in Röcken, Saxony, Prussia (–1900). 4 December 1844 Americans elect Democrats James K Polk president and George M Dallas president and vice-president, respectively. 1844 Scottish writer Robert Chambers publishes The Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation, which dispels the idea of divine creation and anticipates some of Charles Darwin's conclusions. 1844 The English artist J M W Turner paints Rain, Steam, and Speed, the first major art work to feature a train. 1844 The French writer Alexandre Dumas père publishes his adventure novels Les Trois Mousquetaires/The Three Musketeers and Le Comte de Monte-Cristo/The Count of Monte Cristo. 1844 The US essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson publishes his second volume of Essays. Among them are 'The Poet' and 'Nature'. 1844 The world's first telegraph line, connecting Washington, DC, and Baltimore, Maryland, becomes operational. 1844 US dentist Horace Wells uses nitrous oxide as an anaesthetic to perform painless dental operations. In January 1845 he gives a demonstration in which the patient proves unresponsive. 11 March 1845 Further Maori risings take place against British rule in New Zealand, following revolts in 1843 and 1844. 13 September 1845 The Knickerbocker Club, New York City, codifies the rules of baseball. 23 October 1845 Sarah Bernhardt, French actor, born in Paris, France (–1923). 11 December 1845 The First Anglo-Sikh War breaks out in northwest India when the powerful Sikh army crosses the Sutlej River to attack British territories in central Hindustan, after a period of growing tension following the death of the Sikh maharaja Ranjit Singh. 1845 English mathematician Arthur Cayley publishes Theory of Linear

Transformations. He studies compositions of linear transformations. 1845 Henry Jones of Bristol, England, creates self-raising flour. 1845 Scottish inventor Robert Thomson patents the pneumatic tyre. Although used for 1,930 km/1,200 mi on a horsedrawn brougham carriage, pneumatic tyres are not used again until the end of the century. 1845 The potato blight fungus Phytophthora infestans causes potato crops to fail throughout Europe. In Ireland, where the potato is a staple, over half the crop is lost causing devastating famine. Over 1 million die and 1.5 million emigrate over the next 2 years. 1845 The US writer Edgar Allan Poe publishes The Raven and Other Poems. c. 1845 The US artist George Caleb Bingham paints Fur Traders Descending the Missouri. 1845–1958 German naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt lays the basis of modern geography with the publication of Kosmos/Cosmos, in which he arranges geographic knowledge in a systematic fashion. 9 March 1846 By the Treaty of Lahore ending the First Anglo-Sikh War in India, Britain gains territory beyond the Sutlej River, the previous boundary of British India. Punjab becomes a British protectorate. 15 June 1846 Cardinal Mastai-Ferretti, at this time regarded as a liberal, is elected Pope Pius IX. 19 June 1846 In what is regarded as the first real baseball game (played under the rules modified in 1845 by the Knickerbocker Club) the Knickerbocker Club play the New York Club at the Elysian Fields, Hoboken, New Jersey. 27 June 1846 Charles Stewart Parnell, Irish nationalist who leads the movement for Irish home rule, born in Avondale, County Wicklow, Ireland (–1891). 10 September 1846 US inventor Elias Howe patents a practical sewing machine; it revolutionizes garment manufacture in both the factory and home. 23 September 1846 German astronomer Johann Gottfried Galle discovers the planet Neptune on the basis of French astronomer Urbain Le Verrier's calculations of its position. 30 September 1846 US dentist William Thomas Morton gives the first successful demonstration of ether as an anaesthetic during a dental operation to extract a tooth. He uses it in Boston, Massachusetts, on 16 October, to anaesthetize a patient while removing a tumour from his neck.

10 October 1846 Queen Isabella II of Spain is married to the Duke of Cadiz, Don Francisco de Asis, while her sister Princess Maria Louisa Fernanda marries the duc de Montpensier, the youngest son of the French king, Louis Philippe, giving France undue influence in Spain. Fears of British opposition to the marriages weaken the Orléanist monarchy in France. 1846 Alexander Turney Stewart opens the Marble Dry Goods Palace on Broadway in New York City. It is the first department store and the largest shop in the world. 1846 German composer Felix Mendelssohn completes his oratorio Elias/Elijah (Opus 70). It is first performed in Birmingham, England, in 1846. 1846 Italian chemist Ascanio Sobrero is the first to prepare the powerful explosive nitroglycerine. 1846 The beginnings of native segregation are seen in the British colony of Natal, southern Africa, where the first location commission sets up preserves for immigrant Zulus. 1846 The English palaeontologist Richard Owen publishes Lectures on Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals, one of the first textbooks on comparative vertebrate anatomy. 1846 The French composer Hector Berlioz completes his dramatic cantata La Damnation de Faust/The Damnation of Faust (Opus 24), based on Goethe's play Faust, written in 1808. Berlioz began work on this piece in 1828. 1846 The French writer Honoré de Balzac publishes his novel La Cousine Bette/ Cousin Bette. 1846 The Irish potato crop fails again, as in 1845, and famine increases despite organized relief. 1846 The US writer Nathaniel Hawthorne publishes his story collection Mosses From an Old Manse, which includes 'Young Goodman Brown' and 'Rappaccini's Daughter'. 11 February 1847 Thomas Alva Edison, prolific US inventor who invents the light bulb, phonograph, and motion picture projector, born in Milan, Ohio (–1931). 3 March 1847 Alexander Graham Bell, Scottish-born US scientist who invents the telephone, born in Edinburgh, Scotland (–1922). 1 July 1847 The first adhesive postage stamps in the USA go on sale. 24 July 1847 The Mormon leader Brigham Young leads a group of Mormons to what is now Salt Lake City, Utah, where they establish their headquarters.

26 August 1847 Liberia, the colony established in west Africa for freed US slaves, is proclaimed an independent republic under the presidency of Joseph Roberts. 9 September 1847 Gold is discovered in California and leads to the first 'gold rush'. 21 October 1847 Civil war begins in Switzerland, following the Catholic cantons' refusal on 20 July to dissolve their armed league, the Sonderbund, in the face of a liberal, anticlerical majority in the diet. October 1847 The English writer Charlotte Brontë publishes her second novel, Jane Eyre, under the name Currer Bell. (Her first novel, The Professor, does not appear until 1857.) 4 November 1847 Felix Mendelssohn(-Bartholdy), German composer, dies in Leipzig, Germany (38). December 1847 The English writer Emily Brontë publishes her only novel, Wuthering Heights, under the name Ellis Bell. 1847 English physicist James Joule discovers the law of conservation of energy – the first law of thermodynamics. 1847 German physicist Franz Neumann states the mathematical laws of electrical induction – the process of converting mechanical energy into electrical. 1847 Scottish physician James Simpson, in Account of a New Anaesthetic Agent 1847, first describes the use of chloroform as an anaesthetic. He uses it to assist women during childbirth. 1847 The British Museum in London, England, designed by the English architect Robert Smirke, is completed, a leading example of the Greek revival style. 1847 The English mathematician George Boole publishes The Mathematical Analysis of Logic, in which he shows that the rules of logic can be treated mathematically. Boole's work lays the foundation of computer logic. 1847 The English writer Frederick Marryat publishes his historical novel The Children of the New Forest, which becomes a classic of children's literature. 20 January 1848 King Christian VIII of Denmark dies and is succeeded by his liberal son Frederick VII, who is nevertheless committed to retaining the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein despite their claims for independence. 24 January 1848 The US prospector James Marshall discovers gold in the millrace at Sutter's Mill on the American River near Sacramento, California.

24 February 1848 King Louis-Phillipe of France abdicates in favour of his grandson, Louis-Philippe-Albert, comte de Paris, but a Republican provisional government containing the socialist Louis Blanc is established under Alphonse de Lamartine. 3 March 1848 A revolution breaks out in Budapest and on 15 March the Hungarian diet (national assembly) is subsequently granted the reforms it advocated in March 1847, making it effectively independent under Austrian rule. 12–15 March 1848 A revolution in Vienna, the Austrian capital, begins with demonstrations by liberal students, inspired by the revolutions in Paris, France, and Budapest, Hungary. 14 March 1848 A constitution for the Papal States is promulgated reluctantly by Pope Pius IX, in response to the revolutions in the rest of Italy. 17 March 1848 Demonstrations in the Prussian capital, Berlin, begin a revolution in Prussia for political reform and the creation of a united Germany. 20 March 1848 The Second Anglo-Sikh War begins in India, arising out of the Sikh aristocracy's discontent at British administration and the subsequent murder of two British officers. 22 March 1848 King Charles Albert of Sardinia-Piedmont declares war on Austria in an attempt to check Austrian influence and unify Italy under his leadership. 13 April 1848 Sicily, having revolted against the rule of the Bourbon King Ferdinand II of the Two Sicilies, declares itself independent of Naples. 2 May 1848 A Prussian force invades Denmark in support of the independent German government of the combined duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. 18 May 1848 A National Assembly composed of liberal delegates elected from all over Germany meets in Frankfurt and suspends the German Confederation prior to discussing a more unified organization of the German states. 7 June 1848 Paul Gauguin, French post-Impressionist painter, born in Paris, France (–1903). 9 August 1848 Following the decisive Piedmontese defeat at Custozza in the Veneto, an armistice is concluded between Austria and Sardinia-Piedmont at Vigevano, Lombardy, by which Sardinia-Piedmont gives up Lombardy and accepts the status quo as it existed in Italy before the revolutions. 12 August 1848 George Stephenson, English engineer, inventor of the railway locomotive, dies in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, England (67). 26 August 1848 The Truce of Malmö is made between Denmark and Prussia

ending the war over the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. The truce establishes an armistice that lasts for 17 months, during which Schleswig–Holstein is jointly administered by Austria and Prussia. 29 August 1848 The Boers (Dutch settlers) in southern Africa are defeated at Boomplaats in the Orange Free State by British forces, and retire across the Vaal River, ensuring British sovereignty over the Orange River. 7 September 1848 The feudal practice of serfdom, by which peasants are tied to the land and controlled by their landlords to whom they owe dues of service, is abolished in Austria. 12 September 1848 Following the defeat of the Sonderbund, the armed league of the seven Catholic cantons, Switzerland adopts a new constitution by which the states become a federal union with strong central government. 17 September 1848 Count Josip Jellacic leads a Croat invasion of Hungary, disputing Magyar domination of the Habsburg monarchy's Slav peoples. 7 November 1848 MexicanAmerican War hero Zachary Taylor is elected as US president and Millard Fillmore as vice-president. 2 December 1848 The mentally unstable emperor Ferdinand I of Austria abdicates in favour of his nephew Franz Josef I. 5 December 1848 The Prussian National Assembly is dissolved and a constitution is imposed that includes universal male suffrage, but the ultimate authority of King Frederick Wilhelm IV is maintained. 19 December 1848 Emily Brontë, English novelist known for Wuthering Heights (1847), dies in Haworth, Yorkshire (now West Yorkshire), England (30). 1848 French scientists Alexandre Becquerel and Abel Niépce de Saint-Victor produce the first colour photographs using coatings of silver chloride. They are unable to be fix the images. 1848 John Curtis of Bangor, Maine, produces the first commerical chewing gum, 'State of Maine Pure Spruce Gum'. 1848 Scottish physicist William Thomson (Lord Kelvin) devises the absolute temperature scale. He defines absolute zero as -273°C/-459.67°F, where the molecular energy of molecules is zero. He also defines the quantities currently used to describe magnetic forces: magnitude of magnetic flux, beta, and H the magnetizing force. 1848 The English artists William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, and Dante Gabriel Rossetti found the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Rejecting the materialism and industrialization of Victorian England, they seek an art which

has the moral and religious integrity of the medieval world. 1848 The French artist and caricaturist Honoré Daumier completes his series of lithographs Les Gens de justice/Lawyers. 1848 The French writer François-Auguste-René, vicomte de Chateaubriand, publishes the first part of his autobiographical Mémoires d'outre-tombe/Memoirs from Beyond the Grave. 1848 The German political philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei/Manifesto of the Communist Party, one of the central works of Marxism. It contains the famous lines: 'Workers of the world unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains.' 1848–1849 German explorers Johann Ludwig Krapf and Johannes Rebmann travel into the interior of Africa from its eastern coast, exploring the region of Kenya, and becoming the first Europeans to sight Mounts Kilimanjaro (Rebmann, May 1848) and Kenya (Krapf, December 1849). 9 February 1849 The Papal States in Italy are proclaimed a republic (the Roman Republic) under the Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini. 4 March 1849 The Kremsier Constitution is promulgated in Austria, giving all national groups considerable autonomy, but is immediately replaced by a constitution in which the territories are deemed indivisible. 23 March 1849 The Austrian army of Count Joseph Radetzky decisively defeats the Piedmontese army of King Charles Albert at Novara, Piedmont, ending the war between them. Charles Albert, who had renewed the war only because of radical pressure, abdicates in favour of his son Victor Emmanuel II. 29 March 1849 Britain annexes the Indian province of Punjab by a treaty with the maharajah of Lahore, following the surrender of the Sikh army on 12 March. 3 April 1849 King Frederick Wilhelm IV of Prussia is unwilling to take the crown of a new united Germany from the people and wishes instead to receive it from the German princes. His vague reply is taken by the German National Assembly as a refusal. 15 May 1849 The capital of Sicily, Palermo, is entered by Neapolitan forces to end the revolt in Sicily, which is forced to resubmit to monarchical rule from the Italian kingdom of Naples. 21 May 1849 The core of the deputies to the German National Assembly in Frankfurt withdraw, having been unable to organize a peaceful parliamentary union of the German states. 3 July 1849 French troops enter Rome despite resistance by the Italian patriot

Giuseppe Garibaldi, and restore Pope Pius IX, ending the radical Roman Republic. 13 August 1849 The army of Lajos Kossuth's Hungarian Republic capitulates at Vilagos, Hungary, after determined but hopeless resistance, to Russian troops under General Ivan Paskievich, sent to aid Austria in putting down the Hungarian revolt. 7 October 1849 Edgar Allan Poe, US poet, critic, and short-story writer, dies in Baltimore, Maryland (40). 17 October 1849 Frédéric Chopin, French composer known for his works for piano, dies in Paris, France (39). 1849 English tea wholesaler Henry Charles Harrod buys a grocery store in London, England, which will grow to become one of the world's most famous department stores. 1849 French army officer Claude-Etienne Minié invents the Minié ball, a cylindrical bullet which increases the range of rifles from 200m/650 ft to 1,000 m/3,300 ft, and which is subsequently used by all European armies and in the American Civil War. 1849 French tailor M Jolly-Bellin invents dry-cleaning. 1849 The English writer and art critic John Ruskin publishes his influential treatise on architecture The Seven Lamps of Architecture. 1849 The English writer Charles Dickens begins to publish his novel David Copperfield in serial form. It is published as a book in 1850. Its full title is: The Personal History, Experience and Observations of David Copperfield the Younger, of Blunderstone Rookery, Which He Never Meant to be Published on Any Account. 1849 The German composer Robert Schumann completes his Manfred overture (Opus 115), based on a verse drama by the English poet George Gordon, Lord Byron; his piano pieces Waldscenen/Woodland Scenes (Opus 82); and his orchestral work Introduction and Allegro appassionato (Opus 92). 1849 The Hungarian composer Franz Liszt completes his work for piano and orchestra Totentanz/Dance of Death and his piano transcription of Richard Wagner's overture to Tannhäuser. 1849 The Laing Store, in New York City, designed by the US architect James Bogardus, is completed. It is one of the first public buildings to have a cast-iron façade, a feature which allows the use of pre-fabricated parts. 23 April 1850 William Wordsworth, English Romantic poet, and poet laureate 1843–50, dies in Grasmere, Westmorland, England (80).

2 July 1850 Robert Peel, British prime minister 1834–35 and 1841–46, founder of the Conservative Party, dies in London, England (62). 10 July 1850 Following the death of US president Zachary Taylor of cholera the previous day, he is succeeded by Vice-President Millard Fillmore, who is sworn as 13th president of the USA. 5 August 1850 Guy de Maupassant, French short-story writer in the Naturalist school, born near Dieppe, France (–1893). 5 August 1850 The British Parliament passes the Australia Government Act, granting representative government to South Australia, Tasmania, and Victoria (which is separated from New South Wales). 18 August 1850 Honoré de Balzac, French novelist whose writings helped establish the modern form of the novel, dies in Paris, France (51). 9 September 1850 The US Congress passes the Texas and New Mexico Act, establishing the boundaries of Texas and New Mexico, and the Utah Act, establishing the boundary of Utah. As part of the so-called Compromise of 1850, the fate of slavery in the prospective states of New Mexico and Utah would be decided by the principal of popular sovereignty. 10 October 1850 The Taiping Rebellion breaks out in China under Hong Xiuquan, who takes the cities of Nanjing and Shanghai, proclaims himself emperor, and attacks Beijing. 13 November 1850 Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish novelist who writes Kidnapped, Treasure Island, and The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, born in Edinburgh, Scotland (–1894). 28 November 1850 As a result of Russian mediation, Felix, Prince zu Schwarzenberg, of Austria and Otto von Manteuffel of Prussia sign the Punctation of Olmütz, by which Prussia subordinates itself to Austria and recognizes the Frankfurt diet (assembly) of the German Confederation. 1850 British inventor Francis Bakewell invents a 'copying telegraph' that can transmit images or print painted with varnish on one conducting roller to another. It is an early version of the facsimile machine and a forerunner of television. 1850 English engineer Robert Stephenson's high-level bridge at Newcastle upon Tyne, England, opens. It is a two deck structure with railways on the upper level and a roadway underneath, with the iron decks carried on five stone pillars. 1850 German mathematical physicist Rudolf Clausius formulates the second law of thermodynamics in Über die Bewegende Kraft der Wärme/On the Driving Power of Heat.

1850 The Bavarian immigrant Levi Strauss makes the first jeans out of canvas in San Francisco, California. They are originally designed for Californian gold miners. 1850 The English artist John Everett Millais paints Christ in the House of his Parents. 1850 The English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, publishes In Memoriam, a long elegy on the death of his friend Arthur Hallam, anonymously. 1850 The English writer Elizabeth Barrett Browning publishes her poetry collection Poems, which contains the sonnet sequence Sonnets from the Portuguese. 1850 The German composer Robert Schumann completes his Symphony No. 3 (Opus 97), the Rhenish. 1850 The opera Lohengrin by the German composer Richard Wagner is first performed, in Weimar, Germany. The wedding march becomes widely used at marriage services. c. 1850 The Welsh physicist William Grove demonstrates that steam in contact with a hot platinum wire decomposes into hydrogen and oxygen, thus proving the thermal dissociation of atoms within a molecule. 1 February 1851 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, English writer, author of Frankenstein, dies in London, England (53). 15 March 1851 An act drawn up by the French minister of education, Frederick, Vicomte de Falloux, is passed, reintroducing clerical control of education in France. 16 March 1851 Spain agrees a concordat with the papacy by which Catholicism becomes the sole faith in Spain and the church gains control of education and the press. 1 May–18 September 1851 The Great Exhibition is held in Hyde Park, London, England. Devised by Prince Albert, it is the first exhibition to display the latest technical innovations in industry, from both Britain and Europe. Exhibits are housed in the Crystal Palace, a large iron and glass structure, designed by English architect Joseph Paxton. 10 July 1851 Louis Daguerre, French painter and physicist who invented the first practical method of photography, the daguerreotype, dies in Bry-sur-Marne, France (62). 12 August 1851 US inventor Isaac Merrit Singer patents the first practical domestic sewing machine for general use, in Boston, Massachusetts. His design, which enables continuous and curved stitching, and allows any part of the

material to be worked on, sets the pattern for all subsequent sewing machines. 14 September 1851 James Fenimore Cooper, US novelist who wrote of life on the frontier, dies in Cooperstown, New York (61). 18 September 1851 The New York Times newspaper is launched in the USA, edited by Henry J Raymond. 2 December 1851 The French president, Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, carries out a coup d'état to extend his presidency and give him more power. 19 December 1851 J(oseph) M(allord) W(illiam) Turner, English Romantic landscape painter, dies in London, England (76). 31 December 1851 The Austrian constitution of 1849 is abolished, consolidating the return to conservative rule in the Habsburg Empire. 1851 As the USA becomes increasingly wealthy, women's fashions grow more expensive, with much use of silk and velvet. 1851 French scientist Jean-Bernard-Léon Foucault proves that the Earth rotates by using a pendulum 67 m/220 ft long in Paris, France. The pendulum always swings in the same plane and the Earth rotates underneath it. 1851 German businessman Paul Julius, Baron von Reuter, founds the Reuters News Agency, in London, England. 1851 Populations (in millions) are China, 430; German States and free cities, 34; France, 33; Britain, 20.8; Ireland, 6.5; Italy, 24; USA, 23; Austrian Empire, 16. 1851 The Crystal Palace, in London, England, designed by the English architect and gardener Joseph Paxton, is completed. Designed to house the Great Exhibition of 1851, it is of a revolutionary design employing only prefabricated units of glass and iron and is the largest building in the world, 563 m/1,847 ft long, 139 m/456 ft wide, and 31 m/108 ft tall. It is destroyed by fire in 1936. 1851 The English scientist William Henry Fox Talbot takes the first high-speed flash photograph. He uses a spark produced from the discharge of a Leyden jar battery for the flash. 1851 The English sculptor F Scott Archer develops the wet-collodion photographic process. Collodion-coated (nitrocellulose) glass plates are exposed in the camera while still wet and then developed and fixed immediately. It permits instantaneous exposures but requires photographers in the field to take portable darkrooms. 1851 The opera Rigoletto by the Italian composer Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi is first performed, in Venice, Italy. It is based on the play Le Roi s'amuse/

The King Amuses Himself, published in 1832 by Victor Hugo. The opera is first performed in Britain in 1853 (in London, England), and in the USA in 1855 (in New York City). 1851 The US writer Herman Melville publishes his novel Moby Dick, or the Whale, his major work and one of the great US novels of the 19th century. 1851 There is a record number of Irish immigrants to the USA, in the wake of the 1845 potato crop failure. 1851 US industrialist William Kelly develops a method of removing impurities from pig iron by blowing air through the molten mass. In oxidizing the carbon impurities, the temperature rises and the process can be used to produce wrought iron or steel. It results in the production of large quantities of cheap steel. 1851–1860 Emigration to the USA from Britain is 423,964, and from Ireland, 914,119. 1851–1860 Photographic exposure times become short enough to capture movement. 17 January 1852 The Sand River Convention is made between the Boers (Dutch settlers) and the British government, allowing the Boers to establish the South African Republic (Transvaal). 3 February 1852 Juan Manuel de Rosas is overthrown as dictator of Argentina at the Battle of Caseros by the insurgent Justo de Urquiza, supported by Brazilian and Uruguayan forces. 1 April 1852 The Second Anglo-Burmese War breaks out after the expiry of a British ultimatum to the king of Burma to pay compensation to British merchants following disputes between the traders and local inhabitants. 20 April 1852 Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes Uncle Tom's Cabin in book form. The book, previously serialized in the antislavery broadsheet National Era, is instantly controversial and popular, selling 1.2 million copies by mid-1853. 25 June 1852 Antonio Gaudí, Spanish architect known for his free-flowing forms and rich colours, born in Reus, Spain (–1926). 30 June 1852 A British act of Parliament grants a new constitution providing for representative government for the colony of New Zealand. 14 September 1852 Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, British army commander and Tory prime minister 1828–30, dies in Walmer Castle, Kent, England (83).

24 September 1852 French engineer Henri Giffard flies the first steam-powered airship a distance of 28 km/17 mi, at an average speed of 10 kph/6 mph. 2 December 1852 The Second French Empire is proclaimed. President LouisNapoléon Bonaparte becomes Emperor Napoleon III. 1852 British publisher Samuel Orchart Beeton launches the first mass-market women's magazine, the Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine. Its popularity is partly due to the contributions of his wife, Isabella Beeton, on domestic management. 1852 English scientist William Fox Talbot patents a photolythic engraving method that involves photographing images through a fine mesh and developing them on sensitized steel plates. It leads to the development of photogravure. 1852 Polygamy becomes a tenet of the Mormon faith in the USA. 1852 The Butchers' Guild of Frankfurt introduces frankfurters in Germany. 1852 The English artist Ford Madox Brown paints The Last of England. 1852 The English writer William Makepeace Thackeray publishes his novel The History of Henry Esmond. 1852 The Houses of Parliament, in London, England, designed by the English architect Charles Barry, are completed, one of the most prominent examples of the Gothic Revival style. The interiors are by Augustus Pugin. 1852 US inventor and machine-shop owner Elisha Otis installs, in a factory in Albany, New York, a freight lift equipped with an automatic safety device that prevents it from falling if the lifting chain or rope breaks. This leads to the passenger elevator, making the building of skyscrapers more practical. The first permanent Otis and Son elevator is installed in the Haughwort Department Store in New York in 1857. 30 March 1853 Vincent van Gogh, Dutch painter whose work inspires the expressionists, born in Zundert, the Netherlands (–1890). 14 July 1853 The first World's Fair, modelled on the Great Exhibition of London, England, in 1851, opens in New York. 15 November 1853 Queen Maria II of Portugal (known as Maria da Glória dies and is succeeded by her young son Pedro V, who initially rules under a regency. 1853 The British confectionery company Fry's produces the chocolate bar Fry's Chocolate Stick, later renamed Fry's Chocolate Cream. 1853 The English writer Matthew Arnold publishes Poems: A New Edition. It

contains 'The Scholar Gipsy' and 'Sohrab and Rustum'. 1853 The French architect Georges-Eugène, Baron Haussmann becomes Prefect of the Seine Department and begins reconstruction of Paris, France, using long wide avenues that converge on focal points. He begins with the Bois de Boulogne. 1853 The opera Il trovatore/The Troubadour by the Italian composer Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi is first performed, in Rome, Italy. It is first performed in both Britain and the USA in 1855 (in London, England, and New York City). His opera La traviata/The Fallen Woman is also first performed, in Venice, Italy. It is based on the novel The Lady of the Camelias, published in 1848 by Alexandre Dumas fils. It is first performed in both Britain and the USA in 1856 (in London, England, and New York City). 1853 The US chef George Crum creates potato crisps in Saratoga Springs, New York. The product is so popular that general commercial production begins almost immediately. 1853 The US inventor Richard Hoe improves his rotary press, developing the web press which can print 18,000 sheets per hour on both sides. 1853 There are 48,000 km/30,000 mi of railroad track in the USA, up from 14,400 km/9,000 mi in 1850. 1853 Tighter licensing laws in Scotland make pubs close at 11 p.m. and all day on Sunday. Illicit stills proliferate as a result. 12 March 1854 Britain and France conclude an alliance with the Ottoman Empire against Russia. 7 July 1854 Georg Simon Ohm, German physicist who discovered Ohm's law, which relates electric current to voltage, dies in Munich, Germany (67). 12 July 1854 George Eastman, US inventor, manufacturer, and philanthropist who introduces the Kodak camera, born in Waterville, New York (–1932). 8 August 1854 The 'Four Points' issued by Britain, Austria, and France from the Austrian capital, Vienna, state their conditions of peace with Russia to be Russia's abandonment of its claim to a protectorate over the Ottoman sultan's Christian subjects, revision of the Straits settlement in the interests of European powers, free passage of the mouth of the River Danube, and a guarantee of the integrity of the Danubian principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia, and of Serbia. 14 September 1854 Britain and France land unopposed in the Crimea to begin the Crimean War with Russia over its attempt to increase its power in southeast Europe at the expense of the Ottoman Empire. 20 September 1854 British and French troops are victorious over Russian forces

at the Battle of the Alma in the Crimean War. 17 October 1854 English and French forces begin the siege of the Russian-held city of Sevastopol in the Crimea. 25 October 1854 British and French forces win a narrow victory over Russia at great cost at Balaclava in the Crimea, following cavalry charges of the British Light and Heavy Brigades. 5 November 1854 British and French forces defeat the Russians at the Battle of Inkerman. November 1854 English nurse Florence Nightingale arrives in Scutari, Ottoman Empire, and introduces sanitary measures in an effort to reduce deaths from cholera, dysentery, and typhus during the Crimean War. 9 December 1854 The English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, publishes his poem 'The Charge of the Light Brigade', a poetic description of the disastrous attack on October 25 1854 by the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava, during the Crimean War. 1854 English physician John Snow traces a local epidemic of cholera and typhoid to a communal pump in Broad Street, London, England. He discovers that the well's water supply is being contaminated by a leakage from a neighbouring sewage tank. 1854 French scientist Henri-Etienne Sainte-Claire Deville develops a new process for making aluminium. 1854 The British climber Alfred Wills climbs the Wetterhorn from Grindelwald in the Alps, an event which is regarded as the start of mountaineering as a sport. Within the next 11 years all the Alpine peaks are reached except La Meije. 1854 The English artist John Everett Millais paints Ophelia. 1854 The first baby show takes place, in Springfield, Ohio. 1854 The German historian Theodor Mommsen publishes the first volume of his Römische Geschichte/History of Rome. The last volume appears in 1856. 1854 The US poet and essayist Henry David Thoreau publishes Walden, or Life in the Woods. His best-known work, it records his life in a cabin on the shore of Walden Pond in eastern Massachusetts between 1845 and 1847. 1854 US inventor Elisha Graves Otis demonstrates his safety lift at the Crystal Palace Exposition in New York by riding in it and ordering the rope to be cut. 2 March 1855 Following the death of the reactionary tsar Nicholas I of Russia, he

is succeeded by the more moderate Alexander II. 31 March 1855 Charlotte Brontë, English novelist who wrote Jane Eyre (1847), dies in Haworth, Yorkshire (now West Yorkshire), England (38). March 1855 Violence and fraud mar Kansas' territorial election, as pro-slavery partisans from Missouri cross into Kansas to swell the ranks of pro-slavery legislators. Despite evidence of fraud, the Pierce administration endorses the election results. 21 April 1855 The first bridge across the Mississippi, between Rock Island, Illinois, and Davenport, Iowa, opens to rail traffic. 16 July 1855 The British Parliament establishes responsible government throughout the Australian states, except for Western Australia. 11 September 1855 British and French forces enter the Crimean city of Sevastopol after the besieged Russians within capitulate. 3 November 1855–20 May 1856 Scottish missionary and explorer David Livingstone completes his crossing of the African continent by travelling eastwards from Linyanti on the River Zambezi to Quelimane in Portuguese East Africa, visiting and naming the Victoria Falls (17 November 1855) on the way. 1855 Austrian chemist Franz Köller adds tungsten to steel to make tungsten steel. It is harder than normal steel and tools made from the alloy last up to six times as long as others. 1855 British chemist Alexander Parkes invents the first synthetic plastic. 1855 The English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, publishes Maud and Other Poems. 1855 The English poet Robert Browning publishes his collection of poetry Men and Women. 1855 The English social scientist Herbert Spencer publishes Principles of Psychology, in which, several years before Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species, he sets out a theory of evolution. 1855 The English writer Anthony Trollope publishes his novel The Warden. 1855 The French physiologist Claude Bernard discovers that ductless glands produce hormones, which he calls 'internal secretions'. 1855 The German biologist Rudolf Virchow discovers that 'every cell is derived from a cell' – the principle of cell division. 1855 The Sault Ste Marie Canal, between lakes Superior and Huron, is

completed. It bypasses the St Mary's River rapids and makes the Great Lakes a navigable waterway. 1855 The US writer Henry Wadsworth Longfellow publishes his long narrative poem The Song of Hiawatha, one of his best-known works. 30 March 1856 The integrity of the Ottoman Empire is recognized by the signatories to the Treaty of Paris ending the Crimean War, which guarantees the Danubian principalities. Russia cedes Bessarabia, the Black Sea is to be neutral, and the River Danube is to be free to ships of all nations. 24 April 1856 Henri-Philippe Pétain, French general during World War I, born in Cauchy-à-la-Tour, France (–1951). 6 May 1856 Sigmund Freud, Austrian neurologist, founder of psychoanalysis, born in Freiberg, Moravia (now Príbor, Czech Republic) (–1939). 12 July 1856 Natal, formerly part of the British Cape Colony in southern Africa, is established as a separate British crown colony with an elected assembly. 26 July 1856 George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist, literary critic, and socialist propagandist, born in Dublin, Ireland (–1950). 8 October 1856 The Arrow Incident, when a ship flying the British flag is boarded by Chinese who arrest members of its crew, provokes the outbreak of the Second Opium War. 16 October 1856 Oscar O'Flahertie Wills Wilde, Irish poet and dramatist, born in Dublin, Ireland (–1900). 1 November 1856 War breaks out between Britain and Persia after the latter occupies the city of Herat in Afghanistan (known as 'the key of India'). 6 December 1856 The South African Republic (Transvaal) is organized under the political leadership of Marthinius Wessel Pretorius, from the four republics of Lydenburg, Potchefstroom, Zontpansberg, and Utrecht. 28 December 1856 (Thomas) Woodrow Wilson, twenty-eighth president of the USA 1913–21, a Democrat, born in Staunton, Virginia (–1924). 1856 English inventor Henry Bessemer obtains a patent for the Bessemer converter, which converts cast iron into steel by blowing air through molten iron. The converter is tilted to take a charge of molten pig iron, then turned to the vertical and air is blown in at the bottom, then tilted again to pour out the molten steel when conversion is complete. It is an efficient way of making steel. 1856 French chemist and microbiologist Louis Pasteur establishes that microorganisms are responsible for fermentation, thus establishing the discipline of

microbiology. 1856 German naturalist Johann Fuhrott discovers the first fossil remains of a Neanderthal in Quaternary bed in Feldhofen Cave near Hochdal cave above the Neander Valley, Germany. They cause immediate debate about whether they are the remains of ancient humans or the deformed bones of a modern human. 1856 The English poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning publishes her novel in verse Aurora Leigh (the first printing is incorrectly dated 1857). 1856 The French writer Gustave Flaubert publishes his novel Madame Bovary in serial form. Appearing as a book in 1857, it is one of the major French novels of the 19th century. 1856 The US historian John Lothrop Motley publishes Rise of the Dutch Republic. 1856 The US writer Herman Melville publishes his story collection Piazza Tales, which includes 'Bartleby the Scrivener'. 14 June 1857 A commercial treaty is signed between France and Russia. France is developing freer trade and Russia is more receptive to western ideas under Tsar Alexander II. 10 October 1857 The Irish Republican Brotherhood (whose members are known as Fenians) is founded in New York City to fight for Irish independence from Britain 16 November 1857 British troops, under the Scottish general Sir Colin Campbell, commander of the forces in India, future field marshal and Baron Clyde, relieve the north Indian city of Lucknow, besieged by Indian rebels. 26 November 1857 Ferdinand de Saussure, Swiss linguist whose ideas about the structure of language lay the foundation of modern linguistics, born in Geneva, Switzerland (–1913). 3 December 1857 Joseph Conrad (pen-name of Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski), Polish-born British novelist whose works include Heart of Darkness, Nostromo, and Chance, born in Berdichev, Poland (–1924). 6 December 1857 British forces recapture the rebel-held city of Cawnpore (now Kanpur) from Indian rebel forces. 1857 German mathematical physicist Rudolf Clausius develops the mathematics of the kinetic theory of heat and demonstrates that evaporation occurs when more molecules leave the surface of a liquid than return to it, and that the higher the temperature, the greater the number of molecules that will leave. 1857 The British army officer Henry Creswicke Rawlinson deciphers the

Mesopotamian cuneiform. 1857 The English historian Henry Thomas Buckle publishes the first part of his History of Civilization. The second part appears in 1861. 1857 The English writer Anthony Trollope publishes his novel Barchester Towers. 1857 The English writer Thomas Hughes publishes Tom Brown's Schooldays, which becomes a classic of English 'public school' literature. 1857 The English writer William Makepeace Thackeray begins to publish his novel The Virginians (which he also illustrates) in serial form. It appears as a book in 1859. 1857 The first toilet paper, Gayetty's Medicated Paper, is launched in the USA. 1857 The French writer Charles Baudelaire publishes his poetry collection Les Fleurs du mal/Flowers of Evil, one of the major works of 19th-century European poetry. It is banned for obscenity and the author, publishers, and printers fined. An enlarged edition appears in 1861. 1857 The Hungarian composer Franz Liszt completes his Faust Symphonie/Faust Symphony. It is based on Goethe's verse drama Faust, published in 1808. He also completes his Symphonic Poem Hunnenschlacht/Battle of the Huns. 1857–1859 British explorers John Hanning Speke and Richard Burton explore inland east Africa, becoming the first Europeans to reach Lake Tanganyika (February 1858). Speke continues northwards, and on 30 July 1858 he visits and names Lake Victoria, which he guesses to be the source of the Nile. 31 January 1858 English engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel's steamship Great Eastern is launched. With a displacement of 19,222 tonnes/18,918 tons, and 211 m/692 ft long, it is the largest ship in the world. It has two sets of engines that drive two screw propellers and two paddlewheels, and is the first steamship with a double iron hull. Its design serves as the prototype for modern ocean liners. 23 April 1858 Max Planck, German theoretical physicist who is the originator of quantum theory, born in Kiel, in the duchy of Schleswig (–1947). 26 June 1858 The Treaty of Tianjin between China and Britain ends the Second Opium War, by which China opens more ports to British commerce and legalizes the opium trade. A similar treaty is signed between the Chinese and the French on 27 June. 8 July 1858 The British declare the Indian Mutiny officially at an end. 14 July 1858 Emmeline Pankhurst, militant English suffragette, born in Manchester, England (–1928).

2 August 1858 British Columbia in Canada is organized as a British colony following the discovery of gold there. 12 August 1858 The first message by transatlantic telegraph cable is sent from Newfoundland, Canada, to Valentia, Ireland. 16 August 1858 Queen Victoria of Britain and US president James Buchanan are the first to exchange messages on the first successful Atlantic telegraph cable laid between Valentia, Ireland, and Newfoundland, Canada. The cable lasts for only 27 days. 8 November 1858 The formal independence of Montenegro is accepted by the sultan of the Ottoman Empire, together with the borders of the former Ottoman possession as fixed by France, Britain, Prussia, Russia, and the Ottoman Empire, following friction between Montenegro and the Ottomans. 1858 About 100,000 Americans move west in reaction to the discovery of gold at two sites in the Colorado territory. 1858 Australian cricketer Thomas Wills and his cousin Henry Colden Harrison devise Australian Rules football, and help to form the first club, Melbourne Football Club. 1858 English chemists William Henry Perkin and B F Duppa synthesize the amino acid, glycine. 1858 German chemist Friedrich Kekulé von Stradonitz publishes Uber die Konstitution und die Metamorphosen der chemischen Verbindungen and über die chemische Natur des Kohlenstoffs/On the Constitution and Changes of Chemical Compounds and on the Chemical Nature of Carbon, in which he shows that carbon atoms can link together to form long chains, the basis of organic molecules. 1858 Saint Patrick's Cathedral in New York City, designed by the US architect James Renwick, is completed. It is one of the best-known examples of American Gothic Revival. 1858 Stone tools in situ with Pleistocene animals are discovered by English school-master William Pengelly at Windmill Hill Cave at Brixham, Dorset, England. They demonstrate that human beings are as old as now extinct animals thus founding the science of prehistory. 1858 The British physician Henry Gray publishes Anatomy of the Human Body, Descriptive and Surgical (Gray's Anatomy). It remains the standard text in anatomy for over 100 years. 1858 The comic opera Orphée aux enfers/Orpheus in the Underworld by the German-born French composer Jacques Offenbach is first performed, in Paris,

France. It is an immediate success and popularizes the French dance the cancan. 1858 The French inventor Louis Ducos du Hauron patents a method of making colour photographs. He uses colour filters and prints on zinc plates. 1858 The German biologist Rudolf Virchow publishes Die Cellularpathologie in ihrer Begründung auf physiologische und pathologische Gewebenlehre/Cellular Pathology as Based upon Physiological and Pathological Histology. In it he expands his ideas on the cell as the basis of life and disease, establishing cellular pathology as essential in understanding disease. 27 January 1859 Kaiser Wilhelm II, German emperor and king of Prussia 1888–1918, born in Potsdam, near Berlin, Prussia (–1941). 3 May 1859 France declares war on Austria in response to the Austrian invasion of the Italian kingdom of Piedmont to dispute plans for Italian unification. 22 May 1859 Arthur Conan Doyle, Scottish novelist who creates the detective Sherlock Holmes, born in Edinburgh, Scotland (–1930). 14 June 1859 Prussia begins to mobilize against France in support of Austria, opposing the unification of Italy. 24 June 1859 Austrian forces, opposing the unification of Italy, are defeated in a decisive battle at Solferino, near Verona, Italy, by French and Piedmontese forces. 30 June 1859 The French tightrope walker Charles Blondin (pseudonym of JeanFrançois Gravelet) crosses Niagara Falls, between Canada and the USA, on a tightrope. About 25,000 people witness the crossing, which takes five minutes. 8 July 1859 King Oscar I of Sweden dies and is succeeded by Charles XV. 11 July 1859 The preliminary Peace of Villafranca temporarily ends the conflict between France and Austria. Austria is to cede the Italian states of Parma and Lombardy to France, for subsequent cession to Sardinia-Piedmont; Tuscany and Modena are to be restored to their pre-revolutionary rulers, and Venice is to remain Austrian. The treaty causes the Piedmontese prime minister Count Camillo Benso di Cavour to resign in disgust. 28 August 1859 US engineer Edwin Drake drills the world's first oil well, at Titusville, Pennsylvania. Drilled to a depth of 21 m/69 ft, it produces 1,818 l/400 gal per day. His success, coinciding with a growing demand for oil products, especially kerosene, leads to further drilling. 15 September 1859 Isambard Kingdom Brunel, British marine engineer who built the first transatlantic steamer, the Great Western (1838), and the Great Eastern (1858), the largest ship in the world for 40 years, dies in Westminster, London,

England (53). 27 October 1859 Theodore ('Teddy') Roosevelt, twenty-sixth president of the USA 1901–09, a Republican, born in New York City (–1919). 24 November 1859 Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species by Natural Selection, which expounds his theory of evolution by natural selection, and by implication denies the truth of biblical creation and God's hand in Nature. It sells out immediately and revolutionizes biology. 1859 Belgian inventor Etienne Lenoir builds the first successful internal combustion engine, which runs on a mixture of coal gas and air. Ignition is supplied by a high-tension spark obtained from a battery and induction coil. It is the first gas engine and development follows rapidly. 1859 The Gloire, the first ironclad battleship, is launched in France. Designed by French naval architect Stanislas-Henri-Laurent Dupuy de Lôme, its iron plates, 11 cm/4.5 in and 12 cm/4.6 in thick, are attached to the outside of a 66 cm/26 in thick wooden hull. 1859 The Australian landowner Thomas Austin imports two dozen English rabbits, so that he can shoot them for sport: the rabbits multiply rapidly, causing a major agricultural problem in Australia. 1859 The Cachar Club, the first polo club of the modern era, is founded in Assam, India. 1859 The English philosopher John Stuart Mill publishes On Liberty. His most important work, it is an attempt to safeguard the rights of individuals in a democratic society. 1859 The English writer Charles Dickens publishes his novel A Tale of Two Cities. 1859 The English writer Edward Fitzgerald publishes The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam of Naishapur anonymously. A translation of the poetry of the 12thcentury Persian poet and astronomer Omar Khayyam, it becomes very popular. 1859 The French artist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres paints The Turkish Bath. 1859 The French artist Jean-François Millet paints The Angelus. Through reproductions, this becomes one of the best-known images in late 19th-century France. 1859 The opera Faust by the French composer Charles-François Gounod is first performed, in Paris, France. It is based on Goethe's verse drama Faust, published in 1808. 1859 The Russian writer Ivan Alexandrovich Goncharov publishes his comic novel

Oblomov. 1859 US businessman George Bissell distils kerosene from crude oil and markets it as lamp fuel. 17 January 1860 Anton Chekhov, Russian writer and dramatist known for his mastery of the short story, born in Taganrog, Russia (–1904). 23 January 1860 The Cobden–Chevalier Treaty (negotiated between the British Liberal politician and economist Richard Cobden and the French economist Michel Chevalier) establishes a substantial degree of free trade between Britain and France. 17 March 1860 The Second Maori War breaks out in New Zealand, arising out of grievances against British settlers encroaching on aboriginal territory. 19 March 1860 William Jennings Bryan, US lawyer, three-time Democratic presidential candidate, and prosecuting attorney in the Scopes trial against Tennessee schoolteacher John T Scopes for teaching Darwinism, born in Salem, Illinois (–1925). 3 April 1860 The Pony Express begins mail service between St Louis, Missouri and Sacramento, California. Riders change horses at 157 stations along the 2,897 km/1800 mi route and mail takes ten days. Within a few months it is made obsolete by the establishment of the transcontinental telegraph system. 5 May 1860 The Italian soldier and patriot Giuseppe Garibaldi and his Redshirts ('The Thousand') sail from Genoa, northwest Italy, to attempt to complete the unification of Italy. 30 June 1860 At the British Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Oxford, Darwin's theory of evolution is widely discussed, especially its implications for the origin of humans among apes. Conservative English cleric Archbishop Samuel Wilberforce joins forces with scientists opposed to Darwin's theories. English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley aggressively defends Darwin, earning the reputation of his 'bulldog'. is an important advocate of his friend Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection. August 1860–June 1861 Irish settler Robert Burke and English surveyor William Wills lead an expedition out of Victoria to cross Australia from south to north. The four-man advance party turns back only a few miles from the coast of the Gulf of Carpentaria and misses the support party in the desert of Cooper Creek; only one member of the expedition, John King, survives. 7 September 1860 The Italian soldier and patriot Giuseppe Garibaldi and his followers enter Naples as part of their attempt to unify Italy, forcing King Francis II of Naples to flee. 11 September 1860 King Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia-Piedmont invades the

Papal States (which he intends to annex as part of a unified Italy under his sovereignty), after the rising in favour of union with Italy there on 8 September. 17 October 1860 A 3-round 36-hole strokeplay competition for professional golfers at Prestwick, Scotland, regarded as the first British Open golf championship, is won by Scottish golfer Willie Park, Sr. 20 October 1860 The October Diploma amends the Austrian constitution, restoring the federal institutions as they existed before 1848. The Habsburg territories are granted considerable autonomy in the hope of conciliating the subject nationalities. 1860 British publisher Jeremiah Smith invents the self-adhesive envelope. 1860 English nurse Florence Nightingale establishes the Nightingale School for Nurses. The first nursing school in England, it establishes nursing as a profession for women. 1860 The British Adulteration of Food Law is passed after medical testimony that some food colouring is fatally poisonous. 1860 The English writer George Eliot (pseudonym of Mary Anne Evans) publishes her novel The Mill on the Floss. 1860 The English writer William Wilkie Collins publishes his novel The Woman in White. 1860 The Russian writer Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev publishes his novel Nakanune/ On the Eve. 1860 The Swiss art historian Jakob Christoph Burckhardt publishes Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien/The Culture of the Renaissance in Italy. His most important work, it has a profound effect on the study of art history. c. 1860 The French chemist and microbiologist Louis Pasteur develops the process of pasteurization: sterilizing milk and other beverages by heating to a high temperature for a few minutes to kill micro-organisms. 2 January 1861 King Frederick Wilhelm IV of Prussia dies and is succeeded by his brother Wilhelm I. February 1861 South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana form the Confederate States of America in a constitutional convention at Montgomery, Alabama. 3 March 1861 An edict emancipating serfs on private Russian estates is proclaimed, ending the medieval practice which ties them to their landlords.

17 March 1861 The kingdom of Italy is formally proclaimed by the first Italian parliament. King Victor Emmanuel is proclaimed king. 19 May 1861 Nellie Melba, Australian soprano, born in Richmond, near Melbourne, Australia (–1931). 25 June 1861 Sultan Abdul Mejid of the Ottoman Empire dies and is succeeded by his brother Abdul Aziz. 30 June 1861 Elizabeth Barrett Browning, English poet and wife of the English poet Robert Browning, dies in Florence, Italy (55). 11 November 1861 King Pedro V of Portugal dies and is succeeded by Louis I. 1861 A telegraph wire is strung across the USA between New York City and San Francisco, California; it follows the route of the pony express which it now makes redundant. 1861 Belgian chemist Ernest Solvay patents a method for the economic production of sodium carbonate, washing soda, from sodium chloride, ammonia, and carbon dioxide. 1861 French inventor Pierre Michaux and his son Ernst construct the first successful bicycle with pedals. The pedals are attached to the front wheel, and because it has steel tyres and no springs it is called the 'bone-shaker'. 1861 Isabella Beeton writes her Book of Household Management, a comprehensive domestic manual for housewives and mothers in Britain based on her articles in the Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine. 1861 The first Archaeopteryx feather is found in upper Jurassic limestones of Solnhofen, Bavaria (now in Germany). Archaeopteryx has many reptilian features and is 55–190 million years old. It is still the oldest known bird. 1861 The population of Russia is 76 million, 32 million in the USA, 23.1 million in Britain, 5.7 million in Ireland, and 25 million in Italy. 1861–1865 The USA, or the North, has a booming economy during the Civil War as production and profits soar. There is inflation, too; prices rise 117% and wages rise just 43%. 1861–1870 Emigration to the USA from Britain totals 606,896; from Ireland it is 435,779. 30 January 1862 The Swedish-born US engineer John Ericsson's ironclad warship Monitor is launched. Steam-powered and propeller-driven, and with an armoured revolving gun turret, its design sets the pattern for future warships.

8–9 March 1862 The Confederate warship Merrimack and the ironclad warship Virginia sink the Union Cumberland and Congress at Hampton Roads, Virginia, but are forced to withdraw by the ironclad Union vessel Monitor, in the first battle between two ironclad warships. 31 March 1862 Arthur Griffith, Irish journalist and nationalist, founder of Sinn Fein (1905) and president of the Irish Republic (1922), born in Dublin, Ireland (–1922). 6 April 1862 Union and Confederate soldiers clash at Shiloh, Tennessee, with the Union forces getting the better of the battle by the end of the second day. Each side suffers roughly 10,000 casualties. 5 June 1862 The Treaty of Saigon is signed between France and Annam (part of modern Vietnam) by which France annexes half of Cochin-China (also part of modern Vietnam), which has been under blockade since 1858. 22 August 1862 Claude Debussy, French composer, born in Saint-Germain-enLaye, France (–1918). 29 August 1862 The Italian soldier and patriot Giuseppe Garibaldi attempts to conquer Rome and make it part of Italy, but is captured at Aspromonte by Italian troops sent to protect the papacy and forestall foreign intervention. 29–30 August 1862 In the Second Battle of Bull Run (known to Confederates as Second Manassas), Confederate forces effectively block a Union advance on the Confederate capitol, Richmond, Virginia. 11 September 1862 O Henry (pen-name of William Sydney Porter), US shortstory writer and novelist, born in Greensboro, North Carolina (–1910). 17 September 1862 In the Battle of Antietam, Maryland, (Sharpsburg, in Confederate parlance), the Union army foils a Confederate advance on Washington, DC. Some 23,000 soldiers fall on this, the war's costliest day of fighting. President Abraham Lincoln uses the Union 'victory' as a pretext for issuing the Emancipation Proclamation five days later. 7 October 1862 The Prussian diet (state assembly) again rejects an increase in the military budget and is adjourned, so that Chancellor Otto von Bismarck rules without a budget for four years. November 1862 US inventor Richard Gatling patents a ten-barrel, crankoperated machine gun; it can fire 320 rounds per minute. 1862 Belgian inventor Etienne Lenoir constructs the first car with an internal combustion engine and makes a 10 km/6 mi trip. 1862 The English philosopher John Stuart Mill publishes Utilitarianism, an

influential work on moral philosophy. 1862 The English writer Christina Georgina Rossetti publishes her poetry collection Goblin Market and Other Poems. 1862 The first casino opens in Monte Carlo, Monaco. 1862 The French artist Edouard Manet paints Lola de Valence and Olympia, a painting of a naked prostitute. Refused by the official Academy, it is exhibited in 1863 at the 'Salon des Refusés', where it causes a public outcry. 1862 The French writer Victor Hugo publishes his novel Les Misérables. 1862 The Hungarian composer Franz Liszt completes his orchestral work Mephistowaltzer/Mephisto Waltz No. 1. 1862 The International Exhibition, a world trade fair, takes place in London, England. 1862 The Russian writer Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev publishes his novel Ottsy i deti/Fathers and Sons. Depicting the conflict between conservatives and radicals, the book is attacked by both. 1862 The US astronomer Alvan Clark observes the companion star of Sirius – the first white dwarf to be discovered. 1 January 1863 Pierre, Baron de Coubertin, French administrator responsible for the revival of the Olympic Games and who serves as the first president of the International Olympic Committee 1896–1925, born in Paris, France (–1937). 10 January 1863 The Metropolitan Railway opens between Faringdon Street and Bishops' Road, Paddington, in London, England. The world's first subway system, it is 6 km/3.75 mi long, uses steam locomotives, and carries 9.5 million passengers during the first year. 17 January 1863 David Lloyd George, Welsh Liberal politician, British prime minister 1916–22, born in Manchester, England (–1945). 22 January 1863 A Polish insurrection against Russian rule begins when the Polish National Committee, a conspiratorial body, publishes a manifesto demanding the reconstitution of an independent Polish state. 8 February 1863 Prussia allies with Russia to suppress the Polish revolt through a convention drawn up by Gustav, Count von Alvensleben, chief advisor to the Prussian king Wilhelm I (the 'Alvensleben Convention'). 17 February 1863 The International Red Cross is founded in Geneva, Switzerland.

2–4 May 1863 In one of the most humiliating Union defeats of the American Civil War, 60,000 Confederate troops defeat a Union force over twice that size at the Battle of Chancellorsville. The Confederacy suffers the most grievous loss, however, as the outstanding Confederate general Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson is mortally wounded by one of his own men and subsequently dies on 10 May. 10 May 1863 Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson, one of the most able Confederate generals in the American Civil War, dies from pneumonia in Guiney's Station, Virginia, eight days after being accidentally shot by one of his own men (39). 30 July 1863 Henry Ford, US industrialist who develops the mass-production of cheap Ford cars, born in Wayne County, Michigan (–1947). 19–20 September 1863 Confederate forces under Braxton Bragg win a clear but strategically indecisive victory over a Union army commanded by William Rosecrans at the Battle of Chickamauga, Tennessee. The Confederacy loses 18,000 men, the Union 16,000. 20 September 1863 Jacob Grimm, German author (with his brother Wilhelm) of Grimm's Fairy Tales (1812), dies in Berlin, Germany (78). 26 October 1863 The Football Association is founded in London, England, by the representatives of 11 clubs. Their purpose is to establish 'a definite code of rules for the regulation of the game'. All clubs are from the London area. 15 November 1863 King Frederick VII of Denmark dies and is succeeded by his liberal son Christian IX, who is determined to pursue his father's policies with regard to the duchy of Schleswig. 19 November 1863 US president Abraham Lincoln delivers the Gettysburg Address at the dedication of the Civil War cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. He reiterates the principles of freedom, equality, and democracy embodied in the US constitution. 23–25 November 1863 Union forces attain command of a crucial railway junction at the Battle of Chattanooga, Tennessee, thus strengthening the Union's grip on Confederate supply lines. 8 December 1863 The Church of La Compañia, in Santiago, Chile, burns down, killing 2,500 people. 12 December 1863 Edvard Munch, Norwegian painter of psychological subjects such as The Scream, born in Löten, Norway (–1944). 1863 English chemist John Alexander Reina Newlands devises the table of the elements. 1863 French parasitologist Casimir-Joseph Davaine shows that anthrax is due to

the presence of rodlike micro-organisms in the blood. It is the first disease of animals and humans to be shown to be caused by a specific micro-organism. 1863 The English artist and poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti paints Beata Beatrix/ Blessed Beatrix. 1863 The French artist Edouard Manet paints Déjeuner sur l'herbe/Luncheon on the Grass. It causes an outcry when it is exhibited in the Salon in 1865, where it is condemned as badly painted and obscene because of its composition of nude female figures and male figures in everyday dress. He also paints Spanish Dancers. 1863 The French company Source Perrier launches its naturally carbonated Perrier mineral water. 1863 The French historian (Joseph-) Ernest Renan publishes his Vie de Jésus/Life of Jesus. The book is controversial because it treats Jesus as a purely historical figure and denies any supernatural aspects to his life. He also publishes the first volume of his Histoire des origines du christianisme/History of the Origins of Christianity. The final volume appears in 1904. 1863 The opera Les Pêcheurs de perles/The Pearl Fishers by the French composer Georges Bizet is first performed, in Paris, France. It is first performed in Britain in 1887 (in London, England), and in the USA in 1893 (in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania). 1863 US president Abraham Lincoln establishes the annual national Thanksgiving holiday on the last Thursday in November. 1 February 1864 Austro-Prussian troops enter Schleswig in opposition to Denmark's incorporation of the disputed territory. 10 April 1864 Archduke Maximilian of Austria accepts the title offered by Napoleon III of emperor of Mexico, following French military victories there in an attempt to enforce the payment of European debts. France wishes to establish a liberal, Catholic empire in Mexico. June 1864 At the Battle of Cold Harbor, Virginia, a Confederate army repels a Union army nearly twice its size. In the aftermath, Union general Grant begins a prolonged siege of Petersburg, Virginia, that will last to the end of the war. 23 August 1864 Eleutherios Venizelos, Greek politician, prime minister of Greece 1910–15, 1917, 1924, and 1928–30, born in Mourniés, Crete (–1936). 30 October 1864 The Peace of Vienna concludes the German-Danish war, by which Denmark cedes the duchies of Schleswig, Holstein, and Lauenburg to Austria and Prussia.

24 November 1864 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, French artist who depicts the personalities of Parisian night life, born in Albi, France (–1901). 28 November 1864 An advanced new democratic constitution in Greece does away with the upper Chamber of Deputies. 8 December 1864 A papal Syllabus Errorum/Syllabus of Errors condemns the errors of the 19th century – nationalism, naturalism, socialism, communism, and freemasonry. 8 December 1864 George Boole, English mathematician who developed Boolean algebra, which is central to computer operations, dies in Ballintemple, Ireland (49). 1864 By examining their spectra, English astronomer William Huggins demonstrates that the Orion Nebula (and hence all nebulae) consists of gases, while the Andromeda Nebula is composed of stars and is therefore a galaxy. 1864 French engineers Pierre and Emile Martin use scrap iron in place of iron ore in a Siemens regenerative furnace. Two years later Siemens and the Martins combine to produce the Siemens-Martin open-hearth furnace. 1864 Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell introduces mathematical equations that describe the electromagnetic field, and predict the existence of radio waves. 1864 The (First) International Working Men's Association is founded in London, England, by the German philosopher, economist, and social theorist Karl Marx to coordinate the activities of workers' associations worldwide. 1864 The Russian writer Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky publishes his novel Zapiski iz podpolya/Notes from the Underground. 1864 The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy publishes the first part of his epic novel Voyna i mir/War and Peace. The second part appears in 1869. 27 January 1865 A treaty between Spain and Peru recognizes the independence of the former Spanish colony, following ongoing friction since the latter's cession. 18 February 1865 The Confederate port of Charleston, South Carolina, besieged by the US Navy since 1861, surrenders. 18 March 1865 The dictator of Paraguay, President Francisco Solano López, seizes Argentine territory, provoking a war against Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay. 9 April 1865 The Confederate Army of Northern Virginia under Robert E Lee surrenders to Union general Ulysses S Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia.

15 April 1865 Abraham Lincoln, 16th president of the USA 1861–65, a Republican, dies in Washington, DC, and is succeeded by Vice-President Andrew Johnson (56). 26 May 1865 The surrender of the last Confederate army at Shreveport, near New Orleans, Louisiana, ends the American Civil War. 13 June 1865 W(illiam) B(utler) Yeats, Irish poet, dramatist, and nationalist, born in Sandymount, Dublin, Ireland (–1939). 2 July 1865 William and Catherine Booth launch their Christian Mission in Britain, which they will later name the Salvation Army. 14 August 1865 The Convention of Gastein temporarily resolves the question of the administration of the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein (ceded to Austria and Prussia by Denmark). Austria receives Holstein and Prussia obtains Schleswig and the port city of Kiel, while purchasing the duchy of Lauenburg. 26 September 1865 A Native Rights Act in New Zealand recognizes the Maori people as natural-born subjects of Queen Victoria of Great Britain, and institutes a land court to hear their grievances against colonial settlers who have dispossessd them of their lands. 29 October 1865 The Liberal politician Lord John Russell becomes prime minister of Great Britain. 10 December 1865 King Leopold I of Belgium dies and is succeeded by his son, Leopold II. 12 December 1865 A new constitution in Sweden abolishes the traditional four estates and replaces them with two chambers, following long-standing demands for political reform. 24 December 1865 Former Confederate cavalry commander Nathan Bedford Forrest founds the Ku Klux Klan, allegedly as a social club for Confederate veterans and their families. 30 December 1865 Rudyard Kipling, English novelist, short-story writer, and poet, born in Bombay (now Mumbai), India (–1936). 1865 French physiologist Claude Bernard develops the concept of homeostasis when he notes that 'all the vital mechanisms, varied as they are, have only one object: that of preserving constant the conditions of life'. 1865 German chemist Friedrich August Kekulé von Stradonitz proposes the molecular structure of benzene. 1865 The authorities in Britain's Australian colonies refuse to accept further

shipments of transported British criminals. As a result, longer, harsher sentences are introduced in Britain. 1865 The Hungarian composer Franz Liszt completes his orchestral work Rákóczymarsch/Rákóczy March. 1865 The opera Tristan und Isolde/Tristan and Isolde by the German composer Richard Wagner is first performed, in Munich, Germany. Among its best-known parts is the Liebestod sung by Isolde. 1865 The Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel invents the blasting cap. Used to detonate nitroglycerine safely and dependably, it expands the use of explosives in industry. 1865 US financier Cyrus West Field and Scottish physicist William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, use Isambard Kingdom Brunel's steamship the Great Eastern to begin laying the first successful transatlantic telegraph cable. 14 January 1866 Peru declares war on Spain in resentment over clauses in the treaty of 27 January 1865 by which Peru's independence was recognized. 8 April 1866 An offensive and defensive alliance is signed between Prussia and Italy. 7 June 1866 Prussian troops march into the Austrian-ruled duchy of Holstein. The Prussian chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, wants to provoke war with Austria and end its influence in Germany. 12 June 1866 A secret treaty is agreed between Austria and France, by which the French emperor, Napoleon III, promises French neutrality in Austria's coming war with Prussia provided that Austria cedes Venice, which France will in turn hand over to Italy. 15–16 June 1866 Prussia invades the German states of Saxony, Hanover, and Hesse, which, as Austria's allies, have opposed Prussia's entry into the Austrianruled duchy of Holstein. 3 July 1866 The Prussians defeat the Austrians at Sadowa (Königgrätz), Bohemia, in the decisive battle of the Seven Weeks War. 4 July 1866 Emperor Napoleon III of France announces the cession of the Italian state of Venice by Austria following the Austrian defeat in the Seven Weeks' War with Prussia, as agreed in the treaty between Prussia and Austria of 12 June. 23 August 1866 The Peace of Prague between Prussia and Austria confirms the preliminary Peace of Nikolsburg (26 July) whereby Austria is to be excluded from Germany, while the German states of Hanover, Hesse, Nassau, and Frankfurt are to be incorporated with Prussia, the south German states are to be independent,

but the states north of the River Main are to form a confederation under Prussia, which also obtains Austrian Silesia and territory from Saxony and from the south German states. August 1866 The Japanese shogun (military ruler) Iemochi dies and is succeeded by Yoshinobu. 2 September 1866 After a long period of unrest under Ottoman authority, the island of Crete revolts and decrees union with Greece. 3 September 1866 Having defeated Austria and established Prussia as the leading power in Germany, the Prussian chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, obtains an indemnity from a grateful Prussian diet (state assembly) for having ruled without parliamentary approval of government budgets, ending the constitutional conflict that began in 1862. 21 September 1866 H(erbert) G(eorge) Wells, English novelist, sociologist, and historian, who writes The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, and The Invisible Man, born in Bromley, Kent, England (–1946). 3 October 1866 The war between Austria and Italy, arising from Italy's support of Prussia against Austria in the Seven Weeks War, is formally ended by the Treaty of Vienna, with Italy receiving Venice from Austria. 12 October 1866 Ramsay MacDonald, British politician, first Labour Party prime minister of Britain 1924, prime minister again in 1929, and in a coalition government 1931–35, born in Lossiemouth, Moray, Scotland (–1937). 24 October 1866 The German Confederation is formally ended following Prussia's defeat of Austria for control of Germany. 1866 Austrian monk and botanist Gregor Mendel publishes 'Versuche uber Pflanzenhybriden/Experiments on Plant Hybridization' in the little known Proceedings of the Brunn Natural History Society in which he describes the inheritance of different characteristics in pea plants and proposes general methods for predicting patterns of inheritance, from one generation to the next. The work establishes the fundamental laws of heredity and is the basis of modern genetics. Mendel sends the paper to eminent biologists but is ignored. 1866 Swiss company Nestlé launches its first product, formula milk for babies. 1866 The German embryologist Ernst Haeckel proposes a third category of living beings intermediate between plants and animals. Called Protista, it consists mostly of microscopic organisms such as protozoans, algae, and fungi. 1866 The Russian writer Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky publishes his novel Prestupleniye i nakazaniye/Crime and Punishment, the first of his major novels.

1866 Three-fourths of US imports are manufactured goods, while three-fourths of US exports are crude materials or crude foodstuffs. 1866 US scientist Mahlon Loomis transmits the first telegraph message over radio waves. It is sent between two mountains in West Virginia using kites to support the aerials. 1866–1867 A new set of boxing rules is drafted in Britain under the auspices of John Sholto Douglas, Marquess of Queensberry. With their insistence on the wearing of padded gloves, three-minute rounds, and a count of ten for knockouts, they herald the beginning of modern boxing. 17 February 1867 The Hungarian diet (national assembly) is opened and the constitution of 1848 restored. Government by Ausgleich ('compromise') begins, allowing for a dual monarchy under which the Magyars gain autonomy in Hungary while Austria continues to govern the rest of the Habsburg territories, with unitary foreign and war policies. 29 March 1867 The British North America Act establishes the Dominion of Canada comprising Quebec, Ontario, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, confederated provinces with a central parliamentary government under a British governor-general. March 1867 The US Congress overrides President Andrew Johnson's veto to pass the Reconstruction Act. It divides the South into five military districts, each under the command of a military governor. Civil government will be restored on an individual basis as states rejoin the Union. 16 April 1867 Wilbur Wright, US pioneer of aviation who, with his brother Orville, is the first to achieve sustained powered flight, born near Millville, Indiana (–1912). 15 August 1867 The Second Reform Act extends the franchise in Britain and redistributes parliamentary seats to reflect increasing urbanization. The electorate is roughly doubled from 1 to 2 million. 25 August 1867 Michael Faraday, English physicist and chemist whose work contributed to a basic understanding of electromagnetism, dies in Hampton Court, Surrey, England (76). 7 November 1867 Marie Curie (born Sklodowska), Polish-born French physicist who, with her husband Pierre Curie, discovers polonium and radium, and who wins the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 and for Chemistry in 1911, born in Warsaw, Poland (–1934). 12 November 1867 Sun Zhong Shan (Sun Yat-sen), leader of the Chinese Nationalist Party (Guomindang) which overthrows the Manchu dynasty, first president of the Republic of China 1911–12, and de facto ruler 1923–25, born in Xiangshan, Guangdong Province, China (–1925).

1867 French gardener Joseph Monier patents reinforced concrete by adding steel rods, bars, or mesh to the concrete. It dramatically increases the tensile strength of the concrete, making it capable of sustaining heavy stresses. 1867 Liebig's Soluble Food for Babies, developed in Germany by Baron Justus von Liebig, is the first commercial baby food. 1867 Swedish chemist Alfred Bernhard Nobel patents the blasting explosive dynamite. 1867 The German political philosopher Karl Marx publishes the first volume of Das Kapital/Capital, his major work and the central text of communism. 1867 The Norwegian dramatist Henrik Johan Ibsen publishes his verse play Peer Gynt. It is first performed in 1876. 1867 The Paris Exposition Universelle (World Fair) in France introduces Japanese art to the West. Its influence can be seen in the works of artists as varied as Degas, Whistler, and van Gogh. c. 1867 The game of badminton, based on the old English game of battledore and shuttlecock (itself based on an ancient Chinese game), is devised at Badminton Hall, Gloucestershire, England, by the family and friends of the Duke of Beaufort. 3 January 1868 The Tokugawa shogunate is abolished in Japan, having ruled since 1603, and the Meiji dynasty is restored under Emperor Matsuhito. 23 February 1868 W E B Du Bois, US sociologist, writer, and black leader, born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts (–1963). 18 May 1868 Nicholas II, Tsar of Russia 1895–1917, born in Tsarskoye Selo, near St Petersburg, Russia (–1918). May 1868 The US Senate twice votes 35–19 to impeach President Andrew Johnson. Both times the vote falls short of the necessary 2/3 majority. 10 June 1868 King Michael III of Serbia is murdered by followers of the Karageorgevic dynasty and succeeded by his cousin Milan IV. 7 July 1868 The Third Maori War breaks out in New Zealand between the aboriginal inhabitants and British settlers encroaching on their land. 30 September 1868 Queen Isabella II of Spain flees to France and is declared deposed, following the Liberal revolt against her rule. 13 November 1868 Gioacchino Rossini, Italian composer, dies in Passy, near

Paris, France (76). 3 December 1868 The English statesman William Ewart Gladstone forms a Liberal ministry in Britain after victory over the Conservatives in the general election. 1868 French geologist Louis Lartet is the first to discover the skeletal remains of anatomically modern humans, in a cave near Cro-Magnon, France. They are 35,000 years old. 1868 The French artist Edouard Manet paints The Execution of Emperor Maximilian. 1868 The German composer Johannes Brahms completes his choral work Ein deutsche Requiem/A German Requiem. 1868 The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche publishes Gözendammerung/ Twilight of the Idols. 1868 The Swedish physicist Anders Ångström expresses the wavelengths of Fraunhofer lines in units of 10-10 m, a unit now known as the angstrom. 1868 The world's first traffic lights are installed in front of the House of Commons, London, England, to help pedestrians cross the street. They consist of red and green gas lamps which are alternately raised and lowered. 1868 US printer Christopher Latham Sholes develops a typewriter with a 'QWERTY' keyboard that permits documents to be typed faster than they can be written out. The position of the keys reduces the chance of them jamming. April 1869 After ratifying the Fifteenth Amendment, guaranteeing black American male suffrage, Virginia, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas are readmitted to the Union. 10 May 1869 The first US transcontinental railway is completed when the Union Pacific Railroad, building west, and the Central Pacific Railway, building east, meet at Promontory Point, Utah. It is 2,832 km/1,770 mi long. 2 October 1869 Mahatma Gandhi (honorific name of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi), leader of the nationalist movement to free India from British rule, born in Porbandar, India (–1948). 17 November 1869 French diplomat and engineer Ferdinand de Lesseps completes the 168 km/105 mi long Suez Canal in Egypt that links the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, and which reduces the route from Europe to Asia by 8,000 km/5,000 mi. 31 December 1869 Henri Matisse, French painter, sculptor, illustrator, and

designer, born in Le Cateau, France (–1954). December 1869 The Wyoming Territory becomes the first US state or territory to grant suffrage to women. 1869 Foreigners invest $1.5 billion in the USA; US interests invest $100 million overseas. 1869 French chemist Hippolyte Mège-Mouriés patents margarine. 1869 French physicist Louis Ducos du Hauron publishes Les Couleurs en photographie: Solution du problème/Colours in Photography: Solution of the Problem, in which he identifies the additive and subtractive system of colour photography. 1869 Russian chemist Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeleyev develops the periodic table of the elements. He leaves gaps for elements yet to be discovered. 1869 The English philosopher John Stuart Mill publishes 'The Subjection of Women', an essay arguing for sexual equality. 1869 The English writer Matthew Arnold publishes Culture and Anarchy. His major work, it is a study of the moral, intellectual, and religious perplexities of Victorian society. 1869 The French artist Edgar Degas paints The Orchestra of the Opéra. 1869 The German composer Johannes Brahms completes the last of his Ungarische Tänze/Hungarian Dances for piano and his Liebesliederwalzer/Love Song Waltzes for piano and voices (Opus 52). 1869 The opera Das Rheingold by the German composer Richard Wagner is first performed, in Munich, Germany. It is the first part of his Der Ring des Nibelungen/The Ring of the Nibelung cycle of operas. 1869 The Perkins Institute in Boston, Massachusetts, produces the first novel in raised type for blind people, Charles Dickens'The Old Curiosity Shop. 1869 US inventor John Wesley Hyatt, in an effort to find a substitute for the ivory in billiard balls, invents celluloid. The first artificial plastic, it can be produced cheaply in a variety of colours, is resistant to water, oil, and weak acids, and quickly finds use in making such things as combs, toys, and false teeth. 1869–1870 At the First Vatican council, a council of the Roman Catholic Church convened by Pope Pius IX, liberalism is condemned and the infallibility of the pope is asserted. 10 January 1870 US industrialist John D Rockefeller founds the Standard Oil

Company in Ohio; it quickly comes to dominate the US oil industry. March 1870 The Fifteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, guaranteeing black American voting rights, becomes law. 22 April 1870 Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, founder of the Russian Communist Party, leader of the Russian Revolution, and head of the Soviet Union 1917–24, born in Simbirsk, Russia (–1924). 12 May 1870 Manitoba is made a Canadian province, which helps to end the Red River Rebellion by mixed-blood rebels over territory. 5 June 1870 A fire in Constantinople, in the Ottoman Empire, kills 900 people. 9 June 1870 Charles Dickens, English novelist of the Victorian era, dies in Gad's Hill, Chatham, Kent, England (58). 13 July 1870 A French ultimatum to Prussia not to renew its attempts to put a Hohenzollern ruler on the Spanish throne results in the 'Ems Telegram', a conciliatory message from King Wilhelm I of Prussia provocatively rewritten by the Prussian chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, to incite war. 18 July 1870 The Vatican council issues the 'Declaration of Papal Infallibility', declaring that papal pronouncements on spiritual questions are not questionable. 19 July 1870 France declares war on Prussia following its receipt of the 'Ems Telegram' of 13 July. 2 September 1870 Emperor Napoleon III of France capitulates to the Prussians at Sedan, France, conceding defeat in the Franco-Prussian War. 4 September 1870 The French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War leads to a revolt in Paris, France, against the government of Emperor Napoleon III. A provisional government of national defence is set up to continue the war against Prussia and a republic is proclaimed. 1 October 1870 The British Post Office issues the world's first postcards. 12 October 1870 Robert E Lee, Confederate general who commanded the Southern armies during the American Civil War, dies in Lexington, Virginia (63). 5 December 1870 Alexandre Dumas (père), French novelist best known for The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers (both 1844), dies in Puys, France (68). 1870 A telegraph link between Britain and India opens. 1870 German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann begins archaeological

excavations at Hissarlik, in Anatolia (modern Turkey), the site of the ancient city of Troy. 1870 The ballet Coppélia, ou La Fille aux yeux d'émail/Coppelia, or the Girl with Enamel Eyes by the French composer (Clément-Philibert-) Léo Delibes is first performed, in Paris, France. The choreography is by the French choreographer Arthur Saint-Léon. 1870 The British newspaper the Daily Telegraph has the largest circulation in the world, with sales in excess of 250,000 copies. 1870 The English churchman John Newman publishes The Grammar of Assent, a defence of religious belief. 1870 The English inventor James Starley makes the first 'pennyfarthing' bicycle, so named because the difference in size between the wheels resembled the difference between the largest and smallest British coins. 1870 The English scientist William Henry Fox Talbot reduces photographic exposure time to one-hundredth of a second, making moving pictures feasible. 1870 The French writer Jules Verne publishes his novel Vingt Mille Lieues sous les mers/Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. 1870 The Jürgens Mekaniske Establissement in Copenhagen, Denmark, begins manufacturing the Skrivekugle, the first commercial typewriter. 1870 The Suez Canal in Egypt is used by 436,000 tons of shipping; 71% of the traffic is British shipping. 1870 The US writer Bret Harte publishes The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Stories, which includes, along with the title story, 'The Outcasts of Poker Flats' and 'Tennessee's Partner'. The stories first appeared in the magazine Overland Monthly. 18 January 1871 Following the defeat of Emperor Napoleon III of France in the Franco-Prussian War, King Wilhelm I of Prussia is proclaimed German emperor at Versailles in France, the North German Confederation having been enlarged to include all the German states except Austria-Hungary. 28 January 1871 The French capital, Paris, besieged by Prussian forces since September 1870, capitulates and an armistice with Germany is signed. 13 March 1871 The London Conference between the great powers of Europe revokes the Black Sea clauses of the Treaty of Paris of 1856 and gives Russia the freedom to deploy its forces in the Black Sea (following Russia's independent repudiation of these clauses in October 1870).

18 March 1871 A left-wing rising begins in Paris, France, when soldiers sent to requisition cannons stationed in the city side with the populace, who wish to establish their own radical government and continue the war with Prussia. 10 May 1871 The Peace of Frankfurt formally ends the Franco-Prussian War. France is to cede Alsace-Lorraine to Germany, pay an indemnity of 5 milliards of francs, and be subject to military occupation until payment is completed. 21–28 May 1871 In 'Bloody Week' in Paris, France, fighting between government troops and demonstrators ends in the defeat of the extreme left-wing Paris Commune (provisional national government) at a cost of 20,000–30,000 lives. 7 July 1871 The German government begins its Kulturkampf (cultural struggle) with the Catholic Church, when Chancellor Otto von Bismarck suppresses the Roman Catholic department for spiritual affairs. 10 July 1871 Marcel Proust, French novelist who writes A la recherche du temps perdu/Remembrance of Things Past (1913–27), born in Auteuil, France (–1922). 19 August 1871 Orville Wright, US pioneer of aviation who, with his brother Wilbur, is the first to achieve sustained powered flight, born in Dayton, Ohio (–1948). 30 August 1871 Ernest Rutherford, New Zealand physicist and investigator of radioactivity, born in Spring Grove, New Zealand (–1937). 31 August 1871 The French Liberal statesman Adolphe Thiers is elected the first president of the Third Republic in France. 18 October 1871 Charles Babbage, English inventor who designed the first digital computer, dies in London, England (78). 23 October 1871–14 March 1872 Welsh-born US journalist Henry Stanley reaches Lake Tanganyika in Africa in search of the lost Scottish explorer David Livingstone, who he finds at the trading settlement of Ujiji. Together they explore the lake's northern reaches, and establish that it is not the source of the Nile. Livingstone refuses to leave Africa with Stanley. 1 November 1871 Stephen Crane, US novelist known for his book The Red Badge of Courage (1895), born in Newark, New Jersey (–1900). 1871 English doctor Richard Leach Maddox and English chemist Joseph Wilson Swan replace the collodion wet-emulsion photographic plate with a dry, silverbromide sensitized, gelatin-emulsion plate. The gelatin emulsions go on sale in 1873 and the plates in 1876. They revolutionize photography. 1871 English naturalist Charles Darwin publishes The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex, in which he applies his evolutionary theory to

humans and also elaborates the theory of sexual selection. 1871 Populations of selected countries (in millions): Germany, 41; USA, 39; France, 36.1; Japan, 33; Great Britain, 26; Ireland, 5.4; Italy, 26.8. 1871 The English writer and mathematician Lewis Carroll writes the children's classic Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. 1871 The English writer George Eliot (pseudonym of Mary Anne Evans) publishes the first part of her novel Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life. The last part appears in 1872. 1871 The opera Aïda by the Italian composer Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi is first performed, in Cairo, Egypt (to celebrate the opening of the Suez Canal). 1871 The US artist Thomas Eakins paints Max Schmitt in a Single Scull. 1871 The US poet Walt Whitman publishes his political tract Democratic Vistas, arguing that democracy and individualism are compatible. 16 March 1872 A crowd of 2,000 at the Oval cricket ground in London, England, watch Wanderers, a team of ex-public school players, defeat the Royal Engineers 1–0 to win the inaugural Football Association (FA) Cup final. 2 April 1872 Samuel Finley Breese Morse, US painter and inventor of Morse Code, dies in New York City (80). 26 April 1872 The proclamation of Don Carlos, Duke of Madrid, as Charles VII of Spain leads to the Second Carlist War as his followers dispute the authority of the ruling king Amadeo I. 1 July 1872 A telegraph line is established between Britain and Australia. 16 July 1872 Roald Amundsen, Norwegian explorer who was the first person to reach the South Pole, born in Oslo, Norway (–1928). 7 September 1872 A meeting of the three emperors Wilhelm, Alexander, and Franz Josef in Berlin, Germany, leads to a tacit entente between Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary to uphold authoritarian rule in Europe. 7 December 1872–26 May 1876 The British ship Challenger undertakes the world's first major oceanographic survey. Under the command of the Scottish naturalist Wyville Thomson, the crew collect marine animals and water samples, dredge and core samples of the ocean bottom, and make hundreds of temperature and depth measurements. December 1872 The US ship the Mary Celeste is found adrift without crew in the

Atlantic Ocean, undamaged and with its cargo intact. 1872 Lyman Bloomingdale and his brothers Gustave and Joseph, the family behind the great US department store Bloomingdale's, open their Great East Side Store in New York City. 1872 The English writer Samuel Butler publishes his satirical novel Erewhon. 1872 The French artist Claude Monet paints Impression: Sunrise. It is this painting that gives Impressionism its name. 1872 The French artist Edgar Degas paints Dancing Class at the Ballet School. 1872 The US artist James Abbot McNeill Whistler paints Arrangement in Grey and Black No 1: The Artist's Mother. 1872 The US artist Winslow Homer paints Snap the Whip. 1872 The US astronomer Henry Draper develops astronomical spectral photography and takes the first photograph of the spectrum of a star – that of Vega. 1872 The US religious leader Charles Taze Russell founds the religious movement the Jehovah's Witnesses, their main belief being that the end of the world is imminent. Their zeal in finding converts helps them to grow quickly. c. 1872 Grigory Yefimovich Rasputin, Siberian peasant and mystic who influences the Russian tsar Nicholas II and tsarina Alexandra, born in Pokrovskoye, Siberia, Russia (–1916). 9 January 1873 Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (Napoleon III), emperor of France 1852–71, dies in Chislehurst, Kent, England (64). 16 February 1873 A republic is proclaimed in Spain following the abdication of King Amadeo I. 1 April 1873 Sergey Vasilevich Rachmaninov, Russian composer and piano virtuoso, born in Oneg, near Semenovo, Russia (–1943). 4 April 1873 War breaks out between Britain and the Ashanti in west Africa (modern Ghana) as a result of British attempts to stop King Kofi Kari-Kari's slave trade. 1 May 1873 David Livingstone, Scottish missionary and explorer who explored much of East Africa in search of the source of the River Nile, dies in Chitambo, Barotseland (Zambia) (59). 24 May 1873 French president Adolphe Thiers is deposed by the monarchist

Asembly, and the antidemocratic candidate Marie-Edme-Patrice-Maurice MacMahon, duc de Magenta, is elected in his place. 12 August 1873 Russia assumes suzerainty of the Khanates of Khiva and Bukhara, pushing further into central Asia. 22 October 1873 An alliance of the emperors of Germany, Russia, and AustriaHungary (the Dreikaiserbund) formalizes the agreement between them of 1872 to uphold autocratic government in Europe. 1873 English electrician Willoughby Smith confirms that the electrical conductivity of selenium increases with the amount of illumination; it proves to be an important discovery in the development of television. 1873 German Egyptologist George Maurice Ebers discovers a papyrus text at Thebes. Known as the Ebers papyrus, it is dated to 1500 BC and is the oldest medical work known, containing over 700 folk remedies for various afflictions. 1873 German physicist Ernst Abbe discovers that to distinguish two separate objects under the microscope the distance between them must be more than half the wavelength of the light that illuminates them. The discovery becomes important in the later development of electron and X-ray microscopes. 1873 Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell publishes A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism, in which he provides a mathematical model of electromagnetic waves and identifies light as being one such wave. 1873 The French artist Edgar Degas paints The Cotton Office. 1873 The French artist Paul Cézanne paints The House of the Hanged Man and A Modern Olympia. 1873 The French Symbolist poet Arthur Rimbaud publishes his prose poems Une Saison en enfer/A Season in Hell. 3 February 1874 Gertrude Stein, US avant-garde writer and eccentric, born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (–1946). 4 February 1874 The British general Garnet Wolseley burns the Ashanti capital of Kumasi in west Africa (modern Ghana), ending the war between the Ashanti and Britain. 15 March 1874 France assumes a protectorate over Annam (part of modern Vietnam), which breaks off its vassalage to China. 25 April 1874 Guglielmo Marconi, Italian physicist and inventor of radio, born in Bologna, Italy (–1937).

4 July 1874 The St Louis Bridge over the Mississippi River at St Louis, Missouri, is officially opened. Built by US engineer James Buchanan Eads, it consists of three hollow-steel arch trusses each over 150 m/500 ft long, making it the longest bridge in the world. A landmark in engineering, the arches are cantilevered so they can be raised, the foundations are planted to record depths of 30 m/100 ft, and it pioneers the use of structural steel. 10 August 1874 Herbert Hoover, thirty-first president of the USA 1929–33, a Republican, born in West Branch, Iowa (–1964). 13 September 1874 Arnold Schoenberg, Austrian composer who develops a new 'atonal' method of musical composition, born in Vienna, Austria (–1951). 25 October 1874 Britain annexes the Fiji islands in the southwest Pacific Ocean. 12 November 1874–12 August 1877 Welsh-born US journalist and explorer Henry Stanley explores the shores of Lake Victoria and circumnavigates Lake Tanganyika before travelling down the Congo River (now the Zaïre) to Africa's west coast, establishing beyond argument that Lake Victoria is the principal source of the Nile. 27 November 1874 Chaim Weizmann, first president of Israel 1949–52, born in Motol, Poland, then part of the Russian Empire (–1952). 30 November 1874 Winston Churchill, British prime minister 1940–45 and 1951–55, who leads Britain through World War II, born at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, England (–1965). 1874 The Austrian surgeon Theodor Billroth develops the study of the bacterial causes of fever associated with wounds with the publication of Untersuchungen über die Vegetationsformen von Coccobacteria septica/Investigations of the Vegetal Forms of Coccobacteria septica. 1874 The Dutch chemist Jacobus Henricus van't Hoff and the French chemist Joseph-Achile Le Bel, independently propose a three-dimensional shape for organic molecules based on a tetrahedral carbon atom. 1874 The English inventor H J Lawson develops the 'safety bicycle'. Because it has two equal-sized wheels, rubber tyres, and is powered by an endless chain between the pedals and the rear wheel, it has greater stability and is easier to brake than other bicycles. 1874 The English writer Thomas Hardy publishes his novel Far from the Madding Crowd. 1874 The first Impressionist exhibition is held in Paris, France, with works by (among others) Cézanne, Degas, Pissarro, and Sisley.

1874 The first jeans with rivets are produced by Levi Strauss of San Francisco, California. 1874 The German psychologist Wilhelm Wundt publishes Grundzüge der physiologischen Psychologie/Principles of Physiological Psychology. 1874 The operetta Die Fledermaus/The Bat by the Austrian composer Johann Strauss is first performed, in Vienna, Austria. It is first performed in the USA the same year (in New York City), and in Britain in 1876 (in London, England). 1874 The Russian composer Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky completes his piano work Pictures at an Exhibition. This is orchestrated by several composers, notably by the French composer Maurice Ravel in 1922. 1874 US inventor Joseph Glidden designs a machine for making barbed wire. Inexpensive and easy to put up, it transforms the open range of the western USA into fenced pastureland. c. 1874 The US artist James Abbot McNeill Whistler paints Nocturne in Black and Gold: Falling Rocket. This picture is attacked by the English art critic John Ruskin as 'a pot of paint... flung in the public's face'. Whistler sues for libel, and though he wins his case, he is awarded only a farthing (quarter of a penny) in damages. 22 January 1875 D(avid Lewelyn) W(ark) Griffith, US pioneer of film-making, born in Flodysfork, Kentucky (–1948). 20 May 1875 The International Bureau of Weights and Measures is established in France by a treaty signed in Paris. Located at Sèvres, its purpose is to unify systems of measurement, and to establish standards by providing a prototype metre and kilogram as the basis for all scientific and other measures. 26 July 1875 Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist who founds analytic psychology, born in Kesswil, Switzerland (–1961). 4 August 1875 Hans Christian Andersen, Danish storyteller, dies in Copenhagen, Denmark (70). 24–25 August 1875 The English swimmer Matthew Webb, a captain in the British Merchant Navy, becomes the first person to swim the English Channel. He takes 21 hours and 45 minutes to cross from Dover, England, to Calais, France. 25 November 1875 Britain buys 176,602 shares in the Suez Canal linking the Mediterranean with the Red Sea from Khedive Ismail of Egypt, the canal being a vital part of the route to India. 1875 Henry John Heinz, his brother John, and cousin Frederick form their company in the USA. Heinz ketchup is one of the first products launched.

1875 Russia has a standing army of 3,360,000 soldiers; Germany 2,800,000; France 412,000; Britain 113,649. 1875 The first canned baked beans are produced, for fishermen in Portland, Maine. 1875 The German cytologist Eduard Adolf Strasburger publishes Über Zellbildung und Zellteilung/On Cell Formation and Cell Division, in which he describes the process of mitosis. 1875 The Opéra (the Opera House), designed by the French architect (JeanLouis-) Charles Garnier, is completed in Paris, France. It is one of the outstanding examples of the ornate and flamboyant Beaux Arts style. 1875 The opera Carmen by the French composer Georges Bizet is first performed, in Paris, France. It is based on a story by the French writer Prosper Mérimée, published in 1840. It is first performed in both Britain and the USA in 1878 (in London, England, and New York City). 1875 The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy publishes the first part of his novel Anna Karenina. The second part appears in 1875. 1875 The Swiss food company Nestlé develops the first milk chocolate. 1 January 1876 The International System of Weights and Measures comes into effect in France. 12 January 1876 Jack London (pseudonym of John Griffith Chaney), US novelist and short-story writer, born in San Francisco, California (–1916). 2 February 1876 The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, the first major league, is established in New York City by representatives of eight teams brought together by the Chicago White Stockings president William A Hulbert. 28 February 1876 The Second Carlist War in Spain ends with the flight to France of the pretender Don Carlos following the defeat of his forces by the king's troops. 7 March 1876 Scottish-born US inventor Alexander Graham Bell patents a device for transmitting human speech over electric wires. It consists of an identical microphone and receiver each made of a solenoid placed next to an iron membrane; vibration in the microphone's membrane induces a current in the solenoid that travels down the wire and causes the membrane in the receiver to vibrate. 10 March 1876 Scottish-born US inventor Alexander Graham Bell transmits the first complete sentence by voice over wire using his newly invented telephone in the USA: 'Mr Watson, come here. I want you'.

25 June 1876 At the Battle of Little Bighorn, Sioux and Cheyenne warriors commanded by legendary chief Sitting Bull rout a force of US soldiers led by General George A Custer, killing Custer and over 200 of his soldiers. 30 June 1876 Serbia, under the nationalist leader Jovan Ristic, declares war on the Ottoman Empire. 2 July 1876 Montenegro declares war on the Ottoman Empire in support of the revolt against Ottoman rule in Bosnia and Herzegovina. 31 August 1876 Sultan Murad V of the Ottoman Empire is deposed because of his insanity and is succeeded by Abdul Hamid II. 23 December 1876 An Ottoman constitution is proclaimed by the reformist grand vizier (chief minister) Midhat Pasha, guaranteeing parliamentary government, freedom of worship, and a free press throughout the empire. 25 December 1876 Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Indian/Pakistani Muslim politician, founder and first premier of Pakistan 1947–48, born in Karachi, India (now Pakistan) (–1948). 1876 German engineer Nikolaus Otto patents the four-stroke internal combustion engine, the prototype of modern engines. Its development marks the beginning of the end of the age of steam. More than 30,000 are built in the following decade. 1876 The Austrian composer Josef Anton Bruckner completes his Symphony No. 5. 1876 The French artist Auguste Rodin sculpts The Age of Bronze. 1876 The German engineer Karl von Linde develops the first really efficient refrigerator, replacing the potentially explosive methyl ether with ammonia. It opens the way for refrigerated railway cars and ships. 1876 The operas Siegfried and Götterdämmerung/The Twilight of the Gods by the German composer Richard Wagner are first performed, in Bayreuth, Germany. They form the third part of his Der Ring des Nibelungen/The Ring of the Nibelung cycle of operas, which is now performed in its entirety. 1876 The Scottish physicist William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), develops the first analogue computer. Called the 'Harmonic Analyser', he uses it to solve differential equations to predict tides. 1876 The US writer Mark Twain publishes his novel The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. 1 January 1877 Queen Victoria of Britain is proclaimed empress of India.

28 February 1877 A peace is signed between the Ottoman Empire and Serbia ending the Serbian revolt against Ottoman rule, without significant concessions. 2 March 1877 On the basis of its committee's recommendation, the US Congress rewards all 20 disputed electoral votes in the previous December's presidential election to Republican Rutherford B Hayes. The decision furnishes Hayes with a 185–184 majority over Democrat Samuel J Tilden. 15–19 March 1877 Australia defeats England by 45 runs in the first ever Test cricket match, played in Melbourne, Australia. Approximately 20,000 spectators attend the match over the four days of play. 12 April 1877 The British colonial administrator Theophilus Shepstone annexes the southern African Republic of Transvaal for Britain on grounds of bankruptcy and danger from Basutos and Zulus, though this annexation violates the Sand River Convention of 1852. 24 April 1877 Russia declares war on the Ottoman Empire and invades Romania in support of the Balkan revolts against Ottoman rule. 2 May 1877 The dictator Porfirio Díaz becomes president of Mexico after overthrowing the government of President Sebastián Ierdo de Tejada the previous year. 9–19 July 1877 The first All England Lawn Tennis Championships are played at Wimbledon, London. A crowd of 200 people watches Spencer Gore defeat William Marshall in the final of the Gentlemen's Singles, the only event at the meeting. July 1877 Social reformers Annie Bassant and Charles Bradlaugh are put on trial in Britain for reissuing The Fruits of Philosophy: a Private Companion of Young Married People, a guide to contraception. 29 August 1877 Brigham Young, US religious leader of the Mormon Church who led converts to colonize the US West and established a base at Salt Lake City, dies in Salt Lake City, Utah (76). 9 September 1877 The antidemocratic and anti-Western Satsuma Rebellion in Japan ends in defeat for the samurai at Kumamoto. 26 October 1877 English surgeon Joseph Lister performs the first operation to repair a fractured kneecap. Conducted under antiseptic conditions, its success convinces other surgeons of the value of antisepsis. 6 December 1877 US inventor Thomas Alva Edison patents the phonograph. Recording involves the transmission of sound vibrations through a large horn and a diaphragm to a stylus, which inscribes a groove on a rotating wax cylinder. Reproduction of the sound is achieved by reversing the process. The first reproduction of a human voice occurs on the 29 November when Edison utters

the words 'Mary had a little lamb'. 14 December 1877 Serbia, siding with Russia, declares war on the Ottoman Empire. 1877 German aeronautical engineer Otto Lilienthal begins to build successful gliders with arched wings like a bird and which he steers by moving his legs. The Wright brothers draw heavily on his experiements. 1877 The English writer Anna Sewell publishes her novel Black Beauty: The Autobiography of a Horse, which becomes a classic of children's literature. 1877 The English-born US photographer Eadweard Muybridge develops a camera with a shutter speed of 1/1,000 of a second. He uses 12 of them to take still photographs of a horse galloping down a racetrack, demonstrating that at one point in the horse's gallop all four hooves leave the ground. The horse broke strings stretched across the track which tripped each shutter in turn, exposing a different phase of its stride. 1877 The French artist Claude Monet paints Gare St Lazare. 1877 The French bacteriologist Louis Pasteur discovers that certain bacteria die when cultured with another type of bacteria, suggesting that the latter gives off a toxic substance – an antibiotic. 1877 The German composer Johannes Brahms completes his Symphony No. 2. 1877 The Red Crescent society is founded in the Ottoman Empire, a humanitarian organization active in Islamic nations, formed on the same principles as the Red Cross. 1877 The Trinity Church in Boston, Massachusetts, designed by the US architect Henry Hobson Richardson, is completed. The interior is decorated by the US artist John La Farge. 9 January 1878 Humbert I succeeds as king of Italy on the death of Victor Emmanuel II. 28 January 1878 The first commercial telephone exchange opens in New Haven, Connecticut; it has 21 subscribers. The following month the first telephone directory is published by the New Haven Telephone Co. with 50 subscribers listed. 7 February 1878 Cardinal Joachim Pecci is elected as Pope Leo XIII. 3 March 1878 By the preliminary Treaty of San Stefano ending the RussoOttoman War over the Balkans, Montenegro is to be enlarged with the port of Antivari; Romania, Montenegro, and Serbia are to be independent; reforms are to be undertaken in Bosnia and Herzegovina; Bulgaria is to be enlarged with a

seaboard on the Aegean and most of Macedonia; and Russia is to receive the fortified cities of Ardahan, Kars, and Batum in eastern Anatolia, while the Ottoman Empire is to pay Russia a huge indemnity. 21 March 1878 Jack Johnson, US boxer and the first black person to win the world heavyweight boxing championship (1908–15), born in Galveston, Texas (–1946). 5 June 1878 Francisco 'Pancho' Villa, Mexican revolutionary who fights against the regimes of Porfirio Díaz and Victoriano Huerto, born in Hacienda de Rio Grande, Mexico (–1923). 13 July 1878 By the Treaty of Berlin, Bulgaria is split into (a) autonomous Bulgaria, north of the Balkans, (b) Eastern Rumelia with a special organization under the Ottoman Empire, and (c) Macedonia, where reforms are to be undertaken; Austria-Hungary is given a mandate to occupy Bosnia and Herzegovina; Romania is warded the region of Dobrudja but has to hand over South Bessarabia to Russia; Montenegro is given the port of Antivari; Montenegro, Romania, and Serbia become independent states; Russia receives the towns of Batum, Kars, and Ardaham; and the British occupation of Cyprus is confirmed. Italian and Greek demands are shelved, while promises for reforms in Macedonia and Asia Minor lead to agitation. 18 October 1878 An anti-Socialist law in Germany prohibits public meetings, publications, and collections, thus driving socialism underground. 30 November 1878 English chemist and physicist William Crookes describes an early form of the cathode-ray tube, now known as Crooke's tube, to the Royal Society. It is a forerunner of the television tube. 1878 Dutch doctor Aletta Jacobs opens the first contraceptive clinic in the world, in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. 1878 German-born British inventor Charles William Siemens invents the electric arc furnace, the first to use electricity to make steel. 1878 Swedish scientist Carl de Laval invents the centrifugal cream separator. It eliminates the need to leave milk in large pans to separate and leads to an expansion of the butter industry in Denmark, the Netherlands, and the USA. 1878 The British sugar manufacturer Henry Tate introduces sugar cubes. 1878 The comic opera HMS Pinafore, or the Lass Who Loved a Sailor, by the English writer William Schwenk Gilbert and the English composer Arthur Seymour Sullivan, is first performed at the Opera Comique in London, England. 1878 The English evangelist leader William Booth begins his 'Christian Mission' in the East End in London, England. This forms the basis of the Salvation Army.

1878 The French artist Auguste Rodin sculpts Walking Man. 1878 The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche publishes Menschliches, Allzumenschliches/Human, All Too Human. 1878 The Remington Model 2 typewriter is introduced in the USA. It is the first typewriter to have a shift key to write both upper and lower case letters; earlier typewriters had only capitals. 1878 The US writer Henry James publishes his story 'Daisy Miller' and his novel The Europeans. 12 January 1879 Frederic Thesiger, Lord Chelmsford, invades Zululand and begins the war between the British and the Zulus. 22 January 1879 Zulu warriors massacre British troops at Isandhlwana, Zululand. 30 January 1879 Following Republican gains in the senatorial elections, President Marie-Edme-Patrice-Maurice MacMahon, duc de Magenta, resigns and François-Paul-Jules Grévy, a moderate Republican, is elected president of France. 14 February 1879 Chile begins a war with Peru and Bolivia over the control of nitrate-producing regions. 14 March 1879 Albert Einstein, German-born US physicist who develops the theory of relativity, born in Ulm, Württemberg, Germany (–1955). 19 May 1879 Nancy Witcher Langhorne, Lady Astor, British politician and the first woman to sit in the House of Commons, born in Danville, Virginia (–1964). 8 August 1879 Emiliano Zapata, Mexican revolutionary who leads a guerilla force during the Mexican Revolution, born in Anenecuilo, Mexico (–1919). 1 September 1879 The British sign a peace treaty with the Zulu chiefs with whom they are at war. 3 September 1879 Afghan troops massacre the British legation at Kabul, reigniting the Anglo-Afghan war ended by the Treaty of Gandamak on 26 May. 21 October 1879 US inventor Thomas Alva Edison demonstrates his carbonfilament incandescent lamp light. He lights his Menlo Park power station with 30 lamps that burn for two days; later filaments burn for several hundred hours. Each light can be turned on or off separately in the first demonstration of parallel circuit. 5 November 1879 James Clerk Maxwell, Scottish physicist who formulated the theory of electromagnetism, dies in Cambridge, England (48).

7 November 1879 Leon Trotsky (adopted name of Lev Davidovitch Bronstein), communist theorist and activist, a leader in Russia's October Revolution of 1917, born in Ianovka, Ukraine, Russian Empire (–1940). 18 December 1879 Paul Klee, Swiss Abstract artist, born in Münchenbuchsee, near Bern, Switzerland (–1940). 21 December 1879 Joseph Stalin (adopted name, Russian for steel, of Josef Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili), secretary general of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union 1922–53, and premier 1941–53, born in Gori, Georgia, Russian Empire (–1953). 1879 German electrical engineer Werner von Siemens demonstrates an electric tram at the Berlin Exhibition in Germany. The first electrically powered locomotive, it runs on a track 500 m/1,640 ft long. 1879 German psychologist Wilhelm Max Wundt founds the first experimental psychology laboratory at Leipzig, Germany. 1879 Maria, the 12-year-old daughter of Spanish nobleman Marcelino de Sautuola, discovers prehistoric paintings of bison and other animals in Altamira Cave, Spain. They are initially dismissed as forgeries. 1879 Store clerk Frank Winfield Woolworth opens a 'five-and-ten' store in the USA, which will become the basis of his retail empire. 1879 The Bohemian composer Bedrich Smetana completes his cycle of symphonic poems Má Vlast/My Country. 1879 The comic opera The Pirates of Penzance, or The Slave of Duty, by the English writer William Schwenk Gilbert and the English composer Arthur Seymour Sullivan, is first performed, in Paignton, Devon, England. 1879 The English writer George Meredith publishes his novel The Egoist. 1879 The play El dukkehjem/The Doll's House by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Johan Ibsen is first performed, in Christiania (now Oslo) in Norway. 1879 The Russian writer Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky publishes the first part of his novel Bratia Karamazovy/The Brothers Karamazov. The second part appears in 1880. 1879 The US religious leader Mary Baker Eddy becomes pastor of the First Church of Christ, Scientist in Boston, Massachusetts. 1879 US chemist Ira Remsen and his German student Constantin Fahlberg discover the artificial sweetener saccharin; it is 500 times sweeter than sugar.

28 April 1880 William Ewart Gladstone forms a Liberal ministry in which he is also chancellor of the Exchequer, with Lord Granville foreign secretary, William Harcourt home secretary, and Joseph Chamberlain president of the Board of Trade. 8 May 1880 Gustave Flaubert, French realist novelist best known for Madame Bovary (1857), dies in Croisset, France (58). 6 June 1880 The Clericals defeat their ideological rivals, the Liberals, in the Belgian elections and begin a long era of power which extends until 1914. 13 October 1880 The Transvaal declares itself independent from Britain in opposition to Britain's annexation of the Boer Transvaal Republic in 1877. 2 November 1880 The Republican candidate James A Garfield is elected as president of the USA. In the Congressional elections, Republicans and Democrats share the seats in the Senate (37–37), but the Republicans regain control of the House (147–135). 2 December 1880 George Eliot (pseudonym of Mary Anne Evans), English novelist, dies in London, England (61). 1880 British geologist John Milne invents the modern seismograph for measuring the strength of earthquakes. 1880 Fifty thousand private telephones are in use in the USA. 1880 Greenwich Mean Time is established as the legal time in the British Isles. 1880 Railway mileage in operation stands at 140,481 km/87,801 mi in the USA, 28,696 km/17,935 mi in Britain, 26,288 km/16,430 mi in France, and 19,520 km/12,200 mi in Russia. 1880 Salmon, meat, and fruit are all available in tins. 1880 Soft canvas shoes, known in Britain as 'plimsolls', catch on with the increasing popularity of lawn tennis as a sport. 1880 The French artist Auguste Rodin begins work on his monumental Gates of Hell, meant to be a doorway to the Museum of Decorative Art in Paris, France. Still unfinished at his death in 1917, the motifs for the project turned into some of his best-known works, such as The Thinker. 1880 The French artist Edgar Degas sculpts The Little 14-year-old Dancer. 1880 The French writer Emile Zola publishes his novel Nana, one of the Les Rougon-Macquart series and Le Roman expérimental/The Experimental Novel, setting out his theories on the novel.

1880 The Suez Canal linking the Mediterranean and the Red Sea is used by 4,344,000 tons of shipping, 70 % of which is British. 1880 The US writer Lewis Wallace publishes his historical novel Ben-Hur. 1880 The world's first ice hockey club is formed at McGill University, Montreal, Canada. 1880 There are 149,874 km/93,671 mi of railroad track in the USA. c. 1880 Ibn Saud, Arabian tribal and Muslim leader who founds the modern state of Saudi Arabia in 1932 and begins to exploit its oil resources, born in Riyadh, Arabia (–1953). 9 February 1881 Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky, Russian novelist best known for Crime and Punishment (1866) and The Brothers Karamazov (1879–80), dies in St Petersburg, Russia (59). 13 March 1881 Alexander II, tsar of Russia 1855–81 who was responsible for emancipating the Russian serfs, is assassinated in St Petersburg, Russia, after calling an assembly of Russian nobles (62). 13 March 1881 Following the assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia by terrorists, he is succeeded by Alexander III. 5 April 1881 Britain and the Boers sign the Treaty of Pretoria, ending the First Anglo-Boer War and recognizing the independence of the South African Republic of Transvaal. 19 April 1881 Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield, British prime minister 1868 and 1874–80, a Conservative, dies in London, England (76). 4 May 1881 Alexander Kerensky, Russian revolutionary and head of the Russian provisional government July–October 1917, born in Simbirsk, Russia (–1970). 5 May 1881 French microbiologist Louis Pasteur vaccinates sheep against anthrax. It is the first infectious disease to be treated effectively with an antibacterial vaccine, and his success lays the foundations of immunology. 6 August 1881 Alexander Fleming, Scottish bacteriologist who discovers penicillin, born in Lochfield, Ayr, Scotland (–1955). 12 August 1881 Cecil B de Mille, US motion picture director and producer known for his spectacular films, born in Ashfield, Massachusetts (–1959). 11 October 1881 US inventor David Henderson Houston patents a camera that takes roll film.

25 October 1881 Pablo Picasso, Spanish painter and sculptor who, along with Georges Braque, founds cubism, born in Málaga, Spain (–1973). 1881 (Mustafa) Kemal Atatürk, Turkish soldier, statesman, and reformer, founder and first president of the Republic of Turkey 1923–38, born in Greece (–1938). 1881 Austrian surgeon Theodor Christian Albert Billroth initiates modern abdominal surgery by removing the cancerous lower part of a patient's stomach. 1881 British inventor Percival Everitt patents the first practical vending machine, which supplies goods when a coin is inserted into it. 1881 Cuban physician Carlos Juan Finlay discovers that the mosquito Aëdes aegypti is the carrier of yellow fever. His results are published in 1886 but his experiments are ignored until 1900. 1881 German-born US physicist Albert Michelson develops an interferometer to measure distances between stars. 1881 Joel Chandler Harris publishes Uncle Remus: His Songs and Sayings, an anthology of traditional Southern black American slave stories and songs. 1881 Political parties are founded in Japan following an imperial decree that an assembly will be convened in 1890. 1881 Population in the USA stands at 53 million, in Germany, 45.2 million, in France, 37.6 million, in Italy, 28.4 million, in Britain, 29.7 million, and in Ireland, 5.1 million. 1881 Populations of the chief European and North American cities stand at 3.3 million in London, England, 2.2 million in Paris, France, 1.2 million in New York City, 1.1 million in Berlin, Germany, 1 million in Vienna, Austria, 0.8 million in Tokyo, Japan, 0.6 million in St Petersburg, Russia, and 0.1 million in Brussels, Belgium. 1881 The French artist Edouard Manet paints Bar at the Folies-Bergères. 1881 The opera Les Contes d'Hoffmann/The Tales of Hoffmann, by the Germanborn French composer Jacques Offenbach, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1881 The unfinished novel Bouvard et Pécuchet/Bouvard and Pécuchet, by the French writer Gustave Flaubert, is published posthumously. 1881 Violent pogroms against Jews begin in Russia and eastern Europe, forcing many Jews to emigrate westwards in succeeding years. 1881–1890 Emigration to the USA is 807,357 from Britain and 655,482 from

Ireland. 18 January 1882 A(lan) A(lexander) Milne, English author who creates Winniethe-Pooh, born in London, England (–1956). 25 January 1882 Virginia Woolf, English author and critic, born in London, England (–1941). 30 January 1882 Franklin Delano Roosevelt, US statesman, thirty-second president of the USA 1933–45 (re-elected three times), a Democrat, born in Hyde Park, New York (–1945). 2 February 1882 James Joyce, Irish novelist and poet, born in Dublin, Ireland (–1941). 1–30 March 1882 Floods along the Mississippi River in the USA leave about 85,000 people homeless. 24 March 1882 German physician Robert Koch announces the discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacillus responsible for tuberculosis. This is the first time a micro-organism has been definitively associated with a human disease. 19 April 1882 Charles Robert Darwin, English naturalist who developed the theory of evolution through natural selection, dies in Downe, Kent, England (73). 20 May 1882 Italy joins the Austro-German alliance for a period of five years, thereby forming the Triple Alliance (which is subsequently renewed until 1915). This assures Italy of support in the event of attack by France, commits Italy to support Germany in the event of a French attack on Germany, and guarantees Italian neutrality in the event of war between Austria-Hungary and Russia. 2 June 1882 Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian soldier whose conquest of Sicily and Naples helped to unify Italy, dies in Caprera, Italy (74). 27 August 1882 Samuel Goldwyn, US pioneer Hollywood film-maker and producer, one of the founders of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), born in Warsaw, Poland (–1974). 4 September 1882 US inventor Thomas Alva Edison opens the Pearl Street electric generating station in New York City. The first in the USA, it employs three 125 horsepower steam generators to supply direct current (DC) to 225 houses. 13 September 1882 The British general Sir Garnet Wolseley defeats the Egyptians at Tel-el-Kebir, Lower Egypt, and proceeds to occupy Egypt and the Sudan.

30 September 1882 Hans Geiger, German physicist who invents the Geiger counter to measure radioactivity, born in Neustadt-an-der-Haardt, Germany (–1945). 30 September 1882 The world's first hydroelectric generating plant opens at Appleton, Wisconsin. It consists of two direct current generators powered by a 107 cm/42 in waterwheel. It produces 2.5 kW of power. 5 October 1882 Robert Goddard, US astronautics pioneer who develops modern rockets used for launching spacecraft, born in Worcester, Massachusetts (–1945). 14 October 1882 Eamon de Valéra, Irish politician and revolutionary, president 1959–73 who takes Ireland out of the British Commonwealth, born in New York City (–1975). 9 November 1882 Anglo-French dual control of Egypt is re-established following its suspension during Arabi Pasha's period of influence. 1882 French physiologist Etienne-Jules Marey invents a rifle-shaped camera that records 12 successive photographs a second. In order to study the flight of birds, he mounts images on a rotating glass plate to simulate motion, and then projects them. They are the first motion pictures taken with a single camera. 1882 Scottish physicist Balfour Stewart postulates the existence of an electrically conducting layer of the outer atmosphere (now known as the ionosphere) to account for the daily variation in the Earth's magnetic field. 1882 The book Dieu et l'Etat/God and the State by the Russian anarchist Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin is published posthumously. 1882 The first judo kodokan (training hall) is established at Shitaya, Japan, by Jigoro Kano. 1882 The French writer Guy de Maupassant publishes his short story collection Mademoiselle Fifi. 1882 The Married Women's Property Act in Britain gives married women the right of separate ownership of property of all kinds. 1882 The opera Parsifal by the German composer Richard Wagner is first performed, in Bayreuth, Germany. Wagner did not want the opera performed anywhere but at Bayreuth, but illegal performances were given, one of the first being in the USA in 1903, in New York City. 1882 US physicist Henry Augustus Rowland invents the concave diffraction grating, in which 20,000 lines to the inch are engraved on spherical concave mirrored surfaces. The grating revolutionizes spectrometry by dispersing light and permitting spectral lines to be focused.

3 January 1883 Clement Attlee, Earl Attlee, British prime minister 1945–51, a member of the Labour Party, born in London, England (–1967). 13 February 1883 (Wilhelm) Richard Wagner, German dramatic composer and theorist, who wrote the operatic sequence Der Ring des Nibelungen/The Ring of the Nibelung dies in Venice, Italy (69). 14 March 1883 Karl Marx, Prussian political theorist, economist, and sociologist whose ideas formed the basis of communism, dies in London, England (65). 30 April 1883 Edouard Manet, French realist painter and important 19th-century artist, dies in Paris, France (51). 1 May 1883 Chancellor Otto von Bismarck introduces a state sickness insurance scheme in Germany to lessen the appeal of socialism to the working classes. 24 May 1883 The Brooklyn Bridge over the East River between Brooklyn and Manhattan, New York City, opens. Designed by German-born US engineer Augustus Roebling, and completed by his son Washington Roebling, the suspension bridge is the first to use steel cable wire and is the longest in the world, with a span of 486 m/1595 ft. 5 June 1883 John Maynard Keynes, English economist concerned with the causes and solutions of long-term unemployment, born in Cambridge, England (–1946). June 1883–December 1885 The French wage a war with Madagascar when the Hova government rejects the island's status as a French protectorate, created in 1882. 3 July 1883 Franz Kafka, Bohemian-born German writer, born in Prague, Bohemia (–1924). 19 July 1883 Benito Mussolini, 'Il Duce', Italian prime minister 1922–43, first of Europe's fascist dictators, born in Predappio, Italy (–1945). 19 August 1883 Coco (Gabrielle) Chanel, French couturier whose classic designs become widely copied, born in Saumur, France (–1971). 25 August 1883 France proclaims a protectorate in Annam and Tonkin, in Southeast Asia. 26–28 August 1883 Krakatoa volcano, Indonesia, erupts in one of the most catastrophic volcanic events in human history. The climactic explosion on the second day is heard nearly 3,000 miles away. Over 36,000 people in Sumatra and Java are drowned by an ensuing tsunami (tidal wave) 35 m/115 ft high, and dust, which is thrown 80 km/50 mi into the air, drifts around the world, causing spectacular sunsets for over a year.

4 September 1883 Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev, Russian novelist, poet, and playwright, dies in Bougival, near Paris, France (65). 14 September 1883 Margaret Sanger, US birth control advocate who opens the first birth control clinic in the USA, born in Corning, New York (–1966). 4 October 1883 The luxury train the Orient Express leaves on its first trip. Europe's first transcontinental express train, it runs 2,740 km/1,700 mi from Paris, France, to Varna, Bulgaria, where passengers disembark to be ferried to Constantinople (Istanbul), Turkey. 20 October 1883 By the peace of Ancón, hostilities between Peru and Chile are concluded. Peru cedes territory to Chile, which is to occupy the disputed provinces of Tacna and Arica for ten years, at the end of which a plebiscite is to be held. 5 November 1883 The Sudanese followers of the dervish Mahdi (prophet) Mohammed Ahmed of Dongola defeat an Egyptian force under the British general William Hicks at El Obeid, in Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, and the British decide to evacuate the country. 1883 British explorer and translator Richard (Francis) Burton translates the Indian classic the Kama Sutra. 1883 German physiologist Paul Ehrlich publishes 'The Requirement of the Organism for Oxygen', in which he shows that different tissues consume oxygen at different rates and that the rate of consumption can be used to measure biological activity. 1883 Irish physicist George Francis FitzGerald suggests that electromagnetic waves (radio waves) can be created by oscillating an electric current. A later demonstration of such waves by the German physicist Heinrich Hertz leads to the development of wireless telegraphy. 1883 The German composer Johannes Brahms completes his Symphony No. 3. 1883 The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche publishes the first part of his Also sprach Zarathustra/Thus Spake Zarathustra. The final part appears in 1885. It is in this work that he develops his concept of the übermensch (superman). 1883 The Russian artist Ilya Yefimovich Repin paints The Return of the Exile. 1883 The Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson publishes his adventure novel Treasure Island. It first appeared as a serial in the magazine Young Folks from 1881 to 1882 under the title The Sea Cook, or Treasure Island. 1883 The US writer Mark Twain (pseudonym of Samuel Langhorne Clemens) publishes his autobiographical Life on the Mississippi.

1883 US architect William Lebaron Jenney completes construction of the tenstorey Home Insurance Building in Chicago, Illinois. The world's first true skyscraper, it consists of a steel-girder framework on which the outer covering of masonry hangs. It sparks a boom in the construction of skyscrapers in Chicago. 1883 US inventor Thomas Alva Edison observes the flow of current between a hot electrode and a cold electrode in one of his vacuum bulbs. Known as the 'Edison effect', it results from the thermionic emission of electrons from the hot electrode, and is the principle behind the working of the electron tube, which is to form the basis of the electronics industry. April–August 1884 Germany occupies South West Africa, Togoland, and Cameroon. 8 May 1884 Harry S Truman, thirty-third president of the USA 1945–53, a Democrat, born in Lamar, Missouri (–1972). 6 July 1884 Gregor Mendel, Austrian monk and botanist who laid the mathematical foundations of genetics, dies in Brünn, Austro-Hungarian Empire (61). 1884 German inventor Paul Gottlieb Nipkow patents a mechanical scanning device consisting of a rotating disc with a spiral of holes. All television systems later use the disc, or a modified version of it, to scan images, until electronic scanning is invented. 1884 German-born US inventor Ottmar Mergenthaler patents the first Linotype typesetting machine. Characters are cast as metal type in complete lines rather than as individual letters as in a monotype machine. 1884 Moses Fleetwood Walker becomes the first black American major league baseball player when he makes his American Association league debut for the Toledo Blue Stockings. 1884 Scotland wins the first football British International Championship, the world's oldest international football championship. 1884 The Fabian Society, an association of intellectual British socialists, is founded. 1884 The French artist Pierre-Auguste Renoir paints Umbrellas. 1884 The Spanish architect Antonio Gaudí begins work on the Sagrada Familia Church in Barcelona, Spain, an extravagant and idiosyncratic building that is still unfinished at his death in 1926. 1884 The US artist John Singer Sargent paints Madame X (Madame Gautreau).

1884 The US writer Mark Twain publishes his novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. 26 January 1885 German mechanical engineer Karl Friedrich Benz patents a three-wheeled vehicle powered by a two-cycle, single-cylinder internal combustion engine, pioneering the development of the motorcar. His car achieves a speed of 14.4 kph/9 mph. 26 January 1885 The Sudanese followers of the dervish Mahdi (prophet) Mohammed Ahmed of Dongola capture the city of Khartoum, capital of AngloEgyptian Sudan, massacring the inhabitants and the occupying Anglo-Egyptian forces, including the Anglo-Egyptian commander, British general Charles Gordon. 5 February 1885 The Congo State is established as a personal possession of King Leopold II of Belgium. 25 February 1885 Germany annexes Tanganyika and Zanzibar, forming German East Africa and continuing its expansion into East Africa. 2 May 1885 Victor Hugo, French Romantic novelist, dies in Paris, France (83). 17 May 1885 Germany annexes Northern New Guinea and the Bismarck Archipelago. 20 May 1885 Faisal I, King of Iraq 1921–33 and promoter of pan-Arab nationalism, born in Mecca, Hejaz (–1933). May 1885 Croatian-born US physicist Nikola Tesla sells his polyphase system of alternating current (AC) dynamos, transformers, and motors to US industrialist George Westinghouse, who begins a power struggle to establish AC technology over US inventor Thomas Alva Edison's direct current (DC) systems. 5 June 1885 The British proclaim a protectorate in the Niger River region of West Africa. 21 June 1885 The dervish Mahdi (prophet) Mohammed Ahmed of Dongola dies, probably of typhoid, in Omdurman, Sudan, and is succeeded by his son Abdullah. 25 June 1885 Robert Cecil, Lord Salisbury, forms a Conservative ministry in Britain, with himself taking the position of foreign secretary as well as prime minister, Michael Hicks Beach chancellor of the Exchequer, and Richard Cross home secretary. 4 July 1885 Louis B Mayer, US film executive, head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) 1924–48, born in Minsk, Russia (–1957). 23 July 1885 Ulysses S Grant, US general who commanded the Union army during the last two years of the American Civil War and president 1863–1877, dies

in Mount McGregor, New York (63). 11 September 1885 D(avid) H(erbert) Lawrence, English poet and novelist, author of the controversial Lady Chatterley's Lover, born in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire, England (–1930). 30 October 1885 Ezra Pound, US poet and literary critic, born in Hailey, Idaho (–1972). 13 November 1885 Serbia invades Bulgaria following the union of Bulgaria and former Ottoman province of Eastern Rumelia, to force compensation for the territorial gains of its neighbour. 16 November 1885 Louis Riel, Canadian Mètis leader who led an uprising against the Canadian government, is hanged in Assiniboia, Canada (41). 19 December 1885 The conservative Republican François-Paul-Jules Grévy is reelected president of France. 1885 Britain proclaims a protectorate in Southern New Guinea, following German annexation of the north part of the island. 1885 The comic opera The Mikado, or The Town of Titipu by the English writer William Schwenk Gilbert and the English composer Arthur Seymour Sullivan is first performed, at the Savoy Theatre in London, England. 1885 The Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh paints The Potato Eaters. 1885 The English explorer and translator Richard Burton publishes the first volume of his The Arabian Nights, translations of a collection of Arabic tales. The final volume appears in 1888. 1885 The English writer Henry Rider Haggard publishes his adventure novel King Solomon's Mines. 1885 The French artist Auguste Rodin sculpts Burghers of Calais. 1885 The Hungarian composer Franz Liszt completes his piano work Mephistowaltzer/Mephisto Waltz No. 4 and the last of his 19 Hungarian Rhapsodies. The first was completed in 1846. 1885 The play Vildanden/The Wild Duck, and the verse play Brand, by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Johan Ibsen, are first performed in Christiania (now Oslo), Norway. Brand was written in 1886. 1885 The US firm Singer demonstrates the first electric sewing machine, at the Philadelphia Electric Exhibition.

1885–1890 British astronomer David Gill photographs over 450,000 stars of 11th magnitude or brighter in the southern hemisphere, in South Africa. 1 January 1886 Britain annexes Upper Burma, though guerrilla warfare continues. 3 March 1886 The Peace of Bucharest ends the war between Serbia and Bulgaria on the basis of the status quo. 5 April 1886 Abdul Hamid II, the Ottoman sultan, appoints Alexander of Bulgaria governor of Eastern Rumelia in a compromise that keeps the area under Ottoman sovereignty but places it under Bulgarian rule. 8 May 1886 John S Pemberton invents the soft drink Coca-Cola in the USA: it goes on sale in Atlanta, Georgia, as 'the intellectual beverage and temperance drink', and is claimed to be a cure for headaches and dyspepsia. 26 May 1886 Al Jolson (stage name of Asa Yoelson), US popular singer and comedian, star of The Jazz Singer (1927), the first feature film with synchronized speech and music, born in Srednike, Russia (–1950). 8 June 1886 British prime minister William Ewart Gladstone's Liberal government is defeated on the second reading of the Irish Home Rule Bill, with 93 Liberals, including John Bright, Joseph Chamberlain, and the Marquess of Hartington voting with the opposition. 3 July 1886 The New York Tribune is the first newspaper to put into operation the linotype machine, an automatic typesetting machine invented by Ottmar Mergenthaler in 1884. 26 July 1886 Robert Cecil, Lord Salisbury, forms a Conservative government following their electoral victory. 31 July 1886 Franz (Ferencz) Liszt, Hungarian pianist and composer, dies in Bayreuth, Germany (74). 20–21 August 1886 A military coup is effected in Sofia, Bulgaria, by discontented pro-Russian army officers. 4 September 1886 King Alexander of Bulgaria abdicates following the coup and Stefan Nikolov Stambulov becomes regent. 16 October 1886 David Ben-Gurion, Zionist statesman and first prime minister of the newly formed state of Israel 1948–53 and 1955–63, born in Plonsk, Poland (–1973). 28 October 1886 The Statue of Liberty is dedicated on Liberty Island (Bedloe's Island) in New York Harbour, New York, by US president Grover Cleveland.

Designed by the French artist Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi, on a frame built by Gustave Eiffel, it was presented to the USA by the French government to celebrate the 100th anniversary of US independence. Made of copper, it is 46 m/152 ft high. Its full name is Liberty Enlightening the World. 1886 John Collinson compiles the rules of bridge in Britain, after seeing the game played during a trip to Constantinople in the Ottoman Empire. 1886 Swedish chemist Svante August Arrhenius introduces the idea that acids are substances that dissociate in water to yield hydrogen ions, H+, and that bases are substances that dissociate to yield hydroxide ions, OH-. 1886 The British submarine Nautilus is launched. The first electric-powered submarine, it uses two electric 50 horsepower motors powered by a 100 cell storage battery to achieve a speed of 6 knots. The need for frequent battery recharges limits its range to 130 km/80 mi. 1886 The collection of prose poems Les Illuminations/Illuminations, by the French Symbolist poet Arthur Rimbaud, is published by his friend and fellow poet Paul Verlaine. Rimbaud was thought to be dead, but was in fact living in Africa. The poems were written between 1872 and 1874 when he was aged 17–19. 1886 The first 'Avon ladies', door-to-door saleswomen for the Avon Calling cosmetics company, start working in the USA. 1886 The first oil tanker, the 90 m/300ft long German ship Gluckhauf, is launched. Oil is carried in tanks located along the hull. Previously, oil was transported in barrels on regular merchant ships. By 1900 99% of oil carried by sea is carried in such ships. 1886 The French artist Georges Seurat paints Sunday on the Island of Grande Jatte. 1886 The French artist Henri Rousseau paints Carnival Evening. 1886 The French composer Camille Saint-Saëns completes his orchestral work Carnaval des animaux/Carnival of the Animals, though he forbids a performance of the work during his life time. 1886 The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy publishes his novella Smeat Ivana Ilyicha/ The Death of Ivan Ilyich. 1886 The Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson publishes his novels The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and Kidnapped. 1886 The US writer Henry James publishes his novels The Bostonians and The Princess Casamassima.

1886 US astronomer and physicist Samuel Pierpont Langley begins the first systematic aerodynamic research. He measures lift and drag on models of wings and other objects, which he attaches to a counterweighted beam, mounted on a pivot, that may be rotated at a speed of up to 112 kph/70 mph. 1886 US chemist Charles Martin Hall and French chemist Paul-Louis-Toussaint Héroult independently develop the same method for the production of aluminium by the electrolysis of aluminium oxide. 4 March 1887 German mechanical engineer Gottlieb Daimler fits his engine to a four-wheeled carriage to produce a four-wheeled motorcar. During the same year he fits his internal combustion engine to a boat, creating the first motor boat. 20 April 1887 The first motor race, organized by the French cycling magazine La Vélocipède, is held in Paris. The winner (and only entrant) is Georges Bouton on a four-seater steam quadricycle. 18 June 1887 A secret German–Russian Reinsurance Treaty is signed to replace the expiring Three Emperors' Alliance (including Austria-Hungary), which Russia refuses to renew. 12 August 1887 Erwin Schrödinger, Austrian physicist who develops the wave theory of matter, born in Vienna, Austria (–1961). 6 October 1887 Le Corbusier (assumed name of Charles-Edouard Jeanneret), Swiss architect and city planner whose designs combines expressionism and functionalism, born in Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland (–1965). 31 October 1887 Jiang Jie Shi (Chiang Kai-shek), Chinese statesman, leader of the Nationalist government 1928–49, and then of the Chinese Nationalist government in exile on Taiwan, born in Zhejiang Province, China (–1975). 2 December 1887 François-Paul-Jules Grévy resigns the presidency of France following financial scandals connected with his son-in-law Daniel Wilson, who trafficked in medals of the Legion of Honour. Marie-François-Sadi Carnot is elected president. 1887 France organizes Cochin-China, Cambodia, Annam, and Tonkin as the Union Indo-Chinoise (French Indochina). 1887 George Hancock of the Farragut Boat Club, Chicago, Illinois, invents softball as an indoor version of baseball. The game later becomes known as 'mush-ball' or 'kitten-ball'; it is not called 'softball' until the 1920s. 1887 German immigrant Emile Berliner patents his gramophone, a machine which plays discs, in the USA. Commercial production begins in Germany in 1889 and in the USA in 1894.

1887 German physicist Heinrich Hertz discovers the photoelectric effect, in which a material gives off charged particles when it absorbs radiant energy, when he observes that ultraviolet light affects the voltage at which sparking between two metal plates takes place. Later work on this phenomenon leads to the conclusion that light is composed of particles called photons. 1887 German-born US inventor Emil Berliner patents the flat phonograph disc or record, and develops a method of making them. Easier to manufacture than cylinders, they also minimize distortions caused by gravity since the stylus moves across the record rather than up and down as on the cylinders. 1887 Polish philoligist Luwik Lejzer Zamenhof devises Esperanto: based on phonetic spelling and a very simple grammar, it becomes the most widely accepted of the artificial languages. He invents it as a way of combatting nationalism. 1887 The Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh paints Portrait of Père Tanguy. 1887 The Scottish writer Arthur Conan Doyle publishes A Study in Scarlet, the first Sherlock Holmes novel. 1887 US physicist Albert Michelson and US chemist Edward Williams Morley fail in an attempt to measure the velocity of the Earth through the 'ether' by measuring the speed of light in two directions. Their failure discredits the idea of the ether and leads to the conclusion that the speed of light is a universal constant, a fundamental premise of Einstein's theory of relativity. 6 March 1888 Louisa May Alcott, US author of children's books, best known for Little Women (1869), dies in Boston, Massachusetts (65). 9 March 1888 Frederick III succeeds as emperor of Germany following the death of Wilhelm I. 15 April 1888 Following election to the French chamber, General Georges Boulanger begins a campaign for the revision of the constitution with the intention of making himself dictator. Charles Floquet forms a cabinet which stands until February 1889. 12 May 1888 The British proclaim a protectorate in North Borneo and Brunei. 15 June 1888 Wilhelm II becomes emperor of Germany on the death of his father, Frederick III. June 1888 US manufacturer George Eastman introduces the hand-held 'Kodak' box camera. The first commercial roll film camera, it is simple to use and contains a 100-exposure roll of paper film. The entire camera is returned to Eastman's factory for the film to be developed and printed, and the camera reloaded. Costing $25, it revolutionizes photography by making it possible for

large numbers of amateur photographers to take acceptable snapshots. 23 July 1888 Raymond Chandler, US author, creator of the private detective Philip Marlowe, born in Chicago, Illinois (–1959). 13 August 1888 John Logie Baird, Scottish engineer who is the first to televise moving pictures, born in Helensburgh, Dunbarton, Scotland (–1946). 15 August 1888 T(homas) E(dward) Lawrence ('Lawrence of Arabia'), British scholar, military strategist, and author, born in Tremadoc, Caernarvonshire, Wales (–1935). 26 September 1888 T(homas) S(tearns) Eliot, US-born British modernist poet and playwright who has a strong influence on 20th-century poetry, born in St Louis, Missouri (–1965). 9 October 1888 The Washington Monument, 202.2 m/555 ft high and built at a cost of $1.2 million, opens to the public in Washington, DC. 16 October 1888 Eugene O'Neill, US dramatist, born in New York City (–1953). October 1888 The magazine National Geographic is launched in the USA. 1888 Five female prostitutes are murdered in the Whitechapel area of London, England, by an unidentified assailant known popularly as 'Jack the Ripper'. 1888 Serbian-born US inventor Nikola Tesla invents the first alternating current (AC) electric motor, which serves as the model for most modern electric motors. He sells the patent to George Westinghouse, who manufactures the motors in competition with Edison's direct current (DC) electric generators. 1888 The Financial Times newspaper is launched in Britain. 1888 The comic opera The Yeoman of the Guard, or The Merryman and His Maid by the English writer William Schwenk Gilbert and the English composer Arthur Seymour Sullivan is first performed, in London, England. 1888 The Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh paints Sunflowers and The Night Café. 1888 The French artist Paul Gauguin paints Vision After The Sermon and The Awakening of Spring. 1888 The French composer Erik Satie completes his three piano pieces Gymnopédies. The first and third are orchestrated by the French composer Claude Debussy in 1897. 1888 The French writer Guy de Maupassant publishes his novel Pierre et Jean/ Pierre and Jean.

1888 The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche publishes Der Antichrist/The Anti-Christ, and Ecce Homo/Behold the Man. 10 January 1889 France proclaims a protectorate over the Ivory Coast. 1 April 1889 General Georges Boulanger, fearing trial for treason, flees from France. In the subsequent elections the Republicans triumph. 16 April 1889 Charlie Chaplin, British-born US actor and director of the silent film era, who gains fame playing a pathetic but humorous character, born in London, England (–1977). 20 April 1889 Adolf Hitler, German fascist leader of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party, dictator of Germany 1933–45, born in Braunau, Germany (–1945). 26 April 1889 Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austrian-born British philosopher, one of the most influential in the 20th century, born in Vienna, Austria (–1951). 2 May 1889 By the Treaty of Ucciali with Menelek of Ethiopia, Italy proclaims a protectorate over Ethiopia. 5 July 1889 Jean Cocteau, French writer, actor, and painter, born in MaisonsLafitte, near Paris, France (–1963). 11 October 1889 James Prescott Joule, English physicist who demonstrated that the various forms of energy can be transformed one into another, dies in Sale, Cheshire, England (70). 14 November 1889 Jawaharlal Nehru, first prime minister of independent India 1947–64, born in Allahabad, India (–1964). 15 November 1889 Brazil is proclaimed a republic on the abdication of Dom Pedro II following a coup. 20 November 1889 Edwin Powell Hubble, US astronomer who provides the first proof that the universe is expanding, born in Marshfield, Missouri (–1953). 1889 British inventor William Friese-Greene develops a camera that takes ten photographs per second, on a roll of perforated film moving behind a shutter. The first true motion picture camera, he uses it to film scenes at Hyde Park Corner, London, England. 1889 German aeronautical engineer Otto Lilienthal writes Der Vogelflug als Grundlage der Fliegekumst/Bird Flight as a Basis of Aviation, a basic work on aeronautics in which he shows that the curved wings of birds are advantageous for flight.

1889 German physiologists Oskar Minkowski and Joseph von Mering remove the pancreas from a dog, which then develops diabetic symptoms. It leads them to conclude that the pancreas secretes an antidiabetic substance, which is now known as insulin. 1889 Manhood suffrage, the right of adult male citizens to vote, is granted in New Zealand. 1889 The British are the largest consumers per capita of sugar in the world. 1889 The English writer Jerome K Jerome publishes his comic novel Three Men in a Boat. 1889 The French corset-maker Hermine Cadolle creates the first bra, which frees women from the restrictions of corsets. 1889 The play Fröken Julie/Miss Julie by the Swedish writer Johan August Strindberg is first performed, in Copenhagen, Denmark. It was published in 1888. 1889 The US composer John Philip Sousa completes his march Washington Post. 1889–1890 A pandemic of influenza, called the Russian flu, seeps the world. Beginning in Russia, it then spreads to the rest of Europe, China, and North America by 1890. It kills nearly 250,000 people in Europe and about 500,000 people worldwide. 10 February 1890 The US government opens 11 million acres of South Dakota land, formerly under the possession of the Sioux, to settlement. 20 March 1890 Otto von Bismarck is dismissed by the new emperor Wilhelm II and Leo, Count von Caprivi, becomes German chancellor. 24 May 1890 By the Mackinnon Treaty between King Leopold II of Belgium and the British East Africa Company, the latter recognizes Leopold's rights on the west bank of the Upper Nile in return for territory near Lake Tanganyika. 18 June 1890 Germany allows the lapse of former chancellor Otto von Bismarck's Reinsurance Treaty with Russia of June 1887, despite Russian attempts to open negotiations for a renewal. 1 July 1890 Under an Anglo-German convention, Britain exchanges the North Sea island of Heligoland for Zanzibar and Pemba in East Africa. 29 July 1890 Vincent van Gogh, Dutch painter whose work inspired the expressionists, dies in Auvers-sur-Oise, near Paris, France (37). 1 October 1890 The German antisocialist law of 1878 proscribing the Social Democratic Party (SPD) expires and is not renewed.

2 October 1890 Groucho Marx (born Julius Marx), US comedian of stage, film, radio, and television along with two of his brothers, Harpo and Chico, born in New York City (–1977). 14 October 1890 Dwight David Eisenhower, thirty-fourth president of the USA 1953–61, a Republican, born in Denison, Texas (–1969). 22 November 1890 Charles de Gaulle, French general and president of France 1958–69, born in Lille, France (–1970). 23 November 1890 On the death of William III and the accession of Queen Wilhelmina, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg is separated from the Netherlands. 5 December 1890 Fritz Lang, Austrian-born US film director who makes Metropolis, born in Vienna, Austria (–1976). 10 December 1890 US Army troops capture Sioux chief Sitting Bull, who resists the white settlement of South Dakota. 18 December 1890 Sir Frederick Lugard occupies Uganda for the British East Africa Company. 1890 Poems, a selection of the poems of the US writer Emily Dickinson, who died in 1886, is published posthumously. Although she wrote over 1,000 poems, only six were published in her lifetime, all without her permission. 1890 A new version of the ballet Spyashchaya krasavitsa/The Sleeping Beauty by the Russian composer Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky is first performed, in St Petersburg, Russia. The choreography is by the French choreographer Marius Petipa. 1890 It is estimated that 1% of the US population holds more than half of the nation's wealth. 1890 The City and South London Railway's 'tube' railway line opens. The world's first electric underground railway, the 4.8 km/3 mi line runs beneath the River Thames. Fares cost two pence. 1890 The English evangelist leader William Booth publishes In Darkest England and the Way Out. 1890 The first version of the Henry Draper Star Catalogue is published. Produced by astronomers at Harvard College Observatory, it lists the position, magnitude, and type of over 10,000 stars, and begins the alphabetical system of naming stars according to temperature. Subsequent editions increase the listing to 400,000 stars. 1890 The French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec paints Dance at the Moulin

Rouge. 1890 The French writer Emile Zola publishes his novel La Bête humaine/The Human Beast. 1890 The German composer Richard Strauss completes his symphonic poem Tod und Verklärung/Death and Transfiguration. 1890 The National Carbon Co. launches Ever Ready batteries in the USA, the first dry-cell battery to be made commercially. 1890 The Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun (pseudonym of Knut Pederson) publishes his novel Sult/Hunger. 1890 The Russian writer Leo Tolstoy publishes his story Kreitserova sonata/The Kreutzer Sonata. 1890 The Scottish anthropologist and folklorist James George Frazer publishes the first volume of his 12-volume The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion, which details the cults, legends, myths, and rites of the world's peoples. The final volume appears in 1915. 1890 The US Congress passes the McKinley Tariff Act, raising tariffs to record heights. 1890 US inventor and statistician Herman Hollerith uses punched cards to automate counting the US census. The holes, which represent numerical data, are sorted and tabulated by an electric machine, the forerunner of modern computers. In 1896 Hollerith forms the Tabulating Machine Company, which later changes its name to International Business Machines (IBM). 1890 US inventor John William Lambert builds the first automobile in the USA to be powered by an internal combustion engine: a single-cylinder, three-wheeled vehicle which he tests in 1891 at Ohio City, Ohio, achieving a speed of 24 kph/15 mph. 4 April 1891 The Pan-German League is founded, a popular association dedicated to agitating for German expansionism. 11 April 1891 Sergey Sergeyevich Prokofiev, Russian composer, born in Sontsovka, Ukraine, Russia (–1953). 16 June 1891 John Abbot becomes premier of Canada following the death of Sir John Macdonald, premier since 1878 and the force behind making Canada a dominion. 27 August 1891 A Franco-Russian entente is made as a result of friendlier relations following the break between Germany and Russia.

19 September 1891 The dictator José Balmaceda is driven from office in Chile following civil war with the congress. 28 September 1891 Herman Melville, US novelist, short-story writer, and poet who wrote Moby Dick, dies in New York City (72). 6 October 1891 Charles Stewart Parnell, Irish nationalist who led the movement for Irish home rule, dies in Brighton, Sussex, England (45). 23 November 1891 The autocratic president of Brazil Deodoroda Fonseca is driven from office by a naval revolt and is succeeded by Florians Peixoto, who also governs dictatorially. 26 December 1891 Henry Miller, US novelist, born in New York City (–1980). 1891 A telephone link is established between London, England, and Paris, France. 1891 French inventors René Panhard and Emile Levassar create a car to a design which becomes the basis for modern cars, by putting the engine at the front (which improves traction for the front wheels) and by replacing the typical leather drive-belt with a transmission, gear shift, and clutch. It is the first vehicle to be designed as an automobile rather than a modified 'horseless' carriage. 1891 The 'blink' comparator is invented. It permits the discovery of objects in the Solar System by comparison of two photographs, taken a few hours apart, of the same region of the sky. Stars remain fixed, while planets and asteroids move or 'blink'. 1891 The Canadian educationalist James Naismith, an instructor at the Springfield, Massachusetts, YMCA Training School, invents the game of basketball, attaching two peach baskets to the tops of ladders at opposite ends of a gymnasium floor. 1891 The English writer Thomas Hardy publishes his novel Tess of the D'Urbervilles. 1891 The Irish writer Oscar Wilde publishes his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray and Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories. 1891 The Scottish writer Arthur Conan Doyle publishes the first of his Sherlock Holmes stories in Strand Magazine. 1891 The Wainwright Building in St Louis, Missouri, designed by the US architect Louis Sullivan, is completed. Combining recent technological developments in building – particularly the use of a steel framework – the Wainwright Building is one of the first masterpieces in the development of the skyscraper.

1891 The world's first long-distance high-voltage line for transmitting electricity is established between Lauffen and Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Over 8,000 volts are carried over a distance of 177 km/120 mi. 1891 US electrical engineer Thomas Edison, with his assistant William Dickson, develops the Kinetoscope, the first commercial motion picture film process. 1891 US inventor Whitcomb L Judson patents the zip fastener under the name of 'Clasp Locker or Unlocker'. It is initially designed for use on shoes and boots, and is not called the 'zipper' until 1926. 1891 US inventors Thomas Edison and William Dickson patent the 'Kinetoscope', a predecessor of the motion-picture film projector. It consists of a strip of film, viewed through a peephole in a box while being wound from one reel to another, producing the illusion of persons and objects in motion. Edison sees it as a toy and fails to consider projection of the images. 3 January 1892 J(ohn) R(onald) R(euel) Tolkien, English novelist, known for his Lord of the Rings trilogy, born in Bloemfontein, South Africa (–1973). 7 January 1892 At the age of 18, Abbas succeeds Tewfik as khedive of Egypt, ruling until 1914 and demonstrating hostility towards British influence. 26 March 1892 Walt Whitman, US journalist, essayist and poet, dies in Camden, New Jersey (72). 6 June 1892 The pro-Western Prince Hirobumi Ito becomes premier of Japan. 23 July 1892 Haile Selassie, Ethiopian emperor 1930–74, who modernizes the country but is deposed, born in Harer, Ethiopia (–1975). 11 August 1892 Following electoral defeat in the British general election, the Conservative prime minister Lord Salisbury resigns and William Ewart Gladstone forms a Liberal ministry, with Lord Rosebery foreign secretary, William Harcourt chancellor of the Exchequer, and Herbert Asquith home secretary. 10 November 1892 The Panama Canal financial scandal breaks in France and the canal's builder Ferdinand de Lesseps and his associates are committed for trial for corruption and mismanagement. 25 November 1892 The French educational reformer and social philosopher Pierre Fredi, Baron de Coubertin calls for a revival of the Olympic Games in a speech at the Sorbonne (University of Paris), France. 4 December 1892 Francisco Franco, Spanish leader of the right-wing nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War 1936–39, then dictator for life, born in El Ferrol, Spain (–1975).

1892 A new version of the ballet Shchelkunchik/Nutcracker by the Russian composer Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky is first performed, in St Petersburg, Russia. The choreography is by the Russian choreographer Lev Ivanovich Ivanov. 1892 Canadian physician William Osler publishes The Principles and Practice of Medicine, the most comprehensive and popular textbook on medicine of the time. 1892 French chemist Ferdinand-Frédéric Henri Moissan invents the first electricarc furnace. He uses it to create many new compounds and to vaporize substances that had been considered to be impossible to melt. 1892 German engineer Rudolf Diesel patents the diesel engine, a new type of internal combustion engine that runs on oil. The engine works on the Otto cycle. Air is highly compressed and the heat generated ignites the oil in the cylinder. It proves more efficient than earlier prime movers. 1892 German inventor Hermann Ganswindt proposes using steel cartridges loaded with explosives to achieve escape velocity and leave the Earth. He is the first to link rockets and space flight. 1892 German-born US electrical engineer Charles Proteus Steinmetz discovers the law of hysteresis, which, by explaining why all electrical devices lose power when magnetic action is converted to heat, allows engineers to improve the efficiency of electric motors, generators, and transformers through design, rather than trial and error. 1892 Russian microbiologist Dimitry Iosifovich Ivanovsky publishes 'On Two Diseases of Tobacco' in which he announces that mosaic disease in tobacco is caused by micro-organisms too small to be seen through a microscope. 1892 The French artist Paul Gauguin paints The Spirit of the Dead Watching. 1892 The opera I pagliacci/The Clowns by the Italian composer Ruggiero Leoncavallo is first performed, in Milan, Italy. 1892 The US artist Mary Cassatt paints The Bath. 1892 The US philosopher William James publishes The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy. 1892 US salesman William Wrigley starts selling chewing gum, previously given away free with other sales, as his main line. 12 January 1893 Hermann Goering, German Nazi leader under Hitler, born in Rosenheim, Germany (–1946). 13 January 1893 The Independent Labour Party is formed under (James) Keir Hardie at a conference in Bradford, England.

17 January 1893 Hawaiian revolutionaries depose Queen Liliuokalani, amid rumours of US government complicity. January 1893 A Franco-Russian alliance is signed, formalizing the entente established between the two countries in August 1891. 15 February 1893 US president Benjamin Harrison's administration submits a Hawaiian annexation treaty to the US Senate, but on 9 March the newly inaugurated president Grover Cleveland retracts the treaty amid controversy over US complicity in the Hawaiian revolution. 10 March 1893 The French colonies of French Guinea and the Ivory Coast are formally established. 5 May–27 June 1893 Panic grips Wall Street as the stock prices dive in the USA. By the end of June, some 600 banks and 15,000 businesses have closed and 74 railways have declared bankruptcy. 10 May 1893 Britain grants Natal self-government following war over its declaration of independence. 11 May 1893 Martha Graham, US choreographer of modern dance, born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (–1991). 9 June 1893 Cole Porter, US composer and lyricist, born in Peru, Indiana (–1964). 6 July 1893 Guy de Maupassant, French short-story writer in the Naturalist school, dies in Paris, France (42). 21 September 1893 Brothers Charles and Frank Duryea, who own a bicycle shop, test the first gasoline-powered car built in the USA. 22 September 1893 At Springfield, Massachusetts, US inventors Charles Edgar and James Frank Duryea demonstrate the first car built in the USA. It has a singlecylinder, water-cooled petrol engine, electric ignition, rubber tyres, and leather transmission. 6 November 1893 Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky, leading 19th-century Russian composer who, amongst a great variety of works, composed the music for the ballets Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, and Sleeping Beauty, dies in St Petersburg, Russia (53). 26 December 1893 Mao Zedong, Chinese Marxist theorist who is chairman of the People's Republic of China 1949–59 and chairman of the Chinese Communist Party 1949–76, born in Shaoshan, Hunan Province, China (–1976). 1893 Canadian physician William Osler, US surgeons William Stewart Halsted and Howard Atwood Kelly, and US pathologist William Henry Welch establish Johns

Hopkins Medical School in Baltimore, Maryland. Associated with Johns Hopkins Hospital, and created especially for teaching and research, it excels in clinical work and surgery, and sets an example that influences medical education in the USA. 1893 France proclaims a protectorate in Laos, continuing the expansion of its influence in Southeast Asia. 1893 German mechanical engineer Karl Friedrich Benz constructs his first fourwheeled car. 1893 German-born US electrical engineer Charles Proteus Steinmetz develops a mathematical method for making calculations about alternating current (AC) circuits. By allowing the performance and efficiency of electrical equipment to be predicted, it leads to the rapid development of devices using AC. 1893 New Zealand becomes the first country to extend the franchise to women. 1893 The Bohemian composer Antonín Dvorák completes his Symphony No. 9 (once classified as No. 5); Z noveho svéta/From the New World; and his String Quartet in F major (Opus 96), the American. 1893 The British philosopher Francis Herbert Bradley publishes Appearance and Reality. 1893 The Coca-Cola trademark is registered. 1893 The play Bygmester Solness/The Master Builder, by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Johan Ibsen, is first performed, in Trondheim, Norway. 1893 The Russian composer Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky completes his Symphony No. 6, the Pathétique/Pathetic. 1893 The US writer Ambrose Bierce publishes his collection of short stories Can Such Things Be? 1893 The US writer Stephen Crane publishes his novel Maggie: A Girl of the Streets. 1893 William Wrigley introduces Juicy Fruit and Spearmint to his chewing gum ranges. Wrigley's is the leading brand in the USA by 1910. 10 February 1894 Harold Macmillan, British politician, Conservative prime minister 1957–63, born in London, England (–1986). 17 April 1894 Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev, first secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union 1953–64 and premier 1958–64, born in Kalinovka, Ukraine in the Russian Empire (–1971).

26 April 1894 Rudolf Hess, German Nazi leader and deputy of Adolf Hitler, born in Alexandria, Egypt (–1987). 22 June 1894 The protectorate of Dahomey is proclaimed a French colony. 23 June 1894 Edward VIII, king of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (January–December 1936) who abdicates to marry the US divorcée Wallis Simpson, born in Richmond, Surrey, England (–1972). 24 June 1894 President Marie-François-Sadi Carnot of France is assassinated at Lyon, France, by an Italian anarchist and is succeeded by Jean Casimir-Périer. 23 July 1894 Japanese troops seize the royal palace in Seoul, Korea, and take control of the country, which has traditionally been a Chinese fiefdom. 1 August 1894 Japan declares war on China over the right of influence in Korea. 27 August 1894 The Wilson–Gorman Tariff Act, introducing a 2% income tax, becomes law in the USA, passed by Congress without receiving the assent of US president Grover Cleveland. It is the nation's first graduated income tax. 1 September 1894 In Hinckley, Minnesota, 480 people die as a result of a forest fire. 26 October 1894 Prince Chlodwig von Hohenlohe succeeds Leo, Count von Caprivi, as German chancellor, the unpopularity of the February commercial treaty with Russia contributing to Caprivi's fall. 26 November 1894 Nicolas II becomes tsar of Russia following the death of Alexander III. 3 December 1894 Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish novelist who wrote Kidnapped, Treasure Island, and The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, dies in Vailima, Samoa (44). 22 December 1894 Major Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish French army officer, is convicted of treason by a court martial, and is imprisoned on Devil's Island, French Guiana. 1894 At the annual meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, British physicist Oliver Joseph Lodge gives the first demonstration of wireless telegraphy, transmitting signals over a distance of 60 m/180 ft; he fails to realize its practical implications. 1894 Coca-Cola is bottled for the first time in the USA: however, most Coca-Cola is sold to drug stores as a syrup, to which carbonated water is added.

1894 Dutch anatomist Marie Eugène Dubois announces the discovery, in Java, of the remains of the first specimen of Homo erectus ('upright man'), which he calls Pithecanthropus erectus, and which has a cranial capacity of 900 cc and is 0.5 to 1 million years old. 1894 French chemists Auguste and Louis Lumière patent a prototype colour film procedure. 1894 The English writer Anthony Hope publishes his novel The Prisoner of Zenda, which becomes a classic adventure novel. 1894 The English writer Rudyard Kipling publishes his collection of tales The Jungle Book. 1894 The French artist Claude Monet paints his Rouen Cathedral series. 1894 The French composer Claude Debussy completes his tone-poem Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune/Prelude to 'The Afternoon of a Faun', inspired by a poem by the French poet Stéhane Mallarmé. The Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky uses Debussy's music for a ballet of this name first performed in 1912. 1894 The Norwegian artist Edvard Munch paints Anguish. 1894 US confectioner Milton Hershey produces his first chocolate bar, the Hershey Milk Chocolate Bar. 1 February 1895 John Ford (adopted name of Sean O'Feeney), US film director best known for his Westerns, born in Cape Elizabeth, Maine (–1973). 6 February 1895 (George Herman) 'Babe' Ruth, US professional baseball player, born in Baltimore, Maryland (–1948). 12 February 1895 The Japanese navy achieves a resounding victory over Chinese forces at Weihaiwei during the Sino-Japanese war. 13 February 1895 French inventors Auguste and Louis Lumière patent the cinématograph, a device for taking and projecting moving pictures. On 28 December 1895, in the basement of the Grande Café in Paris, France, they show the film La Sortie des ouvriers de l'usine Lumière/Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory, the first film shown to a paying public. It sparks an entire new industry. It is also the first documentary film, and projects at 16 frames per second. They make more than 40 films during 1896 and record everyday French life. 30 March 1895 US-born British cinematographic pioneer Birt Acres films the Oxford and Cambridge University Boat Race. This is the first sporting event to be filmed in Britain, and the first regular event in the sporting calendar to be filmed anywhere in the world.

17 April 1895 Under the Treaty of Shimonoseki, China and Japan recognize the independence of Korea following war over its status as a Chinese vassal state. 2 May 1895 Territory belonging to the British South Africa Company south of the Zambezi is organized to form Southern Rhodesia. 6 May 1895 Rudolph Valentino, Italian-born US silent film star, known as the 'Great Lover', born in Castellaneta, Italy (–1926). 11 June 1895 Britain annexes Togoland in order to block the Transvaal's access to the sea. 1 July 1895 The British government creates an East African protectorate on the dissolution of the British East Africa Company. 28 September 1895 Louis Pasteur, French microbiologist who proved that microorganisms cause disease and fermentation and who developed the process of pasteurization, dies in Saint-Cloud, near Paris, France (73). 4 October 1895 English-born US golfer Horace Rawlins receives $150 as the winner of the inaugural US Open golf championship, which is played on a ninehole course at Newport, Rhode Island. 8 November 1895 German scientist Wilhelm Konrad Röntgen experiments with a Crookes' tube and notices that a sheet of paper coated with barium pltinocyanide becomes fluorescent. Realizing that this is due to some unknown emission from the tube, he names it the X-ray. 1895 A new version of the ballet Lebedinoe ozero/Swan Lake, written in 1877 by the Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, is first performed, in St Petersburg, Russia. The choreography of this, the most familiar version, is by the French choreographer Marius Petipa and the Russian choreographer Lev Ivanovich Ivanov. 1895 French sociologist Emile Durkheim publishes Les Règles de la méthode sociologique/The Rules of the Sociological Method, in which he formulates the scientific methodology of sociology and establishes it as a discipline. 1895 Friedrich Engels, German socialist philosopher who, with Karl Marx, wrote The Communist Manifesto (1848) which laid the foundations of modern communism, dies in London, England (75). 1895 More than 300 cars are in use in the USA. 1895 Russian scientist Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky publishes Gryozy o zemle i nebe/Dreams of Earth and Sky. The first book about space travel, it discusses the possibility of space flight using liquid-fuelled rockets, and the idea of designing spacecraft with a closed biological cycle to provide oxygen from

plants for long flights. 1895 Scottish physicist Charles Thomson Rees Wilson develops the first cloud chamber. He builds it to duplicate the effects of clouds on mountain tops, but later realizes its potential in nuclear physics. 1895 The Austrian architect Otto Wagner publishes his influential book Moderne Architektur/Modern Architecture. 1895 The Austrian psychiatrist Sigmund Freud publishes Studien über Hysterie/ Studies in Hysteria. 1895 The comedy The Importance of Being Earnest by the Irish writer Oscar Wilde is first performed, at the St James Theatre in London, England. 1895 The English writer H G Wells publishes his fantasy novel The Time Machine. 1895 The German composer Richard Strauss completes his symphonic poem Till Eulenspiegel. 1895 The US writer Stephen Crane publishes his novel The Red Badge of Courage. 1895 Volleyball is invented by William G Morgan, director of physical training at the Holyoke YMCA, Massachusetts. It is originally known as 'mintonette'. 2 January 1896 Leander Starr Jameson surrenders to Boer commandos at Doornkop, Transvaal, after his attempt to start an anti-Boer rising in Transvaal fails. 3 January 1896 Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany sends the 'Kruger telegram' congratulating the Transvaal leader on suppressing the 'Jameson raid', and provokes a crisis in Anglo-German relations. 6 January 1896 Cecil Rhodes resigns the premiership of Cape Colony following the failure of the raid on Transvaal by his friend Leander Starr Jameson. 2 February 1896 A revolution inspired by the Greeks begins on the Ottoman island of Crete in the search for independence from Turkey. 1 March 1896 The Ethiopians under King Menelek II defeat the attacking Italian force at Adowa, Ethiopia, forcing Italy to sue for peace. 12 March 1896 In order to protect the Nile region from a French advance, Britain decides to undertake the re-conquest of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, evacuated in 1885 because of the hostility of the Sudanese followers of the dervish Mahdi (prophet) Mohammed Ahmed of Dongola. 6–15 April 1896 The first Olympic Games of the modern era are held in Athens,

Greece, in the ancient Panathenaic stadium. Around 250 athletes (all men) from 14 nations assemble to compete in 44 track and field, swimming, cycling, fencing, Graeco-Roman wrestling, gymnastics, shooting, tennis, and weightlifting events. The USA wins 11 gold medals (including 9 of the 12 track and field gold medals); Greece wins 10 gold medals; Germany, 7; France, 5; Great Britain, 3; Hungary, Austria, and Australia, 2 each. The marathon, using the ancient course covered by Pheidippides after the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC, is won by Spiridon Louis of Greece. 1 May 1896 The Shah of Persia Nasir ud-Din is murdered and is succeeded by his son Muzaffar ud-Din. 18 May 1896 The US Supreme Court, in Plessy v. Ferguson, upholds the concept of separate railway cars for black Americans, creating the basis for segregationist provision of 'separate but equal' public facilities in the USA, known as Jim Crow. June 1896 Italian physicist Guglielmo Marconi patents wireless telegraphy. In September, he gives public demonstrations, sending signals 6.4 km/4 mi over Salisbury Plain, England, and 14.5 km/9 mi over the Bristol channel. 1 July 1896 Harriet Beecher Stowe, US writer, author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, dies in Hartford, Connecticut (85). 18 August 1896 France annexes Madagascar, whose external treaties with other states are annulled. 24 September 1896 F Scott Fitzgerald, US novelist and short-story writer, born in St Paul, Minnesota (–1940). 26 October 1896 By the Treaty of Addis Ababa the Italian protectorate of Ethiopia is withdrawn, following Italian military defeat by the Ethiopians. 3 November 1896 The world's first permanent wireless installation is set up at The Needles on the Isle of Wight, Hampshire, England, by the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Co. Ltd. 10 December 1896 Alfred Nobel, Swedish chemist who invented dynamite and founded the Nobel prizes, dies in San Remo, Italy (63). 12 December 1896 The Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi publically demonstrates his system for commercially viable radio communication in Britain and obtains a patent. 1896 Le Coucher de la Marie, directed by Eugène Pirou, is released in France. The first pornographic movie, it stars Louise Willy. 1896 Alfred Harmsworth founds the Daily Mail newspaper in Britain, which is advertised as 'bright and breezy', and sold at 1/2 pence.

1896 Austrian composer Gustav Mahler completes his Symphony No 3. 1896 Italian immigrant Italo Marcioni creates the ice-cream cone in the USA. 1896 Queen Victoria becomes the longest-reigning British monarch. 1896 The 'Red Flag Act' of 1865, which required a man on foot carrying a red flag to precede all carriages, is repealed. 1896 The English writer A E Housman publishes his poetry collection A Shropshire Lad. 1896 The English writer Thomas Hardy publishes his novel Jude the Obscure. 1896 The first comic-strip in a newspaper appears in the New York World. 1896 The French artist Paul Cézanne paints The Great Pine and The Lake at Annecy. 1896 The French philosopher Henri Bergson publishes Matière et Mémoire/ Matter and Memory. 1896 The opera La Bohème/The Bohemian Girl by the Italian composer Giacomo Puccini is first performed, in Turin, Italy. 1896 The Polish writer Henryk Sienkiewicz publishes his novel Quo Vadis?. 1896 US inventor Elmer Ambrose Sperry develops the gyrocompass, which always points to true north. It is first installed on the US battleship Delaware, in 1911, and later in torpedoes and aeroplanes. 28 March 1897 Japan adopts the gold standard, linking its paper money directly to its gold reserves, the accepted Western base for a stable financial system. 7 April 1897 Turkey declares war on Greece in retaliation for its support for the revolt in Crete. 4 May 1897 An explosion and resulting fire at a Cinématograph emonstration at the Charity Bazaar in Paris, France, kills 121 people and leads to a decrease in film attendance. 18 May 1897 Frank Capra, Italian-born US film director who directs It's a Wonderful Life and Mr Smith Goes to Washington, born near Palermo, Sicily (–1991). 25 September 1897 William Faulkner, US novelist, author of a series of novels known as the Yoknapatawpha cycle and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature

in 1949, born in New Albany, Mississippi (–1962). 16 December 1897 The Peace of Constantinople ends the war between Greece and Turkey. 1897 Advertisement films start to be made in Britain, France, and the USA. 1897 English engineer Charles Parsons fits a steam turbine to the boat Turbania, which achieves a speed of 34.5 knots, making it the fastest boat of the time. It is the first time a steam turbine has been applied to propel a ship. Parsons demonstrates the boat to a crowd of thousands at Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee Review of the Fleet, by unexpectedly weaving in and out of the British fleet. 1897 English physicist John Joseph Thomson demonstrates the existence of the electron, the first known subatomic particle. It revolutionizes knowledge of atomic structure by indicating that the atom can be subdivided. 1897 Foreigners invest $3.4 billion in the USA; US interests invest $700 million overseas. 1897 German physicist Karl Ferdinand Braun improves the cathode-ray tube. By varying the voltage, he can control the narrow beam of electrons. His 'Braun tube' is the forerunner of television tubes, radar screens, and oscilloscopes. 1897 Norwegian meteorologist Vilhelm Bjerknes develops mathematical theorems applicable to the motions of large-scale air masses, which are essential to weather forecasting. 1897 The English writer Bram (Abraham) Stoker publishes his novel Dracula, a classic horror novel that launches the Dracula myth. 1897 The English writer H G Wells publishes his novel The Invisible Man. 1897 The French artist Henri Rousseau paints Sleeping Gypsy. 1897 The French artist Paul Gauguin paints Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going? 1897 The French composer Paul Dukas completes his symphonic poem L'Apprenti sorcier/The Sorcerer's Apprentice. 1897 The Irish wit and playwright Oscar Wilde is released from Reading Gaol, after serving a two-year sentence for sodomy. 1897 The play The Devil's Disciple by the Irish writer George Bernard Shaw is first performed, at the Fifth Avenue Theater in New York City.

1897 The Polish-born British writer Joseph Conrad (Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski) publishes his novel The Nigger of the 'Narcissus'. c. 1897 The development of the electric street car makes the suburbs more accessible, leading to an expansion of the cities in the USA. 13 January 1898 French novelist Emile Zola publishes his 'J'accuse!'/'I Accuse!', an open letter to the French president protesting that Alfred Dreyfus is the victim of an anti-Semitic plot. 14 January 1898 Lewis Carroll (pen-name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), English novelist who wrote Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865), dies in Guildford, Surrey, England (65). 23 January 1898 Sergey Mikhaylovich Eisenstein, Russian film director, born in Riga, Latvia (–1948). 10 February 1898 Bertolt Brecht, German poet and playwright, born in Augsburg, Germany (–1956). 15 February 1898 The US warship Maine explodes in Havana harbour, killing 269 US Navy personnel. Despite a lack of evidence, Americans overwhelmingly blame Spain for the incident and begin to agitate for war. 28 March 1898 The first German Navy Bill is introduced by Alfred von Tirpitz and begins the expansion of the German navy and competition with Britain's naval power. 19 May 1898 William Ewart Gladstone, prime minister of Britain 1868–74, 1880–85, 1886, and 1892–94, a Liberal, dies in Hawarden, Flintshire, Wales (88). 7 June 1898 Imre Nagy, independent communist and premier of Hungary 1953–55 who tries to gain Hungary's independence from the Soviet Union, born in Kaposvár, Hungary, Austria-Hungary (–1958). 11 June–16 September 1898 Emperor Guangxu initiates China's 'hundred days of reform' under the guidance of Kang Youwei in response to the interest being shown in China by the Western powers. 30 July 1898 Otto von Bismarck, founder and first chancellor of the German Empire 1871–90, dies in Hamburg, Germany (83). 12 August 1898 The islands of Hawaii are annexed to the USA. 2 September 1898 General Horatio Kitchener defeats the dervishes at the Battle of Omdurman as his British force advances across the Sudan. 21 September 1898 Dowager Empress Zi Xi of China seizes power and revokes

the reforms of Emperor Guangxu. 26 September 1898 George Gershwin, US composer and songwriter of Broadway musicals, born in Brooklyn, New York (–1937). 2 December 1898 The USA, Britain, and Germany sign the Samoan Partition Treaty, dividing the Samoan Islands between the three signatories. 10 December 1898 The USA and Spain sign the Treaty of Paris, in which Spain cedes Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and also the Philippines (which is yet to be conquered) for $20 million, thus ending the Spanish–American War. 1898 A revised version of the 1896 play Chayka/The Seagull by the Russian writer Anton Chekhov is performed in Moscow, Russia. Directed by Konstantin Sergeyevich Stanislavsky, this is the first production of the Moscow Art Theatre. 1898 Cornflakes are introduced in the USA by John Harvey and William Keith Kellogg and manufactured by the Sanitas Nut Food Co., based in Battle Creek, Michigan. 1898 French chemists Pierre Curie and Marie Curie discover the radioactive elements polonium (atomic number 84) and radium (atomic number 88). Radium is discovered in pitchblende and is the first element to be discovered radiochemically. 1898 German physicist Wilhelm Wien discovers the proton. He also discovers that a magnetic field can deflect a beam of charged particles. His discovery lays the foundations of mass spectroscopy. 1898 Martinus Willem Beijerinck identifies the first virus; it is the cause of tobacco mosaic disease. 1898 The French artist Odilon Redon paints The Cyclops. 1898 The submarine Argonaut travels 1,280 km/800 mi from Norfolk, Virginia, to New York City. It is the first time a submarine has navigated extensively in the open ocean. 1898 The US composer Charles Ives completes his Symphony No. 1. 1898 The US writer Henry James publishes his story The Turn of the Screw. 1898 The US writer Stephen Crane publishes his The Open Boat and Other Tales of Adventure, which includes, along with the title story, 'A Bride Comes to Yellow Sky'. 1898 US pharmacist Caleb Bradham produces a drink as a rival to Coca-Cola, calling it Pepsi Cola.

7 January 1899 Francis Poulenc, French composer, born in Paris, France (–1963). 17 January 1899 Al Capone, US gangster, born in Brooklyn, New York City (–1947). 18 February 1899 Emile Loubet is elected president of France following the death of Félix Faure. 3 June 1899 Johann Strauss, Austrian composer of Viennese waltzes and operettas, dies in Vienna, Austria (74). 21 July 1899 Ernest Hemingway, US novelist who writes A Farewell to Arms (1929) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1941), born in Oak Park, Illinois (–1961). 13 August 1899 Alfred Hitchcock, US film director known for his films of suspense, born in London, England (–1980). 24 August 1899 Jorge Luis Borges, Argentine poet, short-story writer, and essayist who establishes the modernist Ultraist movement in South America, born in Buenos Aires, Argentina (–1986). 9 October 1899 Transvaal president Paul Kruger sends an ultimatum to Britain to stop sending troops to southern Africa, or face war. 12 October 1899 A Boer ultimatum demanding Britain stop sending troops to southern Africa expires and the Second Anglo-Boer War begins. 16–20 October 1899 In the America's Cup, the US yacht Columbia defeats the British challenger Shamrock, owned by the British businessman Thomas Lipton, by three races to nil. Lipton makes further attempts, all unsuccessful, to win the trophy in 1901, 1903, 1920, and 1930. 25 December 1899 Humphrey Bogart, US actor, born in New York City (–1957). 1899 German chemist Emil Fischer postulates the 'lock and key' hypothesis to explain the specificity of enzyme action. 1899 German chemist Emil Hermann Fischer shows that proteins are polymers, or large molecules, comprised of amino acids. 1899 Louis and Marcel Renault found the French car company Renault Frères. 1899 New Zealand-born British physicist Ernest Rutherford discovers alpha and beta particles. 1899 Oxo meat stock cubes are developed at Fray Bentos in Uruguay.

1899 The English composer Edward Elgar completes his Enigma Variations. 1899 The French artist Claude Monet paints Water Lilies, the first of a long series that occupy him for the rest of his life (he dies in 1926). 1899 The French composer Maurice Ravel completes his piano work Pavane pour une infante défunte/Pavan for a Dead Infanta, which he orchestrates in 1910. 1899 The US artist John Singer Sargent paints The Wyndham Sisters: Lady Elcho, Mrs Adeane, and Mrs Tennant. 1899 The US artist Winslow Homer paints The Gulf Stream. 1899 The US composer John Philip Sousa completes his march Hands Across the Sea. 1899 The US writer Kate (O'Flaherty) Chopin publishes her short novel The Awakening. 1899–1900 British archaeologist Arthur John Evans excavates the palace of Knossos, Crete. 10 January 1900 Following four months of Boer advances in the Second AngloBoer War, Field Marshal Frederick, Lord Roberts ('Bobs') lands in southern Africa as the new commander in chief of the British army, with Horatio, Lord Kitchener, as chief of staff. 25 January 1900 In the Battle of Spion Kop in the Second Anglo-Boer War, a Boer army forces the British troops under General Sir Redvers Buller to retreat with heavy losses. 29 January 1900 Bancroft Byron 'Ban' Johnson founds the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs in Chicago, Illinois, as a rival to the National Baseball League. 28 February 1900 General Sir Redvers Buller relieves the town of Ladysmith in Natal, which has been besieged by a Boer force since 30 October 1899. 6 March 1900 Gottlieb Daimler, German mechanical engineer who built one of the first successful cars powered by an internal combustion engine, dies in Cannstatt, Germany (65). 25 April 1900 Wolfgang Pauli, Austrian-born US physicist, who discovers the principle that no two electrons in the same atom can have the same energy, born in Vienna, Austria (–1958). 17–18 May 1900 British forces under General Sir Redvers Buller relieve the town of Mafeking, southern Africa, following a seven-month siege by a Boer force.

13 June 1900 The Boxer Rebellion by supporters of the Society of Harmonious Fists begins in China, in opposition to the growth of European influence there. 2 July 1900 German inventor Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin's lighter-than-air ship LZ-3D1 makes its first flight, at Lake Constance, Germany. It has an aluminium sheeting hull. 4 July 1900 Louis Armstrong, US jazz trumpeter, composer, and band leader, born in New Orleans, Louisiana (–1971). 8–10 August 1900 The US public official Dwight Filley Davis presents an international challenge cup for lawn tennis, the Davis Cup. The USA wins the trophy, beating Britain 3–0 at Brookline, Massachusetts. 25 August 1900 Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher and critic, especially of Christianity, dies in Weimar, Thuringian States (55). 7 October 1900 Heinrich Himmler, German Nazi leader, head of the SS, and organizer of the Nazi death camps, born in Munich, Germany (–1945). 16 October 1900 In the 'khaki' election in Great Britain, the Conservatives, successful in the Second Anglo-Boer War, remain in power with a majority of 134. The Conservatives and Unionists take 334 seats, the Liberal Unionists 68, the Liberals 184, the Irish Nationalists 82, and Labour 2. Prime Minister Lord Salisbury reconstructs his government, appointing Lord Lansdowne as foreign secretary. 17 October 1900 Bernhard von Bülow succeeds the aged Prince Chlodwig von Hohenlohe as the German chancellor. 6 November 1900 In the US presidential elections, the Republican candidate William McKinley is re-elected as president of the USA. In the Congressional elections, the Republicans retain majorities in the House (197–151) and Senate (55–31). 11 November 1900 Following British conquests, the Boer forces under General Christiaan De Wet resort to guerrilla tactics, raiding communications and British outposts. Horatio, Lord Kitchener orders that women and children related to Boer combatants be interred in concentration camps, and extends the 'scorched earth' policy started by Field Marshal Frederick, Lord Roberts, destroying Boer farms. 22 November 1900 Arthur Seymour Sullivan, British composer of operettas with William Schwenk Gilbert, dies in London, England (58). 30 November 1900 Oscar Wilde, Irish poet and dramatist, dies in Paris, France (44).

1900 Canadian-born US scientist Reginald Aubrey Fessenden discovers the principle of amplitude modulation (AM) of radio waves. 1900 Cyril Arthur Pearson publishes the Express in Britain; one of the paper's innovations is to have news on the front page. 1900 Dutch geneticist Hugo Marie de Vries, German botanist Carl Erich Correns, and Austrian botanist Erich Tschermak von Seysenegg, simultaneously and independently, rediscover the Austrian monk Gregor Mendel's 1865 work on heredity. 1900 French physiologist Paul Ulrich Villard discovers a new type of radiation that is later known as gamma rays. 1900 French tyre manufacturers André and Edouard Michelin launch the Guide Michelin, the first systematic guidebook to restaurants, hotels, and garages in Europe. 1900 German physicist Max Planck suggests that black bodies (perfect absorbers) radiate energy in packets or quanta, rather than continuously. He thus begins the science of quantum physics, which revolutionizes the understanding of atomic and subatomic processes. 1900 Norwegian Johann Vaaler patents paper clips in Germany. 1900 The Austrian psychiatrist Sigmund Freud publishes Die Traumdeutung/The Interpretation of Dreams. 1900 The English composer Edward Elgar completes his oratorio The Dream of Gerontius, based on a dramatic monologue by the English churchman Cardinal Newman. 1900 The Finnish composer Jean Sibelius completes his orchestral work Finlandia. 1900 The Lumière Brothers Cinématograph is the highlight at the Paris International Exhibition. Primitive colour and sound film systems are also demonstrated. 1900 The Maison du Peuple in Brussels, Belgium, designed by the Belgian architect Victor Horta, is completed. 1900 The opera Tosca by the Italian composer Giacomo Puccini is first performed, in Rome, Italy. 1900 The Polish-born British writer Joseph Conrad (Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski) publishes his novel Lord Jim. 1900 The US author Frank L Baum writes the children's classic The Wizard of Oz.

1900 The US writer Theodore Dreiser publishes his novel Sister Carrie. 1900 The world population stands at 1.6 billion. 1900 There are now 8,000 cars on the roads in the USA. 1900 There are now over 1,300,000 telephones in use in the USA. 1900 US army pathologist Walter Reed establishes that yellow fever is caused by the bite of an Aëdes aegypti mosquito infected with the yellow fever parasite. His discovery leads to the creation of a vaccine and makes possible the completion of the Panama Canal. c. 1900 Ruhollah Khomeini (Ruholla Hendi), Persian Shiite Muslim, organizer of the 1979 revolution after which he became political and religious leader of Iran for life, born in Khomeyn, Persia (–1989). 1 January 1901 The Commonwealth of Australia comes into being, with the federalist and protectionist Edmund Barton as prime minister. 22 January 1901 Following the death of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom after a brief illness, the prince of Wales accedes to the throne as Edward VII. 22 January 1901 Victoria, queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland 1837–1901, empress of India 1876–1901, dies in Osborne, near Cowes, Isle of Wight, with Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany at her side (80). 27 January 1901 Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi, Italian operatic composer, dies in Milan, Italy (87). 3 May 1901 A fire in Jacksonville, Florida burns 1,700 buildings, leaving 10,000 people homeless and causing more than $11 million in property damage. 16 July 1901 A Liberal ministry is formed under Dr Johan Deutzer in Denmark, following elections which end an era of Conservative government. 6 September 1901 The anarchist Leon Czolgosz shoots the US president William McKinley at a reception in Buffalo, New York. 7 September 1901 The Peace of Beijing formally ends the Boxer Rising in China. Under the agreement, China is to pay an indemnity to the European powers, lower tariffs on imports, and accept a strengthening of European protection of its representatives and interests. 9 September 1901 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, French artist who depicted the personalities of Parisian night life, dies in Malromé, France (36).

5 December 1901 Walt Disney, US motion-picture producer and creator of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and other characters, born in Chicago, Illinois (–1966). 5 December 1901 Werner Heisenberg, German physicist and philosopher who introduced the uncertainty principle into quantum mechanics, born in Würzburg, Germany (–1976). 10 December 1901 King Charles XV of Sweden awards the first Nobel prizes, funded by the legacy of the Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel. 12 December 1901 Italian physicist Guglielmo Marconi, in St John's, Newfoundland, Canada, receives the letter 'S' in Morse code, from Poldhu, Cornwall, England. It is the first transmission of a radio signal across the Atlantic Ocean, a distance of 3,200 km/2,000 mi, and it inaugurates the development of radio communication. 1901'Ragtime' music, an African-American musical style characterized by a syncopated beat, is popular in the USA, but the American Federation of Musicians condemns it because of its association with black Americans and 'low dives' and recommends that its members refrain from playing it. 1901 Austrian immunologist Karl Landsteiner discovers the ABO blood group system. 1901 Dutch physician Gerrit Grijns demonstrates that beriberi is caused by a nutritional deficiency (later found to be of vitamin B1). 1901 German philosopher Edmund Husserl publishes Logische Untersuchungen/ Logical Investigations. 1901 The Australian writer Miles Franklin publishes her novel My Brilliant Career, widely seen as one of the first wholly Australian novels. 1901 The English writer Rudyard Kipling publishes his novel Kim. 1901 The German writer Thomas Mann publishes his novel Buddenbrooks. 1901 The Irish writer George Bernard Shaw publishes his play Caesar and Cleopatra, which is first performed in 1906 in Berlin, Germany. 1901 The Japanese-born US chemist Satori Kato creates the first soluble instant coffee. 1901 The mass production of cars in Detroit, Michigan begins when US car manufacturer Ransom Eli Olds produces the three-horsepower Oldsmobile buggy. The first car with a curved dash, it is also the first to be made using assembly line techniques and the first commercially successful car in the USA.

1901 The Norwegian artist Edvard Munch paints Girls on the Bridge. 1901 The Russian composer Sergey Rachmaninov completes his Piano Concerto No. 2. 1901 The Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh designs the interior and furnishings for the Ingram Street Tea Rooms in Glasgow, Scotland. His work is one of the finest expressions of art nouveau design in Britain. 1901 The US writer Frank Norris publishes The Octopus, his first novel. 30 January 1902 Britain qualifies its isolationist foreign policy by signing a treaty with Japan to safeguard their common interests in China and Korea. Under the terms of the treaty, in the event of Britain or Japan being at war with a foreign power in East Asia, the other will maintain strict neutrality, but shall assist its ally if a second foreign power should join the first. 4 February 1902 Charles Lindbergh, US aviator, the first person to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic, born in Detroit, Michigan (–1974). 27 February 1902 John Steinbeck, US novelist who wrote The Grapes of Wrath, born in Salinas, California (–1968). 31 May 1902 The Peace of Vereeniging ends the South African Boer War, in which 5,774 British troops were killed as a result of the conflict and 16,000 through disease, while 4,000 Boers were killed. The Boer people accept British sovereignty, but are promised self-government in the Orange River Colony and the Transvaal, and £3 million for restocking their farms. May 1902 Cuba gains independence from the USA. 1 July 1902 The US Congress passes the Philippines Government Act, making the Philippines a US territory. It creates a bicameral (two chamber) legislature, but retains a US right of veto under a civil governor. The first governor, William Howard Taft, takes office 4 July. 11 July 1902 Robert Cecil, Lord Salisbury, retires as British prime minister, and is immediately succeeded by his nephew Arthur Balfour. 8 August 1902 Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac, English physicist, author of the complete theoretical formulation of quantum mechanics, born in Bristol, England (–1984). 29 September 1902 Emile Zola, French novelist and critic who founded the Naturalist movement, dies in Paris, France (62). 5 October 1902 Ray Kroc, US restaurateur who founded McDonald's fast-food

hamburger restaurants, born in Chicago, Illinois (–1984). 10 December 1902 The Aswan Dam on the River Nile in Egypt is officially opened, having been started in 1898. The largest dam in the world, it is 2,142 m/7,027 ft long and has 180 sluices. 1902 A Russian immigrant toy-shop owner Morris Mitchom in New York City, inspired by Clifford Berryman's cartoon of US president Theodore 'Teddy' Roosevelt refusing to shoot a bear cub, creates the teddy bear. 1902 Art nouveau, as displayed in the architecture of Gaudí, Tiffany lamps, and Lalique jewellery, is very popular. A major exhibition is held in Paris, France. 1902 British physiologists William Bayliss and Ernest Starling discover that a substance, which they call secretin, is released into the bloodstream by cells in the duodenum. It stimulates the secretion of digestive juices by the pancreas and is the first hormone to be discovered. 1902 British writer Beatrix Potter publishes the classic children's book The Tale of Peter Rabbit. 1902 Canadian-born US physicist Reginald Fessenden discovers the heterodyne principle whereby high-frequency radio signals are converted to lower frequency signals that are easier to control and amplify. It leads to the superheterodyne principle essential in modern radio and television. 1902 English physicist Oliver Heaviside and US electrical engineer Arthur Kennelly independently predict the existence of a conducting layer in the atmosphere that reflects radio waves. 1902 Fish and chips becomes more popular in Britain as advances in refrigeration and the railway network allow cheap and quick delivery of fish to inland areas, resulting in an inexpensive and tasty meal. Fish and chip shops are credited with dramatically increasing the protein intake of the working class. 1902 Scottish-born US car manufacturer Alexander Winton sets a land speed record of one mile in 52.2 seconds in his racing car Bullet No.1, at Daytona Beach, Florida. He is the first person to drive a mile in under a minute. 1902 The Austrian composer Gustav Mahler completes his Symphony No. 5. 1902 The English composer Edward Elgar completes his choral work Coronation Ode for the coronation of King Edward VII. The best-known section is the finale, Land of Hope and Glory, adapted from March No. 1 of his Pomp and Circumstance. The words are taken from a poem by the English writer A C Benson. 1902 The English writer Rudyard Kipling publishes his collection of children's

tales Just So Stories. 1902 The French writer André Gide publishes his novel L'Immoraliste/The Immoralist. 1902 The Italian philosopher Benedetto Croce publishes Estetica come scienza dell'espressione e linguistica generale/Aesthetics as the Science of Expression and General Linguistics. 1902 The photography society, the Photo-Secession, is formed in New York City, the intention being to establish photography as a fine art. Outstanding members include Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, and Gertrude Käsebier. A gallery is opened in 1905; the group exhibits for the last time in 1910, but their journal Camera Work continues until 1917. 1902 The US artist Robert Henri paints West 57th Street, New York. 1902 The US National Education Association adopts simplified spellings for words such as altho, thru, catalog, program, thoro, and tho. Some of the changes become permanent, others fail to catch on. 1902 The US writer Helen Keller publishes The Story of My Life, in which she describes how, though deaf and blind since infancy, she was taught to read and write by her companion, Anne Mansfield Sullivan. 1902 US philosopher William James publishes Varieties of Religious Experience: Two Supposed Objections to the Doctrine. 1902–1903 Henry Lunn, the English founder of the Lunn travel agency business, pioneers skiing holidays and skiing races through the Public Schools Alpine Sports Club. 15 March 1903 British forces under Colonel Morland complete the conquest of northern Nigeria by taking the key Nigerian town of Sokoto from the emir of Kano. 8 May 1903 Paul Gauguin, French post-Impressionist painter, dies in Atuona, Hiva Oa, Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia (54). 31 May 1903 The flooding Kansas, Missouri, and Des Moines rivers kill more than 200 people and leave 8,000 others without homes. 19 June 1903 Lou Gehrig, US professional baseball player, born in New York City (–1941). June 1903 Henry Ford combines with John and Horace Dodge and nine others to establish the Ford Motor Company in Detroit, Michigan, making the city the 'motor capital' of the world.

1–19 July 1903 The Tour de France cycling race is run for the first time, organized by Henri Desgrange, editor of the French cycling magazine L'Auto. Twenty-one of the 60 entrants finish the 2,428-km/1,509-mi race, with Maurice Garin of France the winner. 4 July 1903 Honolulu, USA, and Manila in the Philippines are linked by undersea cable. US president Theodore Roosevelt inaugurates transpacific communications by sending a message around the world via San Francisco, Honolulu, and Manila. It takes 12 minutes. 20 July 1903 Following the death of Pope Leo XIII, Giuseppe Sarto is elected Pope Pius X. 8 August 1903 US astronomer and physicist Samuel Pierpont Langley achieves the first flight of a heavier-than-air vehicle powered by a petrol engine. It is uncrewed and flies 300 m/1,000 ft in 27 seconds. 1–13 October 1903 The baseball World Series, between the winners of the American League and the National League, is inaugurated in the USA. The first title is won by the Boston Red Sox of the American League, who beat the National League's Pittsburgh Pirates by five games to three. 28 October 1903 Evelyn Waugh, English satirical novelist, born in London, England (–1966). 31 October 1903 A group of US and Panamanian partisans stage a rebellion in Colombia near the site of the proposed Panama canal. The US Navy prevents the Colombian military from entering the area. Three days later the Republic of Panama is declared. 17 November 1903 The Russian Social Democratic Party splits into the Mensheviks ('minority'), led by Grigory Plekhanov, and the Bolsheviks ('majority'), led by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, at their London congress. The latter group favours a violent seizure of power. 8 December 1903 US astronomer and physicist Samuel Pierpont Langley attempts his manned first flight. His plane, with a wing span of 13 m/40 ft, weighing only 386 kg/850 lb (including pilot), and powered by US aeronautical engineer Charles Manley's engine, snags on takeoff and plunges into the Potomac River just nine days before the Wright brothers make their first successful flight. It is reconstructed several years later and successfully flown by US aviator Glenn Curtiss. 17 December 1903 US aviator Orville Wright makes the first successful flight in an aeroplane with a petrol engine at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, covering 37 m/120ft in a flight lasting just 12 seconds. During the day, Orville and his brother Wilbur make a number of flights, the longest covering 260 m/852 ft and lasting 59 seconds.

30 December 1903 A fire at the Iroquois Theater in Chicago, Illinois, during an Eddie Foy performance, kills 588 people. The public outcry helps lead to the passage of theatre safety codes in many US cities. 1903 A donation from the US newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer is used to found the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, in New York City, and the Pulitzer prizes, awarded annually for outstanding achievement in journalism, letters, and music. 1903 Dutch physiologist Willem Einthoven invents the string galvanometer (electrocardiograph), which measures and records the tiny electrical impulses produced by contractions of the heart muscle. He uses it to diagnose different types of heart disease. 1903 English philosopher G E Moore publishes his influential study of ethics Principia Ethica/Principles of Ethics. 1903 George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair), English novelist who wrote Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, born in Motihari, Bengal, India (–1950). 1903 New Zealand-born British physicist Ernest Rutherford discovers that a beam of alpha particles is deflected by electric and magnetic fields. From the direction of deflection he is able to prove that they have a positive charge and from their velocity he determines the ratio of their charge to their mass. He also names the high-frequency electromagnetic radiation escaping from the nuclei of atoms, first discovered in 1900, as gamma rays. 1903 Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov describes learning by conditioning. Whilst researching digestion Pavlov observes that a dog salivates when food is in its mouth – an example of an unconditional reflex. However, he notices that when accustomed to a feeding routine, dogs salivate at meal times even before food is given to them. If a bell always rings before food appears, the dog soon salivates at the sound of the bell even in the absence of food. The work establishes that reflexes can be conditioned (trained). 1903 The French composer Maurice Ravel completes his String Quartet in F. 1903 The Krupp metalworking industries are founded in the Ruhr region of Germany. 1903 The satirical novel The Way of All Flesh, by the English writer Samuel Butler, is published posthumously. 1903 The Spanish architect Antonio Gaudí begins work on upper transept of the Sagrada Familia Church in Barcelona, Spain. He began work on the church in 1884. 1903 The Telegraphone, the first magnetic recorder, is launched in the USA. It is

initially intended for office uses such as recording telephone messages and dictation. Though limited in scope, its technology forms the basis of current telephone answering machines. 1903 The US writer Henry James publishes his novel The Ambassadors and the story 'The Beast in the Jungle'. 1903 The US writer Jack London publishes his novel The Call of the Wild. 1903 US manufacturer King C Gillette patents disposable safety razor blades. 1903 US writer and feminist Charlotte Perkins Gilman publishes The Home: Its Work and Influence. 18 January 1904 Cary Grant, British-born US film actor, born in Bristol, England (–1986). 8–9 February 1904 The Russo-Japanese War starts when the Japanese fleet makes a surprise attack on the Russian squadron at Port Arthur (the Russian treaty port in northeastern China) without a declaration of war, and damages two battleships and a cruiser. 2 March 1904 Dr Seuss (pseudonym of Theodore Seuss Geisel), US writer of children's books, born in Springfield, Massachusetts (–1991). 4 April 1904 John Christian Watson becomes the world's first Labour prime minister, in Australia. 8 April 1904 The Entente Cordiale settles British–French differences in Morocco, Egypt, and the Newfoundland fishery, and Britain recognizes the Suez Canal Convention and surrenders its claim to Madagascar. 22 April 1904 J Robert Oppenheimer, US theoretical physicist and director of the Los Alamos laboratory which built the first atomic bomb, born in New York City (–1967). 23 April 1904 The USA acquires the property of the French Panama Canal Company when the Panama Canal zone is transferred at a meeting in Paris, France. 24 April 1904 Willem de Kooning, Dutch-born US abstract expressionist painter, born in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. 4 May 1904 Henry Royce and Charles Rolls start manufacturing and selling cars under the name Rolls-Royce in Britain. 11 May 1904 Salvador Dalí, Spanish surrealist painter who also designed furniture, jewellery, and stage and film sets, born in Figueras, Spain (–1989).

21 May 1904 The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), a world governing body for football, is founded in France, without British support. 2 July 1904 Anton Chekhov, Russian writer and dramatist known for his mastery of the short story, dies in Badenweiler, Germany (44). 7 July 1904 Rafael Reyes becomes dictator in Colombia and begins an attempt to reorganize the country's finances. 14 July 1904 Paul Kruger, South African statesman who founded the Afrikaaner nation and was instrumental in initiating the Second Anglo-Boer War, dies in Clarens, Switzerland (79). September 1904 In a lecture at St Louis, Missouri, French mathematician JulesHenri Poincaré proposes a theory of relativity to explain Michelson and Morley's failed experiment to determine the velocity of the Earth. 2 October 1904 Graham Greene, English novelist, born in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, England (–1991). 21 October 1904 The Russian Baltic fleet, bound for the Far East via the Cape of Good Hope, fires on British trawlers in the Dogger Bank area of the North Sea, believing them to be Japanese torpedo boats. One vessel sinks, provoking a wave of indignation in Britain. 8 November 1904 In the US presidential election, President Theodore Roosevelt (Republican) defeats Alton B Parker (Democrat) with 336 electoral votes to Parker's 140. In the popular vote Roosevelt polls 7,623,486 votes and Parker 5,077,911. In the Congressional elections, the Republicans maintain majorities in the House (250–136) and Senate (57–33). 1904 Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud publishes Zur Psychopathologie des Alltagslebens/The Psychopathology of Everyday Life. 1904 Charles W Follis of the USA becomes the first black professional player in American football when he signs for the Shelby Blues. 1904 English electrical engineer John Fleming patents the diode valve, which allows electricity to flow in only one direction. 1904 Japanese physicist Hantaro Nagaoka proposes a model of the atom in which the electrons are located in an outer ring and orbit the positive charge which is located in a central nucleus. The model is ignored because it is thought the electrons would fall into the nucleus. 1904 Spanish physiologist Santiago Ramón y Cajal demonstrates that the neuron is the basis of the nervous system.

1904 The Austrian composer Gustav Mahler completes his song cycle Das Kindertotenlieder/Song of the Death of Children. 1904 The children's play Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up, by the Scottish writer J M Barrie, is first performed, at the Duke of York's Theatre in London, England. 1904 The French artist Henri Matisse paints Luxe, Calme et Volupté/Luxury, Calm and Voluptuousness. 1904 The opera Madame Butterfly, by the Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, is first performed in Milan, Italy. It premieres in London, England, in 1905, and in New York City in 1907. 1904 The play Vishnovy sad/The Cherry Orchard, by the Russian writer Anton Chekhov, is first performed in Moscow, Russia. 1904 The St Louis exposition popularizes the hamburger and the edible icecream cone in the USA. 1904 The Trans-Siberian Railway, begun in 1891, is completed, linking Moscow and Vladivostok. It opens up Siberia to exploitation, settlement, and industrialization. 1904 Thomas Sullivan invents the tea bag in the USA. 1904 US engineer Charles Franklin Kettering invents the first electric cash register. 22 January 1905 Guards outside the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, Russia, fire on a procession of workers and their families led by the priest Father Gapon, who is carrying a petition to Tsar Nicholas II. Over 100 people are killed, and the day becomes known as 'Bloody Sunday'. Strikes break out across Russia in protest. 20 February–9 March 1905 The Japanese forces under Field Marshal Iwao Oyama overcome a Russian force under General Alexei Kuropatkin, and capture the city of Mukden (Shenyang), a key point for the control of Manchuria. 24 March 1905 Jules Verne, French author who pioneered modern science fiction writing, dies in Amiens, France (77). 31 March 1905 The visit of Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany to Tangier, Morocco, sets off the 'First Moroccan Crisis', being seen as a test of the British–French convention of 1904 which arranged for French predominance in Morocco. 24 April 1905 Robert Penn Warren, US novelist and poet, the only US writer to win Pulitzer prizes for fiction and poetry, and the first poet laureate in the USA (1986), born in Guthrie, Kentucky (–1989).

April 1905 In an article in Ladies' Home Journal, former US president Grover Cleveland claims that woman do not need to vote because men have greater intelligence. 16 May 1905 Henry Fonda, US actor of stage and film, born in Grand Island, Nebraska (–1982). 27–29 May 1905 During the Battle of Tsushima in the Tsushima Strait between Korea and Japan, the Japanese fleet under Vice Admiral Heirachiro Togo sinks two-thirds of the recently-arrived Russian Baltic fleet commanded by Admiral Zinovi Rozhdestvenski. 21 June 1905 Jean-Paul Sartre, French existentialist philosopher, novelist, and playwright, born in Paris, France (–1980). 5 September 1905 The Treaty of Portsmouth (New Hampshire) is mediated by the US president Theodore Roosevelt and ends the Russo-Japanese War. Russia is to cede Port Arthur and the Guangdong Peninsula in China, evacuate Manchuria and half of Sakhalin Island (in the Sea of Okhotsk off the coast of Russia), and recognize Japan's interests in Korea. Japan gives up its demand for an indemnity. 18 September 1905 Greta Garbo, Swedish-born US film star of the 1920s and 1930s, then a legendary recluse after 1941, born in Stockholm, Sweden (–1990). 30 October 1905 Tsar Nicholas II of Russia issues the 'October Manifesto', capitulating to demands for the duma (parliament) to have legislative powers and a wider franchise for its election, and civil liberties. 16 November 1905 The reformer Count Sergei Witte is appointed prime minister of Russia. 18 November 1905 Prince Charles of Denmark is elected King Haakon VII of Norway following Norway's independence from Sweden. 5 December 1905 Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman forms a Liberal ministry in Great Britain with Sir Edward Grey as foreign secretary, Herbert Asquith as chancellor of the Exchequer, and Richard Haldane as war secretary. 12 December 1905 A revolution begins in Persia against the corrupt rule of Shah Mohammed Ali. 23 December 1905 The first British beauty contest, the 'Blond and Brunette Beauty Show', takes place in Newcastle upon Tyne. 1905 Charles Fey develops the Liberty Bell, the first slot-machine, in the USA. It is manufactured by the Mills Novelty Co., which introduces fruit symbols to represent the fruit gum 'prizes', as a means of getting round antigambling laws in some states.

1905 Eighteen players are killed and 154 seriously injured during the American football season; the US president Franklin D Roosevelt threatens to ban the sport unless action is taken to curb the violence. 1905 French psychologists Alfred Binet, Victor Henri, and Theodore Simon introduce the first intelligence test for children. 1905 German-born US physicist Albert Einstein develops his special theory of relativity in a series of four papers. In 'On the Motion – Required by the Molecular Kinetic Theory of Heat – of Small Particles Suspended in a Stationary Liquid' he explains Brownian motion. In 'On a Heuristic Viewpoint Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light' he explains the photoelectric effect by proposing that light consists of photons and also exhibits wavelike properties. In 'On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies' he proposes that space and time are one and that time and motion are relative to the observer. In 'Does the Inertia of a Body Depend on its Energy Content?' he argues that mass and energy are equivalent, which can be expressed by the formula E = mc2. 1905 Italian educationalist Maria Montessori publishes Manuale di pedagogica scientifica/Manual of Scientific Pedagogy. 1905 Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (Ulianov) publishes Dvr taktiti/Two Tactics. 1905 Spanish-born US philosopher and writer George Santayana publishes The Life of Reason. 1905 The expressionist art group Die Brücke ('The Bridge') is formed in Dresden, Germany. The group includes the artists Ernst Kirchner and Karl SchmidtRottluff. It is dissolved in 1913. 1905 The French artist Henri Matisse paints Portrait of Madame Matisse (The Green Line). 1905 The French artist Paul Cézanne paints The Great Bathers. 1905 The French composer Claude Debussy completes his piano work Images I and his orchestral work La Mer/The Sea. 1905 The Italian immigrant Gennaro Lombardi introduces pizza at his restaurant in New York City. 1905 The opera Salome, by the German composer Richard Strauss, is first performed in Dresden, Germany. 1905 The plays Major Barbara and Man and Superman, by the Irish dramatist George Bernard Shaw, are first performed at the Royal Court Theatre in London,

England. 1905 The population density in the slums of New York City reaches 1,000 persons an acre, higher than in Bombay (now Mumbai), India. 1905 The US company Chapman & Skinner launches the first portable electric vacuum cleaner for domestic use. 1905 The US drinks company Coca-Cola changes some of the ingredients of its drink, replacing cocaine with caffeine. 1905 The US photographer Alfred Stieglitz opens his Little Gallery of the PhotoSecession at 291–293 Fifth Avenue in New York City. Later known simply as '291', the gallery shows photographs, paintings and sculpture, becoming one of the most influential galleries in the development of modern US art. 1905 The US writer Edith Wharton publishes her novel House of Mirth. 1905 The US writer Jack London publishes his novel White Fang. 1905 There are 77,988 automobiles registered in the USA, up from 300 in 1895. 1905–1907 Danish astronomer Ejnar Hertzsprung discovers that there is a relationship between the colour and absolute brightness of stars and classifies them according to this relationship. It is used to determine the distances of stars and forms the basis of theories of stellar evolution. 17 January 1906 The radical Clément Fallières, the candidate of the Left, is elected president of France. 10 February 1906 The British battleship HMS Dreadnought is launched at Portsmouth, England. Its massive armament (10 30 cm/12 in guns and 24 12pounder guns) makes all other warships obsolete and its name becomes a generic term for battleships with large-calibre armament. 13 March 1906 Susan B(rownell) Anthony, US suffragette whose work eventually led to women's suffrage in the USA (1920), dies in Rochester, New York (85). 8 April 1906 The Act of Algeciras is signed, ending the Moroccan crisis. It gives France and Spain chief control in Morocco under a Swiss inspector, and respects the sultan's authority. 13 April 1906 Samuel Beckett, Irish writer and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969, born in Foxrock, Ireland (–1989). 19 May 1906 João Franco becomes prime minister of Portugal with dictatorial powers, following conflict between the king and liberals.

23 May 1906 Henrik Ibsen, Norwegian poet and playwright whose works include Peer Gynt (1867) and A Doll's House (1879), dies in Christiania (now Oslo), Norway (78). 30 May 1906 Giovanni Giolitti forms a coalition ministry in Italy, charged with dealing with strikes and unrest in southern Italy. The arrangement will continue until December 1909. 6 June 1906 The reformer Peter Stolypin becomes prime minister of Russia. 22 June 1906 Billy Wilder, Academy Award-winning film director and scriptwriter, born (–2002). 26–27 June 1906 The Hungarian driver Ferenc Szisz, in a Renault, wins the French Grand Prix at Le Mans. This is regarded as the first ever motor-racing Grand Prix. 12 July 1906 Following a high profile campaign to release the French army officer Alfred Dreyfus, the guilty verdict returned against him in September 1899 for treason is formally annulled. 23 August 1906 A liberal revolt begins in Cuba, protesting against the fraudulent activities of President Tomás Palma's government. President Palma requests US intervention and mediators US war secretary, William Howard Taft, and Robert Bacon arrive on 25 September; Taft commands the Cuban government for 13 days. 25 September 1906 Dmitry Shostakovich, Russian composer, born in St Petersburg, Russia (–1975). 22 October 1906 Paul Cézanne, French post-Impressionist painter whose work led to the development of cubism, dies in Aix-en-Provence, France (67). 22 November 1906 The Russian prime minister, Peter Stolypin, introduces agrarian reforms in Russia, empowering peasants to claim their share of communal land as private property. 6 December 1906 Britain grants self-government to Transvaal and Orange River Colony following agitation for autonomy there. 19 December 1906 Leonid Brezhnev, Soviet statesman, First Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party 1964–82, born in Kamenskoye, Russia (–1982). 24 December 1906 Canadian-born US physicist Reginald Fessenden makes the first wireless transmission of speech and music from Brant Rock, Massachusetts using amplitude modification. He broadcasts music, a poem, and a talk, all heard by ships' radio operators.

1906 Lectures on Modern History by the English historian Lord Acton (John Emerich Edward Dalberg) is published posthumously. 1906 A telephone directory enquiries service is introduced in New York City. 1906 English biochemist Frederick Gowland Hopkins is first to suggest the existence of vitamins. 1906 English physicist Charles Glover Barkla demonstrates that each element can be made to emit X-rays of a characteristic frequency. 1906 Eugène Lauste patents the first sound-on-film process in Britain, though it is not yet suitable for speech. His attempts at later commercial exploitation of it are thwarted by the war. 1906 George Albert Smith of the Charles Urban Trading Co. develops Kinemacolour, the first commercially successful colour process for film: it uses two colour filters and two reels of film. 1906 German hairdresser Karl Ludwig Nessler introduces the permanent wave for hair styling in Britain. Because of the expense and awkwardness of the process, it will not really catch on until he moves to the USA, where the bob is popular. 1906 German physicist Walther Herman Nernst formulates the third law of thermodynamics, which states that matter tends towards random motion and that energy tends to dissipate at a temperature above absolute zero (-273.12°C/350°F). 1906 Russian botanist Mikhail Semyonovich Tsvet develops chromatography to separate plant pigments. 1906 The British Trade Disputes Act reverses the Taff Vale judgement of 1901. Peaceful picketing is now allowed and unions are immune from claims for damage caused by strikes. 1906 The English writer John Galsworthy publishes The Man of Property, the first novel in his sequence of novels and stories The Forsyte Saga. The final volume appears in 1922. 1906 The first animated cartoons are made in the USA and Britain. 1906 The first ever feature-length film is produced, The Story of the Kelly Gang, in Australia. It is directed by Charles Tait, and stars Elizabeth Tait and an uncredited actor as Ned Kelly. 1906 The French artist André Derain paints The Port of London. 1906 The French artist Pierre Auguste Renoir paints Nude (After the Bathe).

1906 The German artist Paula Modersohn-Becker paints Old Poorhouse Woman with Glass Bottle and Poppy. 1906 The John Gabel Automatic Entertainer, the first selective disc-playing jukebox, is introduced in the USA. 1906 The Post Office Savings Bank in Vienna, Austria, designed by the Austrian architect Otto Wagner, is completed. 1906 The Unity Temple Church in Oak Park, Chicago, Illinois, is completed. It is designed by the US architect Frank Lloyd Wright. His application of abstract forms devoid of ornament is made possible by the use of concrete. 1906 The US composer Charles Ives completes his orchestral work Central Park in the Dark in the Good Old Summertime. 1906 The US journalist Upton Sinclair publishes his novel The Jungle, a controversial book that exposes the conditions in the Chicago stockyards. As a direct result Congress passes laws to improve conditions in slaughterhouses. 1906 The US writer Joel Chandler Harris, creator of Br'er Rabbit, publishes Uncle Remus and Br'er Rabbit. 1906 US physicist Lee De Forest invents the 'audion tube', a triode vacuum tube with a third electrode, shaped like a grid, between the cathode and anode that controls the flow of electrons and permits the amplification of sound. It is an essential element in the development of radio, radar, television, and computers. 26 January 1907 Following a long campaign for reform, a bill that extends suffrage to all males aged 24 or over is passed in Austria. 2 February 1907 Dmitry Mendeleyev, Russian chemist who developed the periodic table of elements, dies in St Petersburg, Russia (72). 12 February 1907 The passenger steamer Larchmont sinks in the Long Island Sound off New York City, killing 131 people. 19 February 1907 War breaks out between Honduras, Nicaragua, and El Salvador when Nicaraguan president José Santos Zelaya tries to use force to create a Central American confederation under his leadership. The conflict continues until December. 14 May 1907 Sweden adopts proportional representation for elections to both chambers of its parliament, and introduces universal adult suffrage for its second chamber. 22 May 1907 Laurence Olivier, English stage and film actor, director, and producer, born in Dorking, Surrey, England (–1989).

26 May 1907 John Wayne, US film actor who usually starred in westerns and war films, born in Winterset, Iowa (–1979). 6 June 1907 British chemical company Lever Bros launches Persil, the first ever household detergent, in Germany. 14 June 1907 Female suffrage is introduced in Norway. 25 July 1907 Japan declares in a treaty that Korea is its protectorate. Korea also agrees a convention giving Japan control over its government through Japanese vice ministers in its major departments. Japan has controlled Korea's foreign policy since 1905. 31 August 1907 Britain and Russia sign a convention on Persia, Afghanistan, and Tibet, establishing zones of influence and removing obstacles towards an alignment of Russia with Britain and France against the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy). 4 September 1907 Edvard Grieg, Norwegian nationalist composer, dies in Bergen, Norway (64). 26 September 1907 New Zealand becomes known as the Dominion of New Zealand, reflecting its autonomous status within the British Empire. 8 December 1907 Following the death of King Oskar II, Gustavus V succeeds as king of Sweden (–1950). 17 December 1907 William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Scottish physicist who developed the absolute temperature scale, dies in Netherhall near Largs, Ayrshire, Scotland (84). 1907 A reorganization at Guffey Oil produces the Gulf Oil Company. 1907 A wireless telegraphy service is established between the USA and Ireland. 1907 French engineer Edourd Belin, improving on the work of German inventor Arthur Korn in developing telephotography, invents a device that allows him to make the first long-distance transmission of a photograph, Paris–Lyon–Bordeaux. It is used in Europe to transmit news photographs. 1907 French philosopher Henri Bergson publishes L'Evolution créatrice/Creative Evolution. 1907 Lee De Forest of the De Forest Radio Telephone Co. begins the first regular experimental radio broadcasts in the USA, in New York City. These are for entertainment, and consist mainly of music.

1907 More than 338,000 Austro-Hungarian immigrants arrive in the USA. 1907 Over 1.25 million immigrants arrive in the US, an all-time record. 1907 The Finnish composer Jean Sibelius completes his Symphony No. 3. 1907 The French artist Henri Rousseau paints The Snake Charmer. 1907 The French Lumière brothers develop the Autochrome system, which makes colour photography in natural colours viable. 1907 The Heidelberg jaw is discovered in a sand pit at Mauer, Germany. Belonging to Homo erectus, it is the oldest European hominid fossil discovered to date and thought to be 400,000 years old. 1907 The Hurley Machine Corporation launches the Thor, the first self-contained electric washing machine, in the USA, designed by Alva J Fisher. 1907 The play Playboy of the Western World, by the Irish dramatist John Millington Synge, is first performed at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, Ireland. Its depiction of Irish life offended many in the audience and fights break out at several performances. 1907 The Rectigraph Co. launches the first photocopier, the Rectigraph, in the USA. 1907 The Romanian artist Constantin Brancusi sculpts The Kiss. 1907 The Royal Dutch Shell Oil Company is formed from a merger of Royal Dutch Oil and Britain's Shell Transport and Trading Company. 1907 The Spanish artist Pablo Picasso paints Les Demoiselles d'Avignon/The Women of Avignon, one of the central works of 20th-century art. 1907 The US artist George Wesley Bellows paints Stag at Sharkey's. 1907 The US company General Electric launches a more efficient light bulb, replacing the usual carbon filament with tungsten. 1907 The US historian Henry Brooks Adams privately publishes his autobiography, The Education of Henry Adams: A Study of 20th Century Multiplicity. 1907 The US Hoover Suction-Sweeping Co. launches the first effective portable vacuum cleaner for domestic use. It is designed by James M Spangler. 1907 US philosopher William James publishes Pragmatism: A New Way for Some Old Ways of Thinking.

6 January 1908 The brother of Sultan Abdul Aziz of Morocco, Mulai Hafid, rebels following protests at European interference in Moroccan affairs and is proclaimed sultan at Fez, Morocco. 9 January 1908 Simone de Beauvoir, French existentialist writer, philosopher, and feminist, born in Paris, France (–1986). 1 February 1908 King Carlos I of Portugal and the crown prince are murdered in Lisbon, Portugal, by republicans, and Prince Manuel becomes King Manuel II (–1910). 20 May 1908 James Stewart, US actor, born in Indiana, Pennsylvania (–1997). 23 June 1908 In a Russian-backed counter-revolutionary coup, Shah Mohammed Ali overthrows the Persian constitution of December 1906. 30 June 1908 An aerial explosion equivalent to 10–15 megatons of TNT flattens approximately 2,000 sq km/1,243 mi of forest near the Tunguska River, Siberia, Russian Empire. No meteorite fragments are discovered but it is thought to have been a fragment of a comet disintegrating in the atmosphere. 24 July 1908 Following the revolt of the Young Turk nationalists in Macedonia, the Ottoman sultan Abdul Hamid II restores the Ottoman constitution of 1876. 24 July 1908 The US runner Johnny Hayes wins the marathon at the Olympic Games in London, England. Dorando Pietri of Italy is first over the finishing line but he is disqualified for receiving help from officials after collapsing on the final stadium lap. In sympathy he is awarded a special gold cup by Queen Alexandra. 12 August 1908 US car manufacturer Henry Ford of the Ford Motor Company introduces the Model T. Inexpensive (sold for $850), easy to maintain, and massproduced after 1913, it revolutionizes transportation. 20 August 1908 King Leopold II of Belgium transfers the Congo to Belgium, having previously exploited it through a private company. 27 August 1908 Lyndon Baines Johnson, 36th president of the USA 1963–69, a Democrat, born in Gillespie County, Texas (–1973). 14 September 1908 William C Durant of the Buick Motor Company forms the General Motors Company in Detroit, Michigan, as the basis for establishing a conglomerate of car-building companies. 16 September 1908 The foreign ministers of Austria and Russia, Count Alois Aehrenthal and Alexander Izvolsky, hold the Buchlau conference. Austria undertakes not to oppose the opening of the Dardanelles to Russian warships and Russia agrees to Austria's proposed annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

5 October 1908 King Ferdinand I of Bulgaria declares Bulgaria's independence from the Ottoman Empire and assumes the title of tsar. 6 October 1908 Austria annexes Bosnia and Herzegovina from the Ottoman Empire, by decree. 7 October 1908 In response to events in Bulgaria and Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Ottoman possession of Crete announces its union with Greece. 15 October 1908 John Kenneth Galbraith, Canadian-born US economist known for his liberal ideas, born in Iona Station, Ontario, Canada. 27 October 1908 The British Daily Telegraph publishes remarks by Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany in which he states that the German people are hostile to Britain, though he remains a friend. The statement arouses strong feelings in Germany against Britain, and also against the Kaiser for making policy pronouncements without consulting the German chancellor. 14 November 1908 Emperor Guangxu of China dies, to be followed on 15 November by the Dowager Empress Cixi. P'u-i becomes emperor, with the reactionary Prince Ch'un as regent. November 1908 The Gideon Society, an interdenominational Christian society, begins distributing Bibles in hotel rooms in the USA. 10 December 1908 Olivier Messiaen, French composer and organist, born in Avignon, France (–1992). 26 December 1908 Jack Johnson of the USA becomes the first black fighter to win the World Heavyweight Boxing Championship, beating the defending champion, Tommy Burns of Canada, in 14 rounds in Sydney, Australia. 28 December 1908 An earthquake hits the region of the Strait of Messina, between Sicily and South Calabria, Italy, estimated to measure 7.5 on the Richter scale. The towns of Messina in Sicily and Reggio di Calabria on the mainland are the worst hit, and are both devastated, with Reggio di Calabria suffering a tidal wave following the earthquake. Estimates of the death toll vary between 75,000 and 200,000, most deaths occurring in the two towns. It is Europe's worst earthquake. 1908 Belgian-born US chemist Leo Hendrik Baekeland invents the plastic Bakelite; its insulating and malleable properties, combined with the fact that it does not bend when heated, ensures it has many uses. 1908 English mathematician Godfrey Hardy and German physician Wilhelm Weinberg establish the mathematical basis for population genetics. 1908 French social philosopher Georges Sorel publishes Réflexions sur la

violence/Reflections on Violence. 1908 German physicist Hans Geiger and New Zealand-born British physicist Ernest Rutherford develop the Geiger counter, which counts individual alpha particles emitted by radioactive substances. 1908 Monosodium glutamate is identified in Japan as a taste enhancer. 1908 Smith Richardson relaunches Vicks VapoRub in the USA, with the slogan 'Rub it on, sniff it in, it's good for you, it's made by Presbyterians.' 1908 Swiss chemist Jacques Brandenberger creates cellophane, which becomes invaluable in food packaging. 1908 The French artist Georges Braque paints the cubist landscape Trees at L'Estaques, one of a series painted at L'Estaques in France. 1908 The French artist Henri (Le Douanier) Rousseau paints Football Players. 1908 The French artist Pierre Auguste Renoir paints Portrait of Ambroise Vollard. 1908 The French composer Claude Debussy completes his six piano pieces Children's Corner, which includes Golliwog's Cake Walk. 1908 The German company Rowenta launches the first commercial electric iron. 1908 The Morse code for SOS is formally introduced as the international distress signal - three dashes, three dots, and three dashes. 1908 The Romanian artist Constantin Brancusi sculpts the first of several versions of his work Mademoiselle Pogany. 1908 The Scottish writer Kenneth Grahame publishes his children's novel The Wind in the Willows. 1908 The subway system in New York City is expanded, as two further lines are opened. 1908 The US Eck Dynamo & Electric Co. produces the first oscillating electric fan. 1908 US physicist Percy Williams Bridgman invents equipment that can create atmospheric pressures of 100,000 atmospheres (later 400,000), creating a new field of investigation. 13 February 1909 The grand vizier of the Ottoman Empire, Kiamil Pasha, is forced to resign by the Turkish nationalists, who now dominate the Ottoman parliament.

15 March 1909 The US businessman H G Selfridge opens the first modern department store in Britain, Selfridge's in London, England, using the slogan, 'All your shopping under one roof.' March 1909 The National Board of Censorship of Motion Pictures is founded in the USA. There is no classification system for films – they are either approved or cuts are recommended. 13 April 1909 An army counter-revolution begins in Constantinople (modern Istanbul), Ottoman Empire, against the rule of the Young Turks, following agitation by the Islamic Mohammedan Union. 27 April 1909 The Young Turks depose the Ottoman sultan Abdul Hamid II because of his sympathy for the attempted counter-revolution. He is succeeded by his brother Mohammed V (–1918). 18 May 1909 Fred (Frederick John) Perry, English lawn-tennis player who dominated men's singles tennis in the mid-1930s and was the last Briton to win the men's singles at Wimbledon, in 1936, born in Stockport, Cheshire, England (–1995). June 1909 The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is formally established in New York City as the National Committee for the Advancement of the Negro. 14 July 1909 Bernhard von Bülow resigns as German chancellor because of disagreements with Kaiser Wilhelm II and the naval programme, and is succeeded by Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg. 16 July 1909 Mohammed Ali, shah of Persia, is deposed by the pro-liberal Bakhtiari chief, Ali Kuli Khan, in favour of Sultan Ahmad Shah, aged 12. 24 July 1909 Following the resignation of Georges Clemenceau in reaction to turbulence over his antistrike measures, the more moderate Aristide Briand forms a government in France. 25 July 1909 French aviator Louis Blériot crosses the English Channel by monoplane in 37 minutes from Le Boraques, France, to Dover, England. 12 December 1909 Civil war breaks out in Honduras between the supporters of President Miguel Dávila and ex-president Manuel Bonilla, and continues until 1911. 17 December 1909 Following the death of King Leopold II of Belgium, Albert I succeeds as king (–1934). 1909 Americans consume more than 30 million gallons of ice cream.

1909 Danish biochemist Søren Peer Lauritz Sørensen devises the pH scale for measuring acidity and alkalinity. 1909 German-born US physicist Albert Einstein introduces his idea that light exhibits both wave and particle characteristics. 1909 Italian philosopher Benedetto Croce publishes Logica come scienza del concetto puro/Logic as the Science of Pure Concept. 1909 Russian and Polish Jews set up the first kibbutz, Degania, at Lake Kinnaret, Tiberias, in Palestine. 1909 The AEG Turbine Factory in Berlin, Germany, designed by the German architect Peter Behrens, is completed. It is one of the first steel and glass buildings. 1909 The Austrian composer Gustav Mahler completes his Song-Symphony Das Lied von der Erde/The Song of the Earth, set to poems translated from Chinese. 1909 The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams completes his song cycle, On Wenlock Edge, inspired by the poems of A E Housman, and his Symphony No. 1, A Sea Symphony. 1909 The French writer André Gide publishes his novel La Porte Etroite/Strait is the Gate. 1909 The increasing cost of living in the USA is resulting in people having smaller families. 1909 The School of Art, designed by the Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh, is completed in Glasgow, Scotland. It is one of the most original art nouveau buildings in Britain. 1909 US film director D W Griffith works with Canadian-born child actor Gladys Smith, and helps transform her into Mary Pickford, one of the first great movie stars, who comes to be known as 'America's Sweetheart'. Their first film together is The Violin Maker of Cremona (1909). 1909 US philosopher William James publishes The Meaning of Truth: A Sequel to 'Pragmatism'. 1909 US sociologist Lewis Hein takes Carrying-in Boy, one of the best-known images of a range of his photographs, to highlight the working conditions of the US poor. 28 February 1910 The last Chinese labourers leave the Rand diamond mines in South Africa, the slave-like conditions of their employment having created a furore throughout the British Empire.

23 March 1910 Akira Kurosawa, Japanese film director, born in Tokyo, Japan. 21 April 1910 Mark Twain (pseudonym of Samuel Langhorne Clemens), US author who created the characters Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, dies in Redding, Connecticut (74). 6 May 1910 Following the death of King Edward VII of Great Britain and Ireland, he is succeeded by George V. 19 May 1910 Halley's Comet – which comes near the Earth roughly every 75 years – returns, with the Earth passing through the comet's tail. In the USA, it is regarded by some as announcing the end of the world. 5 June 1910 O Henry (pen-name of William Sydney Porter), US short-story writer and novelist, dies in New York City (47). 1 July 1910 By an act of the British Parliament the Union of South Africa becomes a dominion, an independent country remaining within the British Empire. 4 July 1910 The black American boxer Jack Johnson retains the world heavyweight title, beating the former champion Jim Jeffries of the USA in 15 rounds in Reno, Nevada, USA. Disturbances arising from Johnson's victory lead to the deaths of 10 people in 7 US cities, and a film of the fight is not shown in many cities for fear of triggering race riots. 13 August 1910 Florence Nightingale, 'Lady of the Lamp', English nurse who was in charge of nursing the British troops during the Crimean War and who established nursing as a profession for women, dies in London, England (90). 20 August 1910 Eero Saarinen, Finnish-born US architect, born in Kirkkonummi, Finland (–1961). 22 August 1910 Japan formally annexes Korea, having already secured political and military control of the Chinese fiefdom. 27 August 1910 Mother Teresa (born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu), Albanian-born Indian ascetic who founded the Order of the Missionaries of Charity, devoted to helping the poor, born in Yugoslavia of Albanian parents (–1997). 28 August 1910 Montenegro is proclaimed a kingdom independent of the Ottoman Empire under Nicholas I. 15 September 1910 The South African Party wins the first South African elections and Louis Botha becomes prime minister. 5 October 1910 Portugal is proclaimed a republic under Theophila Braga, following the deposition of King Manuel II.

18 October 1910 The nationalist Eleutherios Venizelos becomes prime minister of Greece and begins financial reforms. 20 November 1910 Lev Nikolayevich ('Leo') Tolstoy, Russian author best known for War and Peace and Anna Karenina, dies in Astapovo, Russia (82). 12 December 1910 In the British general election the Liberals win 272 seats, Labour wins 42 seats, the Irish Nationalists win 84, and the Unionists 272. This gives a majority of 126 seats for a Parliament Bill and Home Rule, an increase of 4 since the January election. 1910 Elizabeth Arden opens her first beauty shop, in New York City. She will later expand to create a chain of shops and a very successful range of cosmetics. 1910 Less than half the population over 25 in the USA has a high school education and just 4% are college graduates. 1910 Manhattan Bridge in New York City is opened. 1910 The Austrian composer Alban Berg completes his String Quartet (Opus 3). 1910 The Austrian composer Gustav Mahler completes his Symphony No. 9. 1910 The ballet The Firebird, by the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky and the Russian choreographer Mikhail Fokine, is first performed in Paris, France, under the Russian impressario Sergei Diaghilev. 1910 The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams completes his orchestral work Fantasia on a Theme of Thomas Tallis. 1910 The French artist Henri Matisse paints The Dance. 1910 The French composer Maurice Ravel completes his orchestral work Pavane pour une infante défunte/Pavan for a Dead Infanta, based on a piano work of 1899, and his work for two pianos Ma Mère l'oye/Mother Goose, which he orchestrates in 1911 and turns into a ballet in 1912. 1910 The French industrial chemist Georges Claude develops neon lighting when he discovers that the gas emits light when an electric current is passed through it. As it is initially only possible to produce red lighting, its potential is mainly restricted to advertising. 1910 The Gaumont-Palace opens in Paris, France, the first of the great 'picture palaces' and one of the first cinemas with facilities to give continuous showing of multi-reel films. 1910 The Indian writer Rabindranath Tagore publishes his Bengali poetry

collection Gitanjali/Song Offering. 1910 The Italian artist Umberto Boccioni paints Riot in the Galleria and The City Rises. 1910 The Russian composer Alexander Scriabin completes his symphonic poem Prometheus – The Poem of Fire. 1910 The Spanish artist Pablo Picasso paints Portrait of Ambroise Vollard and Portrait of D H Kahnweiler. 1910 The synthetic fabric rayon is used in Germany for stockings, the first garment to be manufactured from it. 1910 The US company Hamilton Beach Manufacturing Co. launches the first electric food mixer. 1910 US geneticist Thomas Hunt Morgan discovers that certain inherited characteristics of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster are sex linked. He later argues that because all sex-related characteristics are inherited together they are linearly arranged on the X-chromosome. 1910 US physician Dr Hawley Harvey Crippen murders his second wife, Cora Turner, and dissects and buries her body at their home in London, England. Crippen plans to escape to Canada with his mistress and former secretary Elthel Le Neve, but is caught on board the SS Montrose after the suspicious captain contacts Scotland Yard (the first use of radio in catching criminals). Crippen is tried and hanged. 6 February 1911 Ronald Reagan, 40th president of the USA 1981–89, a Republican, born in Tampico, Illinois. 10 March 1911 Clocks are put back by 9 minutes and 21 seconds at midnight in France and Algeria, making Greenwich time the standard. 26 March 1911 Tennessee Williams (Thomas Lanier Williams), US dramatist, most of whose plays are set in the Deep South, born in Columbus, Mississippi (–1983). 30 April 1911 Portuguese women get the vote. 29 May 1911 William Schwenk Gilbert, English playwright known for his works produced with Arthur Seymour Sullivan, dies in Harrow Weald, Middlesex, England (74). 13 June 1911 Luis W Alvarez, US physicist who received the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1968 for his discovery of several subatomic particles, born in San Francisco, California (–1988).

1 July 1911 The German gunboat Panther arrives in Agadir, Morocco, allegedly to protect German interests threatened by French involvement in Morocco, and sparks an international crisis. 14 September 1911 The Russian prime minister, Peter Stolypin, is assassinated by a revolutionary, and on 19 September the moderate Vladimir Kokovtsov is appointed prime minister. 26 October 1911 A revolutionary Chinese republic is proclaimed by revolutionaries contesting the rule of the Manchu emperors. 4 November 1911 A convention ends the 'Agadir crisis' in Morocco, when Germany allows France a free hand in Morocco in return for territory in the Congo. 5 November 1911 Italy annexes Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, and Libya from the Ottoman Empire. 1911 David Horsley establishes the first film studio in Hollywood, California, the Nestor Studio. Fifteen film companies are also established within the year. 1911 Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes discovers superconductivity, the characteristic of a substance of displaying zero electrical resistance when cooled to just above absolute zero. 1911 New Zealand-born British physicist Ernest Rutherford proposes the concept of the nuclear atom, in which the mass of the atom is concentrated in a nucleus occupying 1/10,000 of the diameter of the atom and which has a positive charge balanced by surrounding electrons. 1911 The ballet Petrushka, by the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky and Russian choreographer Mikhail Fokine, is first performed in Paris, France, under the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev. 1911 The English writer G K Chesterton publishes his collection of detective stories The Innocence of Father Brown. 1911 The English-born US writer Frances Hodgson Burnett publishes her children's novel The Secret Garden. 1911 The expressionist art group Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) is founded in Munich, Germany. Leading figures include the Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky and the German artists Franz Marc, August Macke, and Gabriele Münter. 1911 The opera Der Rosenkavalier/The Cavalier of the Rose, by the German composer Richard Strauss, is first performed in Dresden, Germany. It premieres in both London, England, and New York City in 1913.

1911 The Russian artist Wassily Kandinsky paints Improvisation 21a and Composition IV. It is at this time, in a series of paintings called Compositions and Improvisations, that Kandinsky develops his own form of abstract art. 1911 The Russian-born artist Marc Chagall paints I and My Village. 1911 The US composer Charles Ives completes his Symphony No. 3, The Camp Meeting, and his orchestral works The Gong on the Hook and Ladder (Fireman's Parade on Main Street) and Tone Roads No. 1. 1911 The US writer Edith Wharton publishes her tale Ethan Frome. 1911 US engineer Frederick Winslow Taylor publishes The Principles of Scientific Management. 1911 US physicist Robert Millikan measures the electric charge on a single electron in his oil-drop experiment, in which the upward force of the electric charge on an oil droplet precisely counters the known downward gravitational force acting on it. 1911–1914 82,500 Mexicans emigrate to the USA. 12 February 1912 P'u-i, the last Manchu emperor of China, abdicates, and China becomes a republic under provisional president Sun Zhong Shan (Sun Yat-sen). 13 March 1912 Bulgaria and Serbia sign a treaty of alliance in preparation for a war with the Ottoman Empire. 23 March 1912 Werner von Braun, German rocket engineer who was also involved in the exploration of space in Germany and the USA, born in Wirsitz, Germany (–1977). 14–15 April 1912 The British luxury liner Titanic, carrying 2,224 people on its maiden transatlantic voyage, hits an iceberg 640 km/400 mi off the coast of Newfoundland and sinks causing the deaths of 1,513. One of the largest ships afloat (269 m/882 ft) it has a double-hulled bottom and is considered unsinkable. The accident leads to the first international convention for safety at sea, held in London, England, the following year, which draws up safety standards. 15 April 1912 Kim Il Sung, Korean dictator 1948–94, born near Pyongyang, Korea (now North Korea) (–1994). 22 May 1912 Count Stephen Tisza, leader of the Hungarian National Party of Work, is elected president of the Hungarian chamber. Socialists call a strike in support of universal male suffrage and riots occur in Budapest, Austria-Hungary. 30 May 1912 Wilbur Wright, US pioneer of aviation, who, with his brother Orville, was the first to achieve sustained powered flight, dies in Dayton, Ohio

(45). 23 June 1912 Alan Mathison Turing, English mathematician who pioneered computer theory and computer processes, born in London, England (–1954). June 1912 English amateur archaeologist Charles Dawson discovers a human skull with an ape-like jaw, the fossil remains of Piltdown man Eoanthropus dawsoni, in a gravel pit in Piltdown, southeast England. In 1953 they are discovered to be a hoax. 17 July 1912 The International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF), the world governing body for track and field, is formed in Stockholm, Sweden, with 17 founder members. 14 August 1912 As a pretext for war, Bulgaria demands autonomy for Macedonia from the Ottoman Empire. 20 August 1912 William Booth, English preacher who founded the Salvation Army, dies in London, England (83). August 1912 For the third time in one year, President William Howard Taft dispatches US marines to a neighbouring country to protect US commercial interests from political tumult. This time the country is Nicaragua, where the marines will remain until 1933. 8 October 1912 Montenegro declares war on the Ottoman Empire. 18 October 1912 Italy and the Ottoman Empire sign a peace treaty at Lausanne, Switzerland, by which Tripoli and Cyrenaica are granted autonomy under Italian suzerainty, and Italy restores the Dodecanese Islands to the Ottoman Empire. 18 October 1912 The Ottoman Empire declares war on Bulgaria and Serbia. 5 November 1912 The Democrat Woodrow Wilson wins the US presidential election with 435 electoral votes, while the Progressive candidate, Theodore Roosevelt, wins 88 votes, and the residing Republican president, William Howard Taft, wins 8. In the popular vote Wilson receives 6,293,454 votes, Roosevelt 4,119,538, and Taft 3,484,980. Democrats attain majorities in both the House (2911–127) and Senate (51–44). 26 November 1912 Eugène Ionesco, Romanian-born French dramatist whose play La Cantatrice chauve/The Bald Prima Donna (1950) inspired the Theatre of the Absurd, born in Slatina, Romania (–1994). 1912 English biochemist Frederick Gowland Hopkins publishes the results of his experiments that prove that 'accessory substances' (vitamins) are essential for health and growth and that their absence leads to diseases such as scurvy or beriberi. In the same year, Polish-born US biochemist Casimir Funk discovers that

pigeons fed on rice polishings can be cured of beriberi, and suggests that the absence of a vital nitrogen-containing substance known as an amine causes such diseases. He calls these substances 'vitamines'. 1912 English philosopher George Edward Moore publishes Ethics. 1912 English philosopher Bertrand Russell publishes The Problems of Philosophy. 1912 German Protestant theologian Ernst Troeltsch publishes The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches, an influential study of the relationship between church and the state. It is translated into English in 1931. 1912 London, England, has 400 cinemas, up from 90 in 1909; in the USA, 5 million people visit the cinema daily. 1912 Norway is the first country to introduce compulsory third-party insurance for car owners. 1912 Polish-born US biochemist Casimir Funk isolates vitamin B1 (thiamine) and coins the name 'vitamines'. This proves a vital discovery in the treatment of the disease beriberi, which is caused by a deficiency of the vitamin. 1912 Scottish physicist Charles Thomson Rees Wilson perfects the cloud chamber, which detects ion trails since water molecules condense on ions. It is used to study radioactivity, X-rays, cosmic rays, and other nuclear phenomena. 1912 The Farm Journal holds the first national public opinion poll in the USA, to predict the presidential election result. 1912 The Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg completes his Pierrot lunaire/ Moonstruck Pierrot, settings of poems by the French poet Albert Giraud for spoken voice (or sprechstimme) and chamber ensemble. 1912 The ballet L'Après-midi d'un faune/The Afternoon of a Faun, by the French composer Claude Debussy and the Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky, is first performed in Paris, France, under the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev. The sets and costumes are by the Russian artist Léon Bakst and Nijinsky dances the central role. 1912 The black American poet-historian James Weldon Johnson anonymously publishes The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. 1912 The Edison film studio produces the first film with sound. It is a 15 minute musical based on nursery rhymes in which the sound is roughly synchronized on a phonograph with the image. 1912 The English composer Frederick Delius completes his orchestral work On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring, one of his Two Mood Pictures.

1912 The first film awards for feature-length films take place at the International Exhibition in Turin, Italy. 1912 The French artist Georges Braque creates the first papiers-collés (paintings that incorporate pieces of paper), exemplified by works such as Fruit Dish and Glass. 1912 The French artist Marcel Duchamp paints Nude Descending a Staircase, No 2. 1912 The German geophysicist Alfred Wegener proposes that, 250 million years ago, a single land mass formed a supercontinent he calls 'Pangea'. He argues that the supercontinent split into two components from which different portions broke free, forming the present continents which occupy their current positions through continental drift. 1912 The German writer Thomas Mann publishes his novella Der Tod in Venedig/ Death in Venice. 1912 The socialist paper Pravda ('Truth') is founded in Russia. 9 January 1913 Richard M(ilhous) Nixon, 37th president of the USA 1969–74, a Republican, the first president to resign, born in Yorba Linda, California (–1994). 17 January 1913 Raymond Poincaré is elected president of France (–1920). 21 January 1913 The moderate Aristide Briand succeeds Raymond Poincaré as prime minister of France. 5 February 1913 Fights between Caucasian and black American boxers in New York City are banned by the New York State Athletic Commission in the USA. 8 February 1913 Part of the Mexican army rebels and frees the ex-prime minister Felix Diaz and General Fernando Reyes. 18 February 1913 The commander of the Mexican army, Victoriano Huerta, joins the rebel Mexican soldiers and forces President Francisco Madero to resign. He subsequently declares himself president, and civil war ensues. 22 February 1913 Ferdinand de Saussure, Swiss linguist whose ideas about the structure of language laid the foundation of modern linguistics, dies in Geneva, Switzerland (55). 3 March 1913 On the eve of the inauguration of the US president, 5,000 women parade in Washington, DC, demanding female suffrage. 18 March 1913 King George I of Greece is assassinated in newly occupied

Thessaloníki (English Salonika) by a drunken Greek called Alexandros Skinas. 3 April 1913 Militant suffragist Emmeline Pankhurst is imprisoned in Britain for inciting persons to place explosives outside the house of the chancellor of the Exchequer, David Lloyd George. 30 May 1913 A peace treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Balkan states is signed in London, England, ending the First Balkan War. 11 June 1913 Vince Lombardi, US football coach who led the Green Bay Packers to five NFL championships, born in Brooklyn, New York (–1970). 29 June 1913 The Second Balkan War begins when Bulgaria attacks Serbian and Greek positions. 14 July 1913 Gerald Ford, 38th president of the USA (1974–77), a Republican, born in Omaha, Nebraska. 30 July 1913 The Balkan states sign an armistice in Bucharest, Romania, ending the Second Balkan War. July 1913 Billboard magazine is the first publication in the USA to print a weekly chart of best-selling popular songs. 10 August 1913 The Balkan states sign a peace treaty in Bucharest, Romania, in which Serbia and Greece retain the areas of Macedonia they have taken from Bulgaria. 12 September 1913 Jesse Owens, black US track and field athlete who won four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, born in Danville, Alabama (–1980). 18 September 1913 A Bulgarian–Ottoman treaty settles the frontier in Thrace, leaving Adrianople under Ottoman rule. October 1913 Henry Ford introduces the assembly line process, reducing the time required to produce a Model T car from 12.5 to 1.5 hours. October 1913 The US president Woodrow Wilson signs the Underwood-Simmons Tariff Act, the biggest change in tariffs since the mid-19th century, which reduces or removes duties on some 958 items. 11 November 1913 Premier Yuan Shikai outlaws the revolutionary Guomindang party, seeking to make himself sole ruler of China. 13 November 1913 A Greek–Ottoman peace treaty following the Second Balkan War allows Greece to absorb Crete and all the Aegean islands except Tenedos, Imbros, and the Dodecanese.

17 November 1913 The first vessel passes through the Panama Canal. 22 November 1913 Albert Camus, French novelist who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, born in Mondovi, Algeria (–1960). 18 December 1913 Willy Brandt, chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) 1969–74, born in Lübeck, Germany (–1992). 23 December 1913 The US Congress passes the Glass-Owen Currency Act (Federal Reserve Bank Act), establishing a Federal Reserve Board with power over monetary policy and 12 district Federal Reserve banks, and creating the nation's first central banking system since the dissolution of the Second Bank of the United States in the 1830s. 1913 British firm Vickers introduce the Experimental Fighting Biplane No. 1. It is the first plane to have a machine gun mounted on it. 1913 Coco Chanel's boutique at Deauville, France, leads a trend towards more casual fashions in women's dress. 1913 English philosopher Bertrand Russell publishes the final volume of Principia Mathematica/Principles of Mathematics in collaboration with another English mathematician and philosopher, Alfred North Whitehead. They attempt to derive the whole of mathematics from a logical foundation. 1913 English physicist Henry Gwyn-Jeffreys Moseley discovers the characteristic feature of an element, the atomic number. Moseley discovers that the X-ray spectra of the elements have a deviation that changes regularly through the periodic table. 1913 English physicists William and Lawrence Bragg develop X-ray crystallography further by establishing laws that govern the orderly arrangement of atoms in crystals displays interference and diffraction patterns. They also demonstrate the wave nature of X-rays. 1913 German inventor Oskar Barnak devises the first 35-mm camera. It is not commercialized until 1924. 1913 Spanish writer and philosopher Miguel de Unamuno publishes Del sentimiento trágico de la vida en los hombres y en los pueblos/The Tragic Sense of Life in Men and Peoples. 1913 The Austrian composer Anton Webern completes his Bagatelles for string quartet (Opus 9), 5 Stücke/Five Pieces for orchestra (Opus 10) and 6 Bagatelles for string quartet (Opus 11). 1913 The ballet Le Sacre du printemps/The Rite of Spring, by the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky and the Russian dancer Vaslav Nijinsky, is first

performed, in Paris, France, under the Russian impresario Sergei Diaghilev. Nijinsky dances the central role. Audiences riot, judging the work to be crude and offensive. 1913 The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams completes his Symphony No. 2, A London Symphony. 1913 The English writer D H Lawrence publishes his novel Sons and Lovers. 1913 The first domestic refrigerators appear on the market in the USA and Germany. 1913 The first stainless steel is cast in Britain, by Harry Brearley in Sheffield. 1913 The French artist Marcel Duchamp creates Bicycle Wheel. The first 'assisted readymade', it consists of a bicycle wheel fastened on top of a stool. 1913 The French writer Alain-Fournier publishes his novel Le Grand Meaulnes/ The Lost Domain. 1913 The French writer Marcel Proust publishes Du Côté de chez Swann/Swann's Way. This is the first volume of his multi-volume novel A la recherche du temps perdu/Remembrance of Things Past. 1913 The International Exhibition of Modern Art is held in New York City. Known as the 'Armory Show', it proves to be a controversial exhibition of postImpressionist and cubist art, widely criticized as decadent. The exhibition plays an important role in introducing modern European art to the USA. 1913 The Italian artist Umberto Boccioni sculpts Unique Forms of Continuity in Space. 1913 The Russian writer Osip Mandelstam publishes his poetry collection Kamen/ Stones. 1913 The US writer Eleanor Porter publishes her children's novel Polyanna. 1913 The US writer Willa Cather publishes her novel O Pioneers! 1913 The Woolworth Building, designed by the US architect Cass Gilbert, is completed in New York City. With 60 floors, it will be world's highest skyscraper until 1931. 1913 The Woolworth building, designed by US architect Cass Gilbert, is completed in New York City. At 232 m/791 ft high, it is the tallest building in the world. 1913 The world's first diesel-electric locomotives begin running in Sweden.

27 January 1914 President Oreste of Haiti abdicates during a revolt, and US marines are sent in to preserve order. General Zamon is elected president on 8 February. 5 February 1914 William S(eward) Burroughs, US writer noted for his experimental methods, black humour, explicit homo-eroticism, and apocalyptic vision, author of Naked Lunch, born in St Louis, Missouri (–1997). 20 March 1914 The 'Curragh incident' or 'mutiny' takes place when General Hubert Gough and 58 other British cavalry officers stationed at Curragh near Dublin, Ireland, indicate that they would resign if the army were ordered to take action in northern Ireland to enforce Home Rule. 13 May 1914 Joe Louis, black US world heavyweight champion boxer 1937–49, born in Lexington, Alabama (–1981). 15 May 1914 Tenzing Norgay, Nepalese sherpa who, with Edmund Hillary, was the first person to reach the summit of Mount Everest, born in Solo Khumbu, Nepal (–1986). 15 June 1914 A British–German agreement settles the dispute over the Baghdad Railway, when Germany agrees not to build a route south of Baghdad, Iraq, and promises to respect British interests. 28 June 1914 Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary (50) and his wife are assassinated at Sarajevo, Bosnia, by Gavrilo Princip, an 18-year-old Bosnian Serb student linked with the Serbian nationalist society 'the Black Hand'. The death of Archduke Ferdinand is to spark off World War I. June 1914 The British golfer Harry Vardon wins a sixth British Open golf title, at Prestwick, Scotland; his achievement remains unsurpassed. 6 July 1914 Germany issues the 'blank cheque', promising support to AustriaHungary in any action it chooses to take against Serbia over the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand. 23 July 1914 Austria-Hungary, suspecting Serbian involvement in the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, issues an ultimatum to Serbia, which contains deliberately unreasonable demands. 28 July 1914 Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia. 30 July 1914 Russia orders the general mobilization of its armies in response to the Austro-Hungarian declaration of war on Serbia. 1 August 1914 Germany declares war on Russia.

3 August 1914 Germany declares war on France. 4 August 1914 Britain declares war on Germany and establishes a naval blockade of the North Sea, the Channel, and the Mediterranean Sea in order to cut supplies to the Central Powers. 4 August 1914 Germany declares war on Belgium and invades Belgium and France. 6 August 1914 Austria-Hungary declares war on Russia. 15 August 1914 The Panama Canal opens to traffic. One of the world's greatest engineering feats, it is 81.6 km/50.7 mi long and saves 12,800 km/8,000 mi on the trip around South America. It cost $366,650,000 and around six thousand workers died during its construction. 23 August 1914 At the Battle of Mons in Belgium, British troops under Sir John French are thrown back in confusion by the German First Army, led by General Alexander von Kluck. 23 August 1914 Japan declares war on Germany. 26–30 August 1914 German forces defeat the Russian armies at the Battle of Tannenberg in East Prussia, and halt the Russian advance in the region. 27 August 1914 The political parties in France declare a Union Sacrée ('Sacred Union' or coaliton government), with a reconstructed cabinet under René Viviani, and the appointment of General Joseph Galliéni as governor of Paris, France. 1 September 1914 The last passenger pigeon dies in the Cincinnati zoo, Ohio. 3 September 1914 Following the death of Pope Pius X on 20 August, the Italian clergyman Giacomo Della Chiesa is elected Pope Benedict XV. 5–10 September 1914 In the First Battle of the Marne on the Western Front of World War I, the armies led by General Joseph Joffre halt the German advance on Paris, France. 6–15 September 1914 At the First Battle of the Masurian Lakes in East Prussia, German forces drive back the occupying Russian troops. 15 September–24 November 1914 The 'race to the sea' takes place as Allied and German forces move northwards trying to outflank one other. This establishes the basic line of the Western Front, stretching from the North Sea through Belgium and France to Switzerland. 28 September–31 October 1914 German and Austrian forces attack Russian troops south of Warsaw, Poland, in the First Battle of Warsaw, but are driven

back. 5 November 1914 France and Britain declare war on the Ottoman Empire. 14 November 1914 Sultan Mehmet V of the Ottoman Empire proclaims a Jihad ('Holy War') against the British Empire. 25 November 1914 Joe DiMaggio (Joseph Paul DiMaggio), US baseball player, born in Martinez, California. 8 December 1914 In the Battle of the Falkland Islands, a British naval force under Vice Admiral Sir Frederick Sturdee destroys Vice Admiral Maximilian von Spee's German East Asia Squadron. 1914 German biochemist Fritz Albert Lepmann explains the role of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) as the carrier of chemical energy from the oxidation of food to the energy consumption processes in the cells. 1914 The Crescent Washing Machine, the first domestic electric dishwasher, is launched in the USA. 1914 The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams completes his romance for violin and orchestra The Lark Ascending. 1914 The French artist Marcel Duchamp creates Bottle Rack. The first true 'ready made' (or everyday, manufactured object presented as an art work), it is, simply, a mass-produced bottle rack. 1914 The Irish writer James Joyce publishes his collection of short stories Dubliners. The stories were written between 1904 and 1907. 1914 The Irish writer W B Yeats publishes his poetry collection Responsibilities. 1914 The Italian artist Giorgio de Chirico paints The Enigma of a Day and Portrait of Guillaume Apollinaire. 1914 The play Pygmalion, by the Irish writer George Bernard Shaw, is first performed at His Majesty's Theatre in London, England. A German version was previously performed in Vienna, Austria, in 1913. 1914 The US writer Robert Frost publishes his poetry collection North of Boston, in England. It contains some of his best-known poems including 'The Death of the Hired Man' and 'Mending Wall'. 1914 The US-born English artist Jacob Epstein sculpts Rock Drill. c. 1914 Soldiers fighting in World War I find wristwatches a practical option, even though they had previously been considered effeminate.

24 January 1915 In the Battle of Dogger Bank in the North Sea, a British force under Admiral Sir David Beatty sinks the German cruiser Blücher. January 1915 Germany uses chlorine gas against the Russians. It is the first use of chemical warfare, but it has little effect. On 22 April, however, they use it at the Battle of Ypres to rout French and Canadian troops. 3 February 1915 The German army uses poison gas at Bolimov, Poland, on the Eastern Front. It is the first time that they have used poison gas on a significant scale. 4 February 1915 Germany declares the establishment of a submarine blockade around Britain from 18 February, and declares that any foreign vessel found in the area will be considered a legitimate target. 7–21 February 1915 In the Winter Battle of Masuria on the Eastern Front, the German and Austro-Hungarian armies force the Russian troops to retreat. 8 February 1915 The film Birth of a Nation, directed by D W Griffith, is released in the USA. An influential and commercially successful silent film, it stars Lillian Gish, Mae Marsh, and Henry B Walthall. Its epic scope and innovative cinematic techniques are, however, marred by racism, which includes a sympathetic portrayal of the Ku Klux Klan. 22 March 1915 Russian forces take Przemysl in the Polish area of northeastern Austria-Hungary (a key strategic point in the Carpathian Mountains) after a siege of 194 days. 7 April 1915 Billie Holiday (real name Eleanora Fagan), US jazz singer, born in Baltimore, Maryland (–1959). 22 April–25 May 1915 At the Second Battle of Ypres, Belgium, a German counteroffensive pushes the Western Front in southwestern Belgium forward by 5 km/3 mi. 24 April 1915 The wartime deportation and massacre of Armenians accused of collaborating with the Allies begins in the Ottoman Empire. 1.75 million people are driven across the Mesopotamian desert, over a million of them dying in the process. 25 April 1915 Allied landings take place on the Gallipoli Peninsula in the Dardanelles under the command of Sir Ian Hamilton. British and French forces land at Cape Helles, and Australian and New Zealander Army Corps (Anzac) forces at Anzac Cove. Initiated because of the stalemate on the Western Front, their aim is to knock the Ottoman Empire out of the war and assist the Russian effort against Germany on the Eastern Front, but the Allies meet stiff resistance from the Ottoman army commanded by Mustafa Kemal and the German general Otto Liman von Sanders.

26 April 1915 Britain, France, and Italy make the secret Treaty of London, under which Italy will join the war in return for land and reparations from Germany and Austria-Hungary when the war ends. 2 May–19 September 1915 An Austro-German offensive begins in Galicia (northeastern Austria-Hungary) with the Battle of Gorlice-Tarnów, breaking the Russian lines. 6 May 1915 Orson Welles, US film actor, director, producer, and writer, best known for Citizen Kane, born in Kenosha, Wisconsin (–1985). 7 May 1915 A German submarine sinks the British liner Lusitania off the south coast of Ireland, killing 1,198 passengers and crew, including 114 US citizens. 9 May–18 June 1915 At the Second Battle of Artois in France, the French armies under General Henri Pétain push forward in northeastern France, but gain little ground in spite of diversionary British attacks. 3 June 1915 The Russian southern front collapses when German forces recapture Przemysl, Poland. 10 June 1915 Saul Bellow, Canadian-born US writer who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1976, born in Lachine, Canada. 23 June–7 July 1915 The First Battle of the Isonzo takes place when an Italian army under General Luigi Cadorna tries to force bridgeheads on the River Isonzo at Gorizia and Tolmino in Italy, an area held by Austrian forces led by Archduke Eugene. 9 July 1915 German forces in South West Africa surrender to the South African Louis Botha. 24 July 1915 The passenger steamboat Eastland capsizes at her berth at a pier in Chicago, Illinois, killing 852 people. 6 August 1915 Allied troops under Sir Frederick Stopford land at Suvla Bay, Gallipoli, in the Dardanelles, in an unsuccessful attempt to outflank the Ottoman forces pinning down the Allied troops at Cape Helles and Anzac Cove. 5 September 1915 Tsar Nicholas II of Russia takes personal command of the Russian armies, replacing Grand Duke Nicholas after the defeats of the summer. 25 September–15 October 1915 At the Third Battle of Artois, French forces attack the German line in northeastern France and in Champagne to the southeast, while a British force, using gas for the first time, attacks the line at Loos on 4 November. Only small gains are made.

September 1915 The armoured car division of the British Royal Naval Air Service introduce 'Little Willie', the first purpose-built tank. A second model, 'Big Willie', is introduced shortly afterwards. 14 October 1915 Bulgaria enters the war on the side of the Central Powers. 28 October 1915 René Viviani resigns as prime minister of France and is replaced on 29 October by the former prime minister Aristide Briand. 12 November 1915 Britain annexes the Gilbert and Ellice Islands (modern Tuvalu and Kiribati) in the Pacific Ocean, converting the protectorate into a colony. 22 November–4 December 1915 In the Battle of Ctesiphon, Ottoman troops force the British invaders of Mesopotamia back to Kut-al-Imara, Mesopotamia. 25 November 1915 Augusto Pinochet, Chilean president 1973–89, and military dictator, born. November 1915 The Ku Klux Klan, a racist society that originated in the 1860s, is revived by William Joseph Simmons near Atlanta, Georgia, dedicated to 'white supremacy' and 'Americanism'. Within six years it attracts a membership of nearly 100,000. 12 December 1915 Frank Sinatra, US singer and actor, born in Hoboken, New Jersey. 18–19 December 1915 In a highly successful evacuation, Allied troops withdraw from Suvla Bay and Anzac Cove on the Gallipoli Peninsula following the failure of the Dardanelles campaign. 1915 Dr Herbert Kalmus develops the Technicolor film process in the USA. It will not be commercially viable until the 1930s. 1915 German industrialist Walter Rathenau organizes a government Kriegsrohstoffabteilung/War Raw Materials Department or KRA, which establishes corporations to oversee the supply of raw materials to industry and to procure extra supplies where necessary. 1915 Russian engineer Igor Sikorsky builds a 16-passenger biplane. Passengers are in an enclosed cabin and the aeroplane is powered by four 100-horsepower Mercedes engines. It is the first multi-engine aeroplane. 1915 The Bohemian-born German writer Franz Kafka publishes his novella Die Verwandlung/Metamorphosis. 1915 The English writer D H Lawrence publishes his novel The Rainbow. 1915 The English writer Ford Madox Ford publishes his novella The Good Soldier.

1915 The English writer Somerset Maugham publishes his novel Of Human Bondage. 1915 The film The Tramp, directed by Charlie Chaplin, is released in the USA. He also stars in it, with Edna Purviance. 1915 The Finnish composer Jean Sibelius completes the first version of his Symphony No. 5. 1915 The German company Bayer introduces aspirin in tablet form. 1915 The Russian artist Kasimir Malevich paints Suprematist Composition: Black Square. 1915 The US composer Charles Ives completes his Orchestral Set No. 2 and his Piano Sonata No. 2, Concord Massachusetts 1840–1860, which includes solos for viola and flute. 1915 The US writer Willa Cather publishes her novel The Song of the Lark. 1915 US physicist Manson Benedicks discovers that a germanium crystal can convert alternating current to direct current. This leads to the field of solidstate electronics, in the late 1940s. 1915 US researchers Eugene C Sullivan and William C Taylor at the Corning Glass Works create Pyrex, a heatproof and shockproof kitchenware. 8–9 January 1916 Allied forces are withdrawn from Cape Helles on the Gallipoli Peninsula in the Ottoman Empire, completing the evacuation of troops from the Dardanelles. 8–17 January 1916 Austro-Hungarian forces attack Montenegro, and the Serbian army flees to Corfu. 2 February 1916 The conservative Boris Stürmer becomes Russian prime minister, replacing the elderly Ivan Goremykin. 18 February 1916 The last German garrison in the Cameroons surrenders to the British general Sir Charles Dobell. 21 February–18 December 1916 German and Allied troops meet in the Battle of Verdun in France, the German commander Eric von Falkenhayn planning to sap French reserves in a battle of attrition. By the end of the battle each side has lost about 400,000 men. 28 February 1916 Henry James, US-born British novelist and playwright, dies in Chelsea, London, England (72).

11 March 1916 Harold Wilson, Labour prime minister of Britain 1964–70 and 1974–76, born in Huddersfield, Yorkshire, England (–1995). 15 March 1916 A US punitive expedition under the command of General John J Pershing is sent into Mexico to pursue the Mexican revolutionary Francisco 'Pancho' Villa. 15 March 1916 Germany begins a second campaign of unrestricted submarine warfare. 24 April–1 May 1916 With the support of Sinn Fein, members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood take part in the 'Easter Rising' in Dublin, Ireland, in an attempt to end British rule in Ireland. The rising is suppressed by British forces after heavy fighting, and its leaders (including Patrick Pearse and James Connolly) are executed. 29 April 1916 The Ottoman army recaptures the Mesopotamian city of Kut-alImara from the occupying British forces, following a siege dating from 7 December 1915. 10,000 prisoners are taken. 31 May–1 June 1916 The British and German surface fleets clash in the Battle of Jutland in the North Sea, their one major conflict of the war. The British fleet under Admiral Sir John Jellicoe loses a greater number of ships, but succeeds in reaffirming its naval dominance. The German fleet will remain in harbour for the rest of the war. 4 June–20 August 1916 The Russian armies commanded by General Alexei Brusilov mount the Brusilov Offensive, pushing the Austro-Hungarian line south of the Russian Pripet Marshes, but the attack is blunted by German reinforcements. 6 June 1916 British and French armies blockade Greece, suspecting that King Constantine is in league with the Central Powers, and only relent when the Greek army is stood down on 22 June. 17 June 1916 Following the fall of Antonio Salandra on 11 June, Paolo Boselli forms a coalition government in Italy, which includes Catholics and Reformist Socialists. Boselli has championed the Allied cause since the start of the war. 1 July–18 November 1916 French and British troops mount the Battle of the Somme in France, a massive offensive which gains 8 km/5 mi of territory. The British Army suffers 60,000 casualties (including 20,000 dead) on the first day, while the whole campaign results in over 620,000 British and French casualties and about 450,000 German casualties. 9 July 1916 Edward Heath, prime minister of Britain 1970–74, a Conservative, born in Broadstairs, Kent, England. 27 August 1916 Romania joins the Allies and declares war on Austria-Hungary.

29 August 1916 Following victories on the Eastern Front, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg is appointed German chief of the general staff (with Eric Ludendorff as quartermaster general) in sucession to Eric von Falkenhayn, whose strategy at Verdun, France, is not working. 31 August 1916 The German government accepts the 'Hindenburg Plan' for militarization of the German war economy. 4 September 1916 Allied troops under the South African general Jan Smuts take Dar es Salaam, the capital of German East Africa (now Tanzania). 9 October 1916 The former Greek prime minister Eleutherios Venizelos arrives in Thessaloníki (English Salonika), Greece, to establish a provisional government supportive of the Allies. 26 October 1916 François Mitterrand, Socialist president of France 1981–96, born in Jarnac, France (–1996). 7 November 1916 Montana voters make Jeanette Rankin the first woman to be elected to the US House of Representatives. 7 November 1916 The Democrat Woodrow Wilson is re-elected US president with 277 electoral votes, while the Republican Charles E Hughes wins 254 votes. In the popular vote Wilson polls 9,129,606, Hughes 8,538,221, and A L Benson 585,113. In the Congressional elections, Democrats retain majorities in the House (216–210) and Senate (53–42). 7 December 1916 David Lloyd George is appointed British prime minister and forms a coalition government. On 10 December he forms a war cabinet, including the Conservatives Arthur Balfour, Andrew Bonar Law, Lord Curzon, and Lord Milner, and the Labour leader Arthur Henderson. 12 December 1916 Aristide Briand forms a French war ministry along similar lines to the arrangement in Britain, appointing five leading political figures to the administration. 12 December 1916 The US Senate passes its Immigration Bill, with an amended literacy test clause designed to meet Japanese criticism. 30 December 1916 Grigory Yefimovich Rasputin, Siberian peasant and mystic, the 'debauched holy man' who influenced the Russian tsar Nicholas II and tsarina Alexandra, is murdered in Petrograd, Russia by a group of nobles (c. 54). December 1916 The 'turnip winter' in Central Europe sees food shortages caused by the Allied naval blockade and a high mortality rate among the civilian population. 1916 Coca-Cola launches its distinctively shaped bottle.

1916 German physicist Albert Einstein publishes The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity, in which he postulates that space is curved locally by the presence of mass, and that this can be demonstrated by observing the deflection of starlight around the Sun during a total eclipse. This replaces previous Newtonian ideas that invoke a force of gravity. 1916 Northam Warren introduces Cutex, the first liquid nail polish, in the USA. 1916 The Austrian War Dog Institute and the German Association for Serving Dogs begin training dogs as guides for the blind. 1916 The clocks are put forward by one hour in Germany in order to save energy for the war effort by reducing the need for artificial illumination. 1916 The Dada movement (producing iconoclastic 'anti-art' works) emerges in Zürich in Switzerland, its leading figures including the Romanian writer Tristan Tzara and the French artist Hans Arp. It lasts until the early 1920s, when it is absorbed by surrealism. 1916 The English artist Mark Gertler paints The Merry-Go-Round. 1916 The English composer Gustav Holst completes his orchestral suite The Planets. 1916 The film Intolerance, directed by D W Griffith, is released in the USA, starring Lillian Gish, Robert Harron, Mae Marsh, and Constance Talmadge. 1916 The Irish writer James Joyce publishes his novel Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. It has already been published serially in the English literary journal The Egoist during 1914 and 1915. 1916 The term 'jazz' emerges, for syncopated, improvisational, highly rhythmic music originating in black communities in the southern USA. 1916 The US writer Carl Sandburg publishes his poetry collection Chicago Poems. 1 February 1917 Germany announces its return to a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare in order to cut off the supplies sent to the Allies from the British Empire and the USA. 1 March 1917 The publication in the USA of the 'Zimmermann telegram' causes outrage. The telegram is a message from the German foreign minister Arthur Zimmermann to the German ambassador in Mexico City, Mexico, which states that if war breaks out between Germany and the USA, the ambassador is to propose an alliance with Mexico and support Mexico's reacquisition of territory lost to the USA in 1848.

4 March–5 April 1917 German troops withdraw to the specially constructed 'Hindenburg Line' on the Western Front. The line is a defensive system in which weak points found in the previous front line have been avoided. 8 March 1917 Ferdinand (Adolf August Heinrich) Graf von Zeppelin, German builder of rigid dirigible airships, dies in Charlottenburg, near Berlin, Germany (78). 8–15 March 1917 The 'February Revolution' takes place in Russia, striking workers being joined on 10 March by soldiers. On 14 March the duma (parliament) establishes a provisional government headed by Prince George Lvov. The revolution is called the 'February Revolution' on the basis of the old Julian calendar, under which the revolution takes place in the period 23 February–2 March. 15 March 1917 Tsar Nicholas II of Russia abdicates the throne on behalf of both himself and his son. His brother Grand Duke Michael refuses the throne on 16 March, thereby ending the rule of the Romanov dynasty. 19 March 1917 The French prime minister, Aristide Briand, resigns over the continued stalemate in the war. Alexandre Ribot forms a cabinet. 2 April 1917 The US president Woodrow Wilson calls a special session of the US Congress to debate a declaration of war against Germany, telling Congress 'The world must be made safe for democracy'. The Senate votes 82–6 to declare war on Germany and the House of Representatives votes 373–50 in favour. 16 April–9 May 1917 The French commander General Robert Nivelle launches the 'Chemin des Dames' offensive (or Second Battle of the Aisne) along the River Aisne. The French forces make tiny advances at heavy cost. 17 April 1917 The first in a wave of French army mutinies occurs on the Western Front in protest at the 'Chemin des Dames' offensive. A more serious mutiny begins on 29 April, and such mutinies continue until August 1917, ending the French army's capacity to mount offensives. 28 April 1917 Jack Kirby, US comic book artist who created over 400 characters including Spiderman, the Incredible Hulk, and Captain America, born in New York City (–1994). 15 May 1917 Following the mutinies in response to the costly 'Chemin des Dames' offensive, General Robert Nivelle is dismissed as commander in chief of the French army and is replaced by Henri Pétain, who is renowned for using his troops sparingly. Ferdinand Foch replaces Pétain as chief of the general staff. 18 May 1917 Prince George Lvov reforms the cabinet of the Russian provisional government with representation by socialists, and Alexander Kerensky becomes minister of war.

29 May 1917 John F Kennedy, 35th president of the USA 1961–63, a Democrat, born in Brookline, Massachusetts (–1963). 12 June 1917 Following threats of invasion from the Allies, the pro-German King Constantine I of Greece abdicates in favour of his second son, Alexander (–1920). 18 June–13 July 1917 The Russian minister of war, Alexander Kerensky, launches the Kerensky Offensive on the Eastern Front with a series of attacks against the German armies, which are quickly repulsed with heavy Russian losses. 26 June 1917 The pro-Allies head of the Greek provisional government Eleutherios Venizelos travels across Greece from Thessaloníki (English Salonika) to Athens to become prime minister. 2–5 July 1917 A race riot erupts in East St Louis, Missouri, where alienated white workers rampage through black neighbourhoods killing any black American in sight. 'Official' figures list 39 black and 8 white people killed, but civil-rights leader W E B Du Bois insists that as many as 125 people have died in what is undoubtedly the worst racial pogrom in US history. 16–17 July 1917 During mass demonstrations in Petrograd, Russia, known as the 'July Days', the provisional government is undermined, but an attempted Bolshevik rising fails after details emerge of the dealings between the Bolshevik leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Germany, who had helped him return to Russia. 19 July 1917 The SPD, Centre Party, and Progressives in the German Reichstag (parliament) combine to pass a motion demanding peace with no annexations or indemnities. 21 July 1917 Alexander Kerensky replaces Prince George Lvov as Russian prime minister. 31 July–6 November 1917 The Third Battle of Ypres (the Battle of Passchendaele) takes place on the Western Front. British forces in Belgium advance about 13 km/8 mi, but at a heavy cost in casualties. 9–14 September 1917 General Lavr Kornilov attempts a counter-revolutionary coup but is prevented from reaching Petrograd, Russia, by Bolshevik railwaymen. Kornilov is later arrested. 27 September 1917 Edgar Degas, French artist known for his paintings, drawings, and bronzes of the human figure in motion, dies in Paris, France (83). 24 October–26 December 1917 At the Battle of Caporetto, Italy, the AustroHungarian and German forces under General Otto von Below break the Italian line and advance 16 km/10 mi. The Italian army regroups along the River Piave. 28 October 1917 Vittorio Orlando becomes Italian prime minister following the

major military defeat at Caporetto, and establishes a Unione Sacra coalition government which keeps Italy in the war. 1 November 1917 Count Georg von Hertling succeeds George Michaelis as German chancellor when the latter fails to quell the pro-peace lobby. 2 November 1917 The British foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour, issues the 'Balfour declaration' on Palestine, in which he favours the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people without prejudice to non-Jewish communities. 6 November 1917 The 'October Revolution' takes place in Russia, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and the Bolsheviks seizing the Winter Palace in Petrograd, Russia, on 7 and 8 November and overthrowing the provisional government. The revolution is named after the date on which it commences under the old Julian calendar (24 October). 7 November 1917 At a meeting of the all-Russian congress of soviets (councils) in Petrograd, Russia, most Mensheviks and other socialists walk out, leaving the Bolsheviks in control. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin forms a council of people's commissars (composed of Bolsheviks) as the new government. 16 November 1917 Paul Painlevé falls as prime minister of France amid fears of French capitulation in the European war, and the aggressive Georges Clemenceau ('the tiger') forms a cabinet. 17 November 1917 Auguste Rodin, French sculptor renowned for his realistic treatment of the human figure, dies in Meudon, France (77). 19 November 1917 Indira Gandhi, prime minister of India 1966–77 and 1980–84, born in Allahabad, India (–1984). 20 November–7 December 1917 The Battle of Cambrai takes place in northeastern France and is the first major battle involving tanks. A British tank force breaks the German line at Cambrai, but their success is not exploited. 5 December 1917 German and Russian delegates sign an armistice at BrestLitovsk (in modern Belarus). 8 December 1917 Bolshevik rule is established in Estonia under the communist leader Jaan Anvelt; it lasts only until the German occupation of the country in February 1918. 9 December 1917 Romania signs an armistice with the Central Powers at Focsani, Romania. 16 December 1917 Arthur C Clarke, English writer of science fiction, born in Minehead, Somerset, England.

1917 Dr Herbert Kalmus makes the first successful use of the Technicolor film process, which he invented in 1915. The Gulf Between is the first technicolor film. 1917 Italian philosopher Benedetto Croce publishes Teoria e storia della storiografia/History: Its Theory and Practice. 1917 The cinema is becoming a more popular pastime among the middle classes in the USA and in Europe with the advent of better-quality films and the need for diversion during the war. 1917 The English writer P G Wodehouse publishes The Man with Two Left Feet, a collection of stories in which his comic characters Jeeves and Wooster first appear. 1917 The films Easy Street, The Cure, and The Immigrant, all directed by Charlie Chaplin, are released in the USA. Chaplin also stars in them alongside Edna Purviance. 1917 The French composer Maurice Ravel completes his piano work Le Tombeau de Couperin/The Tomb of Couperin, which he orchestrates in 1919. 1917 The Irish writer W B Yeats publishes his poetry collection The Wild Swans at Coole, which includes 'An Irish Airman Foresees his Death'. 1917 The Italian artist Giorgio de Chirico paints Disquieting Muses. 1917 The need for British women to cut their hair short for war work in the factories leads to a fashion for the bob. 1917 The US inventor Clarence Birdseye develops a rapid freezing method of preserving food that also preserves its flavour. 1917 The US inventor Edwin Armstrong invents the superheterodyne radio circuit. It allows easy tuning of weak radio waves, which it also amplifies. Its design becomes the basis of radar, television, and all amplitude modulation (AM) radios. 1917 There are 4,842,139 motor vehicles registered in the USA, including more than 435,000 trucks, over half of world total. 8 January 1918 In a message to the US Congress, President Woodrow Wilson propounds 'fourteen points' for a peace settlement, including the principles of national self-determination, free trade, open diplomacy, and the founding of a league of nations. 15 January 1918 Gamal Abdel Nasser, prime minister of Egypt 1954–56 and then president 1956–70, born in Alexandria, Egypt (–1970).

26 January 1918 Nicolae Ceausescu, president of the Socialist Republic of Romania 1967–89, born in Scornicesti, Romania (–1989). 16 February 1918 Lithuania proclaims its independence from Russia. 3 March 1918 A British force lands in Murmansk, Russia, to aid anti-Bolshevik forces and keep Russia in the war against Germany. 3 March 1918 Russia and the Central Powers sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, in which Russia cedes the Baltic Provinces and Russian Poland, and recognizes the independence of Finland and the Ukraine. The Ottoman Empire takes the former Russian districts of Kars, Ardahan, and Batum. 21 March–5 April 1918 The German army launches a spring offensive on the Western Front with the Second Battle of the Somme, and advances 64 km/40 mi towards Paris, France. 25 March 1918 Claude Debussy, French composer, dies in Paris, France (55). 21 April 1918 Manfred, Freiherr von Richthofen (the 'Red Baron'), German aviator and leading ace during World War I, is shot down and killed in Vaux-surSomme, France (26). It is not certain whether he was shot down by Canadian pilot Roy Brown or by ground fire. 21 April 1918 Universal suffrage is granted in Denmark. 7 May 1918 Romania signs the Peace of Bucharest with Germany and AustriaHungary. Romania is allowed to annex Bessarabia, though Russia refuses to recognize the annexation. 11 May 1918 Richard Feynman, US theoretical physicist in the field of quantum electrodynamics, born in New York City (–1988). 26 May 1918 Georgia proclaims independence from Russia. 15–23 June 1918 In the Battle of the Piave, Italy, Austro-Hungarian troops cross the River Piave to attack the Italian line, but are resisted. 25 June 1918 Czech soldiers in Siberia, who were originally captured by the imperial Russian army, revolt. They seize the Trans-Siberian Railway in their attempt to reach Vladivostok, Russia, en route for Europe. 14 July 1918 Ingmar Bergman, Swedish film director, born in Uppsala, Sweden. 16 July 1918 Nicholas II, tsar of Russia 1895–1917, is executed by the Bolsheviks, in Yekaterinburg, Russia (50).

18 July 1918 Nelson Mandela, South African nationalist, political prisoner, and president from 1994, born in Umtata, Cape of Good Hope, South Africa. 3 August 1918 A British force lands at Vladivostok, Russia, beginning a joint effort with France and the USA to prevent Japanese aggrandizement in Siberia. 8–11 August 1918 The Battle of Amiens is fought on the Western Front, British forces breaking the German line to such an extent that 8 August becomes known as 'the black day of the German army'. 15–24 September 1918 An Allied (French, British, Italian, and Serbian) offensive makes large gains at the Battle of Monastir on the Macedonian front. 18 September 1918 A British offensive begins in Palestine when troops under Sir Edmund Allenby defeat an Ottoman force at the Battle of Megiddo. 30 September 1918 Bulgaria signs an armistice with the Allies. September 1918 The Royal Navy launches the first aircraft carrier, the Argus. A converted merchant ship, it has a flight deck measuring 170.7 m/560 ft and a hangar that can house 20 aeroplanes. 21 October 1918 Czechoslovakia is proclaimed an independent republic in the Czech city of Prague. 24 October–4 November 1918 The Battle of Vittorio Veneto on the Italian front leads to the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian army. 3 November 1918 A Polish republic is proclaimed in Warsaw, Poland, by the Russian-sponsored regency council. 3 November 1918 Riots spread across Germany from the north German port of Kiel, and workers' and soldiers' soviets (revolutionary councils) or Räte are established. 3 November 1918 The Allies sign an armistice with Austria-Hungary, which is to come into force on 4 November. 4 November 1918 Wilfred Owen, English poet noted for his war poems, is killed in action in France (25). 7 November 1918 A republic is proclaimed in Bavaria, Germany, by the socialist Kurt Eisner. 8 November 1918 A German armistice commission meets the Allied delegation, headed by the French marshal Ferdinand Foch, in a railway carriage in Compiègne, France. An armistice is agreed, to be effective from 11 November.

9 November 1918 The Social Democrat Philip Scheidemann pre-empts the proclamation of a communist republic in Germany by declaring a republic himself. Friedrich Ebert replaces Prince Max as chancellor and, on 10 November, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany flees to the Netherlands. 12 November 1918 Emperor Charles I abdicates in Austria and, on 13 November, in Austria-Hungary. 13 November 1918 The Russian government annuls the harsh Treaty of BrestLitovsk, signed with Germany in March following the defeat of Germany by the Western allies in World War II. 16 November 1918 Hungary proclaims itself a republic independent of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. 18 November 1918 Admiral Alexander Kolchak establishes an anti-Bolshevik dictatorial regime at Omsk, Russia. 26 November 1918 The national assembly in Montenegro proclaims the deposition of King Nicholas and the union of Montenegro with Serbia. 30 November 1918 Iceland becomes a sovereign state, independent of Denmark but under the same monarch. 4 December 1918 A national council proclaims the formation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, with Alexander I (son of King Peter of Serbia) as prince-regent. The country will be renamed Yugoslavia in 1929. 14 December 1918 In the British general election, the victorious wartime coalition wins a majority of 249. The coalition Conservatives take 335 seats, the coalition Liberals 133, and the coalition Labour candidates 10, giving the coalition a total of 478 seats, while the Irish Unionists win 25 seats, the Irish Nationalists 7, the Conservatives 23, the Liberals 28, Labour 63, Sinn Fein 73, and others 10. 14 December 1918 Sidonio Paes, the dictatorial president of Portugal, is assassinated. Democracy is subsequently restored. 1918 Daylight Saving time is introduced in the USA. 1918 German historian Oswald Spengler publishes the first volume of his Der Untergang des Abendlandes/The Decline of the West. The second volume appears in 1922. 1918 Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin publishes Gosudarstvo i revoliutsiia/The State and Revolution. 1918 The Poems of the English Victorian writer Gerard Manley Hopkins are

published posthumously. 1918 The birth-control pioneer Dr Marie Stopes publishes the controversial book Married Love, a manual on sex, marriage, and contraception, in Britain. 1918 The English writer Lytton Strachey publishes his biographical studies Eminent Victorians. 1918 The Russian artist Kasimir Malevich paints Suprematist Composition: White on White. 1918 US historian Ulrich Bonnell Phillips publishes American Negro Slavery. 1918–1919 A worldwide pandemic of Spanish influenza (so called because of its particular virulence in Spain) or Encephalitis lethargica (sleeping sickness) kills over 20 million people, more than were killed during the conflicts of World War I. The movement of the armed forces at the end of the war promotes its spread. 4 January 1919 The Red Army takes Riga, Latvia, as the Russian communists attempt to reconquer the Baltic states. 6 January 1919 Theodore ('Teddy') Roosevelt, 26th president of the USA 1901–09, a Republican, dies in Oyster Bay, New York (60). 15 January 1919 Volunteer soldiers suppress the Spartacist rising in Berlin, Germany, in which the Spartacist leaders Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg are arrested and shot. 17 January 1919 Joseph Pilsudski becomes president of Poland, and Ignacy Paderewski becomes prime minister of the coalition government there. Paderewski resigns on 7 December. 31 January 1919 Jackie Robinson, US baseball player, the first black player in the major leagues, born in Cairo, Georgia (–1972). January 1919 The Eighteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, prohibiting the manufacture, sale, and distribution of alcoholic beverages, becomes law. 2 March 1919 The Communist Third International (Comintern) is founded to encourage world revolution. The debate over affiliation to this body will mark the split between socialist and communist movements and parties. 17 March 1919 Nat 'King' Cole, US jazz and popular singer, born in Montgomery, Alabama (–1965). 21 March 1919 A soviet government is formed in Budapest, Hungary, under the revolutionary leader Béla Kun.

23 March 1919 Benito Mussolini founds the Fasci d'Italiani di Combattimento, an Italian fascist movement. 28 March 1919 Hungary declares war on Czechoslovakia over disputed areas of Slovakia. 4 April–1 May 1919 A soviet republic is established in Bavaria, Germany, by communists, following a radicalization of politics in the wake of the assassination of Kurt Eisner. 10 April 1919 Emiliano Zapata, Mexican revolutionary who led a guerilla force during the Mexican Revolution, is ambushed and shot in Morelos, Mexico (39). 10 April 1919 Romania invades Hungary to prevent it attempting to retake disputed Transylvania. 13 April 1919 Gurkha troops of the British Army fire on a protesting crowd in northern India in what becomes known as the 'Amritsar Massacre', killing 379 people and wounding over 1,200 more. 28 April 1919 The Red Army in Russia begins a counteroffensive against the White forces in Siberia under Admiral Kolchak. 29 April 1919 The Dodecanese Islands vote to return to Greece, having been under Italian rule since 1912. 3 May 1919 War begins between British India and Afghanistan following Afghanistan's demand for complete independence. On 8 August a peace will be agreed at Rawalpindi (now in Pakistan), conceding independence. 7 May 1919 At the Paris Peace Conference in France, the Allies present their terms to Germany without giving opportunity for negotiation. The Rhineland is to be demilitarized and semi-occupied for between 5 and 15 years, reparations are to be paid, limits will be placed on the size of Germany's armed forces, and it is to accept a 'war guilt' clause acknowledging responsibility for starting the European War. Germany's colonies are also disposed of, assigning German East Africa to Britain as a mandated territory of the League of Nations, and German South West Africa as a mandate under the administration of South Africa. 7 May 1919 Eva Perón, unofficial Argentine political leader and wife of Juan Perón, born in Los Todos, Argentina (–1952). 9 May 1919 Universal suffrage is granted in Belgium. 10 May–11 June 1919 Sir Barton, ridden by US jockey Johnny Loftus, wins the Kentucky Derby, Preakness, and Belmont Stakes to become the first horse to win the US Triple Crown (though the term 'triple crown' is not applied to this feat until 1930).

26 May 1919 Women's suffrage is granted in Sweden. 28 May 1919 Armenia declares its independence from Anatolia (modern Turkey). 29 May 1919 English astrophysicist Arthur Eddington and others observe the total eclipse of the Sun on Príncipe Island (West Africa), and discover that the Sun's gravity bends the light from the stars beyond the edge of the eclipsed sun, thus fulfilling predictions made according to Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity. 14–15 June 1919 British aviators John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown fly, in a Vickers-Vimy twin-engined biplane, from Newfoundland to Ireland in 16 hr 12 min, winning the £10,000 prize offered by the Daily Mail for the first nonstop transatlantic flight. 20 June 1919 The German chancellor, Philip Scheidemann, resigns in opposition to the Treaty of Versailles, which dictates peace terms unfavourable to Germany. The Social Democrat Gustav Bauer forms a cabinet comprising Social Democrats, Centre Party delegates, and Democrats on 21 June. 21 June 1919 German sailors scuttle the 'Grand Fleet' in Scapa Flow, the British naval base in the Orkney Islands where the fleet has been quartered since the end of World War I, to prevent it falling into Allied hands following the signing of the Treaty of Versailles. 28 June 1919 Britain and the USA guarantee French security in the event of an unprovoked German attack, though the US Senate later refuses to ratify the treaty. 28 June 1919 German representatives sign the peace treaty ending the 1914–18 war in the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles near Paris, France (for terms, see 7 May). 4 July 1919 President José Pardo of Peru is overthrown and is succeeded by the reforming Augusto Leguía on 24 August. 5 July 1919 The French tennis player Suzanne Lenglen wins the first of five consecutive women's singles titles at the Wimbledon lawn tennis championships in London, England. 1 August 1919 The Hungarian socialist regime under Béla Kun falls in the face of the advance of the Romanian army. 9 August 1919 Universal suffrage is granted in the Netherlands. 11 August 1919 Andrew Carnegie, US steel magnate and philanthropist, dies in Lenox, Massachusetts (83).

10 September 1919 Austria signs a treaty of peace with the Allies at SaintGermain-en-Laye near Paris, France, in which Austria recognizes the independence of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, and agrees not to ally with Germany. Its name subsequently changes from German Austria to the Republic of Austria. 10 September 1919 The 'Avus' autobahn opens in Berlin, Germany. The world's first controlled access motorway, it is 10 km/6.2 mi long. 12 September 1919 The poet and nationalist Gabriele d'Annunzio leads an unofficial Italian army to seize the northern Adriatic port of Fiume before it is incorporated into the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. 1–9 October 1919 The Chicago White Sox lose the US baseball World Series to the Cincinnati Reds by five games to three. Eight Sox players ('the Black Sox') are subsequently banned for life from major league baseball for conspiracy to 'throw' the series, but an attempt to have them committed for fraud collapses when they are acquitted on a technicality. 2 October 1919 Three weeks into a nationwide campaign to secure Senate ratification of the Treaty of Versailles, President Woodrow Wilson suffers a stroke in Wichita, Kansas, after suffering a breakdown in Denver, Colorado, on the 25 September. 22 October 1919 The Bolshevik Red Army defeats an advancing White force under General Nicolay Yudenich near Petrograd, Russia. 14 November 1919 The Bolshevik Red Army takes Omsk, Russia, from the forces of Admiral Kolchak and pushes them back into Siberia. 19 November 1919 In a 55–39 vote the US Senate rejects the Treaty of Versailles, leaving the USA outside the League of Nations. 20 November 1919 German troops are forced to evacuate Latvia and Lithuania under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. 27 November 1919 The Peace of Neuilly formally ends the war between the Allies and Bulgaria, with Bulgaria recognizing the independence of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes and agreeing to pay reparations. 28 November 1919 In Britain, Lady Nancy Astor is elected in a by-election and becomes the first woman member of Parliament to take her seat. 3 December 1919 Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French Impressionist painter, dies in Cannes, France (78). 1919 André Citroën launches the Citroën car in France.

1919 Austrian zoologist Karl von Frisch proposes that bees communicate the distance and direction of nectar to each other by two types of rhythmic movements, which he calls wagging and circle dances. 1919 Dutch historian Johan Huizinga publishes Herfsttijd der middeleeuwen/The Waning of the Middle Ages. 1919 German theologian Karl Barth publishes Der Römerbrief/The Epistle to the Romans. 1919 New Zealand-born British physicist Ernest Rutherford splits the atom by bombarding a nitrogen nucleus with alpha particles, discovering that it ejects hydrogen nuclei (protons). It is the first artificial disintegration of an element and inaugurates the development of nuclear energy. 1919 The Bauhaus school of design, architecture, and crafts is founded in Weimar, Germany, by the German architect Walter Gropius. It is transferred to Dessau in 1926. 1919 The film The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, directed by Robert Wiene, is released in Germany, starring Wener Krauss and Conrad Veidt. 1919 The first radio station in Britain is established at Chelmsford, Essex. Using a 6 kW transmitter, two half-hour speech and music programmes are broadcast daily. They are banned the following year for fear of commercialization. 1919 The first regular international civilian airmail service is set up between London, England, and Paris, France, by French aviators Maurice and Henri Farman. It is initially too expensive to catch on. 1919 The French artist Marcel Duchamp creates the work L H O O Q, a reproduction of the painting Mona Lisa, on which he has painted a moustache. 1919 The Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani paints Portrait of Jeanne Hébuterne in a Sash and Self-Portrait. 1919 The US writer Sherwood Anderson publishes his short-story collection Winesburg, Ohio. 1919 The US-born English writer T S Eliot publishes his poetry collection Poems, which includes 'Gerontion'. 1919 The world's first commercial greyhound race track with a mechanical hare is opened in Emeryville, California. 1919 W O Bentley launches the Bentley car in Britain. 2 January 1920 Isaac Asimov, US science fiction writer, born in Petrovichi,

Russia (–1992). 8 January 1920 In the Russian Civil War, the Red Army defeats a White army under Admiral Alexander Kolchak at Krasnoyarsk in south-central Siberia. Kolchak is executed by the Bolsheviks on 7 February. 16 January 1920 Prohibition (the ban on manufacturing, selling, or transporting alcohol) begins in the USA, leading to an increase in the sales of soft drinks and coffee and a thriving bootleg and homebrew industry. 20 January 1920 Federico Fellini, Italian film director, born in Rimini, Italy (–1993). 2 February 1920 In a treaty signed at Tartu in Estonia, the Bolsheviks recognize the independence of Estonia and renounce all claims to Russian sovereignty over the Baltic state. 26 February 1920 In accordance with the Treaty of Versailles, the League of Nations takes over the Saar area between France and Germany; France takes control of the Saar's coal deposits. 1 March 1920 The military commander in chief Admiral Nikolaus Horthy is elected regent of Hungary, pending a possible restoration of the Habsburg monarchy. 13–17 March 1920 The 'Kapp Putsch' takes place in Germany, the government fleeing when US-born German journalist Wolfgang Kapp and his right wing military supporters seize Berlin, Germany. However, a general strike prevents the conspirators from establishing their authority. 16 March 1920 In response to growing nationalist agitation Allied forces invest Constantinople, Anatolia (modern Istanbul, Turkey), and arrest and deport leading nationalists. The sultan of Anatolia closes the parliament. 27 March 1920 The Red Army takes Novorossiysk on the Black Sea, precipitating the collapse of Anton Denikin's White Russian army. General Peter Wrangel takes command of White operations. 23 April 1920 A new Turkish assembly opens at Ankara, Anatolia (modern Turkey), which elects the nationalist Mustafa Kemal as its president and proclaims a new constitution, the Law of Fundamental Organization. 25 April–12 October 1920 A Polish offensive is launched under Joseph Pilsudski, which aims to capture the Ukraine. The action begins the Polish–Russian War. 5 May 1920 Britain is awarded a mandate over Iraq by the Supreme Council of the Paris Peace Conference deciding terms for the end of World War II.

5 May 1920 The Treaty of Berlin ends the war between Germany and Latvia and recognizes Latvian independence. 7 May 1920 During the Polish–Russian War, Polish and Ukrainian forces enter Kiev in the Ukraine, but are driven out by Bolshevik forces on 11 June. 18 May 1920 John Paul II, pope from 1978, the first non-Italian pope in 456 years, born in Wadowice, Poland. 20 May 1920 President Venustiano Carranza of Mexico is assassinated. In response the US government suspends diplomatic relations with Mexico. Adolfo de la Huerta takes office as provisional president of Mexico. 4 June 1920 The Allies (principally France and Britain) agree the Treaty of Trianon with Hungary. It removes various territories from Hungary, imposes limits on Hungary's armed forces, and requires Hungary to pay reparations for damage inflicted by Austro-Hungarian forces during the war. 4 June 1920 The US sculler John B Kelly is refused entry to the Henley Regatta, England, because it is deemed that his job as a bricklayer gives him an unfair advantage in competition with 'gentlemen'. He goes on to win two gold medals for rowing at the Antwerp Olympic Games. 21 June 1920 Konstantin Fehrenbach of the German Centre Party becomes chancellor of Germany, his coalition government of Social Democrats and Centre Party members being joined by members of the People's Party. 22 June 1920 Greece, with the support of Britain, invades Anatolia (modern Turkey) in order to force it to accept the peace dictated by the Allies. 23 July 1920 Britain annexes its East African Protectorate as Kenya Colony (a crown colony). 24 July 1920 The Treaty of St Germain-en-Laye between the Allies (principally Britain and France) and Austria (signed 19 September 1919) comes into force. 28 July 1920 The Teschen Agreement, which divides the territory disputed between Czechoslovakia and Poland, is signed in Paris, France. 10 August 1920 The Treaty of Sèvres is signed, ending the war between the Ottoman Empire and the Allies. Under the terms of the agreement the Empire is broken up. Mesopotamia and Palestine become British mandates and Syria becomes a French mandate. Part of eastern Thrace, Smyrna (modern Izmir), and other territory is awarded to Greece, Rhodes is awarded to Italy, the Hejaz region becomes independent, and the Dardanelles are internationalized. 11 August 1920 Russia and Latvia sign the Riga Treaty, in which Russia recognizes Latvia's independence.

14 August 1920 The Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes and Czechoslovakia make an alliance (and are joined in 1921 by Romania) to form the 'Little Entente', a defensive measure against Hungarian revanchism (a policy aimed at regaining lost territories). 14–16 August 1920 Polish forces under Joseph Pilsudski defeat the advancing Russian troops led by Michael Tukhachevski at Warsaw, Poland. 29 August 1920 Charlie 'Yardbird' or 'Bird' Parker, US saxophonist, composer and bandleader, born in Kansas City, Kansas, (–1955). 5 September 1920 Alvaro Obregón is elected president of Mexico and takes office on 1 December. 7 September 1920 The first 'Miss America' beauty competition is held in Atlantic City, New Jersey; the winner is Miss Margaret Gorman. 17 September 1920 A new professional American football league, the American Professional Football Association, the forerunner of the National Football League, is formed at Canton, Ohio. It comprises 10 teams (soon extended to 14). 23 September 1920 Alexandre Millerand succeeds Paul Deschanel as president of France, the latter having resigned on 15 September because of ill health. 12 October 1920 Russia and Poland sign a peace treaty to end their war, at Tartu, Estonia, signing a full treaty on 18 March 1921. 2 November 1920 The Republican Warren G Harding wins the US presidential election with 404 electoral votes, the Democrat James M Cox taking 127 votes. In the popular vote Harding wins 16,152,200 votes, Cox wins 9,147,353, and the socialist Eugene V Debs (in prison) takes 919,799. In Congressional elections, Republicans retain majorities in the House (301–131) and Senate (59–37). 2 November 1920 The Westinghouse Company establishes the world's first commercial radio station, KDKA, in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, run by the US engineer Frank Conrad, inaugurating national radio broadcasting in the USA. The first broadcast is of the presidential election returns. 14 November 1920 The Russian Red Army takes Sevastopol in the Crimea. With the evacuation of General Peter Wrangel's White forces to Constantinople, Anatolia (modern Turkey), the civil war in Russia is effectively over, with the communists victorious. 15 November 1920 Danzig (modern Gdansk in Poland) is proclaimed a free city under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. In early December its constitutional assembly is proclaimed the city parliament. Close commercial ties with Poland are confirmed.

17 November 1920 Following the recent death of King Alexander, dowager Queen Olga becomes regent of Greece. 5 December 1920 A plebiscite in Greece following the death of King Alexander favours the return of the former king, Constantine, who abdicated under Allied pressure in 1917. On 19 December he returns to Greece. 27 December 1920 Italian troops force the revolutionary nationalist Gabriele D'Annunzio and his troops out of Fiume, Italy. 1920 Abortion is legalized in Russia. 1920 Abortion is made illegal in France, to increase the population which has dropped because of World War I. 1920 English philosopher Alfred North Whitehead publishes The Concept of Nature. 1920 Following the establishment of the League of Nations, numerous countries become members, including Argentina (13 January), Switzerland (13 February), Norway (5 March), Denmark (8 March), the Netherlands (10 March), Austria (3 December), Bulgaria, Costa Rica, Finland, and Latvia (16 December), and Albania (17 December). 1920 Frei-Sonnenland, the first nudist camp, opens at Motzener See in Germany. 1920 German sociologist Max Weber publishes his influential Die Protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus/The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. 1920 Greek forces, encouraged by the British prime minister David Lloyd George, begin an offensive against the increasingly popular Turkish Nationalists of Mustapha Kemal. By 9 July the Greeks have occupied Bursa in western Anatolia (modern Turkey). 1920 The Collected Poems of the English poet Wilfred Owen (killed in World War I) are published posthumously, edited by Siegfried Sassoon. 1920 The average life expectancy in the USA is 54 years, up from 49 years in 1901. 1920 The English writer Agatha Christie publishes The Mysterious Affair at Styles. Her first novel, it introduces her Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. 1920 The French writer Colette publishes her novel Chéri/Darling. 1920 The German artist Ernst Barlach sculpts The Refugee.

1920 The Negro National League, a professional baseball league, is founded in the USA. 1920 The New Zealand writer Katherine Mansfield publishes her collection of short stories Bliss, which includes the story 'Prelude'. 1920 The US writer Carl Sandburg publishes his poetry collection Smoke and Steel. 1920 There are 253,000 miles of railroad track in the USA. 1920 US historian Carl L Becker publishes The United States: An Experiment in Democracy. 1920 US physicist Albert Michelson, using a stellar interferometer, measures the diameter of the star Betelgeuse to be 386,160,000 km/241,350,000 mi, which is about 300 times the diameter of the Sun. It is the first time an accurate measurement of the size of a star other than the Sun has been made. c. 1920 Joseph Krieger manufactures the first commercially available tea bags, in San Francisco, California. Originally intended for caterers, they soon become popular with housewives. 19 February 1921 The US Red Cross announces that 20,000 children die in automobile accidents each year. 21 February 1921 The nationalist army officer Reza Khan stages a coup in Persia (modern Iran). 25 February 1921 A Bolshevik government is established in the republic of Georgia. 28 February–17 March 1921 A mutiny of sailors begins at Kronstadt naval base near Petrograd, Russia, in opposition to the communist government's harsh policies; it is put down by troops. 17 March 1921 At the 10th Congress of the Russian Communist Party, the Russian leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin introduces his New Economic Policy, which restores some private business and freedom of trade; the forcible requisition of grain has led to famine and revolts. 2 April 1921 A Bolshevik government is established in the republic of Armenia. 2 April 1921 In the Greek–Turkish War, Turkish troops under Ismet Pasha halt the Greek advance at Inönö and the Greek army withdraws. 14 April 1921 The conservative Count Stephen Bethlen becomes prime minister of Hungary.

23 April 1921 Through a Czechoslovak-Romanian alliance Romania joins the 'Little Entente' (a defensive alliance of eastern European nations). 24 April 1921 The northern Adriatic port of Fiume (Rijeka), disputed between Italy and the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, votes to become a free city. 2 May 1921 Satyajit Ray, Indian film director, born in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India (–1992). 5 May 1921 Chanel No. 5 perfume, created by perfumer Ernst Beaux, is launched. 19 May 1921 The University of Chicago announces that the average college graduate earns $5,762 per year after ten years of work. 21 May 1921 Andrey Dimitriyevich Sakharov, Soviet nuclear physicist and outspoken supporter of human rights and civil liberties, born in Moscow, Russia (–1989). 7 June 1921 An alliance is made between Romania and the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, completing Romania's entry into the 'Little Entente' (a defensive alliance of eastern European nations). 2 July 1921 In the first ever boxing match to gross over a million dollars, more than 80,000 people in a purpose-built wooden stadium in Jersey City, USA, watch the defending US champion Jack Dempsey knock out George Carpentier of France in four rounds to retain his world heavyweight boxing title. 9 July 1921 The Irish nationalist leader Eamon de Valera, on behalf of the selfdeclared Irish Republic, agrees a truce with the British authorities (fighting ends two days later). 21 July 1921 Spanish troops under General Fernandez Silvestre waging a campaign against the Riffians in Morocco are defeated by troops led by Abd alKarim; 12,000 are killed. 16 August 1921 King Peter I of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes dies; he is succeeded by his son, Alexander I. 19 August 1921 Gene Roddenberry, US writer and film and television producer who created Star Trek, born in El Paso, Texas (–1991). 5 November 1921 A treaty of alliance is signed between the communist governments of Mongolia and Russia following the defeat of anticommunist White Russian forces under Roman von Ungern-Sternberg. 5 November 1921 The US president Warren G Harding declares Armistice Day (November 11, the date of the end of World War I in 1918) a national holiday.

11 November 1921 The Unknown Soldier, whose body has been lying in state in the Capitol rotunda in Washington, DC, is buried at Arlington National Ceremony, Virginia, as a memorial to all other unidentified US soldiers killed in World War I. 27 November 1921 Alexander Dubcek, Czechoslovak communist leader 1968–69 whose liberal policies led to the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia (now the Czech and Slovak Republics), born in Uhrovec, Slovakia (–1992). 6 December 1921 The British government and representatives of the Dáil Eireann sign the Anglo-Irish Treaty providing for an independent southern Ireland with dominion status (within the British Empire). 29 December 1921 Following the defeat of the Conservatives in the Canadian general election, the Liberal leader Mackenzie King is appointed prime minister and governs with support from the Progressives. 1921 Canadian physiologists Frederick Banting, Charles Best, and John James MacLeod isolate insulin. A diabetic patient in Toronto, Canada, receives the first insulin injection. 1921 Five million people die in a famine in the Volga region of Russia, a consequence of Bolshevik food requisitioning policies and drought. 1921 German physicist Max Born develops a mathematical description of the first law of thermodynamics. 1921 Swiss psychologist Carl Jung publishes Psychologische Typen/Psychological Types, in which he differentiates two personality types: extroverted and introverted. 1921 The 27-year reign of the German chess player Emanuel Lasker as world champion is brought to an end when he is defeated 9–5 by José Capablanca of Cuba, in Havana, Cuba. 1921 The Czech writer Jaroslav Hašek publishes the first volume of his satirical novel Osudy dobrého vojáka Švejka za svetové války/The Good Soldier Schweik. The last volume appears in 1923. 1921 The death rate in the USA is 1,163.9 per 100,000 population, compared with 1,755 in 1900. 1921 The Einstein Tower in Potsdam, Germany, designed by the German architect Erich Mendelssohn, is completed, one of the finest examples of expressionist architecture. 1921 The English composer William Walton completes his 'entertainment'Façade for voices and chamber ensemble. It consists of settings of poems by the English

writer Edith Sitwell. 1921 The English writer D H Lawrence publishes his novel Women in Love. It was privately published in the USA in 1920. 1921 The film Dream Street, directed by D W Griffith, is released in the USA, starring Tyrone Power, Sr, Ralph Graves, and Carol Dempster. It is the first to feature some singing and dialogue, supplied on synchronized records. 1921 The German artist Max Ernst paints The Elephant Celebes. 1921 The Irish writer W B Yeats publishes his poetry collection Michael Robartes and the Dancer, which includes 'Easter 1916' and 'The Second Coming'. 1921 The Italian writer Italo Svevo publishes his novel La coscienza di Zeno/The Confessions of Zeno. 1921 The play R U R: Rossum's Universal Robots, by the Czech writer Karel Capek, is first performed, in Prague, Czechoslovakia. It popularizes the word 'robot', from the Czech word 'robota ', meaning 'compulsory labour'. 1921 The play Sei personaggi in cerca d'autore/Six Characters in Search of an Author, by the Italian writer Luigi Pirandello, is first performed, in Rome, Italy. 1921 The Swiss artist Paul Klee paints The Fish. 1921 US physicist Albert Hull invents the magnetron, an oscillator that generates microwaves. 26 January 1922 The legislative council of British Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) accepts a draft constitution conferring limited self-government. 5 February 1922 US publishers DeWitt Wallace and his wife Lila Acheson Wallace publish the first issue of the Reader's Digest magazine in Greenwich Village, New York City. 6 February 1922 Following the death of Pope Benedict XV on 22 January, the Italian clergyman Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti is elected Pope Pius XI. 1 March 1922 Yitzhak Rabin, prime minister of Israel 1974–77 and 1992–95, born in Jerusalem (–1995). 12 March 1922 The communist republics of Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan combine to form the Transcaucasian Socialist Republic. 15 March 1922 The Irish nationalist leader Eamon de Valera organizes a Republican Society demanding full independence for Ireland, to fight the ProTreaty Party (Cumann na nGaedheal) which supports the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty.

11 April 1922 A boxing match between the US fighters Johnny (Joe) Dundee and Johnny Ray at Motor Square, Pittsburgh, USA, is the first sporting event to be broadcast on the radio. 16 April 1922 By the Rapallo Treaty between Germany and Russia, Germany recognizes Russia as 'a great power' and both sides waive World War I reparations claims; the treaty leads to the resumption of diplomatic and trade relations and to cooperation between the two countries' armies. 16 April 1922 Kingsley Amis, English writer, born in London, England (–1995). 12 May 1922 A 20.3 tonne/20 ton meteorite lands in a field near Blackstone, Virginia, leaving a 46 sq m/500 sq ft hole in the ground. 16 June 1922 Elections in the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) give a majority to the Pro-Treaty (Anglo-Irish Treaty) candidates (58, against 35 antiTreaty Republicans); anti-Treaty Republicans continue to oppose the new government, with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) taking large areas under its control. 24 June 1922 The Jewish German foreign minister Walther Rathenau is murdered by anti-Semitic nationalists. 28–30 June 1922 Anti-Treaty (Anglo-Irish Treaty) republicans seize the assistant chief of staff of the Irish army, General Ginger O'Connell, in Dublin in the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) and hold him hostage in the Four Courts building; the Irish army besieges the building and the rebel forces present surrender. Fighting continues in the rest of Dublin. 20–24 July 1922 The Council of the League of Nations approves mandates for the former German colonies of Togoland (now Togo) and the Cameroons to France and Britain, and Tanganyika (now Tanzania) and Palestine to Britain. 2 August 1922 Alexander Graham Bell, Scottish-born US scientist who invented the telephone, dies in Beinn Bhreagh, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada (75). 12 August 1922 Arthur Griffith, Irish journalist and nationalist, founder of Sinn Fein 1905, president of the Dáil of the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) 1922, dies suddenly of a brain haemorrhage, in Dublin, Ireland (60). 22 August 1922 Michael Collins, the prime minister of the provisional government of the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland), is killed by a republican ambush in west Cork. 30 August 1922 In the Greek–Turkish War, the Ankara Turks (nationalists) defeat the Greeks at the Battle of Afyon in Anatolia (modern Turkey).

12 September 1922 The US Protestant Episcopal Church changes its marriage ceremony, deleting the word 'obey' from the vows. 16 September 1922 A British force lands at Chanak on the Dardanelles to oppose the Turkish nationalists' advance on the Dardanelles in the Greek–Turkish War. 27 September 1922 King Constantine I of Greece abdicates for the second time, following a rising of the ex-prime minister Eleutherios Venizelos's supporters, and is succeeded by his son George II. 10 October 1922 The formal British mandate over Iraq is ended and an alliance between the two is concluded. 13 October 1922 The Armistice of Mudania is signed, ending the Greek–Turkish War and formalizing relations between the Allies and the Turkish nationalist government in Ankara; the Allies allow Turkish troops to enter Constantinople (modern Istanbul). 14 October 1922 The Bell Telephone Company installs the first mechanical switchboard system in New York City. The exchange is called 'Pennsylvania'. 23 October 1922 Andrew Bonar Law forms a Conservative government in Britain after the resignation of David Lloyd George over the 'Chanak Crisis' of September–October. 24 October 1922 The socialist Friedrich Ebert is re-elected president of Germany. 28 October 1922 The fascists in Italy begin the 'March on Rome' to bring down the government. 31 October 1922 The Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini forms a government of liberals, nationalists, and fascists at King Victor Emmanuel III's request. 8 November 1922 Christiaan Barnard, South African surgeon, who performed the first successful heart transplant, born in Beaufort West, South Africa (–2001). 17 November 1922 Following the victory of the Turkish nationalists in the Greek–Turkish War, the caliph (and former sultan) of Turkey, Muhammad VI, leaves the country and is declared deposed; his successor, Prince Abd ul-Mejid, renounces the sultanate (political leadership) and holds only the caliphate (religious leadership). 17 November 1922 The Far Eastern Republic votes for union with Russia, following the defeat of White Russian forces previously active in the region. 18 November 1922 Marcel Proust, French novelist who wrote A la recherche du temps perdu/Remembrance of Things Past (1913–27), dies in Paris, France (51).

3 December 1922 Ahmed Bey Zogu, leader of the Yugoslav Party, becomes Albanian prime minister. 15 December 1922 The Russian leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin suffers a second stroke and dictates his 'Testament', detailing the strengths and weaknesses of his potential successors and harshly criticizing both Joseph Stalin and Leon Trotsky. 30 December 1922 The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) is established through the confederation of Russia, Belarus, the Ukraine, and the Transcaucasian Federation. 1922 Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein publishes Tractatus LogicoPhilosophicus/Tract on Logic and Philosophy, a classic of 20th-century philosophy that analyses the relationship between language and reality. 1922 Italian physicist Guglielmo Marconi suggests that radio waves may be used to detect moving objects. The US Naval Research Laboratory tests the idea and detects a ship moving between the receiver and transmitter. It is the first example of a sophisticated radar system. 1922 Long-distance telephone lines are used to connect a radio station in New York City with one in Chicago, Illinois, that is broadcasting the action of a football game. It is the beginning of network broadcasting. 1922 The Danish composer Carl Nielsen completes his Symphony No. 5. 1922 The French writer Paul Valéry publishes his poetry collection Charmes ou poèmes/Charms or Poems, which includes his poem 'Le Cimetière marin'/'Graveyard by the Sea'. 1922 The Irish writer James Joyce publishes his novel Ulysses in Paris, France. 1922 The New Zealand writer Katherine Mansfield publishes her collection of short stories The Garden Party and Other Stories. 1922 The play The Hairy Ape, by the US dramatist Eugene O'Neill is first performed, at the Provincetown Playhouse in New York City. 1922 The play Vec Makropoulos/The Makropoulos Affair, by the Czech writer Karel Capek, is first performed, in Prague, Czechoslovakia. The Czech composer Leoš Janácek turns it into an opera in 1926. 1922 The Swiss architect Le Corbusier (pseudonym of Charles Edouard Jeanneret) designs his project Ville Contemporaine, a total plan for a city built on rigorously logical principles. 1922 The US magazine Vanity Fair employs the term 'flapper' to denote an independent young woman who does not conform to traditional notions of

femininity, dresses in a provocative manner, and smokes. Clara Bow, in the 1927 film It, is subsequently seen as the embodiment of the flapper. 1922 The US writer F Scott Fitzgerald publishes his story collection Tales of the Jazz Age, which includes 'The Diamond as Big as the Ritz'. 1922 US philosopher John Dewey publishes Human Nature and Conduct. 1922 US political journalist Walter Lippmann publishes Public Opinion. 1922 US-born English writer T S Eliot publishes his long poem The Waste Land in The Criterion. 11 January 1923 Because of Germany's failure to meet World War I reparations payments, French and Belgian troops occupy the Ruhr, Germany; its inhabitants respond with passive resistance and sabotage. 31 January 1923 Norman Mailer, US novelist, born in Long Branch, New Jersey. 13 February 1923 Charles (Chuck) E Yeager, US test pilot, the first person to break the sound barrier, born in Myra, West Virginia. 3 March 1923 US editor Henry A Luce and US publisher Briton Hadden found the weekly news magazine Time in New York City. 26 March 1923 Sarah Bernhardt, French actor, dies in Paris, France (77). 1 May 1923 Joseph Heller, US novelist known best for Catch 22 (1961), born in Brooklyn, New York City. 24 May 1923 The Irish nationalist leader Eamon de Valera calls off the guerrilla war, suspended since 27 April, of the anti-Treaty (Anglo-Irish Treaty) republicans who have been fighting for full independence for Ireland because of high losses of men. 26 May 1923 Emir Abdullah ibn Hussein (second son of King Hussein of the Hejaz) is proclaimed ruler of Transjordan (modern Jordan), which becomes an autonomous state under a British mandate. 26–27 May 1923 The French drivers André Lagache and René Leonard, in a 3litre Chenard and Walcker 'sport', win the inaugural Le Mans 24-hour motor race in France. They drive 2,210 km/1,373 mi at an average speed of 92 kph/57.2 mph. 9 June 1923 A coup in Bulgaria by discontented army officers leads to the fall of the prime minister Alexander Stambolisky (he is assassinated on 15 June). 20 June 1923 Francisco 'Pancho' Villa, Mexican revolutionary who fought against

the regimes of Porfirio Díaz and Victoriano Huerto, is assassinated at his ranch in Parral, Mexico (44). 24 July 1923 By the Treaty of Lausanne between Greece, Turkey, and the Allies, ending the Greek–Turkish War, Greece agrees to give up Smyrna, Eastern Thrace, and the islands of Imbros and Tenedos. 2 August 1923 Following the death of US president Warren G Harding, he is succeeded on 3 August by Vice-President Calvin Coolidge. 6 August 1923 Following the resignation of Wilhelm Cuno, Gustav Stresemann is appointed German chancellor and foreign minister and forms a grand coalition of parties. 1 September 1923 Rocky Marciano (Rocco Francis Marchegiano), US world heavyweight boxer 1952–56, born in Brockton, Massachusetts (–1969). 1 September 1923 Tokyo and Yokohama, Japan, are destroyed by an earthquake estimated to measure 8.3 on the Richter scale; 140,000 die. 13 September 1923 The Spanish soldier and politician Miguel Primo de Rivera becomes dictator in Spain (ruling under King Alfonso XIII) after a coup. 26 September 1923 The German chancellor Gustav Stresemann calls for an end to passive resistance to the French and Belgian occupation of the Ruhr (France is making the region work with imported labour while Germany's economy disintegrates). 26 October–8 November 1923 The Imperial Conference in London, England, recognizes the right of the Dominions (Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South Africa) to make treaties with foreign powers. 29 October 1923 The revue Runnin' Wild, is performed for the first time, at the Colonial Theater, New York City. It includes 'Charleston' by Cecil Mack and James P Johnson, which launches a dance craze. 8–9 November 1923 In the 'Munich Putsch', the German Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and his National Socialist German Workers' (Nazi) Party attempt a coup to overthrow the Bavarian government in Munich, Germany. 15 November 1923 The value of the German mark drops to rate of 4,200,000 million to the US dollar; the government introduces a new currency, the rentenmark, to replace the mark. 1923 Chance, Love, and Logic: Philosophical Essays by the Late Charles S Pierce is published posthumously, edited by the US philosopher Morris R Cohen. Though one of the most important US philosophers of the 19th century, Pierce published very little during his lifetime.

1923 Austrian psychiatrist Sigmund Freud publishes The Ego and the Id, in which he elaborates his division of the mind into the id, ego, and superego. 1923 Austrian theologian Martin Buber publishes Ich und Du/I and Thou. 1923 Danish chemist Johannes Nicolaus Brønsted and British chemist Thomas Martin Lowry simultaneously and independently propose the concept of acid–base pairs. 1923 English economist Alfred Marshall publishes Money, Credit and Commerce. 1923 German mathematician Hermann Oberth publishes Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen/The Rocket into Interplanetary Space, a treatise on space-flight in which he is the first to provide the mathematics of how to achieve escape velocity. 1923 German philosopher Ernst Cassirer publishes the first volume of his Philosophie der symbolischen Formen/The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. The final volume appears in 1929. 1923 Hungarian cultural philosopher György Lukács publishes Geschichte und Klassenbewusstein: Studien über marxistische Dialektik/History and Class Consciousness: Studies in Marxist Dialectic. 1923 Interpol, the international police coordination body, is founded following the Second International Judicial Police Conference in Vienna, Austria. 1923 The Charleston and the Foxtrot emerge as popular dances in the USA. 1923 The French artist Marcel Duchamp completes his sculpture The Large Glass (The Bride Stripped Bare by her Bachelors, Even). 1923 The French-born US composer Edgard Varèse completes his orchestral works Hyperprism and Octandre. 1923 The German artist Max Beckmann paints Self-Portrait with Cigarette. 1923 The German writer Rainer Maria Rilke publishes his Duineser Elegien/Duino Elegies, and his poetry cycle Die Sonette an Orpheus/Sonnets to Orpheus. 1923 The play Die Maschinenstürmer/The Machine Wreckers, by the German dramatist Ernst Toller, is first performed, in Berlin, Germany. 1923 The Romanian artist Constantin Brancusi sculpts Bird in Space. 1923 The Russian-born US engineer Vladimir Zworykin develops the iconoscope in the USA, an image-scanner that can produce electronic signals for reconstitution on the screen of a cathode-ray tube – the basis of television.

1923 The Swiss composer Arthur Honegger completes his orchestral work Pacific 231. 1923 The US confectioner Forrest Mars invents the Milky Way chocolate bar. 1923 The US writer Wallace Stevens publishes Harmonium, his first book of poems. 1923 The US writer William Carlos Williams publishes his poetry collection Spring and All, which includes 'The Red Wheelbarrow'. 1923 There are more than 13 million passenger automobiles in the USA. 21 January 1924 A struggle for the leadership of the USSR begins following the death of the Soviet leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. 21 January 1924 Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, founder of the Russian Communist Party, leader of the Russian Revolution, and head of the Soviet Union 1917–24, dies in Gorky, near Moscow, USSR (53). 23 January 1924 Ramsay MacDonald forms the first Labour government in Britain (without an overall majority), with Philip Snowden as chancellor of the Exchequer. 25 January 1924 A French-Czechoslovak alliance is formed; France wishes to create a defensive ring around Germany. 25 January 1924 The 1st Winter Olympic Games open at Chamonix, France, attended by 258 competitors, 13 of whom are women, from 16 nations. Norway and Finland win 4 gold medals each; Austria, 2; and the USA, Switzerland, Canada, and Sweden, 1 each. Clas Thunberg of Finland wins five speed skating medals, including three golds. 28 January 1924 Following the Nationalists' victory in the Egyptian elections, Saad Zaghlul forms a government. 3 February 1924 (Thomas) Woodrow Wilson, 28th president of the USA 1913–21, a Democrat, dies in Washington, DC (67). 19 February 1924 Shah Ahmad of Persia (modern Iran) is deposed by the nationalist army officer Reza Khan. 3 March 1924 The Turkish national assembly expels the Ottoman dynasty and abolishes the caliphate and other religious institutions. 25 March 1924 Greece is proclaimed a republic (confirmed by plebiscite on 13 April; Admiral Pavlos Koundouriotis becomes president).

3 April 1924 Marlon Brando, US actor, born in Omaha, Nebraska. 9 April 1924 Committees under the US financier Charles Dawes and British politician Reginald McKenna make reports on the World War I reparations issue; the Dawes Plan reduces Germany's debt to 1 million gold marks. 4 May–27 July 1924 The 8th Olympic Games are held in Paris, France, attended by 3,092 competitors, 136 of whom are women, from 44 countries. The USA wins 45 gold medals; Finland, 14; France, 13; Britain, 9; and Italy, 8. The star of the games is Paavo Nurmi of Finland who wins gold medals in the 1,500 metres, 5,000 metres, 3,000 metres team race, and 10,000 metres individual and team cross-country events. Harold Abrahams of Britain is the first European to win the 100 metres. May 1924 US Congress passes the Johnson–Reed Immigration Act, setting the annual immigration quota at 2% of the US population (based on the 1890 census) from any given country. Exceptions are Japanese immigrants, who are totally excluded, and immigrants from Canada and Latin America, for whom there are no limits. 3 June 1924 Franz Kafka, Bohemian-born German writer, dies in Kierling, near Vienna, Austria (40). 12 June 1924 George Herbert Walker Bush, 41st president of the USA 1989–93, a Republican, born in Greenwich, Connecticut. 13 June 1924 The moderate Gaston Doumergue is elected president of France, succeeding Alexandre Millerand, who has resigned. 15 June 1924 The Ford Motor Company announces the production of its 10 millionth automobile. 5 July 1924 The victory of the French tennis player Jean Borotra, 'the Bounding Basque', is the first of six consecutive men's singles titles won by French players at the Wimbledon lawn tennis championships in London, England. 21 July 1924 New York teenagers Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb are sentenced to life imprisonment for the kidnapping and murder of Bobby Franks. The two friends had committed the murder to see what the experience would be like. 3 August 1924 Joseph Conrad (pen-name of Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski), Polish-born British novelist whose works include Heart of Darkness, Nostromo, and Chance, dies in Canterbury, Kent, England (66). 30 August 1924 The German Reichsbank becomes independent of the government and introduces a new mark, following the complete devaluation of the old one by hyperinflation.

16 September 1924 Lauren Bacall (Betty Joan Perske), US actor, born in New York City. 27 September 1924 Following an election, Plutarco Calles is declared president of Mexico. He takes office 1 October. 30 September 1924 Truman Capote, US playwright and novelist, born in New Orleans, Louisiana (–1984). 1 October 1924 Jimmy Carter, 39th president of the USA 1977–81, a Democrat, born in Plains, Georgia. 25 October 1924 The British newspaper the Daily Mail publishes the 'Zinovyev Letter', a document inciting revolutionary activity in the army and Ireland, which is said to be from Grigory Zinovyev, chairman of the External Committee of the Comintern (the Soviet-controlled Communist International). It is later proved to be a forgery. 4 November 1924 Ramsay MacDonald resigns as British prime minister following Labour's electoral defeat; a week later Stanley Baldwin forms a Conservative government with Austen Chamberlain as foreign secretary and Winston Churchill as chancellor of the Exchequer. 4 November 1924 The Republican candidate Calvin Coolidge wins the US presidential election with 382 electoral votes over John W Davis, Democrat, with 136 votes, and Robert M LaFollette, Progressive, with 13; the popular vote is Coolidge 15,725,016, Davis 8,386,503, and LaFollette, 4,822,856. Republicans maintain majorities in the House (247–183) and Senate (56–39). 18 November 1924 The evacuation of the Ruhr area of Germany by French troops is completed (the Ruhr having been occupied in 1923 because of Germany's default in payment of World War I reparations). 1924 Australian-born South African anthropologist Raymond Dart discovers the skull of an early hominid at Tuang, Botswana, which he calls Australopithecus africanus. It is now believed to be one of the oldest human ancestors. 1924 Clarence Birdseye founds the General Sea Foods Co. in the USA to undertake the preparation and sale of frozen fish. 1924 French writer André Breton publishes his Manifeste du surréalisme/ Surrealist Manifesto. 1924 The Chilean writer Pablo Neruda publishes Veinte poemas de amor y una canción desesperada/Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair. 1924 The English writer E M Forster publishes his novel A Passage to India.

1924 The film company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, a merger of the Metro and the Goldwyn studios, with the addition of Louis M Mayer Productions, is formed, thanks to negotiations by Marcus Loews, president of Loew's Inc, a theatre company. Louis Mayer becomes head of the studio, a position he holds for three decades. 1924 The French writer St-John Perse publishes his epic poem Anabase/Anabasis. 1924 The German firm Leitz introduces the Leica camera, the first commercially produced camera that takes 35-mm film. 1924 The German writer Thomas Mann publishes his novel Der Zauberberg/The Magic Mountain. 1924 The Italian composer Ottorino Respighi completes his orchestral work Pini di Roma/The Pines of Rome. 1924 The play Desire under the Elms, by the US dramatist Eugene O'Neill, is first performed, at the Greenwich Village Theater in New York City. All God's Chillun Got Wings receives also its first performance in the same year. 1924 The play Juno and the Paycock, by the Irish dramatist Sean O'Casey, is first performed, at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, Ireland. 1924 The Russian-born US engineer Vladimir Zworykin patents the kinescope television receiver. It develops into the modern television picture tube. 1924 The Scottish engineer John Logie Baird produces televised images in outline. 1924 The US composer George Gershwin completes his orchestral work Rhapsody in Blue. 1924 The US composer George Antheil completes his Ballet mécanique/ Mechanical Ballet, scored for aeroplane propellers, anvils, motor horns, and several musical instruments. 1924 Two million radio sets are in use in the USA. 1924 US astronomer Edwin Hubble demonstrates that certain Cepheid variable stars are several hundred thousand light years away and thus outside the Milky Way galaxy. 1924 US inventor and radio engineer Lee DeForest invents the the Phonofilm system, which records sound optically on film. 16 January 1925 Leon Trotsky, outmanoeuvred by Joseph Stalin in his battle for

the leadership of the USSR, is dismissed from the chairmanship of the Revolutionary Military Council. 20 February 1925 Robert Altman, US film director, born in Kansas City, Missouri. 21 February 1925 The first issue of the magazine New Yorker, featuring fiction, humor, and cartoons, appears in the USA, edited by Harold Ross. 12 March 1925 Sun Zhong Shan (Sun Yat-sen), leader of the Chinese Nationalist Party (Guomindang) which overthrew the Manchu dynasty, first president of the Republic of China 1911–12, and de facto ruler 1923–25, dies in Beijing, China (58). 3 April 1925 Tony (Anthony Wedgwood) Benn, outspoken British Labour politician, born in London, England. 25 April 1925 The former military leader Paul von Hindenburg is elected president of Germany, having entered the contest only in the second ballot; he wins 48.5% of the popular vote against 45.2% for Wilhelm Marx of the Centre Party. 28 April 1925 Britain returns sterling to the gold standard (linking the value of the pound to the Bank of England's gold reserves) at the prewar level of US $4.86, an act deemed necessary by politicians to maintain London, England, as an international centre of finance, but which leads to increasing difficulties for British industry. 1 May 1925 Cyprus is declared a British crown colony (having been occupied in 1914). 19 May 1925 Malcolm X, US black militant leader, born in Omaha, Nebraska (–1965). 10 July 1925 The Tass (Telegrafnoe Agentsvo Sovetsovo Soyuza) press agency is founded in the USSR. 10–21 July 1925 The celebrated Scopes monkey trial is held in Dayton, Tennessee. The case pits liberal lawyer Clarence Darrow against politician and fundamentalist William Jennings Bryan in the case of a schoolteacher, John T Scopes, arrested in May for teaching the theory of evolution contrary to state law. Scopes is convicted and fined $100, but this is waived on a technical point. 26 July 1925 William Jennings Bryan, US lawyer, three-time Democratic presidential candidate, and prosecuting attorney in the Scopes trial (against Tennessee schoolteacher John T Scopes for teaching Darwinism), dies in Dayton, Tennessee (65). 19 September 1925 The US tennis player Bill Tilden wins the men's singles title at the US lawn tennis championships at Forest Hills, New York, for the sixth year

in succession. 3 October 1925 Gore Vidal, US novelist, playwright, and essayist, born in West Point, New Hampshire. 5–16 October 1925 The Locarno Conference in Switzerland drafts a treaty by which Britain, France, Belgium, Italy, and Germany guarantee Germany's western borders, and draws up lesser mutual assistance treaties to stabilize Germany's eastern borders. 13 October 1925 Margaret Thatcher, prime minister of Britain 1979–90, a Conservative, born in Grantham, Lincolnshire, England. 19 October 1925 Italy completes the occupation of Italian Somaliland in east Africa (part of present-day Somalia), making it a protectorate. 13 December 1925 The nationalist army officer Reza Khan becomes shah of Persia (modern Iran). 1925 Austrian physicist Wolfgang Pauli discovers the exclusion principle, which accounts for the electronic structure of the atom and the chemical properties of the elements. Pauli's exclusion principle states that no two electrons can occupy the same state or configuration, which relates quantum theory to the observed properties of atoms. 1925 English political scientist Harold Laski publishes A Grammar of Politics. 1925 The English writer Ivy Compton-Burnett publishes her novel Pastors and Masters. 1925 The English writer Virginia Woolf publishes her novel Mrs Dalloway. 1925 The English writer Virginia Woolf publishes The Common Reader, a collection of essays. 1925 The film The Battleship Potemkin, directed by Sergey Eisenstein, is released in the USSR, starring Alexander Antonov, Grigory Alexandrov, and Vladimir Barsky. 1925 The first motel in the USA opens in California. 1925 The flapper dress, which features a drop waist, becomes a popular women's style in the USA. 1925 The German artist Otto Dix paints Three Prostitutes on the Street. 1925 The Italian writer Eugenio Montale publishes his poetry collection Ossi di seppia/Cuttlefish Bones.

1925 The novel Der Prozess/The Trial by the Bohemian-born German writer Franz Kafka is published posthumously. 1925 The opera L'Enfant et les sortilèges/The Spellbound Child, a 'lyrical fantasy' by the French composer Maurice Ravel, is first performed, in Monte Carlo, Monaco. The story is by the French writer Colette, the choreography by the Russian choreographer George Balanchine. 1925 The opera Wozzeck by the Austrian composer Alban Berg is first performed, in Berlin, Germany. It is based on the play Woyzeck, published in 1836 by the German writer Georg Büchner. 1925 The Russian artist Chaim Soutine paints Carcass of Beef. 1925 The Scottish electrical engineer John Logie Baird transmits the first television images of recognizable human faces. 1925 The US Census Bureau reports that there are 75,000 fewer farms in the USA than in 1920. 1925 The US composer Aaron Copland completes his choral work The House on the Hill and his orchestral work Music for the Theater. 1925 The US jazz trumpeter, singer, and composer Louis 'Satchmo' Armstrong begins recording with his group, The Hot Five, in Chicago, Illinois. 1925 The US writer E E Cummings publishes his poetry collections XLI Poems and &. 1925 The US writer F Scott Fitzgerald publishes his novel The Great Gatsby. 1925 The US writer John Dos Passos publishes his novel Manhattan Transfer. 1925 The US writer Sinclair Lewis publishes his novel Arrowsmith. 1925 US geneticists Thomas Hunt Morgan, Alfred Sturtevant, and Calvin Blackman Bridges publish the results of their genetic experiments with the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, showing that genes can be mapped onto chromosomes. c. 1925 Idi Amin (Dada Oumee), president of Uganda 1971–79, who tortured and murdered between 100,000 and 300,000 Ugandans during his presidency, born in Koboko, Uganda. 8 January 1926 Following conquests in Arabia and the abdication of Hussein ibn Ali (5 October 1924), Ibn Saud is proclaimed king of the Hejaz in Mecca.

16 February 1926 John Schlesinger, Oscar-winning British film director, born (–2003). 16 March 1926 US inventor Robert Hutchings Goddard achieves the first flight of a liquid-propelled rocket, at Auburn, Michigan. It reaches an altitude of 12 m/41 ft. 21 April 1926 Elizabeth II, Queen of Great Britain and Northern Ireland from 1952, born in London, England. April 1926 US advertising executive Harry Scherman founds the first bookclub in the world, the Book-of-the-Month Club, in the USA. 3–12 May 1926 A general strike in Britain in support of the striking coal miners paralyses the country. 12–15 May 1926 The chief of the Polish army Józef Pilsudski and army units march on the Polish capital Warsaw and seize power. President Wojciechowski and Prime Minister Vincent Witos resign on 15 May; the speaker of parliament becomes acting president. 16 May 1926 Mehmed VI, last sultan of the Ottoman Empire 1918–22, dies in San Remo, Italy (65). 16 May 1926 The Irish nationalist Eamon de Valera founds the Fianna Fáil ('Soldiers of Destiny') party in the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland) to put up republican candidates for election to the Dáil (parliament). 23 May 1926 France proclaims the Lebanon (part of the territory mandated to it by the League of Nations) a republic. 26 May 1926 The Riff revolt against the French and Spanish invaders in Morocco ends with the Berber leader Abd-al-Karim's surrender to France. 28 May 1926 General Manuel de Oliveira Gomes da Costa leads a coup in Portugal and deposes President Bernardino Machado. 1 June 1926 Marilyn Monroe, US actor and sex symbol, born in Los Angeles, California (–1962). 9 July 1926 The insurgent Portuguese general Manuel de Oliveira Gomes da Costa is overthrown by General Antonio Oscar de Fragoso Carmona. 10 July 1926 Lightning starts a fire at an ammunition depot in Lake Denmark, New Jersey, killing 31 people and causing $93 million in property damage. 23 July 1926 Raymond Poincaré becomes prime minister of a National Union ministry in France, a coalition formed to deal with the current financial crisis.

28 July 1926 Following a Belgian financial crisis the Belgian franc is devalued and King Albert I is given dictatorial powers for six months. July 1926 Following concern about the control of radio in Britain, the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) is incorporated by royal charter (effective from 1 January 1927). As a public body, it is run by a crown-appointed chairman and governors and financed by a licence fee. 8 August 1926 Gertrude Ederle of the USA becomes the first woman to swim the English Channel, completing the 56 km/35 mi crossing from Cape Nez, France, to Dover, England, in 14 hrs, 31 min, a new world record for a man or a woman. 13 August 1926 Fidel Castro, Cuban communist revolutionary and leader of Cuba from 1959, born near Birán, Cuba. 23 August 1926 Rudolph Valentino, Italian-born US silent film star, known as the 'Great Lover', dies in New York City (31). 8 September 1926 Germany is admitted to the League of Nations. 18 September 1926 A hurricane sweeps across Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, killing 372 people and injuring more than 6,000 others. 25 September 1926 Following the defeat of the Conservatives in the House of Commons and in a general election, William Mackenzie King forms another Liberal ministry in Canada. 18 October 1926 Chuck Berry, US singer and guitarist and one of the first rock and roll stars, born in St Louis, Missouri. 19 October 1926 Leon Trotsky and Grigory Zinovyev are expelled from the Politburo of the Communist Party in the USSR, having been defeated by Joseph Stalin on the question of whether to continue Vladimir Ilyich Lenin's New Economic Policy. 19 October–18 November 1926 An Imperial Conference in London, England, decides that Britain and the Dominions (Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and South Africa) are autonomous communities, equal in status. 11 November 1926 The Italian Socialist, Republican, and Communist parties are dissolved and the abstaining antifascist deputies are declared to have forfeited their parliamentary seats. 27 November 1926 The Treaty of Tirana is agreed between Italy and Albania; Italy recognizes the status quo, but rapidly turns Albania into a virtual protectorate. November 1926–July 1927 An unsuccessful communist revolt takes place in

Java, Dutch East Indies (later Indonesia). 5 December 1926 Claude Monet, French Impressionist painter, dies in Giverny, France (87). 25 December 1926 Emperor Yoshihito of Japan dies and is succeeded by his son Hirohito. 1926 A new constitution for Lebanon (a French mandate) seeks to balance the different communities in government by providing for a Maronite president, a Sunni Muslim prime minister, and a Shiite Muslim speaker of the chamber. 1926 Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger develops wave mechanics. 1926 English astrophysicist Arthur Eddington publishes Internal Constitution of the Stars, in which he shows that the luminosity of a star is a function of its mass. 1926 German chemist Hermann Staudinger proves that polymers are formed by chemical interaction between small monomer units. 1926 German-born US physicist Albert Michelson uses an eight-sided rotating prism to determine the speed of light. The value determined by Michelson is 2.99774 × 108 m s-1. 1926 The Czech composer Leoš Janácek completes his M'sa glagolskaja/ Glagolitic Mass. 1926 The English artist Stanley Spencer paints The Resurrection, Cookham. 1926 The English historian Richard Henry Tawney publishes Religion and the Rise of Capitalism: A Historical Study. 1926 The English writer A A Milne publishes his children's story book Winnie-thePooh. 1926 The fascist government in Italy undertakes (in theory at least) a 'corporatist' reorganization of industry with the declaration of 13 state-controlled corporations and the establishment of the National Council of Corporations. Workers are to be represented by fascist labour syndicates. 1926 The film The General, directed by Buster Keaton, is released in the USA. Keaton also stars in it. 1926 The German artist George Grosz paints Pillars of Society. 1926 The Hungarian photographer André Kertész takes On the Quais, Paris. 1926 The novel Das Schloss/The Castle by the Bohemian-born German writer

Franz Kafka is published posthumously. 1926 The opera Háry János by the Hungarian composer Zoltán Kodály is first performed, in Budapest, Hungary. 1926 The opera Turandot by the Italian composer Giacomo Puccini is first performed, in Milan, Italy. Puccini died during its composition, and it was completed by Franco Alfano. 1926 The Russian writer Isaak Babel publishes his story collection Konarmiya/ Red Cavalry. 1926 The Scottish electrical engineer John Logie Baird transmits pictures of moving objects over telephone lines between London, England, and Glasgow, Scotland. The first demonstration of true television, the images are 30-line silhouettes. 1926 The Spanish artist Salvador Dalí creates his Lobster Telephone sculpture. 1926 The US artist Edward Hopper paints Sunday. 1926 The US artist Georgia O'Keeffe paints Black Iris. 1926 The US writer E E Cummings publishes his poetry collection is 5. 1926 The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his novel The Sun Also Rises, which is published as Fiesta in Britain. He also publishes his novel The Torrents of Spring. c. 1926 The Russian artist Chaim Soutine paints Pageboy at Maximus. 7 January 1927 A transatlantic telephone service begins between London, England, and New York City, provided by the American Telephone and Telegraph company (AT&T). 29 March 1927 The British driver Henry Segrave establishes a new world landspeed record of 327.96 kph/203.79 mph in a 1,000 hp Sunbeam, at Daytona Beach, Florida. He is the first person to set a land-speed record in excess of 200 mph. 7 April 1927 The American Telephone and Telegraph company (AT&T)'s president Walter Gifford gives the first demonstration of television in the USA, in the auditorium of Bell Laboratories. The image and voice of US commerce secretary Herbert Hoover is transmitted from Washington, DC, to New York City. 12 April 1927 Following the arrival of Guomindang forces in Shanghai, east China, their leader Jiang Jie Shi and conservatives start purging communists and other leftist elements from the Guomindang (Chinese National People's Party).

April 1927 The flooding Mississippi River overflows onto 16,000 sq km/6250 sq mi, leaving 600,000 people without homes for weeks and causing $300 million in property damage. 20–21 May 1927 US aviator Charles Lindbergh, in his single-engine aircraft Spirit of St Louis, flies from New York City to Paris, France, the first nonstop solo transatlantic flight. He arrives at Le Bourget Airfield, outside Paris, France, at 10:24 p.m., 33 hr 29 min after departing Roosevelt Field, Long Island, New York. 3–4 June 1927 The first Ryder Cup match between the professional golfers of the USA and Great Britain is held at Worcester, Massachusetts. The US team wins 9–2. 6 June 1927 The Druze revolt against French rule in Syria is finally ended. 2 July 1927 The US tennis player Helen Wills (later Helen Moody) wins the first of eight ladies' singles titles at the Wimbledon lawn tennis championships in London, England. Full seeding for all five events at the championships is introduced. 29 July 1927 Bellevue Hospital in New York City installs an electric respirator, a device designed to offset respiratory failure designed by Harvard University physicians Philip Drinker and Louis Shaw. 6 August 1927 Andy Warhol, US artist and film-maker, a leading exponent of Pop Art in the 1960s, born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (–1987). 12 August 1927 Having agreed to swear an oath of allegiance to the Dáil of the Irish Free State (now the Republic of Ireland), the Fianna Fáil leader Eamon de Valera and other anti-Treaty (Anglo-Irish Treaty) republicans agree to take up their seats in the Dáil. 23 August 1927 Following the death of the prime minister Saad Zaghlul, Nahas Pasha becomes the leader of the Wafd nationalist party in Egypt. 2 September 1927 The Turkish president Mustafa Kemal Pasha (later known as Atatürk) is empowered to nominate all candidates in the elections, giving his People's Party a monopoly. 29 September 1927 A tornado sweeps through St Louis, Missouri, killing 87 people and causing $50 million in property damage. 30 September 1927 The US baseball player Babe Ruth of the New York Yankees sets a major league record of 60 home runs in a season. The record stands until 1961 when Roger Maris, also of the Yankees, hits 61, from 7 more games. 6 October 1927 The film The Jazz Singer, directed by Alan Crosland and produced by the film company Warner Brothers, is released in the USA. It is the

first feature film with spoken dialogue, and it stars Al Jolson, May McAvoy, and Warner Oland. All US film studios convert to sound within two years. 17 October 1927 The first Labour government is formed in Norway by Christopher Hornsrud, following a general election in which Labour won 59 seats, the Conservatives 30, the Liberals 30, and the Farmers' Party 26. 14 November 1927 In Soviet leader Joseph Stalin's decisive victory over his rivals, Leon Trotsky and Grigory Zinovyev are expelled from the Soviet Communist Party. 15 November 1927 Canada is elected to a seat on the Council of the League of Nations. 1927 Belgian astronomer Georges Lemaître proposes that the universe was created by an explosion of energy and matter from a 'primaeval atom' – the beginning of the Big Bang theory. 1927 Canadian anthropologist Davidson Black discovers the first specimens of 'Beijing man' (Sinanthropous pekinensis), a species of Homo erectus believed to be 300,000 to 400,000 years old, at Choukoutien, China. 1927 German philosopher Martin Heidegger publishes his central work Sein und Zeit/Being and Time. 1927 German physicist Werner Heisenberg propounds the 'uncertainty principle' in quantum physics, which states that it is impossible to simultaneously determine the position and momentum of a particle without some degree of error or uncertainty – the better one is determined, the greater the error in the other. 1927 The English writer Virginia Woolf publishes her novel To the Lighthouse. 1927 The film Napoleon, directed by Abel Gance, is released in France, starring Albert Dieudonné, Antonin Artaud, and Pierre Batcheff. 1927 The German writer Hermann Hesse publishes his novel Der Steppenwolf/ Steppenwolf. 1927 The US motion picture executive William Fox produces the Movietone News newsreel. It is the first commercially successful sound film combining narration and picture. 1927 The US photographer Edward Weston takes Shell. 1927 The US photographer Ansel Adams takes Monolith, the face of Half Dome, Yosemite Valley, California.

1927 The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his story collection Men Without Women. 1927 The US writer Sinclair Lewis publishes his novel Elmer Gantry. 1927 The US writer Thornton Wilder publishes his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey. 1927 Work begins on Mount Rushmore in South Dakota, which when complete will include the likenesses of US presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. 11 January 1928 Thomas Hardy, English novelist and poet, dies in Dorchester, Dorset, England (87). 4 February 1928 The first demonstration of colour television is given at the Dominion Hotel, London, England, on a 9 ft by 12 ft screen, by John Logie Baird. 27 April 1928 The reforming Portuguese academic Antonio de Oliveira Salazar is given wide powers as minister of finance to address Portugal's economic problems. 12 May 1928 An Italian law abolishes female suffrage, reduces the electorate from 10 million to 3 million, and arranges for 400 government candidates to be accepted or rejected en bloc. 14 June 1928 Che (Ernesto) Guevara, Cuban and South American communist guerrilla, born in Rosario, Argentina (–1967). 14 June 1928 Emmeline Pankhurst, militant English suffragette, dies in London, England (69). 18 June 1928 Roald Amundsen, Norwegian explorer who was the first person to reach the South Pole, dies in the Arctic Ocean sometime after this date (he disappeared on this day; the exact date of his death is not known), while trying to rescue the Italian explorer Umberto Nobile (55). 24 June 1928 The French franc is again devalued to make the national debt easier to pay as France's economic difficulties continue. 28 June 1928 Hermann Müller, Social Democrat, is appointed German chancellor (following the resignation of Wilhelm Marx's ministry on 13 June). 3 July 1928 Following his return to Greece in March, the veteran politician Eleutherios Venizelos is again appointed prime minister. 19 July 1928 King Fuad I stages a coup in Egypt, where parliament is dissolved and the constitution suspended; the king rules by decree.

27 August 1928 The Kellogg–Briand Pact (drawn up by the US secretary of state F B Kellogg and the French foreign minister Aristide Briand), outlawing war and providing for the pacific settlement of disputes, is signed in Paris, France, by 15 states, including the USA. 1 September 1928 Albania is proclaimed a kingdom and President Ahmed Bey Zogu is elected as King Zog. 1 October 1928 The Soviet leader Joseph Stalin ends the New Economic Policy and introduces state-directed economic planning and distribution, the development of industry, and collectivization of agriculture, in accordance with the first Five-Year Plan. 6 October 1928 The nationalist leader Jiang Jie Shi is elected president of China, the Guomindang (Chinese National People's Party) having secured control of nearly all the country. 7 October 1928 The modernizing Ras (prince) Tafari becomes negus (king) of Ethiopia on the death of Hapta Giorgis. He retains the position of regent and heir apparent to the empress Zauditu. 7 October 1928 The Republican candidate Herbert Hoover wins the US presidential election with 444 electoral votes against Alfred E Smith, Democrat, with 87; the popular vote is Hoover, 21,391,381; Smith, 15,016,443; and Norman Thomas (Socialist), 267,835. In US Congressional elections, Republicans retain majorities in the House (267–167) and Senate (56–39). 7 December 1928 Noam Chomsky, US linguist and founder of the school of linguistic analysis known as transformational grammar, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 1928 Chinese archaeologist Li Chi, under the auspices of the Academia Sinica, begins the first excavations of An-Yang, the capital of the Shang dynasty (1384–1111 BC). 1928 German philosopher Rudolf Carnap publishes Der logische Aufbau der Welt/ The Logical Structure of the World and Scheinproblem in der Philosophie/PseudoProblems in Philosophy. 1928 Russian-born US physicist George Gamow shows that the atom can be split using low-energy ions. It stimulates the development of particle accelerators. 1928 Scottish bacteriologist Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin when he notices that the mould Penicillium notatum, which has invaded a culture of staphylococci, inhibits the growth of the bacteria. 1928 The English writer D H Lawrence publishes his novel Lady Chatterley's Lover privately in Florence, Italy. Thought obscene, the full text is not published

until 1959 in the USA, and 1960 in Britain. 1928 The English writer Evelyn Waugh publishes his novel Decline and Fall. 1928 The film The Passion of Joan of Arc, directed by Danish film-maker Carl Theodor Dreyer, is released in France, starring Renée Falconetti. 1928 The first homogenized peanut butter, Peter Pan Peanut Butter, is produced by Swift Packing Company in the USA. 1928 The Irish writer W B Yeats publishes his poetry collection The Tower, which includes 'Sailing to Byzantium' and 'Among School Children'. 1928 The opera Die Dreigroschenoper/The Threepenny Opera by the German composer Kurt Weill is first performed, in Berlin, Germany. It is a modern interpretation of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera of 1728, with material by the German writer Bertolt Brecht. 1928 The Spanish writer Federico García Lorca publishes his poetry collection Romancero gitano/Gypsy Ballads. 1928 The US company Western Electric develops a sound-on-film system with greater flexibility than Vitaphone (a sound-on-disc system), which has proved expensive and difficult to transport. 1928 The Walt Disney cartoon Steamboat Willie is released in the USA, starring Mickey Mouse, the first animated film with sound. 1928 Track and field events for women are introduced at the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam, in large part due to agitation from the Fédération Sportive Féminine Internationale (FSFI). 5 January 1929 King Alexander I suppresses the constitution of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes and establishes a royal dictatorship. 31 January 1929 Leon Trotsky, having lost the contest to succeed Vladimir Ilyich Lenin as Soviet leader to Joseph Stalin, is expelled from the USSR. 11 February 1929 The Lateran Treaties recognize the pope's sovereignty over the Vatican, bringing the Vatican City State into being, and ending the hiatus in Italian relations with the Vatican that had existed since Italian unification in 1870. 14 February 1929 In the 'St Valentine's Day Massacre' in Chicago, Illinois, gangsters dressed as policemen, working for Al 'Scarface' Capone, gun down seven members of the gang led by George 'Bugsy' Moran. 4 May 1929 Audrey Hepburn (born Edda van Heemstra Hepburn-Ruston), US

motion picture actor, born in Brussels, Belgium (–1993). 30 May 1929 In the British general election, the first held under universal adult suffrage, Labour wins 287 seats, the Conservatives 260, the Liberals 59, and others 9. 3 June 1929 A settlement is reached in the Arica–Tacna border territory dispute (originated in 1910), by which Chile is awarded Arica, Peru gains Tacna, and Bolivia acquires railway rights. 5 June 1929 Ramsay MacDonald forms a Labour government in Britain, with Arthur Henderson as foreign secretary, Philip Snowden as chancellor of the Exchequer, and John Clynes as home secretary. 12 June 1929 Anne Frank, German Jew whose diary written while hiding from the Nazis has been translated into over 30 languages, born in Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany (–1945). 27 June 1929 Scientists at Bell Laboratories in New Jersey demonstrate the transmission of moving color images; 50 lines are scanned at 17.7 frames per second. Among the pictures they show are the US flag, the Union Jack, and a bouquet of roses. 27 July 1929 Raymond Poincaré resigns because of ill health and Aristide Briand again becomes prime minister of France. 28 July 1929 Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, wife of President John F Kennedy, born in East Hampton, New York (–1994). 6–13 August 1929 At the Reparations Conference in The Hague in the Netherlands, Germany accepts the Young Plan for German World War I reparations; in return, the Allies agree to evacuate the Rhineland by June 1930. 24 August 1929 Yassir Arafat, Palestinian nationalist politician and president of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from 1969, born in Jerusalem, in the British mandate of Palestine. 30 September 1929 German car manufacturer Fritz von Opel test-pilots the first rocket-powered aircraft, a glider with a gunpowder rocket attached. 3 October 1929 The name of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes is changed to Yugoslavia as part of King Alexander I's attempts to end ethnic divisions within the country. 16 October 1929 The modernizing general Muhammad Nadir becomes king of Afghanistan, following a period of political unrest. 24–29 October 1929 Share values crash on the Wall Street stock market, New

York City, starting with 'Black Thursday' and continuing (after closure of the market from noon on 24 October until 28 October) on 'Black Monday' (28 October) and 'Black Tuesday' (29 October). Widespread panic results in the trading of some 16.4 million shares, a new record. The episode triggers still more panic in the days and weeks ahead, ultimately precipitating the Depression. 17 November 1929 The 'Right Opposition' led by Nikolai Bukharin is expelled from the Communist Party of the USSR by the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. 1929 English archaeologist Charles Leonard Woolley publishes Ur of the Chaldees. 1929 English philosopher Alfred North Whitehead publishes Process and Reality: An Essay in Cosmology. 1929 German psychiatrist Hans Berger invents the electroencephalograph, which measures and records brain wave patterns. 1929 Irish physicist Ernest Walton and English physicist John D Cockcroft develop the first particle accelerator. 1929 NBC begins operating the first public television broadcasting station in the USA; 60 lines are scanned at 20 frames per second. 1929 Regulation L-20 is introduced in the USA, permitting the heads of national forests to set aside wilderness areas for recreational use. By 1939 some 72 areas have been designated. 1929 Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset publishes La rebelión de las masas/The Revolt of the Masses. 1929 The 1928–29 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Waner Baxter, for In Old Arizona; Best Actress: Mary Pickford, for Coquette; Best Film: Broadway Melody, directed by Harry Beaumont; Best Director: Frank Lloyd, for The Divine Lady. 1929 The Belgian artist René Magritte paints The Treachery of Images (Ceci n'est pas une pipe/This is not a Pipe) and On the Threshold of Liberty. 1929 The Dutch artist Piet Mondrian paints Composition with Yellow and Blue. 1929 The English writer J B Priestley publishes his novel The Good Companions. 1929 The English writer Richard Hughes publishes his novel A High Wind in Jamaica, which is published in the USA as The Innocent Voyage. 1929 The German Pavilion at the International Exhibition in Barcelona, Spain, designed by the German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, is completed.

1929 The German photographer August Sander publishes his photo album Antlitz der Zeit/Face of our Time. Beginning in 1910, Sander tried to create a comprehensive 'man of the 20th century' series, photographing a wide range of Germans in their everyday occupations. One of the best-known images is The Pastry Cook 1928. 1929 The German writer Alfred Döblin publishes his novel Berlin Alexanderplatz. 1929 The German writer Erich Remarque publishes his novel Im Westen nichts Neues/All Quiet on the Western Front. 1929 The Japanese writer Junichiro Tanizaki publishes his novel Tade kuu mushi/ Some Prefer Nettles 1929 The play Journey's End, by the English dramatist R C Sherriff, is first performed, at the Savoy Theatre in London, England. It becomes a classic depiction of World War I. 1929 The Spanish writer Federico García Lorca writes his poems Poeta en Nueva York/Poet in New York, which are published posthumously in 1940. 1929 The Swiss artist Paul Klee draws Fool in a Trance with one continuous line. 1929 The US artist Charles Sheeler paints Upper Deck. 1929 The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his novel A Farewell to Arms. 1929 The US writer Thomas Wolfe publishes his novel Look Homeward, Angel. 1929 The US writer William Faulkner publishes his novels Sartoris and The Sound and the Fury. 1929 The USA now has 377 skyscrapers with more than 20 storeys. 1929 US inventors Joseph Horton and Warren Marrison apply the oscillations of the quartz crystal to timekeeping. Because the crystals oscillate at 100,000 hertz, they greatly improve the accuracy of clocks, being out by about one second every ten years. 1929–1935 Experimental television broadcasting begins in England. 28–30 January 1930 The Spanish dictator Primo de Rivera resigns following the army's withdrawal of its support, and the Liberal general Dámaso Berenguer forms a ministry (30 January) pledged to a restoration of democracy. 18 February 1930 US astronomer Clyde Tombaugh, at the Lowell Observatory, Arizona, discovers the ninth planet, Pluto.

2 March 1930 D(avid) H(erbert) Lawrence, English poet and novelist, author of the controversial Lady Chatterley's Lover, dies in Vence, near Antibes, France (45). 12 March–6 April 1930 The Indian nationalist leader Mahatma Gandhi opens a civil-disobedience campaign in India with his 'Salt March' (a march from Ahmedabad, Gujarat, to Dandi on the coast where, on 6 April, Gandhi seizes salt to protest at the levying of salt tax on poor people). 30 March 1930 Heinrich Brüning, leader of the Centre Party, forms a coalition of the right in Germany, replacing the Social Democrats, but without a majority in the Reichstag (parliament). 3 April 1930 Ras Tafari, regent of Ethiopia, becomes emperor on the death of Empress Zauditu; he assumes the name Haile Selassie ('Might of the Trinity'). 19 May 1930 White women are enfranchised in South Africa. 31 May 1930 Clint Eastwood, US actor, director, and producer, star of many westerns, born in San Francisco, California. 31 May–27 September 1930 Bobby Jones of the USA wins four national golf championships in one year: the US and British Opens and the US and British Amateur Championships. Following this unique achievement he retires from competitive golf. 8 June 1930 Crown Prince Carol, strongly supported by the army and the peasantry, is elected king of Romania as Carol II by the national assembly, which sets aside his son Michael, king since 1927. 11 June 1930 The first bathysphere, a spherical steel craft for undersea exploration, built by US zoologist William Beebe and US engineer Otis Barton, descends to 435 m/1,428 ft. 17 June 1930 The US president Herbert Hoover signs the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act, raising duties on some 890 agricultural and manufactured items. 7 July 1930 Arthur Conan Doyle, Scottish novelist who created the detective Sherlock Holmes, dies in Crowborough, Sussex, England (71). 5 August 1930 Neil Armstrong, US astronaut and the first person to set foot on the Moon (1969), born in Wapakoneta, Ohio. 6 August 1930 Following the general election victory of the Conservatives in July, the Liberal leader William Mackenzie King resigns as prime minister of Canada; he is succeeded by the Conservative leader Richard B Bennett. 25–27 August 1930 Following a revolt by an army garrison, a military junta takes

power in Peru and forces Augusto Leguía to resign the presidency. Colonel Luis Sánchez Cerro, leader of the original revolt, becomes president on 27 August after marching on the capital Lima. 3 September 1930 US inventor Thomas Edison installs an experimental electric passenger train on the Lakawanna Railroad in New Jersey. 6 September 1930 Demonstrations by crowds in Buenos Aires and a revolt by the army force President Hipólito Irigoyen of Argentina to resign; General José Uriburu is appointed president. 14 September 1930 In the German elections the Social Democrats win 143 seats and the communists 77, but the National Socialists (Nazis), denouncing the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, gain 107 seats (the Centre Party has 68 seats, the National People's Party 41, and others 137). 1930 English economist J M Keynes publishes his Treatise on Money. 1930 English geneticist and statistician Ronald Fisher publishes The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection in which he synthesizes Mendelian genetics and Darwinian evolution. 1930 English inventor Frank Whittle patents a turbo-jet engine. It is later used on the first jet aeroplane. 1930 German philosopher Moritz Schlick publishes Fragen der Ethik/Problems of Ethics. 1930 German political thinker Alfred Rosenberg publishes Der Mythus des 20 Jahrhunderts/The Myth of the 20th Century, one of the most influential expressions of Nazi doctrine. 1930 Laura Elizabeth Ingalls Wilder publishes Little House on the Prairie. 1930 Mussolini's regime outlaws the distribution of birth control information and abortions, but half a million abortions continue to be carried out in Italy every year. 1930 Pope Pius XI condemns contraception, but allows the use of the rhythm method for birth control. 1930 Russian revolutionary leader Leon Trotsky publishes Permanentnaia revoliutsiia/The Permanent Revolution. 1930 Swedish biochemist Arne Wilhem Kaurin Tiselius invents electrophoresis. This process, also known as 'cataphoresis', is defined as the movement of electrically charged particles through a liquid under the influence of an applied electric field.

1930 The 1929–30 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: George Arliss, for Disraeli; Best Actress: Norma Shearer, for The Divorcee; Best Film: All Quiet on the Western Front, directed by Lewis Milestone; Best Director: Lewis Milestone, for All Quiet on the Western Front. 1930 The Austrian writer Robert Musil publishes the first part of his novel Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften/The Man Without Qualities. The final part appears in 1943. 1930 The English writer Agatha Christie publishes her novel Murder at the Vicarage, which introduces her amateur detective Miss Jane Marple. 1930 The film All Quiet on the Western Front, directed by Russian-born filmmaker Lewis Milestone, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Erich Maria Remarque, it stars Lew Ayres, Louis Wolheim, Slim Summerville, John Wray, Raymond Griffith, Russell Gleason, and Ben Alexander. 1930 The film Morocco, directed by Austrian film-maker Josef von Sternberg, is released in the USA, starring Marlene Dietrich, Gary Cooper, and Adolphe Menjou. It starts a fashion for trousers as everyday wear for women. His film The Blue Angel is also released in the USA, starring Marlene Dietrich and Emil Jannings. 1930 The German writer Hermann Hesse publishes his novel Narziss und Goldmund/Narcissus and Goldmund. 1930 The Motion Pictures Producers and Distributors of America, better known under president Will Hays as the Hays Office, adopts the Motion Picture Production Code, a self-regulatory code to give guidance on content issues in films, especially sex and religion. 1930 The play Private Lives, by the English writer and performer Noël Coward, is first performed, at the Phoenix Theatre in London, England. 1930 The Russian artist Marc Chagall paints Lovers in the Lilacs. 1930 The US artist Edward Hopper paints Early Sunday Morning. 1930 The US artist Grant Wood paints American Gothic, which becomes an icon of US life, and Stone City, Iowa. 1930 The US writer Dashiell Hammett publishes his novel The Maltese Falcon, a classic of US hard-boiled detective fiction. 1930 The US writer John Dos Passos publishes his novel 42nd Parallel. 1930 The US writer Katherine Anne Porter publishes her short-story collection Flowering Judas.

1930 US anthropologist Margaret Mead publishes Growing Up in New Guinea. 1930 US electrical engineer Vannevar Bush builds the differential analyser. The first analogue computer, it is used to solve differential equations. It is the forerunner of modern computers. c. 1930 It becomes socially acceptable for women to wear trousers when playing golf or riding a horse. 1 February 1931 Boris Yeltsin, Russian politician who was a prime force in the establishment of a new Commonwealth of Independent States to replace the USSR, born in Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg), Russia. 23 February 1931 Nellie Melba, Australian soprano, dies in Sydney, Australia (72). 2 March 1931 Mikhail Gorbachev, Russian politician, president of USSR 1990–91 during the downfall of communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union, born in Stavropol Kray, Russia. 4 March 1931 Under the terms of the Delhi pact between the Indian nationalist leader Mahatma Gandhi and the British viceroy of India, Lord Irwin, the civil disobedience campaign organized by the Indian National Congress is suspended. The Congress Party promises to participate in the Round Table Conference on Indian constitutional reform in London, England, and political prisoners are released. 18 March 1931 Schick Dry Shaver Inc. in Stamford, Connecticut, markets the first electric shavers. 14 April 1931 Following municipal elections in Spain, Niceto Alcalá Zamora, leader of a revolutionary committee in Madrid, successfully demands the abdication of Alfonso XIII. Alcalá Zamora becomes president of a provisional government. 30 April 1931 The Empire State Building is completed in New York City. Its designers are the architectural firm of Shreve, Lamb, and Harmon. It has 102 floors and soon becomes a symbol of the city. At 381m/1,250 ft, it remains the highest building in the world until 1972. 20 June 1931 US president Herbert Hoover proposes a moratorium on World War I reparations payments and inter-Allied debts in response to the worldwide economic depression; a London protocol is drawn up to formalize the moratorium. 26 July 1931 Colonel Carlos Ibáñez del Campo resigns as president of Chile owing to popular opposition to his repressive regime and the failure of his

economic policies in the face of the worldwide depression, and flees to exile in Argentina. August 1931 One of the worst floods in history occurs when the Huang Ho River, China, overflows its banks; 3.7 million people die. 18 September 1931 Japanese troops occupy Mukden (now Shenyang), northeast China, and, joined by reinforcements, begin to expand throughout north Manchuria. 21 September 1931 Britain abandons the gold standard (the linking of the value of sterling to the Bank of England's gold reserves), signalling Britain's willingness to take economic decisions without regard to international finance. 7 October 1931 Desmond Tutu, South African Anglican bishop, a vigorous opponent of apartheid, born in Klerksdorp, South Africa. 18 October 1931 Thomas Alva Edison, prolific US inventor who invented the light bulb, phonograph, and motion picture projector, dies in West Orange, New Jersey (84). 21 November 1931 The American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) introduces the first telex service. November 1931 RCA-Victor in the USA releases Beethoven's Fifth Symphony as the first long-playing record (33 1/3 RPM compared to 78). 8 December 1931–1 January 1932 Departing from his laissez-faire philosophy, the US president, Herbert Hoover, asks Congress to create the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC). Capitalized in January at $2 billion, the RFC will lend money to banks, railroads, insurance companies, and building and loan associations. 12 December 1931 The British Parliament passes the Statute of Westminster, establishing the equality of Britain and its dominions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and Newfoundland. 16 December 1931 Niceto Alcalá Zamora, leader of the Liberal Republican Right, is elected president of Spain, and the left-wing Manuel Azaña is appointed prime minister. 1931 Alfred Mosher Butts of Rhinebeck, New York, invents the word game Scrabble under the name Criss-Cross. The first sets do not go on sale until 1946, under the name Lexico. Two years later the name Scrabble is adopted. 1931 Austrian mathematician Kurt Gödel publishes 'Gödel's proof' (On Formally Undecidable Propositions of Principia Mathematica and Related Systems). His proof questions the possibility of establishing dependable axioms in

mathematics, showing that any formula strong enough to include the laws of arithmetic is either incomplete or inconsistent. 1931 English historian Herbert Butterfield publishes The Whig Interpretation of History, a widely influential attack on the belief in inevitable progress in the course of history. 1931 In the USA, unemployment figures reach 8 million. 1931 In the USA, union membership declines to 3.3 million, down from a high of 5 million in 1920. 1931 Populations (in millions): China 410; India 338; USSR 168; USA 122; Japan 75; Germany 64; Great Britain 46; France 42. 1931 The 1930–31 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Lionel Barrymore, for A Free Soul; Best Actress: Marie Dressler, for Min and Bill; Best Film: Cimarron, directed by Wesley Ruggles; Best Director: Norman Taurog, for Skippy. 1931 The B-9 bomber, the progenitor of all modern combat aeroplanes, is produced by the Boeing Aircraft Company in the USA; it is the first twin-engine, all-metal bomber with retractable landing gear. 1931 The Belgian-born French crime writer Georges Simenon publishes his first Maigret novel, Pietr-le-Letton/The Case of Peter the Lett. 1931 The British Commonwealth of Nations is founded, reflecting the autonomy and equality of status of the Dominions (Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Canada) with Britain. 1931 The Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong establishes the Chinese Soviet Republic (Jianxi Soviet) in southeast China. Many of its social policies will be applied to the entire country after the communist takeover in 1949. 1931 The Depression prompts a change in cinema exhibition and in an attempt to improve business US movie theatres begin to show double features, involving the screening of two feature films, a newsreel, and a cartoon, all for the price of a single film. The double feature is so successful that it remains the standard mode of exhibition until 1940. 1931 The English writer Virginia Woolf publishes her novel The Waves. 1931 The film Monkey Business, directed by Norman Z McLeod, is released in the USA, starring the Marx Brothers. 1931 The French writer and aviator Antoine Marie Roger de St-Exupéry publishes his second novel Vol de nuit/Night Flight.

1931 The play Mourning Becomes Electra, by the US writer Eugene O'Neill, is first performed, in the Guild Theater in New York City. Set in Puritan New England, it is a retelling of the Ancient Greek trilogy the Oresteia, by Aeschylus. 1931 The Spanish artist Salvador Dalí paints The Persistence of Memory, one of his best-known works. 1931 The US writer Pearl Buck publishes her novel The Good Earth. A story about peasant life in China, it becomes the best-selling novel in the USA for two years. She receives a Pulitzer prize for it in 1932 and it contributes to her winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938. 1931 The US writer William Faulkner publishes his novel Sanctuary. Despite its subject matter – rape, murder, and a lynching – it is the first of his novels to achieve popular success. 1931 US philosopher John Dewey publishes Philosophy and Civilization. 1931 US photographer Edward Weston takes Cabbage Leaf. c. 1931–c. 1940 Aeroplanes undergo radical changes; they become streamlined, are made almost entirely of metal, acquire controllable-pitch propellers, have air-cooled engines and retractable landing gear, and passengers and crew are protected in soundproofed and insulated cabins. c. 1931–c. 1940 The development of facsimile machines is made possible with the discovery of a dry chemical copying process. 4 January 1932 Following the return of the nationalist leader Mahatma Gandhi to India from the second Round Table Conference in London, England, and the revival of civil disobedience, the Indian government is granted emergency powers for six months. The Indian National Congress is declared illegal and Gandhi is arrested. 2 February 1932 Sixty nations, including the USA and the USSR, attend the Geneva Disarmament Conference, at which a French proposal for an armed force under international control is opposed by Germany. 1 March 1932 The baby son of US aviator Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow Lindbergh is kidnapped from the couple's home in Hopewell, New Jersey. Bruno Hauptmann, a German-born carpenter and petty criminal, is to be executed for the child's murder on 3 April 1936. 1 March 1932 The Import Duties Act comes into force in Britain, effectively ending 80 years of free trade. 9 March 1932 The Dáil (lower house of the legislature) elects Éamon de Valera as president of the executive council (prime minister) in the Irish Free State.

13 March 1932 In the German presidential election, the conservative former field marshal Paul von Hindenburg receives 18.6 million votes (49.6%) against the Nazi leader Adolf Hitler's 11.3 million (30.1%), falling just short of the necessary absolute majority. 14 March 1932 George Eastman, US inventor, manufacturer, and philanthropist who introduced the Kodak camera, dies in Rochester, New York (77). 29 March–6 April 1932 Jewish athletes from 20 countries participate in the inaugural World Maccabiah Games in Tel Aviv. 10 April 1932 Paul von Hindenburg is re-elected German president on the second ballot. 10 May 1932 The moderate conservative Albert Lebrun succeeds Paul Doumer as French president. 15 May 1932 Inukai Tsuyoshi, Prime Minister of Japan, is assassinated by young naval officers following his attempt to halt military activities against China. 20–21 May 1932 US aviator Amelia Earhart flies from Newfoundland, Canada, to Londonderry, Northern Ireland, in 13.5 hours, the first woman to make a solo flight across the Atlantic. 2 June 1932 Franz von Papen, expelled from the Centre Party on becoming chancellor, forms a nonparty 'cabinet of barons' in Germany. 15 June 1932 The Chaco War between Bolivia and Paraguay begins, with Bolivians attacking Paraguayan positions in the disputed border territory of Chaco Boreal. June–October 1932 Over 4,000 people die from cholera in New York City. 30 July–14 August 1932 The 10th Olympic Games are held in Los Angeles, California. The USA wins 16 gold medals; Italy, 12; France, 10; Sweden, 9; Japan, 7; Hungary, 6; Finland, 5. National flags and the three-tiered victory stand are used in medal ceremonies for the first time; photo-finish equipment is first used in track events. The games are attended by 1.25 million spectators. Mildred 'Babe' Didrikson of the USA wins a gold medal in the javelin and the 80 m hurdles, and a silver medal in the high jump. Kusuo Kitamura of Japan, aged 14 years and 309 days, wins the men's 1,500-m freestyle swimming gold medal. US athlete Eddie Tolan wins the men's 100-m and 200-m gold medals. 31 July 1932 The Nazis win 230 seats in the election to the German Reichstag (lower legislative house). The Social Democrats gain 133, the Centre 75, the communists 89, the National People's Party 37, and others 44. The result is a stalemate, since neither Nazis nor Social Democrats will enter a coalition.

2 August 1932 In Slough, England, Forrest Mars launches the Mars Bar: this product will form the basis of the Mars confectionery empire. 22 August–10 September 1932 In collaboration with Baird Company, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) begins the first regular television service, with transmissions between 11 a.m. and 11:30 p.m. 9 September 1932 The northeast region of Catalonia is granted autonomy in Spain, with its own flag, language, and parliament. 2 October 1932 The Lytton Commission, set up by the League of Nations to investigate Japan's 1931 invasion of Manchuria, China, recognizes Japan's special transport and economic interests in the region and recommends an autonomous state under Chinese sovereignty but Japanese control. 3 October 1932 The Times introduces the Times New Roman font, in the UK. Designed by Stanley Morrison, it will become the most widely used font for newspapers and magazines. 3 October 1932 Britain terminates its mandate over Iraq, and it is admitted to the League of Nations as an independent state. 11 October 1932 The Democratic Party gives the first party political television broadcast, in New York City. 27 October 1932 Sylvia Plath, US poet and novelist, born in Boston, Massachusetts (–1963). 30 October 1932 Louis Malle, French film director, born in Thumeries, France. 6 November 1932 Further elections to the German Reichstag (parliament), after the inconclusive elections of 31 July, produce another deadlock, with some communist gains from Nazis. 8 November 1932 Franklin D Roosevelt wins the US presidential election in a Democratic landslide, with 472 electoral votes to the Republican Herbert Hoover's 59 votes. In the House of Representatives, Democrats pick up 90 seats for a 310–117 majority; in the Senate, Democrats gain 13 seats for a majority of 60–35. 25 December 1932 King George V of Britain makes the first Christmas broadcast by a British head of state. 1932 French philosopher Henri Bergson publishes Les Deux Sources de la morale et de la religion/The Two Sources of Morality and Religion, which analyses the role of morality and religion in society. 1932 German philosopher Karl Jaspers publishes his three-volume Philosophie/

Philosophy, in which he expounds his own distinctive form of existentialism. 1932 In the USA, 26 states have passed compulsory sterilization laws for those described as 'morons, mental defectives, epileptics, illiterates, paupers, unemployables, criminals, prostitutes, and dope fiends'. 1932 In the USA, the Mexican artist José Clemente Orozco paints the mural Prometheus at Pomona College in Claremont, California. 1932 Mildred 'Babe' Didrikson wins the US women's Amateur Athletic Union team title for her club, Employers' Casualty of Dallas. She enters eight out of ten events and wins the 80 m hurdles, the long jump, javelin, shot, and baseball throwing, and is equal first in the high jump. 1932 Russian revolutionary leader Leon Trotsky publishes his three-volume History of the Russian Revolution. 1932 Swiss Protestant theologian Karl Barth publishes the first volume of Die Kirchliche Dogmatik/Church Dogmatics. 1932 The 1931–32 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor (jointly): Wallace Beery, for The Champ and Fredric March, for Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde; Best Actress: Helen Hayes, for The Sin of Madelon Claudet; Best Film: Grand Hotel, directed by Edmund Goulding; Best Director: Frank Borzage, for Bad Girl. 1932 The Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg completes the first two acts of his opera Moses und Aaron/Moses and Aaron. The third act is often spoken (as Schoenberg said it should be) though it is sometimes set to music from the first two acts. 1932 The English writer Aldous Huxley publishes his novel Brave New World, which presents a nightmarish vision of a utopia based on science and technology. 1932 The film Das Blaue Licht/The Blue Light, directed by Leni Riefenstahl, is released in Germany. She also stars in it. 1932 The film Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, directed by Russian-born film-maker Rouben Mamoulian, is released in the USA, based on the novel by Robert Louis Stevenson and starring Fredric March. 1932 The film I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang, directed by Mervyn LeRoy, is released in the USA, starring Paul Muni. 1932 The French artist Georges Rouault paints Christ Mocked. 1932 The French Senate denies women's suffrage for the third time. 1932 The French writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline publishes his novel Voyage au

bout de la nuit/Journey to the End of the Night. A grimly realistic account of his experiences as a doctor among the poor, written in a strikingly original style, it wins international acclaim. 1932 The infamous couple Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow commit a series of robberies and kill fifteen people throughout the South and Midwest USA. 1932 The Mexican artist Frida Kahlo paints My Birth. 1932 The Russian writer Boris Pasternak publishes his poetry collection Vtoroe rozhdenie/Second Birth. 1932 The US corporation Technicolor develops a special camera in which three separate films, registering red, green, and blue, are exposed simultaneously. 1932 The US writer Erskine Caldwell publishes his novel Tobacco Road, which establishes his reputation and becomes a best-seller. In 1933, dramatized by Jack Kirkland, it will run on Broadway for more than 3,000 performances. 1932 US engineer Karl Jansky discovers that the interference in telephone communications is caused by radio emissions from the Milky Way. He thus begins the development of radio astronomy. 1932 US scientist Carl David Anderson, while analysing cosmic rays, discovers positive electrons ('positrons'), the first form of antimatter to be discovered. 1932 US sculptor Alexander Calder creates his Mobiles (sculptures moved by engines or air currents), soon followed by Stabiles which do not move. 1932 Women in Brazil gain the vote. 1932 Women in Thailand win the right to vote and to hold public office. 1932–1934 Soviet leader Joseph Stalin collectivizes farms and seizes grain and livestock in the Ukraine and Caucasus regions, starting a famine; an estimated 5 million people die. 22 January 1933 The USSR launches its second five-year plan, envisaging the continued growth of heavy industry and increased production of consumer goods. 30 January 1933 The German president, Paul von Hindenburg, appoints the Nazi leader, Adolf Hitler, as chancellor. His cabinet includes only two other Nazis, Hermann Goering and Wilhelm Frick. Franz von Papen is vice chancellor and Constantin von Neurath foreign minister. 27 February 1933 The Reichstag, seat of the German parliament, is set on fire. 28 February 1933 German chancellor Adolf Hitler persuades president Paul von

Hindenburg to issue a 'decree for the protection of people and state'. It suppresses civil liberties and freedom of the press in the wake of the Reichstag fire and allows the Nazis to arrest thousands of their opponents. 7 March 1933 The Austrian chancellor, Engelbert Dollfuss, suspends parliament after political polarization makes democratic government impossible: he rules by decree while a new constitution is drawn up. 9 March–16 June 1933 The US Congress begins a special session to deal with economic and social problems, granting President Franklin D Roosevelt control over gold and silver bullion and foreign exchange. It passes 15 major bills during the 'Hundred Days'. 12 March 1933 President Roosevelt holds the first 'fireside chat' by radio with the US people, to encourage support for the New Deal. 19 March 1933 Philip Roth, US novelist and short-story writer, born in Newark, New Jersey. 23 March 1933 An enabling bill is passed by the Nazi-dominated Reichstag (parliament) in Germany giving the chancellor, Adolf Hitler, full dictatorial powers. 26 March 1933 A new constitution, known as the 'Estado Novo' is drawn up in Portugal, establishing a dictatorial government under the president, Sidónio Pais. 2 May 1933 Trades unions are suppressed by the Nazi government in Germany. 1 June 1933 The Douglas Company DC-1 airliner makes its first flight from Santa Monica, California. During the flight it loses power in both engines. Power is regained on the descent and it is discovered that the carburettors have been installed backwards. The plane has variable speed propellers and can fly at 241kph/150 mph and carry 12 passengers. 6 June 1933 Josef Goebbels, the German Minister of Information and Propaganda, authorizes legislation to exclude Jews and foreigners from involvement in film production. As the Nazis increase their control over the cinema industry, a number of noted Germans involved in film production, notably Fritz Lang, Erich Pommer, Leontine Sagan, and Max Ophüls, leave the country. 14 July 1933 All political parties other than the National Socialist (Nazi) Party are banned in Germany. 15–22 July 1933 US aviator Wiley Post makes the first solo flight around the world, in 7 days 18 hr 49 min. 8 September 1933 Faisal I, King of Iraq 1921–33 and promoter of pan-Arab

nationalism, dies in Bern, Switzerland (48). 14 October 1933 Germany withdraws from the League of Nations and its disarmament conference. 1933 British physicist Arthur Eddington publishes The Expanding Universe, in which he lays out his theory that the universe is constantly increasing in size. 1933 English economist John Maynard Keynes publishes The Means to Prosperity. 1933 English philosopher Alfred North Whitehead publishes Adventures of Ideas. 1933 In the USA, Prohibition ends, although controls remain in some states; an estimated 1.4 billion gallons of illegal alcohol have been consumed. The boom in sales of soft drinks ends, and grape sales are also hit, as home wine-making declines in popularity. 1933 Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung publishes Modern Man in Search of a Soul. 1933 The average life expectancy in the USA is 59 years, as opposed to 49 years in 1900. 1933 The Convalescent Home in Paimio, Finland, designed by the Finnish architect Alvar Aalto, is completed. 1933 The English writer George Orwell publishes Down and Out in Paris and London, an account of his experience of working among the poor and dispossessed. 1933 The film The Testament of Dr Mabuse, directed by Fritz Lang, is released in Germany starring Rudolph Klein-Rogge, Otto Wenicke, and Gustav Diesl. The German censors prevent it being shown, and Fritz Lang leaves Germany shortly afterwards. 1933 The French writer André Malraux publishes his novel La Condition humaine/ Man's Estate. 1933 The German artist Max Beckmann paints his triptych Departure. 1933 The German birth rate begins to increase, as a result of Adolf Hitler's economic incentives to 'Aryan' Germans to have children. 1933 The German composer Kurt Weill writes his ballet The Seven Deadly Sins in seven scenes with songs for soprano and male chorus. 1933 The Germans open Ravensbrück, the first concentration camp for women.

1933 The Mexican artist Diego Rivera completes murals in the Rockefeller Center, New York City. They are soon overpainted because they contain a portrait of the Soviet leader Lenin. 1933 The Spanish writer Federico García Lorca completes his play Bodas de sangre/Blood Wedding. 1933 The US magazine Good Housekeeping is the first such publication to accept advertisements for sanitary towels. 1933 The US writer Gertrude Stein publishes The Autobiography of Alice B Toklas, her autobiography. 1933 The US writer Nathanael West publishes his novel Miss Lonelyhearts, a bitter satire on US life. 1933 US engineer Edwin Armstrong patents frequency modulation (FM) in radio, which eliminates static. 8 January 1934 The French financier Alexandre Stavisky, accused of issuing fraudulent bonds, is found dead. The government's attempt to hush up the affair results in a popular charge of corruption. 1–16 February 1934 Political parties are forcibly dissolved in Austria except for Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss's Fatherland Front. 3 February 1934 Deutsche Lufthansa start the first regular transatlantic airmail service, completing the journey from Berlin, Germany to Buenos Aires, Argentina in four days. 9 February 1934 Greece, Turkey, Romania, and Yugoslavia form the Balkan Entente as a counterpart to the Little Entente (Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia), with the aim of preventing attack by another Balkan state. 15 February 1934 The Civil Works Emergency Relief Act becomes law in the USA, extending the scope of New Deal relief and work relief provision through civil works projects during the economic depression. 17 February 1934 King Albert I of Belgium is killed in a climbing accident. He is succeeded by his son, Leopold III. 9 March 1934 Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin, Soviet cosmonaut and the first person to travel in space, born near Gzhatsk, Russia (–1968). 15 March 1934 Premier Karlis Ulmanis becomes dictator in Latvia after suspending parliament in response to an alleged communist plot. 16 March 1934 German chancellor Adolf Hitler announces the creation of an

army of half a million soldiers, in direct contravention of the Treaty of Versailles. 16–17 March 1934 Protocols are signed in Rome between Italy, Austria, and Hungary to form a Danubian bloc against the Little Entente (Czechoslovakia, Romania, and Yugoslavia). 20 March 1934 German scientist Rudolf Kuhnold, using a 700-watt transmitter on 600 megacycles plus a receiver, succeeds in receiving echoes bounced off a battleship anchored 550 m/1,800 ft away. It is the first practical demonstration of radar. 26 March 1934 The Road Traffic Act introduces driving tests in the UK. March 1934 The first US Masters (later to become the fourth major golfing championship) is held in at the Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia; the winner is Horton Smith of the USA. 18 April 1934 The first launderette opens in Fort Worth, Texas. It charges by the hour. 24 April 1934 Shirley MacLaine, US actor, born in Richmond, Virginia. 19 May 1934 Fascists in Bulgaria seize power in collaboration with King Boris. May 1934 As the drought in the US dust bowl enters its second year, about 270 billion kg/300 million tons of topsoil from 40 million hectares/100 million acres in Kansas, Texas, Colorado, and Oklahoma is blown into the Atlantic, causing large-scale migration to California and other states. 6 June 1934 The US Congress passes the Reciprocal Trade Agreement Act. It authorizes the president to conclude trade agreements with individual nations, thereby annulling the 1930 Smoot–Hawley tariff. 9 June 1934 Walt Disney releases the animated cartoon The Wise Little Hen, the first cartoon starring Donald Duck. 30 June 1934 The German chancellor, Adolf Hitler, purges the SA (Sturmabteilung, storm troopers or 'Brownshirts') of dozens of its top leaders in the 'Night of the Long Knives'. Those murdered by Heinrich Himmler's SS (Schutzstaffel, Nazi elite corps) as potential rivals to Hitler include the SA head Ernst Röhm and the former chancellor Kurt von Schleicher. June 1934 In London, England, 60 official pedestrian crossing places are established on roads. 2 July 1934 General Lázaro Cárdenas, of the reformist wing of the ruling National Revolutionary Party, is elected president of Mexico.

4 July 1934 Marie Curie (born Sklodowska), Polish-born French physicist who, with her husband Pierre Curie, discovered polonium and radium, and who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 and for Chemistry in 1911, dies near Sallanches, France (66). 13 July 1934 Wole Soyinka, Nigerian poet, novelist, playwright, and critic, born near Abeokuta, Nigeria. 16 July 1934 The first general strike in the USA takes place in San Francisco, California, with workers out in sympathy with stevedores. 25 July 1934 Engelbert Dollfuss, leader of the Fatherland Front, chancellor, and effective fascist dictator of Austria, is assassinated by the Nazis in an attempted coup. 30 July 1934 The 'Fatherland Front' politician Kurt von Schuschnigg is appointed Austrian chancellor following the assassination of Engelbert Dollfuss by the Nazis. 2 August 1934 When the German president, Paul von Hindenburg, dies, the German presidency is merged with the chancellorship and all members of the armed forces take an oath of loyalty to Adolf Hitler personally as Führer ('Leader'). 12 September 1934 The Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania) sign a Treaty of Understanding and Cooperation (known as the 'Baltic Entente') in Geneva, Switzerland. 18 September 1934 The USSR is admitted to the League of Nations. 20 September 1934 Sophia Loren, Italian film actor, born in Rome, Italy. 9 October 1934 King Alexander I of Yugoslavia is assassinated by a Croatian separatist agent during a visit to France. He is succeeded by his 11-year-old son, Peter II. 15 October 1934 The Long March of the Chinese communists begins, led by Mao Zedong and others. Driven out by a Nationalist offensive, some 100,000 people leave the Jiangxi Soviet in southern China and march 9,600 km/6,000 mi to the province of Shaanxi in the extreme northwest, where the survivors set up a new communist revolutionary base. 1 December 1934 Sergey Kirov, Party leader in Leningrad and a senior communist leader in the USSR, is assassinated, probably with the connivance of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. The assassination marks the beginning of the Great Purge (1934–38). 1934 Austrian-born English philosopher Karl Popper publishes Logik der Forschung/The Logic of Scientific Discovery.

1934 English historian Arnold Toynbee publishes the first volume of his monumental 12-volume A Study of History. The last volume will appear in 1961. 1934 French physicists Frédéric and Irène Joliot-Curie bombard boron, aluminium, and magnesium with alpha particles and obtain radioactive isotopes of nitrogen, phosphorus, and aluminium – elements that are not normally radioactive. They are the first radioactive elements to be prepared artificially. 1934 Japanese Buddhist scholar Daisetsu Teitaro Suzuki publishes An Introduction to Zen Buddhism. 1934 The 1932–33 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Charles Laughton, for The Private Life of Henry VIII; Best Actress: Katharine Hepburn, for Morning Glory; Best Film: Cavalcade, directed by Frank Lloyd; Best Director: Frank Lloyd, for Cavalcade. 1934 The English artist Edward Burra paints Harlem. 1934 The English crime writer Agatha Christie publishes novel Murder on the Orient Express. 1934 The English novelist Evelyn Waugh publishes his satirical novel A Handful of Dust. 1934 The English novelist James Hilton publishes his sentimental novel about a school teacher, Goodbye, Mr Chips. It becomes a best-seller in the USA. 1934 The film David Copperfield, directed by George Cukor, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Charles Dickens, it stars Frank Lawton, with W C Fields as Mr Micawber. 1934 The film musical The Gay Divorcee, directed by Mark Sandrich, is released in the USA, starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. 1934 The German philosopher Rudolf Carnap publishes Logische Syntax der Sprache/The Logical Syntax of Language. 1934 The novel And Quiet Flows the Don by the Russian writer Mikhail Sholokhov is published in English. The first part of a two-part English translation, it comprises the first two volumes of the four-volume epic Tikhy Don/The Silent Don, which began appearing in the Soviet Union in 1928. 1934 The play La Machine infernale/The Infernal Machine, an adaptation of the Oedipus myth by the French writer Jean Cocteau, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1934 The US writer Henry Roth publishes his novel Call it Sleep.

1934 The US writer William Saroyan publishes The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze, a collection of short stories that establishes his reputation. 1934 US social philosopher Lewis Mumford publishes Technics and Civilization. His aim is to reveal the possible dehumanizing consequences of the unthinking use of technology. 1934 Using powers granted to him by the Gold Reserve Act, the US president Franklin D Roosevelt devalues the dollar to 59.06% of its last official gold value. 8 January 1935 Elvis Presley, US rock and roll singer, whose great success changed US popular culture, born in Tupelo, Mississippi (–1977). 15–17 January 1935 Grigory Zinovyev, Lev Kamenev, and other former leading communists in the USSR are tried and imprisoned for 'moral complicity' in the assassination of party leader Sergey Kirov in December 1934, beginning the ' Great Terror' or purge of the Communist Party. 1 March 1935 The district of Saarland, administered by the French under the League of Nations since 1919, is restored to Germany. 1 March 1935 The former Greek prime minister Eleutherios Venizelos leads a rebel group attempting to prevent the restoration of the monarchy. The attempt fails and he flees to France. 16 March 1935 Germany repudiates the disarmament clauses of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles and the Führer Adolf Hitler reintroduces general military conscription. 11–14 April 1935 The prime ministers of Italy, France, and Britain, conferring in Stresa, Italy, protest against German rearmament and agree to act jointly against Germany, forming what becomes known as the Stresa Front. 15 April 1935 US scientists Leopold Godowsky and Leopold Mannes announce the development of 'Kodachrome', the first commercially available colour film. 19 May 1935 T(homas) E(dward) Lawrence ('Lawrence of Arabia'), British scholar, military strategist, and author, dies in Clouds Hill, Dorset, England (46). 25 May 1935 In less than an hour at the Big Ten Championships held at Ann Arbor, Michigan, US athlete Jesse Owens, of Ohio State University, breaks the world record in the long jump, the 220 yards, the 220 yards hurdles, and equals the record for the 100 yards. His jump of 8.13 m/26 ft 8 1/4in is the first ever over 8 metres and is not bettered until 1960. 7 June 1935 The Conservative Stanley Baldwin succeeds Ramsay MacDonald as prime minister of Britain, heading a National Government. Sir John Simon is home secretary, and Samuel Hoare is foreign secretary.

18 June 1935 Britain and Germany make an agreement by which Germany undertakes that its navy will not exceed a third of the tonnage of Britain's Royal Navy. Britain's independent negotiation of the agreement fatally undermines the unity of the Stresa Front (formed in April 1935). 2 August 1935 The British Parliament passes the Government of India Act. It reforms the governmental system, separates Burma and Aden from India, grants provincial governments greater autonomy, and creates a central legislature in Delhi (effective from 1 April 1937). 14 August 1935 The Social Security Act is enacted in the USA. It provides for oldage pensions, help for the disabled, and unemployment assistance (from 1942), paid for by contributions rather than from tax revenues. The act also provides states with matching grants to help them care for dependent mothers and children. 3 September 1935 British driver Malcolm Campbell drives Bluebird at 484.5 kph/301.1 mph at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, USA; he sets a new land speed record. 12 September 1935 US multimillionaire Howard Hughes sets the world's airspeed record of 567.23 kph/352.46 mph, in an aeroplane of his own design. 15 September 1935 The German Führer Adolf Hitler announces the racist 'Nuremberg Laws' against Jews at the Nazi Party Nuremberg rally. Legislation will define Jews, ban them from professions, and forbid their marriage or sexual relations with non-Jews. 3 October 1935 Italy invades Ethiopia (Abyssinia), aiming to extend Italian territory in East Africa. October 1935 German radio bans jazz of black or Jewish origin. 28 November 1935 The Miles quads of St Neots, England, are the first quads to survive infancy. 29 November 1935 Michael Joseph Savage becomes New Zealand's first Labour prime minister. 1 December 1935 Jiang Jie Shi (Chiang Kai-shek) is elected chairman of the Guomindang (Nationalist Party) Executive Council, so becoming virtual ruler of China. 1 December 1935 Woody Allen, US film director, screenwriter, actor, and author, born in Brooklyn, New York City. 7 December 1935 The National Convention of the US Amateur Athletic Union decides, by 61 votes to 55, not to withdraw from the Olympic Games in

Germany. The German government's discriminatory attitude against Jewish athletes, it is argued, is in violation of Olympic rules. 1935 British chemist Michael Perrin and his group working for Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) polymerize ethylene to make polyethylene, the first true plastic. 1935 Despite emigration and a falling birth rate, overpopulation causes concern in Japan: the population has effectively doubled in size since 1872 and stands at more than 70 million. 1935 German chemist Gerhard Domagk uses the dye Prontosil red to cure a streptococcal infection in his youngest daughter; this is the first use of a sulfa drug on a human. 1935 In a second round of New Deal legislation in the USA, President Franklin D Roosevelt establishes the Resettlement Administration, to help owners and tenants move to better land; the Works Progress Administration, to provide work for the unemployed; and the Rural Electrification Administration, to raise the standard of rural living by equipping farms with electric power. 1935 Japanese physicist Hideki Yukawa proposes the existence of a new particle, an exchange particle, to explain the strong nuclear force. 1935 Polish-born French artist Hans Bellmer creates The Doll, ten tinted photographs. 1935 The Bulgarian writer Elias Canetti publishes the novel Die Blendung/The Blinding in German. It will be translated in 1946 as Auto-Da-Fé in Britain and The Tower of Babel in the USA. 1935 The English artist Stanley Spencer paints St Francis and the Birds. 1935 The English writer Christopher Isherwood publishes his novel Mr Norris Changes Trains. It is published in the USA as The Last of Mr Norris. 1935 The English writer Ivy Compton-Burnett publishes her novel A House and its Head. 1935 The film A Night at the Opera, directed by Sam Wood, is released in the USA, starring the Marx Brothers. 1935 The film Les Misérables, directed by Polish film-maker Richard Boleslavsky, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Victor Hugo, it stars Fredric March, Charles Laughton, Cedric Hardwicke, and Rochelle Hudson. 1935 The film musical Top Hat, directed by Mark Sandrich, is released in the USA, starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

1935 The German artist Kurt Schwitters leaves incomplete his first Merzbau, a room in a house in Hanover, Germany, which he has filled with constructions made of discarded materials. 1935 The magnetophone, the first tape recorder to use plastic tape, is developed by AEG in Berlin, Germany. 1935 The name 'Oscar' is adopted for the Academy Awards. 1935 The opera Porgy and Bess by the US composer George Gershwin is first performed, in New York City and Boston, Massachusetts. 1935 The play Waiting for Lefty, by the US writer Clifford Odets is first performed, at the Civic Theater in New York City. It becomes one of the bestknown examples of US proletarian drama. 1935 The Polish-born French artist Balthus paints The Street. 1935 The verse play Murder in the Cathedral, by the US-born English writer T S Eliot, is first performed, in Canterbury Cathedral, England. 1935 US businesses spend $1.7 billion on advertising: $762 million in newspapers; $136 million in magazines; and $112 million on radio. 1935 US inventor Robert H Goddard launches a liquid-propelled rocket faster than the speed of sound. 18 January 1936 Rudyard Kipling, English novelist, short-story writer, and poet, dies in London, England (70). 16 February 1936 The Popular Front coalition of left-wing parties wins 256 seats in the Spanish election, against 165 for the right and 52 for the centre. Manuel Azaña again becomes prime minister and re-establishes the constitution of 1931. February 1936 Adolf Hitler commissions Ferdinand Porsche to design a 'people's car' and the Volkswagen Beetle is born. 18 March 1936 Eleutherios Venizelos, Greek politician, prime minister of Greece 1910–15, 1917, 1924, and 1928–30, dies in Paris, France (71). 18 March 1936 F(rederik) W(illem) de Klerk, South African politician, president of South Africa 1989–94, who ended the apartheid system, born in Johannesburg, South Africa. 25 March 1936 In Germany, the first public videophone service, to be used by Aryans only, starts in Berlin and Leipzig. 3 May 1936 Left-wing parties supporting the Popular Front win 376 seats in the

French general election, against 147 for the Socialists. 9 May 1936 Italy formally annexes Ethiopia (Abyssinia), having occupied the capital, Addis Ababa, on 5 May. 10 May 1936 Manuel Azaña of the Republican Left succeeds Niceto Alcalá Zamora as president of Spain. 4 June 1936 The Popular Front leader, Léon Blum, becomes the first Socialist and Jewish prime minister of France. 12 June 1936 A strike by 300,000 workers results in social reforms in France, including a 40-hour working week and paid holiday. 18 July 1936 The right-wing Spanish general Francisco Franco leads an army mutiny in Morocco against the Spanish Republican government. Other mutinies break out on the Spanish mainland, marking the start of the Spanish Civil War. 1–16 August 1936 The 11th Olympic Games are held in Berlin, Germany. Germany wins 33 gold medals; the USA, 24; Hungary, 10; Italy, 8; Finland and France, 7 each; Sweden and Holland, 6 each; Japan, 5. The US black American athlete Jesse Owens wins 4 gold medals, in the 100 metres, the 200 metres, the long jump, and the 4 × 100-metre relay. Jack Lovelock of New Zealand wins the 1,500 metres title in a world record time of 3 minutes 47.8 seconds. A selection of highlights is shown live and viewed by an estimated 150,000 people in the public viewing rooms in Berlin. 4 August 1936 In the Spanish Civil War, General Franco's Nationalist army captures Badajoz in the southwest, enabling antigovernment forces in the north and south to combine. 26 August 1936 A treaty of alliance is signed between Britain and Egypt. To last for 20 years, it gives Britain the right to station troops in the Suez Canal region and use Alexandria as a naval base. 26 August 1936 Britain signs a treaty with Egypt recognizing the latter's sovereignty and independence and pledging mutual defence and a 20-year alliance. 27 September 1936 France, Switzerland, and the Netherlands abandon the gold standard. 5 October 1936 Václav Havel, Czech dissident playwright and poet, president of Czechoslovakia in 1989, president of the newly formed Czech Republic in 1992, born in Prague, Czechoslovakia. 5–11 October 1936 Britain's first woman Labour member of Parliament, Ellen Wilkinson, leads a 'hunger march' of workers from Jarrow in northeast England to

London as a protest against unemployment following the closure of local shipyards. 2 November 1936 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) starts the world's first public high-definition television service from its transmitter at Alexandra Palace, London, England, using Logie Baird's mechanical system and EMI's electronic system. 25 November 1936 Germany and Japan sign an anti-Comintern pact and agree to work together against international communism. Germany also recognizes Japan's regime in Manchuria, China. 3 December 1936 In the UK, the press, after a period of self-restraint, breaks the news of King Edward's intention to marry Mrs Wallis Simpson. 10 December 1936 Luigi Pirandello, Italian playwright, novelist, and short-story writer, dies in Rome, Italy (69). 11 December 1936 Edward VIII abdicates as king of Great Britain and Northern Ireland following his refusal to give up the idea of marriage to the US divorcee Wallis Simpson. 12 December 1936 The Constitution (amendment) Act in the Irish Free State removes the king from membership of the Irish parliament and deprives the British governor general of most of his functions. 12 December 1936 The Duke of York, younger brother of Edward VIII, succeeds to the British throne as George VI, following Edward's abdication on 11 December. 1936 38% of families in the USA live below the poverty line designated by the government. 1936 A system of maternity welfare is established in the USSR, including child care and financial support for women. 1936 Cinema censorship guidelines in fascist Italy discourage the portrayal of women as anything but virgins, wives, or mothers. The Pope expresses concern about the moral influence of cinema. 1936 Earl Haas patents tampons and commercial production begins at Tampax, Inc. in New Brunswick, New Jersey. 1936 English economist John Maynard Keynes publishes General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, proposing that recession can be prevented if the government sponsors a full employment policy. It has a profound effect on economic thinking and government economic strategy worldwide. 1936 In Moscow, Russia, the government revokes a 1920 law legalizing abortion,

and introduces restrictions on the availability of abortion. 1936 In Slough, England, the confectionery company Mars introduces Maltesers. 1936 Plexiglas lenses, the first plastic contact lenses, are manufactured in Germany by I G Farben. 1936 Populations (in millions): China, 422; India, 360; USSR, 173; USA, 127; Japan, 89; Germany, 70; Great Britain, 47; France, 44. 1936 Rates of maternal mortality begin to drop in the USA because of antibiotics and better trained physicians; they continue to decline sharply for the next 20 years. 1936 The 1935 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Victor McLaglen, for The Informer; Best Actress: Bette Davis, for Dangerous; Best Film: Mutiny on the Bounty, directed by Frank Lloyd; Best Director: John Ford, for The Informer. 1936 The American Optical Society produces Polarized sunglasses, developed by Edwin Land of Boston, Massachusetts. 1936 The Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg completes his Violin Concerto (Opus 36) and his String Quartet No. 4 (Opus 37). 1936 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) begins the first public television broadcasts; the system used has 405-line pictures. 1936 The Dutch artist Piet Mondrian paints Composition in Red and Blue. 1936 The English mathematician Alan Turing supplies the theoretical basis for digital computers by describing a machine, now known as the Turing machine, capable of universal rather than special-purpose problem solving. 1936 The English philosopher A J Ayer publishes Language, Truth, and Logic. A brilliant exposition of logical positivism, its claim that the statements of morality and religion are, literally, 'meaningless', makes it the most controversial British philosophical work of the period. 1936 The English-born US writer W H Auden publishes his poetry collection Look, Stranger! and writes the verse commentary for the General Post Office documentary film Night Mail, directed by Harry Watt and Basil Wright. 1936 The film Modern Times, directed by the English film-maker Charlie Chaplin, is released, the last of the great silent films. He also stars in it, along with Paulette Goddard. 1936 The film The Trail of the Lonesome Pine, directed by Henry Hathaway, is released in the USA. The first film to contain location shooting in colour, it stars

Fred MacMurray, Sylvia Sidney, and Henry Fonda. 1936 The film Things to Come, directed by William Cameron Menzies, is released in the UK. Based on H G Wells's novel The Shape of Things to Come, it stars Raymond Massey, Edward Chapman, and Ralph Richardson. 1936 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his song cycle Poèmes pour Mi/Poems for Mi. 1936 The German film-maker Leni Riefenstahl, one of the leading women directors in film history, directs Olympia (released 1938–39). It is a stylized twopart film documenting the Berlin Olympic Games, and is recognized as one of the landmarks of Nazi cinema. 1936 The Hungarian composer Béla Bartók completes his Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta. 1936 The Hungarian-born US photographer Robert Capa (pseudonym of André Friedman) takes Death of a Loyalist (also known as Moment of Death), one of the best-known images of the Spanish Civil War. 1936 The movie industry has its most prosperous year, completing 500 feature films, most in black and white although Technicolor has been invented. 1936 The rejection of German films abroad, because of the unpalatably high propaganda content, leads to a crisis in the German film industry. 1936 The self-help book How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie is published. It will sell more copies than any other non-fiction title apart from the Bible. 1936 The Swiss artist Meret Oppenheim creates Object (Fur Tea Cup). A furlined tea cup, it becomes one of the most familiar images of surrealism. 1936 The US writer Margaret Mitchell publishes her novel Gone with the Wind, which becomes one of the best-selling novels of the 20th century. 1936 The US writer William Faulkner publishes his novel Absalom, Absalom!. 1936 The Welsh poet Dylan Thomas publishes his collection Twenty-five Poems. 1936 US aircraft manufacturer Douglas introduces the 21-passenger DC-3, one of the most successful commercial aircraft ever built (10,000 are produced by 1945). Powered by two 1200-horsepower engines, it reaches speeds of 300 kph/186 mph c. 1936 Catalytic cracking, a chemical process in which long-chain hydrocarbon molecules are broken down into smaller ones, is introduced to produce gasoline

from low grade crude oil by the US Sun Oil Company and Socony-Vacuum Company. c. 1936 Home remedies used to terminate pregnancies rely on solutions of water, Lysol, carbolic soap, iodine, and turpentine. The bark of the American slippery elm tree, rolled and inserted in the cervix, is also used to abort the fetus. 18 March 1937 A school fire in New London, Texas, kills 294 students and teachers. 30 March 1937 Warren Beatty, US actor, director, and producer, born in Richmond, Virginia. 12 April 1937 English engineer Frank Whittle tests the first prototype jet engine. A similar engine is developed in Germany at the same time. 22 April 1937 Jack Nicholson, US actor, screenwriter, and director, born in Neptune, New Jersey. 26 April 1937 Guernica, the historic Basque capital in northern Spain, is heavily bombed by aircraft of the German Condor Legion supporting the Spanish Nationalist rebels. 3–10 May 1937 Anarchists and Syndicalists revolt against the increasingly authoritarian and communist-dominated wartime policies of the Republican government, in Barcelona, northeast Spain. The revolt is put down by government troops, causing a crisis in the government. 6 May 1937 The giant German airship Hindenburg explodes in the USA as it attempts to moor at Lakehurst Naval Station, New Jersey; 36 people are killed. 8 May 1937 Thomas Pynchon, US novelist, born in Glen Cove, Long Island, New York. 23 May 1937 John D Rockefeller, US industrialist who founded Standard Oil, and philanthropist who founded the Rockefeller Foundation, dies in Ormond Beach, Florida (97). 28 May 1937 Stanley Baldwin retires as British prime minister. Neville Chamberlain forms a National Government, with Sir John Simon as chancellor of the Exchequer and Anthony Eden as foreign secretary. 22 June 1937 Joe Louis of the USA wins the world heavyweight boxing title by knocking out James Braddock of the USA in the eighth round in Chicago, Illinois. June 1937 The introduction of the shopping cart, which replaces smaller, handheld bags and was devised by Sylvan N Goldman in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma,

revolutionizes grocery shopping in the USA. 1 July 1937 The 999 emergency telephone number for police, fire, and ambulance services is introduced in the UK. 11 July 1937 George Gershwin, US composer and songwriter for Broadway musicals, dies in Hollywood, California (38). 20 July 1937 Guglielmo Marconi, Italian physicist and inventor of radio, dies in Rome, Italy (63). 8 August 1937 Dustin Hoffman, US actor, star of the 1967 film The Graduate, born in Los Angeles, California. 18 August 1937 Robert Redford, US actor, producer, and director, born in Santa Monica, California. 2 September 1937 Pierre, baron de Coubertin, French administrator who was responsible for the revival of the Olympic Games and who served as the first president of the International Olympic Committee 1896–1925, dies in Geneva, Switzerland (64). 15 September 1937 The National Housing Act (Wagner–Steagall Act) creates the US Housing Authority, to make housing for people on low incomes more affordable and to spur rural and urban construction. 19 October 1937 Ernest Rutherford, New Zealand-born British physicist and investigator of radioactivity, dies in Cambridge, England (66). 6 November 1937 Italy joins the German–Japanese Anti-Comintern Pact against international communism. 9 November 1937 Ramsay MacDonald, British politician, first Labour Party prime minister of Britain 1924, prime minister again in 1929, and in a coalition government 1931–35, dies at sea (71). 10 November 1937 The Brazilian president Getúlio Vargas organizes a coup that annuls the 1934 constitution and sets up the totalitarian Estado Novo (New State). 5–13 December 1937 Japanese troops take the Chinese city of Nanjing. Their victory is followed by the 'rape of Nanjing', when around a quarter of a million Chinese are killed. 11 December 1937 Italy withdraws from the League of Nations. 1937 A German court rules that the state may remove children from homes that do not teach Nazi ideology.

1937 Austrian zoologist Konrad Lorenz coins the term 'imprinting' to describe the process by which visual and auditory stimuli from animals around them cause young ducklings to associate these animals with parents of their own species. Lorenz suggests this is evolution's mechanism for locating the biologically 'right' object species for their upbringing. 1937 British inventor Alec Reeves develops a system in which analogue sound is transformed into electrical impulses and a receiver transforms them back into an analogue signal – the basis of digital recording. 1937 German-born British biochemist Hans Adolf Krebs describes the citric acid cycle in cells, which converts sugars, fats, and proteins into carbon dioxide, water, and energy – the 'Krebs cycle'. 1937 In Richmond, Virginia, Irv Abeloff presents the first phone-in radio programme, Telephone Interviews. Radio legislation does not permit callers to appear live, and so all calls are recorded. 1937 Nazi authorities hold an exhibition entitled 'Entartete Kunst'/'Degenerate Art' in Munich, Germany. The artists whose works are on display include Kandinsky, Picasso, Chagall, van Gogh, Beckmann, and Matisse. Nearby, the authorities endorse an exhibition of approved art, German and very traditional in style. 1937 Nylon, developed by W H Carothers, is patented by the US chemicals company DuPont and is commercially available the following year in the form of toothbrush bristles; nylon stockings become widely available in the USA in May 1940. 1937 Spam, made from pork shoulder and ham, is first marketed by George A Hormel & Co. in Minnesota. It becomes the world's best-selling tinned meat. Its name is a contraction of 'spiced ham'. 1937 The 1936 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Paul Muni, for The Story of Louis Pasteur; Best Supporting Actor: Walter Brennan, for Come and Get It; Best Actress: Luise Rainer, for The Great Zeigfeld; Best Supporting Actress: Gale Sondergaard, for Anthony Adverse; Best Film: The Great Ziegfeld, directed by Robert Z Leonard; Best Director: Frank Capra, for Mr Deeds Goes to Town. 1937 The animated character Bugs Bunny makes his debut in the Warner Bros production Porky's Hare Hunt, released in the USA, although it will take a few years before his looks and character become settled. 1937 The Austrian artist Oskar Kokoschka paints Portrait of a 'Degenerate Artist', a self-portrait. 1937 The British Institute of Public Opinion is founded by George Gallup to introduce his polling method from the USA into Britain.

1937 The Danish writer Isak Dinesen publishes Den Afrikanske Farm/The African Farm, which she translates into English the same year as Out of Africa. 1937 The English writer George Orwell publishes The Road to Wigan Pier, an account of his visits to working-class areas in Lancashire, England. 1937 The English writer J R R Tolkien publishes his fantasy novel The Hobbit. 1937 The film A Day at the Races, starring the Marx Brothers, is released in the USA. It is directed by Sam Wood. 1937 The film Lost Horizon, directed by the Italian-born US film-maker Frank Capra, is released. Based on a novel by James Hilton, it stars Ronald Colman, H B Warner, Thomas Mitchell, Edward Everett Horton, and Sam Jaffe. 1937 The film The Prisoner of Zenda is released in the USA, produced by David O Selznick and directed by John Cromwell. Based on the novel by Anthony Hope, it stars Ronald Colman, Mary Astor, and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. 1937 The film industry in the USA attracts three-quarters of all spending on leisure and entertainment. 1937 The French artist Pierre Bonnard paints Nude in the Bath, one of many pictures on a theme for which he becomes famous. 1937 The French director Jean Renoir's La Grande Illusion/The Great Illusion is released. A pacifist film set in a German prisoner of war camp during World War I, it will be acclaimed as a classic of world cinema. The film stars Jean Gabin, Pierre Fresnay, and Erich von Stroheim. 1937 The French microbiologist Max Theiler develops a vaccine against yellow fever; it is the first antiviral vaccine. 1937 The German composer Carl Orff completes his Carmina Burana, cantiones profanae/Carmina Burana, Secular Songs. 1937 The Japanese writer Yasunari Kawabata publishes his novel Yukiguni/The Snow Country. 1937 The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) makes regular experimental television broadcasts in the USA. 1937 The opera Lulu by the Austrian composer Alban Berg is first performed, in Zürich, Switzerland. It was left unfinished at his death in 1935. The first complete performance, with the last act completed by the Austrian composer Friedrich Cerha, will be given in Paris, France, in 1979. 1937 The play Electre/Electra, by the French writer Jean Giraudoux, is first

performed, in Paris, France. 1937 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his Symphony No. 5 in D minor, A Soviet Artist's Reply to Just Criticism. It was written in response to severe criticism of Shostakovich (inspired by the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin) that appeared in the official newspaper Pravda. 1937 The Swiss confectionery company Nestlé introduces the Milky Bar, the first chocolate bar made from white chocolate. 1937 The US historian Charles Austin Beard publishes The Making of American Civilization. 1937 The US mathematician Georges Stibitz builds the first binary circuit that can add two binary numbers based on Boolean algebra. Consisting of batteries, lights, and wires, it is instrumental in the development of subsequent electromechanical computers. 1937 The US political journalist Walter Lippmann publishes The Good Society. The book marks his move away from his earlier liberalism. 1937 The US theologian Reinhold Niebuhr publishes Beyond Tragedy: Essays on the Christian Interpretation of History. 1937 The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his novel To Have and Have Not. 1937 The US writer John Steinbeck publishes his novella Of Mice and Men. 1937 The US writer Wallace Stevens publishes his poetry collection The Man with the Blue Guitar. 1937 US radio engineer Grote Reber builds the first radio telescope. It has a parabolic reflector 9.4 m/31 ft in diameter and begins service in Wheaton, Illinois. 1937 Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is released in the USA. It is the first feature-length animated film. 1937 Xerography, an electrostatic copying process, is pioneered in the USA by electrical engineer Chester Carlson; it becomes commercially available in 1950. 1937–1939 US mathematician and physicist John V Atanasoff invents an electromechanical digital computer for solving systems of linear equations. It uses punched cards and is the first electronic calculator using electronic vacuum tubes. 4 February 1938 The German war minister and Wehrmacht (army) commander, Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg, resigns following a personal domestic

scandal. The Führer formally declares himself commander with Wilhelm Keitel as chief of staff. Joachim von Ribbentrop is appointed foreign minister. 20 February 1938 The British foreign minister Anthony Eden resigns in protest at Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement of Nazi Germany and fascist Italy. 2–14 March 1938 The former leading communist Nikolai Bukharin and other political leaders are put on trial in the USSR. Bukharin is falsely accused of counterrevolutionary activities and espionage, found guilty, and shot on 14 March. 12 March 1938 German troops are ordered to invade Austria to prevent a vote for continued independence in the referendum proposed by the Austrian chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg; the referendum is called off before they enter Austrian territory. 13 March 1938 Austria is declared part of the German Reich, after the cancellation of a proposed referendum on unity with Germany (Anschluss or 'Annexation'). 6 April 1938 US chemist Roy Plunkett discovers the stable and slippery substance polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) (a synthetic resin), marketed by DuPont as Teflon. The most slippery substance known, it becomes commercially available in 1947–48 and is used for electrical insulation and to produce nonstick coatings. 14 May 1938 On the advice of the Football Association and the British Ambassador, the English team give the Nazi salute during the playing of 'Deutschland über Alles' before an international football match with Germany in Berlin, Germany. England win the game 6–3. 17 August 1938 US boxer Henry 'Homicide Hank' Armstrong becomes the first boxer to hold three world professional titles simultaneously: featherweight, welterweight, and lightweight. 26 September 1938 Gas-masks are issued to civilians in Britain. 30 September 1938 The Munich Agreement is signed in Munich, Germany, by the British prime minister, the French prime minister, the German Führer, and the Italian prime minister. It permits Germany to annex the Sudetenland in western Czechoslovakia. Chamberlain returns to London, England, speaking of 'peace with honour' and 'peace in our time'. 2 October 1938 Japan withdraws from the League of Nations in protest at its identification by the League as the aggressor in the Sino-Japanese war. 4 October 1938 The Popular Front government falls in France when the socialists and communists abstain from a vote of confidence because they are opposed to government economic policy (particularly the devaluation of the franc).

9–10 November 1938 Following the assassination of a Nazi diplomat in Paris, France, the Nazis organize a night of violence in Germany against Jews and their property. The assault is known as Kristallnacht ('crystal night'), because of the litter of broken glass. 10 November 1938 Kemal Atatürk, Turkish soldier, statesman, and reformer, founder and first president of the Republic of Turkey 1923–38, dies in Istanbul, Turkey (57). 1938 A scanning electron microscope is demonstrated by German physicist Manfred von Ardenne. 1938 Donald Budge of the USA becomes the first tennis player to achieve the Grand Slam, holding all four major tournaments (Wimbledon and the US, French, and Australian championships) simultaneously. 1938 During 1938, there are 32,000 automobile-related deaths in the USA, onethird involving pedestrians. 1938 In the UK, the Amulree Committee report recommends the extension to most workers of a week's paid annual holiday, on grounds of social justice and industrial efficiency. 1938 Superman appears in Action Comics, in the USA. Cartoonists Jerry Siegel and Joseph Shuster created the super-hero character while still in high school. 1938 The 1937 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Spencer Tracy, for Captains Courageous; Best Supporting Actor: Joseph Schildkraut, for The Life of Emile Zola; Best Actress; Luise Rainer, for The Good Earth; Best Supporting Actress: Alice Brady, for In Old Chicago; Best Film: The Life of Emile Zola, directed by William Dieterle; Best Director: Leo McCarey, for The Awful Truth. 1938 The Austrian composer Anton Webern completes his String Quartet, Opus 28. 1938 The ballet Romeo i Dzhulyetta/Romeo and Juliet, by the Russian composer Sergey Prokofiev, is first performed, in Brno, USSR. The choreography is by the Czech choreographer Ivo Vána Psoda. 1938 The Belgian artist Paul Delvaux paints The Call of the Night. 1938 The British chemist Charles Dodds creates the first synthetic oestrogen and Schering Pharmaceutical chemists create an oestrogen contraceptive pill. 1938 The Dutch historian Johan Huizinga publishes Homo Ludens, which analyses the role of play in human culture.

1938 The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams completes his Serenade to Music. 1938 The English writer Daphne du Maurier publishes her highly successful romantic melodrama Rebecca. 1938 The English writer Graham Greene publishes his novel Brighton Rock. 1938 The Fair Labor Standard Act is passed in the USA, limiting working hours and confirming statutory minimum wage and overtime rates. 1938 The film Angels with Dirty Faces, directed by Michael Curtiz, is released in the USA. It stars James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, and Humphrey Bogart. 1938 The film Pygmalion, directed by Anthony Asquith and Leslie Howard, is released in the UK. Based on the play by George Bernard Shaw, it stars Howard as Professor Higgins and Wendy Hiller as Eliza Doolittle. 1938 The film The Adventures of Robin Hood, directed by William Keighley and Michael Curtiz, is released in the USA, starring Errol Flynn, Melville Cooper, and Olivia de Havilland. 1938 The film The Lady Vanishes, directed by the English film-maker Alfred Hitchcock, is released. Adapted from the novel by Daphne du Maurier, it stars Margaret Lockwood and Michael Redgrave. 1938 The French philosopher and writer Jean-Paul Sartre publishes his novel Nausée/Nausea. It becomes one of the classics of the philosophy of existentialism. 1938 The French philosopher Gaston Bachelard publishes La Psychoanalyse du feu/The Psychoanalysis of Fire. 1938 The French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson takes Sunday, Bank of the Marne. 1938 The French sociologist Raymond Aron publishes Introduction à la philosophie de l'histoire/ Introduction to the Philosophy of History. 1938 The French writer and actor Antonin Artaud publishes Le Théâtre et son double/The Theatre and Its Double in which he proposes a 'theatre of cruelty'. 1938 The German inventor Konrad Zuse constructs the first binary calculator using a binary code (Boolean algebra); it is the first working computer. 1938 The Irish writer Samuel Beckett publishes his first novel, Murphy. 1938 The opera Mathis der Maler/Matthias the Painter by the German composer

Paul Hindemith is first performed, in Zürich, Switzerland. 1938 The Russian composer Igor Stravinsky completes his orchestral work Dumbarton Oaks. 1938 The Swiss food company Nestlé produces instant coffee in response to a coffee surplus in Brazil. 1938 The US composer Samuel Barber writes his Adagio for Strings, which he has adapted from his String Quartet of 1936. 1938 The US writer Allen Tate publishes his novel The Fathers. 21 January 1939 The German Führer dismisses Hjalmar Schacht as president of the Reichsbank for opposing his rearmament expenditure. He replaces him with Walther Funk, minister of economics. 26 January 1939 Nationalist forces, assisted by Italian troops, take the city of Barcelona, the last major stronghold of the Republican government in northeastern Spain. 28 January 1939 W B Yeats, Irish poet, dramatist, and nationalist, dies in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, France (73). February 1939 The British government begins to build air-raid shelters in areas likely to be bombed in wartime. 2 March 1939 Following the death of Pope Pius XI on 10 February, Eugenio Pacelli is elected pope and takes the name Pius XII. 15 March 1939 German troops occupy Bohemia and Moravia in Czechoslovakia. The German Führer makes a triumphal entry into Prague, the Czech capital, the same evening. The regions become a German protectorate under Konstantin von Neurath. 28–29 March 1939 Madrid surrenders to the Spanish Nationalists, after a siege of almost two and a half years. The remaining Republican areas capitulate on 29 March, ending the Spanish Civil War. 31 March 1939 Britain and France pledge to support Poland in any attack on Polish independence. On 6 April a pact is signed by all three governments confirming the pledge. 7 April 1939 Francis Ford Coppola, US film director, writer, and producer, born in Detroit, Michigan. 7 April 1939 Italy invades and occupies Albania. The Albanian king, Ahmed Bey Zogu, flees to Greece.

30 April 1939 The National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) makes the first public demonstration of television in the USA with President Roosevelt opening the New York World's Fair. The broadcast is seen by 1,000 people. Later in the year, NBC begins broadcasting for two hours a week. The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) also starts to broadcast. 30 April 1939 The World's Fair in Queens, New York City, is the biggest international exhibition ever, featuring international technical, business, and cultural displays: Germany is notably absent. April 1939 US physicists Georges Stibitz and Samuel B Williams of Bell Laboratories build a computer consisting of over 400 relays connected to teletype machine for input and output of data, thus introducing the idea of operating a computer via a terminal. Called a Complex Number Calculator, it is demonstrated on 8 January 1940. 2 May 1939 US baseball player Lou Gehrig withdraws from the lineup after making 2,130 consecutive appearances for the New York Yankees, a sequence that stands as a major league record until 1995. 10 May 1939 The Methodist Church is reunited after 109 years of division, a split caused between churches in the North and South over slavery. 16 May 1939 Rochester, New York, begins a food-stamp plan to distribute surplus food to the poor, a plan copied by more than 100 US cities in the next two years. 22 May 1939 The German Führer and Italian prime minister sign a ten-year political and military alliance, the 'Pact of Steel'. 19 August 1939 British motor racing driver Malcolm Campbell breaks the world water speed record for the third time in two years with a speed of 228.1 kph/141.7 mph on Coniston Water, Lancashire, in England. 23 August 1939 The USSR and Germany sign a nonaggression agreement. Secret protocols provide for the partition of Poland and for the USSR to operate freely in the Baltic states, Finland, and the Romanian province of Bessarabia. 26 August 1939 The world's first regular advertisements on television are read live by the commentator in the interval of a baseball game in the USA. 27 August 1939 The Heinkel He 178 makes a test flight in Germany, achieving a speed of 500 kph/360 mph; it is the first jet aeroplane to fly. 1 September 1939 Germany invades Poland and annexes the free city of Danzig (now Gdansk). Italy declares its neutrality. 1 September 1939 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) stops television

broadcasting in the UK for the duration of the war in the middle of a Mickey Mouse film. Service is resumed in 1946. 3 September 1939 Britain and France declare war on Germany when it fails to respond to ultimatums following the German invasion of Poland. Australia and New Zealand also declare war on Germany. 3 September 1939 The Citizens' Advice Bureaux scheme is launched in the UK with the opening of 200 offices. 14 September 1939 Japanese troops advance south towards the Chinese port of Changsha, but are repulsed. This ends Japanese expansion in central China until 1944. 14 September 1939 The first effective helicopter, the VS-300, designed by Ukranian-born US engineer Igor Sikorsky, makes its first test flight. 17 September 1939 Red Army troops from the USSR invade Poland from the east, to effect the secretly agreed partition of Poland with Germany. 23 September 1939 Sigmund Freud, Austrian neurologist, founder of psychoanalysis, dies in London, England (83). 10 October 1939 The USSR signs a pact with Lithuania allowing Soviet troops to be stationed on Lithuanian territory (and in effect reducing the Baltic state to a Soviet colony). The city of Vilna (now Vilnius), formerly in Poland but taken by the USSR on 28 September, is returned to Lithuania. 4 November 1939 US president Franklin D Roosevelt signs a bill enabling belligerents in the war in Europe to buy arms in the USA on a 'cash and carry' basis, provided that such arms are carried in their own ships. Britain's naval blockade of German trade ensures that only Britain and France are able to take advantage of this provision. 18 November 1939 Margaret (Eleanor) Atwood, Canadian novelist, poet, shortstory writer, and critic, born in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. 30 November 1939 The USSR invades Finland, with its main offensive to the north of Lake Ladoga. Finland responds by declaring war on the USSR. 13–17 December 1939 The British heavy cruiser Exeter and light cruiser Ajax, and the New Zealand light cruiser Achilles engage the German 'pocket battleship'Graf Spee in the Battle of the Rio de la Plata (River Plate) in South America. It ends with the scuttling of the German warship off Montevideo, Uruguay. 1939 After the German annexation of Czechoslovakia and the invasion of Poland, the free press is closed down in both countries.

1939 Americans buy 45 million 'popular' music records and 5 million 'classical' records. 1939 Eastman Kodak in Rochester, New York, produces the first camera with synchronized flash for amateur use. 1939 For the first time Thanksgiving Day is celebrated on the fourth rather than the last Thursday in November in the USA, in order to guarantee a longer Christmas shopping period. 1939 German physicists Hans Bethe and Carl von Weizsäcker propose that nuclear fusion of hydrogen is the source of a star's energy. 1939 The 1938 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Spencer Tracy, for Boys Town; Best Supporting Actor: Walter Brennan, for Kentucky; Best Actress: Bette Davis, for Jezebel; Best Supporting Actress: Fay Bainter, for Jezebel; Best Film: You Can't Take It With You, directed by Frank Capra; Best Director: Frank Capra, for You Can't Take It With You. 1939 The character of Batman is created in the USA by Bob Kane and appears in Detective Comics. His sidekick Robin joins him shortly afterwards. 1939 The classic Western Stagecoach, directed by John Ford, is released in the USA, starring John Wayne, Claire Trevor, Thomas Mitchell, and George Bancroft. Also Ford's film Young Mr Lincoln, starring Henry Fonda is released in the USA. 1939 The English writer Rumer Godden publishes her novel Black Narcissus. A melodrama set in a convent in the Himalayas, it becomes a best-seller. 1939 The evacuation of around 650,000 children from London to rural England begins. Some 1.5 million people in total will move to the country for part of the war. 1939 The film Gone With the Wind, directed by Victor Fleming (with George Cukor and Sam Wood), is released in the USA, premiering in Atlanta, Georgia. Based on the novel by Margaret Mitchell, it stars Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable. One of the most commercially successful films of all time, it runs for 222 minutes and wins eight Academy Awards. 1939 The film Mr Smith Goes to Washington, directed by Frank Capra, is released in the USA, starring James Stewart, Claude Rains, Jean Arthur, Thomas Mitchell, and Edward Arnold. 1939 The film The Hunchback of Notre Dame, directed by the German filmmaker William Dieterle, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Victor Hugo, it stars Charles Laughton, Cedric Hardwicke, and Maureen O'Hara. 1939 The film musical The Wizard of Oz, directed by Victor Fleming and King

Vidor, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Frank L Baum, it stars Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, Bert Lahr, and Margaret Hamilton. 1939 The first pre-cooked frozen meals are marketed by General Foods in the USA under the Birds Eye label. 1939 The French physicists Frédéric Joliot and Irène Curie-Joliot demonstrate the possibility of a chain reaction when they split uranium nuclei. 1939 The Irish writer Flann O'Brien publishes his novel At Swim-Two-Birds. 1939 The Irish writer James Joyce publishes the final version of his novel Finnegan's Wake (parts had appeared as early as 1928). 1939 The Radio Corporation of America (RCA) develops the first experimental television sets in the USA. 1939 The Swiss artist Paul Klee paints La Belle Jardinière/The Beautiful Gardener. 1939 The US artist Ben Shahn paints Hard Ball. 1939 The US crime writer Raymond Chandler publishes his classic novel The Big Sleep, the first of his novels to feature his detective Philip Marlowe. 1939 The US humorist James Thurber publishes his story 'The Secret Life of Walter Mitty' in New Yorker magazine. In 1942 it is published in the collection My World – And Welcome to It. 1939 The US inventor Edwin Armstrong constructs the first FM radio transmitter station. 1939 The US writer John Steinbeck publishes his novel The Grapes of Wrath, a vivid account of the Depression in California. 1939 There are 2,012 films produced worldwide; 483 of these are produced in the USA. 1939 Two major designs by the US architect Frank Lloyd Wright are completed in the USA: the Kaufman House, 'Falling Water', in Bear Run, Pennsylvania; and the Johnson Wax Factory (with umbrella columns), in Racine, Wisconsin. 1939 Warner Brothers' designer Leona Gross Lax in the USA develops the concept of bra cup-sizing. 1939 Women gain the right to vote in the Philippines.

21 January 1940 Jack Nicklaus, US golfer, born in Columbus, Ohio. 12 March 1940 The Russo-Finnish war ends. Finland signs a peace treaty with the USSR, ceding the Karelian Isthmus, the shores of Lake Ladoga, the city of Viborg, and the Hango naval base. 200,000 Finns are evicted from the area. 10–13 April 1940 Several naval battles are fought between British and German forces off the port of Narvik in northern Norway; ten German destroyers (from a total of twenty) are sunk. Their loss, added to the loss of three (out of eight) cruisers in the invasion of Norway itself severely weakens the German navy's offensive capability. 14–17 April 1940 British forces land at Namsos (14 April), and Åndalsnes (17 April), Norway, to assist the Norwegians against the invading German forces. Units from Åndalsnes reach the city of Lillehamer (21 May) before withdrawing. 10 May 1940 German armoured forces begin to break through French and British defensive positions into northern France. 10 May 1940 The British prime minister Neville Chamberlain resigns following criticism for the failure of the British military expedition to Norway. Winston Churchill forms a coalition government, with Lord Halifax foreign secretary and Labour members Clement Attlee as Lord Privy Seal, Albert Alexander as First Lord of the Admiralty, and Ernest Bevin as minister of labour. 10–14 May 1940 German forces invade the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg. 14 May 1940 Recruiting begins for the Local Defence Volunteers (later the Home Guard) in Britain. 26 May–4 June 1940 Over 338,000 British, French, and Belgian troops are evacuated from Dunkirk, France to England by an unprecedented armada of small British boats, following the German encirclement of Allied forces in northeastern France. May 1940 Nylon stockings are marketed in the USA by a range of manufacturers and prove an instant success; however, nylon production is shortly to be taken up with military requirements. 15–17 June 1940 The USSR occupies the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, formally incorporating them into the USSR in August. 22 June 1940 France signs an armistice with Germany during World War II and is divided into two zones. The Germans occupy northern and southwestern France, and a so-called autonomous 'Vichy' French state is to control the remaining third of the country.

26–28 June 1940 The USSR demands Bessarabia and Bukovina from Romania. Romania requests German support for rejection of the demand, but the German Führer refuses. Romania cedes the territories on 27 June and they are occupied by Soviet troops on 28 June. 29 June 1940 Paul Klee, Swiss Abstract artist, dies in Muralto-Locarno, Switzerland (60). 3 July 1940 Britain's Royal Navy destroys most of the French fleet at Mers elKebir, Algeria, to prevent them being commandeered by the Germans. 10 July–18 August 1940 Bomber and fighter aircraft of the German Luftwaffe (air force) attack shipping convoys in British waters and English ports, in the first phase of the Battle of Britain. July 1940 Free milk is provided in the UK for mothers and children. 13 August 1940 The German Luftwaffe (air force) makes 1,786 sorties in the Battle of Britain, against 975 by the British Royal Air Force. It is known as 'Adler Tag' (Eagle Day), the most intense 24 hours of the Battle of Britain, and marks the beginning of 'Adlerangraft' (Eagle War), a two-week attack on RAF Fighter Command's aircraft, airfields, and installations. 21 August 1940 Leon Trotsky, communist theorist and activist, a leader in Russia's October Revolution of 1917, is assassinated in Coyaocán, near Mexico City, Mexico (61). 23 August 1940 An all-night German bombing raid on London, England, begins the period of intense bombing known as the 'Blitz'. 24 August 1940 Australian pathologist Howard Florey and German-born British biochemist Ernst Chain develop penicillin, in Oxford, England, for general clinical use as an antibiotic, announcing their results in The Lancet. 3 September 1940 The USA sells 50 veteran destroyers to Britain for use by the Royal Navy in World War II in return for a 99-year rent-free lease of bases in Newfoundland and the Caribbean. 4 September 1940 Ion Antonescu becomes prime minister of Romania and establishes a fascist dictatorship. King Carol II abdicates in favour of his son, Michael, and flees to Switzerland with his mistress, Magda Lupescu. 12 September 1940 Schoolboys discover Palaeolithic paintings and engravings in a cave at Lascaux, France. 25 September 1940 King Haakon of Norway is deposed, and Vidkun Quisling, leader of the Norwegian Nazi Party, is appointed prime minister by the German Reichscommissioner in Norway.

27 September 1940 Germany, Italy, and Japan sign the Tripartite Pact in Berlin, Germany, pledging mutual military and economic cooperation. 1 October 1940 The first modern limited-access toll highway in the USA, the Pennsylvania Turnpike, officially opens. It creates an economic boom along its route and heralds a new era in transportation in the USA. Other states begin constructing highways soon afterwards. 9 October 1940 John Lennon, English pop singer and songwriter, one of the Beatles, born in Liverpool, England (–1980). 23 October 1940 Pele (Edson Arantes do Nascimento), Brazilian footballer, born in Três Corações, Brazil. 24 October 1940 The 40-hour work week, declared by Congress in a 1938 law, goes into effect in the USA. 11–12 November 1940 Twenty-one British Swordfish naval torpedo-bombers from the aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious attack and cripple the Italian fleet at Taranto, southeast Italy, severally damaging the battleships Conte di Cavour, Littorio, and Caio Duilio. November 1940 Franklin D Roosevelt is re-elected US president for an unprecedented third term, with 449 Democratic electoral votes to the Republican Wendell Willkie's 82. The Democrats retain a 66–28 majority over the Republicans in the Senate and a 268–162 majority in the House of Representatives. November 1940 There are 3.3 million telephones and 8.9 million radios in use in the UK. 21 December 1940 F Scott Fitzgerald, US novelist and short-story writer, dies in Hollywood, California (44). 1940 About 4% of blacks and 14% of whites have completed four years of high school in the USA. 1940 British scientists John Turon Randall and Henry Albert Boot develop the cavity magnetron, which can generate high power at high frequencies (20,000 watts at 3,000 megahertz), making centimetric radar practical for the first time. The resulting smaller radar antennae make airborne radar a practicality. 1940 In the USA, about 5% of whites and about 1% of blacks have completed four years of college. 1940 In the USA, Colonel Sanders concocts his special recipe for Kentucky Fried Chicken.

1940 Rationing of basic foods begins in the UK, with bacon, butter, and sugar among the first items. 1940 Social security payments start in the USA. The first cheque is for $22.54. 1940 The 1939 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Robert Donat, for Goodbye Mr Chips; Best Supporting Actor: Thomas Mitchell, for Stagecoach; Best Actress: Vivien Leigh, for Gone with the Wind; Best Supporting Actress: Hattie McDaniel (the first black woman to win an Academy Award), for Gone With the Wind; Best Film: Gone With the Wind, directed by Victor Fleming; Best Director: Victor Fleming, for Gone With the Wind. 1940 The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) demonstrates its colour-television system, making the world's first broadcast in colour from the Chrysler Building, New York City. The system is based on a three-colour rotating disc developed by US engineer Peter Goldmark. 1940 The ecumenical community at Taizé, near Cluny, France, is founded by brother Roger Schutz of the Protestant French Reformed Church. The aim is to foster Christian unity. 1940 The English writer Graham Greene publishes his novel The Power and the Glory. 1940 The film Rebecca is released in the USA. It stars Joan Fontaine, Laurence Olivier, George Sanders, and Judith Anderson, and is the English director Alfred Hitchcock's first Hollywood film. 1940 The film The Grapes of Wrath, adapted from the novel by John Steinbeck, is released in the USA. It is directed by John Ford and stars Henry Fonda, Jane Darwell, and John Carradine. 1940 The film The Philadelphia Story, directed by George Cukor, is released in the USA, starring Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, and James Stewart. It is based on the play by Philip Barry. 1940 The film The Thief of Bagdad is released, produced by Alexander Korda, and directed by Michael Power and Ludwig Berger. An epic production, begun in the UK and completed in the USA after the outbreak of World War II, the film features Academy Award-winning Technicolor photography, special effects, and art direction, and stars Conrad Veidt and Sabu. 1940 The Hungarian-born British writer Arthur Koestler publishes Darkness at Noon, set in Russia during the Stalinist purges of the 1930s. 1940 The population of the world is estimated at 2.229 billion. 1940 The populations figures for the United Kingdom are (in millions): England

39.2; Wales 2.5; Scotland 4.9; Ireland/Northern Ireland 1.3. 1940 The US animators William Hanna and Joseph Barbera create the cartoon duo Tom (a cat) and Jerry (a mouse), who appear in their first cartoon Puss Gets the Boot. 1940 The US anthropologist Ruth Benedict publishes Race: Science and Politics, an attack on racism. 1940 The US writer and critic Edmund Wilson publishes To the Finland Station, a study of the thinkers who helped to create the Russian Revolution. 1940 The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, set during the Spanish Civil War. 1940 The US writer Walter van Tilburg Clark publishes his novel The Ox-Bow Incident. Based on a lynching, the novel brings considerable psychological and moral depth to the Wild West novel. 1940 US unemployment stands at 8 million: this represents 14.6% of the population. 1940 Walt Disney releases the cartoon animation film Fantasia. The classical music score includes Dukas's The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Disney also releases the animated film Pinocchio in the USA. 1940–1944 A large-scale migration of people from rural areas of the USA to the cities creates major urban problems. 1940–1949 Immigration into the USA for the period 1940–49 stands at 856,608. 1 January 1941 The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) begins regular television broadcasting (in competition with NBC). 13 January 1941 James Joyce, Irish novelist and poet, dies in Zürich, Switzerland (58). 24 March 1941 German and Italian forces commanded by the German general Erwin Rommel take El Algheila in Libya from the British 8th Army, the start of an offensive that will clear British troops from all of Libya apart from the besieged coastal town of Tobruk. 27 March 1941 Prince Paul, Regent of Yugoslavia, is deposed in a coup organized by air force officers exploiting the unpopularity of adherence to the Tripartite Pact between the Axis powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan). 28 March 1941 Virginia Woolf, English author and critic, dies near Rodmell, Sussex, England (59).

6 April 1941 German, Italian, and Bulgarian forces invade Yugoslavia, and German forces attack the Metaxas Line, Greece's main system of defences. 17 April 1941 Yugoslavia formally surrenders to the invading German forces. 21 April 1941 The Greek army surrenders to the invading German forces; the last British forces are evacuated from mainland Greece on 28 April. April 1941 Rice-rationing is introduced in Japan. 20 May 1941 President Roosevelt moves Thanksgiving to the last Thursday of November, ending a two-year experiment in which it was the fourth Thursday of the month. 24 May 1941 Bob Dylan (Robert Zimmerman), US singer and songwriter, known for his 'protest songs' of the 1960s, born in Duluth, Minnesota. 27 May 1941 The German battleship Bismarck, on its first and only sortie into the Atlantic, is sunk, after a long hunt, by units of Britain's Royal Navy west of Brest, France. 29–31 May 1941 British and allied forces evacuate the port of Iráklion, Crete, and withdraw to Egypt, leaving the Greek island of Crete under German occupation. 1 June 1941 Clothes are rationed in the UK and 'utility' clothing and furniture are introduced. 2 June 1941 Lou Gehrig, US professional baseball player, dies in New York City (37). 4 June 1941 Kaiser Wilhelm II, German emperor and king of Prussia 1888–1918, dies in Doorn, the Netherlands (82). 22 June 1941 Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the USSR, begins. 27 June 1941 Krzysztof Kieslowski, Polish film director and screenwriter, born in Warsaw, Poland (–1996). 29 July 1941 Romania reoccupies the territories of Bessarabia and Bukovina, which it had ceded to the USSR in June 1940. 14 August 1941 The British prime minister Winston Churchill and the US president Franklin D Roosevelt meet at the Placentia Bay conference on board the US cruiser Augusta. They sign the Atlantic Charter, condemning territorial changes and affirming human rights, which subsequently becomes the basis of the United Nations (UN) Declaration of Human Rights.

29 August 1941 Slobodan Miloševic, president of Serbia 1989–, thought to be responsible for much of the ethnic conflict in Yugoslavia, born in Pozarevac, Czechoslovakia). 3 October 1941 The US chemists Lyle D Goodhue and W N Sullivan patent the aerosol container. 5 December 1941–5 January 1942 Soviet armies of the Northwest, Volkhov, and Kalinin fronts, reinforced by units from Siberia, launch a counteroffensive north and south of Moscow to relieve pressure from the German Army Group Centre's advance on the Soviet capital. 6 December 1941 The 'Manhattan Project' starts in Chicago, Illinois, and Los Angeles, California, before being concentrated at Los Alamos in 1943 under the direction of US physicist Julius Robert Oppenheimer. Its aim is to develop an atomic bomb. 7 December 1941 Japanese naval aircraft make a surprise air attack on the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Four battleships and 140 aircraft are destroyed and 2,330 troops killed. 8 December 1941 The use of gas in the so-called 'final solution' to the Jewish problem begins when 2,300 Polish Jews are gassed at Chelmno, western Poland. 9 December 1941 The National Service Bill in the UK lowers the age of call-up to 181/2 and renders single women aged 20–30 liable to military service. 9–10 December 1941 Japanese aircraft sink the British battleship Prince of Wales and battlecruiser Repulse off the east coast of Malaya, leaving the Allies with no active battleship in the Pacific and severely weakening the defences of Singapore. 20 December 1941 President Roosevelt signs the Draft Act, which calls for all men 18 to 64 to register and all men 20 to 44 to be eligible for active duty. December 1941 In the USA, food prices are 61% above prewar levels. 1941 The Last Tycoon, an unfinished novel by the US writer F Scott Fitzgerald, is published posthumously. 1941 German mathematician Konrad Zuse develops a type of digital computer using binary codes, while working on ballistics. The machine has no memory capacity. 1941 One thousand three hundred and sixty Soviet heavy industrial plants are moved further east to continue production after the German invasion of the USSR.

1941 Selected population figures (in millions): China 450; India 389; USSR 182; US 131; Germany, including Austria, Slovakia, West Poland, etc., 110; Japan 105; Great Britain 47; Brazil 41; France 40. 1941 The 1940 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: James Stewart, for The Philadelphia Story; Best Supporting Actor: Walter Brennan, for The Westerner; Best Actress: Ginger Rogers, for Kitty Foyle; Best Supporting Actress: Jane Darwell, for The Grapes of Wrath; Best Film: Rebecca, directed by Alfred Hitchcock; Best Director: John Ford, for The Grapes of Wrath. 1941 The English artist Henry Moore begins drawing people huddled in the Underground (subway) during the London Blitz. 1941 The English composer Michael Tippett completes his choral work A Child of Our Time. 1941 The English-born US writer W H Auden publishes his poetry collection The Double Man (published in Britain as New Year Letter). 1941 The film Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles, is released in the USA. He also cowrites and stars in it, with Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore, and Everett Sloane. The US millionaire William Randolph Hearst threatens to sue the makers, regarding the film as personally defamatory. 1941 The film Jew Süss, directed by Veit Harlan, is released in Germany. A notorious travesty of an earlier film of the same name, this is an example of German anti-Semitic propaganda at its most repellent. It stars Ferdinand Marian, Werner Krauss, Heinrich George, and Kristina Söderbaum. 1941 The film The Maltese Falcon, directed by John Huston, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Dashiell Hammett, it stars Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre and Elisha Cook, Jr. 1941 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his Quartet for the End of Time, written while he is in a German prisoner-of-war camp. 1941 The French philosopher Etienne Gilson publishes God and Philosophy, lectures delivered at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. 1941 The German Protestant theologian Rudolf Bultmann publishes New Testament and Mythology. 1941 The German-born US psychologist Erich Fromm publishes Escape from Freedom. 1941 The German-born US political philosopher Herbert Marcuse publishes Reason and Revolution.

1941 The play Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder/Mother Courage and her Children, by the German writer Bertolt Brecht, is first performed, in Zürich, Switzerland. 1941 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his Symphony No. 7 during the siege of Leningrad by German forces. Dedicated to the defenders of the city, it becomes known as the Leningrad Symphony. It is first performed in Kuibyshev in the USSR in 1942. 1941 The Spanish artist Joan Miró completes his series of paintings Constellations. 1941 The UK government introduces 'double summer time', with clocks running two hours ahead of Greenwich Mean Time. 1941 The United Service Organization (USO) is formed in the USA to organize entertainments for Allied soldiers by performers such as Bob Hope and Bing Crosby. 1941 The US photographer Ansel Adams takes Moonrise, Hernandez. 1941 The US theologian Reinhold Niebuhr publishes the first volume of The Nature and Destiny of Man. The second volume will appear in 1943. 1941 The US writer Eugene O'Neill completes one of his best-known plays, Long Day's Journey into Night. It will not open until 1956. 1941 Unemployment is virtually eliminated in the UK. 1941 Walt Disney releases the cartoon animated film Dumbo in the USA. 1941 Women in Panama gain the right to vote on the same basis as men. 8 January 1942 Stephen Hawking, English theoretical physicist known for his theory of expanding black holes, born in Oxford, England. 11 January 1942 Japanese forces advancing through Malaya capture the capital, Kuala Lumpur. 17 January 1942 Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay), US professional boxer, born in Louisville, Kentucky. 20 January 1942 At the Wannsee Conference in Germany, which is chaired by Reinhard Heydrich, head of the Nazi secret police, Nazi officials discuss 'the final solution' of 'the Jewish question' (in effect, the annihilation of European Jewry). January 1942 Japanese troops seize Manila, the capital of the Philippines, forcing the US general Douglas MacArthur to retreat to the Battan peninsula on

the island of Luzon. January 1942 The US Office of Production Management bans retail sales of new cars and passenger trucks to shift the focus of the auto industry to the production of military vehicles. 9 February 1942 Clocks in the USA turn ahead one hour for daylight savings time, where they will remain for the duration of World War II. 15 February 1942 The strategic British colony and naval base of Singapore surrenders to Japanese forces, together with over 70,000 British and Commonwealth soldiers and airmen. British prime minister Winston Churchill later describes the event as 'the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history'. 28 February 1942 Japanese forces land on the island of Java in the Netherlands East Indies. 28 March 1942 Neil Kinnock, British politician, leader of the Labour Party 1983–92, born in Tredegar, Monmouthshire, Wales. 23–30 April 1942 In the Baedeker raids, named after the German tourist guidebooks, German aircraft bomb Exeter, Bath, and other historic cities in Britain in reprisal for British raids on Cologne and Lübeck. 24 April 1942 Barbra Streisand, US singer, actor, and director, born in Brooklyn, New York City. April 1942 Japanese forces overrun Burma, seize the town of Lashio near Mandalay, and close the Burma Road, the main supply route for China's war effort running from Lashio, Burma, to Kunming, China. 4–8 May 1942 US naval forces narrowly succeed in preventing a Japanese attempt to take the Allied base at Port Moresby, Papua, in the first great carrier battle of the Pacific War, the Battle of the Coral Sea. 14 May 1942 In the USA, women's military involvement in the war begins when Congress founds WAAC (Women's Auxiliary Army Corps). May 1942–November 1943 Japan constructs the Kwai Railway between Bangkok in Siam (modern Thailand) and Moulmein in Burma. Over 15,000 Allied prisoners of war and 90,000 native labourers die during its construction. 3–6 June 1942 US carrier planes sink the Japanese aircraft carriers Hiryu, Soryu, Kaga, and Akagi for the loss of the US carrier Yorktown in the Battle of Midway, off Midway Island in the Pacific. The naval balance in the Pacific war swings in the Allied favour.

10 June 1942 The German Gestapo (secret police) destroys the village of Lidice, Czechoslovakia, in reprisal for the killing of Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi 'protector' of Bohemia and Moravia, by Czech resistance fighters; 198 men are shot, 184 women sent to the Ravensbrück concentration camp, and 98 children deported. 1–4 July 1942 The British 8th Army under General Claude Auchinleck halts the advance of German troops under Field Marshal Erwin Rommel into British-held Egypt at the First Battle of El Alamein. 1–11 July 1942 Gunder Hägg of Sweden sets 10 world track records over a period of 82 days, including a new mile record time of 4 min 6.2 sec. 13 July 1942 Harrison Ford, US actor in many popular adventure films, born in Chicago, Illinois. July 1942 The German Messerschmidt Me 262 makes its first flight; it is the first operational jet aeroplane. 19 August 1942 Canadian and British forces raid the port of Dieppe in northeast France. The operation is a disaster, and casualties include 3,367 Canadians killed, wounded, or take prisoner. 3 October 1942 The V2 rocket, the ancestor of modern space rockets, is first launched, in Germany; weighing 40 tons it is 12 m/40 ft long, burns an alcoholliquid oxygen mixture, can reach a distance of 200 km/125 mi, a height of 97 km/60 mi, and travels at 5,300kph/3,300 mph. 24–26 October 1942 Two US aircraft carrier task forces engage the Japanese South Seas fleet under Vice-Admiral Nobutaki Kondo off the Santa Cruz Islands, near Guadalcanal. The Japanese aircraft carriers Zuiho and Shokaku are damaged, but the US carrier Hornet is sunk, leaving the damaged Enterprise the only operational Allied aircraft carrier in the Pacific. 17 November 1942 Martin Scorsese, US film writer and director, born in Flushing, Long Island. 27 November 1942 Jimi Hendrix, US rock singer and influential guitarist, born in Seattle, Washington (–1970). 28 November 1942 The Coconut Grove, a nightclub in Boston, Massachusetts, burns, killing 487 people. It is the worst single fire in the modern era. 2 December 1942 Italian physicist Enrico Fermi and his colleagues at the University of Chicago, Illinois, use thin layers of uranium oxide and graphite to create the first nuclear pile and initiate a controlled chain-reaction – the first nuclear reactor.

1942 A group of university academics in Oxford, England, concerned at the plight of children in occupied Greece, form the aid agency OXFAM (Oxford Committee for Famine Relief). They are headed by the classicist Gilbert Murray. 1942 The 1941 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Gary Cooper, for Sergeant York; Best Actress: Joan Fontaine, for Suspicion; Best Supporting Actress: Mary Astor, for The Great Lie; Best Film: How Green Was My Valley, directed by John Ford; Best Director: John Ford, for How Green Was My Valley. 1942 The Algerian-born French writer Albert Camus publishes his novel L'Etranger/The Outsider. 1942 The English churchman William Temple is appointed as archbishop of Canterbury, England, and publishes Christianity and the Social Order. 1942 The English writer Enid Blyton publishes the first of her Famous Five children's novels. 1942 The film Casablanca, directed by Michael Curtiz, is released in the USA. It stars Ingrid Bergman, Humphrey Bogart, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Peter Lorre, Dooley Wilson, and Sydney Greenstreet. 1942 The film The Magnificent Ambersons, directed by Orson Welles, is released in the USA, starring Joseph Cotten, Dolores Costello, Agnes Moorehead, and Tim Holt. Desperate for box office success, the film company RKO edit the film beyond recognition in Welles's absence, cutting over 40 minutes. No copy of the original is kept. 1942 The French artist Georges Braque paints Kitchen Table. 1942 The T-shirt is produced, designed specifically for the US Navy to allow freedom of movement and to absorb sweat. 1942 The US artist Edward Hopper paints Nighthawks. 1942 The US philosopher Susanne Langer publishes Philosophy in a New Key. 1942 The US photographer Gordon Parks takes American Gothic, Washington, DC. 1942 The US writer Wallace Stevens publishes two collections of poetry: Notes towards a Supreme Fiction and Parts of a World. 1942 Twentieth Century Fox insure the legs of film star and war pin-up girl Betty Grable with Lloyds of London for $1 million. 1942–1945 During the war, US women are recruited on a large scale for the war effort; between 1942 and 1945 the number of working women increases by 50%.

7 January 1943 Nikola Tesla, Croatian-born US electrical engineer who discovered the rotating magnetic field and invented a polyphase system of alternating current, dies in New York City (86). 14–24 January 1943 A conference is held at Casablanca in newly liberated Morocco between British prime minister Winston Churchill and US president Franklin Roosevelt. They agree to increase bombing of Germany and mount an invasion of Sicily to exploit Allied success in North Africa. They also demand the unconditional surrender of the Axis powers. 31 January 1943 The German 6th Army, commanded by Friedrich von Paulus, surrenders at Stalingrad (now Volgograd) in the USSR, to the Soviet armies encircling it. Over 200,000 Germans are killed and captured in a major blow for the Third Reich. 28 March 1943 Sergey Vasilevich Rachmaninov, Russian composer and piano virtuoso, dies in Beverly Hills, California (69). 29 March 1943 John Major, British politician, Conservative prime minister on the resignation of Margaret Thatcher in 1990, then again 1992–97, born in London, England. 27 April 1943 Judy Johnson makes her debut as the first professional woman jockey in a steeplechase race at the Pimlico Racetrack, Baltimore, Maryland. She has been granted a licence by the Maryland Jockey Club because of the shortage of male jockeys resulting from their enlistment to the armed forces. April 1943 In the USA, the wearing of helmets is made compulsory in the National Football League (NFL). 5 May 1943 The US Post Office begins postal zone numbers in 178 cities in order to speed delivery. 8 May 1943 The rebellion of Warsaw Jews against the Nazis is finally put down. Around 14,000 have died, and the 7,000 survivors are sent to the death camp at Treblinka, Poland. 16 May 1943 British bombers attack three dams in the Ruhr industrial region of Germany in Operation Chastise, using the rotating bouncing bombs designed by the British aeronautical engineer Barnes Wallis. Two dams are breached. 20–22 June 1943 Race riots break out in Detroit, Michigan, caused by the migration of 300,000 black Americans to the city for war industry jobs, leading to 35 deaths and injuring 600 people. Rioting also occurs in other US cities. 5 July 1943 German forces of Army Group Centre and Army Group South mount their last major offensive on the Eastern Front against well-prepared Soviet positions north and south of a huge salient around Kursk, USSR. Kursk is the largest tank battle in history, and fatally weakens German forces on the Eastern

Front. 10 July 1943 Arthur Ashe, US tennis player and the first black man to win a major men's singles championship, born in Richmond, Virginia (–1993). 1 August 1943 A race riot in Harlem, a black neighborhood in New York City, leads to the death of 5 people and $5 million in property damage. 23 August 1943 The Soviet army recaptures the city of Kharkov in the USSR from the Germans. 3 September 1943 Allied (British and US) forces land in mainland Italy; an armistice is signed between the Allies and the Italian government of Marshal Pietro Badoglio, the successor to the deposed dictator Benito Mussolini, on the same day. 15 September 1943 The former Italian prime minister Benito Mussolini establishes a new republican fascist government at Salò on Lake Garda, Italy. 29 September 1943 Lech Walesa, Polish labour activist and statesman, president of Poland from 1990, born in Popowo, Poland. 22 November 1943 Billie Jean King, US women's tennis player, born in Long Beach, California. 28 November–1 December 1943 At the Tehran Conference in Iran, President Franklin D Roosevelt of the USA and Prime Minister Winston Churchill of Britain outline to the Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin, the plan for an invasion of Germanoccupied France in 1944. 1 December 1943 Gas rationing begins in the USA. 17 December 1943 US president Franklin D Roosevelt signs the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, granting Chinese people resident in the USA the right to naturalization and permitting immigration of 105 Chinese citizens a year. December 1943 A system of balloting National Service boys to provide extra manpower in coal mines is introduced in the UK. In 1944–45, 21,000 ballotees, popularly known as 'Bevin boys', after Ernest Bevin, Minister of Labour, worked in the mines. 1943 A severe famine strikes Bengal. 1943 All-America Comics launch a new cartoon starring Wonder Woman, a female version of Superman. 1943 French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau invents the aqualung (or selfcontained underwater breathing apparatus, 'scuba'), the first fully automatic

compressed-air breathing apparatus. It allows him to dive to a depth of 64 m/210 ft. 1943 In Switzerland, Buhrle & Co. develop the first telephone answering machine, which is then manufactured under the name of Ipsophone. 1943 Jive, a faster, more danceable version of jazz, emerges as a popular musical style. 1943 Meat rationing is introduced in the USA. 1943 Nationwide salvage drives in the USA collect 255,513 tons of tin cans, 6 million tons of waste paper, and 26 million tons of iron and steel scrap. 1943 Russian-born US biologist Selman Abraham Waksman discovers the antibiotic streptomycin, which is used as a treatment for tuberculosis; he coins the term 'antibiotic' to describe the range of antibacterial drugs developed since the discovery of penicillin. 1943 The 1942 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: James Cagney, for Yankee Doodle Dandy; Best Supporting Actor: Van Heflin, for Johnny Eager; Best Actress: Greer Garson, for Mrs Miniver; Best Supporting Actress: Teresa Wright, for Mrs Miniver; Best Film: Mrs Miniver, directed by William Wyler; Best Director: William Wyler, for Mrs Miniver. 1943 The Algerian-born French writer Albert Camus publishes his influential philosophical study Le Mythe de Sisyphe/The Myth of Sisyphus. 1943 The Dutch artist Piet Mondrian completes his painting Broadway BoogieWoogie. 1943 The English artist Henry Moore sculpts Madonna and Child. 1943 The French writer and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre publishes L'Etre et le néant/Being and Nothingness. His most important philosophical work, it becomes a central text of the philosophy of existentialism. 1943 The French writer Antoine Marie Roger de Saint-Exupéry publishes his children's story Le Petit Prince/The Little Prince. 1943 The German writer Hermann Hesse publishes his novel Das Glasperlenspiel/ The Glass Bead Game. 1943 The Hungarian composer Béla Bartók completes his Concerto for Orchestra. 1943 The US medical establishment recognizes the 'pap' smear (named after Greek-born US physician George Nicholas Papanicolaou) for detecting cervical cancer. In 20 years cervical cancer drops from the first to the third most common

cause of death among US women. 1943 The US physicists John V Atanasoff and Clifford Berry build the Atanasoff–Berry computer; designed to solve linear equations, it uses vacuum tubes and stored programs. 1943 The worst rice crop for 50 years in Japan leads to deprivation. 1943 Two plays by the German writer Bertolt Brecht are first performed in Zürich, Switzerland: Der gute Mensche von Sezuan/The Good Woman of Sezuan and Leben des Galilei/The Life of Galileo. 23 January 1944 Edvard Munch, Norwegian painter of pyschological subjects such as The Scream, dies in Ekely, near Oslo, Norway (80). 27 January 1944 Soviet forces clear German troops from the Leningrad–Moscow railway line, ending the German siege of Leningrad after 900 days and over 1 million civilian deaths from starvation and enemy action. 9 February 1944 Alice Walker, US novelist, author of The Color Purple (1983), born in Eatonton, Georgia. 19–26 February 1944 German aircraft make their heaviest raids (known as the 'Little Blitz') on London, England, since May 1941. 20 February 1944 Saboteurs blow up a ferry on Lake Tinnsjo, Norway, destroying Germany's entire supply of 'heavy water' (for use in atomic research). 20–27 February 1944 During 'Big Week', a combined US–UK air assault on German aircraft-making capability, 18,874 tonnes/20,799 tons of bombs are dropped on selected targets in Germany. 11–18 April 1944 Soviet forces clear all of the Crimea, apart from the port of Sevastopol, of German troops. 11–18 May 1944 Allied forces finally break through the German Gustav Line at Monte Cassino, Italy, with Polish troops storming the monastery on 18 May. The German defeat enables Allied troops at Anzio to break out of the beachhead, and clears the way to Rome. 14 May 1944 George Lucas, US film director and producer, born in Modesto, California. 26 May 1944 There are street riots in Damascus after the Syrian government permits women to remove their veils in public. 6 June 1944 D-day marks the start of Operation Overlord. Allied forces (British, US, and Canadian) land on five beaches in Normandy, northwest France, against

heavy German opposition. 13 June 1944 Germany launches the first V1 (Vergeltungswaffen, 'retribution weapon') pilotless flying-bombs from mainland Europe against London, England, in retaliation against Allied bombing of German cities. 22 June 1944 The US president Franklin D Roosevelt signs the Servicemen's Readjustment Act, also known as the GI Bill of Rights. The act guarantees veterans a wide range of benefits, including money for college tuition and lowcost home mortgages. 1–22 July 1944 The Bretton Woods Conference in New Hampshire draws up financial plans for the post-war world after the expected defeat of Germany and Japan. 6 July 1944 A fire at the Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus in Hartford, Connecticut, kills 167 spectators. 18 July 1944 General Hideki Tojo is forced to resign as prime minister of Japan following the loss of the Pacific island of Saipan to US forces. He is succeeded by General Kuniaki Koiso. 20 July 1944 An abortive assassination attempt is made on the German Führer Adolf Hitler in his Rastenburg headquarters. The planter of the bomb, Count Claus von Stauffenberg, is shot the same evening. 28 July 1944 Armies of the Soviet 1st Belorussian Front recapture the city of Brest-Litovsk (now Brest), on the Polish-Soviet border, concluding Operation Bagration. The huge Soviet offensive has virtually destroyed German field marshal Ernst Busch's Army Group Centre. 1 August–2 October 1944 Polish resistance forces in Warsaw under General Tadeusz Bor-Komorowski (commander in chief of the Polish Home Army) rebel against the German occupation, but Soviet forces outside the city fail to assist them and the Soviet government bans the use of airfields to fly in supplies from the west. 14 August 1944 Production of consumer goods, such as vacuum cleaners and stoves, resumes in the USA. 19 August 1944 Henry Wood, English conductor, founder of the Promenade Concerts (the 'Proms') in 1895, dies in Hitchin, Hertfordshire, England (75). 21 August 1944 Allied troops encircle a large concentration of German armoured forces to the south of the town of Falaise, northwest France, as US forces link up with the steady British and Canadian advance southwards. Some 50,000 Germans are captured.

21 August–7 October 1944 At the Dumbarton Oaks Conference in Washington, DC, China, the USSR, the USA, and Britain draw up proposals for a new world organization, the future United Nations (UN). 24 August 1944 US units enter Paris, France, following the liberation of the city from German occupation, and a French unit is allowed to lead the procession into the city the following day. 17–28 September 1944 In Operation Market Garden in the Netherlands, US airborne troops land at Eindhoven and Nijmegen to seize bridges over the rivers Maas, Waal, and Rhine (Market), while British troops land at Arnhem on the Rhine to open a route to the Ruhr region in Germany (Garden). The landing at Arnhem is a disaster. 19 September 1944 Brian Epstein, the Beatles' manager, born in Liverpool, England (–1967). 14 October 1944 Erwin Rommel, German field marshal who commanded the Afrika Korps during World War II, chooses to commit suicide, in Herrlingen, near Urm, Germany, to avoid being prosecuted for his part in the attempt to assassinate Hitler on 20 July (52). 20 October 1944 General Douglas MacArthur of the USA, forced to evacuate the islands on 12 March 1942, fulfils his celebrated promise to return to the Philippines. 20 October 1944 Soviet and Yugoslav troops capture Belgrade, the Yugoslav capital, from the occupying German forces. 12 November 1944 British bombers sink the last German battleship, Tirpitz, in the Tromsö fjord, Norway, enabling Britain's large ships to be released for service in the Pacific. 16 December 1944 German forces launch the Battle of the Bulge, or Ardennes offensive, against the Allies in the Ardennes, a wooded plateau in Luxembourg and Belgium. It is the last major German offensive of World War II 1944 British biochemists Archer John Porter Martin and Richard Laurence Millington Synge invent paper chromatography. 1944 Family Allowance is introduced in the UK: it is a state payment to mothers for each child. 1944 In France, only four pre-war national newspapers – those that refused to collaborate with the occupying German authorities – are allowed to resume publication. 1944 The 1943 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Paul Lukas, for Watch on

the Rhine; Best Supporting Actor: Charles Coburn, for The More the Merrier; Best Actress: Jennifer Jones, for The Song of Bernadette; Best Supporting Actress: Katina Paxinou, for For Whom the Bell Tolls; Best Film: Casablanca, directed by Michael Curtiz; Best Director: Michael Curtiz, for Casablanca 1944 The Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges publishes Fictions. 1944 The Austrian-born British economist Friedrich von Hayek publishes The Road to Serfdom. 1944 The Dutch-born US artist Willem de Kooning paints Pink Lady. 1944 The English artist Barbara Hepworth sculpts Wood and Strings. 1944 The English novelist Joyce Cary publishes his novel The Horse's Mouth. 1944 The film Double Indemnity, directed by Billy Wilder, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by James M Cain and adapted for the screen by Raymond Chandler, it stars Fred MacMurray, Barbara Stanwyck, and Edward G Robinson, and becomes a landmark film in the evolution of the US film noir movement. Other film noirs this year include Laura, directed by Otto Preminger, and starring Dana Andrews, Gene Tierney, and Clifton Webb; Murder My Sweet (also known as Farewell, My Lovely), directed by Edward Dmytryk; Phantom Lady, directed by Robert Siodmak; and When Strangers Marry (also known as Betrayed), directed by William Castle. 1944 The French writer Jean Genet publishes his first novel Notre Dame des fleurs/Our Lady of the Flowers, written in prison. 1944 The German philosopher Ernst Cassirer publishes An Essay on Man: An Introduction to Human Culture. 1944 The play Huis Clos/In Camera (in the USA No Exit), by the French writer and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, is first performed, in Paris, France. It contains the famous line 'hell is other people'. 1944 The role of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) in genetic inheritance is first demonstrated by US bacteriologist Oswald Theodore Avery, US biologist Colin M MacLeod, and US biologist Maclyn McCarthy. 1944 The Russian composer Sergey Prokofiev completes his Symphony No. 5. 1944 The Soviet leader Joseph Stalin acts to re-establish communist rule in the USSR's non-Russian European regions. Using the pretext that various ethnic groups have collaborated with the Germans, he orders mass deportations and annuls autonomous regions. 1944 The US artist Clyfford Still paints No. 1.

1944 The US composer Aaron Copland completes his score for the ballet Appalachian Spring, with choreography by Martha Graham. It is first performed the same year in Washington, DC. 1944 The US Eastman Kodak company produces Kodacolor, a colour negative film which makes it possible to take colour pictures with a reasonably cheap camera. 1944 The US mathematician Howard Aitken builds the Harvard University Mark I, or Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator. The first programme-controlled computer, it is 15 m/50 ft long and 2.4 m/8 ft high, and its operations are controlled by a sequence of instruction codes on punched paper that operate electromechanical switches. Simple multiplication takes 4 sec and division 11 sec. 1944 The US social philosopher Lewis Mumford publishes The Condition of Man. 3 January 1945 The British 14th Army begins a new offensive in Burma, aimed at clearing Japanese forces from the remainder of the country. 4–11 February 1945 At the Yalta Conference in the Crimea, USSR, the US president, Franklin D Roosevelt, the British prime minister, Winston Churchill, and the Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin, plan for the division of post-war Germany into four occupied zones, with four zones in Berlin, the capital. 13–15 February 1945 British and US aircraft bomb the city of Dresden in eastern Germany, ostensibly to disrupt the transfer of German troops to the Soviet front. Over 60,000 people are killed and the city's historic centre is destroyed. 19 February–24 March 1945 US marines capture the Japanese island of Iwo Jima after fierce fighting, which results in over 21,000 US casualties. 28 February 1945 The US general Douglas MacArthur enters Manila, the capital of the Philippines, three years after being forced out by the Japanese. 26 March 1945 David Lloyd George, Welsh Liberal politician, British prime minister 1916–22, dies in Ty-newydd, Caernarvonshire, Wales (82). March 1945 Anne Frank, German Jew whose diary written while hiding from the Nazis has been translated into over 30 languages, dies in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp near Hanover, Germany (15). 3 April 1945 President Edvard Beneš of Czechoslovakia re-establishes a government in his native land, with the Socialist Zdenek Fierlinger as prime minister, Jan Masaryk as foreign minister, and the communist Václav Nosek as interior minister. 12 April 1945 Following the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, president of the USA, he is succeeded by Vice-President Harry S Truman.

12 April 1945 Franklin Delano Roosevelt, US statesman, 32nd president of the USA 1933–45 (re-elected three times), a Democrat, dies in Warm Springs, Georgia (63). 25 April 1945 The United Nations Conference on International Organization (UNCIO) in San Francisco, California, attended by representatives of 50 nations, drafts the Charter of the United Nations (UN). 25 April 1945 US and Soviet troops in Germany link up at Torgau on the River Elbe. 28 April 1945 Benito Mussolini, Italian prime minister 1922–43, first of Europe's fascist dictators, is shot by the Italian Resistance in Dongo, Italy (61). His mistress, Clara Petacci, and members of his entourage are also shot. 29 April 1945 The German Führer Adolf Hitler marries his mistress, Eva Braun, in their Berlin bunker. 30 April 1945 Adolf Hitler, German fascist leader of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party, dictator of Germany 1933–45, commits suicide in his bunker in Berlin, Germany (56). His mistress, Eva Braun, takes poison. 8 May 1945 General Alfred Jodl signs the official surrender of Germany in World War II in Reims, France, at 2:41 a.m., in the presence of US general Dwight D Eisenhower and other Allied officers. 8 May is celebrated as VE (Victory in Europe) Day in Western Europe and the USA. 23 May 1945 Heinrich Himmler, German Nazi leader, head of the SS, and organizer of the Nazi death camps, commits suicide after being captured in Lüneberg, Germany (44). 27 June 1945 The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) allocates thirteen channels for commercial television broadcasting. 16 July 1945 The first atomic explosion occurs when the nuclear device codenamed 'Trinity' is exploded near Alamogordo, New Mexico. On 6 August and 9 August similar devices are dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. 17 July–2 August 1945 At the Potsdam Conference in Germany, the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, the US president Harry S Truman, and the British prime minister (first Winston Churchill, then Clement Attlee after the Labour election victory of 26 July) organize the occupation of Germany following its surrender in World War II. 26 July 1945 Labour wins a landslide victory in the British general election, with 393 seats against the Conservatives' 199. Clement Attlee becomes prime minister, Ernest Bevin foreign secretary, and Hugh Dalton chancellor of the Exchequer.

6 August 1945 The US B-29 bomber Enola Gay drops an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, destroying two-thirds of the city. 9 August 1945 The US B-29 bomber Bock's Car drops an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, destroying half the city. 10 August 1945 Robert Goddard, US astronautics pioneer who developed modern rockets used for launching spacecraft, dies in Baltimore, Maryland (62). 14 August 1945 The Japanese emperor Hirohito proclaims Japan's acceptance of the Allies' terms for ending World War II in the Pacific and urges his people to accept the surrender. 15 August 1945 Rationing of petrol and fuel oil in the USA comes to an end. 17 August 1945 Indonesian leaders proclaim their country's independence from Dutch rule, but this is rejected by the Netherlands. 2 September 1945 Japan signs its capitulation on board the USS Missouri, marking the end of World War II. 8 October 1945 In Waltham, Massachusetts, Percy LeBaron Spencer patents the first microwave oven, which is used in restaurants and institutions. 24 October 1945 The United Nations (UN), with headquarters in New York City, comes into formal existence on the ratification of its Charter by 29 nations. 13 November 1945 General Charles de Gaulle is elected president of France's post-World War II provisional government in Paris. 20 November 1945 The trials of 24 leading Nazis opens before the Allied International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg, Germany. The Tribunal rules that an individual's obedience to orders is an insufficient defence for crimes committed against humanity. The trials continue until 31 August 1946. 21 November 1945–13 March 1946 United Auto Workers at the General Motors plant in Detroit strike for 113 days before gaining better wages and benefits; the strike is the first sign of post-war labor trouble. 23 November 1945 All rationing stops in the USA, with the exception of sugar. Food remains scarce everywhere else and the black market continues to exist throughout Europe. 29 November 1945 The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia is proclaimed, under Marshal Josip Broz Tito, leader of the communist resistance against Germany during World War II. 15 December 1945 The Japanese parliament, under pressure from Allied

occupation forces, grants women voting rights. 1945 A nuclear reactor using natural uranium and heavy water as both coolant and moderator (a material that slows down the fission process) begins operating at Chalk River, Ontario, Canada; a second reactor starts operation two years later. 1945 After a delay caused by the war, television broadcasting in the USA begins on a regular basis. 1945 Grand Rapids, Michigan, begins adding fluoride to its water to help prevent tooth decay; other cities in the USA soon follow. 1945 Macy's Thanksgiving Parade in the USA is televised for the first time. 1945 The 1944 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Bing Crosby, for Going My Way; Best Supporting Actor: Barry Fitzgerald, for Going My Way; Best Actress: Ingrid Bergman, for Gaslight; Best Supporting Actress: Ethel Barrymore, for None But the Lonely Heart; Best Film: Going My Way, directed by Leo McCarey; Best Director: Leo McCarey, for Going My Way 1945 The Allies effectively dismantle the production and distribution infrastructure of the film industry in Germany. 1945 The Austrian-born British philosopher Karl Popper publishes The Open Society and its Enemies. 1945 The Bosnian writer Ivo Andric publishes his novel Na Drini cuprija/The Bridge on the Drina. 1945 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) extends its range of radio programmes with the establishment of the Home Service and the Light Programme. 1945 The Czech composer Bohuslav Martinu completes his Symphony No. 4 and his Cello Concerto No. 2. 1945 The English novelist Evelyn Waugh publishes his novel about the Catholic English aristocracy, Brideshead Revisited. 1945 The English writer George Orwell publishes his novel Animal Farm, a satire directed against Stalinist Russia in particular, and totalitarianism in general. 1945 The English writer Henry Green publishes his novel Loving. 1945 The film Les Enfants du Paradis, directed by Marcel Carné, is released, starring Arletty, Jean-Louis Barrault, and Pierre Brasseur. Filmed in France during the German occupation, its treatment of passion and sacrifice embody the

French spirit in wartime. 1945 The film The Lost Weekend, directed by Billy Wilder, is released. Based on the 1944 novel of the same name by Charles Reginald Jackson, and focusing on the social problems caused by alcoholism, it stars Ray Miland, Jane Wyman, and Philip Terry. 1945 The first recorded music album sales chart is released, in the USA. 1945 The French artist Henri Matisse paints The Romanian Blouse. 1945 The French composer Darius Milhaud completes his Kaddisch, for voice and orchestra, and his Elégie/Elegy for piano and cello. 1945 The French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty publishes Phénoménologie de la perception/Phenomenology of Perception. 1945 The French writer and philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre publishes his novels L'Age de raison/The Age of Reason and Le Sursis/The Reprieve. They form the first two parts of his novel sequence Les Chemins de la liberté/The Roads to Freedom. 1945 The Italian writer Carlo Levi publishes Cristo si èfermato ad Eboli/Christ Stopped at Eboli, a lyrical account of his political exile in southern Italy. 1945 The opera Peter Grimes by the English composer Benjamin Britten is first performed, at the Sadler's Wells Theatre in London, England. 1945 The play The Glass Menagerie, by the US writer Tennessee Williams, is first performed, at the Plymouth Theater in New York City. 1945 The Polish-born US photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt takes The Kiss (V-J Day). 1945 The US chemist Earl W Tupper invents a range of sealable plastic bowls and containers – Tupperware – that will be sold through Tupperware parties in the home. 1945 There are 27.8 million telephones in the USA, or one telephone for every five people. 45% of homes have telephones. 1945 William Joyce, the Nazi propagandist known as 'Lord Haw-Haw', is captured and convicted in the UK of treason; he is hanged on 3 January 1946.

The making of global civilization (1946–2005)

20 January 1946 Charles de Gaulle resigns the presidency of the post-World War II French provisional government when he is frustrated by the parliamentary system in the implementation of his plans for post-war reconstruction. January 1946 In Japan, Emperor Hirohito repudiates the doctrine of the emperor's divinity. 1 February 1946 The Norwegian Labour politician Trygve Lie is elected the first secretary general of the United Nations (UN), serving until 1952. 24 February 1946 The army officer Juan Perón is elected president of Argentina, with 69% of the popular vote. 22 March 1946 Britain recognizes the independence of Transjordan, a British League of Nations mandate since the end of World War I. 21 April 1946 John Maynard Keynes, English economist concerned with the causes and solutions of long-term unemployment, dies in Firle, Scotland (60). 5 May 1946 Civil war breaks out in Greece between the British-backed monarchists and the communists supported by Albania, Bulgaria, and Yugoslavia. 1 June 1946 Television licences are introduced in the UK: around 7,500 are sold, at a cost of £2 each. 10 June 1946 Jack Johnson, US boxer and the first black person to win the world heavyweight boxing championship (1908–15), dies in Raleigh, North Carolina (68). 14 June 1946 John Logie Baird, Scottish engineer who was the first to televise moving pictures, dies in Bexhill-on-Sea, Sussex, England (57). 14 June 1946 King Umberto II and his male heirs are permanently banished from Italy after the popular vote for a republican constitution. 5 July 1946 French designer Louis Réard launches the bikini, naming it after the nuclear-test site Bikini Atoll. 12 July 1946 Pius XII becomes the first pope to appear on television when the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) broadcasts a papal address from the Vatican. 22 July 1946 Zionist terrorists, intent on forcing Britain to set up a Jewish state in Palestine, blow up part of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem containing British government and military offices, killing 91 people. 29 July 1946 Gertrude Stein, US avant-garde writer and eccentric, dies in Paris, France (72).

July 1946 The US president Harry S Truman proclaims the independence of the Philippines from the US. 13 August 1946 H G Wells, English novelist, sociologist, and historian, who wrote The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, and The Invisible Man, dies in London, England (70). 19 August 1946 (William Jefferson) 'Bill' Clinton, US Democratic politician, 42nd president of the USA from 1993, born in Hope, Arkansas. 1 October 1946 The International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, Germany, announces its verdict on Nazi war criminals: Joachim von Ribbentrop, Hermann Goering, and ten other leading Nazis (including Martin Bormann, tried in absentia) are sentenced to death, and Rudolf Hess, Walter Funk, and Erich Raeder to life imprisonment. Four others receive long sentences, but Hjalmar Schacht, Franz von Papen, and Hans Fritzsche are acquitted. 15 October 1946 The former leading Nazi and head of the Luftwaffe (German air force) Hermann Goering, awaiting execution for war crimes, commits suicide in Nuremberg Prison, Germany, by taking poison. 7 December 1946 In the worst hotel fire in US history, 127 die in a blaze at Winecoff Hotel in Atlanta. 10 December 1946 Damon Runyon, US short-story writer and journalist, dies in New York City (62). 19 December 1946 The French Indochina War (for Vietnamese independence) begins, and Ho Chi Minh, the leader of the Vietminh (Vietnam Independence League), seeks refuge in a remote area of North Vietnam. 24 December 1946 The Fourth Republic is declared in France when a new constitution is narrowly ratified by a referendum. December 1946 Nylon stockings, the first commercial nylon goods to be manufactured in Britain, go on sale in London, England. 1946 The Idea of History by the English philosopher R G Collingwood is published posthumously. 1946 Achille Gaggia invents the espresso coffee machine in Italy. 1946 Cygnus A, the first radio galaxy (a galaxy that is a strong source of electromagnetic waves of radio wavelength), and the most powerful cosmic source of radio waves, is discovered by the English physicist James Hey. 1946 ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator, Analyser, and Calculator), the first general purpose, fully electronic digital computer, is completed at the University

of Pennsylvania for use in military research. It uses 18,000 vacuum tubes instead of mechanical relays, and can make 4,500 calculations a second. It is 24 m/80 ft long and is built by electrical engineers John Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, with input from John Atanasoff. 1946 Mexican women gain the right to vote on the same basis as men. 1946 Populations (in millions): China, 455; India, 311; USSR, 194; USA, 140; Japan, 73; West Germany, 48; Italy, 47; Britain, 46; Brazil, 45; France, 40; Spain, 27; Poland, 24; Korea, 24; Mexico, 22; East Germany, 18; Egypt, 17. 1946 Procter & Gamble introduces Tide, the first commercially available domestic detergent to wash clothes. 1946 The 1945 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Ray Milland, for The Lost Weekend; Best Supporting Actor: James Dunn, for A Tree Grows in Brooklyn; Best Actress: Joan Crawford, for Mildred Pierce; Best Supporting Actress: Anne Revere, for National Velvet; Best Film: The Lost Weekend, directed by Billy Wilder; Best Director: Billy Wilder, for The Lost Weekend. 1946 The Cultural Relaxation Centre (COC) in the Netherlands is the first cultural facility in the world established for homosexuals. 1946 The English composer Benjamin Britten completes his Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell). 1946 The English computer scientist Maurice Wilkes writes the first assembly language – a mnemonic code using alphabetic symbols that translates instructions into computer machine language. 1946 The English writer Mervyn Peake publishes his fantasy novel Titus Groan. 1946 The Estée Lauder beauty products empire is launched with Estée Lauder's first sales to Saks, New York City. 1946 The Exchange National Bank in Chicago, Illinois, becomes the first drive-in bank. 1946 The film A Matter of Life and Death (titled Stairway to Heaven in the USA) is released in the UK. It is written, produced, and directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, and stars David Niven, Kim Hunter, and Roger Livesey. 1946 The film Great Expectations, directed by David Lean, is released in the UK. Based on the novel by Charles Dickens, it stars John Mills, Bernard Miles, Finlay Currie, Martita Hunt, Valerie Hobson, and Jean Simmons. 1946 The film It's a Wonderful Life, directed by Frank Capra, is released in the USA, starring James Stewart, Henry Travers, Donna Reed, and Lionel Barrymore.

1946 The film The Best Years of Our Lives, directed by William Wyler, is released in the USA. Focusing on the difficulties of reintegration for returning soldiers, it stars Fredric March, Myrna Loy, Teresa Wright, and Dana Andrews. 1946 The first completely automated production lines are introduced at the Ford Motor Company in the USA. 1946 The French constitution recognizes women's equality in most political areas. 1946 The French poet Jacques Prévert publishes his poetry collection Paroles/ Words. 1946 The Fulbright scholarships are instituted in the USA to enable US citizens to study abroad and people from abroad to study in the USA. 1946 The Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis publishes his novel Víos kai politía tou Aléxi Zormá/Zorba the Greek. 1946 The Guatemalan writer Miguel Angel Asturias publishes his novel El señor Presidente/The President. 1946 The musical Annie Get Your Gun, with words and music by Irving Berlin, is first performed in New York City. One of its best-known songs is 'There's No Business Like Show Business'. 1946 The play An Inspector Calls , by the English writer J B Priestley, is first performed, in London, England. 1946 The play The Iceman Cometh, by the US writer Eugene O'Neill is first performed, at the Martin Beck Theater in New York City. 1946 The ranch house, a one-story design, becomes the most popular style in the USA's growing suburbs. 1946 The report produced by the Reith Committee in the UK leads to the founding of New Towns as growth points in Britain, with Stevenage the first New Town to be built. 1946 The US artist Mark Rothko paints Sacrifice. 1946 The US biologists Max Delbrück and Alfred D Hershey discover recombinant DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) when they observe that genetic material from different viruses can combine to create new viruses. 1946 The US composer Elliot Carter completes his Elegy for string orchestra. 1946 The US novelist and academic Robert Penn Warren's novel All the King's

Men, based on the career of Louisiana governor Huey Long, is published. 1946 The US paediatrician Benjamin Spock publishes The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care. The book becomes an unexpected best-seller and a generation of children is raised according to its permissive guidelines of parental understanding and flexibility. 1946 The US physicists Edward Mills Purcell and Felix Bloch independently discover nuclear magnetic resonance, which is used to study the structure of pure metals and composites. 1946 The US writer John Hersey publishes Hiroshima, a classic account of the atomic bomb explosion over the Japanese city, filling an entire issue of New Yorker magazine. 1946 The Welsh writer Dylan Thomas publishes his poetry collection Deaths and Entrances. 1946 Vespa scooters are brought onto the Italian market by Enrico Piaggio as a cheap form of transportation. Vespa means 'wasp' in Italian and refers to the noisiness of the engines. 1946 Women are granted a statutory right to equal pay in France. 1946 Women gain the vote in Italy. 1946–1948 The Swiss physicist Auguste Piccard constructs the bathyscaph FNRS 2, a navigable diving vessel designed for deep descent into the ocean. 25 January 1947 Al Capone, US gangster, dies in Miami Beach, Florida (48). 10 February 1947 By a treaty signed in Paris, France, Italy loses the Dodecanese Islands to Greece and border territories to France and Yugoslavia; Romania loses Bessarabia and North Bukovina to the USSR but regains Transylvania; Bulgaria retains South Dobrudja; Hungary regains its 1938 frontiers; and Finland cedes Petsamo (now Pechenga) to the USSR. 12 March 1947 The US president Harry S Truman announces a plan (the Truman Doctrine) to give aid to Greece, which is threatened by communist insurrection, and to Turkey, which is under pressure from Soviet expansion. 7 April 1947 Henry Ford, US industrialist who developed the mass-production of cheap Ford cars, dies in Dearborn, Michigan (82). 15 April 1947 Jackie Robinson becomes the first black American player in major league baseball since Moses Fleetwood Walker in 1884 when he plays for the Brooklyn Dodgers against the Boston Braves. Five days earlier Robinson joined the Dodgers from the Montreal Royals of the International League.

21 April 1947 The first airport duty-free shop is opened at Shannon Airport in Eire. 5 May 1947 The Japanese parliament adopts an equal-rights amendment that bans discrimination by sex and gives women the power to bring lawsuits charging bias. 16 May 1947 Frederick Gowland Hopkins, English biochemist who discovered vitamins, dies in Cambridge, England (85). 5 June 1947 The US secretary of state, General George C Marshall, calls for a European Recovery Programme (the Marshall Plan) funded by the USA, to forestall the emergence of communist governments throughout the continent. 11 June 1947 Sugar rationing comes to an end in the USA. 15 August 1947 British rule in India ends after 163 years and the two new independent countries of India and Pakistan are established. Jawaharlal Nehru becomes prime minister of India, and Mohammed Ali Jinnah governor general of Pakistan, with Liaquat Ali Khan as prime minister. 9 September 1947 Women in Argentina gain the right to vote thanks to the efforts of First Lady Eva Perón. 4 October 1947 Max Planck, German theoretical physicist who was the originator of quantum theory, dies in Göttingen, Germany (89). 5 October 1947 US president Harry S Truman makes the first presidential address to the nation on television. 14 October 1947 US test pilot Major Charles 'Chuck' Yeager becomes the first person to fly faster than the speed of sound; he does it in a Bell X-1 rocket plane which reaches Mach 1.06 (1,207 kph/750 mph) October 1947 Abraham Levitt & Sons builds Levittown on Long Island, New York, for war veterans; this starts the trend towards mass suburbanization in the USA. 20 November 1947 The wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten takes place in Westminster Abbey, London, England. 25 November 1947 Prompted by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) hearings, which are intended to expose alleged communists working in Hollywood, the US film industry blacklists a number of writers and producers. 29 November 1947 Petra Kelly, German political activist, cofounder of the Green Party, born in Günzburg, West Germany (–1992). December 1947 The play A Streetcar Named Desire, by the US writer Tennessee

Williams, is first performed, in New York City, directed by Elia Kazan and starring Marlon Brando. 1947 La Pesanteur et la grâce/Gravity and Grace by the French philosopher and mystic Simone Weil is published posthumously. 1947 Lettere del carcere/Prison Notebooks by the Italian political thinker Antonio Gramsci is published posthumously. 1947 At Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah, British racing driver John Cobb extends his world land-speed record from 595.02 kph/369.74 mph, set in 1939, to 634.37 kph/394.19 mph. On one of the two runs necessary for the record, he becomes the first person to exceed 400 mph on land, attaining a speed of 648.7 kph/403.1 mph. 1947 English economist William Beveridge publishes his Report on Social Insurance and Allied Services. The work of Beveridge is to provide the foundation of the welfare society in the post-war years. 1947 English physiologists Alan Hodgkin and Andrew Huxley insert microelectrodes into the giant nerve fibres of the squid Loligo forbesi to discover the chemical and electrical properties of the transmission of nerve impulses. 1947 In Germany, the news magazine Der Spiegel is published. 1947 In the USA, 18% of white males and 16% of white females finish four years of high school; the corresponding figures for blacks are 8% and 9%. 1947 In the USA, 5.4% of white men and 3.7% of white women complete four years of college; the corresponding figures for blacks are 2.3% and 2.6%. 1947 Kenneth Wood designs the Kenwood Chef, the first food processor, in Woking, England. 1947 Reynolds Metals introduces an aluminium foil for use in the kitchen, in Louisville, Kentucky. 1947 The 1946 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Fredric March, for The Best Years of Our Lives; Best Supporting Actor: Harold Russell, for The Best Years of Our Lives; Best Actress: Olivia de Havilland, for To Each His Own; Best Supporting Actress: Anne Baxter, for The Razor's Edge; Best Film: The Best Years of Our Lives, directed by William Wyler; Best Director: William Wyler, for The Best Years of Our Lives. 1947 The Algerian-born French writer Albert Camus publishes his novel La Peste/ The Plague. 1947 The Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg completes his vocal work A

Survivor from Warsaw, for speaker, male chorus, and orchestra. 1947 The British jockey Gordon Richards rides 269 winners in the flat race season, breaking his own record of 259 winners set in 1933. 1947 The comic opera Albert Herring by the English composer Benjamin Britten is first performed, at Glyndebourne, England. Britten also completes A Charm of Lullabies for voice and piano. 1947 The Dead Sea Scrolls are discovered by shepherd boys in a cave near the Dead Sea in Palestine; stored in earthen jars, the Hebrew manuscripts date from the mid-3rd century BC to AD 68. 1947 The English historian Hugh Trevor-Roper publishes The Last Days of Hitler. 1947 The English writer Malcolm Lowry publishes his finest novel Under the Volcano. 1947 The English-born poet W H Auden (who took US citizenship in 1946) publishes his long poem The Age of Anxiety: A Baroque Eclogue. It wins a Pulitzer prize in 1948. 1947 The film Crossfire, directed by Edward Dmytryk, is released in the USA. Typical in style of the films noirs made in Hollywood after the end of the war, it stars Robert Young, Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan, and Gloria Grahame. 1947 The first microwave ovens go on sale, in the USA, but the public are slow to buy them. 1947 The first recorded sighting of an unidentified flying object (UFO) is made in the sky over Kansas, by Kenneth Arnold. 1947 The German philosophers Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer publish Dialektik der Aufklärung/Dialectic of Enlightenment. 1947 The German writer Thomas Mann publishes his novel Doktor Faustus. 1947 The Marriage Guidance Council is set up in Sheffield, England, specifically to help couples adjust to changing roles after the war. 1947 The Martinique writer Aimé Césaire publishes Cahier d'un retour au pays natal/Return to My Native Land. 1947 The play L'Invitation au château/Ring Around the Moon , by the French writer Jean Anouilh, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1947 The poliomyelitis virus is isolated by US physician Jonas E Salk.

1947 The printed circuit board is developed by British scientist John Sargrove. Because the layout of wiring is planned, it greatly simplifies the production of radio and television. 1947 The Swiss artist Alberto Giacometti sculpts Man Pointing, one of the earliest of the tall, thin sculptures for which he becomes known. 1947 The US artist Jackson Pollock paints Cathedral. This is one of the earliest examples of his characteristic drip-and-splash style of abstract expressionism. 1947 The US-Hungarian mathematician John Von Neumann introduces the idea of a stored-program computer, in which both instruction codes and data are stored. 1947 US chemist and physicist Willard Libby develops carbon-14 dating. 1947 US inventor Edwin Land causes a revolution in photography when he develops the 'Polaroid Land Camera', a camera that develops and prints photographs in 60 seconds; it goes on sale on 26 November the following year. 1947–1957 Weekly attendance at US movie theatres decreases by 50% during this period, with the spread of television. 1 January 1948 The Benelux Customs Union comes into effect, creating a freetrade zone between Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. It is a significant step towards closer European integration. 4 January 1948 Burma achieves independence from Britain and becomes a republic. 30 January 1948 Mahatma Gandhi (honorific name of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi), leader of the nationalist movement to free India from British rule, assassinated in Delhi, India (78). 30 January 1948 Orville Wright, US pioneer of aviation who, with his brother Wilbur, was the first to achieve sustained powered flight, dies in Dayton, Ohio (76). February 1948 Sergey Mikhaylovich Eisenstein, Russian film director, dies in Moscow, USSR (50). 15 March–12 April 1948 Over 200,000 US coal miners strike for more generous pension benefits. They return to work on April 12 after the United Mine Workers union president, John L Lewis, reaches an agreement with mine operators. 22 March 1948 Andrew Lloyd Webber, English composer of popular musicals with lyricist Tim Rice, born in London, England. 15 May 1948 The British mandate in Palestine ends, and the Jewish authorities

proclaim the new state of Israel, with David Ben-Gurion as prime minister. Egypt, Transjordan, Iraq, and Syria invade Israel and occupy areas in the south and east. 3 June 1948 The 5-m/200-in Hale reflector telescope is opened at Mount Palomar Observatory, California; it remains the world's largest and most powerful telescope until 1974. 20 June 1948 The variety programme The Toast of the Town, which later becomes The Ed Sullivan Show, is broadcast on US television by the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS). Performers who appear on the programme include Elvis Presley, Albert Schweitzer, Irving Berlin, Hedy Lamarr, Walt Disney, Fred Astaire, and the Beatles. 24 June 1948 The USSR blockades road and rail traffic between the German city of Berlin and the West, in response to the currency reform of 20 June in the western zones of Germany. The blockade forces the Western powers to organize a massive airlift to bring in supplies for the US, British, and French zones of Berlin, which continues until 30 September 1949. 28 June 1948 Yugoslavia is expelled from the Cominform (Communist Information Bureau) for its hostility to the USSR. June 1948 The American John Grimek wins the first Mr Universe contest. 23 July 1948 D W Griffith, US pioneer of film-making, dies in Hollywood, California (73). 29 July 1948 To coincide with the opening day of the Olympic Games in London, England, the inaugural national Stoke Mandeville Games, the forerunner of the Paralympics for disabled athletes, are held at Stoke Mandeville hospital, Buckinghamshire, England. 15 August 1948 The Republic of Korea is proclaimed in the city of Seoul, ending the US military administration of World War II in southern Korea. 16 August 1948'Babe' Ruth, US professional baseball player, dies in New York City (53). August 1948 At the Olympic Games in London, England, 30-year-old mother of two Fanny Blankers-Koen of the Netherlands wins gold medals in the 100 metres, 200 metres, 80-metre hurdles, and the 4 × 100-metre relay. 9 September 1948 The Supreme People's Assembly in North Korea proclaims the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, with Pyongyang as its capital, and claims authority over the entire country of Korea. The prime minister is Kim Il Sung. 11 September 1948 Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Indian/Pakistani Muslim politician, founder and first premier of Pakistan 1947–48, dies in Karachi, Pakistan (71).

24 October 1948 In speech to a US Senate committee, Bernard Baruch popularizes the phrase 'Cold War'. 12 November 1948 The main Japanese war crimes trial ends in Tokyo. The former prime minister during World War II, Hideki Tojo, and six others are sentenced to death; 16 receive life imprisonment; and two are given lesser sentences. 14 November 1948 Charles Philip Arthur George, British heir to the throne, eldest child of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, born in Buckingham Palace, London, England. December 1948 In the USA, the McDonald brothers open the first McDonalds when they convert their drive-in to a self-service hamburger restaurant. They grant Ray Kroc all franchise rights 12 years later, which begins the expansion that will make it the world's largest fast-food company. 1948 Abortion is freely available in Japan, where overpopulation continues to be a problem. The population stands now at about 80 million. 1948 Albanian missionary Agnes Bojaxhiu, better known as Mother Teresa, forms the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India. 1948 All Commonwealth citizens qualify for British passports by the passing of the British Citizenship Act. 1948 Bread rationing in Britain comes to an end. 1948 By the Displaced Persons Act, Congress permits some 400,000 homeless people to settle in the USA. 1948 Hungarian-born British physicist Dennis Gabor invents holography, the production of three-dimensional images. 1948 In New York City, the musical Kiss Me, Kate, with lyrics by Bella and Samuel Spewack, and music by Cole Porter, is first performed. It is based on William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. 1948 In the USA, the Baskin–Robbins ice cream chain is started when Burton 'Butch' Baskins and Irvine Robbins merge their ice cream parlours. They soon start to franchise the name. 1948 Manchester University in Manchester, England, demonstrates a computer with a simple memory, which permits some software development. The storedprogram electronic computer, Mark I, designed by Tom Kilurn, is the first to use Von Neumann architecture and stores data in a type of cathode ray tube (Williams tube).

1948 One million homes have television sets in the USA, compared to 5,000 in 1945. 1948 The 1947 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Ronald Colman, for A Double Life; Best Supporting Actor: Edmund Gwenn, for Miracle on 34th Street; Best Actress: Loretta Young, for The Farmer's Daughter; Best Supporting Actress: Celeste Holm, for Gentleman's Agreement; Best Film: Gentlemen's Agreement, directed by Elia Kazan; Best Director: Elia Kazan, for Gentlemen's Agreement. 1948 The British solicitor's clerk Anthony Pratt develops the board game Cluedo. It is later marketed in the USA under the name Clue. 1948 The Consolidated B-36 bomber is introduced in the US Air Force. With a range of 16,000 km/10,000 mi, it is the first intercontinental bomber. 1948 The English photographer Bill Brandt publishes Camera in London, a book of his photographs. 1948 The English writer Graham Greene publishes his novel The Heart of the Matter. 1948 The English writer Henry Green publishes his novel Concluding. 1948 The Exhibition Hall in Turin, Italy, designed by the Italian architect Pier Luigi Nervi, is constructed. It is a single-roof structure made of undulating prefabricated concrete. 1948 The film Ladri di biciclette/Bicycle Thieves, directed by Vittori De Sica, is released in Italy, starring Lamberto Maggiorani and Enzo Staiola. 1948 The film The Naked City, directed by US-born French film-maker Jules Dassin, is released in the USA, starring Barry Fitzgerald, Don Taylor, and Howard Duff. 1948 The film Whisky Galore (known in the USA as Tight Little Island), directed by Alexander Mackendrick, is released in Britain. A classic Ealing film, it is based on the novel by Compton Mackenzie and stars Basil Radford, Joan Greenwood, Gordon Jackson, and James Robertson Justice. 1948 The first atomic clock is installed at the National Bureau of Standards, Washington, DC; it is based on the oscillation of the ammonia molecule and operates using the natural vibrations of atoms. It is extremely accurate, with an error margin of 2 seconds in every 2 million years. 1948 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his Turangalîla Symphony and his vocal work 5 Rechants. 1948 The German composer Richard Strauss completes his Vier letzte Lieder/

Four Last Songs. 1948 The play Les Bonnes/The Maids, by the French writer Jean Genet, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1948 The romantic comedy The Lady's Not for Burning, by the English writer Christopher Fry, is first performed, in the Arts Theatre in London, England. 1948 The Russian-born US physicist George Gamow and US physicist Ralph Alpher develop the 'Big Bang' theory of the origin of the universe, which says that a primeval explosion led to the universe expanding rapidly from a highly compressed original state. 1948 The South African writer Alan Paton publishes Cry, the Beloved Country, a novel which brings international attention to apartheid in South Africa. 1948 The US artist Andrew Wyeth paints Christina's World. 1948 The US monk Thomas Merton publishes Seven Storey Mountain, an autobiography published in Britain as Elected Silence. 1948 The US theologian Paul Tillich publishes The Shaking of the Foundations. 1948 The US writer Ezra Pound publishes his poems The Pisan Cantos, sections of the Cantos Pound has been working on since 1915. 1948 The US writer Norman Mailer publishes The Naked and the Dead. A novel depicting the lives of US soldiers in World War II, it quickly becomes a best-seller. 1948 The US-born British writer T S Eliot publishes his critical study Notes Towards the Definition of Culture. 1948 US biologist Alfred Mirsky discovers ribonucleic acid (RNA) in chromosomes. 1948 US physicists John Bardeen, William Bradley Shockley, and Walter Brattain develop the transistor in research at Bell Telephone Laboratories in the USA. A solid-state mechanism for generating, amplifying, and controlling electrical impulses, it revolutionizes the electronics industry by enabling the miniaturization of computers, radios, and televisions, as well as the development of guided missiles. 1948–1955 The German Protestant theologian Rudolph Bultmann publishes his multivolume Kerygma und Mythos/Kerygma and Myth. 20 January 1949 Making his inaugural address, President Harry S Truman of the USA announces his Fair Deal: a liberal domestic reform programme that extends social security, raises the minimum wage, and increases public housing legislation. He also announces a four-point programme that includes economic

aid for underdeveloped countries. 25 January 1949 Awards for television are inaugurated in the USA: the first Emmy awards are presented by Walter O'Keefe in Hollywood, California. 25 January 1949 The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon) is formed in Moscow to further economic cooperation between the USSR and its satellites (Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Albania, with Yugoslavia as an associated member). 1 February 1949 Clothes rationing ends in the UK. 27 February–2 March 1949 The US B-50 bomber Lucky Lady II is the first aeroplane to fly nonstop around the world, refuelling in midair and completing 37,734 km/23,452 mi in 94 hr 1 min. 4 April 1949 The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is founded to provide mutual support against the Soviet military presence in eastern Europe. The treaty is signed by the USA, Canada, Britain, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Portugal, Denmark, Iceland, and Norway. 9 April 1949 In the USA, the first telethon is presented by Milton Berle in aid of cancer research. It runs for 14 hours and raises more than $1 million. 18 April 1949 Eire is formally proclaimed the Republic of Ireland and leaves the Commonwealth. 4 May 1949 Seventeen members of the Torino (Turin) football team, which is on the verge of winning its fifth consecutive Italian League Championship, are killed in a plane crash at Superga, on the outskirts of Turin, in Italy. 9 May 1949 The first self-service launderette in Britain opens in London, England, with Bendix Home Appliances Ltd supplying the fully automatic washing machines. 23 May 1949 The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) comes into being, with Bonn as its capital. West Berlin is excluded from the new state but associated with it. May 1949 EMI sets up the first permanent closed-circuit television system in Britain, in Guy's Hospital in London, England. 3 August 1949 In the USA, the Basketball Association of America merges with the National Basketball League to form the National Basketball Association (NBA). August 1949 BINAC (acronym for binary automatic computer) is built by US scientists John W Mauchly and John Presper Eckert. It is the first electronic stored-program computer to store data on magnetic tape.

12 September 1949 Theodor Heuss, a Free Democrat, is elected president of West Germany, and Konrad Adenauer, the Christian Democratic leader, becomes chancellor. Adenauer forms a government of Christian Democrats, Free Democrats, and the German Party. 23 September 1949 Bruce Springsteen, US rock singer, songwriter, and guitarist, born in Freehold, New Jersey. 1 October 1949 China's communist leader Mao Zedong proclaims the establishment of a People's Republic, with its government based in Beijing and with Zhou Enlai as prime minister and foreign minister. 7 October 1949 The Soviet-occupied zone of Germany (East Germany) is proclaimed a Democratic Republic. 9 October 1949 Harvard Law School announces that it will enrol women. 16 October 1949 The civil war in Greece between the monarchists and the rebel communists (ELAS) ends with the defeat of the rebels. 8 December 1949 Chinese Nationalists, driven by communist military forces from the mainland, declare Taipei on the island of Formosa (Taiwan) to be the capital of the Republic of China. 27 December 1949 An Indonesian republic, known as the 'United States of Indonesia', is established, comprising all the former Netherlands East Indies territories except western New Guinea and having a nominal union with the Netherlands. 1949 L'Enracinement/The Need for Roots by the French philosopher and mystic Simone Weil is published posthumously. 1949 Paris-Match, an illustrated news magazine, begins publication in France. 1949 Adolf Dassler designs the prototype training shoe, which is sold in Germany by Addas (which later changes its name to Adidas). 1949 Ballpoint pens become established in the USA, with sales exceeding those of fountain pens for the first time. 1949 Charles Lubin launches his Sara Lee bakery line in Chicago, Illinois, with his first product, the Sara Lee cheesecake. 1949 Following the communists' victory in the Chinese civil war between communists and nationalists, the Common Programme establishes the right of all citizens to education and the responsibility of the state to provide it. 1949 In New York City, the musical South Pacific, with lyrics by Oscar

Hammerstein and music by Richard Rodgers, is first performed. 1949 In the USA, the Research Tower for S C Johnson & Son, in Wisconsin, designed by the US architect Frank Lloyd Wright, is completed. 1949 Meat, sugar, and dairy produce are still scarce in the UK, and sales are restricted. 1949 Social legislation in South Africa begins to implement apartheid, suspending the automatic granting of citizenship to Commonwealth immigrants after five years, outlawing marriage between Europeans and non-Europeans, and banning sexual intercourse between Europeans and coloureds. The Population Registration Act starts the process of defining people as white, coloured, or African. 1949 The 1948 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Laurence Olivier, for Hamlet; Best Supporting Actor: Walter Huston, for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre; Best Actress: Jane Wyman, for Johnny Belinda; Best Supporting Actress: Claire Trevor, for Key Largo; Best Film: Hamlet, directed by Laurence Olivier; Best Director: John Huston, for Key Largo. 1949 The ballet The Age of Anxiety by US choreographer Jerome Robbins and US composer Leonard Bernstein, is first performed, in New York City. It is based on a poem of that title by the English-born US poet W H Auden. 1949 The English philosopher Gilbert Ryle publishes The Concept of Mind. 1949 The English writer Enid Blyton publishes the first of her Noddy children's books. 1949 The English writer George Orwell publishes his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, a darkly pessimistic vision of the future. 1949 The film Kind Hearts and Coronets, directed by Robert Hamer, is released in the UK, starring Dennis Price and Alec Guinness. 1949 The film Passport to Pimlico, directed by Henry Cornelius, is released in the UK, starring Stanley Holloway, Margaret Rutherford, and Basil Radford. 1949 The film The Third Man, directed by Carol Reed, is released in the UK, starring Joseph Cotten, Trevor Howard, Orson Welles, and Alida Valli, and featuring the music of Anton Karas on the zither. 1949 The film musical On the Town, directed by Gene Kelly, is released in the USA. He also stars in it, along with Frank Sinatra and Jules Munshin. 1949 The French artist Georges Braque paints Atelier II, one of the Ateliers/ Studios series he paints between the late 1940s and 1956.

1949 The French writer and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir publishes Le Deuxième Sexe/The Second Sex, a classic of feminist literature. 1949 The French writer Jean Genet publishes his autobiographical novel Journal du voleur/The Thief's Journal. 1949 The play Death of a Salesman, by the US writer Arthur Miller, is first performed, in New York City. 1949 The United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) issues the first charity Christmas card, based on a design by the seven-year-old Czechoslovakian girl Jitka Samkova. 1949 The US artist Robert Motherwell begins his series Elegy to the Spanish Republic. 1949 The US engineer John W Mauchly develops the Short Code, the first highlevel programming language, which allows computers to recognize two-digit mathematical codes. 1949 The US philosopher Max Black publishes Language and Philosophy: Studies in Method. 1949 The US-born British artist Jacob Epstein sculpts Lazarus. 21 January 1950 George Orwell, English novelist who wrote Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, dies in London, England (46). 18 February 1950 In the USA, telephone direct-dialing becomes possible between New York and New Jersey. 23 February 1950 For the first time, British election returns are televised. 1 March 1950 The rationing of all foods except sugar ends in West Germany. 1 April 1950 Italian Somaliland, occupied by British troops from 1941 to 1949, becomes a United Nations (UN) trust territory under Italian administration, but most of modern Somalia (British Somaliland) continues as a British protectorate until 1960. 9 May 1950 The Schuman Plan is announced in France for the creation of a single authority to control the production of steel and coal in France and West Germany, with membership then opened to other countries. 12 May 1950 The American Bowling Congress, after court action, revokes its 34year-old rule limiting participation in its annual tournament to 'the white male race'.

2 June–16 July 1950 Uruguay beats the host side Brazil 2–1 in the final of the fourth football World Cup in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, witnessed by 199,854 spectators at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro. England, the British representatives in the finals, lose 1–0 to the USA in one of the biggest upsets in the history of the competition. 25 June 1950 Communist North Korean forces invade South Korea, with several armies advancing southwards. 27 June 1950 President Harry S Truman of the USA orders US air and naval forces in eastern Asia to resist North Korean aggression against South Korea and sends reinforcements to the South. 1 August 1950 King Leopold III of Belgium abdicates in favour of his son, Prince Baudouin, who acts as head of state from 11 August to 17 July 1951, when he is crowned king. 4 August 1950 After the start of fighting in Korea, the US Army calls up 21,000 enlisted reservists for 21 months' duty. 1 October 1950 South Korean and United Nations (UN) forces, moving north, cross the 38th parallel, the border line between North and South Korea. 2 October 1950 Al Jolson, US popular singer and comedian, star of The Jazz Singer (1927), the first feature film with synchronized speech and music, dies in San Francisco, California (64). 2 October 1950 In the USA, Charles Schulz's comic strip Peanuts, starring Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and friends, appears in newspapers for the first time. 2 November 1950 George Bernard Shaw, Irish dramatist, literary critic, and socialist propagandist, dies in Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire, England (94). 26 November 1950 Chinese troops enter the Korean War, obliging United Nations (UN) forces to retreat south from the Manchurian border. 28 November 1950 Poland and East Germany proclaim the Oder–Neisse line as the frontier between the two countries, giving Poland territorial gains in the west to compensate for territory lost to the USSR at the end of World War II. 1950 2% of 40,000 Japanese college students are women. 1950 A coaxial telephone cable with submerged repeaters is laid between Miami, Florida, and Havana, Cuba; its success paves the way for transatlantic cables. 1950 Club Med opens its first holiday village. Set up in Majorca, Spain, it consists of tents supplied from US army surplus and caters mainly for water-polo players.

1950 Diners Club cards, introduced in the USA, become the first credit cards. Initially issued by lawyer Frank X McNamara to around 200 members for use in 27 restaurants in the New York City area, the scheme gains popularity and quickly spreads. 1950 Dr Yoshiro Nakamata of the Imperial University, Tokyo, Japan, develops the floppy disk and licenses it to International Business Machines (IBM). 1950 In the USA, the lowest fifth of the population earns 4.5% of all income; the second fifth 11.9%; the third fifth 23.4%; the fourth fifth 23.4%; and the highest fifth 42.8%. 1950 Life expectancy for men and women in India is 32 compared to 66 and 71 in the USA. 1950 Millionaire US industrialist, aviator, and film producer Howard Hughes becomes a recluse. 1950 Population figures for the United Kingdom (in millions): England 41.1; Wales 2.5; Scotland 5.2; Ireland/Northern Ireland 1.4. 1950 Populations (in millions): London, England, 8.3; New York City, 7.8; Tokyo, Japan, 5.3; Moscow, Russia, 4.1; Chicago, Illinois, 3.6; Shanghai, China, 3.6; Calcutta (now Kolkata), India, 3.5; Berlin, Germany, 3.3. 1950 The 1949 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Broderick Crawford, for All the King's Men; Best Supporting Actor: Dean Jagger, for Twelve O'Clock High; Best Actress: Olivia de Havilland, for The Heiress; Best Supporting Actress: Mercedes McCambridge, for All the King's Men; Best Film: All the King's Men, directed by Robert Rossen; Best Director: Joseph L Mankiewicz, for A Letter to Three Wives. 1950 The average family income in the USA is $3,319; $3,455 for whites and $1,869 for blacks and other minorities. 1950 The Chilean writer Pablo Neruda publishes his Canto General/General Song, a series of poems that give an epic account of the history of South America. 1950 The English historian E H Carr publishes the first volume of his 14-volume History of Soviet Russia. The last volume will be published in 1978. 1950 The English writer Doris Lessing publishes her novel The Grass is Singing. 1950 The first Xerox photocopying machine is produced by the Haloid Company (later to become the Xerox Corporation) in Rochester, New York. 1950 The intricately structured film Rashomon, directed by Akira Kurosawa, is released in Japan, starring Toshiro Mifune, Machiko Kyo, and Masayuki Mori. It

wins the Grand Prix at the Venice International Film Festival the following year, helping to create a market for Japanese cinema in the West. 1950 The Italian writer Cesare Pavese publishes his novel La luna e ifalò/The Moon and Bonfire. 1950 The Mexican writer Octavio Paz publishes El laberinto de la soledad/The Labyrinth of Solitude, an influential study of Mexican history and culture. 1950 The musical Guys and Dolls, by Frank Loesser and Abe Burrows, is first performed, in New York City. It is taken from the collection of stories by the US writer Damon Runyon. 1950 The Polish-born US writer Isaac Bashevis Singer publishes his novel The Family Moskat. 1950 The population of the world is estimated at 2,516 million. 1950 The Swiss artist Alberto Giacometti sculpts Tall Forest. 1950 The US artist David Smith sculpts Blackburn, Song on an Irish Blacksmith. 1950 The US artist Jackson Pollock paints Autumn Rhythm: No. 30. 1950 The US population reaches 150,697,361 and the centre of the nation's population moves westward into Illinois. 1950 The US Scientologist L Ron Hubbard publishes Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. 1950 The US writer Ray Bradbury publishes his science fiction novel The Martian Chronicles. 1950 There are 43 million telephones in the USA and 60% of homes have telephones. 1950 US businesses spend $5.7 billion on advertising: $2.1 billion in newspapers; $605 million on radio; $515 in magazines; and $171 million on television. 1950 Women in India gain the right to vote on the same basis as men. 1950–1959 The number of people in the USA who live in the suburbs increases by 44% in the 1950s. 1 January 1951 In the Korean War, North Korean and Chinese forces break United Nations (UN) lines on the 38th parallel and, on 4 January, take Seoul, capital of South Korea.

1 January 1951 The British Board of Film Censors introduces the 'X' classification, to identify films unsuitable for those under 16. 7–31 March 1951 In the Korean War, United Nations (UN) forces move northwards to the 38th Parallel, recapturing the South Korean capital of Seoul 14 March: the UN commander General Douglas MacArthur advocates extending the war into China, using atomic bombs. 11 April 1951 The US president Harry S Truman relieves General Douglas MacArthur of command of the United Nations (UN) forces in Korea, because of his public advocacy of war with China. He is succeeded by General Matthew Ridgway. 16 April 1951 The 1950 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: José Ferrer, for Cyrano de Bergerac; Best Supporting Actor: George Sanders, for All About Eve; Best Actress: Judy Holliday, for Born Yesterday ; Best Supporting Actress: Josephine Hull, for Harvey; Best Film: All About Eve, directed by Joseph L Mankiewicz; Best Director: Joseph L Mankiewicz, for All About Eve. 29 April 1951 Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austrian-born British philosopher, one of the most influential in the 20th century, dies in Cambridge, England (62). June 1951 US engineers John Mauchly and John Eckert build UNIVAC 1 (Universal Automated Computer), the first commercially available electronic digital computer, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Built for the US Bureau of the Census by the Remington Rand corporation, it uses vacuum tubes, is the first to handle both numeric and alphabetic information easily, has a memory of 1.5 kilobytes, and is the first to store data on magnetic tape. 13 July 1951 Arnold Schoenberg, Austrian composer who developed a new 'atonal' method of musical composition, dies in Los Angeles, California (76). 14 August 1951 William Randolph Hearst, US newspaper publisher, dies in Beverley Hills, California (88). 1 September 1951 The USA, Australia, and New Zealand sign the Pacific Security Agreement (also known as the ANZUS Pact), in San Francisco, California, providing for mutual assistance if any signatory power is attacked. 20 September 1951 The US Air Force makes the first successful recovery of animals from a rocket flight when a monkey and 11 mice are recovered from a flight to an altitude of 72,000 m/236,000 ft. 15 October 1951–24 June 1957 I Love Lucy, US television's first smash hit situation comedy, is shown, starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley. 27 October 1951 The veteran British Conservative Party leader Winston Churchill forms a government, with Anthony Eden as foreign secretary and R A 'Rab' Butler as chancellor of the Exchequer.

5 November 1951 State authorities open 82 km/51 mi of the New Jersey Turnpike, a toll road that will eventually stretch 190 km/118 mi across the entire state of New Jersey, connecting to other state highways at both ends. 12 December 1951 The first power station in the USA to produce electricity from atomic energy begins operating at Arco, Idaho. Built by the US Department of Energy's Idaho National Engineering Laboratory and known as experimental breeder reactor No. 1 (EBR-I), it is built to demonstrate the feasibility of nuclear power. It generates 300 kW. 16 December 1951 A study finds that on an average weekend 1.2 million bagels are consumed in New York City. 24 December 1951 Libya (an Italian colony from 1911–42, and under British military administration since then) becomes an independent federation under King Idris I, previously emir of Cyrenaica, a region of eastern Libya. This follows a resolution of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly of 21 November 1949 that Libya should become independent, and makes Libya the first independent state to be created by the UN. 1951 For the first time air passenger-miles (10,679,281,000) exceeds total passenger-miles in railway cars (10,224,714,000) in the USA. 1951 German philosopher Hans Reichenbach publishes The Rise of Scientific Philosophy. 1951 German-born US philosopher Hannah Arendt publishes The Origins of Totalitarianism. 1951 The Algerian-born French writer Albert Camus publishes his philosophical study L'Homme révolté/The Rebel. 1951 The English writer Arthur C Clarke publishes his short story 'The Sentinel', which is filmed in 1968 as 2001: A Space Odyssey. 1951 The English writer Anthony Powell publishes A Question of Upbringing, the first of 12 volumes in the sequence A Dance to the Music of Time. The final volume appears in 1975. 1951 The English writer Nicholas Monsarrat publishes his novel The Cruel Sea. 1951 The film The Man in the White Suit, directed by US film-maker Alexander Mackendrick, is released in Britain, starring Alec Guinness and Joan Greenwood. 1951 The film musical An American in Paris, directed by Vincente Minnelli, is released in the USA. With music and lyrics by George and Ira Gershwin, it stars Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron, Oscar Levant, and Nina Foch.

1951 The French photographer Robert Doisneau takes Down and Out in Paris. 1951 The German-born English artist Lucian Freud paints Interior Near Paddington. 1951 The Irish writer Samuel Beckett publishes his novels Malone meurt/Malone Dies and Molloy in French (the English versions appear in 1956 and in 1955 respectively). 1951 The opera Billy Budd by the English composer Benjamin Britten is first performed, at Covent Garden in London, England. It is based on a novella by the US writer Herman Melville. 1951 The opera The Rake's Progress by the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky is first performed, in Venice, Italy. Inspired by engravings by the English artist William Hogarth, the text is by the English-born US writer W(ystan) H(ugh) Auden. 1951 The Russian-born US writer Isaac Asimov publishes Foundation, the first novel in his science fiction Foundation Trilogy. 1951 The US artist Barnett Newman paints Vir Heroicus Sublimis/Sublime Heroic Man. 1951 The US computer scientist Grace Hopper develops the first compiler. It translates programmers' codes into the binary machine codes used by computers. 1951 The US writer Carson McCullers publishes her novella The Ballad of the Sad Café. 1951 The US writer J D Salinger publishes his novel The Catcher in the Rye. 1951 The US writer James Jones publishes his novel From Here to Eternity. 1951 The US writer William Faulkner publishes his novel Requiem for a Nun. 1951 Two plutonium-production reactors, the first full-scale nuclear reactors in the UK, go into operation at Windscale (known as Sellafield from 1973) in Cumbria, England. 1951 US chemists Linus Pauling and Robert Corey establish the helical or spiral structure of proteins. 1951 US philosopher Nelson Goodman publishes The Structure of Appearance. 1951 US physicist Edward Purcell discovers line radiation of wavelength 21 cm/8.3 in emitted by hydrogen in space.

1951 US psychologist Carl Rogers publishes Client-Centered Therapy. 6 February 1952 Following the death of King George VI of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, he is succeeded by his daughter Queen Elizabeth II, who is on a visit to Kenya at the time (proclaimed on 8 February). 26 February 1952 The British prime minister Winston Churchill announces that Britain has produced its own atomic bomb. The first successful test of the new weapon takes place on 2 October over the Monte Bello Islands in the Pacific Ocean. 8 March 1952 An artificial heart keeps a patient alive for 80 minutes at the Pennsylvania Hospital, Philadelphia, USA. 14 April 1952 The 1951 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Humphrey Bogart, for The African Queen; Best Supporting Actor: Karl Malden, for A Streetcar Named Desire; Best Actress: Vivien Leigh, for A Streetcar Named Desire; Best Supporting Actress: Kim Hunter, for A Streetcar Named Desire; Best Film: An American in Paris, directed by Vincente Minelli; Best Director: George Stevens, for A Place in the Sun. 2 May 1952 BOAC's De Havilland Comet inaugurates jet-powered passenger aircraft service with the first scheduled commercial flight, from London, England, to Johannesburg, South Africa. 27–31 May 1952 The foreign ministers of France, Italy, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, and West Germany sign a series of agreements in Paris, France, establishing a European Defence Community (EDC), with reciprocal guarantees between the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the EDC. 20 June 1952 Vikram Seth, Indian novelist who wrote A Suitable Boy, born in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India. 1 July 1952 The Schuman Plan, which creates a European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), comes into force. 26 July 1952 Eva Perón, unofficial Argentine political leader and wife of Juan Perón, dies in Buenos Aires, Argentina (33). 11 September 1952 The United Nations (UN) settlement devised for the former Italian colony of Eritrea (that is, a federation with Ethiopia) is ratified by Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia. Eritrea is to have autonomy in domestic affairs. 20 October 1952 Britain proclaims a state of emergency in its colony of Kenya because of Mau Mau nationalist disturbances, and about 200 leading members of the Kenya African Union (the political party led by future president Jomo Kenyatta, the alleged leader of the Mau Mau movement) are arrested.

1 November 1952 The USA explodes the first thermonuclear fusion device, or hydrogen bomb, at Eniwetok island in the Marshall Islands, although this is not revealed until February 1954. 9 November 1952 Chaim Weizmann, first president of Israel 1949–52, dies in Rehovot, Israel (77). 14 November 1952 The popular music magazine New Musical Express publishes Britain's first pop singles chart. November 1952 Americans elect Dwight D Eisenhower as president in a landslide victory. In the Congressional elections, the Republican party regains control of the House (221–211) and Senate (48–47). 17 December 1952 The US soprano Dorothy Maynor sings at the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR)'s Constitution Hall in Washington, DC, making her the first black person to sing there since 1939, breaking a formal ban that went into effect when the DAR refused to let Marian Anderson sing at their headquarters. 1952 British biochemists Archer Martin and Anthony T James develop gas chromatography, a technique for separating the elements of a gaseous compound. 1952 British doctor Douglas Bevis develops amniocentesis, a diagnostic test on the fetus. 1952 Danish surgeon Christian Hamburger performs the first successful sexchange operation. George Jorgensen becomes Christine Jorgensen. 1952 English biophysicist Rosalind Franklin uses X-ray diffraction to study the structure of DNA. She suggests that its sugar-phosphate backbone is on the outside – an important clue that leads to the elucidation of the structure of DNA the following year. 1952 The butterfly stroke, developed by US swimmers in the 1930s and used in breaststroke races, is recognized and regulated as a separate stroke by the Fédération Internationale de Natation Amateur (International Swimming Federation or FINA). 1952 The Dutch-born US artist Willem de Kooning paints Woman with Lipstick. 1952 The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams completes his orchestral work Sinfonia Antarctica/Antarctic Symphony. 1952 The English film director and star Charlie Chaplin leaves the USA after allegations that he has connections with subversive causes. When he is informed that his re-entry would be challenged, he announces that he will never return, and settles in Vevey, Switzerland.

1952 The English philosopher R M Hare publishes The Language of Morals. 1952 The English writer Doris Lessing publishes her novel Martha Quest. 1952 The film High Noon, directed by Fred Zinnemann, is released in the USA, starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. 1952 The film musical Singin' in the Rain, directed by Gene Kelly, is released in the USA. Kelley also stars in it with Donald O'Connor and Debbie Reynolds. 1952 The French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson publishes Images à la sauvette/The Decisive Moment, an influential album of photographs that contains his ideas on photography. 1952 The introduction of automatic pinspotters for tenpin bowling and their approval by the American Bowling Congress helps increase the popularity of the game in the USA. 1952 The opera Boulevard Solitude by the German composer Hans Werner Henze is first performed, in Hannover, West Germany. 1952 The play Les Chaises/The Chairs, by the Romanian-born French dramatist Eugène Ionesco, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1952 The play The Mousetrap, by the English writer Agatha Christie, is first performed, in London, England. 1952 The Russian composer Igor Stravinsky completes his Cantata for voices and chorus, settings of anonymous English poems. 1952 The Unité d'Habitation, an influential housing complex in Marseilles, France, designed by the Swiss-born French architect Le Corbusier (pseudonym of Charles Edouard Jeanneret), is completed. 1952 The US composer John Cage creates 4' 33", a piece for piano that consist of a pianist sitting silently at a piano for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. 1952 The US writer Bernard Malamud publishes his allegorical novel about baseball The Natural. 1952 The US writer Ernest Hemingway publishes his novella The Old Man and the Sea. 1952 The US writer John Steinbeck publishes his novel East of Eden. 1952 There are 17 million television sets in US homes, up from around 7 million in 1950.

1952 US biologists Alfred Day Hershey and Martha Chase use radioactive tracers to show that bacteriophages infect bacteria with DNA and not protein. 1952 US nuclear physicist Donald Glaser develops the bubble chamber to observe the behaviour of subatomic particles. It uses a superheated liquid instead of a vapour to track particles. 1 January 1953 The Maldive Islands become independent under British protection. The new president, Amin Didi, plays centre forward in a ceremonial football match. 20 January 1953 Dwight D Eisenhower is inaugurated as 34th president of the USA. The ceremony is broadcast throughout the country on television for the first time. 5 March 1953 Following the death of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, he is succeeded on 6 March by Georgi Malenkov (designated by Stalin), as chairman of the council of ministers. 5 March 1953 Joseph Stalin (adopted name, Russian for steel, of Josef Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili), secretary general of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union 1922–53, and premier 1941–53, dies in Moscow, USSR (73). 31 March 1953 Dag Hammarskjöld of Sweden is elected secretary general of the United Nations (UN) by the Security Council in succession to the Norwegian Trygve Lie. On 7 April the election is ratified by the General Assembly. 13 April 1953 The 1952 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Gary Cooper, for High Noon; Best Supporting Actor: Anthony Quinn, for Viva Zapata!; Best Actress: Shirley Booth, for Come Back Little Sheba ; Best Supporting Actress: Gloria Grahame, for The Bad and the Beautiful ; Best Film: The Greatest Show on Earth, directed by Cecil B De Mille; Best Director: John Ford, for The Quiet Man. 25 April 1953 English molecular biologist Francis Crick and US biologist James Watson announce the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA, the basic material of heredity. They also theorize that if the strands are separated then each can form the template for the synthesis of an identical DNA molecule. It is perhaps the most important discovery in biology. April–July 1953 The US golfer Ben Hogan wins the US Masters, the US Open, and the British Open to become the first player to win three majors in a single year; he is unable to compete in the year's fourth major event, the US Professional Golfers Association (PGA) tournament, because the date clashes with that of the British Open. 6 May 1953 Tony (Antony Charles Lynton) Blair, British prime minister from 1997, a Labour politician, is born in Edinburgh, Scotland.

6 May 1953 US physician John Gibbon performs the first successful open-heart operation. He uses a heart-lung machine to oxygenate the blood during the operation. 11 May 1953 Tornadoes sweep through Waco and San Angelo, Texas, killing 124 people. 29 May 1953 Edmund Hilary from New Zealand and Sherpa Norkey Tenzing from Nepal, as part of John Hunt's British expedition, complete the first successful ascent of Mount Everest, the world's highest mountain (8,848 m/29,028 ft) in the Himalayas, Nepal. 2 June 1953 The coronation of Queen Elizabeth II is watched on televisions in homes and public places, such as church halls, by an estimated 20 million viewers in Britain. The event also stimulates the purchase of television sets. 8 June 1953 A tornado blows through Ohio and southern Michigan, killing 139 people. 10–19 June 1953 A bus boycott in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, results in an amendment of the rules requiring blacks to sit at the back of buses; it is the first major action of the modern civil-rights movement. 17 June 1953 A strike in East Berlin on 16 June turns into a rising against East Germany's communist government; in the afternoon the Soviet commandant of Berlin proclaims a state of emergency and Soviet military forces put down the rising. 18 June 1953 A republic is proclaimed in Egypt, with General Muhammad Naguib Bey as president and prime minister, and Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser as deputy prime minister and minister of the interior. 21 June 1953 Benazir Bhutto, prime minister of Pakistan 1988–90 and from 1993, born in Karachi, Pakistan. 25 June 1953 The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) begins the first regular television broadcasts in colour, in the USA. 9 July 1953 Lavrenti Beria, the Soviet minister of internal affairs, is arrested (and shot on 23 December); his Politburo rivals for leadership of the USSR fear his potential power. 15 July 1953 Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the first elected president of Haiti, is born in Port Salut, Haiti. 27 July 1953 Delegates from the United Nations (UN), North Korea, and China sign an armistice at Panmunjom, ending the Korean War.

12 September 1953 The US senator from Massachusetts and future president John Fitzgerald Kennedy marries Jacqueline Lee Bouvier, in Newport, Rhode Island, USA. 28 September 1953 Edwin Powell Hubble, US astronomer who provided the first proof that the universe is expanding, dies in San Marino, California (63). 6 October 1953 Fearing the establishment of communism in British Guiana (now Guyana) by the People's Progressive Party, Britain sends troops and, on 9 October, the constitution is suspended and the governor rules under a state of emergency. 2 November 1953 The Constituent Assembly in Pakistan decides to declare the country a republic, within the British Commonwealth, as the 'Islamic Republic of Pakistan'. 9 November 1953 Ibn Saud, Arabian tribal and Muslim leader who founded the modern state of Saudi Arabia in 1932 and began to exploit its oil resources, dies in At Taif, Saudi Arabia (about 73). 27 November 1953 Eugene O'Neill, US dramatist, dies in Boston, Massachusetts (65). December 1953'TV dinners', precooked frozen dinners, are introduced by the food processing company C A Swanson of Omaha, Nebraska. December 1953 Hugh Hefner publishes the soft porn magazine Playboy in the USA. Its mixture of serious journalism, erotic fiction, and the nude feature 'Playmate of the Month' proves successful. 1953 Philosophical Investigations by the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein is published posthumously. This work (which marks a complete break with his early philosophy) has a profound impact on Anglo-American philosophy. 1953 British cryptographer Michael Ventris publishes 'Evidence for Greek Dialect in the Mycenaean Archives', in which he announces his decipherment (1952) of the Minoan Linear B script, an ancient form of Greek written between 1500 and 1200 BC. 1953 German philosopher Martin Heidegger publishes Einführung in die Metaphysik/An Introduction to Metaphysics. 1953 IBM introduces the IBM 650, the first computer to be produced in large numbers. It has a memory of 10 kilobytes. 1953 The English writer Ian Fleming publishes Casino Royale, the first James Bond thriller.

1953 The film Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulo/Mr Hulot's Holiday, directed by Jacques Tati, is released in France. Tati also stars in it. 1953 The film Tokyo Story, directed by Yasujiro Ozu, is released in Japan, starring Chishu Ryu and Chieko Higashiyama. 1953 The film musical Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, directed by Howard Hawks, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Anita Loos, it stars Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe, and features the song 'Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend'. 1953 The French artist Henri Matisse creates his collage The Snail. 1953 The Irish writer Samuel Beckett publishes his novel L'Innommable/The Unnamable in French. The English version appears in 1958. He also publishes his novel Watt. 1953 The Irish-born British artist Francis Bacon paints Study After Velàzquez: Pope Innocent X. 1953 The play En attendant Godot/Waiting for Godot, by the Irish writer Samuel Beckett, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1953 The play The Crucible, by the US dramatist Arthur Miller, is first performed, at the Martin Beck Theater in New York City. 1953 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his Symphony No. 10 and his String Quartet No. 5. 1953 The US lawn tennis player Maureen 'Little Mo' Connolly, aged 18, becomes the first woman to achieve the Grand Slam, winning the singles titles at the Australian, French, Wimbledon, and US championships within the same calendar year. 1953 The US writer Raymond Chandler publishes his novel The Long Goodbye. 1953 The US writer Saul Bellow publishes his novel The Adventures of Augie March. 1953 The US writer William Burroughs publishes his novel Junkie: Confessions of an Unredeemed Drug Addict. 1953 US philosopher Willard V Quine publishes From a Logical Point of View: Nine Logico-Philosophical Essays. 1953 US psychologist B F Skinner publishes Science and Human Behavior. 1 January 1954 Flashing directional indicator lights are made compulsory on cars in Britain.

14 January 1954 The US actor Marilyn Monroe is married for a second time, to US baseball star Joe DiMaggio; in October, she sues for divorce. 21 January 1954 The first nuclear-powered submarine, the Nautilus, is launched by the USA at Groton, Connecticut. It is also the largest submarine, at 97 m/319 ft long. January 1954 Chinese military attacks on the Nationalist Chinese-held islands of Quemoy and Matsu in the Taiwan Strait raise international tension. February 1954 The USA announces that it detonated the world's first hydrogen bomb at Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands two years before. 12 April 1954 The 1953 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: William Holden, for Stalag 17; Best Supporting Actor: Frank Sinatra, for From Here to Eternity ; Best Actress: Audrey Hepburn, for Roman Holiday; Best Supporting Actress: Donna Reed, for From Here to Eternity; Best Film: From Here to Eternity, directed by Fred Zinnemann; Best Director: Fred Zinnemann, for From Here to Eternity. 22 April–17 June 1954 The McCarthy 'witch-hunts' reach their peak as Wisconsin senator Joseph McCarthy, chairman of the Senate Permanent Investigations Subcommittee, alleges that a communist spy ring is active at the US Army Signal Corps headquarters at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. During the hearings, which are televised across the country, McCarthy accuses the Army secretary of deliberately concealing evidence. McCarthy's conduct turns public opinion against him. 6 May 1954 Roger Bannister of Great Britain, with a time of 3 min 59.4 sec becomes the first person to run a mile in under 4 minutes, at the Iffley Road Sports Ground, Oxford, England. 7 May 1954 The Vietminh siege of French forces at Dien Bien Phu in North Vietnam ends with the surrender of 10,000 French troops. 5,000 more French troops are dead and the defeat effectively ends French power in Indochina. May 1954 The US Supreme Court, in Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas, overturns the Plessy v. Ferguson decision of 1896 and declares 'separate but equal' schools to be unconstitutional. 7 June 1954 Alan Mathison Turing, English mathematician who pioneered computer theory and computer processes, dies in Wilmslow, Cheshire, England (41). 24 June 1954 New York State Thruway is opened, a 894-km/559-mi long highway stretching from New York City to Buffalo, New York.

3 July 1954 Marilyn Sheppard, the 31-year-old pregnant wife of an osteopath, is murdered in her home in Bay Village, Ohio. Her husband, Samuel H ('Dr Sam') Sheppard, claims that 'a bushy-haired man' killed his wife and knocked him unconscious. Despite his protestations, Sheppard is arrested for murder. The case becomes the inspiration for the US television program The Fugitive (1963–67). 18 July 1954 The first jazz festival at Newport, Rhode Island, takes place. 20 July 1954 An armistice ending the fighting in Indochina is signed in Geneva, Switzerland. Under the terms of the agreement France is to evacuate North Vietnam, while the communists are to evacuate South Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. France also undertakes to respect the independence of Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam, and the communist leader Ho Chi Minh is to form a government in North Vietnam. 30 August 1954 The French parliament votes against ratification of the 1952 treaty establishing the European Defence Community (EDC), which is destroyed by the decision. 1 September 1954 Hurricane Carol strikes Long Island, New York, killing 68 people and causing $50 million of property damage. 8 September 1954 The South-East Asian Defence Treaty (for mutual defence) and Pacific Charter are signed in Manila, Philippines, by the USA, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Thailand, the Philippines, Britain, and France. The treaty establishes SEATO, the South-East Asia Treaty Organization, based in Bangkok, Thailand. 11 September 1954 The Miss America beauty competition, held in Atlantic City, New Jersey, is televised throughout the USA. 15 October 1954 Hurricane Hazel smashes into the northern US and Canadian seaboard, killing 348 people. 19 October 1954 Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser, prime minister of Egypt, signs a British–Egyptian agreement which terminates the treaty of alliance of 1936. British troops are to withdraw from the Suez Canal zone, but Britain reserves the right to intervene if the canal is threatened. The agreement comes into force from 6 December. 25 October 1954 A meeting of the US cabinet is televised for first time. 3 November 1954 Henri Matisse, French painter, sculptor, illustrator and designer, dies in Nice, France (84). 2 December 1954 The US Senate votes by 67 to 22 to censure Wisconsin senator Joseph McCarthy on charges of misconduct, after public opinion has turned against his accusations of subversive activity in the government and army.

21 December 1954 Samuel H ('Dr Sam') Sheppard is convicted of the seconddegree murder of his wife Marilyn, and is sentenced to life in prison, after a trial in Cleveland, Ohio, that is later characterized as filled with 'prejudicial publicity' and having a 'carnival atmosphere'. The verdict is overturned in 1966. 29 December 1954 Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia all become independent under a treaty with France. 1954 29 million homes – 60%– have television sets in the USA. 1954 A new constitution in the British protectorate of Nigeria establishes the Federation of Nigeria, comprising northern, eastern, and western regions, the Southern Cameroons (a United Nations Trust territory), and the Federal Territory of Lagos. 1954 English historian of science Joseph Needham publishes the first volume of his 12-volume Science and Civilization in China. The final part appears in 1984. 1954 The English writer Kingsley Amis publishes his novel Lucky Jim. 1954 The English writer William Golding publishes his novel Lord of the Flies, partly a reworking of the Victorian boys' tale The Coral Island (1858). 1954 The film Genevieve, directed by Henry Cornelius, is released in Britain, starring Kenneth More, Dinah Sheridan, John Gregson, and Kay Kendall. It is the first British film to be shot in Technicolor. 1954 The film Rear Window, directed by the English film-maker Alfred Hitchcock, is released in the USA, starring James Stewart and Grace Kelly. 1954 The film Seven Samurai, directed by Akira Kurosawa, is released in Japan, starring Toshiro Mifune, Takashi Shimura, and Kuninori Kodo. 1954 The French composer of Greek parentage Iannis Xenakis completes his orchestral work Metastaseis. 1954 The Nigerian writer Cyprian Ekwenski publishes his novel People of the City. 1954 The Polish-born French artist Balthus paints Le Passage du Commerce Saint André/St André Commercial Street. 1954 The UNIVAC 1103A computer is introduced in the UK. It is the first commercial computer to have a magnetic-core memory and is 50 times faster than UNIVAC I, introduced in 1951. 1954 The US artist Mark Rothko paints Untitled: Yellow, Orange, Red on Orange. 1954 The US artist Robert Motherwell paints Elegy to the Spanish Republic No 34.

1954 US entrepreneur Malcolm Maclean initiates the use of containers to ship goods between New York City and Houston, Texas. The idea catches on rapidly throughout the world. 1954 US psychologist Abraham Harold Maslow publishes Motivation and Personality. 24 February 1955 Turkey and Iraq sign a treaty of alliance, the Baghdad Pact, which provides for mutual support against communist militants. February 1955 IBM introduces the IBM 705 computer, the first commercially successful business computer to use magnetic core memory. 11 March 1955 Alexander Fleming, Scottish bacteriologist who discovered penicillin, dies in London, England (73). 12 March 1955 Charlie 'Yardbird' or 'Bird' Parker, US jazz saxophonist, composer, and bandleader, dies in New York City (34). 5–24 April 1955 Ministers of 29 states meet at the Bandung or Afro-Asian Conference held in Bandung, Indonesia, to form a 'nonaligned bloc' of countries opposed to the 'imperialism' and 'colonialism' of the superpowers. 18 April 1955 Albert Einstein, German-born US physicist who developed the theory of relativity, dies in Princeton, New Jersey (76). 18 April 1955 The 1954 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Marlon Brando, for On the Waterfront; Best Supporting Actor: Edmond O'Brien, for The Barefoot Contessa; Best Actress: Grace Kelly, for The Country Girl; Best Supporting Actress: Eve Marie Saint, for On the Waterfront; Best Film: On the Waterfront, directed by Elia Kazan; Best Director: Elia Kazan, for On the Waterfront. 9 May 1955 West Germany is admitted as a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). 14 May 1955 The Warsaw Treaty (of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance) is signed by the USSR, Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania, establishing the 'Warsaw Pact' and providing for a unified military command (with headquarters in Moscow) and stationing of Soviet military units in member countries. 29 June 1955 Charles Dumas of the USA, aged 19, in winning the high jump at the US Olympic Trials, becomes the first person to clear the 2.1 m/7 ft barrier with a jump of 2.11m/7ft 1/2in. 18 July 1955 Disneyland, created by Walt Disney, opens in Anaheim, California. It is the first theme park in the world.

30 July 1955 Louison Bobet of France becomes the first cyclist to win the Tour de France three years in succession. 12 September 1955 English engineer Christopher Cockerell patents the first hovercraft. 13 September 1955 An announcement is made at the end of meetings between the West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer and Soviet leaders in Moscow, USSR, to the effect that diplomatic relations will be restored. On 23 September the German Bundestag (parliament) approves, and a Soviet ambassador is appointed on 8 January 1956. 23 October 1955 A referendum in South Vietnam advocates the deposition of Emperor Bao Dai and, on 26 October, a republic is proclaimed under Ngo Dinh Diem. 28 October 1955 Bill Gates, US computer software executive who developed and marketed the Microsoft Disk Operating System (MS-DOS) which is standard on almost all IBM and IBM-compatible computers, born in Seattle, Washington. 14 December 1955 Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), Finland, Hungary, Republic of Ireland, Italy, Jordan, Laos, Libya, Nepal, Portugal, Romania, and Spain are admitted to the United Nations (UN). 1955 Container ships begin to appear, revolutionizing the shipping industry by reducing the need for longshoremen. Their hulls are divided into compartments that accommodate truck containers, which can be loaded and unloaded far faster than traditional cargo ships. The first container ships are converted tankers. 1955 English radio astronomer Martin Ryle builds the first radio interferometer. Consisting of three antennae spaced 1.6 km/1 mi apart, it increases the resolution of radio telescopes, permitting the diameter of a radio source to be determined, or two closely spaced sources to be separated. 1955 Spanish-born US molecular biologist Severo Ochoa discovers polynucleotide phosphorylase, the enzyme responsible for the synthesis of RNA (ribonucleic acid), which allows him to synthesize RNA. 1955 The Australian writer Patrick White publishes his novel The Tree of Man. 1955 The Church of Notre-Dame-du-Haut at Ronchamp, France, designed by the Swiss architect Le Corbusier (pseudonym of Charles Edouard Jeanneret), is completed. 1955 The English writer Graham Greene publishes his novel The Quiet American. 1955 The film Bad Day at Black Rock, directed by John Sturges, is released in the USA, starring Spencer Tracy and Robert Ryan.

1955 The film Marty, directed by Delbert Mann, is released in the USA, based on the play by Paddy Chayevsky and starring Ernest Borgnine, Betsy Blair, Esther Minciotti, and Joe Mantell. It wins the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in France. 1955 The film Pather Panchali/The Song of the Road, directed by Satyajit Ray, is released in India. The first in a trilogy, it stars Kanu Bannerjee, Karuna Bannerjee, Uma Das Gupta, and Subir Bannerjee, and features music by Ravi Shankar. 1955 The film Rebel Without A Cause, directed by Nicholas Ray, is released in the USA, starring James Dean, Natalie Wood, and Sal Mineo. 1955 The film The Seven Year Itch, directed by Billy Wilder, is released in the USA, starring Marilyn Monroe and Tom Ewell. 1955 The French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss publishes Tristes Tropiques/ Sad Tropics, his intellectual autobiography. 1955 The French composer Pierre Boulez completes his vocal work Le Marteau sans maître/The Hammer without a Master, settings of a poem by the French writer René Char. 1955 The French scientist and theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin publishes Le Phénomène humain/The Phenomenon of Man. 1955 The French writer Alain Robbe-Grillet publishes his novel Le Voyeur/The Voyeur. 1955 The German physicist and philosopher Werner Heisenberg publishes Das Naturbild der heutigen Physik/The Physicist's Conception of Nature. 1955 The Irish-born English writer and philosopher Iris Murdoch publishes her novel The Flight from the Enchanter. 1955 The play A View from the Bridge by the US dramatist Arthur Miller, is first performed, at the Coronet Theater in New York City. 1955 The play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, by the US dramatist Tennessee Williams, is first performed, at the Morosco Theater in New York City. 1955 The Russian-born US writer Vladimir Nabokov publishes his novel Lolita in Paris, France, following rejection by US publishers on grounds of obscenity. It is published in the USA in 1958. 1955 The US artist Jasper Johns paints the first of his Flag, Target, and Number series, including Target with Four Faces.

1955 The US electrical engineer Jack Gilmore builds the TX0, a computer that uses a cathode-ray tube display and function keys; it is the forerunner of the modern video terminal. 1955 The US geneticists Joshua Lederberg and Norton Zinder discover that some viruses carry part of the chromosome of one bacterium to another; called transduction it becomes an important tool in genetics research. 1955 The US rock 'n' roll group Bill Haley and the Comets releases the single 'Rock Around the Clock', also included in a controversial film of this year, The Blackboard Jungle. Sales will exceed 17 million, making it second only to 'White Christmas' as the best-selling single ever. 1955 The US rock 'n' roll singer Chuck Berry releases the singles 'Maybelline' and 'Roll Over Beethoven' (the latter does not enter the charts until 30 June 1956). 1955 The US writer Flannery O'Connor publishes her short-story collection A Good Man is Hard to Find. 1955 The US writer William Gaddis publishes his novel The Recognitions. 1955 Tight jeans for both men and women are fashionable in North America and Western Europe. 1955 US firm IBM develops SABRE (Semi-Automated Business Related Environment) for American Airlines passenger reservations. It consists of more than 1,000 teletypewriters connected to a central database – the first computer network. 1955 US political journalist Walter Lippmann publishes The Public Philosophy. 1955 US radiophysicists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology develop the use of ultra high-frequency (UHF) waves for television broadcasting. With a 0.1–1 metre wavelength and a frequency of 3,000 and 300 megahertz they are used in the USA and Canada to carry channels 14 to 83. 31 January 1956 A(lan) A(lexander) Milne, English author who created Winniethe-Pooh, dies in Hartfield, Sussex, England (74). 25 February 1956 The general secretary of the Communist Party in the USSR, Nikita Khrushchev, denounces former leader Joseph Stalin and his policies, at a closed session of the 20th Conference of the Communist Party. The speech is made public on 18 March. 29 February 1956 The Pakistan parliament passes a bill containing a constitution for the new independent Islamic Republic of Pakistan. On 2 March it decides to stay in the British Commonwealth, and on 23 March it becomes independent, with Iskander Mirza, the governor general, as provisional president.

February 1956 US engineers Charles Ginsburg and Raymond Dolby of Ampex Corporation demonstrate the first practical videotape recorder. It revolutionizes television broadcasting by permitting shows to be taped rather than shown live. 2 March 1956 France recognizes the independence of its former colony of Morocco, and Spain grants recognition on 7 April. 16 April 1956 The 1955 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Ernest Borgnine, for Marty; Best Supporting Actor: Jack Lemmon, for Mister Roberts; Best Actress: Anna Magnani, for The Rose Tattoo; Best Supporting Actress: Jo Van Fleet, for East of Eden; Best Film: Marty, directed by Delbert Mann; Best Director: Delbert Mann, for Marty. 19 April 1956 The US film star Grace Kelly marries Prince Rainier of Monaco. The screening of her films in Monaco is subsequently banned. 27 April 1956 The US boxer Rocky Marciano retires as world heavyweight champion, undefeated. He has won all his 49 professional fights, including six defences of his world title. 2 May 1956 The general conference of the Methodist Church, meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota, orders the abolishment of racial segregation in its churches. 6 June 1956 Björn Borg, Swedish tennis player who won the men's singles championship five successive years at Wimbledon in London, England (1976–80), born in Södertälge, Sweden. 29 June 1956 The US actor Marilyn Monroe marries the US playwright Arthur Miller; this is her third marriage. They divorce in 1961. 9 July 1956 Tom Hanks, US actor, born in Concord, California. 26 July 1956 The Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser announces the nationalization of the Suez Canal (owned partly by France and Britain) after the USA and Britain announce they will not help fund the Aswan Dam project. On 31 July Britain, France, and the USA retaliate with financial measures. 1 August 1956 Bertolt Brecht, German poet and playwright, dies in East Berlin, East Germany (now Berlin, Germany) (58). 1 August 1956 Drug manufacturers in the USA begin to market the poliomyelitis vaccine developed by Dr Jonas E Salk. 19 October 1956 A Soviet–Japanese treaty ends an 11-year state of war dating from 1945, but the status of the disputed Kurile Islands remains unresolved.

30 October 1956 The Hungarian prime minister Imre Nagy promises free elections in Hungary, and Cardinal Mindszenty is released following eight years of captivity. The USSR responds by sending Soviet and satellite state troops to invade Hungary. 4 November 1956 Soviet forces attack Budapest, Hungary, and the Hungarian prime minister Imre Nagy takes refuge in the Yugoslavian embassy. János Kádár, the leader of the Central Committee of the Hungarian Workers' Party, cooperates with the USSR and forms a 'revolutionary peasant-worker' government. 5 November 1956 British paratroops land at Port Said, Egypt, at the northern end of the Suez Canal. 7 November 1956 Britain and France accept a ceasefire in the Suez Crisis in Egypt, but Britain declares it will evacuate its troops only on the arrival of the United Nations (UN) emergency force. 22 November 1956 The 16th Olympic Games, opening in Melbourne, Australia, are affected by political boycotts: Egypt, Lebanon, the Netherlands, Spain, and Switzerland refuse to take part following the French–British–Israeli action in Egypt and the Soviet invasion of Hungary. China also withdraws in protest at the participation of Formosa (Taiwan). 5 December 1956 British and French forces begin their withdrawal from Egypt and the Suez Crisis there, completing their evacuation on 22 December. 1956 English anthropologist E E Evans-Pritchard publishes Nuer Religion. 1956 IBM introduces RAMAC (Random Access Method of Accounting and Control), the first hard disk storage of data. Indexes are used to locate the data on the disk. 1956 Polish-born English scientist Jacob Bronowski publishes Science and Human Values. 1956 Polish-born US philosopher Alfred Tarski publishes Logic, Semantics, and Metamathematics. 1956 Rock 'n' roll music dominates dance floors in the USA and Britain. 1956 The Algerian-born French writer Albert Camus publishes his novel La Chute/ The Fall. 1956 The English artist Richard Hamilton creates the collage What Is It That Makes Today's Homes So Different, So Appealing?, one of the first works of British Pop Art. 1956 The English writer Laurie Lee publishes Cider with Rosie, recollections of

his childhood in an English village. 1956 The Eurovision Song Contest is launched. The first winner is Switzerland's Lys Assia with 'Refrains'. 1956 The film Aparajito/The Unvanquished, directed by Satyajit Ray, is released in India. The second in a trilogy starting with Pather Panchali and concluding with The World of Apu, it stars Pinaki Sen Gupta, Karuna Bannerjee, and Kanu Bannerjee. 1956 The French artist Yves Klein creates the first of his blue monochrome paintings. He patents the colour in 1960 as YKB (Yves Klein Blue). 1956 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his orchestral work Oiseaux exotiques/Exotic Birds. 1956 The High Court Building in Chandigarh, the Punjab, India, designed by the Swiss architect Le Corbusier (pseudonym of Charles Edouard Jeanneret), is completed. A new city, Chandigarh gave Le Corbusier opportunities to develop many of his ideas during the 1960s. Others who work there include the English architects Maxwell Fry and Jane Drew. 1956 The horror film Invasion of the Body Snatchers, directed by Don Siegel, is released in the USA. Based on the novel The Body Snatchers by Jack Finney, it stars Kevin McCarthy, Dana Wynter, Larry Gates, King Donovan, Carolyn Jones, and Virginia Christine. 1956 The Japanese writer Yukio Mishima publishes his novel Kinkakuji/The Temple of the Golden Pavilion. 1956 The Mile High Center in Denver, Colorado, designed by the Chinese-born US architect I M Pei, is completed. 1956 The play A Long Day's Journey into Night, by the US dramatist Eugene O'Neill, is first performed, at the Helen Hayes Theater in New York City. 1956 The play Le Balcon/The Balcony, by the French writer Jean Genet, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1956 The popularity of singer Lonnie Donegan's 'Rock Island Line' (recorded in 1954) triggers the skiffle craze in Britain. The sound is based on acoustic guitar and home-made percussion, including washboards. Its main significance is to make the British market more receptive to blues music. 1956 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his String Quartet No. 6. 1956 The Russian writer Yevgeny Yevtushenko publishes his long poem Stantsiya

Zima/Zima Junction. 1956 The US journalist William Hollingsworth Whyte publishes The Organization Man. 1956 The US rock singer Elvis Presley releases the singles 'Heartbreak Hotel', 'Don't Be Cruel', 'Love Me Tender', 'Blue Suede Shoes', and 'Hound Dog' which, with sales of over 3 million, is the top-selling single of the 1950s in the USA. 1956 The US writer Allen Ginsberg publishes Howl and Other Poems, which becomes a classic of 'Beat' literature. 1956 The US writer John Berryman publishes his poetry collection Homage to Mistress Bradstreet. 1956 The US writer Nelson Algren publishes his novel A Walk on the Wild Side. 1956 The US writer Patricia Highsmith publishes her novel The Talented Mr Ripley. 1956 The US writer Saul Bellow publishes his novel Seize the Day. 1956 Univac initiates the second generation of computers when it introduces the first commercially successful computer using transistors instead of vacuum tubes. 1956 US automobile companies manufacture about 6 million cars and 1 million trucks. About one in every eight cars is a station wagon. 1956 US biochemist and physician Arthur Kornberg discovers how DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) molecules replicate, allowing him to synthesize DNA in a test tube. 1956 US biologists Maklon Hoagland and Paul Zamecnik discover transfer RNA (ribonucleic acid), which transfers amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, to the correct site on the messenger RNA. 1956 US computer programmer Jack Backus at IBM invents FORTRAN (formula translation), the first computer programming language. It is used primarily by scientists and mathematicians. 1956 US physicists Clyde Cowan and Fred Reines detect the existence of the neutrino, a particle with no electric charge and no mass, at the Los Alamos Laboratory, New Mexico, USA. 1956–1957 The Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz publishes his Cairo Trilogy, comprising Bayn al-Qasrayn/Palace Walk, Qasr al-Shawq/Palace of Desire, and AlSukkari-yah/The Sukkariyah.

10 January 1957 The Conservative Harold Macmillan becomes British prime minister after the resignation of Anthony Eden 9 January, and, on 13 January, he forms a ministry with R A Butler as home secretary, Selwyn Lloyd as foreign secretary, and Peter Thorneycroft as chancellor of the Exchequer. 14 January 1957 Humphrey Bogart, US actor, dies in Hollywood, California (57). 6 February 1957 Israeli troops hand over the 'Gaza Strip', Egyptian territory to the southwest of Israel seized in 1956, to a United Nations (UN) force. 17 February 1957 A fire at a nursing home in Warrenton, Missouri, kills 72 people. 6 March 1957 The Gold Coast (comprising the former colonies of the Gold Coast, Ashanti, the Northern Territories, and British Togoland) becomes an independent state within the British Commonwealth and is renamed Ghana, with Kwame Nkrumah as prime minister. On 8 March Ghana is admitted to the United Nations (UN). 25 March 1957 Belgium, France, West Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands (the 'Six') sign the Treaty of Rome establishing the European Economic Community (EEC) or 'Common Market', and a second Rome Treaty establishing the European Atomic Energy Authority or 'Euratom' (to take effect from 1 January 1958). March 1957 The electronics company Sony markets the first pocket-sized transistor radio, in Japan. 9 April 1957 Severiano ('Seve') Ballesteros, Spanish golfer, the youngest to win the British Open Championship (1979 at 22), born in Santander, Spain. 15 April 1957 The 1956 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Yul Brynner, for The King and I; Best Supporting Actor: Anthony Quinn, for Lust for Life; Best Actress: Ingrid Bergman, for Anastasia; Best Supporting Actress: Dorothy Malone, for Written on the Wind; Best Film: Around the World in Eighty Days, directed by Michael Anderson; Best Director: George Stevens, for Giant. 27–28 June 1957 Hurricane Audrey hits Texas and Louisiana, leaving 532 people dead or missing. 4 July 1957 Vyacheslav Molotov, Dmitri Shepilov, and Georgi Malenkov are expelled from the presidium of the Soviet Central Committee of the Communist Party as Nikita Khrushchev consolidates his power. 6 July 1957 Althea Gibson of the USA becomes the first black player to win a singles title at the Wimbledon lawn tennis championships in London, England. 12 August 1957 Following Britain's decision to restore self-government in British

Guiana (now Guyana), an election is held for 14 seats on a new legislative council. Cheddi Jagan's People's Progressive Party wins 9 seats and, on 15 August, Jagan forms a government. 31 August 1957 The British protectorate over Malaya ends and the independent Malayan Federation comes into being. 13 September 1957 The Mousetrap, by Agatha Christie, becomes Britain's longest-running play, with its 1,998th performance, in London, England. 20 September 1957 Jean Sibelius, Finnish composer, dies in Järvenpäa, Finland (91). 21 September 1957 King Haakon VII of Norway dies and is succeeded by his son, Olaf V. 26 September 1957 The musical West Side Story, with lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and music by Leonard Bernstein, is first performed, at the Winter Garden Theater, New York City. It features the songs 'Tonight' and 'Maria'. September 1957 The US Labor Department announces that the average factory worker earns $2.08 per hour or $82.99 per week. 4 October 1957 The USSR launches the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, to study the cosmosphere. It weighs 84 kg/184 lb and circles the Earth in 95 minutes, inaugurating the space age. 10 October 1957 A fire in a military reactor producing plutonium at the English nuclear facility Windscale (now Sellafield) releases large amounts of radioactivity into the surrounding area, news of which is suppressed by the UK government. 29 October 1957 Louis B Mayer, US film executive, head of Metro-GoldwynMayer (MGM) 1924–48, dies in Los Angeles, California (72). 1 December 1957 Seventeen-year-old Charles Starkweather murders service station attendant Robert Colvert in Lincoln, Nebraska; this is the first of his 11 murders, crimes that many blame in part upon his admiration for the rebellious persona of the actor James Dean. 18 December 1957 The first full-scale commercial nuclear power station in the USA opens at Shippingport, Pennsylvania. It produces 60,000 kilowatts of electricity. 1957 Interferon, a natural protein that fights viruses, is discovered by Scottish virologist Alick Isaacs and Swiss virologist Jean Lindemann. 1957 Juan Manuel Fangio of Argentina, driving a Maserati, wins the German Grand Prix and the Nüburgring circuit to clinch the Formula One World Drivers'

Championship for an unprecedented fourth successive year. 1957 The Australian writer Patrick White publishes his novel Voss. 1957 The civil-rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr, helps establish the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization devoted to ending discrimination nonviolently. 1957 The English artist Henry Moore sculpts Reclining Figure for the UNESCO building in Paris, France. 1957 The English poet Ted Hughes publishes his poetry collection The Hawk in the Rain. 1957 The English theologian Alan Watts publishes The Way of Zen. 1957 The English writer John Braine publishes his novel Room at the Top. 1957 The English writer Lawrence Durrell publishes his novel Justine, the first volume of The Alexandria Quartet. 1957 The English writer Nevil Shute publishes his novel On the Beach. 1957 The film Kumonosu-Jo/Throne of Blood, directed by Akira Kurosawa, is released in Japan. A version of Shakespeare's Macbeth, it stars Toshiro Mifune and Isuzu Yamada. 1957 The film Paths of Glory, directed by Stanley Kubrick, is released in the USA, starring Kirk Douglas, Adolphe Menjou, and George McCready. 1957 The film The Bridge on the River Kwai, directed by David Lean, is released in Britain, starring Alec Guinness, William Holden, and Jack Hawkins. 1957 The film The Seventh Seal, directed by Ingmar Bergman, is released in Sweden, starring Max Von Sydow, Bengt Ekerot, Gunnar Bjornstrand, and Bibi Andersson. Bergman's film Wild Strawberries is also released in Sweden, and stars Victor Sjöström, Ingrid Thulin, Gunnar Bjornstrand, and Bibi Andersson. 1957 The film Twelve Angry Men, directed by Sidney Lumet, is released in the USA, starring Henry Fonda. 1957 The French cultural critic Roland Barthes publishes Mythologies. 1957 The illustrated children's books How the Grinch Stole Christmas and The Cat in the Hat are published by the US author and illustrator Dr Seuss. 1957 The Jodrell Bank observatory, located in Cheshire, England, and designed by English astronomer Bernard Lovell, begins operating. The first large radio

telescope, it has a 76-m/250-ft diameter reflector, which can be rotated horizontally at 20° per minute and vertically at 24° per minute. Lovell uses it to track the Soviet satellite Sputnik 1, launched 4 October. 1957 The opera Les Dialogues des Carmélites/The Carmelites' Dialogue, by the French composer Francis Poulenc, is first performed, in Milan, Italy. It is based on a play by the French writer Georges Bernanos. 1957 The play The Entertainer, by the English dramatist John Osborne, is first performed. 1957 The play The Hostage, by the Irish writer Brendan Behan, is first performed, in Dublin, Ireland. 1957 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his Symphony No. 11 (the 1905) and his Piano Concerto No. 2. 1957 The Russian writer Boris Pasternak publishes his novel Doktor Zhivago/Dr Zhivago in Italy, permission having been refused in the USSR. An English translation appears in 1958. Its worldwide success causes Pasternak to be severely criticized in the USSR, and he declines the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1958 fearing that if he leaves the USSR he will not be allowed to return. 1957 The US artist Alexander Calder sculpts Mobile for the Idlewild (now JFK) Airport in New York City. 1957 The US linguist Noam Chomsky publishes Syntactic Structures, which establishes transformational-generative grammar as a linguistic theory. 1957 The US pop duo the Everly Brothers release the singles 'Bye Bye Love' and 'Wake Up Little Susie'. 1957 The US rock singer Elvis Presley releases the singles 'All Shook Up' – his first number one in Britain – and 'Jailhouse Rock'. 1957 The US rock singer/songwriter Buddy Holly releases the singles 'Peggy Sue', 'Rave On', and 'That'll Be the Day'. 1957 The US writer Jack Kerouac publishes his novel On the Road, one of the major works of the 'Beat' movement of the 1950s and 1960s. 1957 The US writer John Cheever publishes his novel The Wapshot Chronicle. 21 January 1958 The seventeen-year-old Charles Starkweather kills the parents and baby sister of his fourteen-year-old girlfriend Caril Ann Fugate. He follows these crimes with seven more murders in Fugate's company in a week-long crime spree through Nebraska and Wyoming. In 1959, Starkweather is sentenced to death; Fugate is sentenced to life in prison.

14 April 1958 The 1957 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Alec Guinness, for The Bridge on the River Kwai; Best Supporting Actor: Red Buttons, for Sayonara; Best Actress: Joanne Woodward, for The Three Faces of Eve; Best Supporting Actress: Miyoshi Umeki, for Sayonara; Best Film: The Bridge on the River Kwai, directed by David Lean; Best Director: David Lean, for The Bridge on the River Kwai. 29 April 1958 Michelle Pfeiffer, US actor, born in Santa Ana, California. 17 June 1958 Imre Nagy, independent communist and premier of Hungary 1953–55, who tried to gain Hungary's independence from the USSR, is executed in Budapest, Hungary (62). 14 July 1958 Brigadier Abdul Karim Kassem mounts a coup in Baghdad, Iraq, and King Faisal II, his heir, and the prime minister Nuri-es-Said are murdered. King Hussein of Jordan assumes power as head of the Arab Federation. 19 July 1958 Following the coup in Iraq, Iraq (nominally under the control of King Hussein of Jordan) and the United Arab Republic (UAR), formed of Egypt and Syria, sign a treaty of mutual defence, and on 20 July the UAR severs relations with Jordan. 28 August 1958 Michael Jackson, US rock singer, born in Gary, Indiana. 29 August 1958 The Chinese politburo approves the creation of a rural economy based on agricultural communes, the backbone of Maoist economic policy. 12 September 1958 US electrical engineer Jack Kilby demonstrates the first integrated circuit. It consists of transistors, resistors, and capacitors contained within a silicon substrate. It leads to the third generation of computers. 19 September 1958 The Algerian rebel leader Ferhat Abbas makes a proclamation in Cairo, Egypt, of the establishment of a Provisional Government of the Republic of Algeria. 28 September 1958 A referendum held in France, Algeria, and other French overseas territories approves the constitution for the Fifth French Republic (promulgated on 5 October), giving the president greater powers and strengthening the position of the government in the French assembly. 2 October 1958 Guinea becomes independent, having already rejected membership of the French Union. 24 October 1958 The French prime minister Charles de Gaulle says he is willing to discuss a ceasefire with nationalist rebels in Algeria, but his proposal is rejected by the Algerian Provisional Government on 25 October. October 1958 The first scheduled transatlantic jet services are launched, by

British Overseas Airways Corporation flying a Comet IV between London, England, and New York City, followed by Pan-Am flying a Boeing 707 between Paris, France, and New York City. 1 December 1958 A fire at a parochial school in Chicago, Illinois, kills 87 children and 3 nuns. 15 December 1958 Wolfgang Pauli, Austrian-born US physicist, who discovered the principle that no two electrons in the same atom can have the same energy, dies in Zürich, Switzerland (57). 21 December 1958 Charles de Gaulle is elected president of the French Republic with 78.5% of votes cast. The communist candidate wins 13.1% and the candidate of the Union of Democratic Forces 8.4%. 30 December 1958 The French West African states of Chad, Congo, Gabon, Mali, Mauritania, and Senegal decide to form a federation within the French Community. 1958 45.6 million households in the USA have television sets. 1958 Communist China launches the 'Great Leap Forward', aiming to increase industrial output at great speed, especially the production of steel. Communes become the basis of agricultural production. 1958 The Bank of America issues the first recognizable multipurpose credit card, the Bank Americard, later known as Visa; the American Express charge card is also launched. 1958 The English writer Alan Sillitoe publishes his novel Saturday Night and Sunday Morning. 1958 The film Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, directed by Richard Brooks, is released in the USA. Based on the play by Tennessee Williams, it stars Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Newman, Burl Ives, Jack Carson, Judith Anderson, Madeline Sherwood, and Larry Gates. 1958 The film Popiól i diament/Ashes and Diamonds, directed by Andrzej Wajda, is released in Poland, starring Zbigniew Cybulski, Ewa Krzyzanowska, and Adam Pawlikowski. 1958 The film Touch of Evil, directed by Orson Welles, is released in the USA. He also stars in it, along with Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, and Marlene Dietrich. 1958 The film Vertigo, directed by the English film-maker Alfred Hitchcock, is released in the USA, starring James Stewart and Kim Novak. 1958 The film musical South Pacific, based on Tales of the South Pacific by

James Michener and directed by Joshua Logan, is released in the USA. With music and lyrics by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, it stars Mitzi Gaynor, Rossano Brazzi, Ray Walston, and John Kerr. 1958 The French writer and philosopher Simone de Beauvoir publishes her first volume of autobiography, Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée/Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter. 1958 The French writer Marguerite Duras publishes her novel Moderato cantabile. 1958 The French-born US composer Edgard Varèse completes his electronic work Poème électronique/Electronic Poems. 1958 The German physicist and philosopher Werner Heisenberg publishes Physics and Philosophy. 1958 The German-born US philosopher Hannah Arendt publishes The Human Condition. 1958 The hula hoop is developed by the Wham-O Manufacturing Co. of San Gabriel, California. 1958 The Irish writer Brendan Behan publishes his autobiographical Borstal Boy. 1958 The Italian writer Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa publishes his novel Il gattopardo/The Leopard. 1958 The Kurdish writer Yashar Kemal publishes his novel Ince Memed/Mehmed, My Hawk. 1958 The Nigerian Ibo writer Chinua Achebe publishes his novel Things Fall Apart. 1958 The notebooks, The Blue Book and The Brown Book, of the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein are published posthumously. 1958 The play Biedermann und die Brandstifter/The Fireraisers, by the Swiss dramatist Max Frisch, is first performed, in Zürich, Switzerland. 1958 The play Krapp's Last Tape, by the Irish writer Samuel Beckett, is first performed, at the Royal Court Theatre in London, England. 1958 The play The Birthday Party, by the English dramatist Harold Pinter, is first performed, in Cambridge, England. 1958 The Russian-born English philosopher Isaiah Berlin publishes Two Concepts of Liberty. 1958 The Seagram Building in New York City, designed by the German architect

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and the US architect Phillip Johnson, is completed. 1958 The US artist David Smith sculpts 8 planes and 7 bars. 1958 The US artist Jasper Johns sculpts Light Bulb and paints Three Flags. 1958 The US rhythm and blues musician Chuck Berry releases the singles 'Sweet Little Sixteen' and 'Johnny B Goode'. 1958 The US writer Truman Capote publishes his novella Breakfast at Tiffany's. 1 January 1959 The Cuban guerrilla campaign of the 26 July Movement forces General Fulgencio Batista to resign and flee to Dominica. A military junta appoints Carlos Piedra as provisional president. 2 January 1959 The Cuban 26 July Movement ignores the military junta and proclaims Dr Manuel Urratía provisional president. He announces a cabinet on 3 January, with Fidel Castro as prime minister (takes oath on 16 February). 21 January 1959 Cecil B DeMille, US film director and producer known for his spectacular films such as The Greatest Show on Earth, dies in Hollywood, California (77). 10 February 1959 A tornado touches down in St Louis, Missouri, killing 22 people, injuring 350 more, and causing $12 million in property damage. 16 February 1959 John McEnroe, US tennis player, born in Wiesbaden, West Germany. 19 February 1959 The prime ministers of Greece, Turkey, and Britain sign an agreement in London, England, granting Cyprus independence. As a republic, the president of Cyprus is to be Greek and the vice-president Turkish, and the two communities are to be allowed considerable autonomy. Britain will retain two military bases on the island. Enosis (union with Greece) is ruled out. 2 March 1959 Raymond Chandler, US author, creator of the private detective Philip Marlowe, dies in La Jolla, California (70). 4 April–30 May 1959 The autonomous French West Africa colonies of Ivory Coast, Niger, Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso), and Dahomey (now Benin) sign a series of agreements to form the Sahel–Benin Union. 13 April 1959 The 1958 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: David Niven, for Separate Tables; Best Supporting Actor: Burl Ives, for The Big Country; Best Actress: Susan Hayward, for I Want to Live; Best Supporting Actress: Wendy Hiller, for Separate Tables; Best Film: Gigi, directed by Vincente Minelli; Best Director: Vincente Minelli, for Gigi.

April 1959 The St Lawrence Seaway is completed. It provides the Great Lakes with access to the Atlantic Ocean. 19 May 1959 Following an indecisive general election in the Netherlands on 12 March, Jan Edward de Quay forms a four-party coalition ministry, and the Labour Party goes into opposition for the first time since 1945. 25 May 1959 The US Supreme Court rules that a Louisiana state ban on boxing matches between white and black fighters is unconstitutional. 3 June 1959 The British colony of Singapore becomes self-governing. 8 June 1959 The US X-15 rocket plane makes its first flight. Only three of the planes are built, but over the next ten years they achieve a speed of 7,200 kph/4,500 mph (Mach 6) and an altitude of 106,700 m/350,000 ft. 11 June 1959 The US Postmaster General bans the novel Lady Chatterley's Lover by D H Lawrence from the mail (meaning in effect that it cannot be distributed in the USA), citing its erotic passages. 17 July 1959 Billie Holiday (real name Eleanora Fagan), US jazz singer, dies in New York City (44). 21 July 1959 A US federal district court in New York City lifts the ban that the Postmaster General had placed on Lady Chatterley's Lover by English author D H Lawrence, ruling that the novel, which was privately published in Florence in 1928, is not obscene. A complete edition is published. 21 August 1959 Following the withdrawal of Iraq from the Baghdad Pact on 24 March, the Pact changes its name to the Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) and moves its headquarters to Ankara, Turkey. August 1959 The US president Dwight D Eisenhower proclaims Hawaii the 50th state. Hawaiians had overwhelmingly endorsed statehood in a referendum on 27 June. 14 September 1959 The Soviet spacecraft Luna 2 (launched on 12 September) becomes the first spacecraft to strike the Moon. 25 September 1959 Following the assassination of Solomon Bandaranaike, prime minister of Ceylon (Sri Lanka), by a Buddhist monk, he is succeeded by Wijayananda Dahanayake. 7 October 1959 The Soviet Luna 3 (launched on 4 October) takes the first photographs of the far side of the Moon. 21 October 1959 The Solomon Guggenheim Museum, a modern art museum designed by US architect Frank Lloyd Wright, opens in New York City.

10 November 1959 The ending of the Mau Mau emergency in Kenya is officially announced by the government (a proclamation to this effect is signed by the governor of Kenya on 12 January 1960). 15 November 1959 Richard Hickock and Perry Smith rob the home of Herbert W Clutter of Holcomb, Kansas; when they find less than $50 in the house, they murder all four residents: Herbert (48), Bonnie (45), Nancy (16), and Kenyon (15). Details of the crime, and the criminals' capture, trial, and execution will be recorded in 1966 by Truman Capote in his true-crime best-seller In Cold Blood. 1 December 1959 An Antarctic Treaty is signed, suspending territorial claims and aiming to prevent development in the region (valid 23 June 1961–December 1989). 29 December 1959 US theoretical physicist Richard Feynman delivers a paper entitled 'There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom' to the American Physical Society, in which he describes the manufacture of transistors and other electronic components one atom at a time. It anticipates nanotechnology. 1959 Berry Gordy founds Motown Records in Detroit, Michigan, and launches the Tamla record label with 'Come to Me', by Marv Johnson. 1959 The Barbie doll, designed by Californian entrepreneurs Ruth and Eliot Handler, is launched in the USA. 1959 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) broadcasts the first transatlantic programme, from London, England, to Montreal, Canada, showing the departure of the queen and Prince Philip for Canada. 1959 The English philosopher P F Strawson publishes Individuals: An Essay in Descriptive Metaphysics. 1959 The English writer Roald Dahl publishes his collection of short stories Kiss, Kiss. 1959 The English writer William Golding publishes his novel Free Fall. 1959 The film Apur Sansar/The World of Apu, directed by Satyajit Ray, is released in India. The concluding part of a trilogy (following Pather Panchali/The Song of the Road and Aparajito/Unvanquished), it stars Soumitra Chatterjee, Sarmila Tagore, and Alok Chakravarti. 1959 The film Ben-Hur, directed by William Wyler, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by the US author and diplomat Lew Wallace, it stars Charlton Heston. 1959 The film Look Back in Anger, directed by Tony Richardson, is released in Britain. Based on the play by John Osborne, it stars Richard Burton, Mary Ure,

Claire Blook, Edith Evans, and Gary Raymond. 1959 The film North by Northwest, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, is released in the USA, starring Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint, and James Mason. 1959 The film Some Like it Hot, directed by Billy Wilder, is released in the USA, starring Marilyn Monroe, Jack Lemmon, and Tony Curtis. 1959 The first fast breeder reactor (that produces more nuclear fuel than it consumes) is commissioned at Dounreay in Scotland. 1959 The French composer Jean Françaix completes his L'Horloge de flore/The Floral Clock for oboe and orchestra. 1959 The French writer Raymond Queneau publishes his novel Zazie dans le métro/Zazie in the Metro. 1959 The German writer Günther Grass publishes his novel Die Blechtrommel/ The Tin Drum. 1959 The German writer Heinrich Böll publishes Billiard um halb zehn/Billiards at Half-Past Nine. 1959 The play A Taste of Honey, by the English dramatist Shelagh Delaney, is first performed, at the Wyndham Theatre in London, England. 1959 The play Sergeant Musgrave's Dance, by the English dramatist John Arden, is first performed, at the Royal Court Theatre in London, England. 1959 The Scottish writer Muriel Spark publishes her novel Memento Mori. 1959 The US artist Allan Kaprow creates his first 'happening' – 18 Happenings in 6 Parts – in the Reuben Gallery in New York City. Typical of US art in the 1960s and 1970s, happenings combine visual arts, music, and improvised theatre, and often encourage audience participation. 1959 The US artist Robert Rauschenberg creates Monogram, a multimedia work (which he calls a 'combine-painting') that includes a stuffed goat wearing an automobile tyre. It becomes one of the most distinctive images of the 1960s. 1959 The US clothing manufacturer Glen Raven Mills develops fine nylon tights (pantyhose), originally marketed as Panti-Legs. 1959 The US social scientist Seymour Martin Lipset publishes Political Man. 1959 The US writer Philip Roth publishes his short-story collection Goodbye, Columbus.

1959 The US writer Robert Lowell publishes his poetry collection Life Studies, which includes 'Skunk Hour'. 1959 The US writer Saul Bellow publishes his novel Henderson the Rain King. 1959 The US writer William Burroughs publishes his novel The Naked Lunch. 1959 US engineer Jean Hoerni of Fairchild Semiconductor Corporation designs the planar or 'flat' transistor and US engineer Robert Noyce discovers a way to join the circuits by printing, eliminating hundreds of hours in their production. Their work leads to the creation of the first microchip, which stimulates the computer industry with its sharply reduced size and cost and leads to the third generation of computers. 1959 US philosopher Sidney Hook publishes Political Power and Personal Freedom: Critical Studies in Democracy, Communism, and Civil Rights. 1959–1960 The US artist David Smith sculpts his Cubi series. 1 January 1960 French Cameroon becomes the independent Republic of Cameroon. 4 January 1960 Albert Camus, French novelist who received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, dies in Sens, France (46). 23 January 1960 Swiss engineer Jacques Piccard and US Navy lieutenant Don Walsh descend to the bottom of Challenger Deep (10,916 m/35,810 ft), off the Pacific island of Guam, in the bathyscaph Trieste, setting a new undersea record. 13 February 1960 France explodes an atomic bomb over the Sahara Desert, thus becoming the fourth atomic power. 21 March 1960 Ayrton Senna, Brazilian racing car driver, born in São Paulo, Brazil (–1994). 21 March 1960 The 'Sharpeville massacre' occurs in a township near Vereeniging (south of Johannesburg), South Africa, where members of the Pan-African Congress demonstrating against pass laws are fired on by police, killing 69 demonstrators and wounding 186 more. 30 March 1960 Following demonstrations, strikes, and marches by blacks demanding civil rights, the South African government proclaims a state of emergency (–31 August) and passes the Unlawful Organizations Act. On 8 April the African National Congress (ANC) and Pan-African Congress are banned, and Nelson Mandela and others form Umkonto we Sizwe ('Spear of the Nation'), as the guerrilla wing of the ANC. 1 April 1960 R Griggs & Co. begin to produce Doc Martens boots under licence in

Britain. 18 April 1960 The 1959 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Charlton Heston, for Ben-Hur; Best Supporting Actor: Hugh Griffith, for Ben-Hur; Best Actress: Simone Signoret, for Room at the Top; Best Supporting Actress: Shelley Winters, for The Diary of Anne Frank; Best Film: Ben-Hur, directed by William Wyler; Best Director: William Wyler, for Ben-Hur. 27 April 1960 The French-governed part of Togoland becomes the independent Republic of Togo, Africa's smallest independent country. 1 May 1960 Soviet military forces shoot down a US high-altitude U-2 spy aircraft over the Ural Mountains, USSR. On 19 August, the pilot Gary Powers is sentenced to ten years of imprisonment for espionage. 3 May 1960 The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) comes into force, with 20% tariff cuts between members from July. 16–19 May 1960 A summit meeting takes place in Paris, France, between the Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, the British prime minister Harold Macmillan, the US president Dwight D Eisenhower, and the French president Charles de Gaulle. Khrushchev uses the U-2 incident to break up the summit, when President Dwight D Eisenhower refuses to give a public apology for the incident and to pledge that there would be no further intrusions into Soviet air space. 31 May 1960 The President's Joint Commission on Mental Illness and Health in the USA reports that 25% of Americans suffer from mental illness at some point in their lives. 6 June 1960 A study by the American Heart Association finds that men who smoke are 50–150% more likely to die from coronary disease than nonsmokers. 20 June 1960 In beating Ingemar Johansson of Sweden in five rounds of their fight in New York City, US boxer Floyd Patterson becomes the first boxer to regain the world heavyweight title. 26 June 1960 British Somaliland becomes independent and, on 27 June, unites with Somalia. 26 June 1960 The French colony of Madagascar is proclaimed independent as the Malagasy Republic (but remains within the French Community). It is admitted to the United Nations (UN) on 20 September. 30 June 1960 The Promotion of Bantu Self-Government Act comes into force in South Africa, establishing separate 'homelands' for blacks. 4 July 1960 The 50-star US flag, recognizing Hawaii's statehood of August 1959, becomes the official flag.

5–6 July 1960 The army in the newly independent Congo Republic mutinies, and Europeans in the country flee from the Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) area to Brazzaville (French Congo). 18 July 1960 Following the cancellation of the US president Dwight D Eisenhower's visit to Japan in June after riots by Japanese students protesting against a US–Japanese treaty, Nobusuke Kishi resigns as Japanese prime minister, and is succeeded by Hayato Ikeda. 31 July 1960 The official end of the 'Malayan Emergency' (British and Mayalan operations against communist insurgents in Malaya, beginning in 1948) is announced. 16 August 1960 Cyprus becomes an independent republic with Greek Cypriot Archbishop Makarios as president and Turkish Cypriot Dr Fazil Kütchük as vicepresident. August 1960 The Japan Stationery Company, in Tokyo, markets Pentel, the first felt-tip pens. 9 September 1960 A crowd of 21,597 watches the Denver Broncos defeat the Boston Patriots 13–10 in Boston, Massachusetts, in the first American Football League (AFL) regular season game. The AFL was formed earlier this year as a rival to the National Football League (NFL). 9 September 1960 Representatives of Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela meet in Baghdad, Iraq, and vote to establish the Organization of Petroleum-Exporting Countries (OPEC), a permanent organization to represent their interests. OPEC is finally formed in 1961. 26 September 1960 US presidential candidates John F Kennedy and Richard M Nixon debate on television, establishing a precedent for several subsequent elections. Viewers consider the outcome to be a draw, but radio listeners believe Nixon to be the winner, indicating that style and appearance are as much a part of Kennedy's campaign as substance. October 1960 The 11th general Conference on Weights and Measures replaces the metric system with the International System (SI) of weights and measures. It redefines the seven basic units of measurement, from which all others are derived, in atomic terms. The metre, for instance is redefined as 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of the orange-red line in the krypton-86 spectrum. 28 November 1960 The colony of Mauritania proclaims independence from France as an Islamic Republic. November 1960 Americans elect John F Kennedy president and Lyndon B Johnson vice president in the closest popular vote in US history (49.7% to 49.6%). In the Congressional elections, Democrats retain majorities in the House (263-

174) and Senate (65-35). November 1960 US computer scientist Kenneth Olsen, at Digital Equipment Corporation, introduces the PDP-1 computer. It has a memory of 26 megabytes and is the first to use a monitor and keyboard. It is the forerunner of the minicomputer. 14 December 1960 The Congo prime minister Patrice Lumumba's vice-president, Antoine Gizenga, proclaims himself premier and establishes a pro-communist government in Stanleyville (now Kisangani). 16 December 1960 The worst airline disaster to date occurs when a United Air Lines and a TWA plane collide in fog over New York City killing 132 passengers and crew members. 1960 A television monitoring group in Los Angeles records in one week's viewing of US television 144 murders and 143 attempted murders. The increase in portrayed violence has been caused by a ratings war between stations. 1960 In the USA, 22% of white males and 29% of white females have finished four years of high school; the corresponding numbers for black males and females are 12% and 15%. 1960 Scottish psychologist R D Laing publishes The Divided Self: A Study in Sanity and Madness. 1960 The absurdist play Le Rhinocéros/The Rhinoceros, by the Romanian-born French dramatist Eugène Ionesco, is first performed, in Paris, France. 1960 The English artist David Hockney paints Adhesiveness. 1960 The film À bout de souffle/Breathless, directed by Jean-Luc Godard, is released in France, starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg. 1960 The film La dolce vita/The Good Life, directed by Federico Fellini, is released in Italy, starring Marcello Mastroianni. 1960 The film Psycho, directed by the English film-maker Alfred Hitchcock, is released in the USA. Based on the book by Robert Bloch, it stars Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, Janet Leigh, and John Gavin. 1960 The film Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, directed by the Czechoslovakian film-maker Karel Reisz, is released in Britain. Based on the novel by Alan Sillitoe, it stars Albert Finney, Shirley-Anne Field, and Rachel Roberts. 1960 The film Spartacus, directed by Stanley Kubrick, is released in the USA, starring Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, Peter Ustinov, Charles Laughton, Tony

Curtis, and Jean Simmons. 1960 The first public performance by John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Pete Best as the Beatles takes place, at Bruno Koschminder's Indra Club in Hamburg, West Germany. 1960 The French historian Philippe Ariès publishes L'Enfant et la vie familiale sous l'ancien régime/The Child and the Family. 1960 The French writer Claude Simon publishes his novel La Route des Flandres/ The Road to Flanders. 1960 The German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen completes his electronic work Kontakte/Contact. 1960 The lowest fifth of the population earns 4.8% of the total household income in the USA; the second fifth earns 11.9%; the third fifth earns 17.8%; the fourth fifth earns 24%; and the highest fifth earns 41.1%. 1960 The median income for families in the USA is $5,620, or $5,835 for white families and $3,233 for blacks and other minorities. 1960 The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) meets for the first time, in Baghdad, Iraq. It raises the price of oil. 1960 The play A Man for All Seasons, by the English dramatist Robert Bolt, based on the life of Sir Thomas More, is first performed, at the Globe Theatre in London, England. 1960 The play The Caretaker, by the English dramatist Harold Pinter, is first performed, at the Arts Theatre in London, England. 1960 The Swiss artist Jean Tinguely creates Homage to New York, a selfdestructing sculpture. 1960 The US journalist William L Shirer publishes The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. 1960 The US philosopher W V Quine publishes Word and Object. 1960 The US rock singer Elvis Presley releases the single 'Are You Lonesome Tonight?' It enters the US charts on 14 November 1960, and becomes the bestselling single of 1961 in Britain. 1960 The US writer Harper Lee publishes her novel To Kill a Mockingbird, which wins the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961. 1960 The US writer John Updike publishes his novel Rabbit Run, the first of four

novels featuring the career of Harry 'Rabbit' Armstrong. 1960 The US writer Sylvia Plath publishes her poetry collection The Colossus. 1960 The US Xerox Corporation markets the Xerox 914 copier, which can make 23 × 35.5 cm/9 × 14 in copies on ordinary rather than coated paper. It begins a revolution in the office. 1960 US physicist Theodore Maiman constructs the first laser (light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation), a device producing an intense beam of parallel or coherent light. c. 1960 Skateboarding is invented in California, USA, by surfers who fix rollerskate wheels to short surfboards. Soon afterwards the first skateboards are manufactured commercially, and over the decade the craze spreads east across the USA. 1960–1969 Cliff Richard is the most successful singles artist in Britain in the 1960s, outselling even the Beatles. 1960–1969 The Beatles' song 'She Loves You' is the best-selling single of the 1960s in Britain. The Beatles are responsible for five out of the top six singles in Britain in the 1960s. 4 January 1961 Erwin Schrödinger, Austrian physicist who developed the wave theory of matter, dies in Vienna, Austria (73). 6–8 January 1961 A referendum is held in Algeria, in which 69% of the voters support the French president Charles de Gaulle's policy of allowing Algeria to vote on self-determination and France to ratify the outcome of the vote. The Algerian nationalist Front de Libération Nationale (FLN) boycotts the referendum. 17 January 1961 Patrice Lumumba, the former prime minister of the Congo Republic, is killed near Elisabethville (now Lubumbashi) by agents of President Moise Tshombe's breakaway Katanga province. 26 January 1961 Wayne Gretzky, Canadian ice-hockey player, born in Brantford, Ontario, Canada. 21 March 1961 The British rock group the Beatles make their British debut at the Cavern Club in Liverpool, England. 17 April 1961 The 1960 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Burt Lancaster, for Elmer Gantry; Best Supporting Actor: Peter Ustinov, for Spartacus; Best Actress: Elizabeth Taylor, for Butterfield 8; Best Supporting Actress: Shirley Jones, for Elmer Gantry; Best Film: The Apartment, directed by Billy Wilder; Best Director: Billy Wilder, for The Apartment.

17–20 April 1961 One thousand five hundred Cuban exiles, trained by US military instructors and supported by the CIA, land on Cuba in the 'Bay of Pigs' invasion. An expected sympathetic uprising fails to occur and the invaders are killed or captured. 21 April 1961 A revolt in Algeria by members of the OAS (Secret Army Organization) under General Maurice Challe leads the French president Charles de Gaulle to declare a state of emergency on 23 April. The coup collapses on 26 April. 27 April 1961 The British colony of Sierra Leone wins independence within the Commonwealth. 5 May 1961 US astronaut Alan Shepard in the Mercury capsule Freedom 7 makes a 14.8-minute single sub-orbital flight. He is the first US astronaut in space. 28 May 1961 The last journey of the 'Orient Express', between Paris, France, and Bucharest, Romania, takes place after 78 years of service. 31 May 1961 South Africa becomes an independent republic outside the Commonwealth, with Charles Swart as president. 4 June 1961 The US president John F Kennedy and Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev meet in Vienna, Austria to discuss the future of Laos, Berlin, Germany, and nuclear disarmament. The Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev proposes, to the US president John F Kennedy, a German peace conference to conclude a treaty and establish Berlin as a free city. He also proposes that disarmament discussions should proceed simultaneously with talks about a ban on nuclear tests, but this is rejected by the West on 17 July. 6 June 1961 Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist who founded analytic psychology, dies in Küsnacht, Switzerland (85). 1 July 1961 Lady Diana Spencer, Princess of Wales, humanitarian, and charity worker, born at Park House, Sandringham, Norfolk (– 1997). 2 July 1961 Ernest Hemingway, US novelist who wrote A Farewell to Arms (1929) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1941), commits suicide in Ketchum, Idaho (61). 16 July 1961 Iolanda Balas of Romania sets her 14th women's high-jump world record. Since 1956 she has improved the record from 1.75 m/5.74 ft to 1.91 m/6.26 ft, including the first jump of 6 ft by a woman in 1958. 17–18 August 1961 East German building workers begin constructing the Berlin Wall, a near-impregnable physical barrier sealing off West Berlin and preventing the escape of East Germans to the West. 1 September 1961 Eero Saarinen, Finnish-born US architect, dies in Ann Arbor,

Michigan (51). 6 September 1961 The US folk/rock singer Bob Dylan makes his debut at the Gaslight Café in Greenwich Village, New York City, appearing with blues musician John Lee Hooker. 28 September 1961 An army coup in Damascus, Syria, overthrows the government there. On 29 September, Syria secedes from the United Arab Republic and forms the Syrian Arab Republic. 30 September 1961 The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), established the previous year by an international convention. is founded. It is a successor to the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC), but the OECD includes the USA and Canada among its founder members. 30 October 1961 Luigi Einaudi, first president of the Republic of Italy (1948–55), dies in Rome, Italy (87). 3 November 1961 Following the death of United Nations (UN) secretary general Dag Hammarskjöld on 18 September in an air crash in the Congo Republic while travelling to see President Moise Tshombe of Katanga province, U Thant of Burma becomes acting secretary general. 6–9 November 1961 A fire sweeps across the suburb of Bel Air in Los Angeles, California, destroying more than 400 homes. 8 November 1961 A plane carrying US Army recruits crashes near Richmond, Virginia, killing 74 people. 9 December 1961 Tanganyika becomes an independent state within the British Commonwealth. 1961 Adolf Eichmann is tried in Israel and found guilty of crimes against the Jewish people during the Holocaust of World War II. He is to be executed on 31 May 1962. 1961 Anton Geesink of the Netherlands becomes the first non-Japanese winner of the World Judo Championships, in Paris, France. 1961 Barbara Terry, the daughter of a hairdresser, invents the Afro hairstyle in the USA. 1961 Dr William Scholl invents the Scholl sandal in the USA. The functional footwear will enjoy a revival as a fashion accessory in the mid-1990s. 1961 English molecular biologist Francis Crick and South African chemist Sydney Brenner discover that each base triplet on the DNA strand codes for a specific

amino acid in a protein molecule. 1961 IBM introduces the Selectric typewriter which has some basic wordprocessing capacity. Characters are arranged on a rotating sphere or 'golf ball', rather than on individual arms. Because the sphere rotates there is no need for a moving carriage. It will account for over 70% of the electric typewriter market by the mid-1970s. 1961 Jean Nidetch founds Weight Watchers in New York City. Her system for losing weight is based on a low-protein diet and setting up networks of people to give mutual support at regular meetings. Weight Watchers is later bought by the food company Heinz. 1961 Mattel Toys launches the Ken doll, a boyfriend for Barbie, in the USA. 1961 The British rock group the Rolling Stones is formed. Founder members include Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Brian Jones, and Ian Stewart; the longstanding bassist Bill Wyman joins in late 1962, and drummer Charlie Watts in January 1963. 1961 The British toy company Pedigree launches the Sindy doll, as a competitor to the very popular Barbie. 1961 The English composer Benjamin Britten completes his choral work War Requiem and his Cello Sonata No. 1. 1961 The film Breakfast at Tiffany's, directed by Blake Edwards, is released in the USA. Based on the novella by Truman Capote, it stars Audrey Hepburn and George Peppard. 1961 The film Jules et Jim, directed by François Truffaut, is released in France, starring Jeanne Moreau, Oskar Werner, and Henri Serre. 1961 The film The Hustler, directed by Robert Rossen, is released in the USA, starring Paul Newman. 1961 The film Viridiana, directed by Luis Buñuel, is released in Spain, starring Silvia Pinal and Fernando Rey. It tells the story of a novice about to take her vows who is debauched by an uncle with the complicity of the mother superior. The film is criticized by the Spanish authorities and by the Vatican. It is the joint winner of the Palme d'Or, with Colpi's The Long Absence at the French Cannes Film Festival later in the year. 1961 The film Yojimbo, directed by Akira Kurosawa, is released in Japan, starring Toshiro Mifune, Eijiro Tono, and Katamari Fujiwara. 1961 The film version of Leonard Bernstein's musical West Side Story, directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins, is released in the USA. A rewriting of

Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet set in New York City, it stars Natalie Wood, Richard Beymer, Rita Moreno, and George Chakiris. 1961 The French philosopher Michel Foucault publishes Folie et déraison: histoire de la folie à l'âge classique/History of Madness. 1961 The Hungarian-born Austrian composer György Ligeti completes his orchestral work Atmosphères. 1961 The Indian writer R K Narayan publishes his novel The Man-eater of Malgudi. 1961 The play Andorra, by the Swiss writer Max Frisch, is first performed in Zürich, Switzerland. 1961 The play Luther, by the English dramatist John Osborne, is first performed at the Theatre Royal in Nottingham, England. 1961 The Polish-born US writer Isaac Bashevis Singer publishes his collection of short stories The Spinoza of Market Street, which first appeared in Yiddish in 1944. 1961 The Russian writer Yevgeny Yevtushenko publishes his long poem Babi Yar. 1961 The Scottish writer Muriel Spark publishes her novel The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. 1961 The Squibb Co., New York City, manufactures the first electric toothbrush. 1961 The Swedish-born US artist Claes Oldenburg creates Giant Hamburger with Pickle Attached, a giant replica made of canvas. 1961 The twist dance craze takes off in the USA, inspired by Chubby Checker's song 'The Twist'. It will change the way young people dance, introducing a more freeform style. 1961 The US artist Tom Wesselman paints Great American Nude No 1, the first of a series. 1961 The US ice-cream manufacturer Reuben Mattus creates a range of highquality ice creams and invents a name which will suggest richness and a European origin – Häagen-Dazs. 1961 The US Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization publishes The Family Fallout Shelter, a 31-page guide that explains how to build a fallout shelter in case of nuclear war. 1961 The US rock singer Elvis Presley's album G I Blues, the soundtrack from the

film, is this year's best-selling album in Britain. 1961 The US writer Bernard Malamud publishes his novel A New Life. 1961 The US writer Joseph Heller publishes his novel Catch-22. 1961 The US writer Tillie Olsen publishes her story collection Tell Me a Riddle. 1961 US cigarette manufacturers spend over $110 million on television advertising, compared to $40 million in 1957. 1961 US inventor George Devol and US businessman Joseph Engelberger develop the first true robot, a programmable manipulator called 'Programmed Article Transfer'. Installed at General Motors by their company Unimation, it is used to unload parts from a die-casting operation. 1961 US meteorologist Edward Lorenz discovers a mathematical system with chaotic behaviour, leading to a new branch of mathematics known as chaos theory. 1961 US physicist Murray Gell-Mann and Israeli physicist Yuval Ne'eman independently propose a classification scheme for subatomic particles that comes to be known as the Eightfold Way. 1961 US psychologist Carl Rogers publishes On Becoming a Person. 1 January 1962 Western Samoa, previously administered by New Zealand, becomes the first sovereign independent Polynesian state. 20 February 1962 US astronaut John Glenn, in the Mercury capsule Friendship 7, becomes the first US astronaut to orbit the Earth. He makes three orbits. February 1962 The satirical magazine Private Eye is launched in Britain. In April, it has to be saved from financial difficulties by comedian Peter Cook. 2 March 1962 A military coup in Burma (now Myanmar), led by General Ne Win, overthrows the government of Prime Minister U Nu. 2 March 1962 Wilt Chamberlain of the Philadelphia Warriors achieves a National Basketball Association single game record of 100 points against the New York Knicks. 18 March 1962 Following secret discussions (completed at Evian-les-Bains, France), the French government and the Provisional Government of Algeria make the 'Evian agreements', under which a provisional Muslim–French government is to be installed in Algeria and a referendum is to be held on self-determination. 9 April 1962 The 1961 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Maximilian

Schell, for Judgement at Nuremberg; Best Supporting Actor: George Chakiris, for West Side Story; Best Actress: Sophia Loren, for Two Women; Best Supporting Actress: Rita Moreno, for West Side Story; Best Film: West Side Story, directed by Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins; Best Director: Robert Wise and Jerome Robbins, for West Side Story. 18 April 1962 Following Jamaica's vote (in September 1961) to leave the British West Indies Federation, the British Parliament passes the West Indies Act, dissolving the federation. 12 May 1962 Negotiations are held in Laos between the leaders of the three warring parties, who reach agreement. A Provisional Government of National Unity is established on 22 May, with Prince Souvanna Phouma as president. 6 July 1962 William Faulkner, US novelist, author of a series of novels known as the Yoknapatawpha cycle and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1949, dies near Oxford, Mississippi (64). 10 July 1962 The US communications satellite Telstar is launched for the American Telephone and Telegraph company (AT&T) by the National Aeronautics Space Administration (NASA) from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Weighing 77 kg/170 lb and orbiting the Earth every 158 minutes, it is designed to receive a signal from the ground, amplify it, and then relay it to another ground station. Live television pictures of the chairman of the American Telephone and Telegraph company (AT&T) are transmitted from Andover, Maine, to Goonhilly Down, Cornwall, southwest England, and Brittany, France. Transmissions last only 15 minutes per orbit but they are the first to connect the television networks of Europe and North America. 5 August 1962 Marilyn Monroe, US actor and sex symbol, dies in Los Angeles, California, from an overdose of sleeping pills (36). 6 August 1962 Jamaica becomes independent within the British Commonwealth. 8 August 1962 The leader of the South African organization Umkonto we Sizwe (' Spear of the Nation'), Nelson Mandela, is arrested when returning to Johannesburg, South Africa, from Natal. He is tried in November, and convicted of inciting workers to strike and of leaving the country without valid documents. He is sentenced to five years in prison. 31 August 1962 Trinidad and Tobago (previously members of the West Indies Federation) becomes an independent nation within the British Commonwealth. 9 October 1962 Uganda gains independence within the British Commonwealth. 22 October 1962 During the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F Kennedy of the USA delivers his ultimatum to the USSR in a television address. 22 October 1962 The Cuban Missile Crisis begins. The US president John F

Kennedy announces that the USSR has installed a missile base in Cuba, and declares a naval blockade to prevent missile shipments. 27 October 1962 The play Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, by the US dramatist Edward Albee, is first performed, at the Billy Rose Theater in New York City. 28 October 1962 The Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev announces that he has ordered the withdrawal of nuclear missiles from Cuba, and the US president John F Kennedy promises the USA will not invade Cuba, ending the Cuban Missile Crisis. 19 November 1962 Jodie Foster, US actor, born in Los Angeles, California. 30 November 1962 U Thant of Burma (now Myanmar) is elected United Nations (UN) secretary general, having served as remporary secretary general since the death of Swedish statesman Dag Hammarskjöld on 18 September 1961. 9 December 1962 Tanganyika (now Tanzania) becomes a republic within the Commonwealth, with Julius Nyerere as president. 19 December 1962 The US president John F Kennedy and the British prime minister Harold Macmillan meet at a conference in Nassau, the Bahamas, where the USA agrees to supply Britain with Polaris missiles instead of Skybolt. A crisis had occurred in the 'special relationship' when the USA decided not to supply Skybolt as agreed. 1962 Czech ophthalmologist Otto Witcherle develops soft contact lenses. 1962 German philosopher Martin Heidegger publishes Die Technik und die Kehre/ The Question Concerning Technology. 1962 Helen Gurley Brown publishes her best-selling Sex and the Single Girl, a celebration of the opportunities outside marriage now available to young women. She will go on to become the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine. 1962 Iron City Beer in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, produces the first aluminium can with a ring-pull. These are not immediately popular because they add to the cost of the product and early designs are awkward. 1962 Japanese philosopher D T Suzuki publishes The Essentials of Zen Buddhism. 1962 Press censorship is officially lifted in Spain, though this is not entirely fulfilled in practice. 1962 Royal Crown Cola launch Diet-Rite Cola in the USA, the first sugar-free soft drink on the market. 1962 The Australian tennis player Rod Laver achieves the Grand Slam, winning all four major tennis championships (the Australian Open, the French Open,

Wimbledon, and the US Open) in the same calendar year. He is the first person to do so since Don Budge of the USA in 1938. 1962 The Dow Corning Corporation (manufacturer of chemicals, glass, and other materials) of Detroit, Michigan, develops the silicon breast implant. 1962 The Dutch firm Philips introduces the audiocassette for recording sound on magnetic tape. 1962 The English writer Anthony Burgess publishes his novel A Clockwork Orange, which becomes controversial because of its violence. An equally controversial film adaptation by the director Stanley Kubrick is released in 1971 and soon withdrawn from general circulation in Britain. 1962 The English writer Doris Lessing publishes her novel The Golden Notebook. 1962 The film A Kind of Loving, directed by John Schlesinger, is released in Britain. Based on the novel by Stan Barstow, it stars Alan Bates and June Ritchie. 1962 The film Lawrence of Arabia, directed by David Lean, is released in Britain. An epic biography of T E Lawrence, it stars Peter O'Toole, Omar Sharif, and Arthur Kennedy. 1962 The film The Manchurian Candidate, directed by John Frankenheimer, is released in the USA, starring Laurence Harvey, Frank Sinatra, Janet Leigh, and Angela Lansbury. It is based on the novel by Richard Condon. 1962 The Italian writer Giorgio Bassani publishes his novel Il giardino dei FinziContini/The Garden of the Finzi-Continis. 1962 The play Die Physiker/The Physicists, by the Swiss writer Friedrich Dürrenmatt, is first performed in Zürich, Switzerland. 1962 The rebuilding of Coventry Cathedral in England (damaged during World War II) is completed, following a design by the English architect Basil Spence. The US-born English artist Jacob Epstein provides sculpture, the English artists John Hutton, Lawrence Lee, and John Piper the windows, and the English artist Graham Sutherland a tapestry. 1962 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his Symphony No. 13, Babi Yar, inspired by a poem by the Russian writer Yevgeny Yevtushenko. 1962 The Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn publishes his novella Odin den Ivana Denisovicha/One day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, which wins international acclaim after being allowed into print by the Soviet authorities in the magazine Novy Mir. 1962 The S S Kregge Co. launches the chain of K Mart discount stores in the USA,

opening several stores at the same time. Their form now is 'Kmart'. 1962 The Trans World Airlines Terminal at Idlewild (now John F Kennedy) Airport, in New York City, designed by the Finnish architect Eero Saarinen, is completed. 1962 The US economist Milton Friedman publishes Capitalism and Freedom. 1962 The US folk/rock singer Bob Dylan releases the single 'Blowin' in the Wind'. Written in April 1962, it was released on the album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan in May 1963. 1962 The US philosopher of science Thomas S Kuhn publishes The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 1962 The US rock singer Elvis Presley releases the singles 'Return to Sender' and 'Can't Help Falling in Love'. 1962 The US writer James Baldwin publishes his novel Another Country. 1962 US psychologist A H Maslow publishes Towards a Theory of Being. 1962–1965 The Second Vatican Council, a council of the Roman Catholic Church convened by Pope John XXIII, is held, its aim being to reform Catholic ministry and liturgy, and to seek reunion with other Christian denominations. 11 January 1963 The first discotheque opens, the Whisky-A-Go-Go in Los Angeles, California, with the emphasis on youth and contemporary rock 'n' roll dance music. 11 February 1963 Sylvia Plath, US poet and novelist, commits suicide in London, England (30). 8 April 1963 The 1962 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Gregory Peck, for To Kill a Mocking Bird; Best Supporting Actor: Ed Begley, for Sweet Bird of Youth; Best Actress: Anne Bancroft, for The Miracle Worker; Best Supporting Actress: Patty Duke, for The Miracle Worker; Best Film: Lawrence of Arabia, directed by David Lean; Best Director: David Lean, for Lawrence of Arabia. 13 April 1963 Garry Kasparov, Soviet chess master who dominated international chess from the mid-1980s, born in Baku, Azerbaijan, USSR. 20 May 1963 Tigran Petrosyan wins the world chess championship from fellow Soviet grandmaster Mikhail Botvinnik, who has held the world title for all but two years since 1948, in Moscow, USSR. 22–25 May 1963 The Organization of African Unity (OAU; later African Union) is founded at a conference of African leaders in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; it aims to

maintain solidarity between African leaders and remove colonialism from the African continent. 8 June 1963 The American Heart Association begins its first public campaign against smoking tobacco. 16 June 1963 Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space, is launched into a three-day orbital flight aboard Vostok 6, to study the problem of weightlessness. 21 June 1963 After the death of Pope John XXIII on 3 June, the Italian clergyman Giovanni Battista Montini is elected Pope Paul VI. 26 June 1963 During a tour of West Germany (23–27 June), the US president John F Kennedy visits West Berlin, and tells a crowd of 150,000 Berliners: 'All free men ... are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words, 'Ich bin ein Berliner' ('I am a Berliner'). 1 July 1963 The US postal service introduces five-digit Zone Improvement Plan (ZIP) codes for addresses. 5 August 1963 The USA, USSR, and Britain sign a nuclear test-ban treaty, which is subsequently signed by 96 states, but not France, before coming into force on 1 October. 28 August 1963 Over 200,000 Americans take part in the March on Washington, a peaceful demonstration for civil rights in Washington, DC. They are addressed by the civil-rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr, who proclaims, with the Lincoln Memorial as a backdrop, 'I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character'. 1 October 1963 Nigeria becomes a republic within the Commonwealth, with Nnamdi Azikiwe as president. 18 October 1963 The British prime minister Harold Macmillan resigns for reasons of health, and on 19 October, is succeeded by the Scottish peer the Earl of Home, who later disclaims the peerage, is made a Knight of the Thistle, and becomes Sir Alec Douglas-Home. He is elected a member of the House of Commons, for Kinross, on 8 November. 31 October 1963 A gas explosion at the Indiana State Fair kills 68 people and injures 340 more. 22 November 1963 Following the assassination of US president John F Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, Vice-President Lyndon B Johnson is immediately sworn in as president.

22 November 1963 John F Kennedy, 35th president of the USA 1961–63, a Democrat, is assassinated in Dallas, Texas, as he is driven to make a speech at the Dallas World Trade Center (46). The shots appear to come from the 6th floor of the Texas Book Depository on Elm Street. Former marine and pro-communist Lee Harvey Oswald is arrested 80 minutes later on charges of killing a patrolman, and is subsequently identified as the assassin, although there is speculation as to whether he acted alone or as part of a conspiracy. 24 November 1963 US nightclub owner Jack Ruby murders Lee Harvey Oswald, the alleged assassin of US president John F Kennedy two days previously, as police move Oswald from the city jail in Dallas, Texas. This adds fuel to speculations that Oswald acted as part of a much larger conspiracy. Millions of Americans watch the murder live on national television. 10 December 1963 Zanzibar gains independence within the British Commonwealth (now part of Tanzania). 12 December 1963 Kenya becomes independent within the British Commonwealth. December 1963 The muscle relaxant and antidepressant Valium, developed by Roche Laboratories as a more potent alternative to Librium, appears on the market in the USA. 1963 Doctor Who, a science fiction series for about a time-traveller, starts on British television. The original doctor is William Hartnell; the role is subsequently played by Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy, and Paul McGann. The series also features the Doctor's infamous enemies, the Daleks. 1963 An international team of astronomers discovers the first quasar (3C 273), an extraordinarily distant object brighter than the largest known galaxy yet with a star-like image. 1963 Emmett Leith and Juris Upatnieks of the University of Michigan develop the hologram. 1963 In the US charts, there are 10 tribute albums to President John F Kennedy, including John Fitzgerald Kennedy – A Memorial Album, a collection of radio broadcasts from the day of the assassination, which sells 4 million copies in a week. 1963 The British pop singer Cliff Richard releases the singles 'Bachelor Boy' and 'Summer Holiday', both from the soundtrack of his film Summer Holiday. 1963 The British rock group the Beatles release the singles 'Please Please Me', 'She Loves You', 'Twist and Shout', and 'I Want to Hold Your Hand', which will sell more than 12 million copies worldwide, and enters the US charts at No. 1. The album Please Please Me is also recorded in 12 hours at EMI's Abbey Road studios.

1963 The English political philosopher John Plamenatz publishes Man and Society: A Critical Examination of Some Important Social and Political Theories from Machiavelli to Marx. 1963 The film Hud, directed by Martin Ritt, is released in the USA, starring Paul Newman and Patricia Neal. It is based on the novel Horseman, Pass By by Larry McMurty. 1963 The film The Great Escape, directed by John Sturges, is released in the USA. The star-filled cast includes Steve McQueen, James Garner, Richard Attenborough, and Charles Bronson. 1963 The film The Leopard, directed by Luchino Visconti, is released in Italy. Based on the novel Il gattopardo by Giuseppe de Lampedusa, it stars Burt Lancaster, Claudia Cardinale, and Alain Delon. 1963 The film The Pink Panther, directed by Blake Edwards, is released in the USA, starring Peter Sellers as the hapless Inspector Clouseau. The character proves very popular and five sequels are made with Sellers. 1963 The film Tom Jones, directed by Tony Richardson, is released in Britain. Based on the novel by Henry Fielding, it stars Albert Finney and Susannah York. 1963 The German philosopher Jürgen Habermas publishes Theorie und Praxis/ Theory and Practice. 1963 The German writer Heinrich Böll publishes Ansichten eines Clowns/The Clown. 1963 The Japanese writer Yukio Mishima publishes his novel Gogo no eiko/The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea. 1963 The Polaroid Corporation develops colour polaroid film in the USA. 1963 The US artist Roy Lichtenstein paints I Know... Brad and Whaam!. 1963 The US composer George Crumb completes his work Night Music for soprano, piano, celesta, and percussion. 1963 The US composer Leonard Bernstein completes his Symphony No. 3, Kaddish. 1963 The US writer Allen Ginsberg publishes his poetry collection Reality Sandwiches. 1963 The US writer James Baldwin publishes The Fire Next Time, two essays warning of the threat of racial violence in the USA.

1963 The US writer Kurt Vonnegut publishes his novel Cat's Cradle. 1963 The US writer Mary McCarthy publishes her novel The Group. 1963 The US writer Sylvia Plath publishes her novel The Bell Jar. 1963 The US writer Thomas Pynchon publishes his novel V. 1963 The USA has 6% of the world population and 66% of the world's cars. 12 January 1964 A rebellion takes place in Zanzibar (now part of Tanzania), which is declared a republic. The sultanate is abolished and the sultan banished, and Abdullah Kassim forms a pro-communist government. 25 February 1964 The US boxer Cassius Clay beats Sonny Liston of the USA after six rounds of their fight in Miami, Florida, to win the world heavyweight boxing title. The same year Clay announces his conversion to Islam, changing his name to Muhammad Ali. 15 March 1964 The actors Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton are married in Montreal, Canada. 27 March 1964 An earthquake measuring between 8.3 and 8.5 (later amended upward) on the Richter scale strikes Anchorage in Alaska. Although the sparse population limits casualties to 131, it is the most severe earthquake ever recorded in North America. An area of 120,000 sq km/75,000 sq mi is tilted and in some places adjacent sections of land are separated by 25 m/82 ft. 13 April 1964 The 1963 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Sidney Poitier, for Lilies of the Field; Best Supporting Actor: Melvyn Douglas, for Hud; Best Actress: Patricia Neal, for Hud; Best Supporting Actress: Margaret Rutherford, for The VIPs; Best Film: Tom Jones, directed by Tony Richardson; Best Director: Tony Richardson, for Tom Jones. 27 April 1964 Tanganyika and Zanzibar are united, with Julius Nyerere as president, and, on 29 October, the state is named the United Republic of Tanzania. 2 May 1964 Nancy Witcher Langhorne, Lady Astor, British politician and the first woman to sit in the House of Commons, dies in Grimsthorpe Castle, Lincolnshire, England (84). 14 May 1964 The Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev opens the Aswan Dam in the United Arab Republic (UAR) of Egypt. 27 May 1964 Jawaharlal Nehru, first prime minister of independent India 1947–64, dies in New Delhi, India (74).

11 June 1964 At the end of the 'Rivonia trial' in South Africa (begun 10 October 1963), Nelson Mandela is sentenced to life imprisonment, while eight other defendants receive lesser sentences, and one is discharged. June 1964 The Dutch electronics company Philips launches the compact cassette in Britain. This is still the industry standard for analogue audio cassettes. 6 July 1964 Britain's Nyasaland Protectorate, renamed Malawi, becomes independent within the Commonwealth. 14 July 1964 The French cyclist Jacques Anquetil becomes the first to win the Tour de France race five times, and also the first to win it for four successive years. 16 July 1964 Samuel H ('Dr Sam') Sheppard is released from prison, pending a retrial for the murder of his wife. The appeal that wins his freedom – based on the claims that publicity before and during the trial prejudiced the jury – is pursued by F Lee Bailey, with the support of many prominent Americans, including the mystery author Erle Stanley Gardner. 17 July–31 December 1964 The British car and speedboat enthusiast Donald Campbell emulates his father Malcolm Campbell's achievement of holding the world land- and water-speed records simultaneously. He sets a new land-speed record of 648.77 kph/403.14 mph on Lake Eyre salt flats, Australia. Later in the year he reaches 444.615 kph/276.279 mph on Lake Dumbleyung, Australia, to break the water-speed record for the seventh time since 1955. July 1964 President Lyndon B Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The act outlaws discrimination in federally-funded enterprises and in public facilities and accommodations, and therefore overturns Jim Crow. It also created an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. 5 August 1964 Antigovernment rebels in the Congo Republic capture Stanleyville (now Kisangani), and declare the foundation of a People's Republic of the Congo on 7 August. August 1964 The Tonkin Gulf incident moves the US Congress to authorize President Lyndon B Johnson to undertake 'all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against forces of the USA and to prevent further aggression'. This so-called Tonkin Gulf Resolution provides President Johnson with the de facto consent to wage an undeclared war on North Vietnam. 1 October 1964 The 'New Tokaido Line' between Tokyo and Osaka opens. A 515km/320-mi high-speed rail line, 'bullet' trains travel at an average speed of 166 kph/103 mph. 10 October 1964 US satellites Syncom 3 (launched 19 August 1964) in a synchronous orbit 37,000 km/23,000 mi above the Pacific Ocean, transmits the

opening ceremonies of the Tokyo Olympics, the first transpacific television pictures. 15 October 1964 Cole Porter, US composer and lyricist, dies in Santa Monica, California (73). 15 October 1964 Nikita Khrushchev is replaced as first secretary of the Soviet Communist Party by Leonid Brezhnev and as prime minister by Alexey Kosygin, following foreign policy and agricultural failures. 16 October 1964 Alec Douglas-Home resigns as British prime minister following elections, and Harold Wilson forms a Labour ministry, with Patrick Gordon Walker, defeated at Smethwick, as foreign secretary, George Brown as secretary of state for economic affairs, James Callaghan as chancellor of the Exchequer, and Lord Gardiner as lord chancellor. 16 October 1964 China explodes an atomic bomb, and becomes a nuclear power. 20 October 1964 Herbert Hoover, 31st president of the USA 1929–33, a Republican, dies in New York City (90). 24 October 1964 Northern Rhodesia, renamed Zambia, becomes an independent republic within the Commonwealth, with Kenneth Kaunda as president (Southern Rhodesia is now known as just Rhodesia). 28 November 1964 The USA launches Mariner 4 to Mars. It will pass within 9,800 km/6,118 mi of the planet on 14 July 1965, and relay the first close-up photographs of the surface, as well as information on the Martian atmosphere. November 1964 Americans re-elect Lyndon B Johnson president in a landslide. In the Congressional elections, Democrats retain majorities in the House (295–140) and Senate (68–32). 12 December 1964 Kenya becomes a republic within the Commonwealth, with Jomo Kenyatta as president. 1964 INTELSAT (International Telecommunications Satellite Consortium) is founded by 18 countries to operate telecommunication satellites and establish a global commercial communications network. 1964 Saint Catherine's College in Oxford, England, designed by the Danish architect Arne Jacobsen, is completed. 1964 The Beatles have four hit singles and two hit albums in the first three months of the year in the USA, partly due to their North American tour which includes an appearance on the US Ed Sullivan Show. Sales of Beatles' records represent 60% of all records sold in this period. Their success also marks the beginning of a period of domination by British groups of the US charts.

1964 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) restricts the number of pop records played on radio, because of fears that over-dependence on recorded music will lessen the importance of live performances. 1964 The British rock group the Beatles releases the single and album A Hard Day's Night from their film of the same name. They also release the single 'Can't Buy Me Love', the best-selling single of the year in Britain. 1964 The English writer John Le Carré publishes his novel The Spy Who Came In from the Cold. 1964 The English writer Philip Larkin publishes his poetry collection The Whitsun Weddings. 1964 The English-born US writer Christopher Isherwood publishes his novel A Single Man. 1964 The film A Hard Day's Night, directed by Richard Lester, is released in Britain. Starring the British rock group the Beatles, its mixture of music and comedy is very popular and it is a big commercial success. 1964 The film Doctor Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, directed by Stanley Kubrick, is released in the USA, starring Peter Sellers and George C Scott. 1964 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his orchestral work Couleurs de la cité céleste/Colours of the Celestial City. 1964 The German-born US political philosopher Herbert Marcuse publishes Onedimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society. 1964 The infant mortality rate in Britain is 20 per 1,000, compared to 30 per 1,000 in 1951. 1964 The play Marat/Sade, by the German dramatist Peter Weiss, is first performed in Berlin, Germany. The full title is Die Verfolgung und Ermordung Jean-Paul Marats, dargestellt durch die Schauspielgruppe des Hospizes zu Charenton unter Anleitung der Herrn de Sade/The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat, as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum at Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade. 1964 The Romanian-born German poet Paul Celan publishes his poetry collection Die Niemandsrose/The No-One's Rose. 1964 The Russian composer Igor Stravinsky completes his vocal work Elegy for J F K. 1964 The Scottish artist Eduardo Paolozzi sculpts Wittgenstein at Casino.

1964 The US artist Andy Warhol creates his Brillo Boxes, wooden boxes covered with silkscreen prints meant to imitate commercial cardboard boxes. He also creates the silkscreens Jackie, Race Riots, and Flowers. 1964 The US artist Edward Kienholz creates Back Seat Dodge–38. 1964 The US author and publisher Helen Gurley Brown publishes Sex and the Office, which argues that single women should pursue careers (at least until they get married). 1964 The US rock singer Elvis Presley releases the single 'Blue Christmas'. 1964 The US toy company Mattel produces the G I Joe action figure for boys, an early version of Action Man. 1964 The US writer J D Salinger publishes his book of stories Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters; and Seymour: An Introduction. 1964 The US writer Richard Brautigan publishes his novel A Confederate General from Big Sur. 1964 The US writer Robert Lowell publishes his poetry collection For the Union Dead. 1964 The US writer Saul Bellow publishes his novel Herzog. 1964 Two notable suspension bridges open, the Forth Bridge in Scotland, and the Verrazano Narrows Bridge (the world's longest) at the entry to New York harbour. 1964 US physicists Murray Gell-Mann and George Zweig suggest the existence of quarks, the building block of hadrons, which are subatomic particles that experience the strong nuclear force. 1964 US writer Tom Wolfe publishes The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby, a collection of essays. He is a pioneer of the 'New Journalism' style, combining the techniques of reportage and fiction. 1964 Xerox develops the first office facsimile transmission system (later called the fax machine) in the USA. It can only operate on dedicated phone lines. 4 January 1965 T(homas) S(tearns) Eliot, US-British modernist poet and playwright who had a strong influence on 20th-century poetry, dies in London, England (76). 18 January 1965 Protest marches begin in Selma, Alabama; civil-rights campaigners led by Martin Luther King, Jr, of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference demand that blacks be allowed to register as voters. Many marchers

are repressed by local police. 24 January 1965 Winston Churchill, British prime minister 1940–45 and 1951–55 who led Britain through World War II, dies in London, England (90). 5 February 1965 After a drought that had begun the year before the water storage reservoirs supplying New York City dip to 25% of capacity, a record low. 8 February 1965 US aircraft bomb North Vietnam following Vietcong attacks on US areas in South Vietnam. This begins a pattern of regular US bombing of North Vietnam known as Operation Rolling Thunder or Operation Flaming Dart. 15 February 1965 Nat 'King' Cole, US jazz and popular singer, dies in Santa Monica, California (45). 18 February 1965 Gambia becomes independent within the British Commonwealth. 21 February 1965 Malcolm X, US black militant leader, is shot dead at the Audubon Ballroom, in New York City (39). 8 March 1965 Two battalions of US Marines, 3,500 soldiers, land to defend Danang airbase in South Vietnam. They are the first US combat troops to enter the war. 18 March 1965 Soviet cosmonaut Alexsi Leonov leaves spacecraft Voskhod 2 and floats in space for 20 minutes – the first space walk. 5 April 1965 The 1964 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Rex Harrison, for My Fair Lady; Best Supporting Actor: Peter Ustinov, for Topkapi; Best Actress: Julie Andrews, for Mary Poppins; Best Supporting Actress: Lila Kedrova, for Zorba the Greek; Best Film: My Fair Lady, directed by George Cukor; Best Director: George Cukor, for My Fair Lady. 5 April 1965 The first international communication satellite, Intelsat 1 (Early Bird), is launched into geostationary orbit over the Atlantic Ocean at the Equator. It provides 240 two-way telephone circuits or one television channel. 9 April 1965 The Harris County Sports Stadium, known as the Houston Astrodome, the largest indoor arena in the world, is opened in Houston, Texas. Its playing surface is the first to be covered in Astroturf, an artificial grass made of nylon. 3–7 June 1965 US astronaut Edward White, during the Gemini 4 space mission, demonstrates the ability of humans to function in outer space when he makes a 22-minute space walk, the first by a US astronaut. He is also the first to use a personal propulsion pack during the walk.

June 1965 The USA employs the B-52 bomber for the first time in a raid against Vietcong forces north of Saigon. 14 July 1965 The Australian runner Ron Clarke sets a new 10,000 metres world record time of 27 minutes 39.4 seconds, in Oslo, Norway, an improvement of 36.2 seconds on his existing record set in 1963. 18 July 1965 The first All-African Games sports festival opens in Brazzaville, Congo, with 29 nations competing. Because of political problems the next games are not held until 1973. 25 July 1965 US folksinger Bob Dylan plays an electric guitar at the Newport Folk Festival, supported by the Butterfield Blues Band; his fans jeer, but he shows how folk music could merge with rock. 1 August 1965 Cigarette advertising is banned on British television. 6 August 1965 The Voting Rights Act becomes law in the USA, making illegal the southern states' practice of disenfranchising black voters by imposing taxation, literacy, or other requirements on potential voters. 11–16 August 1965 A race riot erupts in Watts, a neighbourhood of Los Angeles, California, after policemen arrest a black driver for drunk driving. In five days of violence, 35 are killed, hundreds injured, and some $200 million of property is destroyed. 27 August 1965 Le Corbusier (assumed name of Charles Edouard Jeanneret), Swiss architect and city planner whose designs combined expressionism and functionalism, dies in Cap Martin, France (77). 4 September 1965 Albert Schweitzer, German theologian, philosopher and doctor, dies in Lambaréné, Gabon (90). 6 September 1965 The US newspaper the San Francisco Examiner is the first to observe the birth of the hippie movement by noting that the Haight-Ashbury section of San Francisco, California has become 'a hip hangout' for beatniks. 7 October 1965 The Post Office Tower (now the Telecom Tower), is opened in London, England; it is the tallest building in Britain. 9 November 1965 Power is blacked out in the northwest USA and Canada for 13 hours; 30 million people are affected. 11 November 1965 The Rhodesian prime minister Ian Smith makes a Unilateral Declaration of Independence. Britain declares the regime illegal and introduces exchange and trade restrictions. 25 November 1965 General Sese Seko Mobutu deposes President Joseph

Kasavubu in a military coup in the Congo Republic. 29 November 1965 Mary Whitehouse founds the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association in Britain to campaign against offensive and immoral broadcasting. 19 December 1965 Charles de Gaulle defeats François Mitterrand in the second round of the French presidential election. 31 December 1965 The executives of the European Economic Community (EEC), the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), and Euratom are merged into one executive authority. 1965 A study estimates that the average family in the USA takes 52 photographs each year. 1965 Britain decides to adopt metric measurements. 1965 Canadian geologist John Tuzo Wilson publishes 'A New Class of Faults and Their Bearing on Continental Drift', in which he formulates the theory of plate tectonics to explain continental drift and seafloor spreading. 1965 Ex-Harvard lecturer Timothy Leary writes The Psychedelic Reader and coins the phrase 'Tune in, turn on, drop out' to describe the experience of using the hallucinogenic drug LSD. 1965 French biochemists François Jacob and Jacques Monod discover messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA), which transfers genetic information to the ribosomes, where proteins are synthesized. 1965 The Algerian-born French political philosopher Louis Althusser publishes Pour Marx/For Marx. 1965 The artificial sweetener aspartame is launched in the USA, marketed under the name of Nutra-Sweet. 1965 The beat poet Allen Ginsberg coins the term 'flower power' for the antiwar, alternative lifestyle attitudes of the 1960s. 1965 The Benetton clothing company is founded in Italy. Through its chain of franchises, it will attain commercial success worldwide. 1965 The British rock group the Beatles releases the singles 'Help!', 'Ticket to Ride', and 'Day Tripper', and the album Help! 1965 The British rock group the Beatles releases the single 'Yesterday'. 1965 The English historian Christopher Hill publishes Intellectual Origins of the English Revolution.

1965 The film Doctor Zhivago, directed by David Lean, is released in Britain. Based on the novel by Boris Pasternak, it stars Julie Christie and Omar Sharif. 1965 The film Help!, directed by Richard Lester, is released in Britain. A sequel to A Hard Day's Night, it also stars the British rock group the Beatles, but is less commercially successful. 1965 The film The Battle of Algiers, directed by the Italian film-maker Gillo Pontecorvo, is released in France, starring Brahim Haggiag, Jean Martin, Yacef Saadi, and Tommaso Neri. 1965 The film The Knack – and How to Get It, directed by Richard Lester, is released in Britain, starring Rita Tushingham, Michael Crawford, and Ray Brooks. It wins the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in France, later in the year. 1965 The film musical The Sound of Music, directed by Robert Wise, is released in the USA, starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer. It is a huge boxoffice success, becoming the most successful film of the 1960s and even outperforming Gone With the Wind. 1965 The first miniskirts appear in Mary Quant's boutique, Bazaar, in the King's Road, Chelsea, London, England. Affordable and liberating, they rapidly become fashionable throughout the Western world. 1965 The first soft contact lenses are marketed in the USA. 1965 The German artist Joseph Beuys presents the performance work How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare in an art gallery in Düsseldorf, Germany. 1965 The Japanese electronic company Sony launches the Sony CV-2000, the first home video recorder, using Sony's Betamax format. The first colour video recorder is available the following year. 1965 The lava lamp is launched in the USA. 1965 The Pepsi-Cola Co. launches Diet Pepsi in the USA. 1965 The poetry collection Ariel, by the US writer Sylvia Plath, is published posthumously. 1965 The rate of population growth in the USA stands at 1.2%, the lowest since 1945, the year before the baby boom. 1965 The short-story collection Everything That Rises Must Converge by the US writer Flannery O'Connor is published posthumously. 1965 The US composer Leonard Bernstein completes his choral work Chichester

Psalms. 1965 The US composer Virgil Thomson completes his orchestral work Ode to the Wonders of Nature. 1965 The US folk/rock singer Bob Dylan releases the single 'Subterranean Homesick Blues' and the albums The Times They Are A-Changin' and Bringing It All Back Home. 1965 The US journalist Arthur Schlesinger, Jr, publishes Thousand Days, an account of the presidency of John F Kennedy. 1965 The US pop group the Beach Boys releases the single 'California Girls'. 1965 The world population is over 3 billion. 1965 US computer scientists John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz develop BASIC (Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code), a simplified computer programming language used in schools, businesses, and microcomputers. 1965 US Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) introduces the PDP-8 (Programmed Data Processor) computer. The first minicomputer, it has 4 kilobytes of memory, is easy to use, and costs $18,000. It stimulates the growth of computers in business and education. 1 January 1966 Colonel Jean-Bedel Bokassa seizes power in the Central African Republic, and severs ties with the People's Republic of China, his predecessor David Dacko's patron. 11 January 1966 Lal Bahandra Shastri, Indian prime minister, dies and is succeeded by Indira Gandhi on 19 January. 3 February 1966 Soviet spacecraft Luna 9 (launched 31 January) makes the first soft landing on the Moon and transmits photographs and soil data for three days. 1 March 1966 Soviet probe Venera 3 (launched 16 November 1965) crash-lands on Venus, the first artificial object to land on another planet. 4 March 1966 John Lennon speculates that the Beatles are more popular than Jesus Christ; in response, Beatles records are burnt in the US Bible belt. 11 March 1966 Following anticommunist demonstrations, President Achmed Sukarno of Indonesia transfers all political powers to General Suharto, and a purge of communists follows. 10 April 1966 Evelyn Waugh, English satirical novelist, dies in Combe Florey, near Taunton, Somerset, England (62).

18 April 1966 The 1965 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Lee Marvin, for Cat Ballou; Best Supporting Actor: Martin Balsam, for A Thousand Clowns; Best Actress: Julie Christie, for Darling; Best Supporting Actress: Shelley Winters, for A Patch of Blue; Best Film: The Sound of Music, directed by Robert Wise; Best Director: Robert Wise, for The Sound of Music. 28 April 1966 The Boston Celtics win their eighth successive US National Basketball Association (NBA) title. Their coach, Red Auerbach, retires to be replaced by Bill Russell (as player/coach), who becomes the first ever black American head coach. 26 May 1966 The colony of British Guiana gains independence as Guyana. 1 July 1966 France withdraws its forces from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) following a dispute over US involvement in Europe's defence. 13 July 1966 Eight student nurses are murdered in Chicago, Illinois. Two weeks later police indict 24-year-old Richard Speck, who has served time in Texas for theft, forgery, and assault; he is convicted of the murders a year later. 30 July 1966 The host nation, England, wins football's World Cup, beating West Germany in the final at Wembley, London, 4–2 after extra time. The England forward Geoff Hurst scores the first ever hat trick in a World Cup final. 1 August 1966 The student Charles Whitman locks himself in a tower on the University of Texas campus in Austin, Texas, and fatally shoots 13 students and wounds 31 others before police snipers kill him. 10 August 1966 The US spacecraft Lunar Orbiter 1 enters the Moon's orbit and transmits pictures of the dark side. It is the first of a series of five uncrewed spacecraft that photograph the Moon to select sites for the Apollo missions and to make detailed lunar maps. 13 August 1966 The Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, in its first plenary session since 1962, endorses the 'Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution', the movement to 'purify' Chinese communism through a purge of the intelligentsia. 29 August 1966 The British rock group the Beatles give their last concert, at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, California. 31 August 1966 British Aerospace's Harrier, a vertical take off and landing (VTOL) jet, makes its first test flight. 6 September 1966 Margaret Sanger, US birth control advocate who opened the first birth control clinic in the USA, dies in Tucson, Arizona (82). 9 September 1966 The first episode of the science fiction programme Star Trek

is shown on US television. Though its ratings are never very high, it quickly develops a cult following. It stars William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForrest Kelly, James Doohan, Walter Koenig, George Takei, and Nichelle Nichols. 12 September 1966–19 August 1968 The US pop group the Monkees is launched in its show on US television, a situation comedy with tunes. The band members are Mickey Dolenz, Davy Jones, Mike Nesmith, and Peter Tork. 13 September 1966 Following the death of the South African prime minister Henrik Verwoerd on 6 September, he is succeeded by Johannes Vorster. 27 October 1966 The United Nations (UN) Assembly ends South Africa's mandate over South West Africa because of its racial policies, but South Africa refuses to accept the decision. 16 November 1966 In his second trial for the 1954 murder of his wife Marilyn, Samuel H ('Dr Sam') Sheppard is found not guilty. The 'bushy-haired man' whom he claims was the real murderer is never found. 20 November 1966 The musical Cabaret, by John Kander and Fred Ebb, is first performed, at the Broadhurst Theater, New York City. 1 December 1966 Kurt Kiesinger becomes the chancellor of West Germany, following the resignation of Ludwig Erhard. 1 December 1966 Walt Disney, US motion-picture producer and creator of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and other characters, dies in Los Angeles, California (65). 1966 German philosopher Theodore Adorno publishes Negative Dialektik/ Negative Dialectic. 1966 Giacomo Agostini of Italy, riding an MV Augusta, wins the first of seven consecutive 500-cc motorcycling world championships. 1966 The British engineers Charles Kao and Georges Hockman of Standard Telecommunications Laboratories show that data can be carried on light transmitted over long distances in glass fibres rather than on electric currents in copper wire, leading to the development of fibre-optic cables. 1966 The British rock band the Troggs releases the single 'Wild Thing'. 1966 The British rock group the Who releases the single 'My Generation' and an album of the same name. 1966 The city of Florence, Italy, suffers heavy flooding, which destroys many valuable Renaissance works of art. A fund-raising drive is immediately set up, to prevent the recurrence of such as disaster.

1966 The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt completes his Symphony No. 2. 1966 The film A Man for All Seasons, directed by US film-maker Fred Zinnemann, is released in Britain. It is based on the play by Robert Bolt, and stars Paul Scofield, Wendy Hillier, Susannah York, and Robert Shaw. 1966 The film Andrei Rublev, directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, is released in the USSR, starring Anatoly Solonitsin and Ivan Lapikov. 1966 The film Persona, directed by Ingmar Bergman, is released in Sweden, starring Liv Ullmann and Bibi Andersson. 1966 The film Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, directed by Mike Nichols, is released in the USA, starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. It is based on the play by Edward Albee. 1966 The first conviction for burning the draft card is obtained in the USA. 1966 The French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan publishes Ecrits/Writings. 1966 The Guild House Apartments in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, designed by the US architects Robert Venturi and John Rauch, is completed. 1966 The hallucinogenic drug LSD is declared illegal in the USA. 1966 The miniskirt becomes fashionable in the USA. 1966 The play Publikumsbeschimpfung/Offending the Audience, by the Austrian writer Peter Handke, is first performed in Frankfurt, Germany. 1966 The play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, by the Czech-born British dramatist Tom Stoppard, is first performed, at the Edinburgh Festival, Scotland. It opens the following year at the Old Vic Theatre in London, England. 1966 The Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki completes his choral work St Luke Passion. 1966 The US artist Robert Indiana paints LOVE. 1966 The US folk/rock singer Bob Dylan releases the album Blonde on Blonde. 1966 The US manufacturer Procter and Gamble launches Pampers, the first disposable nappies. This product will go on to take nearly 50% of the worldwide market. 1966 The US photographer Diane Arbus takes A Young Man in Curlers at Home on West Twentieth Street, New York City.

1966 The US pop group the Beach Boys releases the singles 'Good Vibrations' and 'Barbara Ann', and the album Pet Sounds. 1966 The US writer and critic Susan Sontag publishes Against Interpretation, a collection of essays. 1966 The US writer John Barth publishes his novel Giles Goat-boy. 1966 The US writer Thomas Pynchon publishes his short novel The Crying of Lot 49. 1966 US-style open air music festivals become popular in Britain. 1966 Xerox develops the first desk-top fax machine, in the USA. It is able to operate on standard phone lines and takes 6 minutes to transmit a page. 15 January 1967 The first Super Bowl American football match is held (between the winners of the National Football League and the American Football League); the Green Bay Packers beat the Kansas City Chiefs 35–10 before 61,496 spectators in Los Angeles, California. 27 January 1967 Three US astronauts, Gus Grissom, Edward White, and Roger B Chaffee, die in a fire during a countdown rehearsal on the Apollo 1 spacecraft at Cape Kennedy, Florida. They are the first human casualties of the US space programme. 18 February 1967 J Robert Oppenheimer, US theoretical physicist and director of the Los Alamos laboratory which built the first atomic bomb, dies in Princeton, New Jersey (62). 18 March 1967 The Liberian-registered 120,000 tonne tanker Torrey Canyon strikes a submerged reef runs aground on the Seven Stones Isles of Scilly, off the southwest coast of Britain, and spills 860,000 barrels (around 119,000 tonnes) of crude oil into the sea. It is the biggest oil spill to date. 10 April 1967 The 1966 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Paul Scofield, for A Man for All Seasons; Best Supporting Actor: Walter Matthau, for The Fortune Cookie; Best Actress: Elizabeth Taylor, for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; Best Supporting Actress: Sandy Dennis, for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; Best Film: A Man for All Seasons, directed by Fred Zinnemann; Best Director: Fred Zinnemann, for A Man For All Seasons. 17 April 1967 The US spacecraft Surveyor 3 is launched and soft lands on the Moon where it conducts sampling experiments on the lunar soil. It is subsequently visited by astronauts from the Apollo 12 mission. 28 April 1967 The World Boxing Association strips Muhammad Ali (formerly Cassius Clay) of his world heavyweight title for refusing to be drafted into the US

army. 16 May 1967 The French president Charles de Gaulle, in a press conference, virtually vetoes British entry into the European Economic Community (EEC). 22 May 1967 A fire in L'Innovation department store in Brussels, Belgium, kills 322 people. 27 May 1967 The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) bans the Beatles' single 'A Day in the Life', as it is seen to be encouraging drug-taking. 30 May 1967 The secession from Nigeria of the province of Biafra, under Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, provokes civil war in Nigeria. 5 June 1967 The Six Day War breaks out between Israel and the Arab states of the United Arab Republic (UAR) Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and Iraq. In pre-emptive air strikes Israel destroys over 300 enemy aircraft. 10 June 1967 The Six Day War ends with Israeli victory, and the USSR breaks off diplomatic relations with Israel. 27 June 1967 Barclays Bank opens the world's first automatic cash machine at Enfield in London, England. 30 June 1967 Forty-six nations sign the Final Acts of the 'Kennedy round' of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). June 1967 The Summer of Love begins in San Francisco, California, with the Monterey Pop Festival. From this atmosphere emerge alternative lifestyles that are established particularly in San Francisco. Acts include the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and Janis Joplin. 7 July 1967 British astronomers Jocelyn Bell and Anthony Hewish, at the Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory, Cambridge, England, discover the first pulsar (announced in 1968). 13 July 1967 The English cyclist Tommy Simpson collapses and dies during the Tour de France cycle race. After large traces of illegal stimulants are found in his body, the Fédération Internationale de Cyclisme Professional introduces new antidrug regulations, many of which are also adopted by other sports. August 1967 In the face of continuing racial injustice and widespread urban rioting, the civil-rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr, exhorts his followers to inaugurate a massive campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience. 3 September 1967 Sweden changes to driving on the right. 20 September 1967 The mid-west of Nigeria proclaims itself independent as

Dahomey (now Benin). 8 October 1967 Clement Attlee, Earl Attlee, British prime minister 1945–51, a member of the Labour Party, dies in Westminster, London, England (84). 18 October 1967 The Soviet spacecraft Venera 4 (launched 12 June) lands on Venus. The first soft landing on another planet, its instrument-laden capsule transmits information about Venus' atmosphere. 25 October 1967 The Abortion Bill is passed in Britain, permitting abortion on medical and psychological grounds. 29 October 1967 The rock musical Hair, with lyrics by Gerome Ragni and music by Galt MacDermot, is first performed, at the Public Theater, East Greenwich Village, New York City. Songs featured in the show include 'Aquarius'. October 1967 Che (Ernesto) Guevara, Cuban and South American communist guerrilla, is shot dead in Bolivia by the Bolivian army (39). 26 November 1967 Aden becomes independent as the People's Republic of South Yemen, and the last British troops leave on 29 November. November 1967 The first national US rock music magazine, Rolling Stone, is published by Jann Wenner in San Francisco, California. 3 December 1967 South African surgeon Christiaan Barnard performs the first heart transplant operation. The patient, Louis Washkansky, survives for 18 days. 1967'Granny glasses', small glasses with thin wire frames, as worn by the Beatles singer and musician John Lennon, become popular. 1967 Amana Refrigeration markets the first microwave oven for home use in the USA. 1967 Elvis Presley marries Priscilla Beaulieu in the USA. 1967 Football hooliganism is a growing problem in England. 1967 Hippie clothes, as sported at open-air rock festivals, influence mainstream fashion, with Afghan jackets, Paisley patterned fabric and beads all becoming popular. 1967 Quartz watches are launched in the USA, costing from $550. They have been developed by a group of Swiss watch manufacturers. 1967 The British model Twiggy popularizes a waif-like look. 1967 The British pop singer Sandie Shaw releases the single 'Puppet on a String',

Britain's winning entry for the Eurovision Song Contest. 1967 The British rock band Procul Harum releases the single 'A Whiter Shade of Pale'. 1967 The British rock group the Beatles releases Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, considered their most innovative album to date. They also release the singles 'All You Need Is Love' and 'Hello Goodbye'. 1967 The Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez publishes his novel Cien años de soledad/One Hundred Years of Solitude. 1967 The Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz publishes his novel Miramar. 1967 The English artist Richard Long sculpts A Line Made by Walking. 1967 The English composer Benjamin Britten completes his Cello Suite No. 2. 1967 The English writer Angela Carter publishes her novel The Magic Toyshop. 1967 The film Belle de jour/Daytime Beauty, directed by the Spanish film-maker Luis Buñuel, is released in France, starring Catherine Deneuve. 1967 The film Bonnie and Clyde, directed by Arthur Penn, is released in the USA, starring Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway. 1967 The film In the Heat of the Night, directed by Norman Jewison, is released in the USA, starring Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger. 1967 The film The Graduate, directed by Mike Nichols, is released in the USA, starring Dustin Hoffman, Anne Bancroft, and Katherine Ross, and featuring the music of Simon and Garfunkel. 1967 The film The Producers, directed by Mel Brooks, is released in the USA, starring Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder. 1967 The first Laura Ashley shop opens in London, England. 1967 The French philosopher Jacques Derrida publishes De la grammatologie/Of Grammatology. 1967 The German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen completes his electronic work Hymnen/Hymns. 1967 The Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu completes his orchestral work November Steps. 1967 The play Soldaten/Soldiers, by the German dramatist Rolf Hochhuth, is

first performed in Berlin, Germany. 1967 The Polish composer Witold Lutoslawski completes his Symphony No. 2. 1967 The Sexual Offences Act (affecting England and Wales) permits homosexual acts in private between consenting adults over the age of 21. 1967 The US artist George Segal sculpts Execution. 1967 The US avant-garde rock group Velvet Underground releases the album The Velvet Underground and Nico. 1967 The US rock group the Doors releases the single 'Light My Fire' and the album The Doors. 1967 The US rock group the Jimi Hendrix Experience releases the albums Are You Experienced? and Axis: Bold As Love, and the single 'Purple Haze'. 1967 The US writer Gore Vidal publishes his novel Washington, DC. 1967 The US writer William Styron publishes his novel The Confessions of Nat Turner, a novel about a 19th-century uprising by black slaves that is awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1968. 1967 US scientists Syukuvo Manabe and Richard T Wetherald warn that the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, produced by human activities, is causing a 'greenhouse effect', which will raise atmospheric temperatures and cause a rise in sea levels. 21 January–8 April 1968 5,000 US marines and South Vietnamese soldiers are besieged by two North Vietnamese army divisions at Khe Sanh in the north of South Vietnam, in one of the fiercest battles of the entire Vietnam War. 30 January–29 February 1968 The Vietcong launches the Tet offensive against South Vietnamese cities. 16 March 1968 US soldiers massacre 450 men, women, and children at the village of My Lai, in South Vietnam. When news of the massacre emerges, some twenty months later, the troops will insist that they acted under the orders of lieutenant William L Calley, Jr. 27 March 1968 Yuri Gagarin, Soviet cosmonaut and the first person to travel in space, is killed when his jet aircraft crashes near Moscow, USSR (34). 30 March 1968 The International Lawn Tennis Association abolishes the distinction between amateurs and professionals following the example of the British Lawn Tennis Association of 15 October 1967.

March 1968 In Britain, figures show a drop of 23% in road deaths since the introduction of breath tests in 1967. 4 April 1968 Martin Luther King, Jr, US Baptist minister and civil-rights leader, is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, by a sniper later identified as escaped convict James Earl Ray (39). 4 April 1968 The assassination of Black American civil-rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr, in Memphis, Tennessee, sparks a week of rioting in black ghettos throughout the nation. His assassin, James Earl Ray, is arrested in London, England, on 8 June and promptly extradited to the USA. 8 April 1968 The USA and its South Vietnamese allies launch Operation Complete Victory, involving some 100,000 US troops, designed to put a definitive end to the Tet offensive. 10 April 1968 The 1967 Academy Awards take place two days later than planned, because of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr, on 4 April and his funeral on 9 April. Best Actor: Rod Steiger, for In the Heat of the Night; Best Supporting Actor: George Kennedy, for Cool Hand Luke; Best Actress: Katharine Hepburn, for Guess Who's Coming to Dinner; Best Supporting Actress: Estelle Parsons, for Bonnie and Clyde; Best Film: In the Heat of the Night, directed by Norman Jewison; Best Director: Mike Nichols, for The Graduate. 14 May 1968 The Czechoslovakian government announces a wide range of liberalizing reforms. 3 June 1968 Valerie Solanis, a part-time actor, shoots and wounds US artist Andy Warhol. 24 June–6 July 1968 At the first 'open' Wimbledon tennis championships in London, England, the singles titles are won by Rod Laver of Australia and Billie Jean King of the USA, who win £2,000 and £750 respectively. 30 June 1968 The Gaullists win a landslide victory in the second round of French general elections following left-wing street violence. 1 July 1968 Sixty-one nations, including Britain, the USA, and USSR sign a nuclear nonproliferation treaty. 20 August 1968 Soviet and other Warsaw Pact forces invade Czechoslovakia and arrest reform leaders including Alexander Dubcek. 29–31 August 1968 The second Isle of Wight pop festival takes place in Britain, with Bob Dylan starring. It attracts around 150,000 people. 7 September 1968 About 200 female activists demonstrate against the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey.

12 September 1968 Albania formally quits the Warsaw Pact. 26 September 1968 After 36 years in the position, Antonio Salazar resigns as prime minister of Portugal because of ill health, and is succeeded by Marcello Caetano. 18 October 1968 At the Olympic Games in Mexico City, Mexico, Bob Beamon of the USA smashes the long-jump world record with a leap of 8.90 m/29 ft 2.5 in. It is the first jump over 28 ft. 31 October 1968 During the Cultural Revolution in China, the Communist Party expels President Liu Shaoqi after a protracted campaign against him by the Red Guards. 31 October 1968 In a nationally televised address, the US president Lyndon B Johnson orders a complete halt to the bombing of North Vietnam and announces an agreement on the composition of Vietnamese delegations for peace talks. October 1968 At the Olympic Games in Mexico City, Mexico, the US athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who finished first and third in the 200 metres, stage a 'black power' demonstration from the victory rostrum during the playing of the US national anthem. October 1968 The US discus thrower Al Oerter becomes the first track and field athlete to win the same event at four successive Olympic Games, in Mexico City, Mexico. 14 November 1968 As the number of US deaths in Vietnam exceeds 30,000, National Turn In Your Draft Card Day is held, with widespread burning of cards. 20 November 1968 An explosion and subsequent fire at a coal mine in Farmington, West Virginia, kills 78 miners. November 1968 Americans elect Richard M Nixon president and Maryland governor Spiro T Agnew vice-president. In the Congressional elections, Democrats retain majorities in the House (243–192) and Senate (58–42). 20 December 1968 John Steinbeck, US novelist who wrote The Grapes of Wrath, dies in New York City (66). 31 December 1968 The world's first supersonic airliner, the Tupolev TU-144, designed by Soviet engineer Alexey Tupolev, makes its first flight. 1968 Biafra suffers a terrible famine. 1968 British guitarist Eric Clapton forms the first (short-lived) supergroup, Blind Faith.

1968 Eighty thousand people march on the US embassy in London, England, in protest at US involvement in Vietnam. 1968 For the first time in Britain, albums are outselling singles. 1968 Sir William Carr sells a 51% stake in the British paper the News of the World to Rupert Murdoch of Australia, having rejected an offer from the British businessman Robert Maxwell. 1968 The 911 emergency telephone system for police, fire, and ambulances is introduced in New York City. It is the first such system in the USA. 1968 The British rock band Cream, founded by Eric Clapton, releases the album Wheels of Fire – the first album to sell 1 million copies – and the single 'Sunshine of Your Love'. 1968 The British rock group the Beatles release their animated film Yellow Submarine. 1968 The British rock group the Beatles releases the single 'Hey Jude', the bestselling single of the year in Britain, and the album The Beatles (known as The White Album). 1968 The British rock singer Van Morrison releases the album Astral Weeks. 1968 The English artist Richard Hamilton paints Swingeing London. 1968 The film 2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by US film-maker Stanley Kubrick, is released in Britain. Based on Arthur C Clarke's story The Sentinel, it stars Gary Lockwood, Keir Dullea, and William Sylvester, with Douglas Rain as the voice of the computer HAL. 1968 The film If., directed by Lindsay Anderson, is released in Britain, starring Malcolm McDowell, David Wood, and Richard Warwick. 1968 The German philosopher Jürgen Habermas publishes Erkenntnis und Interesse/Knowledge and Human Interests. 1968 The German-born English artist Lucian Freud paints Interior with Plant, Reflection Listening. 1968 The Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich completes his String Quartet No. 12. 1968 The Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn publishes his novels V kruge pervom/The First Circle and Rakovy korpus/Cancer Ward. 1968 The US artist Edward Kienholz creates Portable War Memorial.

1968 The US jazz singer and trumpeter Louis Armstrong releases the single 'What a Wonderful World'. 1968 The US social activist and Black Panther member Eldridge Cleaver publishes Soul on Ice, a book of essays on the personal effects of racism that quickly acquires an international status. 1968 The US writer Gore Vidal publishes his transvestite fantasy novel Myra Breckinridge. 1968 The US writer John Updike publishes his novel Couples, a study of sexual promiscuity in New England. 1968 The US writer Norman Mailer publishes The Armies of the Night, an account of the peace demonstrations in Washington, DC, in October 1967. 1968 US engineers Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce found Intel Corporation, which begins making integrated circuits for computers. 1968 US psychologist Erik Erikson publishes Identity: Youth and Crisis. 1968 Waterbeds are first brought onto the market in the USA. 16 January 1969 The Czech student Jan Palach publicly burns himself to death in Prague, Czechoslovakia, in protest at Soviet occupation. 18 January–26 February 1969 Heavy rains in southern California cause mud slides that kill more than 100 people in the region, destroy 10,000 homes, and contribute to $60 million in property damage. 2 March 1969 The prototype of the French–British supersonic airliner Concorde makes its first test flight. Its first supersonic flight takes place on 1 October. 2–15 March 1969 Soviet and Chinese forces clash on the Manchurian border, initiating an intensified period of violence along the disputed frontier. 28 March 1969 Dwight David Eisenhower, 34th president of the USA 1953–61, a Republican, dies in Washington, DC (78). March 1969 Beatle John Lennon and his new wife Yoko Ono make their honeymoon, at the Hilton Hotel, Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, a 'bed-in' for peace. March 1969 With President Richard M Nixon's authorization, the USA begins the secret bombing of Cambodia. 14 April 1969 The 1968 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Cliff Robertson,

for Charly; Best Supporting Actor: Jack Albertson, for The Subject was Roses; Best Actress: Katharine Hepburn, for The Lion in Winter and Barbra Streisand, for Funny Girl; Best Supporting Actress: Ruth Gordon, for Rosemary's Baby; Best Film: Oliver!, directed by Carol Reed; Best Director: Carol Reed, for Oliver! 28 April 1969 The French president Charles de Gaulle resigns following rejection of his constitutional plans; Alain Poher becomes interim president. 15 June 1969 Georges Pompidou is elected president of France and, on 20 June, appoints Jacques Chaban-Delmas as prime minister. 22 June 1969 Judy Garland, US singer and actor, dies in London, England (47). 5 July 1969 Walter Gropius, German architect, dies in Boston, Massachusetts (86). 16–24 July 1969 The US Moon-shot mission Apollo 11 takes place. On 20 July US astronaut Neil Armstrong becomes the first person to walk on the Moon, famously saying 'That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.' He and Buzz Aldrin also install and operate the first Moon seismograph at Tranquillity base, spending a total of 21.6 hours on the Moon's surface, while Michael Collins remains orbiting the Moon in the command module. 20 July 1969 Over 700 million people worldwide watch Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin in the lander module from the US spacecraft Apollo 11 touch down on the Moon. 8 August 1969 France devalues the franc by 12% following a European financial crisis. 15–17 August 1969 Half a million people attend the three-day Woodstock Music and Arts Fair on a farm in New York State. The line-up includes Jimi Hendrix, the Who, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, and Santana. 19 August 1969 The British army assumes full responsibility for security in Northern Ireland following civil unrest. 31 August 1969 Rocky Marciano (Rocco Francis Marchegiano), US world heavyweight boxer 1952–56, is killed in an aeroplane crash near Newton, Iowa (45). 1 September 1969 Colonel Moamer al-Khaddhafi deposes King Idris of Libya in a military coup. 23 September 1969 Ton Dac Thang succeeds President Ho Chi Minh of North Vietnam following Ho Chi Minh's death on 3 September. 3 November 1969 The US president Richard M Nixon promises the complete

withdrawal of US ground forces from Vietnam, on a secret timetable. A further 50,000 troops are withdrawn on 15 December. 14 November 1969 The Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) between the USA and USSR begin in Helsinki, Finland. November 1969 Sesame Street, an educational programme for children funded by the Ford Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation, and the US Office of Education, first appears on US television. The Muppet stars, created by Jim Henson, include Big Bird and Bert and Ernie. 6 December 1969 During a Rolling Stones set at the Altamont Festival in Altamont, California, the teenage fan Meredith Hunter is killed by Hell's Angels acting as security guards. 1969 Russian-born English philosopher Isaiah Berlin publishes Four Essays on Liberty. 1969 Tape sales represent 40% of the music market in the USA. The total market is worth around $1 billion and 75% comes from purchasers under 30. 1969 The Australian businessman Rupert Murdoch buys the British paper the Sun, which is relaunched as a tabloid. 1969 The Beatle John Lennon returns his MBE to the queen in objection to Britain's political position on Vietnam, among other matters. 1969 The Beatle Paul McCartney has to publicly deny rumours of his death: the speculation has resulted from alleged hidden messages in Beatles albums that he has been replaced by a double. 1969 The Brazilian footballer Pele, playing in his 909th first-class match (for the Santos club in São Paulo, Brazil), scores his 1,000th goal. 1969 The British heavy metal/rock group Led Zeppelin releases the albums Led Zeppelin and Led Zeppelin II. 1969 The British pop singer David Bowie releases the single 'Space Oddity'. 1969 The British rock group the Who releases the single 'Pinball Wizard' and the album Tommy, the soundtrack of their rock opera of the same name. 1969 The British rock group the Beatles make their last ever public appearance on the roof of the Apple Records building in London, England. It is recorded as part of their film Let It Be. The police are called out by people in neighbouring buildings who are disturbed by the noise. The group also releases the album Abbey Road and the single 'Something' by George Harrison, the first Beatle hit not to have been written by John Lennon or Paul McCartney.

1969 The English writer Graham Greene publishes his linked set of short stories Travels with My Aunt. 1969 The English writer John Fowles publishes his novel The French Lieutenant's Woman, set in Victorian England. 1969 The film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, directed by George Roy Hill, is released in the USA, starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford. 1969 The film Easy Rider, directed by Dennis Hopper, is released in the USA. He also stars in it with Peter Fonda and Jack Nicholson. 1969 The film Midnight Cowboy, directed by the English film-maker John Schlesinger, is released in the USA, starring Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman. 1969 The film The Wild Bunch, directed by Sam Peckinpah, is released in the USA. The stars include William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, and Robert Ryan. 1969 The film Z, directed by Greek film-maker Constantin Costa-Gavras, is released in France, starring Jean-Louis Trintignant, Jacques Pérrin, and Yves Montand. 1969 The French artist Niki de Saint Phalle sculpts Black Nana. 1969 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his choral work La Transfiguration de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ/The Transfiguration of Our Lord Jesus Christ. 1969 The French philosopher Michel Foucault publishes L'Archéologie de savoir/ The Archaeology of Knowledge. 1969 The mini dress fashion is followed by the ankle-length maxi. 1969 The Ninth Chinese Communist Party Congress ends the Cultural Revolution and re-establishes authority structures. 1969 The play Boesman and Lena, by the South African dramatist Athol Fugard, is first performed in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. 1969 The Russian-born US writer Vladimir Nabokov publishes his novel Ada. 1969 The US artist Donald Judd sculpts Untitled, a series of vertically arranged metal and glass boxes. 1969 The US clothes shop The Gap is founded. 1969 The US singer Frank Sinatra releases the single 'My Way'.

1969 The US writer Kurt Vonnegut publishes his novel Slaughterhouse Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death. 1969 The US writer Philip Roth publishes his novel Portnoy's Complaint. 1969 There are now 81 million television sets in the USA. 1969 US geneticist Jonathan Beckwith and associates at the Harvard Medical School isolate a single gene for the first time. 12 January 1970 In the Nigerian civil war, the Biafran leader General Chukwuemeka Ojukwu flies into exile. On 15 January, Nigeria accepts Biafra's unconditional surrender. January–September 1970 The Australian tennis player Margaret Court becomes only the second woman (after Maureen Connolly in 1953) to achieve the Grand Slam, winning all four major tennis tournaments (the Australian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Open) in the same calendar year. 23 February 1970 Guyana becomes a republic within the British Commonwealth. 10 March 1970 The Israeli parliament, the Knesset, defines what constitutes a Jew under Israeli law, following a dispute between secular and religious factions. 11 March 1970 Iraq recognizes Kurdish autonomy and gives Kurds a bigger say in central government, following a nine-year civil war. 19 March 1970 The first meeting of East and West German heads of government takes place at Erfurt, East Germany. On 21 May, East German leader Willi Stoph and West German leader Willy Brandt meet again at Kassel, West Germany. 1 April 1970 President Richard M Nixon signs a bill banning cigarette advertising on US radio and television. This takes effect the following year. 1 April 1970 The Vietcong launch major assaults throughout South Vietnam after a six-month lull. 7 April 1970 The 1969 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: John Wayne, for True Grit; Best Supporting Actor: Gig Young, for They Shoot Horses, Don't They?; Best Actress: Maggie Smith, for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie; Best Supporting Actress: Goldie Hawn, for Cactus Flower; Best Film: Midnight Cowboy, directed by John Schlesinger; Best Director: John Schlesinger, for Midnight Cowboy. 19 April 1970 The communist Pathet Lao of Laos advances on the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, and, on 20 April, the Cambodian government appeals for US assistance. 20 April 1970 The US president Richard M Nixon announces the withdrawal of a

further 150,000 US troops from Vietnam. 22 April 1970 Millions of Americans participate in the first 'Earth Day' as a series of mass meetings, speeches, and events take place across the USA. 24 April 1970 Gambia becomes a republic within the British Commonwealth. 1–4 May 1970 Demonstrations begin at universities across the USA in protest at military intervention in Cambodia; the National Guard fire on a peaceful demonstration at Kent State University, Ohio, killing four students. 2 May 1970 The USA bombs North Vietnam in the heaviest raids since November 1968. 13 May 1970 The voting age in Britain is lowered from 21 to 18. Susan Wallace becomes the first person under 21 to vote, when she votes in the Bridgwater byelection. 15 May 1970 The International Olympic Committee expels South Africa because of its apartheid policies. 5 June 1970 France ends its 15-month boycott of the Western European Union (begun following a still-unresolved dispute over cooperation with the USA in European defence policy). 19 June 1970 The British prime minister Harold Wilson resigns following the general election and Edward Heath forms a Conservative ministry, with Sir Alec Douglas-Home as foreign secretary, Iain Macleod as chancellor of the Exchequer, and Reginald Maudling as home secretary. 21 June 1970 Brazil defeats Italy 4–1 in the football World Cup final in Mexico City, Mexico, to become the first side to win the competition three times. 28 June 1970 US ground troops withdraw from Cambodia. June–September 1970 Nijinsky, ridden by the English jockey Lester Piggott, is the first winner of the English Triple Crown (2,000 Guineas, Derby, and St Leger) since Bahram in 1935. He also wins the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Diamond Stakes and the Irish Derby in the same year. 3 September 1970 Vince Lombardi, US football coach who led the Green Bay Packers to five NFL championships, dies in Washington, DC (57). 9 September 1970 Ann Summers launches her chain of sex shops with the opening of the Ann Summers Sex Supermarket in London, England. 18 September 1970 Jimi Hendrix, US rock singer and influential guitarist, dies as a result of mixing drugs and alcohol in London, England (27).

19 September 1970 Palestinian hijackers blow up three aircraft (two hijacked 6 September, one 9 September) at Dawson's Field, Jordan. On 30 September the remaining hostages go free, after Britain, West Germany, and Switzerland release their Palestinian prisoners. 19 September 1970–3 September 1977 The Mary Tyler Moore Show, a television situation comedy, provides realistic insight into the lives of single career women in the USA in the 1970s. Mary Tyler Moore stars as Mary Richards, a single woman working at a television station; Ed Asner, Ted Knight, and Valerie Harper also star. 27 September 1970 King Hussein of Jordan, the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Yasser Arafat, and other Arab leaders sign an agreement in Cairo, Egypt, to end the civil war in Jordan. 28 September 1970 Gamal Abdel Nasser, prime minister of Egypt 1954–56 and then president 1956–70, dies in Cairo, Egypt (52). September 1970 Indian-born US biochemist Har Gobind Khorana assembles an artificial yeast gene from its chemical components. 10 October 1970 Fiji Islands becomes independent within the British Commonwealth. 9 November 1970 Charles de Gaulle, French general and president of France 1958–69, dies in Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises, France (79). 7 December 1970 West Germany and Poland sign a treaty, formally recognizing the Oder–Neisse Line as the frontier between East Germany and Poland. 13 December 1970 The Polish government sharply increases food, fuel, and clothing prices. On 14 December strikes, riots, and arson begin in Gdansk, Poland, spreading to other Baltic ports. 20 December 1970 Edward Gierek replaces Wladyslaw Gomulka as first secretary of the Polish Communist Party. December 1970 US president Richard M Nixon signs the Clean Air Act. The act imposes stricter air pollution standards and requires US car manufacturers to reduce emissions of nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide, and hydrocarbons by 90% by the mid-1970s. 1970 At the Cannes Film Festival in France, the Palme d'Or is awarded to M*A*S*H, based on the novel by Richard Hook and directed by the US film-maker Robert Altman. It is released in the USA and stars Donald Sutherland, Elliott Gould, Robert Duvall, and Sally Kellerman. 1970 Divorce is legalized in Italy.

1970 In the USA, 31% of white males and 39% of white females have completed four years of high school; the corresponding numbers for black males and females are 22% and 25%. 1970 In the USA, the lowest-earning fifth of the population earns 5.4% of the total income; the second fifth earns 12.2%; the third fifth earns 17.6%; the fourth fifth earns 23.8%; and the highest-earning fifth earns 40.9%. 1970 New York State liberalizes the abortion laws, virtually permitting 'abortion on demand'. Only two other states in the USA, Hawaii and Alaska, have this kind of legislation. 1970 Shortly after the deaths of Jimi Hendrix of inhalation asphyxia, associated with alcohol and drugs, and of Janis Joplin from a heroin overdose, the US president Richard M Nixon appeals for restrictions on pop music which promotes drug use. 1970 The Australian feminist Germaine Greer writes The Female Eunuch, a radical independent statement of feminism which argues that women should take responsibility for their lives rather than blaming men. 1970 The British heavy metal/rock group Led Zeppelin releases the album Led Zeppelin III. 1970 The British pop group the Kinks releases the single 'Lola'. 1970 The British rock group the Beatles release the single 'Let It Be' and an album of the same name. The group officially split up; all four members release solo albums. 1970 The British tabloid newspaper the Sun features its first topless woman on page three. 1970 The Dutch electronics company Philips launches the first car cassette player in Britain. 1970 The English composer Elisabeth Lutyens completes her choral work The Roots of the World. 1970 The English poet Ted Hughes publishes his poetry collection Crow. 1970 The English political philosopher John Plamenatz publishes Ideology. 1970 The film Five Easy Pieces, directed by Bob Rafelson, is released in the USA, starring Jack Nicholson, Karen Black, and Susan Anspach. 1970 The film Kes, directed by Ken Loach, is released in Britain. Based on Barry

Hines's novel A Kestrel for a Knave, it stars David Bradley, Lynne Perrie, Colin Welland, and Brian Glover. 1970 The film Woodstock, a documentary account of the famous 1969 US openair concert, directed by Michael Wadleigh, is released in the USA. Joan Baez, Crosby, Stills and Nash, Jefferson Airplane, Richie Havens, Jimi Hendrix, and others appear. 1970 The Irish-born English writer Iris Murdoch publishes her novel Bruno's Dream. 1970 The median income for families in the USA is $9,867, or $10,236 for white families and $6,516 for blacks and other minorities. 1970 The play Morte accidentale di un anarchico/Accidental Death of an Anarchist, by the Italian actor and dramatist Dario Fo, is first performed in Milan, Italy. 1970 The population of the world is about 3.7 billion. 1970 The underground music of the 1960s, typified by bands such as Velvet Underground, Pink Floyd, and the early Rolling Stones, has by the end of the decade been absorbed into mainstream culture. 1970 The US artist Robert Smithson creates Spiral Jetty. One of the best-known examples of 'land art', it is a spiral walkway of earth and stones 460 m/1,500 ft long built on Great Salt Lake, Utah. 1970 The US firm IBM develops the floppy disk for storing computer data. 1970 The US folk-rock duo Simon and Garfunkel release the single 'Bridge Over Troubled Water' and an album of the same name. It will be the best-selling album of the 1970s in Britain. 1970 The US journalist (Louis) 'Studs' Terkel publishes Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression. 1970 The US military initiates the Global Positioning System (GPS), consisting of 21 satellites. An individual can determine his or her position anywhere on the Earth to within 23 m/75 ft by receiving the radio signals from a minimum of three satellites. 1970 The US philosopher W V Quine publishes his Philosophy of Logic and The Web of Belief. 1970 The US writer John Updike publishes his novel Bech: A Book. 1970 The US writer Maya Angelou publishes the first volume of her

autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. The title comes from a poem by the US poet Paul Laurence Dunbar. 1970 US biochemists Howard Temin and David Baltimore separately discover the enzyme reverse transcriptase, which allows some cancer viruses to transfer their RNA to the DNA of their hosts turning them cancerous – a reversal of the common pattern in which genetic information always passes from DNA to RNA. 1970 US computer programmers Kenneth Thomson and Dennis Ritchie develop the Unix computer operating system. It becomes the standard operating system for computer systems with multiple tasking and multiple users. 1970 US electronics engineer Robert Moog's synthesizer goes on the market in the USA. 1970 US geneticist Hamilton Smith discovers the Hind II restriction enzyme that breaks the DNA strand at predictable places, making it an invaluable tool in recombinant DNA technology. 1970 Women's median income in the USA is $5,440; that of men is $9,184. 1970–1979 The number of one-parent families in the USA increases 79%, representing one in five of all families. 1970–1979 There are over 4 million immigrants to the USA in the period 1970–79, coming mainly from Asia and the Americas. 10 January 1971 Coco (Gabrielle) Chanel, French couturier whose classic designs have been widely copied, dies in Paris, France (87). 4 February 1971 The prestigious Rolls Royce company, the manufacturer of luxury cars, goes bankrupt. To save face and to prevent job losses, the British government intervenes. 13 February 1971 South Vietnamese troops invade Laos to close the Ho Chi Minh Trail to the North Vietnamese. 15 February 1971 Israel affirms a Jewish settlement policy in its occupied territories. 8 March 1971 US boxer Joe Frazier beats Muhammad Ali of the USA over 15 rounds at Madison Square Garden, New York City, and retains the world heavyweight title. With takings from closed-circuit television the fight grosses almost $20 million. 26 March 1971 Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the leader of the Awami League, which has a majority in the all-Pakistan National Assembly, declares the independence of East Pakistan as Bangladesh ('Bengali country'). The split sparks a civil war.

31 March 1971 The US lieutenant William Calley is sentenced to life imprisonment for the My Lai massacre of 109 civilians in South Vietnam by US troops in March 1968. On 20 August 1971 Lieutenant Calley's prison term is reduced to 20 years. 7 April 1971 The US president Richard Nixon announces the withdrawal of 100,000 more troops from Vietnam by 1 December. 15 April 1971 The 1970 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: George C Scott, for Patton (but he refuses it, criticizing the Academy Awards as a 'meat market'); Best Supporting Actor: John Mills, for Ryan's Daughter; Best Actress: Glenda Jackson, for Women in Love; Best Supporting Actress: Helen Hayes, for Airport; Best Film: Patton, directed by Franklin J Schaffner; Best Director: Franklin J Schaffner, for Patton. 17 April 1971 Egypt, Syria, and Libya sign the Benghazi Agreement to establish the Federation of Arab Republics that, based on democratic socialism, creates a joint defence policy and pursues a hard-line attitude towards Israel. 19 April 1971 Sierra Leone becomes a republic within the Commonwealth. 19 April 1971 The USSR launches the 15-m/50-ftlong Salyut 1 space station. Visited by a three-person crew from 7 to 29 June, the cosmonauts die during their return to Earth when a faulty valve causes their capsule to lose pressure. The station re-enters the Earth's atmosphere six months later. 3 May 1971 Erich Honecker succeeds Walter Ulbricht as first secretary of the Socialist Unity Party of East Germany. 12 May 1971 The English rock star Mick Jagger marries Bianca Perez Morena de Macias, daughter of a Nicaraguan diplomat. 15 May 1971 The British rock group the Rolling Stones releases 'Brown Sugar' and the album Sticky Fingers. 10 June 1971 The USA ends its 21-year embargo on trade with China, which had been imposed by US president Harry S Truman during the Cold War. 13 June 1971 Geraldine Boodrick gives birth to the world's first set of nonuplets, five boys and four girls, in Sydney, Australia. Only six of the babies survive. 21 June 1971 The International Court of Justice in The Hague, the Netherlands, rules South Africa's administration of Namibia (South West Africa) to be illegal. 28 June 1971 The US boxer Muhammad Ali wins a four-year legal battle when a US court overturns his 1967 conviction for draft evasion. 3 July 1971 Jim Morrison, US rock star as singer with The Doors, dies in Paris,

France (27). 6 July 1971 Louis Armstrong, US jazz trumpeter, composer, and band leader, dies in New York City (71). 13–19 July 1971 Heavy fighting takes place in Jordan between the Jordanian army and Palestinian guerrillas, with 1,500 guerrillas captured by 19 July. 1 August 1971 George Harrison, joined by Ravi Shankar, Eric Clapton, Billy Preston, Leon Russell, Ringo Starr, and Bob Dylan, performs in the Benefit for Bangladesh in Madison Square Gardens, New York City. 9–11 August 1971 Over 22 people in Northern Ireland die in fighting between British troops and the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Belfast, Newry, and Londonderry. The Republic of Ireland opens a refugee camp for Catholics. 12 August 1971 Pete Sampras, US tennis player who in 1990 became the youngest man to win the US Open and was ranked number one 1993–96 and 1998, born in Washington, DC. 15 August 1971 Bahrain declares its independence from Britain. 15 August 1971 The US president Richard Nixon introduces a 'New Economic Policy', effectively ending the 1944 Bretton Woods system. The new policy suspends the conversion of dollars into gold and imposes a 90-day wage freeze and a 10% import surcharge, following the first US trade deficit since 1894. 18 August 1971 Australia and New Zealand announce the withdrawal of their forces from the Vietnam War. 1 September 1971 Qatar declares its independence from Britain. 11 September 1971 Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev, First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union 1953–64 and premier 1958–64, dies in Moscow, USSR (77). 1 October 1971 Disney World opens in Orlando, Florida: the development has cost an estimated $500 million. 3 October 1971 US tennis player Billie Jean King is the first female athlete to earn more than $100,000 in prize money in a year 25 October 1971 The United Nations General Assembly votes to admit communist China (the People's Republic of China) and expel Taiwan (the Republic of China). 1 November 1971 US firm Intel introduces the 4-bit 0.1MHz 4004 microprocessor; devised by Ted Hoff, and containing 2,250 transistors, it is

labelled a 'micro-programmable computer on a chip'. It can only process 4 bits (binary digits) of information at a time, but has about the same calculating power as ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator, Analyser, and Calculator) and allows the development of microcomputers. 12 November 1971 The US president Richard Nixon proclaims the end of the US offensive role in the Vietnam War and withdraws 45,000 more troops. 24 November 1971 An agreement is reached between the British foreign secretary Alec Douglas-Home and the Rhodesian prime minister Ian Smith on a new Rhodesian constitution. 24 November 1971 The US space probe Mariner 9 (launched in May) becomes the first artificial object to orbit another planet (Mars); it transmits 7,329 photographs of the planet and its two moons, Deimos and Phobos. 27 November 1971 The British heavy metal rock group Led Zeppelin releases the album Led Zeppelin IV, which features the classic 'Stairway to Heaven'. 2 December 1971 The seven emirates of Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Dubai, Umm al Qaiwain, Ras al Khaimah, Ajman, and Fujairah form the United Arab Emirates. 16 December 1971 East Pakistani forces surrender to India after its recognition of East Pakistan's independence as Bangladesh. India orders a ceasefire on the West Pakistan front, and on 17 December a ceasefire is declared in West Pakistan. 16 December 1971 Leaders of the Zimbabwe African National Union (Patriotic Front) (ZANU (PF)) and the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) form the African National Council with the aim of rejecting the Anglo-Rhodesian independence settlement, which favours white majority rule. 18 December 1971 Bobby Jones, US amateur golfer, the first man to win the Grand Slam – the British and US Amateur and Open Championships – dies in Atlanta, Georgia (69). 18 December 1971 The USA devalues the dollar by 7.9% and lifts its import surcharge. Other major currencies are realigned accordingly. 1971'Hot pants' – very brief skin-tight shorts – become a popular fashion item for women in the West. 1971 A dance instructor holds the first aerobics class, in Malibu, California. 1971 Austrian-born educator and social critic Ivan Illich publishes his polemic Deschooling Society. 1971 German-born English psychologist Hans Eysenck publishes Race,

Intelligence, and Education. 1971 Glam rock emerges. A reaction against progressive rock, it is characterized by elaborate costumes, makeup, and stage posturing, as exemplified by British bands such as T Rex and the Sweet. 1971 Over 300 women in France announce they have had abortions and demand legalization of the procedure. 1971 Populations (in millions): China, 789; India, 548; USSR, 244; USA, 205; Japan, 106; Brazi,l 95; Bangladesh, 63; Pakistan, 62; West Germany, 61; Nigeria, 57; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 56; Italy, 54; France, 51; Mexico, 51. 1971 Telephone direct-dialling between London, England, and New York City is introduced. 1971 The 'Poketronic' is launched in the USA by Texas Instruments; the first battery-powered pocket calculator it weighs more than 1 kg/2.2 lb, can only add, subtract, multiply, and divide and costs $150. 1971 The controversial film A Clockwork Orange is released in the USA. Based on Anthony Burgess's novel, it is directed by Stanley Kubrick and stars Malcolm McDowell. 1971 The English pop singer John Lennon releases the album Imagine. 1971 The film The French Connection is released in the USA. It is directed by William Friedkin and stars Gene Hackman and Fernando Rey. It will win several Academy Awards, including Best Film, Best Director, and Best Actor. 1971 The film The Last Picture Show is released in the USA. It is directed by Peter Bogdanovich and features Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, and Cybill Shepherd. 1971 The General Synod of the Church of England allows baptized members of other Christian denominations to receive communion in Anglican churches. 1971 The German writer Heinrich Böll publishes his novel Gruppenbild mit Dame/ Group Portrait with Lady. 1971 The rock musical Godspell, with lyrics and music by Stephen Schwartz, opens at the Cherry Lane Theater in New York City. 1971 The Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn publishes his novel Avgust chetynadtsatovo/August 1914 in the West (his works were banned in the USSR during the 1960s). 1971 The Swiss Catholic theologian Hans Küng publishes Infallible? An Enquiry, a

challenge to papal infallibility. 1971 The US pop singer Joni Mitchell releases the album Blue. 1971 The US song-writer and pop singer Carole King releases the albums Tapestry and Music. Around 15 million copies of Tapestry will be sold. 1971 US historian Dee Brown publishes Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West. 1971 US philosopher John Rawls publishes A Theory of Justice. 1971 US psychologist B F Skinner publishes Beyond Freedom and Dignity, a controversial defence of behaviourism. c. 1971 A technique known as large-scale integration (LSI) is developed in the USA which makes it possible to pack thousands of transistors, diodes, and resistors on a silicon chip less than 5 mm/0.2 in square; it makes possible the development of microprocessors and microcomputers. c. 1971 The programming language C is developed by Dennis Ritchie and Kenneth Thompson at Bell Laboratories; it is the preferred language of professional programmers and is widely used for writing software packages. 1971–1978 Immigration patterns in the USA: 38% from North America (Mexico, Caribbean); 35% from Asia; 19% from Europe; 6% from South America; and 2% from Africa. 10 January 1972 The US surgeon general reports that inhalation of cigarette smoke by nonsmokers is a severe health hazard; his report prompts calls to ban smoking in such public areas as restaurants, offices, and aeroplanes. 20 January 1972 Juanita Kreps is appointed the first woman governor of the New York stock exchange. 25 January 1972 The US president Richard Nixon reveals that his national security adviser Henry Kissinger has been conducting secret peace negotiations with North Vietnam, during the Vietnam War, since 1969. 30 January 1972 British troops shoot dead 13 civilians in Northern Ireland when violence erupts at a civil-rights march in the Bogside, Londonderry. The day is described as 'Bloody Sunday' by Labour members of the British Parliament. 30 January 1972 Pakistan leaves the Commonwealth in protest at Britain's plans to recognize Bangladesh as an independent nation. 21–27 February 1972 The US president Richard Nixon visits China to promote more congenial relations and foster scientific and cultural exchange.

22 March 1972 The Supreme Court in the USA rules that a Massachusetts law denying contraceptives to single people is unconstitutional. 29 March 1972 The North Vietnamese launch a major offensive in the Vietnam War in Quang Tri, South Vietnam's northernmost city. 30 March 1972 Britain assumes direct rule over Northern Ireland, with William Whitelaw as secretary of state. March 1972 The US Senate sends a 27th amendment to the states. Known as the Equal Rights Amendment, the legislation prohibits sex discrimination. March 1972–April 1973 The syndicated US news columnist Jack Anderson charges International Telephone and Telegraph (ITT) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the US of colluding to topple the Marxist government of Salvador Allende in Chile. ITT admits the charges on April 2, 1973. 9 April 1972 The 1971 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Gene Hackman, for The French Connection; Best Supporting Actor: Ben Johnson, for The Last Picture Show; Best Actress: Jane Fonda, for Klute; Best Supporting Actress: Cloris Leachman, for The Last Picture Show; Best Film: The French Connection, directed by William Friedkin; Best Director: William Friedkin, for The French Connection. 1 May 1972 The South Vietnamese city of Quang Tri falls to North Vietnamese forces. 8 May 1972 The US president Richard Nixon orders the blockade and mining of North Vietnamese ports in the Vietnam War. 22 May 1972 Ceylon ceases to be a British dominion and becomes a republic within the Commonwealth under the name of Sri Lanka. 22–30 May 1972 Richard Nixon becomes the first US president to visit the USSR. On 26 May he signs a treaty limiting antiballistic missile sites. 23 May 1972 Britain abandons its Rhodesian settlement proposals when the Pearce Commission reports that black opinion is unfavourable. 28 May 1972 Edward VIII, King of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (January–December 1936) who abdicated to marry the US divorcée Wallis Simpson, dies in Paris, France (77). 17 June 1972 The English pop star and actor David Bowie releases the album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. June 1972 Publisher Rupert Murdoch purchases the newspapers Sydney Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph in Australia.

June 1972 Sally J Priesand, of Cincinnati, Ohio, becomes the first woman to be ordained a rabbi. June 1972 The United Nations Conference on the Human Environment is held in Stockholm, Sweden; the first international conference on the state of the environment, its aim is to improve the world's environment through monitoring, resource management, and education. 1 July 1972 Ms, the first mainstream feminist magazine, is launched in the USA, with US journalist Gloria Steinem as editor: the first issue of 300,000 copies sells out in eight days. 1 July 1972 Bobby Fischer of the USA beats Boris Spassky of the USSR 12.5–8.5 in the World Chess Championship in Reykjavik, Iceland. 7 July 1972 The British secretary of state for Northern Ireland, William Whitelaw, holds secret talks in London, England, with the Irish Republican Army (IRA). 8 July 1972 The US president Richard Nixon announces that the USSR will purchase $750 million worth of US grain over three years. 23 July 1972 The USA launches Landsat 1, the first of a series of satellites for surveying the Earth's resources from space. July 1972 Hawaiian-born Jesse Kuhaulua, also known as Takamiyama, is the first non-Japanese sumo wrestler to win an official top-division tournament. 4 August 1972 President Idi Amin of Uganda gives Asians holding foreign passports 90 days to leave the country on the grounds that they are 'sabotaging the economy'. His action prompts a flood of refugees into Britain. 12 August 1972 Heavy US air raids on North Vietnam accompany the departure of US combat infantry from South Vietnam. 28 August–4 September 1972 At the Olympic Games in Munich, West Germany, Mark Spitz of the USA wins an unprecedented seven gold medals in swimming, all in world record times. August 1972 Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein implicate the Committee for the Re-election of the President (CREEP) in the Watergate burglary, leading to a series of revelations about the Nixon administration's complicity in the Watergate affair that contribute to the president's eventual downfall. 1 September 1972 Iceland unilaterally extends its fishing limit from 19 km/12 mi to 80 km/50 mi.

5 September 1972 Eight members of the Palestinian Black September guerrilla group attack the Olympic village in Munich, West Germany, killing two Israeli athletes and taking nine hostage; they issue demands for the release of 200 Palestinians from Israeli jails. Five terrorists and all nine hostages are killed when West German police storm the compound the next day. 6 September 1972 A memorial service is held at the Olympic stadium in Munich, West Germany, in honour of the 11 Israeli athletes murdered by Arab terrorists on 5 September. Later the same day, with the support of the Israelis, competition recommences. 7 September 1972 South Korea withdraws its remaining 37,000 troops from South Vietnam. 14 September 1972–20 August 1981 The Waltons, a television drama about a large southern family struggling against the odds during the Depression, starts on US television. 15 September 1972 South Vietnamese forces recapture the city of Quang Tri from the North Vietnamese. 22 September 1972 President Idi Amin orders 8,000 Asians to leave Uganda within 48 hours. 24 September 1972 A referendum in Norway results in a 52.7% vote against entry into the European Economic Community (Common Market). 29 September 1972 Japan and China agree to end the legal state of war that has existed between them since 1937. 3 October 1972 The USA and the USSR sign the final SALT (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) accords limiting submarine-carried and land-based missiles. 24 October 1972 Jackie Robinson, US baseball player, the first black player in the major leagues, dies in Stamford, Connecticut (53). October 1972 A French teenager is tried for having an illegal abortion and is acquitted after outspoken support by influential figures, resulting in increased availability of free abortions in major cities. 1 November 1972 Ezra Pound, US poet and literary critic, dies in Venice, Italy (87). 24 November 1972 Finland formally recognizes East Germany as a separate country, the first Western nation to do so. 15 December 1972 Australian law orders equal pay for women.

18–30 December 1972 US forces carry out heavy bombing in North Vietnam in the Vietnam War. 21 December 1972 West and East Germany sign a basic treaty to establish 'neighbourly relations on the basis of equality'. 26 December 1972 Harry S Truman, 33rd president of the USA 1945–53, a Democrat, dies in Kansas City, Missouri (88). 31 December 1972 British inventor Clive Sinclair launches his pocket calculator, the first to be widely available. The 'Sinclair Executive' weighs 70 g/12.5 oz and goes on sale for £79 in Britain and $195 in the USA. 1972 Approximately 500 sex-change operations have been performed since Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, performed the first one in the USA in 1966. 1972 Austrian-born English philosopher Karl Popper publishes Objective Knowledge. 1972 English engineer Godfrey Hounsfield performs the first successful CAT (computerized axial tomography) scan, which provides cross-sectional X-rays of the human body. 1972 Groups such as the Bay City Rollers, the Jackson Five, the Osmonds, and David Cassidy mark the era of 'Teenybop', with the bands appealing particularly to teenage girls. 1972 Japanese researcher Hideki Shirakawa attempts to make the polymer polyacetylene but accidentally adds a thousand times too much catalyst and discovers electrically conductive plastics; they have a metallic appearance. 1972 Published in an atmosphere of increasing liberality, British gerontologist Alex Comfort's The Joy of Sex: A Gourmet Guide to Lovemaking encourages sexual experimentation. 1972 Sears, Roebuck introduces the first video rental system in the USA, hiring out films for $3–6 a night, to run on the Avco Cartavision video player. 1972 Sociologists at Hebrew University, Israel, conduct a poll concluding that Israeli women reject women's liberation, believing their most admirable goals are to be a good mother and homemaker. 1972 The 411-m/1,350-ft-high World Trade Center opens in New York City – it is the tallest building in the world, until 1973. 1972 The British Jockey Club allows women jockeys to compete in horse racing for the first time, though only on the flat.

1972 The Dutch company Philips patents the video disk. Information is contained in 45,000 grooves, all of the same width and depth but varying in length and spacing, cut in a spiral onto the plastic disc, and reproduced by a laser. 1972 The epic gangster picture The Godfather is released in the USA. It is cowritten and directed by Francis Ford Coppola and stars Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, James Caan, Diane Keaton, and Robert Duvall. 1972 The film Aguirre: The Wrath of God, directed by Werner Herzog, is released, starring Klaus Kinski. 1972 The film Deliverance, based on the novel by James Dickey, is released in the USA. It is directed by English film-maker John Boorman, photographed by Vilmos Zsigmond, and stars Jon Voight and Burt Reynolds. 1972 The film Le Charme discret de la bourgeoisie/The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, co-written and directed by the Spanish film-maker Luis Buñuel, is released in France. It stars Fernando Rey, Delphine Seyrig, Stéphane Audran, and Bulle Ogier. 1972 The film Viskningar och Rop/Cries and Whispers, written and directed by Swedish film-maker Ingmar Bergman, is released in Sweden. It is photographed by Sven Nykvist and stars Harriet Andersson, Liv Ullmann, Ingrid Thulin, and Kari Sylwan. 1972 The French cultural critic Roland Barthes publishes Le Plaisir du texte/ Pleasure of the Text. 1972 The French philosopher Jacques Derrida publishes Marges de la philosophie/ On the Margins of Philosophy. 1972 The Irish poet Seamus Heaney publishes his poetry collection Wintering Out. 1972 The musical Grease, with lyrics and music by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, is first performed at the Eden Theatre in New York City. Its better known songs include 'Shakin'' and 'At the High School Hop'. 1972 The play Jumpers, by the English writer Tom Stoppard, is first performed, at the Old Vic Theatre in London, England. 1972 The play Sizwe Banzi is Dead, by the South African writer Athol Fugard, is first performed, in South Africa. 1972 The Trinidadian writer V S Naipaul publishes In a Free State, a collection of three novellas.

1972 The US birth rate – 15.8 per thousand of the population – is the lowest since records began in 1917. 1972 The US writer Anne Sexton publishes her poetry collection The Book of Folly. 1972 The US writer Eudora Welty publishes her novel The Optimist's Daughter, which is awarded a Pulitzer prize. 1972 The women's magazine Cosmopolitan begins monthly publication, promising to cover 'life, love, sex, and money'. 1972 US computer scientist Nolan Bushnell invents 'Pong', the first computer game. 1972 US microbiologist Daniel Nathans uses a restriction enzyme that splits DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) molecules to produce a genetic map of the monkey virus (SV40), the simplest virus known to produce cancer; it is the first application of these enzymes to an understanding of the molecular basis of cancer. 1972 US palaeontologists Stephen Jay Gould and Nils Eldridge propose the punctuated equilibrium model – the idea that evolution progresses in fits and starts rather than at a uniform rate. 1972 US runners Philip Knight and William Bowerman found Nike, Inc, under the name of Blue Ribbon Sports. By 1990, Nike will be the leader in the training shoes market and Knight will be a billionaire. 1 January 1973 Britain, Ireland, and Denmark become members of the European Economic Community (Common Market). 4 January 1973 Australia abandons the colour bar in admitting new settlers. 8 January 1973 The trial opens in Washington, DC, USA, of seven men accused of attempting to bug the opposition Democratic Party headquarters in the Watergate apartment complex. 21 January 1973 In the case Roe v. Wade, the US Supreme Court rules that state restrictions on abortion are unconstitutional and that a woman has the right to an abortion within the first six months of pregnancy. This provokes militant antiabortion protests. 22 January 1973 Lyndon Baines Johnson, 36th president of the USA 1963–69, a Democrat, dies in Texas (64). 27 January 1973 The USA, North and South Vietnam, and the Vietcong (armed forces of the National Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam) sign a Vietnam War ceasefire agreement in Paris, France.

13 February 1973 The USA devalues the dollar by 10% by raising the price of gold to $42.22 an ounce. 21 February 1973 The government of Laos and the communist resistance group, the Pathet Lao, sign a ceasefire agreement in the captial, Vientiane. 8 March 1973 In a Northern Ireland referendum, 591,820 people vote to remain in the United Kingdom and 6,463 to join the Republic of Ireland. 14 March 1973 Liam Cosgrave, leader of the Fine Gael party, becomes prime minister of the Republic of Ireland. 16 March 1973 Finance ministers of the European Economic Community (Common Market) countries, meeting in Paris, France, agree to establish a floating exchange rate system. 17 March 1973 The British progressive rock band Pink Floyd releases the album The Dark Side of the Moon. It will sell 20 million worldwide and remain in the US top 200 albums for 17 years. 27 March 1973 The 1972 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Marlon Brando, for The Godfather; Best Supporting Actor: Joel Grey, for Cabaret; Best Actress: Liza Minelli, for Cabaret; Best Supporting Actress: Eileen Heckart, for Butterflies are Free; Best Film: The Godfather, directed by Francis Ford Coppola; Best Director: Bob Fosse, for Cabaret. 1 April 1973 A committee of grocers and manufacturers recommends the use of Universal Product Codes (UPC) (bar codes) on items sold in grocery stores. The codes will permit electronic scanning of items, reduce cashier error, and improve stock control; a few stores use it from 1974 and it comes into general use in the USA in 1980. 8 April 1973 Pablo Picasso, Spanish painter and sculptor who, along with Georges Braque, founded cubism, dies in Mougins, France (91). 14 April 1973 The British heavy metal rock group Led Zeppelin releases the album Houses of the Holy. 27 April 1973 The Soviet foreign minister Andrey Gromyko and the chief of the KGB Yury Andropov are promoted to the Soviet Politburo in the first major reshuffle since 1964. 11 May 1973 Joop den Uyl becomes prime minister of the Netherlands after a record 164-day ministerial crisis. 14 May 1973–8 February 1974 The USA launches the Skylab space station. It contains a workshop for carrying out experiments in weightlessness. It is visited by three three-person crews and astronauts make observations of the Sun,

manufacture superconductors, and conduct other scientific and medical experiments. The third mission lasts a record 84 days and gathers data about long space flights. 31 May 1973 Erskine Childers succeeds Éamon de Valera as president of the Republic of Ireland. May 1973 NASA launches Skylab, the first US space station. It contains a workshop for carrying out experiments in weightlessness, an observatory for monitoring the Sun, and cameras for photographing the Earth's surface. Skylab is subsequently visited by three three-person crews, and astronauts make observations of the Sun, manufacture superconductors, and conduct other scientific and medical experiments. 7–16 July 1973 The former White House aide Alexander P Butterfield discloses the existence of the so-called 'Watergate tapes', when he tells a US Senate committee during the hearing on the Watergate affair that President Richard Nixon secretly tape-records all conversations in his office. Within a week, both the US Senate and special prosecutor subpoena them. 10 July 1973 The Bahamas achieve independence within the Commonwealth after almost 300 years of British colonial rule. 17 July 1973 A bloodless army-backed coup deposes King Mohammed Zahir Shah of Afghanistan and the country is proclaimed a republic. 13 August 1973 The US golfer Jack Nicklaus wins the US Professional Golfers Association (PGA) championship at Canterbury, Cleveland, Ohio to surpass US golfer Bobby Jones's 1930 record of 13 major championship victories. He also becomes the first golfer to earn more than $2 million in winnings. 15 August 1973 US bombing in Cambodia and Laos ends. 19 August 1973 Following the formal abolition of the Greek monarchy, Georgios Papadopoulos becomes president. 29 August 1973 Presidents Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Moamer al-Khaddhafi of Libya proclaim the unification of their two countries, with a plan for a joint constituent assembly. 31 August 1973 John Ford (adopted name of Sean O'Feeney), US film director best known for his Westerns, dies in Palm Desert, California (78). 2 September 1973 J R R Tolkien, English novelist known for his Lord of the Rings trilogy, dies in Bournemouth, Hampshire, England (81). 17 September 1973 The British prime minister Edward Heath meets Prime Minister Liam Cosgrave of the Republic of Ireland at an airfield near Dublin for

talks on Northern Ireland. It is the first official visit to the republic by a British prime minister. 18 September 1973 East and West Germany are admitted to the United Nations (UN). 23 September 1973 Juan Perón and his wife Isabel are elected president and vice president of Argentina. 6 October 1973 Full-scale war erupts in the Middle East, as Egypt and Syria attack Israel while Israelis are observing the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur. 8 October 1973 The London Broadcasting Company (LBC) becomes the first commercial radio station in mainland UK, ending the 50-year British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) monopoly of radio. The first channel, funded by advertising, broadcasts only news. 11 October 1973 Counterattacking Israeli forces break through on the Golan Heights during the Yom Kippur War and invade Syria. 15 October 1973 Britain and Iceland end the 'Cod War' with an agreement on fishing rights. 16 October 1973 Israeli forces cross the Suez Canal and invade Egypt in the Yom Kippur War. 17 October 1973 Eleven Arab states agree to cut their oil production by 5% a month in protest against US support for Israel in the Middle East Yom Kippur War. 20 October 1973 The Sydney Opera House, designed by the Danish architect Jørn Utzon, is completed in Australia. His highly original design – perhaps the best-known building in Australia – was controversial, and he left the project before building had finished. 20 October 1973 The US rock singer Lou Reed releases the album Berlin and his classic single 'Walk on the Wild Side'. 21–22 October 1973 The US secretary of state Henry Kissinger and the general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party Leonid Brezhnev meeting in Moscow, agree a plan to stop the Yom Kippur War in the Middle East. Egypt and Israel accept a United Nations (UN) ceasefire on 22 October, but fighting continues. 24 October 1973 Syria accepts a ceasefire in the Yom Kippur War against Israel and fighting halts on both fronts. October 1973 The US secretary of state, Henry Kissinger, shares the Nobel Peace Prize with Le Duc Tho of North Vietnam for bringing the Vietnamese peace negotiations to a successful conclusion.

7 November 1973 The US Congress overrides President Richard Nixon's veto and passes the War Powers Act, restricting the ability of the president to maintain troops overseas without congressional approval. 13 November 1973 The energy crisis in Britain prompts the government to declare a state of emergency. 14 November 1973 Princess Anne, the queen's only daughter, marries Mark Phillips in Westminster Abbey, London, England. 1 December 1973 David Ben-Gurion, Zionist statesman and first prime minister of the newly formed state of Israel 1948–53 and 1955–63, dies in Tel Aviv, Israel (87). 9 December 1973 Talks at Sunningdale, England, between the Irish and British governments and the Northern Ireland Executive-designate agree on the formation of a Council of Ireland with representatives from all three parties. 13 December 1973 The British prime minister, Edward Heath, orders industry to work a three-day week from 31 December to save energy. 17 December 1973 Emergency measures introduced by the Conservative government in Britain during the energy crisis include a television blackout after 10.30 at night. December 1973 The US probe Pioneer 10 (launched 2 March 1972) passes within 130,000 km/81,000 mi of Jupiter taking hundreds of photographs. It is destined to travel beyond the Solar System, leaving it on 13 June 1983. 1973 A physician in France is arrested for performing an illegal abortion; 10,000 protesters march to protest the abortion laws, resulting in the introduction of abortions rights legislation in parliament. 1973 British Judaic scholar Geza Vermes publishes Jesus the Jew. 1973 English psychologist John Bowlby publishes Attachment and Loss. 1973 German economist E F Schumacher publishes Small is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People Mattered, an influential book that expresses a growing concern with the disparity between the economies of the West and the developing world. 1973 German physicists Hans Dehmelt, Philip Ekstron, and David Wineland invent the Penning trap; an electron-capturing device that can hold a single electron in place for months at a time. 1973 Representatives from 80 nations sign the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) that prohibits trade in 375 endangered species of

plants and animals and the products derived from them, such as ivory; the USA does not sign. 1973 Skateboarding, a land recreation for surfers, becomes widely popular in the USA. 1973 The film Badlands, written and directed by Terrence Malick, is released in the USA. It stars Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek. 1973 The film Don't Look Now, directed by Nicolas Roeg and starring Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland, is released in the UK. It is based on a short story by Daphne du Maurier. 1973 The film La Nuit Américaine/Day for Night, directed by François Truffaut, is released in France, starring Jacqueline Bisset and Jean-Pierre Aumont. 1973 The film Mean Streets is released in the USA. It is co-written and directed by Martin Scorsese and stars Harvey Keitel and Robert De Niro. 1973 The film Sleeper, directed by Woody Allen, is released in the USA. He also stars in it, along with Diane Keaton. 1973 The film The Sting, directed by George Roy Hill, is released in the USA. It stars Robert Redford and Paul Newman. The film will win seven Academy Awards, including best picture, best director, and best music score. 1973 The horror film The Exorcist is released in the USA. Based on the bestselling novel by William Peter Blatty, it is directed by William Friedkin and stars Ellen Burstyn, Max Von Sydow, and Linda Blair. 1973 The Italian composer Bruno Maderna completes his theatre piece Satyricon. 1973 The musical A Little Night Music, with lyrics and music by Stephen Sondheim, is first performed, at the Shubert Theater in New York City. Based on the film Smiles of a Summer Night by Ingmar Bergman, it includes the song 'Send in the Clowns'. 1973 The opera Death in Venice by the English composer Benjamin Britten is first performed, at Aldeburgh in England. It is based on the novella Death in Venice by the German writer Thomas Mann. 1973 The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) raises oil prices dramatically, causing a worldwide energy crisis. People drive less and turn to more fuel-efficient cars, airlines reduce services, offices turn the heating down, the US president Richard Nixon proposes tax incentives to encourage oil exploration, demand for nuclear power increases, and coal prices rise, giving a boost to the ailing industry.

1973 The play Absurd Person Singular, by the English writer Alan Ayckbourn, is first performed, at the Criterion Theatre in London, England. 1973 The Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn publishes Arkhipelag Gulag/The Gulag Archipelago in Paris, France, a detailed account of the Soviet prison camps. 1973 The Sears Tower opens in Chicago, Illinois; with 110 storeys and standing 443 m/1,454 ft high, it is the world's tallest building, until 1996. 1973 The US artist Duane Hanson sculpts Florida Shopper, a work of Superrealist sculpture. 1973 The US Supreme Court rules that advertisements for employment cannot specify gender. 1973 The US writer Adrienne Rich publishes her poetry collection Diving into the Wreck. 1973 The US writer Bernard Malamud publishes his short-story collection Rembrandt's Hat. 1973 The US writer Erica Jong publishes her novel Fear of Flying. Controversial because of its explicit sexuality, it becomes a best-seller. 1973 The US writer Robert Lowell publishes his poetry collection The Dolphin. 1973 The US writer Thomas Pynchon publishes his novel Gravity's Rainbow. 1973 The World Trade Center in New York City, designed by the Japanese architect Minoru Yamasaki, is completed. 1973 US biochemists Stanley Cohen and Herbert Boyer develop the technique of recombinant DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). Strands of DNA are cut by restriction enzymes from one species and then inserted into the DNA of another; this marks the beginning of genetic engineering. 1973 US linguist and social critic Noam Chomsky publishes For Reasons of State. 1973 US medical physicist Paul Lauterbur obtains the first NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) image, in Britain. Radio waves are beamed through a patient's body while subjected to a powerful magnetic field; an image is generated because different atoms absorb radio waves at different frequencies under the influence of a magnetic field. 1973 US rock and roll star Elvis Presley divorces his wife Priscilla after six years of marriage, giving her a $750,000 settlement. 1973 Women account for 44.7% of the US work force. Salaries differ as much as

20% between men and women performing the same job. 1973 World economies undergo a simultaneous boom with commodity prices increasing drastically. The rise in the price of oil and restriction of its supply after war breaks out in the Middle East disrupts Western economies. 1973–1979 The value of a typical single-family home in the USA increases by 95% over a six-year period; the monthly cost of owning a home rises by 61% over the same period. 11 January 1974 Sue Rosenkowitz becomes the first woman to give birth to surviving sextuplets, three boys and three girls, in Cape Town, South Africa. 15 January 1974–12 July 1984 The situation comedy Happy Days, about family life in the 1950s, premiers on US television and runs for 11 seasons. 31 January 1974 Samuel Goldwyn, US pioneer Hollywood film-maker and producer, one of the founders of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), dies in Los Angeles, California (91). 7 February 1974 The Caribbean island of Grenada becomes independent within the Commonwealth. 22 February 1974 Pakistan recognizes Bangladesh as an independent nation at the start of the Islamic summit conference in Lahore, Pakistan. 27 February 1974 A new constitution is introduced in Sweden, which strips the monarchy of all its remaining powers. 5 March 1974 Harold Wilson forms a minority Labour government in Britain, with James Callaghan as foreign secretary, Denis Healey as chancellor of the Exchequer, Roy Jenkins as home secretary, and Michael Foot as employment secretary. March 1974 A 'terracotta army' consisting of over 6,000 life-size model soldiers is discovered in the Qin dynasty tomb near Xian in central China; they guard the tomb of China's first emperor, Shi Huangdi. 2 April 1974 The 1973 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Jack Lemon, for Save the Tiger; Best Supporting Actor: John Houseman, for The Paper Chase; Best Actress: Glenda Jackson, for A Touch of Class; Best Supporting Actress: Tatum O'Neal, for Paper Moon; Best Film: The Sting, directed by George Roy Hill; Best Director: George Roy Hill, for The Sting. 25–26 April 1974 General Antônio Ribeiro de Spínola leads a successful coup in Portugal. On 26 April, the junta vows to dismantle the authoritarian state and end the wars in Angola, Mozambique, and Portuguese Guinea (now GuineaBissau).

April 1974 Intel introduces the 8-bit 8080 microprocessor; it has 5,000 transistors. 18 May 1974 An atomic bomb test makes India the world's sixth nuclear power. 19 May 1974 A Protestant general strike begins in Northern Ireland against the power-sharing executive created by the Sunningdale Agreement of 9 December 1973. 27 May 1974 The conservative politician Jacques Chirac is appointed prime minister of France. 28 May 1974 The Northern Ireland Executive collapses when all the Unionist members resign. On 29 May, Britain reimposes direct rule and the general strike ends. 31 May 1974 The US secretary of state Henry Kissinger secures an agreement between Syria and Israel to disengage forces on the Golan Heights. 4 June 1974 The US baseball player Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves breaks Babe Ruth's record of 714 home runs in all major league competition. 4 June 1974 Yitzhak Rabin succeeds Golda Meir as prime minister of Israel. 26 June 1974 The first product barcode (on a pack of Wrigley's chewing gum) is scanned at the checkout of the Marsh Supermarket in Troy, Ohio. June–October 1974 The Belgian cyclist Eddy Merckx becomes the first rider to win the Tour de France, the Giro d'Italia, and the world professional road race in the same season. 15 July 1974 The Cypriot National Guard, with Greek support, overthrows President Makarios of Cyprus and installs Nicos Sampson, a former National Organization of Cypriot Combatants (EOKA) terrorist, in his place. 20–22 July 1974 Turkey invades Cyprus, claiming right of intervention under the 1960 treaty which sets Turkey as a guarantor, along with Greece and Britain, of the Cypriot constitution. A ceasefire follows on 22 July. 23–24 July 1974 The Greek military government resigns. On 24 July, the former prime minister Konstantinos Karamanlis returns from exile in France to form a civilian administration. 29 July–7 October 1974 Eleven women are ordained Episcopal ministers in the US. The ordinations are invalidated by the Episcopal House of Bishops on August 15, though the body endorses the principle of ordaining women on October 17. 5 August 1974 The US president Richard Nixon admits complicity in the

Watergate cover-up (concerning the attempted bugging of the opposition Democratic Party's campaign headquarters). 9 August 1974 The US president Richard Nixon resigns to avoid impeachment because of his involvement in the Watergate affair, and Gerald Ford becomes the 38th president of the USA. 12–14 August 1974 Turkey issues a 24-hour ultimatum demanding the creation of autonomous Turkish cantons in Cyprus. On 14 August, Turkish forces resume their offensive having turned down appeals by Greek foreign minister George Manos and Cypriot president Nicos Sampson to consult their governments. 14 August 1974 Greece withdraws its armed forces from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in protest at its failure to oppose the Turkish 'menace to world peace' following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. 16 August 1974 A second ceasefire following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus leaves 40% of the island under Turkish control. 26 August 1974 Charles Lindbergh, US aviator, the first person to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic, dies in Maui, Hawaii (72). 10 September 1974 Portuguese Guinea gains its independence from Portugal under the name Guinea-Bissau. 11 September 1974–21 March 1983 Little House on the Prairie, a popular television drama based on the classic series of books by Laura Ingalls Wilder, starts on US televison. It chronicles the Ingalls family's struggles in the American West in the 1870s. 12 September 1974 A military coup in Ethiopia deposes Emperor Haile Selassie. 13–17 September 1974 Japanese 'Red Army' terrorists in the Netherlands take French diplomats hostage in The Hague. On 17 September, France and the Netherlands pay a ransom for their release. 30 September 1974 General Francisco Costa Gomes succeeds General Spínola as president of Portugal. 1 October 1974 The first McDonalds hamburger restaurant in the UK opens. 3 October 1974 Frank Robinson is named manager of the Cleveland Indians, becoming the first black American to take charge of a major league baseball team. 5 October 1974 David Kunst successfully completes the first verified around-theworld walk: it has taken him 4 years, 3 months, and 15 days.

29 October 1974 US boxer Muhammad Ali, employing his famous 'rope-a-dope' tactics, knocks out George Foreman of the USA in the eighth round of their bout to regain the world heavyweight boxing title in Kinshasa, Zaire. 2 November 1974 US author J D Salinger breaks a 21-year silence to announce a lawsuit against a publisher and several major bookstore chains for unauthorized publication and distribution of short stories written early in his career. 5 November 1974 Democrat Ella Grasso becomes governor of the state of Connecticut, and the first woman governor of a US state who is not the wife or widow of a former governor. 13 November 1974 Yassir Arafat, the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, addresses the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. 21 November 1974 The US Congress passes the Freedom of Information Act over President Gerald Ford's veto. It prohibits the government from denying access to documents without good cause and requires federal agencies to supply documents without delay. 29 November 1974 The Prevention of Terrorism Act is passed in Britain following a spate of Irish Republican Army (IRA) outrages. Police are given power to hold terrorist suspects for five days without charge and suspects can be banned from the British mainland or deported to Northern Ireland. 1974 English physicist Stephen Hawking suggests that 'black holes aren't black' – they 'evaporate' by emitting subatomic particles. 1974 French philosopher Louis Althusser publishes Eléments d'autocritique/ Essays in Self-Criticism. 1974 Mexican chemist Mario Molina and US chemist F Sherwood Rowland warn that the chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) used in refrigerators and as aerosol propellants may be damaging the atmosphere's ozone layer that filters out much of the Sun's ultraviolet radiation, and that they could persist in the stratosphere for decades. 1974 The energy crisis induced by the oil embargo in the Middle East means that Daylight Savings Time is observed all year round in the USA to save fuel. 1974 The ex-Beatle Paul McCartney (with his band Wings) releases 'Jet' and the album Band on the Run. 1974 The film Emmanuelle, directed by Just Jaeckin, is released in France, at the Triomphe cinema on the Champs-Elysées in Paris. A very successful soft-porn film, it stars Sylvia Kristel, Marika Green, and Daniel Sarky. It will run for a record-breaking 11 years.

1974 The film Godfather Part II is released in the USA. It is directed by Francis Ford Coppola and stars Al Pacino and Robert De Niro. The film will win a number of Academy Awards, including best picture, best directing, best adapted screenplay, and best musical score. 1974 The film Lacombe, Lucien is released in France. It is directed by Louis Malle and stars Pierre Blaise, Aurore Clément, and Holger Löwenadler. 1974 The first word processors are introduced by the Xerox corporation. 1974 The German artist Joseph Beuys presents his performance work I Like America and America Likes Me in New York City. 1974 The neo-noir film Chinatown is released in the USA. It is written by Robert Towne, directed by Roman Polanski, and stars Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, and John Huston. 1974 The play Non si page! Non si page!/Can't Pay, Won't Pay, by the Italian writer and actor Dario Fo, is first performed, in Italy. Fo soon gains an international reputation. 1974 The play Travesties, by the English writer Tom Stoppard, is first performed, at the Aldwych Theatre in London, England. 1974 The Swedish pop group Abba wins the Eurovision Song Contest with 'Waterloo' and shoots to international stardom. 1974 The US artist R B Kitaj paints Arcades (after Walter Benjamin). 1974 The US Equal Opportunity Act forbids discrimination on the grounds of marital status or sex. 1974 The US firm Hewlett Packard introduces the first programmable pocket calculator. 1974 The US writer Robert M Pirsig publishes his philosophical work Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. 1974 US anthropologists Donald Johanson and Maurice Taieb discover the 3.2 million-years-old remains of 'Lucy', an adult female hominid classified as Australopithecus afarensis, at Hadar in Ethiopia. About 40% of her skeleton is found and it indicates that she was bipedal. 1974 US historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr, publishes The Imperial Presidency. 1974 US technician David Ahl develops the first microcomputer; it includes a central processing unit, television screen, and keyboard. It arouses little interest.

8 February 1975 The US folk/rock singer Bob Dylan releases the album Blood on the Tracks. 13 February 1975 Northern Cyprus declares its separate existence as the Turkish Federated State of Cyprus. 14 February 1975 P G Wodehouse, English novelist, short-story writer, playwright, and lyricist, creator of Jeeves, the archetypal gentleman's gentleman, dies in Southampton, Long Island, New York (93). 24 February 1975 Bangladesh introduces a presidential government and becomes a one-party state under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. 15 March 1975 The British heavy metal rock group Led Zeppelin releases the album Physical Graffiti and becomes the first band ever to have six albums in the US chart simultaneously. 30 March 1975 North Vietnamese forces capture Da Nang, South Vietnam's second-largest city. 5 April 1975 Jiang Jie Shi (Chiang Kai-shek), Chinese statesman, leader of the Nationalist government 1928–49, and then of the Chinese Nationalist government in exile on Taiwan, dies in Taipei, Taiwan (87). 8 April 1975 The 1974 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Art Carney, for Harry and Tonto; Best Supporting Actor: Robert De Niro, for The Godfather Part II; Best Actress: Ellen Burstyn, for Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore; Best Supporting Actress: Ingrid Bergman, for Murder on the Orient Express; Best Film: The Godfather Part II, directed by Francis Ford Coppola; Best Director: Francis Ford Coppola, for The Godfather Part II. 13 April 1975 Civil war erupts in Lebanon when clashes between Palestinians and Christian Phalangists outside a church in the capital, Beirut, leave 30 people dead. 17 April 1975 Communist Khmer Rouge revolutionaries in Cambodia capture the capital, Phnom Penh, in the civil war between the right-wing government of the Khmer Republic and the National United Front of Cambodia (the former leader Prince Sihanouk and the Khmer Rouge). 25 April 1975 The first free elections in Portugal since the 1920s fail to produce an overall majority. The Socialists under Mario Soares emerge as the largest party. 29 April 1975 The last US personnel flee the South Vietnamese capital, Saigon (now Ho Ch Minh City), flying by helicopter from the US embassy compound. 30 April 1975 President Minh of South Vietnam surrenders the capital, Saigon

(now Ho Chi Minh City), to the North Korean communist forces. 16 May 1975 Junko Tabei of Japan becomes the first woman to climb Mount Everest, the world's highest mountain. 30 May 1975 Unemployment in the USA reaches 9.2%, the highest rate since 1941. 5 June 1975 The Suez Canal is reopened by the Egyptian president, Anwar Sadat, following its eight-year closure because of Arab–Israeli hostilities. 9 June–15 August 1975 The trial is held in Lancaster, England, of the 'Birmingham Six' charged with the 1974 pub bombings in Birmingham. All are found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. They are released on 14 March 1991 following a successful appeal. 25 June 1975 Mozambique achieves independence from Portugal, with Samora Machel as president. 26 June 1975 The Indian prime minister, Indira Gandhi, declares a state of emergency pending her appeal against the charge of electoral corruption. Censorship is imposed and opposition leaders, including Morarji Desai, the leader of the Janata Party, are imprisoned. 5 July 1975 The Cape Verde Islands gain their independence from Portugal. 6 July 1975 The Comoros Islands gain their independence from France. 12 July 1975 São Tomé e Príncipe gains its independence from Portugal. 15 July 1975 The launch of the Soviet spaceship Soyuz 19 signals the start of a joint US–Soviet space mission. US and Soviet astronauts meet in space on 17 July when Soyuz 19 docks with its NASA counterpart, Apollo 18. 1 August 1975 The European Space Agency is founded in Paris, France, to undertake research and develop technologies for use in space. 1 August 1975 The Helsinki Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe issues a 'Final Act' signed by 30 states. The states are to respect one other's equality and individuality, avoid the use of force in disputes, and respect human rights. 9 August 1975 Dmitry Shostakovich, Russian composer, dies in Moscow, USSR (68). 12 August 1975 John Walker of New Zealand becomes the first man to run a mile in under 3 minutes 50 seconds, in Gothenburg, Sweden.

27 August 1975 Haile Selassie, Ethiopian emperor 1930–74, who modernized the country but was deposed, dies a prisoner in his palace in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (83). 29 August 1975 Éamon de Valera, Irish politician and revolutionary, president 1959–73 who took Ireland out of the British Commonwealth, dies in Dublin, Ireland (92). 31 August 1975 The International Monetary Fund (IMF) abandons the remaining role of gold in world monetary affairs. 16 September 1975 Papua New Guinea gains its independence from Australia and joins the Commonwealth. 23 September 1975 Israel and Egypt reach an agreement on an Israeli withdrawal from the Egyptian Sinai peninsula, which has been occupied by Israel since 1967. 22 October 1975 Three Irish Republican Army (IRA) members and a young woman (the 'Guildford Four') are found guilty of bombing a public house in Guildford, England, and sentenced to life imprisonment. 22–25 October 1975 The Soviet spacecraft Venera 9 and Venera 10, launched on 8 June and 14 June respectively, land on Venus and transmit the first pictures from the surface of another planet. 10 November 1975 Angola gains its independence from Portugal with Agostinho Neto as president, but civil war breaks out between the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). 14 November 1975 Spain agrees with Morocco and Mauritania to pull out of the Sahara by February 1976 and to organize consultations about the region's future. 20 November 1975 Francisco Franco, Spanish leader of the right-wing nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War 1936–39, then dictator for life, dies in Madrid, Spain (82). 25 November 1975 Surinam, formerly Dutch Guiana, gains its independence from the Netherlands. 28 November 1975 The Revolutionary Front for the Independence of East Timor (FRETILIN) unilaterally declares East Timor independent from Portugal. 3 December 1975 Communist forces take control of Laos. King Savang Vatthana abdicates and the country is proclaimed a 'People's Democratic Republic' under the presidency of Prince Souphanouvong.

11 December 1975 The US Congress passes legislation calling for the voluntary conversion to the metric system in ten years. 20 December 1975 The British pop group Queen promotes its song 'Bohemian Rhapsody', from the album A Night at the Opera, with the first pop video. The video, produced by Bruce Gowers on a £4,500 budget, debuts on the television programme Top of the Pops. 1975 Bill Gates, aged 19, and friend Paul Allen Gardiner, found Microsoft. It becomes the biggest seller of computer software in the world and makes Gates a billionaire before he is 30. 1975 Birth control becomes a priority in India; abortion is legalized and the government launches campaigns advocating sterilization for both sexes. 1975 British scientist Derek Brownhall produces the first clone of a rabbit, in Oxford, England. 1975 French philosopher Michel Foucault publishes Surveiller et punir/Discipline and Punishment. 1975 Gillette of Boston, Massachusetts, launches the first disposable razors, made of plastic. 1975 Kenyan field worler Bernard Ngeneo discovers a Homo erectus skull at Koobi Fora, Kenya, which is estimated to be 1.7 million years old; discovered in the same stratum as Australopithecus boisei, it puts an end to the single species hypothesis, the idea that there has never been more than one hominid species at any point in history. 1975 Out of 34,083 doctors' degrees awarded in the USA, 7,266 are to women. 1975 The average female worker in the USA earns 57% of what the average male earns. Average annual salaries of female faculty members in universities are about $4,000 lower than those of men at the same institution. 1975 The blockbuster film Jaws, directed by Steven Spielberg, is released in the USA. It stars Roy Scheider, Robert Shaw, and Richard Dreyfuss. 1975 The Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez publishes his novel El otoño del patriarca. An English translation, The Autumn of the Patriarch, is published in 1977. 1975 The film Ansikte mot ansikte/Face to Face, directed by Ingmar Bergman, is released in Sweden. Edited from a four-part television series, it stars Liv Ullmann and Erland Josephson. 1975 The film Die grosse Ekstase des Bildschnitzers Steiner, Jeder für sich und

Gott gegen alle/The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser is released in West Germany (US title Every Man for Himself and God Against All). It is written and directed by Werner Herzog and stars Bruno S. 1975 The film Monty Python and the Holy Grail, directed by Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones, is released in the UK. It stars the directors as well as the rest of the Monty Python team, John Cleese, Michael Palin, Eric Idle, and Graham Chapman 1975 The film Nashville, directed by Robert Altman, is released in the USA. The film features an all-star cast, including Keith Carradine, Lily Tomlin, and Shelley Duvall. 1975 The film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is released in the USA. It is directed by the Czech film-maker Miloš Forman and stars Jack Nicholson. The film will be only the second in Academy Award history, after Frank Capra's 1934 comedy It Happened One Night, to win Academy Awards in all the major categories: Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Screenplay. 1975 The film Picnic at Hanging Rock, directed by Peter Weir, is released in Australia, starring Anne Lambert, Rachel Roberts, and Helen Morse, and based on the novel by Joan Lindsay. 1975 The film The Godfather Part II, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, is released in the USA, starring Al Pacino, Diane Keaton, Andy Garcia, Eli Wallach, and Bridget Fonda. 1975 The film The Rocky Horror Picture Show is released in the UK. Based on Richard O'Brien's stage hit, it is directed by Jim Sharman and stars Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon, and Barry Bostwick. 1975 The first 'drive-thru' McDonald's hamburger restaurant is opened. 1975 The first 'personal computer', the Altair 8800, is marketed in the USA; it has no keyboard or screen but uses toggle switches to input data and flashing lights for output. 1975 The French composer Pierre Boulez completes his orchestral work Rituel in memoriam Bruno Maderna. 1975 The gel-transfer hybridization technique for the detection of specific DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) sequences is developed; it is a key development in genetic engineering. 1975 The Internal Security Committee of the US House of Representatives, formerly known as the Un-American Activities Committee, is abolished. 1975 The Irish writer Seamus Heaney publishes his poetry collection North.

1975 The Italian writer Primo Levi publishes his collection of meditations and recollections Il sistema periodico/The Periodic Table. 1975 The Jamaican pop group Bob Marley and the Wailers releases 'No Woman No Cry' and the album Natty Dread, one of the classics of reggae. 1975 The Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes publishes his novel Terra Nostra/Our Land. 1975 The percentage of government seats held by women is 4% in Africa; 13% in Asia; 3.4% in Latin America; 3.6% in North America; 13% in Europe; and 32% in the USSR. 1975 The play American Buffalo, by the US writer David Mamet, is first performed, in Chicago, Illinois. 1975 The Polish composer Henryk Górecki completes his Symphony No. 3 ('Symphony of Sorrowful Songs'). 1975 The seven largest capitalist economic powers (the USA, Canada, Japan, West Germany, France, Italy, and Britain, the 'Group of Seven') hold their first meeting, in Bonn, West Germany. 1975 The United Nations (UN) declares 1975 International Women's Year. 1975 The US linguist and social critic Noam Chomsky publishes Reflections on Language. 1975 The US writer Saul Bellow publishes his novel Humboldt's Gift. 1975 Unemployment among blacks is 15% during this year's recession, while the rate for whites is 9%. 1975 US anthropologist Donald Johanson and his team at Hadar in Ethiopia discover the 'first family' – the remains of at least 13 Australopithecus afarensis individuals of varying ages, estimated to be 3.2 million years old. 1975 US philosopher of science Paul Feyerabend publishes Against Method. 1975 Women outnumber men in the USA for the first time due to longer life spans for women, who live an average of eight years longer than men. 12 January 1976 Agatha Christie, English playwright and author of detective novels, dies in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, England (85). 21 January 1976 The British-French supersonic airliner Concorde begins a regular passenger service across the Atlantic; it is the world's first scheduled supersonic passenger service.

21 January 1976 Two Concorde aircraft make their first commercial flights, from London, England, to Bahrain and from Paris, France, to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. 31 January 1976 The population of the world reaches 4 billion. 1 February 1976 Werner Heisenberg, German physicist and philosopher who introduced the uncertainty principle into quantum mechanics, dies in Munich, West Germany (74). 11 February 1976 Aldo Moro forms a minority Christian Democratic government in Italy. 13 February 1976 The Nigerian head of state, General Murtala Mohammad, is killed during an unsuccessful coup. He is succeeded by General Olusegun Obasanjo. 15 March 1976 The French franc is forced out of the European currency 'snake' (system of exchange rates). 24 March 1976 A military coup deposes President Isabel Perón of Argentina, and all political parties and unions are 'suspended'. 29 March 1976 The 1975 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Jack Nicholson, for One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest; Best Supporting Actor: George Burns, for The Sunshine Boys; Best Actress: Louise Fletcher, for One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest; Best Supporting Actress: Lee Grant, for Shampoo; Best Film: One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, directed by Miloš Forman; Best Director: Miloš Forman, for One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest. 4 April 1976 Prince Sihanouk retires as Cambodian head of state, to be succeeded by Khieu Samphan of the Khmer Rouge. 14 April 1976 Western Sahara is divided between Morocco and Mauritania. 16 April 1976 India and Pakistan normalize diplomatic relations for the first time since the 1971 war over the independence of East Pakistan as Bangladesh. 9 May 1976 Ulrike Meinhof, the German terrorist leader and member of the Baader–Meinhof gang, commits suicide in prison. 31 May 1976 Syrian soldiers and tanks enter Lebanon. 1 June 1976 The 'Cod War' between Iceland and Britain ends after mediation by Norway, and a 200-mile fishing limit is agreed. 16–25 June 1976 South African police kill 76 students in Soweto and other

townships during protests and riots about teaching in Afrikaans. 27 June–3 July 1976 Palestinian terrorists hijack an Air France plane and force it to fly to Entebbe, Uganda. On 1 July 100 passengers are released at Entebbe airport and Israeli commandos free 106 hostages two days later. 28 June 1976 The Seychelles gain their independence within the Commonwealth. 1 July 1976 Adolfo Suárez becomes prime minister of Spain. 2 July 1976 North and South Vietnam are formally reunified. 14 July 1976 The ban on political parties in Spain is lifted. 28 July 1976 An earthquake in Tangshan, China, measuring 8.2 on the Richter scale levels nearly every building and kills 242,000 people. It is the worst earthquake in modern history. July 1976 At the Montreal Olympics, the Romanian gymnast Nadia Comeneci scores the first ever maximum 10.00 marks at the Olympics, and then gets four more on the way to winning three gold medals and one silver. July–August 1976 At the Montreal Olympic Games, Polish athlete Danuta Rosani is the first track and field athlete to test positive for anabolic steroids since the drugs were banned in 1975. 1 August 1976 Trinidad and Tobago, having achieved independence from Britain in 1962, gain the status of republic within the Commonwealth. 2 August 1976 Fritz Lang, Austrian-born US film director who made Metropolis, dies in Los Angeles, California (85). 25 August 1976 Jacques Chirac resigns suddenly as prime minister of France and is succeeded by Raymond Barre. 28 August 1976 Indian-born US biochemist Har Gobind Khorana and his colleagues announce the construction of the first artificial gene to function naturally when inserted into a bacterial cell. 9 September 1976 Mao Zedong, Chinese Marxist theorist who was chair of the People's Republic of China 1949–59 and chair of the Chinese Communist Party 1949–76, dies in Beijing, China (83). 19 September 1976 Ian Smith, the prime minister of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), accepts the principle of majority rule in his country. 19 September 1976 The Swedish general election ends 40 years of government by the Social Democrats.

20 September 1976 In a Playboy interview the US presidential candidate Jimmy Carter says, 'I have committed adultery in my heart many times'. 3 October 1976 Helmut Schmidt's Social Democrat-led coalition returns to power in West Germany with a reduced majority. 6 October 1976 A military coup in Thailand seizes control from Prime Minister Seni Pramoj. 7 October 1976 Hua Guofeng succeeds Mao Zedong as Chinese premier. The 'Gang of Four', including Mao's widow, are arrested and denounced for plotting to take power. 25 October 1976 The black homeland of Transkei, South Africa, becomes nominally independent. 2 November 1976 In the US presidential election, the Democratic candidate, Jimmy Carter, defeats the Republican, President Gerald Ford, with 297 electoral college votes to 241. Democrats retain majorities in the House (292-143) and Senate (68-31). 14 November 1976 The televising of Gone With the Wind attracts the highest audience for a film ever in the USA, with more than 33 million viewers. 26 November 1976 Catholicism ceases to be the state religion of Italy. 5 December 1976 Jean-Bédel Bokassa, head of state of the Central African Republic, proclaims his country an empire and himself its emperor. 12 December 1976 The US pop group the Eagles releases the album Hotel California, and the single of the same name. 1976 Computer networking begins in offices when Wang Laboratories introduces a word processor located on a central computer that can be shared by various terminals. 1976 Perrier water is introduced in the USA. 1976 The Bulgarian-born artist Christo (Javacheff) creates Running Fence, 40 km of fabric stretched across a valley in California. 1976 The display of Equivalents VIII – an arrangement of building bricks at the Tate Gallery in London, England, by the US artist Carl André – causes a controversy. The work was created in 1966. 1976 The film All the President's Men, directed by Alan J Pakula, is released in the USA. The story of journalists' exposé of Watergate, it stars Robert Redford

and Dustin Hoffman. 1976 The film Network, directed by Sidney Lumet, is released in the USA. It stars Peter Finch, Faye Dunaway, and William Holden. 1976 The film Rocky, directed by John G Avildsen, is released in the USA. It is written by and stars Sylvester Stallone. Made in 28 days, with a budget of less than $1 million, it goes on to gross over $100 million in the USA alone. 1976 The film Taxi Driver, directed by Martin Scorsese, is released in the USA. It stars Robert De Niro, Cybill Shepherd, Harvey Keitel, and Jodie Foster. At the Cannes Film Festival in France, it is awarded the Palme d'Or on 28 May. 1976 The film The Omen, directed by Richard Donner, is released in the USA. It stars Gregory Peck and Lee Remick. 1976 The home video cassette recorder is introduced into the US market, with two incompatible models. The Japanese electronics company Sony markets the Betamax system, released in 1975, and fellow Japanese electronics company Japanese Matsushita Corporation (JVC) markets the Video Home System (or VHS), which eventually dominates the trade. 1976 The median price for a single-family home in the USA reaches $38,100. 1976 The opera Einstein on the Beach by the US composer Philip Glass is first performed, in Avignon, France. The text is by Robert Wilson. 1976 The play Audience, by the Czech writer and politician Václav Havel, is first performed, in Vienna, Austria. 1976 The play California Suite, by the US writer Neil Simon, is first performed, at the Eugene O'Neill Theater in New York City. 1976 The popularity of CB (citizens-band) radio in the USA leads to a record 656,000 licence applications a month; CB code phrases also filter through to everyday life. 1976 The US artist Chuck Close paints Linda. 1976 The US artist Frank Stella paints Bermuda Petrel. 1976 The US artist Nam June Paik creates Fish Flew in the Sky, a video installation. 1976 The US spacecraft Viking 1 and Viking 2 (launched in 1975) soft-land on Mars (20 July, 7 August). They make meteorological readings of the Martian atmosphere and search for traces of bacterial life which prove inconclusive.

1976 The US writer Alex Haley publishes his novel Roots. Documenting the history of a family of black Americans of African origin through seven generations, it becomes a phenomenal success as a book and a TV series. It will win a Pulitzer prize in 1977. 1976 The US writer Gore Vidal publishes his novel 1876. 1976 The US writer James Merrill publishes his poetry collection Divine Comedies, which wins the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1977. 1976 The US writer Philip Roth publishes his novel The Professor of Desire. 1976 The US writer Raymond Carver publishes his collection of short stories Will You Please be Quiet, Please. 1976 US chemist Stephanie Kwolek develops Kevlar, a plastic fibre as strong as steel; it is used to make bulletproof vests, boat-shells, and tyres. 1976 US cultural historian Shere Hite publishes The Hite Report: A Nationwide Study of Female Sexuality. 1976 With $1,500, Stephen Jobs and Stephen Wozniak begin making computer prototypes in a California garage – the start of Apple Computers. 1976 With the launch of videocassette recorders on the market by Sony and JVC, television advertising rates are hit, as viewers can now choose not to view commercials. 3 January 1977 The International Monetary Fund lends Britain $3.9 billion. 7 January 1977 Human-rights supporters in Czechoslovakia publish the manifesto 'Charter 77', pressing for implementation of the 1975 Helsinki humanrights guarantees given at the 1975 Helsinki conference in Finland. 3 February 1977 Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam becomes leader of Ethiopia after killing the existing head of state, General Teferi Bante, and six other leading members of the ruling military council. 12 March 1977 Political parties are banned in Chile and censorship is tightened under General Augusto Pinochet. 20 March 1977 The Congress Party is defeated in the Indian general election and the prime minister Indira Gandhi loses her seat. 27 March 1977 A KLM Boeing 747 collides during takeoff with a Pan Am 747 still on the ground at Tenerife in the Canary Islands; a total of 582 people are killed on board both planes. It is the world's worst air disaster to date.

28 March 1977 The 1976 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Peter Finch, for Network; Best Supporting Actor: Jason Robards, for All the President's Men; Best Actress: Faye Dunaway, for Network; Best Supporting Actress: Beatrice Straight, for Network; Best Film: Rocky, directed by John G Avildsen; Best Director: John G Avildsen, for Rocky. 11 April 1977 Jacques Prévert, French poet and screenwriter, dies in Omonvillela-Petite, France (77). 8 June 1977 Uganda is excluded from the Commonwealth conference for its human-rights abuses. 15 June 1977 Prime Minister Adolfo Suárez wins a small majority in Spain's first general election since 1936. 16 June 1977 Werner von Braun, German rocket engineer who was also involved in the exploration of space in Germany and the USA, dies in Alexandria, Virginia (65). 27 June 1977 Djibouti gains its independence from France. 30 June 1977 The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), a collective military system, is dissolved. 5 July 1977 A coup ousts Zulfikar Ali Bhutto as prime minister of Pakistan. He is replaced by General Zia ul-Haq, Bhutto's former army chief of staff. 12 July 1977 US medical researcher Raymond Damadian produces the first images of human tissues using an NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) scanner; used to detect cancer and other diseases without the need for X-rays, the scanner is based on the fact that electromagnetic fields cause some atomic nuclei to align themselves. The scanners become commercially available in the USA in 1984. 22 July 1977 The Chinese Communist Party expels the 'Gang of Four', who had tried to seize power after the death of Mao Zedong. Deng Xiaoping is reinstated as deputy premier. 16 August 1977 Elvis Presley, US rock and roll singer, whose great success changed US popular culture, dies of heart failure (probably associated with drug abuse) at his home, Graceland, in Memphis, Tennessee (42). 16–17 August 1977 Around 2 million Elvis Presley records sell within one day of his death. 18 August 1977 The 11th Chinese Communist Party Congress indicates a swing away from hardline Maoism towards economic improvement.

19 August 1977 Groucho Marx (born Julius Marx), US comedian of stage, film, radio, and television along with two of his brothers, Harpo and Chico, dies in Los Angeles, California (86). 26 September 1977 The first Laker 'Skytrain' flies from London, England, to New York City for $102 a ticket, launching Laker Airways no frill low cost service. 18 October 1977 Andreas Baader and two other members of the West German Baader–Meinhof terrorist gang commit suicide in prison. 26 October 1977 The last known case of smallpox is reported, in Somalia. 29 October 1977 The US rock group Meat Loaf releases the album Bat Out of Hell; it will sell more than 25 million copies worldwide. 1 November 1977 The USA quits the International Labour Organization, which formulates standards for labour conditions, but President Jimmy Carter raises the minimum wage to $2.65 an hour. 4 November 1977 The United Nations (UN) imposes a strict arms embargo on South Africa. November 1977 Australian publisher Rupert Murdoch acquires The New York Post. His worldwide business now includes more than 80 newspapers. 6 December 1977–24 March 1978 One of the longest strikes in the history of the US coal industry ends when miners receive higher wages and more generous benefits. 25 December 1977 Charlie Chaplin, English actor and director of the silent film era, who gained fame playing a pathetic but humorous character, dies in Corsiersur-Vevey, Switzerland (88). 1977 Apple Computers launches the Apple II personal computer; owners must use their own television screens and store data on audiocassette tapes. It is the first mass-produced personal computer in assembled form. 1977 English biochemist Frederick Sanger describes the full sequence of 5,386 bases in the DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) of virus phiX174 in Cambridge, England; the first sequencing of an entire genome. 1977 French historian Philippe Ariès publishes The Hour of Our Death. 1977 In the USA, 84% of all travel is by private vehicle; 9% of the population walk to their destination, and only 2.4% use public transportation. 1977 In the USA, George Anderson opens the first video rental shop, charging $50 to join and $10 per film a night.

1977 In-vitro fertilization (IVF) is developed by the British gynaecologists Patrick Steptoe and Robert Edwards. The first IVF baby is born in 1978. 1977 Over 500 million pairs of denim jeans are sold in the USA, with Levi Strauss the largest producer. This represents a huge increase over a decade: sales in 1967 were around 200 million. 1977 Punk music comes to prominence in the UK, with the emergence of bands such as the Sex Pistols, the Clash, the Buzzcocks, the Damned, and the Stranglers. 1977 The Anglo-American rock group Fleetwood Mac releases the album Rumours, one of the best-selling pop albums to date. 1977 The Canadian-born US economist J K Galbraith publishes The Age of Uncertainty. 1977 The Centre National d'Art et de Culture Georges Pompidou (Pompidou Centre) in Paris, France, designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers, is completed. 1977 The disco film Saturday Night Fever, directed by John Badham, is released in the USA. It stars John Travolta and features music by the Bee Gees. 1977 The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt completes his orchestral work Tabula rasa his Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten. 1977 The ex-Beatle Paul McCartney and his band Wings have a hit with 'Mull of Kintyre', co-written by McCartney and band-member Denny Laine. Over 2.5 million copies are sold. 1977 The film Annie Hall, directed by Woody Allen, is released in the USA. Allen co-stars with Diane Keaton. The film will win Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, and Best Original Screenplay. 1977 The film Star Wars, directed by George Lucas, is released in the USA. The first instalment in the original Star Wars trilogy, it stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, and Alec Guinness. 1977 The French social and literary critic Roland Barthes publishes Fragments d'un discours amoureux/A Lover's Discourse. 1977 The German-born English artist Frank Auerbach paints Camden Theatre in the Rain. 1977 The Indian writer R K Narayan publishes his novel The Painter of Signs.

1977 The Jamaican pop group Bob Marley and the Wailers releases the album Exodus. 1977 The Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu completes his orchestral work A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden. 1977 The opera Mary Queen of Scots by the Scottish composer Thea Musgrave is first performed, in Edinburgh, Scotland. It is based on the play Moray by Amalia Elguera. 1977 The opera The Martyrdom of St Magnus by the English composer Peter Maxwell Davies is first performed, in Orkney, Scotland. The text is from Magnus by the Scottish poet George Mackay Brown. 1977 The Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa publishes his novel La tía Julia y el escribidor/Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter. 1977 There are 4,311 black elected officials in the USA, up from 1,469 in 1970. 1977 Two homosexual men in New York City are diagnosed as having the rare cancer Kaposi's sarcoma. They are later thought to be the first victims of AIDS. 1977 US inventor Paul MacCready's aircraft Gossamer Condor makes the first human-powered flight and wins the £50,000 Kremer Prize. 1977 US jurist Ronald Dworkin publishes Taking Rights Seriously. 1977 US scientist Herbert Boyer, of the firm Genentech, fuses a segment of human DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) into the bacterium Escherichia coli, which begins to produce the human protein somatostatin; this is the first commercially produced genetically engineered product. 3 February 1978 The European Economic Community and China conclude their first trade agreement. 3 March 1978 The Rhodesian prime minister, Ian Smith, and three black leaders sign an agreement for a power-sharing government and eventual majority rule, but exclude Robert Mugabe's and Joshua Nkomo's Patriotic Front. 5 March 1978 A new Chinese constitution affirms the rule of law, in contrast to the policies under the Cultural Revolution. 11 March 1978 A new government led by Giulio Andreotti is installed in Italy with the support of the Communist Party. 22 March 1978 The first United Nations 'UNIFIL' (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) troops arrive in Lebanon.

2 April 1978–3 May 1991 Dallas, the first night-time soap opera, runs for 14 seasons and spawns many similar shows such as Dynasty. 3 April 1978 The 1977 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Richard Dreyfuss, for The Goodbye Girl; Best Supporting Actor: Jason Robards, for Julia; Best Actress: Diane Keaton, for Annie Hall; Best Supporting Actress: Vanessa Redgrave, for Julia; Best Film: Annie Hall, directed by Woody Allen; Best Director: Woody Allen, for Annie Hall. 8 May 1978 Reinhold Messner of Italy and Peter Habeler of Austria become the first climbers to reach the summit of Mount Everest, the world's highest mountain, without bottled oxygen. 18 May 1978 Despite intense Vatican opposition, Italy votes to make abortion legal in the first 90 days of pregnancy. 26 June 1978 The president of South Yemen, Salem Ruba Ali, is assassinated by the faction that murdered the North Yemeni president, Ahmed al-Ghashmi. 4 July 1978 Scientists at the Princeton Large Torus test reactor achieve a temperature of 54 million K/60 million°F, and maintain it for one-twentieth of a second. It is hailed as a breakthrough for nuclear fusion. 7 July 1978 The Solomon Islands gain their independence from Britain. 25 July 1978 Louise Brown is born at Oldham Hospital, London, England; she is the first 'test tube' baby. Having been unable to remove a blockage from her mother's Fallopian tube, gynaecologist Patrick Steptoe and physiologist Robert Edwards removed an egg from her ovary, fertilized it with her husband's sperm, and re-implanted it in her uterus. 29 July 1978 Penny Dean, a 23-year-old Californian, swims the English Channel in a new world record time of 7 hours 42 minutes. 26 August 1978 Albino Luciani, Patriarch of Venice, is elected pope. He takes the name John Paul I. August 1978 Toxic chemicals (PCBs, dioxins, and pesticides) leak into the basements of houses in the Love Canal neighbourhood of Niagara Falls, New York. The site, an abandoned canal, was used as a chemical waste dump by the Hooker Chemicals and Plastics Corporation 1947–53. Residents are evacuated but their long-term exposure results in high rates of chromosomal damage and birth defects. It is the worst environmental disaster involving chemical waste in US history. 5–17 September 1978 A summit at Camp David, Maryland, USA, between the US president, Jimmy Carter, the Egyptian president, Anwar Sadat, and the Israeli prime minister, Menachem Begin, concludes with a 'framework' peace treaty ending 30 years of hostility between Israel and Egypt.

15 September 1978 The Spanish parliament recognizes the demand of the Basques for autonomy. 17 September 1978 Muhammad Ali beats fellow US boxer Leon Spinks on points in a World Boxing Association world heavyweight title bout in New Orleans, Louisiana, becoming the first boxer to regain a world heavyweight title twice. 23 September 1978 The US new wave group Blondie releases the album Parallel Lines. 29 September 1978 P W Botha becomes prime minister of South Africa. 4 October 1978 An estimated 500 people are killed or wounded in heavy battles in the civil war in Beirut, Lebanon. 16 October 1978 Following the deaths of Pope Paul VI on 6 August and his successor John Paul I on 28 September, Karol Wojtyla, archbishop of Kraków, is elected as John Paul II, the first non-Italian pope since 1522. 24 October 1978 The US Airline Deregulation Act provides for the phasing out of government control of the airline industry; routes are to be deregulated by 1982 and prices by 1 January 1985. The airlines respond by abandoning the less profitable shorter routes and competing on the longer, more profitable ones by cutting fares. 29 October 1978 The late Mao Zedong's collection of thoughts, known as the Little Red Book, is denounced in China. 18 November 1978 The US cult leader Jim Jones leads 913 followers, most of them Americans, and including 276 children, in a mass suicide at the so-called People's Temple in Jonestown, Guyana. The slaughter is precipitated by the murder of US representative Leo J Ryan and four associates, who had visited Jonestown to investigate charges of religious coercion. 15 December 1978 The USA and China normalize diplomatic relations with effect from 1 January 1979. 25 December 1978 Vietnam begins a full-scale invasion of Cambodia. 1978 4.2 million men earn more than $25,000 per year, while just 140,000 women earn that much. 1978 About 45 legal and 500,000 illegal abortions are performed in Greece this year. 1978 As punk declines, new wave music emerges into the mainstream, influenced particularly by US bands such as Talking Heads, Blondie, and the

Ramones. An early influence on punk, new wave's roots are in New York City, especially venues such as the club CBGB's. 1978 Disco music predominates, as the soundtrack to the film Saturday Night Fever tops the album charts. 1978 Garfield the cat, the creation of US cartoonist Jim Davis, appears in syndicated newspapers for the first time. 1978 In the USA, 49% of all women work, up from 31% in 1950; 48% of married women work, double the percentage in 1950. 1978 Life expectancy in the USA is 70.2 years for men and 77.8 years for women, up from 64.4 and 69.5 in 1945. 1978 Of companies in Japan, 91% have jobs inaccessible to women; 73% start males and females in the same positions at different salaries; 52% do not promote women; 77% have different retirement plans for men and women; and only 1.7% of companies provide childcare facilities. 1978 The Anglo-Irish novelist Iris Murdoch publishes her novel The Sea, The Sea, which wins the Booker Prize. 1978 The ballet Orpheus and Eurydice by the German choreographer Pina Bausch, to music by the 18th-century composer Christoph Gluck, is first performed, in Germany. 1978 The birth rate in the USA is 15.3 per 1,000 population, a decline from 24.1 in 1950. 1978 The comedy National Lampoon's Animal House, directed by John Landis, is released in the USA. It stars John Belushi and Tim Matheson and becomes a cult classic. 1978 The English punk rocker Sid Vicious (born John Simon Ritchie) is arrested in New York City in connection with the fatal stabbing of his girlfriend, Nancy Spungen. He is to die of a heroin overdose before going to trial. 1978 The English writer Martin Amis publishes his novel Success. 1978 The film Days of Heaven, directed by Terrence Malick and photographed by Nestor Almendros, is released in the USA. It stars Richard Gere and Brooke Adams. 1978 The film The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, directed by Fred Schepisi, is released in Australia. It stars Tommy Lewis. 1978 The film The Deer Hunter, directed by Michael Cimino, is released in the

USA. A harrowing account of the impact of the Vietnam War on a small Pennsylvanian community, it features an all-star cast including Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, and Meryl Streep. 1978 The horror film Halloween, directed by John Carpenter, is released in the USA. It stars Donald Pleasance and Jamie Lee Curtis. 1978 The musical Evita, with text by Tim Rice and music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, receives its first performance, at the Prince Edward Theatre, in London, England. The song 'Don't Cry for Me Argentina' becomes well known. 1978 The musical film Grease is filmed in the USA by Randal Kleiser, based on the stage musical and starring John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John. It spawns the best-selling singles 'You're The One That I Want' and 'Summer Nights'. 1978 The play Buried Child, by the US writer Sam Shepard, is first performed, at the Theater de Lys in New York City. 1978 The play Plenty, by the English writer David Hare, is first performed, at the National Theatre in London, England. 1978 The Polish-American poet Czeslaw Milosz publishes his poetry collection Bells in Winter. 1978 The Pregnancy Discrimination Act is passed in the USA, protecting women from being denied employment because of pregnancy. 1978 The queen's sister Princess Margaret obtains a divorce from her husband, the Earl of Snowdon, in the UK. 1978 The US company DEC introduces the VAX (virtual address extension) computer; able to run very large programmes, it becomes an industry standard for scientific and technical applications. 1978 The US pop group Village People releases the singles 'YMCA' and 'In the Navy', which the US Navy considers adopting until it becomes aware of the band's homosexual associations. 1978 US computer programmer John Barnaby develops the word processing program 'Wordstar'; it becomes the most popular word processor in the early 1980s. 1978 US philosopher Nelson Goodman publishes Ways of Worldmaking. 7 January 1979 Vietnamese troops and Cambodian rebels capture the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, and oust the Khmer Rouge regime. 16 January 1979 The shah of Iran and his family flee to Egypt, driven into exile

by supporters of the Shiite Muslim leader Ayatollah Khomeini. 31 January 1979 Giulio Andreotti's government resigns in Italy, ending the 'historic compromise' between Christian Democrats and communists. January 1979 Coca-Cola is marketed for the first time in the People's Republic of China. 2 February 1979 Sid Vicious (born John Simon Ritchie), British punk rocker who played with the Sex Pistols, dies of a drug overdose in New York City (22). 22 February 1979 St Lucia, in the West Indies, gains its independence from Britain. 23 February–16 March 1979 North and South Yemen wage war; the former is supported by the USSR, the latter by the West. 13 March 1979 The European Monetary System (EMS) becomes operational. 15 March 1979 The Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) defence pact collapses when Turkey withdraws, following the withdrawal of Iran and Pakistan on 12 March. 29 March 1979 Radioactive material escapes from the nuclear power station at Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania, when the reactor overheats. Fearing a meltdown and the release of radioactive caesium, 144,000 people are evacuated from the immediate area. The accident halts the growing trend towards reliance on nuclear energy in the USA; 11 orders for new reactors are immediately cancelled, with more cancelled the following year. 1 April 1979 Following a referendum, Iran is declared an Islamic Republic by the Shiite Muslim leader Ayatollah Khomeini. 4 April 1979 The 1978 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Jon Voight, for Coming Home; Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Walken, for The Deer Hunter; Best Actress: Jane Fonda, for Coming Home; Best Supporting Actress: Maggie Smith, for California Suite; Best Film: The Deer Hunter, directed by Michael Cimino; Best Director: Michael Cimino, for The Deer Hunter. 11 April 1979 The Ugandan capital, Kampala, falls to Tanzanian and rebel forces and the president, Idi Amin, flees the country. 13 April 1979 Yusufu Lule succeeds Idi Amin as president of Uganda. 4 May 1979 The British Conservative leader Margaret Thatcher becomes Britain's first woman prime minister. 3 June 1979 Pemex Oil's offshore oil-well Ixtoc 1 blows up, releasing an

estimated 3 million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. The largest oil spill ever recorded, the slick spreads 965 km/600 mi to Texas, contaminating Gulf fisheries and beaches. The well defies capping efforts and it continues to disgorge oil until 24 March 1980. 4 June 1979 Fred Akuffo is deposed as president of Ghana in a military coup led by Flight-Lt Jerry Rawlings. 4 June 1979 President B J Vorster of South Africa resigns after the final Erasmus Report shows that he knew about illegal activities at the Information Department under Connie Mulder. 11 June 1979 John Wayne, US film actor who usually starred in Westerns and war films, dies in Los Angeles, California (72). 15–18 June 1979 A summit meeting in Vienna, Austria, between the US and Soviet presidents Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev ends with the signing of the SALT II treaty limiting nuclear weapons between the two countries. 1 July 1979 Akio Morita, chairman of the Japanese company Sony, launches the Walkman, a small portable, personal tape recorder at a price of $165; he is reputed to have invented the product because his own children were fond of loud music. 11 July 1979 The Gilbert Islands, in the Pacific, gain their independence from Britain with the new name Kiribati. 16 July 1979 Saddam Hussein becomes president of Iraq. 19 July 1979 Left-wing Sandinista rebels take the Nicaraguan capital, Managua, and set up a new government. 22 July 1979 The Spanish golfer Severiano Ballesteros wins the British Open at Royal Lytham St Anne's, becoming the first golfer from continental Europe to win the championship since Arnaud Massy of France in 1907. July 1979 The US space station Skylab 1 falls back to Earth after travelling 140 million km/87 million mi in orbit since 1973. 6 September 1979 Thirty thousand refugee 'boat people' from Vietnam are allowed to settle in the USA. 20 September 1979 The former president of the Central African Empire (now Central African Republic) David Dacko overthrows his uncle, Emperor Jean-Bédel Bokassa, and the country reverts to republic status. 23 September 1979 A rally protesting against nuclear weapons draws 200,000 people to Central Park in New York City.

September 1979 Lee Elder becomes the first black American professional golfer to represent the USA in the Ryder Cup. 27 October 1979 St Vincent and the Grenadines, in the West Indies, gain their independence from Britain. October 1979 A civilian government takes power in Nigeria after 13 years of military rule. 4 November 1979 Iranian students seize the US embassy in Tehran, taking 63 US citizens and 40 others hostage. They demand the return of the Shah from the USA for trial. 3 December 1979 At a concert given by the British pop group The Who in Cincinnati, Ohio, 11 people are crushed to death and 28 injured. 4 December 1979 The European Space Agency's first Ariane rocket is launched from the Guiana Space Centre in Kourou, French Guiana; it is designed to deploy satellites into orbit. 10 December 1979 The rebel parliament in Zimbabwe Rhodesia concludes, ending Rhodesia's unilateral declaration of independence (UDI). 15 December 1979 The British progressive rock group Pink Floyd releases the concept album The Wall. A film is later made by the British director Alan Parker, starring Bob Geldof. 15 December 1979 The Canadian journalists Chris Haney and Scott Abbott invent the board game Trivial Pursuit; after initial commercial reluctance, a breakthrough comes when they sign a deal in 1982 with Selchow & Richter, the developers of Scrabble. This earns them an estimated $200 million. 21 December 1979 The Lancaster House Agreement is signed in London, England, providing for an end to the civil war in Rhodesia and the introduction of majority rule. The new state of Zimbabwe becomes independent in April 1980. 25 December 1979 Soviet troops invade Afghanistan in a bid to halt the civil war and protect Soviet interests. 27 December 1979 President Hafizullah Amin of Afghanistan is killed in a coup d'état and replaced by the communist leader Babrak Karmal. 1979 As a reaction against the ubiquitous disco music, rap is created by urban black musicians. 1979 Digital recording starts, with Stephen Stills the first artist to be recorded digitally.

1979 French anthropologist François Lévèque discovers a badly crushed Neanderthal skeleton near the village of Saint-Césaire in France. Dated at about 35,000 years old, it is one of the latest Neanderthals known and is of special interest because it is found with tools previously assumed to belong to the CroMagnon culture. 1979 French philosopher Jean-François Lyotard publishes The Postmodern Condition. 1979 New laws in Pakistan called the Hadood Ordinances ban women's testimony in serious criminal trials and require four adult males as witnesses to prove rape charges. If the accused is not convicted, under the Qazf Ordinance a woman may receive 80 lashes for false testimony. 1979 Of women over 64 in Canada, almost 60% live at or below the poverty level. 1979 Oil prices double under the impact of the Iranian revolution. 1979 Philips/MCA launches the LaserVision video disk system in the USA. 1979 Record companies introduce innovative marketing techniques to boost sales of singles, such as the limited edition 12-inch coloured vinyl disc. 1979 The 3M Corporation of St Paul, Minnesota, launches Post-It notes; the special adhesive which allows the notes to stick temporarily and without marking was invented by accident. 1979 The British House of Lords has 51 women out of 1,107 members, and the House of Commons has 19 women out of 635 members. 1979 The Czech writer Milan Kundera publishes his work The Book of Laughter and Forgetting in Paris, France. Kundera is stripped of his citizenship by the Czech government in his absence, for his support of liberalization. 1979 The Danish parliament has 49 women out of 179 members. 1979 The Dutch company Philips and the Japanese company Sony work collaboratively to develop the compact disc (CD); tiny pits on the plastic are read by laser to reproduce sound or other information. CDs are first marketed in 1982. 1979 The Egyptian feminist Nawal El Saadawi publishes The Hidden Face of Eve: Women in the Arab World, which reveals female genital mutilation and discusses the traditional emphasis on virginity and family honour. 1979 The film Alien, directed by English film-maker Ridley Scott, is released in the USA. It stars Sigourney Weaver.

1979 The film Apocalypse Now, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, is released in the USA. Based on Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, it stars Martin Sheen, Marlon Brando, and Robert Duvall. 1979 The film Die Blechtrommel/The Tin Drum, directed by Volker Schlöndorff, is released in West Germany. Based on the novel by Günter Grass, it stars David Bennent. 1979 The film Kramer vs Kramer, directed by Robert Benton, is released in the USA. It stars Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep. 1979 The film Manhattan, co-written, directed by, and starring Woody Allen, is released in the USA. Diane Keaton, Michael Murphy, Meryl Streep, and Mariel Hemingway co-star. 1979 The film Monty Python's Life of Brian, directed by Terry Jones, is released in the UK and the USA. It stars the Monty Python team Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin. In the USA, criticism from religious quarters causes the film to be withdrawn. This leads to further unrest, as citizen groups protest that the move constitutes censorship. 1979 The first spreadsheet program for personal computers, VisiCalc, leads to the expansion in business use of PCs. 1979 The General Synod of the Church of England refuses to allow female priests ordained abroad to celebrate holy communion. 1979 The Ideal Toy Co. in New York City begins manufacturing the Rubik cube, invented by a Hungarian lecturer in architectural design Professor Erno Rubik. 1979 The Irish writer Seamus Heaney publishes his Field Work. 1979 The Italian writer Italo Calvino publishes Se una notte d'inverno un viaggiatore/If on a Winter's Night a Traveller. 1979 The play Amadeus, by the English writer Peter Shaffer, is first performed, at the Olivier Theatre in London, England, directed by Peter Hall. It is based on the life of the composer Mozart. 1979 The South African novelist André Brink publishes his novel A Dry White Season. 1979 The South African writer Nadine Gordimer publishes her novel Burger's Daughter. 1979 The Trinidadian writer V S Naipaul publishes his novel A Bend in the River. 1979 The US artist Judy Chicago completes the book The Dinner Party, one of

the leading expressions of feminist art. 1979 The US philosopher Richard Rorty publishes Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. 1979 The US sports goods company Nike introduces the first air-cushioned trainer, the Nike Tailwind; the technology for the product was developed from aerospace research into lunar landings. 1979 The US writer Bernard Malamud publishes his novel Dubin's Lives. 1979 The US writer Norman Mailer publishes his 'non-fiction' novel The Executioner's Song, based on the execution of the murderer Gary Gilmore. 1979 The US writer Peter Matthiessen publishes The Snow Leopard, describing his travels through Nepal. It is awarded a National Book Award. 1979 The US writer Philip Roth publishes his novel The Ghost Writer. 1979 The US writer Tobias Wolff publishes his collection of short stories In the Garden of the North American Martyrs. 1979 The women's movement is launched in Japan to campaign for equal women's rights to government housing, bank loans, benefits, and tax reductions. 1979 The Xerox Corporation introduces the Ethernet, an office communications network. 1979 There are now 150 million television sets in the USA. 1979 US historian Christopher Lasch publishes The Culture of Narcissism. 1979 US law student Ted Bundy is convicted on several charges, including the murder of a 12-year-old girl, but he is believed to have killed at least 36 females, both adult and children. Bundy is sentenced to death, with the sentence being carried out in 1989. 1979 US sports-equipment distributor Paul Fireman obtains the US licence to manufacture British Reebok training shoes. Reebok will go on to challenge Nike's market lead. 1979 Woman march in protest in Teheran, Iran, against Ayatollah Khomeini's legislation that impinges on women's rights and obliges them to wear the chador, a heavy veil over the face, in public. 3 January 1980 The Congress (I) Party, led by Indira Gandhi, wins a sweeping victory in the Indian general election.

11 March 1980 Robert Mugabe, leader of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), forms a coalition government in Zimbabwe Rhodesia, with Joshua Nkomo, leader of the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), as minister of home affairs. 31 March 1980 A Basque regional parliament opens in Guernica, northern Spain. 31 March 1980 Jesse Owens, black US track and field athlete who won four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, dies in Phoenix, Arizona (66). 7 April 1980 The USA bans trade with Iran, breaks off relations, and expels Iranian diplomats in the face of the continuing hostage crisis. 14 April 1980 The 1979 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Dustin Hoffman, for Kramer vs Kramer; Best Supporting Actor: Melvyn Douglas, for Being There; Best Actress: Sally Field, for Norma Rae; Best Supporting Actress: Meryl Streep, for Kramer vs Kramer; Best Film: Kramer vs Kramer, directed by Robert Benton; Best Director: Robert Benton, for Kramer vs Kramer. 15 April 1980 Jean-Paul Sartre, French existentialist philosopher, novelist, and playwright, dies in Paris, France (74). 18 April 1980 Zimbabwe Rhodesia gains its independence from Britain, and is renamed 'Zimbabwe'. Its first president is the Reverend Canaan Banana. 25 April 1980 A US commando mission to rescue US hostages in Iran fails with the loss of eight lives. 29 April 1980 Alfred Hitchcock, English film director best known for his films of suspense, dies in Bel Air, California (80). 4 May 1980 Josip Broz Tito, Yugoslavian communist leader from 1943, elected president 1953–80, dies in Ljubljana, Yugoslavia (87). 5 May 1980 Britain's Special Air Service (SAS) storms the Iranian embassy in London, England, retaking it from the terrorists who seized the building on 30 April. 18 May 1980 Mount St Helens volcano in Washington state, USA, erupts explosively in a blast 500 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb, causing an outbreak of fires, mudslides, and floods; 57 people die in the largest eruption in US history. Ash from the volcano blankets the surrounding area and effects global temperature readings for months to come. 1 June 1980 US entrepreneur Ted Turner launches the Cable News Network (CNN), the first 24-hour network in the world to focus solely on news. 7 June 1980 Henry Miller, US novelist, dies in Pacific Palisades, California (88).

5 July 1980 The Swedish tennis player Björn Borg wins his fifth consecutive men's singles title at the Wimbledon championships in London, England. 19 July 1980 The 22nd Olympic Games open in Moscow, USSR. Following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, the games are boycotted by 65 countries, most notably the USA, West Germany, Japan, and Kenya. 27 July 1980 The inauguration of Fernando Belaúnde Terry as president of Peru ends 12 years of military rule. 30 July 1980 The New Hebrides, in the Pacific, become independent from Britain and France within the Commonwealth as Vanuatu. 5 August 1980 The Belgian parliament passes a bill dividing the country into three autonomous linguistic regions. 20 August 1980 Reinhold Messner of Italy completes the first entirely solo ascent of Mount Everest, the world's highest mountain. 31 August 1980 Lech Walesa, leader of the Gdansk shipyard strikers, signs an agreement with the Polish government allowing the formation of independent trade unions and granting the release of political prisoners. 27 October–18 December 1980 Seven Irish Republican Army (IRA) prisoners in the Maze prison near Belfast, Northern Ireland, go on hunger strike in their demand for 'political status'. 4 November 1980 In the US presidential election, the Republican candidate Ronald Reagan wins a sweeping victory over President Jimmy Carter, with 489 electoral votes against Carter's 49. The Republicans win control of the Senate and gain 33 seats in the House of Representatives. 21 November 1980 Dallas breaks existing television rating records when more than half the population of the USA watches the episode Who Shot JR?. December 1980 John Lennon, English pop singer and songwriter, former member of the Beatles, is shot dead by Mark David Chapman outside the Dakota, his apartment building in New York City (40). 1980 A stage version of Charles Dickens's novel Nicholas Nickleby, adapted for stage by David Edgar, is first performed, at the Aldwych Theatre in London, England. The play runs for over eight hours. 1980 A thin layer of iridium-rich clay, about 65 million years old, is found around the world. US physicist Luis Walter Alvarez suggests that it was caused by the impact of a large asteroid or comet which threw enough dust into the sky to obscure the Sun and cause the extinction of the dinosaurs.

1980 Canadian ice-hockey player Scott Olsen and his brother create rollerblades, high-speed roller-skates, and found Rollerblade Inc in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to manufacture them. 1980 Digitally recorded LP records are widely marketed for the first time. 1980 Divorce rates (divorces per 1,000 of the population): France, 1.50; Germany, 2.68; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 3.08; USA, 5.19; USSR, 3.50. 1980 Mathematicians worldwide complete the classification of all finite and simple groups, a task that has taken over 100 mathematicians more than 35 years to complete. The results take up more than 14,000 pages in mathematical journals. 1980 Over 18% of births in the USA are to unmarried mothers; over 40% of births are to women under 20. 1980 Over 1.5 million abortions are performed in the USA; there are 3 million illegal abortions in Brazil and 280,000 in Colombia; in Egypt, a quarter of all pregnancies are aborted. 1980 Populations (in millions): Tokyo, Japan, 11.6; Shanghai, China, 10.0; Buenos Aires, Argentina 9.7; Mexico City, Mexico 8.9; Beijing, China 8.7; Seoul, South Korea 8.4; Cairo, Egypt 8.1; Moscow, USSR 8.0; New York, USA 7.1; Tientsin, China 7.0. 1980 The English writer William Golding publishes his novel Rites of Passage, which wins the Booker Prize. 1980 The film Le Dernier Métro/The Last Metro is released in France. It is directed by François Truffaut and stars Catherine Deneuve and Gérard Depardieu. 1980 The film Raging Bull, directed by Martin Scorsese, is released in the USA. It stars Robert De Niro. 1980 The film The Blues Brothers, directed by John Landis, is released in the USA. It stars John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, and features music personalities such as Aretha Franklin, James Brown, and Ray Charles. 1980 The film The Empire Strikes Back, directed by Irvin Kershner, is released in the USA. The second instalment in the original Star Wars trilogy, it stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher. 1980 The German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen completes his opera Donnerstag aus Licht/Thursday from Light. This is the first part of a seven-opera cycle. 1980 The Italian writer and scholar Umberto Eco publishes his novel Il nome

della rosa/The Name of the Rose. Though littered with scholarly allusions and Latin quotations, the novel – a detective story set in the Middle Ages – is an unexpected best-seller. 1980 The musical Les Misérables, with lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer and Alain Boubil, and music by Claude-Michel Schönberg, is first performed, at the Palais des Sports in Paris, France. Its first English performance will be in 1985 in London, England. 1980 The New Romantic look, inspired by glam rock, starts to appear, sported by bands such as Spandau Ballet and Duran Duran. 1980 The population of the world is 4.45 billion. 1980 The population of the USA is 226.5 million compared to 76 million in 1900. 1980 The Russian writer Joseph Brodsky publishes his poetry collection A Part of Speech. 1980 The US composer John Cage completes his vocal work Roaratorio, an Irish Circus on Finnegan's Wake. 1980 The US journalist Tom Wolfe publishes The Right Stuff, a fictionalized history of the US space programme. 1980 The US photographer Cindy Sherman publishes her photograph Untitled no 66. 1980 The US photographer Robert Mapplethorpe publishes his photograph Ajitto. 1980 Women in Iraq earn the right to vote and hold office. c. 1980 The USA begins to manufacture cruise missiles with a speed of about 885 kph/550 mph, and an extremely accurate navigational system (Tercom) that uses contour maps stored in its computerized memory; they fly low to the ground to escape detection by radar. 1 January 1981 Greece becomes the 10th member of the European Community. 12 January 1981–11 May 1989 Dynasty, a soap opera about the lives of a Colorado oil family, is shown on US television. Stars include John Forsythe, Linda Evans, and Joan Collins, and there are cameo appearances from former US president Gerald Ford and former secretary of state Henry Kissinger. 20 January 1981 Iran releases all 52 US hostages, held since November 4, 1979, after an agreement is signed in Algiers releasing Iranian financial assets in the USA.

25 January 1981 A show trial in Beijing, China convicts the 'Gang of Four' prominent former political leaders of treason. Jiang Qing, widow of Chairman Mao Zedong, receives a suspended death sentence. 3 February 1981 Labour politician Gro Harlem Brundtland becomes the first woman prime minister of Norway. 23 February 1981 Two hundred Civil Guards storm the Spanish parliament and hold members at gunpoint in an attempted coup. The Guards surrender after King Juan Carlos denounces the coup on February 24. 30 March 1981 John Hinckley attempts to assassinate US president Ronald Reagan; he wounds the president and press secretary James Brady. 31 March 1981 The 1980 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Robert De Niro, for Raging Bull; Best Supporting Actor: Timothy Hutton, for Ordinary People; Best Actress: Sissy Spacek, for Coal Miner's Daughter; Best Supporting Actress: Mary Steenburgen, for Melvin and Howard; Best Film: Ordinary People, directed by Robert Redford; Best Director: Robert Redford, for Ordinary People. 7 April 1981 A referendum in the Philippines grants sweeping new powers to President Ferdinand Marcos. 12 April 1981 Joe Louis, US world heavyweight champion boxer 1937–49, dies in Las Vegas, Nevada (66). 12–14 April 1981 The US reusable space shuttle, using the orbiter Columbia, makes its first flight (second shuttle flight 12–14 November). It is also the first landing of a US spacecraft on land. 30 April 1981 The Central Committee of the Polish Communist Party approves a programme of moderate economic and political reforms. April 1981 The Austrian conductor Herbert von Karajan demonstrates the first compact discs, developed by the Dutch company Philips, at the Salzburg Festival, in Austria. 5 May 1981 Riots break out in Northern Ireland following the death of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) hunger striker and successful parliamentary candidate Bobby Sands in the Maze prison. 10 May 1981 François Mitterrand becomes the first Socialist president of France, winning 51.7% of the vote to Valéry Giscard d'Estaing's 48.3%. 13 May 1981 A Turkish gunman, Mehmet Ali Agca, seriously wounds Pope John Paul II in an assassination attempt in St Peter's Square, Rome. He is jailed for life on 22 July.

17 July 1981 Israeli military aircraft attack Palestinian areas of Beirut. Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization agree a ceasefire on 29 July after two weeks of fighting in southern Lebanon. 29 July 1981 Charles, Prince of Wales, marries Lady Diana Spencer in St Paul's Cathedral in London, England. Television coverage attracts 39 million people, the largest British audience to date. 1 August 1981 With a target audience aged 12–34, and an estimated 2.5 million subscribers, the MTV (music television) channel is launched, with the video of the Buggles' single 'Video Killed the Radio Star'. 3–5 August 1981 The Solidarity trade union movement blockades Warsaw city centre in Poland in protest at food shortages. 12 August 1981 IBM launches its personal computer, using the Microsoft diskoperating system (MS-DOS). 19–28 August 1981 In nine days the English runners Steve Ovett and Sebastian Coe establish three new world records for the mile; the record is cut by over 1 second to 3 min 47.53 sec. Coe runs 3 min 48.53 sec in Zürich, Switzerland. Ovett then runs 3 min 48.40 sec in Koblenz, West Germany, before Coe regains the record with a run of 3 min 47.33 sec in Brussels, Belgium. 19 September 1981 A free concert by the reunited Simon and Garfunkel in Central Park, New York City, is attended by 400,000 people. 21 September 1981 Belize becomes an independent state within the Commonwealth. 22 September 1981 French railways introduce the TGV (train à grande vitesse, 'high-speed train'); electrically powered and capable of cruising at 290 kph/180 mph, it is Europe's first super high speed passenger train. Later in the year achieves a record speed of 380 kph/236 mph. 3 October 1981 The Irish Republican Army (IRA) hunger strike at the Maze prison in Northern Ireland ends after seven months and 10 deaths. 18 October 1981 Andreas Papandreou's Panhellenic Socialist Movement (Pasok) wins the Greek general election and, on October 21, he forms Greece's first Socialist government. 1 November 1981 The Caribbean islands of Antigua and Barbuda become independent states within the Commonwealth. 6 November 1981 The British prime minister Margaret Thatcher and the Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) Garret FitzGerald agree to establish an Anglo-Irish intergovernmental Council. Protest strikes break out in Northern Ireland on

November 23. 12 November 1981 The General Synod of the Church of England votes to recognize the sacraments of the Free Churches and their women ministers and to allow women to be ordained as deacons. 13 December 1981 Martial law is imposed in Poland, leading to mass detentions and imposing curbs on civil liberties and trade union activities. 14 December 1981 Israel formally annexes the Golan Heights, taken from Syria in the 1967 Yom Kippur War. 29 December 1981 Responding to perceived Soviet political pressure on Poland to adopt martial law, President Ronald Reagan introduces US economic sanctions against the USSR. 1981 Jane Fonda's Workout Book, a diet and exercise programme, is a best-seller in the USA. The increasing interest in fitness spawns a whole get-fit book and video market. 1981 Divorce becomes legal in Spain. 1981 Divorces in the USA reach their highest to date at 1,210,000 this year. 1981 English philosopher R M Hare publishes Moral Thinking. 1981 German social scientist Jürgen Habermas publishes Theorie des kommunikatives Handelns/The Theory of Communicative Action. 1981 It is estimated that the average woman in India has eight pregnancies in her lifetime; 3.5 million Indian women are sterilized each year. 1981 Populations (in millions): China, 991.3; India, 690.2; USSR, 268.0; USA, 229.8; Indonesia, 149.5; Brazil, 120.5; Japan, 117.6; Bangladesh, 90.7; Nigeria, 87.6; Pakistan, 84.5; Mexico, 71.2; West Germany, 61.7; Italy, 56.2; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 56.0; France, 54.0. 1981 Strict population controls in China that limit families to one child lead to an increase in female infanticide. 1981 The electronics company Commodore launch the VIC-20, which will become the first microcomputer to sell over 1 million units. 1981 The English novelist Martin Amis publishes his novel Other People. 1981 The film Chariots of Fire, directed by Hugh Hudson, is released in the UK. It stars Ian Charleson and Ben Cross.

1981 The film Das Boot/The Boat, directed by Wolfgang Petersen, is released in West Germany. It stars Jürgen Prochnow. 1981 The film Mephisto, directed by István Szabó, is released in Hungary. It stars Klaus Maria Brandauer. 1981 The first working high-definition television (HDTV) is demonstrated in Japan. 1981 The German-born English artist Lucian Freud paints Naked Girl with Dog. 1981 The IBM personal computer is introduced. 1981 The Indian-born English writer Salman Rushdie publishes his novel Midnight's Children, which wins the Booker Prize. 1981 The musical Cats is first performed, in London, England. Written by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber, it is based on T S Eliot's book of poems for children Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats . One of its best-known songs is 'Memories'. 1981 The Russian composer Alfred Schnittke completes his Symphony No. 3. 1981 The US artist Eric Fischl paints Bad Boy. 1981 The US artist Richard Serra completes his sculpture Tilted Arc, which is set up in Foley Square, New York City. 1981 The US artist Sherrie Levine publishes her photograph After Walker Evans: 7. 1981 The US Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia, first conclusively identifies AIDS; doctors realize that they have previously seen similar cases among drug users and homosexuals. 1981 The US writer Raymond Carver publishes his short-story collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. 1981 The Very Large Array (VLA) radio telescope at Socorro, New Mexico, enters service. Its 27 25-m/82-ft diameter dishes can be steered and moved on railway tracks, and are equivalent to one dish 27 km/17 mi in diameter; together they provide high-resolution radio images. 1981 The world population stands at 4.5 billion, up 2 billion since 1950. 1981 Two Indonesian women are jailed for lesbian acts; one is subjected to surgical and medical treatment designed to 'cure' her. In Iran, lesbians are subject to execution after three warnings.

1981 US feminist Andrea Dworkin publishes Pornography. 1981 US geneticists J W Gordon and F H Ruddle of the University of Ohio inject genes from one animal into the fertilized egg of a mouse that develop into mice with the foreign gene in many of the cells; the gene is then passed on to their offspring creating permanently altered (transgenic) animals; it is the first transfer of a gene from one animal species to another. 1981 US pilot Stephen Ptacek crosses the English Channel from Paris, France, to Manston, Kent, England (368 km /180 mi), at a height of 3,353 m/11,000 ft, in 5.5 hrs in Solar Challenger, the first solar-powered aircraft; it uses 16,000 solar cells. 1981 Women in the USA spend 30.5 hours a week doing housework; men spend 14. 1981 Women's pay as a percentage of men's pay: Denmark, 84.5%; New Zealand, 75%; Finland, 61%; West Germany, 72.5%; UK, 69.5%; Italy, 85%; USA, 59%. 8 January 1982 Spain agrees to end its 12-year blockade of the British Crown colony Gibraltar, but the frontier is not opened until December 15. 16 January 1982 Britain and the Vatican resume full diplomatic relations after a break of over 400 years. 26 February 1982 The National Academy of Sciences notes widespread use of marijuana in the USA and warns of its harmful effects. 19 March 1982 Fifteen England cricketers led by Graham Gooch are banned from Test cricket for three years for participating in a cricket tour of South Africa, breaking an international ban on sporting links with that country because of its policy of apartheid. 29 March 1982 The 1981 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Henry Fonda, for On Golden Pond; Best Supporting Actor: John Gielgud, for Arthur; Best Actress: Katharine Hepburn, for On Golden Pond; Best Supporting Actress: Maureen Stapleton, for Reds; Best Film: Chariots of Fire, directed by Hugh Hudson; Best Director: Warren Beatty, for Reds. 2 April 1982 Argentina invades and occupies the British-held Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic. Britain breaks diplomatic relations with Argentina. 17 April 1982 Repatriation of the Canadian constitution (its removal from British law to place it entirely under Canadian control) breaks Canada's last link with the British government. 25 April 1982 British commandos recapture South Georgia from the small Argentine force occupying the island.

2 May 1982 The British submarine HMS Conqueror sinks the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano off the Falkland Islands, killing 368 officers and crew members. 28 May 1982 British troops recapture Port Darwin and Goose Green in the Falkland Islands, taking 1,400 Argentine prisoners. 5 June 1982 Israeli armed forces invade Lebanon. On June 6 Israeli and Syrian forces clash in southern Lebanon, and the United Nations Security Council calls for a halt to the fighting. 7 June 1982 Elvis Presley's home Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee, opens to the public. 12 June 1982 Approximately 550,000 protesters against nuclear arms march though New York City. 14 June 1982 Argentine forces surrender at Port Stanley, ending the Falklands War, in which 255 Britons and 652 Argentines have died. 21 June 1982 Prince William of Wales, son of Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, and second in line to the British throne, born in London, England. 11 July 1982 Argentina recognizes a de facto cessation of hostilities with Britain in the South Atlantic, and the following day the British government declares an end to hostilities. 19 August 1982 The Israeli cabinet accepts a US plan to evacuate Palestine Liberation Organization guerrillas and Syrian troops from Beirut. The first convoys of guerrillas leave for Cyprus on 21 August, and Yassir Arafat leaves for Tunisia on August 30. 4 September 1982 Douglas Bader, British pilot who lost both legs in a flying accident, and went on to become an ace pilot in World War II, dies in London, England (72). 14 September 1982 The president-elect of Lebanon, Bashir Gemayel, is killed in a Beirut bomb explosion. His brother Amin is sworn in as president on September 23. 17 September 1982 The West German Social Democrat–Free Democrat government collapses following the withdrawal of Free Democrat ministers. On October 1, a new Christian Democrat–Free Democrat government is formed under Christian Democrat Leader Helmut Kohl. 18 September 1982 Over 800 Palestinians are killed after Christian Phalangist militiamen enter the West Beirut refugee camps Sabra and Chatila. On September 25 there are protests in Israel over the massacre, and on September

28 the Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin agrees to an independent board of inquiry. 29 September–1 October 1982 Seven Americans die when cyanide is placed in bottles of Tylenol. The makers of the drug, Johnson and Johnson, recall 264,000 bottles, and new tamper-proof packaging for pharmaceuticals and other products is developed. 30 September 1982 Cheers, a popular situation comedy about several characters who hang out in a bar in Boston, is shown on US television. 8 October 1982 Poland's communist-controlled parliament bans the Solidarity union and forbids the setting up of new trade unions. 13 October 1982 The International Olympic Comittee posthumously restores the two gold medals won by US athlete Jim Thorpe at the 1912 Olympic Games but forfeited a year later when it was discovered that he had once played professional minor league baseball. 30 October 1982 A new Portuguese constitution comes into force, ending military influence in government. October 1982 Japanese company Sony launches the first compact disc (CD) players in Japan, working with Philips, the Dutch manufacturer of the compact disc. 10 November 1982 Leonid Brezhnev, Soviet statesman, First Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party 1964–82, dies in Moscow, USSR (75). 16 November 1982 Sino-Soviet talks open in Moscow, the first since 1969. 2 December 1982 At the University of Utah Medical Center an artificial heart, designed by Robert Jarvik, is implanted into heart patient Barney Clark who lives for 112 days. 12 December 1982 More than 20,000 women encircle the Greenham Common air base in England in protest against the proposed siting of US cruise missiles there. 19 December 1982 Poland's Council of State announces the suspension of martial law, effective from 31 December. 25 December 1982 Michael Jackson's Thriller confirms his status as a pop icon. Within ten years, 40 million copies will have been sold, making it the best-selling album of all time. 1982 In the second half of 1982, unemployment in the USA reaches its highest level since the recession of the 1930s, with 12 million out of work, representing a rate of 10.4%.

1982 Japanese car manufacturers control 22.6% of the market in the USA, compared to 3.7% in 1970. 1982 Kodak launches the digital camera and digital film. 1982 Liposuction becomes available in the USA. 1982 Mexico defaults on a loan payment, leading to general concern about the ability of countries in the developing world to meet their international debts, and about the consequences of defaults for lending nations. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) intervenes with debt rescheduling and imposes austerity measures on debtor countries. 1982 Sony launches the first pocket television set, the Sony Flat TV, in Japan, with a screen size of 5 cm/2 in. It costs $239. 1982 The Chinese writer Zhang Jie publishes her novella Ark, widely seen as the first genuinely feminist work to come from modern China. 1982 The Coca-Cola Company launches Diet Coke. 1982 The film Blade Runner, directed by the English film-maker Ridley Scott, is released in the USA. Based on Philip K Dick's science fiction novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, it stars Harrison Ford and Rutger Hauer. A 'director's cut' of the film is released in 1993. 1982 The film ET: The Extraterrestrial, directed by Steven Spielberg, is released in the USA. It stars child actors Henry Thomas and Drew Barrymore. 1982 The film Fanny och Alexander/Fanny and Alexander, written and directed by Ingmar Bergman, is released in Sweden. Edited from a television series, it stars Pernilla Allwin and Bertil Guve. 1982 The film Fitzcarraldo, directed by German film-maker Werner Herzog, is released in the USA. It stars Klaus Kinski and Claudia Cardinale. 1982 The film The King of Comedy, directed by Martin Scorsese, is released in the USA. It stars Robert De Niro and Jerry Lewis. 1982 The film Tootsie, directed by Syndey Pollack, is released in the USA. It stars Dustin Hoffman and Jessica Lange. 1982 The Indian–British co-production Gandhi, directed by Richard Attenborough, sets a world record for the largest number of extras. It stars Ben Kingsley, and wins eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor. 1982 The Irish writer Samuel Beckett publishes his novel Ill Seen, Ill Said.

1982 The population of China rises to over 1 billion. 1982 The Public Services Building in Portland, Oregon, designed by the US architect Michael Graves, is completed. It is quickly seen as a major work of postmodernist design. 1982 The US artist Jenny Holzer creates Times Square, in which a series of messages are flashed across a Spectacolour board in Times Square, New York City. The messages become known as Holzerisms and include 'Abuse of Power Comes as No Surprise' and 'A Little Knowledge Can Go a Long Way'. 1982 The US company Procter and Gamble launches Vizir, the first liquid detergent for washing machines. 1982 The US graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat holds eight one-man shows in the USA. 1982 The US pop singer Madonna is one of the first stars launched by the MTV music channel, highlighting her dancing and the quality of her video production, and she becomes a pop icon of the 1980s. 1982 The US wholefood enthusiast Gregory Sams develops the vegeburger, which contains sesame seeds, cereals, soya, and vegetables. 1982 The US writer Alice Walker publishes her novel The Color Purple. It wins the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1983. 1982 US company Intel introduces the 16-bit 80286 microprocessor; it has 130,000 transistors and runs at speeds up to 12 MHz. 1982 US firm Applied Biosystems markets an automated gene sequencer that can sequence 18,000 DNA bases a day, compared with a few hundred a year by hand in the 1970s. 1982 US philosopher Richard Rorty publishes The Consequences of Pragmatism. 1982 US researcher Stanley Prusiner discovers prions (proteinaceous infectious particles); they are responsible for several neurological diseases including 'mad cow disease' (first identified in 1986). 1982 Women as a percentage of the workforce: Spain, 29%; Sweden, 46%; China, 36%; East Germany, 50%; UK, 42%; USA, 43%. 1982–1984 Civil war and drought cause a major famine in Ethiopia; at least 800,000 people die and 1.5 million flee the country before foreign grain is received the following year.

19 January 1983 South Africa reimposes direct rule on Namibia (South West Africa). 24 January 1983 Thirty-two Italian Red Brigade terrorists are jailed for the kidnap and murder of former premier Aldo Moro in 1978. 25 February 1983 Tennessee Williams (Thomas Lanier Williams), US dramatist, most of whose plays are set in the Deep South, dies in New York City (71). 6 March 1983 Chancellor Helmut Kohl's ruling Christian Democratic Union wins the general election in West Germany, with the Green Party gaining its first seats in the Bundestag. 23 March 1983 The US president Ronald Reagan proposes a 'Star Wars' defence system for the USA, using satellites to detect and destroy incoming missiles. 29 March 1983 The Tandy Corporation markets the first laptop computer in the USA. The TRS-80 Model 100 weighs less than 2 kg/4 lb and runs on 4 small batteries; prices range from $799 to $999. 11 April 1983 The 1982 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Ben Kingsley, for Gandhi; Best Supporting Actor: Lou Gosset, Jr, for An Officer and a Gentleman; Best Actress: Meryl Streep, for Sophie's Choice; Best Supporting Actress: Jessica Lange, for Tootsie; Best Film: Gandhi, directed by Richard Attenborough; Best Director: Richard Attenborough, for Gandhi. 24 April 1983 Bruno Kreisky's Socialist Party loses its majority in the Austrian general election. A new coalition government is formed under Chancellor Fred Sinowatz on 11 May. 30 April 1983 The English pop star and actor David Bowie releases the single 'Let's Dance', and an album of the same name. April 1983 US biochemist Kary Banks Mullis invents the polymerase chain reaction (PCR). This is a method of copying genes or known sections of a DNA molecule a million times without the need for a living cell. 9 June 1983 The Conservatives under Margaret Thatcher win an overall majority of 144 seats in the British general election, with 397 seats against Labour's 209 and the Liberal–SDP Alliance's 23. 13 June 1983 The US space probe Pioneer 10, launched 3 March 1972, becomes the first artificial object to leave the Solar System. 16 June 1983 Pope John Paul II begins an eight-day visit to Poland and has talks with Premier Wojciech Jaruzelski and Lech Walesa. On 19 June, the Polish government warns the church to stay out of politics.

18–24 June 1983 The US Challenger mission (launched 18 June) includes Sally Ride, the first US woman to go into space. 21 August 1983 The Philippines opposition leader Benigno Aquino is assassinated at Manila airport. 28 August 1983 The Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin announces his intention to resign. He is succeeded on 15 September by Yitzhak Shamir. August 1983 The multiracial United Democratic Front is formed under Allan Boesak in South Africa. Opposed to apartheid, it attracts 2 million members in affiliated clubs, societies, and churches. 1 September 1983 A South Korean Boeing 747 airliner is shot down by a Soviet fighter, killing 269 people, after straying into Soviet air space near Sakhalin Island. On 5 September, western European nations impose a 14-day ban on flights by the Soviet airline Aeroflot. 19 September 1983 The Caribbean islands of St Kitts and Nevis achieve independence from Britain. 19 September 1983 The final episode of the television series M*A*S*H receives by the largest audience for a nonsports programme to date, 125,000,000 viewers. 4 October 1983 British driver Richard Noble breaks the world one-mile land speed record in the Black Rock Desert, Nevada, in his Thrust 2 jet car, averaging a speed of 1,019.44 kph/633.468 mph over the required two runs. 6 October 1983 The Indian government takes over direct control of Punjab state in response to growing violence between the Sikh and Hindu communities there. 12 October 1983 The Chinese Communist Party commences the biggest purge of its membership since the Cultural Revolution. The qualifications of 40 million party members are to be reviewed. 23 October 1983 Attacks by suicide bombers kill 241 US and 58 French troops of the peacekeeping force in a military compound in Beirut, Lebanon. 25 October 1983 US marines invade Grenada to depose the new military government. On 28 October, the USA vetoes a United Nations (UN) resolution deploring the invasion. 2 November 1983 The US Congress votes to make the birthday of the black American civil-rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr, (15 January) a federal holiday from 1986. 23 November 1983 The USSR delegation walks out of the arms limitation talks in Geneva following the deployment of US missiles in Europe. The next day,

President Yuri Andropov announces that the USSR will increase the number of its submarine missiles targeted at the USA. 10 December 1983 Raúl Alfonsín is installed as president of Argentina, ending eight years of military rule. 20 December 1983 The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yassir Arafat is forced to evacuate his forces from Lebanon after talks between Lebanon and Israel. 1983 Car drivers in Chicago, Illinois, try out cellular phones when Motorola introduce a test system of low-power transmitters across the city. 1983 For the first time, cassettes outsell vinyl LPs in the USA. 1983 Illiteracy levels in selected countries (percentage of adult population): Afghanistan, 81.8; Angola, 59.0; Argentina, 6.1; Bangladesh, 70.8; Brazil, 22.2; China, 34.5; Egypt, 61.8; Ethiopia, 37.6; India, 59.2; Indonesia, 32.7; Iran, 45.2; Israel, 8.2; Malaysia, 30.4; Mexico, 17.0; Pakistan, 73.8; Peru, 18.1; Saudi Arabia, 48.9; Sri Lanka, 13.2; Sudan, 68.6; Tunisia, 49.3. 1983 In Switzerland, the Swatch timepiece is created. 1983 Palestinian-American critic Edward Said publishes The World, the Text, and the Critic. 1983 Showing very little change since 1977, 82% of the US population use a private vehicle to reach a destination, 2.2% use public transportation, and 8.5% walk. 1983 The AT&T (American Telephone and Telegraph) Building in New York City, designed by the US architects Philip Johnson and John Burgee, is completed. 1983 The Australian-born US media tycoon Rupert Murdoch purchases the Chicago Sun-Times for $90 million. 1983 The film The Return of the Jedi, directed by Richard Marquand, is released in the USA. The final instalment of the original Star Wars trilogy, it stars Mark Hamill, Harrison Ford, and Carrie Fisher. 1983 The French composer Olivier Messiaen completes his opera Saint François d'Assise/St Francis of Assissi. 1983 The German artist Jorg Immendorf paints Café Deutschland Hörerwunsch. 1983 The Indian novelist R K Narayan publishes his novel A Tiger for Malgudi. 1983 The musical La Cage aux Folles by Jerry Herman and Harvey Fierstein, is

first performed, at the Palace Theater in New York City. 1983 The opera Akhnaten by the US composer Philip Glass is first performed, in Stuttgart, Germany. 1983 The play Glengarry Glen Ross, by the US writer David Mamet is first performed, in London, England. 1983 The popularity of Cabbage Patch Dolls in the USA is so great that a black market emerges. Sales will peak in 1985 at about $600 million. 1983 The Russian artists Vitaly Komar and Aleksandr Melamid paint The Origin of Socialist Realism. 1983 The US Census Bureau reports the highest level of persons living in poverty in the USA in 18 years (35,300,000). 1983 The USA fails to win the America's Cup yacht race for the first time since the race series began in 1870; the winner is the Australian yacht Australia II skippered by John Bertrand, which defeats Liberty, skippered by Dennis Conner, by four races to three. 1983 US computer manufacturer Apple introduces the 'Lisa', the first computer to use a mouse and pull-down menus. 1983 US historian Daniel J Boorstin publishes The Discoverers. 1983 US medical researcher Robert Gallo at the US National Cancer Institute, Maryland, and French medical researcher Luc Montagnier at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, France, isolate the virus thought to cause AIDS; it becomes known as the HIV virus (human immunodeficiency virus). 1 January 1984 A supreme military council under General Mohammed Buhari assumes power in Nigeria. 1 January 1984 The sultanate of Brunei becomes independent after 95 years as a British protectorate. 14 January 1984 Ray Kroc, US restaurateur who founded the McDonald's fastfood hamburger restaurants, dies in San Diego, California (81). 17 January 1984 Home video-taping is ruled legal by the US Supreme Court. 6 February 1984 President Amin Gemayel of Lebanon orders a 24-hour curfew as Shiite Muslim and Druze militias overrun West Beirut. 7 February 1984 US president Ronald Reagan orders US marines to withdraw from Beirut. The last marines leave on 26 February.

11 February 1984 Iraq commences the bombing of non-military targets in Iran in a new escalation of the war between the two countries. 13 February 1984 Konstantin Chernenko is named first secretary of the Soviet Communist Party following the death of Yuri Andropov. 31 March 1984 The Indian government agrees to amend the Punjabi constitution to acknowledge Sikhism as a religion distinct from Hinduism. 5 April 1984 The US basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar of the Los Angeles Lakers becomes the leading scorer in National Basketball Association history when he overtakes US player Wilt Chamberlain's career total of 31,419 points. 9 April 1984 The 1983 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Robert Duvall, for Tender Mercies; Best Supporting Actor: Jack Nicholson, for Terms of Endearment; Best Actress: Shirley MacLaine, for Terms of Endearment; Best Supporting Actress: Linda Hunt, for The Year of Living Dangerously; Best Film: Terms of Endearment, directed by James L Brooks; Best Director: James L Brooks, for Terms of Endearment. 17 April 1984 Yvonne Fletcher, a policewoman in London, England, is killed and 11 others injured when gunmen fire on demonstrators outside the Libyan People's Bureau. On 22 April, Britain breaks diplomatic relations with Libya, and on 27 April the siege of the building ends. 24 May 1984 Iranian war planes attack oil tankers off the coast of Saudi Arabia, in an apparent effort to widen the Iran–Iraq war. On 27 May, the USA sends Stinger anti-aircraft missiles to Saudi Arabia in case of Iranian attack. 6 June 1984 Indian troops storm the Golden Temple complex at Amritsar in Punjab state, killing 250 Sikh extremists. On 11 June, Sikh soldiers mutiny at eight army bases in protest at the attack. 14 June 1984 The Southern Baptist Convention resolves to oppose the ordination of women. 23 June 1984 The US rock singer Bruce Springsteen releases the album Born in the USA. 25 June 1984 Michel Foucault, French philosopher, dies in Paris, France (57). 28 July 1984 The 23rd Olympic Games open in Los Angeles, California, and are boycotted by the Soviet bloc, with the exception of Romania, and by Iran and Libya, in retaliation for the US boycott of the Moscow Olympics in 1980. The People's Republic of China, however, competes for the first time. 3 August 1984 The Upper Volta head of state, Captain Thomas Sankara, renames his country Burkina Faso ('land of incorruptible people').

14 August 1984 J B Priestley, English novelist, playwright, and essayist, dies in Alveston, Warwickshire, England (89). 31 August 1984 Israel's Likud party leader Yitzhak Shamir and the Labour Party leader Shimon Peres agree to form a government of national unity and to alternate in the post of prime minister. 3 September 1984 Fourteen people die in rioting in Sharpeville and other black townships around Johannesburg, South Africa. Overnight, the death toll rises to 29. 4 September 1984 The Progressive Conservatives, led by Brian Mulroney, defeat John Turner's ruling Liberals in the Canadian general election. 7 September 1984 Father Leonardo Boff of Brazil, a leading Franciscan proponent of liberation theology, appears before the Doctrinal Office of the Vatican, accompanied by two Brazilian cardinals. His book The Church: Charisma and Danger is condemned by church authorities as dangerous. 14 September 1984 The South African prime minister, P W Botha, is sworn in as the country's first executive president. On 17 September, the first 19-member multiracial cabinet is sworn in. 20 September 1984 The Cosby Show, a situation comedy about a middle-class black family, begins on US television. It is the top-rated US television show during the 1980s. 26 September 1984 A draft agreement for the return of Hong Kong to China in 1997 is signed by British and Chinese representatives at a ceremony in Beijing. September 1984 Czech-born US tennis player Martina Navratilova wins the women's singles at the US Open tennis championships to become only the third woman after Maureen Connolly and Margaret Court to win six consecutive Grand Slam singles titles. 12 October 1984 An Irish Republican Army (IRA) bomb explodes at the Grand Hotel, in Brighton, England, during the Conservative Party conference, killing 4, injuring 32, and narrowly missing the British prime minister Margaret Thatcher. A fifth victim dies on 13 November. 20 October 1984 Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac, English physicist, author of the complete theoretical formulation of quantum mechanics, dies in Tallahassee, Florida (82). 31 October 1984 Indira Gandhi, prime minister of India 1966–77 and 1980–84 is assassinated in New Delhi, India (66). She is killed by extremist Sikhs among her bodyguards, apparently in response to the storming of the Sikh Golden Temple at

Amritsar by Indian government troops. 31 October 1984 Rajiv Gandhi is sworn in as prime minister of India amid communal violence between Sikhs and Hindus after the assasination of his mother Indira by her Sikh bodyguards. October 1984 Ethical questions are raised when surgeons at Loma Linda University Medical Center in California, USA, transplant the heart of a baboon into a two-week-old girl, 'Baby Fae'. The patient survives for 20 days. 6 November 1984 In the US presidential election, the Republican president, Ronald Reagan, with 525 electoral college votes, wins a landslide victory over the Democrat candidate Walter Mondale, with 13 college votes. 3 December 1984 An explosion occurs at a pesticide factory owned by Union Carbide in Bhopal, India. Between 2,000 and 5,000 people die and about 250,000 people suffer ill heath effects from damage to lungs and eyes. 15 December 1984 The Soviet Politburo member Mikhail Gorbachev visits London, England, and states that the USSR is willing to negotiate large reductions in nuclear weapons. The British prime minister Margaret Thatcher declares 'I like Mr Gorbachev. We can do business together.' 31 December 1984 The USA withdraws from the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), alleging that it is too critical of US policy. It had announced its intention 29 December 1983, saying that the organization 'exhibited hostility towards the basic installations of a free society'. 1984 The Yuppie Handbook confirms 'Yuppie' (standing for 'young urban (or upwardly mobile) professional') as a label for the attitudes and lifestyle of an affluent social group with an aspirational lifestyle, and as an icon of the 1980s in Britain and the USA. 1984 Oversized men's clothing is popular in women's fashion in the USA, and used clothing stores experience a boom in sales. 1984 Rap, a music style developed by inner-city black and Latino teenagers in the 1970s in New York City, becomes popular worldwide. Breakdancing, a highly energetic and athletic form of dancing often done on the street, develops from the rap scene. 1984 Stonewashed denim jeans appear on the market in the USA. 1984 The Czech-born writer Milan Kundera publishes his novel Nesnesitelná lehkost byti/The Unbearable Lightness of Being. 1984 The Dutch company Philips and Japanese firm Sony introduce the CD-ROM, a laser-read, read-only disk.

1984 The English composer Michael Tippett completes his choral work The Mask of Time. 1984 The English writer Julian Barnes publishes his novel Flaubert's Parrot. 1984 The film Once Upon a Time in America, directed by the Italian film-maker Sergio Leone, is released in the USA. It stars James Woods and Robert De Niro. 1984 The film Paris, Texas, directed by German film-maker Wim Wenders, is released in the USA. It stars Harry Dean Stanton and Nastassja Kinski. It is awarded the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in France. 1984 The film The Killing Fields, directed by Roland Joffé, is released in the UK. It stars Sam Waterstone and Haing S Ngor. 1984 The Filofax, a portable looseleaf filing system, emerges as the indispensable yuppie accessory. 1984 The French writer Marguerite Duras publishes her novel L'Amant/The Lover. 1984 The Itaipu power plant on the Paraná River on the border between Brazil and Paraguay starts operating; the largest generating station in the world, it produces 13,200 megawatts of electricity. 1984 The musical Sunday in the Park with George is first performed, at the Booth Theater in New York City. Written by Stephen Sondheim, it is based on the works of the French painter Georges Seurat. 1984 The Neue Staatsgalerie (an art gallery) in Stuttgart, West Germany, designed by the English architect James Stirling, is completed. It is one of the leading works of postmodernism. 1984 The Reagan administration in the USA withdraws funds to worldwide familyplanning programs that perform or offer information about abortions; 67 nations are unable to offer help without this funding, and 200,000 women die of botched abortions as a result. 1984 The US Census Bureau estimates the population of the USA at 236,158,000. 1984 The US composer Ned Rorem completes his choral work An American Oratorio. 1984 US physicist Dennis Matthews builds the first X-ray laser. c. 1984 Computer 'viruses' such as 'Friday 13th', 'Trojan Horse', 'Holland Girl', and 'Christmas Tree' begin to appear. 7–8 January 1985 The US secretary of state George Shultz and the Soviet foreign

minister Andrei Gromyko hold talks in Geneva, Switzerland, on the resumption of arms control negotiations. 25 January 1985 The South African president P W Botha opens the country's new three-chamber parliament for whites, Indians, and coloureds. 5 February 1985 Spain reopens its frontier with Gibraltar, ending the 16-yearlong siege imposed by General Francisco Franco on the British territory. 10 February 1985 The imprisoned African National Congress (ANC) leader Nelson Mandela refuses the South African government's offer of freedom, conditional on his renunciation of violence as a means to political change in the country. 1 March 1985 Julio Sanguinetti takes office as Uruguay's first elected president for 12 years. 3 March 1985 A National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) delegates' conference in Britain votes to return to work without a formal settlement of the pit strike. 11 March 1985 Mikhail Gorbachev is named first secretary of the Soviet Communist Party. He calls for more glasnost ('openness') in Soviet life and later pursues a policy of perestroika ('reconstruction'). 15 March 1985 Twenty-one years of military rule in Brazil ends after increasing popular discontent during 1984, with the election of Tancredo Neves as president. When he dies on 21 April, Vice President José Sarney is elected in his place. 25 March 1985 The 1984 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: F Murray Abraham, for Amadeus; Best Supporting Actor: Haing S Ngor, for The Killing Fields; Best Actress: Sally Field, for Places in the Heart; Best Supporting Actress: Peggy Ashcroft, for A Passage to India; Best Film: Amadeus, directed by Miloš Forman; Best Director: Miloš Forman, for Amadeus. March 1985 Scientists at the British Antarctic Survey announce the discovery of thinning of the ozone layer, which worsens each year in the spring over Antarctica. 6 April 1985 A bloodless coup in Sudan, led by General Siwar ad-Dahab, ends the 16-year rule of Colonel Gaafar Mohamed el-Nimeiri. 8 April 1985 Australian businessman Rupert Murdoch buys 50% of the TwentiethCentury Fox film company in the USA. 23 April 1985 The Coca-Cola Company replaces its established recipe with a sweeter version, called New Coke, aimed at younger consumers, in the USA. Following protests, it has to reinstate the old formula under the Classic name.

6 May 1985 Australian publisher Rupert Murdoch purchases most of Metromedia's television stations in the USA. 29 May 1985 Thirty-nine people are killed at the Heysel stadium in Brussels, Belgium, following a riot by Liverpool fans before the European Cup Final between Liverpool and Juventus of Italy; as a consequence, English football clubs are banned from all European competitions for five years. 4 June 1985 An Alabama law allowing a minute of prayer in public schools is declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. 8 June 1985 The British pop group Dire Straits releases the album Brothers in Arms. It becomes the first CD to sell 1 million copies. 15 June 1985 South Africa appoints a multiracial administration for Namibia but retains control of the territory's foreign policy and defence. 27 June 1985 The US pop singer Whitney Houston releases 'Saving All My Love For You' and the album Whitney, which becomes the best-selling album by a female artist to date. 29 June 1985 The most expensive piece of pop memorabilia to date is sold at Sotheby's in New York City when John Lennon's Rolls Royce fetches over £1.75 million. 1 July 1985 An explosion badly damages the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour, New Zealand, killing one man. The ship was in the South Pacific to disrupt French nuclear tests at Mururoa atoll. 13 July 1985 Live Aid, organized by Band Aid to raise funds for famine-relief in Africa, is a day-long concert held simultaneously at Wembley Stadium in London, England, and JFK Stadium in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Over $70 million is raised worldwide. 13 July 1985 The Soviet pole vaulter Sergey Bubka makes the first ever 6m/19.7-ft jump, in Paris, France. 1 September 1985 The wreck of the Titanic, which sank in 1912, is discovered by US entrepreneur Robert Ballard using the Argo, a remote-controlled robot equipped with video cameras. 10 September 1985 European Community foreign ministers approve sanctions against South Africa, although Britain delays a decision until 25 September. 15 September 1985 Europe's golfers, captained by the English golfer Tony Jacklin, defeat the USA 16.5–11.5 in the Ryder Cup at The Belfry, Sutton Coldfield in England. It is the first time the USA has lost the trophy since 1957.

21 September 1985 Larry Holmes of the USA loses his International Boxing Federation (IBF) world heavyweight boxing crown to fellow US fighter Michael Spinks on points in Las Vegas, Nevada. It is Holmes's first defeat in 48 professional fights, 22 of which were world title bouts. 30 September 1985 Simone Signoret, French dramatic actor of stage and film, dies in Eure, France (64). 7 October 1985 Four Palestinian guerrillas hijack the Italian cruise liner Achille Lauro with 450 people on board in the Mediterranean. On 9 October, the hijackers surrender to the Egyptian authorities after killing one passenger, an elderly US citizen. 10 October 1985 Orson Welles, US film actor, director, producer, and writer, best known for Citizen Kane, dies in Los Angeles, California (70). 27 October 1985 Julius Nyerere retires as president of Tanzania after 24 years, to be succeeded by Ali Hassan Mwinyi. 1 November 1985 Phil Silvers, US comedian who played Sergeant Bilko for many years on television, dies in Los Angeles, California (73). 4 November 1985 Two French secret service agents plead guilty to manslaughter and sabotage in relation to the sinking of the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior in Auckland, New Zealand. On 21 November, they are sentenced to 10 years in prison. 15 November 1985 The Anglo-Irish Agreement is signed at Hillsborough Castle, giving the Irish Republic a consultative role in the affairs of Northern Ireland. The British treasury minister Ian Gow resigns in protest. 1985 The Mahabharata, a nine-hour stage adaptation by Jean-Claude Carrière and Peter Brook of an ancient Indian religious epic, is first performed, in Avignon, France. 1985 Americans purchase 15.6 million cars and trucks, the highest number to date. 1985 An epidemic of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) is reported in beef cattle in Britain; it is later traced to cattle feed containing sheep carcasses infected with scrapie; in following years there are fears that beef consumption could lead to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) in humans. 1985 Conservative Judaism accepts women as rabbis. 1985 Demand for CDs and CD players exceeds supply in the USA; manufacturers predict the decline of the LP record.

1985 Divorce rates (divorces per 1,000 of the population): France, 1.95; Germany, 2.10; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 3.08; USA, 5.0; USSR, 3.36 1985 English chemist Harold Walter Kroto and US chemists Robert Floyd Curl and Richard Erret Smalley discover fullerenes. 1985 Pictures of missing children first begin to be shown on milk cartons in the USA. 1985 Social statistics reveal that in 1985 US women spend an average of 27 hours a week doing housework; US men spend 12. 1985 The Australian writer Peter Carey publishes his novel Illywacker. 1985 The average literacy rate of women worldwide is 97%. In developing countries, however, only 55% of women are literate. 1985 The Canadian writer Margaret Atwood publishes her novel The Handmaid's Tale. 1985 The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt completes his Stabat Mater. 1985 The film Ran, directed by Akira Kurosawa, is released in Japan. A version of Shakespeare's King Lear, it stars Tatsuya Nakadai. 1985 The film Witness, directed by Peter Weir, is released in the USA. It stars Harrison Ford, Kelly McGillis, and Lukas Haas. 1985 The German neo-expressionist artist Anselm Kiefer creates The High Priestess. 1985 The Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank Headquarters in Hong Kong, designed by the English architect Norman Foster, is completed. 1985 The Lloyds Building in London, England, designed by the English architect Richard Rogers, is completed. 1985 The musical Les Misérables is first performed in English, at the Palace Theatre in London, England. The music is by Claude-Michel Schönberg and the lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer and Alain Boubil. The original French version was first performed in Paris, France in 1980. 1985 The number of adolescents visiting the cinema in the USA drops by 20%, while video rental by this group increases 200%. 1985 The Parents' Music Resource Center, formed by Tipper Gore and Susan Baker in the USA, moves to make recording companies print warnings on records with explicit lyrics.

1985 The play Largo desolato, by the Czech writer and politician Václav Havel, is first performed. 1985 The Rhodesian-born English writer Doris Lessing publishes her novel The Good Terrorist. 1985 The US artist Andrew Wyeth paints Field Hand. 1985 The US Bell Laboratories develops an optical fibre capable of simultaneously sending 300,000 telephone conversations or 200 high-resolution television channels. 1985 The US physician Oliver Sachs publishes his collection of essays The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. 1985 US firm Microsoft develops Windows for the IBM PC. 1985 West German physicist Gerd Binnig and Swiss physicist Heinrich Rohrer invent the atomic-force microscope, which explores surfaces by the force of atomic interaction, at the IBM laboratory in Zürich, Switzerland. Individual atoms can be traced and it has the advantage over the scanning tunnelling microscope in that it can be used to image biological molecules. c. 1985 Bike couriers are much in evidence, especially in US cities. The job is high-risk and pays little, and opportunities will decline with the development of electronic communications. 1 January 1986 Spain and Portugal become the 11th and 12th members of the European Community. 25 January 1986 The National Resistance Army in Uganda occupies the capital, Kampala. On 29 January, the army leader, Yuweri Museveni, is sworn in as Uganda's president. 28 January 1986 The US space shuttle Challenger explodes shortly after takeoff, killing the crew of seven and setting the US space programme back years. January 1986 The US space probe Voyager 2 passes within 81,000 km/50,600 mi of Uranus; photographs taken by the probe reveal ten unknown satellites and two new rings. 7 February 1986 President Jean-Claude ('Baby Doc') Duvalier of Haiti flees to France, following antigovernment demonstrations. General Henri Namphy forms a new government. 19 February 1986 The USSR launches the core unit of the Mir 1 space station; it is intended to be permanently occupied.

22 February 1986 The defence minister of the Philippines, Juan Ponce Enrile, and the deputy chief of staff, Fidel Ramos, take over the headquarters of the defence ministry, declaring their opposition to President Ferdinand Marcos and their support for the opposition leader, Cory (Corazón) Aquino. 25 February 1986 President Ferdinand Marcos flees the Philippines, and the opposition leader, Cory (Corazón) Aquino, is sworn in as president. 28 February 1986 Olof Palme, Swedish prime minister 1969–76 and 1982–86, is assassinated by a gunman in a Stockholm street, Sweden (59). 2 March 1986 Queen Elizabeth of Great Britain and Northern Ireland signs the Australia Bill in Canberra, severing Australia's last constitutional ties with Britain. 12 March 1986 Spain votes in a referendum to remain in NATO, but for its military forces to remain separate from the NATO command structure. 16 March 1986 The opposition parties win a narrow majority in the French general election, ending five years of Socialist rule. On 20 March, Jacques Chirac, the Gaullist leader, is appointed prime minister. 24 March 1986 The 1985 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: William Hurt, for Kiss of the Spider Woman; Best Supporting Actor: Don Ameche, for Cocoon; Best Actress: Geraldine Page, for The Trip to Bountiful; Best Supporting Actress: Anjelica Huston, for Prizzi's Honor; Best Film: Out of Africa, directed by Sydney Pollack; Best Director: Sydney Pollack, for Out of Africa. 14 April 1986 Simone de Beauvoir, French existentialist writer, philosopher, and feminist, dies in Paris, France (78). 15 April 1986 Bombers from US warships and bases in Britain attack targets in Libya: 100 people are killed, and one aeroplane is shot down. 26 April 1986 A reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in the Ukraine explodes, releasing radioactive material into the surrounding area and causing a radioactive cloud to cross Europe. This is the world's worst nuclear accident. 30 April 1986 In India, 2,000 police and paramilitary commandos enter the Sikh Golden Temple at Amritsar in Punjab, to expel militants who had proclaimed an independent Sikh state of Khalistan. 4 May 1986 Babrak Karmal resigns as general secretary of the People's Democratic (Communist) Party of Afghanistan, to be replaced by Mohammad Najibullah, former head of the Afghan secret police. 9 May 1986 Tenzing Norgay, Nepalese sherpa who, with Edmund Hillary, was the first person to reach the summit of Mount Everest, dies in Darjeeling, India (72).

25 May 1986 To draw attention to the plight of the homeless, approximately 6 million people form a human chain – Hands Across America – most of the way from New York to California. 1 June 1986 The US Senate allows its proceedings to be televised but discontinues in July. 12 June 1986 The South African president P W Botha announces a countrywide state of emergency in response to increasing popular unrest; 1,000 black activists are arrested. 14 June 1986 Jorge Luis Borges, Argentine poet, short-story writer, and essayist, who established the modernist Ultraist movement in South America, dies in Geneva, Switzerland (86). 19 June 1986 Two Americans die from cyanide poisoning after taking Excedrin capsules that had been tampered with. The manufacturer, Bristol-Myers, Inc, recalls its capsules. 4 July 1986 The Statue of Liberty in New York City is reopened by US president Ronald Reagan in the presence of President François Mitterrand of France, following refurbishment in celebration of its 100th birthday. 5–20 July 1986 The first Goodwill Games are held in Moscow, USSR, conceived by US entrepreneur Ted Turner to promote goodwill between the USA and USSR following the boycotts of the 1980 and 1984 Olympic Games. Over 3,000 athletes from 79 countries compete in 18 different sports. 23 July 1986 Prince Andrew, the third child of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, marries Sarah Ferguson, in London, England. 1 August 1986 Sylvester Stallone is named the best-paid male actor by Company magazine, getting around $12 million a film. The top female actor (Barbra Streisand) gets $5 million. 12 August 1986 The USA suspends its defence obligations to New Zealand following the New Zealand Labour government's espousal of an antinuclear policy, and denial of access to New Zealand for US warships and military aircraft capable of carrying nuclear weapons. 13 September 1986 The US musician Paul Simon's album Graceland, with its cross-cultural mix of Creole, Mexican, and African elements, is released to great critical acclaim. September 1986 Oprah Winfrey's Chicago-based talk show is syndicated on national television in the USA, dominating daytime ratings. 3 October 1986 A comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act in the USA imposes strict

sanctions on South Africa and causes many multinational firms to disinvest. 11–12 October 1986 A US–USSR mini-summit in Reykjavik, Iceland, fails to reach an agreement on arms control after the US president Ronald Reagan refuses to abandon his commitment to the Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars) programme. 27 October 1986 The 'Big Bang' deregulation of the stock exchange in London, England, introduces computerized dealing and abolishes the distinctions between various types of trader. October 1986 The musical Phantom of the Opera, with lyrics by Charles Hart and music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, is first performed, at Her Majesty's Theatre in London, England. Despite critical reservations that the show is lightweight, it is very popular and will run in London and on tour for more than ten years. 22 November 1986 Mike Tyson of the USA beats Trevor Berbick of Canada in two rounds to win the World Boxing Council World Heavyweight title in Las Vegas, Nevada, in the USA; at 20 years old, he is the youngest champion ever. 25 November 1986 US president Ronald Reagan's national security adviser Admiral John Poindexter resigns, and his aide Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North is dismissed from the National Security Council (NSC) in the USA after the revelation that money from arms sales to Iran was illegally channelled to Contra rebels in Central America. On 26 November, Reagan appoints former senator John Tower to head an inquiry into the role of the NSC in the Iran–Contra Affair. 29 November 1986 Cary Grant, English-born US film actor, dies in Davenport, Iowa (82). 29 December 1986 Harold Macmillan, British politician, Conservative prime minister 1957–63, dies in Birch Grove, Sussex, England (92). 1986 A repeal of the Urban Areas Act in South Africa includes the removal of the pass laws. 1986 For the first time, the number of women in the USA holding professional jobs is greater than that of men, by 29,000. 1986 German physicist Johannes Bednorz and Swiss physicist Karl Alex Müller announce the discovery of a superconducting ceramic material in which superconductivity occurs at a much higher temperature (30 K) than hitherto known, increasing the potential for use of superconductivity for more energyefficient motors and computers. They receive the Nobel Prize for Physics – in record time – for their discovery. 1986 Nintendo video games, including Super Mario Brothers, are launched and quickly gain worldwide popularity. Sophisticated programming and graphics ensure their success and by 1990 sales exceed $3 billion.

1986 Palaeontologists discover the fossil remains of two crow-sized birds in Texas that are about 225 million years old. Named Protoavis, the birds predate Archaeopteryx by about 75 million years; they are capable of true flight but also have many saurian features. 1986 Scientists use 10 laser beams, which deliver a total power of 100 trillion watts during one-billionth of a second, to convert a small part of the hydrogen nuclei contained in a glass sphere to helium at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California; it is the first fusion reaction induced by a laser. 1986 The English writer Kingsley Amis publishes his novel The Old Devils, which wins the Booker Prize. 1986 The film 37.2° le matin/Betty Blue, directed by Jean-Jacques Beineix, is released in France. It stars Béatrice Dalle and Jean-Hugues Anglade. 1986 The film Hannah and her Sisters, written and directed by Woody Allen, is released in the USA. It features an all-star cast including Allen, Mia Farrow, Dianne Wiest, Barbara Hershey, Max von Sydow, and Michael Caine. 1986 The film Jean de Florette, directed by Claude Berri, is released in France. Based on the book by Marcel Pagnol, it stars Gérard Depardieu, Daniel Auteuil, and Yves Montand. 1986 The film Manon des Sources/Manon of the Springs, directed by Claude Berri, is released in France. Based on the book by Marcel Pagnol, it stars Daniel Auteuil, Yves Montand, and Emmanuelle Béart. 1986 The first digital audio tape (DAT) recorders are demonstrated in Japan. 1986 The first laptop computer is introduced in the USA. 1986 The French sociologist Jean Baudrillard publishes America. 1986 The German-born English artist Frank Auerbach paints Head of Catherine Lampert. 1986 The Japanese company Fuji launches the disposable camera, designed so that the whole unit is handed over for processing. 1986 The opera Yan Tan Tethera by the English composer Harrison Birtwistle is first performed, on television in Britain. 1986 The Swedish company Pharmacia Les Therapeutics AB develops Nicoret, a nicotine chewing gum to help people give up smoking. 1986 The US Census Bureau reports 2,220,000 unwed couples.

1986 The US Department of Agriculture permits the Biological Corporation of Omaha to market a virus produced by genetic engineering; it is the first living genetically altered organism to be sold. The virus is used against a form of swine herpes. 1986 The US writer Garrison Keillor publishes his radio monologues Lake Wobegon Days. 1986 The US writer Paul Auster publishes his novel sequence New York Trilogy. 1986 The US writer Richard Ford publishes his novel The Sportswriter. 1986 The Vatican declares Father Charles Curran of the USA unfit to teach Catholic theology because of his writings on divorce, contraception, abortion, and homosexuality. 1986 US philosopher Thomas Nagel publishes The View from Nowhere. 6 January 1987 The Portuguese Council of State agrees to restore Macau to China before 2000. On 13 April, Portugal signs an agreement to return Macau in 1999. 16 January 1987 KRON television in San Francisco, California, shows the first advertisements promoting the use of condoms for safe sex. 5 February 1987 Iran launches a missile attack on Baghdad, capital of its opponent in the Iran–Iraq war. On 19 February, a truce is agreed in the 'war of cities', in which both sides have inflicted damage on heavily populated areas. 23 February 1987 Andy Warhol, US artist and film-maker, a leading exponent of Pop Art in the 1960s, dies in New York City (59). 23 February 1987 Astronomers around the world observe a spectacular supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud, the galaxy closest to ours, when a star (SN1987A) suddenly becomes a thousand times brighter than our own Sun. It is the first supernova visible to the naked eye since 1604. 19 March 1987 The popular TV evangelist Rev Jim Bakker admits to an extramarital sexual escapade, beginning the decline of his successful ministry. 25 March 1987 The Belgian government mints ECU coins: these are legal tender in Belgium. 31 March 1987 The 1986 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Paul Newman, for The Color of Money; Best Supporting Actor: Michael Caine, for Hannah and her Sisters; Best Actress: Marlee Matlin, for Children of a Lesser God; Best Supporting Actress: Dianne Wiest, for Hannah and her Sisters; Best Film: Platoon,

directed by Oliver Stone; Best Director: Oliver Stone, for Platoon. 8 April 1987 The state of siege in Paraguay, in force since 1947, is finally allowed to lapse by the administration of General Alfredo Stroessner. 11 April 1987 Primo Levi, Italian Jewish writer and chemist who wrote an account of his survival in a Nazi concentration camp, dies in Turin, Italy (67). 6 May 1987 The ruling National Party wins a sweeping victory in the South African general election, with the far-right Conservatives becoming the secondlargest party. 14 May 1987 A military coup in the Fiji Islands, led by Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka, overthrows the elected government of Timoci Bavadra. 28 May 1987 A 19-year-old West German, Mathias Rust, lands a small plane in Moscow's Red Square. The following day, the commander in chief of the USSR's air defences is dismissed. 4 June 1987 The US athlete Edwin Moses's unbeaten run of 122 successive wins in the 400-metres hurdles, stretching back to 26 August 1977, ends in Madrid, Spain, when he is beaten by Danny Harris of the USA. 11 June 1987 Margaret Thatcher leads the Conservative Party to a third consecutive win in the British general elections. 22 June 1987 Fred Astaire, US dancer who starred in many musical comedies with Ginger Rogers, dies in Los Angeles, California (88). 1 July 1987 Members of the European Community complete ratification of the Single European Act. It comes into force on 1 July, with the aim of starting the creation of a single market in Europe by 1993. It also introduces qualified majority voting in the European Council of Ministers. 11 July 1987 The world population reaches 5 billion – double that of 1950. 16 August 1987 Fifty thousand people gather in Memphis, Tennessee, to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley. 17 August 1987 Rudolf Hess, German Nazi leader and deputy of Adolf Hitler, dies in Spandau prison in West Berlin, West Germany, where he had remained imprisoned since World War II (93). 19 August 1987 A gunman, Michael Ryan, kills 14 people in Hungerford, England, before shooting himself. On 22 September, the British government bans automatic weapons of the kind used by Ryan. 19 August 1987 Zimbabwe's House of Assembly agrees a change to the

constitution, abolishing the 20 seats reserved for whites under the 1979 Lancaster House Agreement. 1 September 1987 Belgium becomes the first country to introduce a national smoking ban in all public buildings. 3 September 1987 A coup in Burundi ends the rule of Colonel Jean-Baptiste Bagaza, and a new Military Council for National Redemption is formed under the leadership of Major Pierre Buyoya. 26 September 1987 The US pop singer Michael Jackson releases the album Bad, the best-selling album of 1987. 5 October 1987 The opera The Electrification of the Soviet Union by the English composer Nigel Osborne is first performed, at Glyndebourne, England. The text, based on Boris Pasternak's story 'The Last Summer', was written by the poet Craig Raine. 6 October 1987 Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka declares the Fiji Islands a republic, formally severing its legal ties with Britain. 15 October 1987 Captain Blaise Compaoré leads a military coup in Burkina Faso. Prime Minister Thomas Sankara and eight others die. 19 October 1987 The New York Dow Jones Industrial Average falls 508.32 points (23%) on 'Black Monday', precipitating large falls in stock prices across the world. 25 October–1 November 1987 At the 13th Communist Party Congress in Beijing, Deng Xiaoping retires as general secretary and as a Politburo member. 8 November 1987 Irish Republican Army (IRA) bombs explode in Northern Ireland at a Remembrance Day service in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, killing 11 people. On 15 November, the Roman Catholic bishops in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic denounce IRA violence. 12 November 1987 Boris Yeltsin is dismissed as chief of the Moscow Communist Party after he criticizes the slow pace of reforms. 18 November 1987 A report of the joint US Senate/House of Representatives Iran–Contra Committee blames President Ronald Reagan for the administration's illegal activities. Eight Republicans refuse to sign the report. November 1987 Construction of the Channel Tunnel between England and France begins; there are to be two tunnels, each 7.6 m/25 ft wide and 49.4 km/30.7 mi long. 7–10 December 1987 At a US–Soviet summit in Washington, DC, US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev agree to eliminate

intermediate-range nuclear forces. 21 December 1987 A ferry disaster in the Philippines kills 2,000 people. 1987 As prices drop and the technology develops to improve the speed of transmission, fax machines become an established feature in offices. 1987 At a conference in Montreal, Canada, an international agreement, the Montreal Protocol, is reached to limit the use of ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) by 50% by the end of the century; the agreement is later condemned by environmentalists as 'too little, too late'. 1987 British historian Simon Schama publishes The Embarrassment of Riches, a social history of the Netherlands. 1987 Consumer electronics companies Seiko and Ferguson jointly launch a colour pocket television in the UK; it has a 6.25-cm/2.5-in LCD screen and costs £250. 1987 Income from video rental in the USA reaches twice the level of box-office receipts. 1987 Objects the size of planets are found orbiting the stars Gamma Cephei and Epsilon Eridani. 1987 Pat Anthony of Northern Transvaal in South Africa becomes the first surrogate grandmother, giving birth to her daughter's triplets. 1987 Satellite television channel MTV is launched in Europe, with the video of Dire Straits' 'Money For Nothing'. 1987 The Australian-born US media tycoon Rupert Murdoch acquires the US publisher Harper & Row for $300 million. 1987 The average monthly income spent on childcare in the USA is 6.6%. Those living in poverty spend 25% of their income on childcare. 1987 The case of Baby M, the child of a surrogate birth agreement in the USA, raises ethical issues when her custody is contested by her natural mother Mary Beth Whitehead and the couple who paid for the surrogacy, William and Elizabeth Stern. On 31 March, the New Jersey judge rules that Whitehead has no parental rights. Surrogacy, not covered by existing laws, is becoming increasingly common. Full custody of the baby is given to William Stern. 1987 The film Der Himmel über Berlin/Wings of Desire, directed by Wim Wenders, is released in West Germany. It stars Bruno Ganz, Solveig Dommartin, and Peter Falk. 1987 The film The Dead, filmed by veteran writer-director John Huston, is

released in the USA. Based on a story from James Joyce's Dubliners, it stars Huston's daughter, Anjelica, and Donal McCann. It is Huston's final film as a director. 1987 The German artist Georg Baselitz paints Double Portrait. 1987 The miniskirt reappears in the fashion world. 1987 The Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe publishes his novel Anthills of the Savannah. 1987 The number of divorces (as percentage of marriages contracted): Australia, 34; Belgium, 31; Canada, 43; Czechoslovakia, 32; Denmark, 44; Finland, 38; France, 31; West Germany, 30; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 41; Greece, 13; Netherlands, 28; Italy, 8; Japan, 22; Norway, 40; Sweden, 44; USA, 48. 1987 The opera Nixon in China by the US composer John Adams is first performed, in Houston, Texas. 1987 The US journalist Tom Wolfe publishes his novel Bonfire of the Vanities. 1987 The US writer Gore Vidal publishes his novel Empire. 1987 The US writer Toni Morrison publishes her novel Beloved, which wins the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988. 1987 Women own 30% of US businesses. January–September 1988 The West German tennis player Steffi Graf becomes the third woman to win the 'Grand Slam' of all four major tournaments (the Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, and US Open). She also wins an Olympic gold medal, following the restoration of tennis to the Olympic Games in Seoul, South Korea. 4 February 1988 The Supreme Court of the USSR approves the posthumous judicial rehabilitation of Nikolai Bukharin and nine other Soviet leaders executed or imprisoned after the 1938 show trial. 8 February 1988 An international commission finds that Austrian president Kurt Waldheim knew about wartime atrocities in the Balkans, but clears him of war crimes. 8 February 1988 The Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev announces that Soviet troops will begin to withdraw from Afghanistan on 15 May. 15 February 1988 Richard Feynman, US theoretical physicist in the field of quantum electrodynamics, dies in Los Angeles, California (69).

6 March 1988 Three suspected Irish Republican Army (IRA) terrorists are shot dead by a British SAS (Special Air Service) team in Gibraltar. 14–16 March 1988 China and Vietnam clash over a period of three days over the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. 3 April 1988 A peace agreement between Ethiopia and Somalia ends 11 years of border conflict. 8 April 1988 The US television evangelist Jimmy Swaggart confesses to committing lewd acts with a prostitute and is ejected from his church. 11 April 1988 The 1987 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Michael Douglas, for Wall Street; Best Supporting Actor: Sean Connery, for The Untouchables; Best Actress: Cher, for Moonstruck; Best Supporting Actress: Olympia Dukakis, for Moonstruck; Best Film: The Last Emperor, directed by Bernardo Bertolucci; Best Director: Bernardo Bertolucci, for The Last Emperor (which wins all nine Academy Awards for which it is nominated). 23 April 1988 The US government bans smoking on all internal passenger airline flights of under two hours' duration. 2 May 1988 Thousands of shipyard workers go on strike in Poland and seven leaders of the Solidarity trade union are detained. 5 May 1988 Eugene Antonio Marino is installed as archbishop of Atlanta, the first black Roman Catholic archbishop in the USA. 8 May 1988 The Socialist president of France, François Mitterrand, defeats the Gaullist candidate, Jacques Chirac, in the presidential elections, winning over 54% of votes. 15 May 1988 Soviet troops begin withdrawing from Afghanistan after eight and a half years. 11 June 1988 A 70th Birthday Tribute concert for South African dissident political leader Nelson Mandela takes place at Wembley Stadium in London, England. Featuring acts such as Peter Gabriel, Simple Minds, George Michael, Annie Lennox, Miriam Makeba, and Youssou N'Dour, it represents a significant protest against the apartheid regime in South Africa. 13 June 1988 US tobacco company the Liggett Group is found liable for the cancer death of a smoker and ordered to pay US$400,000, the first case in which a tobacco company is found guilty. When an appeals court rules for a retrial, the plaintiff drops the case from lack of funds. 15 June 1988 The US Census Bureau reports that for the first time over half of all new mothers remain in the job market.

23 June 1988 Soviet troops move into parts of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, as ethnic violence enters its fifth month. 28 June–1 July 1988 At the 19th Communist Party conference in Moscow, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev outlines plans for changes in the administrative structure of the USSR, intended to make the Party more democratic and businesses more autonomous. 3 July 1988 The US guided-missile cruiser USS Vincennes shoots down an Iranian civilian airliner in error in the Gulf, killing all 286 people on board. 14 August 1988 Enzo Ferrari, Italian racing car designer and sports car manufacturer, dies in Modena, Italy (90). 17 August 1988 Mohammad Zia-ul-Haq, president of Pakistan 1978–88, who had his predecessor, Lulfiqar Ali Bhutto, executed, is killed in Bahawalpur, Pakistan, when his plane is blown up by an assassin's bomb (64). A state of emergency is declared. 17 August 1988 The US ambassador to Pakistan is killed along with President Zia ul-Haq of Pakistan when the plane carrying them explodes in mid-air. 25 August 1988 The centre of Lisbon, Portugal, is gutted by fire. August 1988 Japanese electronics manufacturer Sony launches the Video Walkman, which has a 7.5 cm/3-in colour television and an 8 mm/0.3 in VCR. It weighs 1.5 kg/3 lb in total. 1 September 1988 Luis W Alvarez, US physicist who received the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1968 for his discovery of several subatomic particles, dies in Berkeley, California (77). 23 September 1988 At the Seoul Olympic Games in South Korea, the Canadian runner Ben Johnson wins the 100 metres in a world record time of 9.79 seconds; he is then stripped of the title three days later when drug tests reveal traces of an anabolic steroid, stanozol. 25 September 1988 Barbara Harris, a divorcée, is elected the first female bishop in the Anglican communion, to serve as suffragan bishop of Massachusetts. She is consecrated on 11 February 1989. 30 September 1988 Major changes are made in the Soviet Politburo, including the retirement of President Andrey Gromyko and the dismissal of several leading figures. September 1988 Pope John Paul II reiterates his opposition to women priests in the Catholic Church in his Apostolic Letter 'Mulieris Dignitatem'/'The Dignity of Woman'.

3 October 1988 Chad and Libya end their long-running war and establish diplomatic relations. 11 October 1988 Ladislav Adamec replaces Lubomír Štrougal as prime minister of Czechoslovakia in the course of major changes in the government and Communist Party. 18 October 1988 The situation comedy Roseanne begins broadcasting on US television, starring comic actor Roseanne Barr and following the struggles of a not-so-typical blue collar family. 31 October 1988 British Airways introduces the air miles scheme, offering points towards free flights for specified purchases. 8 November 1988 Republican candidate George Bush, with 426 electoral college votes, defeats Democrat Michael Dukakis, with 112 votes, in the US presidential elections, but the Democratic Party increases its majority in the Senate and House of Representatives. 16 November 1988 Benazir Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party wins 94 seats in the general election. On 2 December, she is sworn in as prime minister of Pakistan. 21 December 1988 A terrorist bomb explodes on a Pan Am Boeing 747 airliner flying over Lockerbie in Scotland, killing all 259 passengers on board and 11 people on the ground. 1988 A French company markets the abortion-inducing drug RU486, developed by Etienne Baulieu; it induces an abortion up to seven weeks after fertilization by blocking receptors for the production of the hormone progesterone; antiabortion groups protest. 1988 Fossil remains of a modern Homo sapiens are discovered in Israel, dated about 92,000 years ago; they suggest modern humans appeared twice as early as previously thought. 1988 Israeli inventor Herman Branover and the US-Israeli Solmecs firm develop a prototype of a magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) generator that uses molten lead fluid and coal as a fuel, making it suitable for countries that do not have petroleum resources. 1988 Network television viewing in the USA drops as almost 53% of homes subscribe to cable and 56% of homes have video cassette recorders. 1988 Opposition political parties are legalized in Hungary by the government of Károly Grósz. 1988 Researchers at IBM's Almaden Research Center in San José, California, using a scanning tunnelling microscope, produce the first image of the ring structure of

benzene, the simplest aromatic hydrocarbon. The image confirms the structure of the molecule envisioned by Frederick Kekulé in 1865. 1988 Several US and European firms develop microcapsule reservoirs only 250 nanometres in diameter and made of a biodegradable polymer. They contain insulin which is delivered when the microcapsule dissolves; it constitutes a fundamentally new method of treating diabetes. 1988 The Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez publishes his novel El amor en los tiempos del cólera/Love in the Time of Cholera. 1988 The controversial film The Last Temptation of Christ, directed by Martin Scorsese, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis, it stars Willem Dafoe. 1988 The English cosmetics entrepreneur Anita Roddick's Body Shop now has 300 stores in 34 countries. 1988 The English novelist Doris Lessing publishes her novel The Fifth Child. 1988 The film Au revoir, les enfants/Goodbye Children, directed by Louis Malle, is released in France. It stars Gaspard Manesse and Raphael Fejto. 1988 The film Cinema paradiso, directed by Giuseppe Tornatore, is released in Italy. It stars Philippe Noiret and Salvatore Cascio. 1988 The film Rain Man, directed by Barry Levinson, is released in the USA. It stars Dustin Hoffman, in an Academy Award-winning performance, and Tom Cruise. It also wins Academy Awards for best film and best director. 1988 The film Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, directed by Robert Zemeckis, is released in the USA. Featuring the interaction of live performers with animated characters, it stars Bob Hoskins. 1988 The Human Genome Organization (HUGO) is established in Washington, DC, USA; scientists announce a project to compile a complete 'map' of human genes. 1988 The Indian-born British writer Salman Rushdie publishes his novel The Satanic Verses. 1988 The number of births in the USA is 3,829,000, the highest in 25 years. 1988 The number of farms in the USA reaches its lowest level since before the Civil War. 1988 The Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski releases Dekalog/Decalogue, a film series made for television based on the Ten Commandments. Extended versions of Krótki film o milosci/A Short Film about Killing and Krótki film o zabijaniu/A

Short Film about Love are also released. 1988 The Portuguese-born English artist Paula Rego paints The Cadet and His Sister. 1988 The US cultural critic Susan Sontag publishes AIDS and its Metaphors. 1988 The US fast-food company McDonald's opens its 10,000th store. 1988 The US philosopher Ted Honderich publishes The Consequences of Determinism. 1988 The US writer Elmore Leonard publishes his novel Freaky Deaky. 1988 The USA experiences its worst drought since 1934, forcing it to import grain for the first time ever. 1988–1994 The amount of chlorofluorocarbons released into the air in the USA is reduced by 52%. 6 January 1989 The USSR announces the mass rehabilitation of thousands of citizens who were victims of Stalin's purges in the 1930s–50s. 7 January 1989 Hirohito, emperor of Japan 1927–89, dies in Tokyo, Japan (87). 7 January 1989 On the death of Emperor Hirohito of Japan after a 62-year reign, he is succeeded by his son, Crown Prince Akihito. 11 January 1989 A declaration outlawing the use of poison gas and toxic and bacteriological weapons is agreed by 149 countries. 11 January 1989 The Hungarian parliament passes a law allowing the formation of political parties. 23 January 1989 Salvador Dalí, Spanish surrealist painter who also designed furniture, jewellery, and stage and film sets, dies in Figueras, Spain (84). 2 February 1989 President P W Botha resigns as leader of the ruling National Party in South Africa, after suffering a stroke. He is succeeded by F W de Klerk. 3 February 1989 The 35-year dictatorial regime of Alfredo Stroessner in Paraguay is overthrown by a military coup led by General Andrés Rodríguez, who replaces him as president. On 1 May, Rodríguez gains a landslide victory in elections won by his right-of-centre Colorado Party. 14 February 1989 Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran issues a fatwa against the British author Salman Rushdie, calling for his death for blasphemy against Islam in his book The Satanic Verses. Rushdie goes into hiding.

24 March 1989 The Exxon Valdez oil tanker runs aground in Prince William Sound, Alaska, spilling an estimated 40,504,000 l/8,910,880 gal of oil. It is the largest oil spill in US history. Over 4,800 km/3,000 mi of shoreline are polluted. 26 March 1989 Voters are offered a choice of candidates for the first time in elections for the Congress of People's Deputies in the USSR. Boris Yeltsin, dismissed from the Politburo 17 months before, gains 89% of the vote in his Moscow constituency, while many senior Party officials fail to get elected. 29 March 1989 The 1988 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Dustin Hoffman, for Rain Man; Best Supporting Actor: Kevin Kline, for A Fish Called Wanda; Best Actress: Jodie Foster, for The Accused; Best Supporting Actress: Geena Davis, for The Accidental Tourist; Best Film: Rain Man, directed by Barry Levinson; Best Director: Barry Levinson, for Rain Man. 5 April 1989 The Solidarity leader Lech Walesa and the Polish government sign an agreement for political and economic reforms. 15 April 1989 Ninety-six Liverpool fans die in a crush during the Football Association (FA) Cup semifinal against Nottingham Forest at Hillsborough, Sheffield, England. 23 April 1989 Kareem Abdul-Jabbar of the Los Angeles Lakers retires as the leading career scorer in National Basketball Association history, with 38,387 points in 1,560 games. 25 April 1989 The Japanese prime minister Noboru Takeshita resigns over a bribery scandal, to be replaced by Sosuke Uno. 2 May 1989 The centre-right coalition under Ruud Lubbers in the Netherlands becomes the first European government to resign over an environmental issue, when the Liberal Democrats refuse to support proposals for financing antipollution measures. 14 May 1989 Carlos Menem, leader of the rightist reformed Peronist party, defeats Eduardo Angeloz of the ruling Radical party in Argentina's presidential elections. On 8 July, Menem takes over as president on the resignation of Raúl Alfonsín. 17 May 1989 The Roman Catholic Church in Poland is given a status unparalleled in post-war Eastern Europe, with the restoration of property confiscated in the 1950s and the right to run schools. 3 June 1989 People's Liberation Army tanks in China move into Tiananmen Square in Beijing, killing 2,000 pro-democracy protesters. 3 June 1989 Ruhollah Khomeini, Iranian Shiite Muslim Ayatollah and organizer of the 1979 revolution that made him political and religious leader of Iran for life,

dies in Tehran, Iran (89). 4 June 1989 The former Polish trade union Solidarity achieves a landslide victory in elections to the Sejm (parliament). 12 June 1989 Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev and West German chancellor Helmut Kohl sign the 'Bonn Document', affirming the right of European states to determine their own political systems. 18 June 1989 Andreas Papandreou's Pasok government loses its overall majority in the general election in Greece. On 2 July, an interim government coalition of the New Democracy and Communist parties, led by Tzannis Tzannetakis, is sworn in. 23 June 1989 President José Eduardo dos Santos of Angola and Jonas Savimbi, leader of the UNITA rebels, sign a declaration ending the 14-year civil war in Angola. 11 July 1989 Laurence Olivier, English stage and film actor, director, and producer, dies near London, England (82). 14 July 1989 The LEP (Large Electron Positron Collider) is inaugurated at the CERN research centre in Switzerland; the new accelerator has a circumference of 27 km/16.8 mi and is the largest scientific apparatus in the world. July 1989 The US Air Force's Stealth Bomber (B-2) makes its first flight. Its profile, and the material used in its construction, are intended to reduce radar reflection. 10 September 1989 Hungary begins to allow East Germans within its frontiers to cross freely to the West. 12 September 1989 A Solidarity-dominated cabinet is formed in Poland under Tadeusz Mazowiecki, the first noncommunist government in Eastern Europe since 1948. 17 October 1989 An earthquake measuring 7.1 on the Richter scale hits San Francisco, California, killing at least 273 people, many of whom die when the upper level of the Nimitz Highway collapses. It is North America's most destructive earthquake since 1906, causing at least $6 billion in property damage. 18 October 1989 Erich Honecker resigns from the leadership of the Communist Party and the state in East Germany, to be succeeded by Egon Krenz, a reformist communist. October 1989 The Canadian ice-hockey player Wayne Gretsky of the Los Angeles Kings surpasses Gordie Howe's National Hockey League scoring record with a new record of 1,850 points.

6–7 November 1989 Members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) join Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea in forming the Council for Asia–Pacific Economic Cooperation. 9 November 1989 East Germany announces the opening of its border with West Germany as unrest continues and refugees continue to reach the West through the neighbouring countries. The authorities begin demolishing sections of the Berlin Wall the following day. 10 November 1989 Petar Mladenov replaces Todor Zhivkov as general secretary of the Communist Party in Bulgaria, ending Zhivkov's 35-year dictatorship. 22 November 1989 The Congress (I) Party led by Rajiv Gandhi loses its parliamentary majority in the Indian general election. On 2 December, a new multiparty government is sworn in under V P Singh of the new Janata Dal ('People's Party'). 24 November 1989 Following the death of President René Muhawad of Lebanon in a terrorist bomb explosion on 22 November, he is succeeded by Elias Hrawi, amid continuing friction between the Christian leader Gen Michel Aoun and occupying Syrian troops. 28 November 1989 The Czechoslovak prime minister, Ladislav Adamec, formally renounces the communist monopoly on power. 1 December 1989 Mikhail Gorbachev becomes the first leader of the USSR to visit the Vatican. He and Pope John Paul II agree to re-establish diplomatic relations between their states. 2 December 1989 The US president George Bush and the Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev formally declare the Cold War to be at an end. 3 December 1989 The Politburo and Communist Party Central Committee resign in East Germany after revelations of widespread corruption. On 8 December, the former leader, Erich Honecker, is charged with abuse of office. 10 December 1989 A majority noncommunist coalition government takes power in Czechoslovakia, led by Marian Calfa. 14 December 1989 Andrey Dimitriyevich Sakharov, Soviet nuclear physicist and outspoken supporter of human rights and civil liberties, dies in Moscow, USSR (68). 17 December 1989 The Romanian army fires on a demonstration in the city of Timisoara, killing about 100 people, but rumours report a far higher figure. On 20 December, President Nicolae Ceausescu declares a state of emergency as protests spread.

19 December 1989 US troops invade Panama to overthrow the regime of General Manuel Noriega. 22 December 1989 Samuel Beckett, Irish writer and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969, dies in Paris, France (83). 22 December 1989 The Romanian army joins forces with antigovernment demonstrators in Romania and overthrows President Nicolae Ceausescu. 25 December 1989 Nicolae Ceausescu, president of the Socialist Republic of Romania 1967–89, is captured (together with Elena Ceausescu), given a summary trial, and executed by the army near Bucharest, Romania (71). 29 December 1989 The former dissident Václav Havel attends a thanksgiving mass in St Vitus' Cathedral, Prague, after his inauguration as the first noncommunist president of Czechoslovakia for 41 years. 1989 A controversial glass pyramid entrance to the Louvre museum, designed by the Chinese-born US architect I M Pei, is completed in Paris, France. 1989 A US Supreme Court case undermines women's right to legal abortions by restricting abortions at facilities that receive federal funding. 1989 Abortion becomes legal in Romania after the downfall of the Ceausescu regime. 1989 Football hooliganism is a growing problem in continental Europe, as well as in Britain. In the Netherlands, 25 games are postponed because of threats of violence. 1989 Illicit drugs are being used at least once a month by 14.5 million Americans. 1989 The English artist David Hockney sends a picture by a series of faxes from his home in California to the UK, where the pieces are reassembled. 1989 The English historian Simon Schama publishes Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution. 1989 The English novelist Julian Barnes publishes his novel A History of the World in 101/2 Chapters. 1989 The English writer Martin Amis publishes his novel London Fields. 1989 The film When Harry Met Sally, directed by Rob Reiner, is released in the USA. It stars Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan. 1989 The Japanese-born English writer Kazuo Ishiguro publishes his novel Remains of the Day, which wins the Booker Prize.

1989 The percentages of women in elective offices in the USA in 1989 are: Congress 5%, state legislatures 17%, county governing boards 9%. 1989 The play Shadowlands, by the English writer William Nicholson, is first performed, at the Queen's Theatre in London, England. It is based on the life of the English writer C S Lewis. 1989 The St Lucian poet Derek Walcott publishes his long poem Omeros. 1989 The ubiquity worldwide of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles characters indicates the growing size of the world licensed merchandising market. 1989 The US computing innovator Jaron Lanier makes the experience of virtual reality possible with his design of a headset and special gloves, which will allow a user to experience and manipulate a computer generated world. 1989 The US philosopher Willard V Quine publishes Pursuit of Truth. 1989 The US writer Tobias Wolff publishes his autobiography This Boy's Life. 1989 There are over 6 million immigrants to the USA in the period 1980–9, coming mainly from Asia and the Americas. This compares with over 4 million in the period 1970–79. c. 1989 Developments in desktop publishing make high-quality print production more generally accessible. 15 January 1990 The Bulgarian National Assembly votes to end the communist monopoly on power. 22 January 1990 Yugoslavia's Communist Party votes to abolish its monopoly on power. 1 February 1990 The Bulgarian government resigns. On 8 February, a new allcommunist government is formed, dominated by the reformed Bulgarian Socialist Party. 7 February 1990 The Soviet Communist Party votes to end its monopoly on political power. 11 February 1990 The African National Congress (ANC) leader, Nelson Mandela, is released in South Africa after almost 26 years in prison. 11 February 1990 US boxer James 'Buster' Douglas wins the undisputed world heavyweight title, knocking out the champion Mike Tyson of the USA in the 10th round of their fight in Tokyo, Japan.

16 February 1990 The SWAPO leader Sam Nujoma is elected the first president of independent Namibia. On 21 February, the Republic of Namibia becomes an independent sovereign state. 24 February 1990 The opposition Sajudis ('Movement') party in Lithuania defeats the rival pro-Moscow and nationalist Communist parties in the USSR's first multiparty elections since 1917. 11 March 1990 General Augusto Pinochet, dictator of Chile since 1973, hands over power to elected president Patricio Aylwin. 11 March 1990 Lithuania declares its independence from the USSR. 15 March 1990 Mikhail Gorbachev is sworn in as the first executive president of the USSR. 18 March 1990 In East Germany's first free elections since 1933, the Alliance for Germany, a coalition led by the right-wing Christian Democratic counterpart of West Germany's ruling party, wins 48% of the vote. 26 March 1990 A 30-second television advertising slot during coverage of the Academy Awards ceremony costs US advertisers $3.5 million. 28 March 1990 The 1989 Academy Awards take place. Best Actor: Daniel Day Lewis, for My Left Foot; Best Supporting Actor: Denzel Washington, for Glory; Best Actress: Jessica Tandy, for Driving Miss Daisy; Best Supporting Actress: Brenda Fricker, for My Left Foot; Best Film: Driving Miss Daisy, directed by Bruce Beresford; Best Director: Oliver Stone, for Born on the Fourth of July. 8 April 1990 The traditionalist Hungarian Democratic Forum and its allies win a landslide victory in the Hungarian general election after the reputation of the ruling Hungarian Socialist Party is damaged by a bugging scandal. 15 April 1990 Greta Garbo, Swedish-born US film star of the 1920s and 1930s, then a legendary recluse after 1941, dies in New York City (84). 24 April 1990 The space shuttle Discovery places the Hubble Space Telescope in Earth orbit; the main mirror proves to be defective. 4 May 1990 Latvia declares itself an independent sovereign state. 8 May 1990 Estonia declares its independence from the USSR. 20 May 1990 Romania holds its first free elections since 1937. The National Salvation Front wins two thirds of the seats and its leader, Ion Iliescu, wins a landslide victory in the presidential elections. 22 May 1990 The traditionally antagonistic North and South Yemen merge to

form the Yemen Republic. 29 May 1990 In the Russian parliament, Boris Yeltsin is elected president of the Russian Federation, narrowly defeating the candidate favoured by the president of the USSR, Mikhail Gorbachev. 31 May 1990 The comedy Seinfeld is first broadcast on US television, starring Larry Seinfeld, Julia Louise-Dreyfus, Michael Richards, and Jason Alexander. May 1990 In Germany, Wella Shampoo is the first product packaged in Biopal, the first fully biodegradable plastic. 4 June 1990 Janet Adkinson of Portland, Oregon, commits suicide using the 'suicide machine', invented earlier in the year by US pathologist Jack Kevorkian, who becomes known as 'Dr Death'. 7 June 1990 President F W de Klerk lifts the four-year state of emergency from all parts of South Africa except Natal province. 8 June 1990 The Civic Forum triumphs in the first free elections in Czechoslovakia since 1946. 8 June 1990 The Russian parliament votes that its laws should take precedence over those of the USSR; on 12 June, the Russian Federation formally declares itself a sovereign state. 25 June 1990 Active homosexuals are admitted to the rabbinate by the Central Conference of American Rabbis, but the Evangelical Lutheran Church suspends two churches that have ordained homosexuals. 1 July 1990 East Germany cedes sovereignty over economic, monetary, and social policy to the West German government and the Bundesbank, with the Deutschmark becoming its official currency. 16 July 1990 The Ukrainian parliament votes for sovereignty, and the former Communist Party leader Leonid Kravchuk is indirectly elected president. 29 July 1990 Free elections are held in Mongolia, with the communist-reformist Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party, led by Punsalmaagiyn Ochirbat, winning a majority. 29 July 1990 Troops loyal to President Samuel Doe in Liberia massacre at least 600 refugees sheltering in a church in the capital, Monrovia. On 5 August, the USA sends marines to evacuate US citizens from the city. July 1990 Japanese electronics manufacturer Sony launches the Data Discman, an electronic book player that runs 8.8-cm/3.5-in disks, capable of storing up to 2,500 pages of text.

2 August 1990 Iraqi forces invade Kuwait, and the emir, Sheikh Jaber al-Sabah, flees to Saudi Arabia. 14 August 1990 The Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev issues decrees rehabilitating all those Soviet citizens who were victims of Stalin-era repression and restoring Soviet citizenship to exiled dissidents, including the writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn. 10 September 1990 Political and military groups in Cambodia, including the proVietnamese government and the Khmer Rouge, agree on a peace formula to end the country's civil war. September 1990 The Japanese company Sony launches the first DAT recorder for domestic use, the Sony DTC 55ES. 2 October 1990 The German Democratic Republic (East Germany) ceases to exist at midnight, and on 3 October, East and West Germany are formally reunited. 24 October 1990 Benazir Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party suffers an overwhelming defeat by the conservative Islamic Democratic Alliance (IDA) in the Pakistan general election. On 6 November, the IDA leader, Nawaz Sharif, is sworn in as prime minister. 7 November 1990 Mary Robinson wins the Irish presidential election to become the country's first woman president. 16–18 November 1990 The inaugural Solheim Cup competition between the women professional golfers of the USA and Europe is played at Lake Nona Golf Club, Florida. The USA wins 11.5–4.5. 28 November 1990 Margaret Thatcher resigns as British prime minister, to be succeeded by John Major. 1 December 1990 British and French tunnelling engineers, working from opposite sides of the English Channel to build the Channel Tunnel, break through the last few yards of ground separating their excavations. 2 December 1990 West German Christian Democratic chancellor Helmut Kohl is elected chancellor in the first elections of a reunited Germany. 9 December 1990 The former Solidarity leader Lech Walesa wins a landslide victory in the Polish presidential election. 13 December 1990 US pathologist Jack Kervorkian, known as 'Dr Death', is acquitted of murder charges that were filed after he assisted the suicide of a patient on 4 June. The judge rules that physician-assisted suicide is not against the law in the state of Michigan. Kervorkian will be tried for murder and acquitted three more times by 1997.

16 December 1990 Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a left-wing Roman Catholic priest, becomes president of Haiti in the country's first fully free elections. 1990 Twin Peaks and The Simpsons are the two new hits of the year on US television. 1990 A four-year-old girl in the USA has the gene for adenosine deaminase inserted into her DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid); she is the first person to receive gene therapy. 1990 About 120 million Americans, or 40% of the population, live in suburbs. 1990 According to the US Census Bureau, 28% of Americans are obese, including 30% of women and 38% of black Americans. 1990 Divorce rates (divorces per 1,000 of the population) in selected countries in 1990 are: France, 1.87; Germany, 1.94; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 2.88; USA, 4.7 (rate for 1988); USSR, 3.94 (rate for 1989). 1990 For the first time, the majority of the US population lives in metropolitan areas. 1990 Households in the USA headed by a single woman total 16.7%, compared to 9.3% in 1950. 1990 In the USA, 21% of citizens have completed at least four years of college (whites 22%; blacks 11%; Hispanics 9%), up from 8% in 1960. 1990 In the USA, 78% of citizens have completed at least four years of high school (whites 79%; blacks 66%; Hispanics 51%), up from 41% in 1960. Mississippi has the largest population of citizens that have not completed high school, 36%; while Utah has the lowest, 15%. 1990 Life expectation at birth for men/women in selected countries: Australia, 74/80; Brazil, 62/68; Canada, 73/80; China, 68/71; France, 73/78; Ghana, 42/43; Great Britain and Northern Ireland, 73/78; India, 55/56; Japan, 76/82; Kenya, 55/60; Mexico, 70/75; USA, 72/79; USSR, 65/74; West Germany, 72/78. 1990 More than 1,400 Muslim pilgrims are crushed to death in Saudi Arabia, in a stampede in an overcrowded tunnel leading from Mecca to the hill outside. 1990 Out of 34,400 doctors' degrees awarded in the USA, 12,900 are to women. 1990 Populations (in millions): Mexico City, Mexico, 18.7; Cairo, Egypt, 14.0; Shanghai, China, 12.8; Tokyo, Japan, 11.9; Beijing, China, 10.4; São Paulo, Brazil, 10.1; Seoul, South Korea, 10.0; Calcutta (now Kolkata), India, 9.2; Paris, France, 9.1; Moscow, Russia, 8.9.

1990 Researchers at IBM's Almaden Research Center in California, USA, are the first to manipulate individual atoms on a surface; they use a scanning tunnelling microscope and spell out the initials 'IBM'. 1990 The British company Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) develops the first practical biodegradable plastic, Biopal. 1990 The crime rate against women in the USA is significantly higher than in other countries. The USA has a rape rate 13 times that in England – every hour, 16 women in the USA confront rapists and a woman is raped every six minutes – 4 times that in Germany, and 20 times that in Japan. 1990 The English writer A S Byatt publishes her novel Possession: A Romance, which wins the Booker Prize. 1990 The film Truly, Madly, Deeply, directed by Anthony Minghella, is released in the UK, starring Juliet Stevenson and Alan Rickman. 1990 The gangster film GoodFellas, co-written and directed by Martin Scorsese, is released in the USA. It stars Ray Liotta, Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Lorraine Bracco, and Paul Sorvino. 1990 The Motion Picture Association of America attempts to introduce a No Children Under 17 rating as a guideline in the USA. However, cinemas refuse to show such films, so the rating is dropped for major films. 1990 The number of fast-food stores in the USA grows to 119,000 from only 67,290 in 1980. 1990 The opera Das verratene Meer/The Revealed Sea by the German composer Hans Werner Henze is first performed, in Berlin, Germany. Based on a novel by the Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima, it was completed in 1989. 1990 The play Dancing at Lughnasa, by the Irish writer Brian Friel, is first performed, at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, Ireland. 1990 The population of the USA is 249,632,692. 1990 The success of the television cartoon series The Simpsons, featuring Bart Simpson and family, significantly boosts the ratings for Rupert Murdoch's Fox channel in the USA. 1990 The Trinidadian writer V S Naipaul publishes India: A Wounded Civilization. 1990 The US feminist writer Naomi Wolf publishes The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty are Used Against Women. 1990 The US telecommunications equipment company PhoneMate launches the

digital answering machine ADAM, the first with messages stored on a silicon chip rather than tape. 1990 There are 188,798,000 cars, trucks, and buses in the USA. 1990 There are 2 women out of 986 chief executives working for 1,000 of the largest US public corporations. In another survey of 799 major companies ranked by Fortune magazine, there are 19 women among 3,993 directors and executives. Of those 19 women, 18 are white. 1990 Two-thirds of US families own their own homes, about double the home ownership rate in Germany, France, Britain, and Japan. 1990 Women comprise 11% of US military troops, the highest percentage to date. 1990 World population distribution by continents, in percentages of the total world population (compared with percentages in 1950) is as follows: Asia, 58.8 (54.7); Europe, 9.4 (15.6); Africa, 12.1 (8.8); USSR, 5.4 (7.2); Latin America, 8.5 (6.6); North America, 5.2 (6.6) 16 January 1991 A US-led coalition commences air offensive 'Operation Desert Storm' to liberate Kuwait from Iraqi occupation, beginning the Gulf War. 24 January 1991 Iraq begins to pump Kuwaiti oil into the Gulf during the Gulf War, creating the world's largest oil spill. About 6–8 million barrels of oil are spilled, polluting 675 km/420 mi of coastline. 25 January 1991 US federal health officials announce that 100,777 people have died from AIDS since the discovery of the disease in 1981. 22 February–3 November 1991 Hundreds of Kuwaiti oil wells are set alight by Iraqi soldiers during the Gulf War; the last fire is extinguished on 3 November. 27 February 1991 Coalition forces enter the capital Kuwait City and declare Kuwait liberated from the Iraqis. 1 March 1991 A popular revolt against the government of Saddam Hussein begins in Basra, Iraq, and spreads to other Shiite cities; at the same time a separate Kurdish revolt starts in the north. 3 March 1991 A nationwide outcry follows the televising in the USA of video footage showing the black motorist Rodney King being beaten by four white policeman in Los Angeles, California. 3 March 1991 An armistice is signed by leaders of the international coalition and the Iraqi army, ending the Gulf War (in force from 11 April). 13 March 1991 The British newspaper publisher and businessman Robert Maxwell

purchases the New York Daily News. 20 March 1991 The 1990 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Jeremy Irons, for Reversal of Fortune; Best Supporting Actor: Joe Pesci, for GoodFellas; Best Actress: Kathy Bates, for Misery; Best Supporting Actress: Whoopi Goldberg, for Ghost; Best Director: Kevin Costner, for Dances with Wolves; Best Film: Dances with Wolves, directed by Kevin Costner. 25 March 1991 Iraqi government forces bomb the city of Kirkuk in northeast Iraq, held by Kurdish rebels; by 30 March the Iraqi government has recovered most of the country. 31 March 1991 The military structure of the Warsaw Pact (formed in 1955 between the USSR and East European communist states) is formally dissolved. 1 April 1991 Martha Graham, US choreographer of modern dance, dies in New York City (96). 3 April 1991 Graham Greene, English novelist, dies in Vevey, Switzerland (86). 4 April 1991 The US Environmental Protection Agency announces ozone layer depletion at twice the speed previously predicted. 9 April 1991 The Soviet republic of Georgia votes for independence from the USSR. 16 April 1991 Tornadoes strike seven midwestern and southwestern states in the USA, killing 23 people. 15 May 1991 The socialist politician Edith Cresson becomes the first woman prime minister of France, following the resignation of Michel Rocard. 18–26 May 1991 English chemist Helen Sharman becomes the first Briton to go into space, as a participant in a Soviet space mission launched in Soyuz TM-12. She spends six days with Soviet cosmonauts aboard the Mir space station. 28 May 1991 The Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) captures the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa, overthrowing the established Marxist government. 31 May 1991 The Angolan president José dos Santos of the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and Jonas Savimbi, leader of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), sign a peace agreement in Lisbon, Portugal, to end the civil war in Angola which has been fought since independence in 1975. 5 June 1991 South Africa ends discriminatory land legislation, dismantling the legal framework of apartheid.

6 June 1991 The Greek Orthodox Church suspends its membership of the National Council of Churches, the USA's largest ecumenical organization, citing the council's liberalism on matters of abortion and homosexuality. 25 June 1991 The republics of Croatia and Slovenia declare independence from Yugoslavia. June 1991 Mount Pinatubo on Luzon, in the Philippines, erupts in the thirdlargest eruption this century. Clouds of ash are sent 20 km/12 mi into the atmosphere along with the greatest volume of sulphur dioxide ever measured. Timely warnings lead to the evacuation of 56,000 people and there are only a few deaths. 1 July 1991 A law passed by Congress extending the employment rights of mentally ill Americans goes into effect. Among other provisions, employers cannot ask job applicants if they have a history of mental illness. 5 July 1991 The Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) collapses after the discovery of massive fraud and involvement in organized crime, arms dealing, and the drug trade. 8 July 1991 Slovenia's independence is recognized by the federal government of Yugoslavia. 19 July 1991 The General Convention of the Episcopal Church issues a compromise statement on homosexuality, affirming that sexual relations should be limited to marriage but noting that not all church members agree with the statement. 25 July 1991 Police in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, arrest Jeffrey L Dahmer and charge him with the serial murder of 17 victims. Dahmer later confesses to the crimes and on 17 February 1992 is sentenced to 15 consecutive life terms in prison. 31 July 1991 The US president George Bush and the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev sign the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) to reduce their arsenals of long-range nuclear weapons by a third. 19 August 1991 Reactionary communists led by Gennady Yanayev stage a coup against the Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev, who is placed under house arrest in the Crimea; radio and television stations are shut down and military rule imposed in many cities. 20 August 1991 The Soviet republic of Estonia declares its independence from the USSR. 21 August 1991 The coup in the USSR against President Mikhail Gorbachev fails; Gorbachev returns to Moscow the following day.

21 August 1991 The Soviet republic of Latvia declares its independence from the USSR. 30 August 1991 In the third World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, Japan, Mike Powell of the USA sets a new world record for the long jump of 8.95 m/29 ft 4.5 in, beating the record set by Bob Beamon of the USA in 1968 – the oldest in track and field athletics. 3 September 1991 Frank Capra, Italian-born US film director who directed It's a Wonderful Life and Mr Smith Goes to Washington, dies in La Quinta, California (94). 22 September 1991 The Soviet republic of Armenia declares its independence from the USSR. 24 September 1991 Dr Seuss (pseudonym of Theodore Seuss Geisel), US writer of children's books, dies in La Jolla, California (87). 8 October 1991 Having overthrown President Jean Bertrand Aristide on 30 September, the military install Judge Joseph Norette as provisional president of Haiti. 18 October 1991 A peace agreement is signed in Rome, Italy, to end civil war in Mozambique between the government and Mozambique National Resistance (MNR) rebels. 20–23 October 1991 Twenty-three people die and 2,777 homes and 433 apartment units are destroyed by fire in Oakland, California. The property damage is valued at more than $5 billion. 24 October 1991 Gene Roddenberry, US writer and film and television producer who created Star Trek, dies in Santa Monica, California (70). 8 November–2 December 1991 European Community foreign ministers decide to impose immediate economic and trade sanctions against Yugoslavia in response to the sieges of Vukovar and Dubrovnik in Croatia by the Serb-dominated Yugoslav national army; on 2 December the sanctions are dropped against all republics except Serbia and Montenegro. 14 November 1991 Prince Norodom Sihanouk returns to Cambodia after 13 years' exile as president of a multi-faction Supreme National Council. 5 December 1991 Leonid Kravchuk becomes president of Ukraine on its formal accession to independence from the USSR. 8 December 1991 The leaders of the Soviet republics of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine agree to the formation of a Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) to replace the USSR.

9–10 December 1991 A summit of European Community heads of government in Maastricht, the Netherlands, agrees the Maastricht Treaty on closer economic and political union (Britain obtains the right to abstain from social legislation and a single currency). 25 December 1991 Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as president of the USSR, which officially ceased to exist on 9 December. 1991 A nationwide poll in the USA indicates that 61% of women feel that they have been subjected to sexual harassment while at work; only 4% report the incidents. 1991 A study in the USA reveals that women hold 45% of all government jobs, but just 31% of upper-level positions in government agencies. 1991 A US government study finds that on average black Americans die six years earlier than white Americans. 1991 A US government survey finds that among the nation's ethnic groups, Hispanics have the highest rates of diabetes, high blood pressure, kidney disease, and some cancers. 1991 Andrew Morton writes Diana: Her True Story, a biography of the Princess of Wales, with the collaboration of her friends. 1991 Following the death from AIDS of the British rock group Queen's lead singer Freddie Mercury, the single 'Bohemian Rhapsody' is re-released and goes to number one in the UK charts for the second time. 1991 In the grip of the longest recession since the 1930s, unemployment in Britain stands at 2.5 million and house repossessions at 80,000 for the year. 1991 In the USA, 21% of prison inmates are aged between 18 and 24, 46% between 25 and 34, and 23% between 35 and 44. 1991 In the USA, 66% of single women over 16 and 58% of married women hold jobs. 1991 In the USA, 7.6 million people subscribe to cellular phone services. 1991 Japanese electronics companies Sega and Nintendo compete for the lucrative console games market. Sega's 'Sonic the Hedgehog' is matched against Nintendo's 'Super Mario Brothers'. 1991 Several US companies introduce local area networks (LANs), which use nondirectional microwaves to transmit data as fast as fibre optic cables.

1991 Studies reveal that one in four babies in the USA is born out of wedlock. 1991 The 'coffee culture' emerges in Seattle, Washington, personified, in part, by the national success of the Seattle-based purveyors of gourmet coffee, Starbuck's. 1991 The body of a man, complete with clothing, bow, arrows, a copper axe, and other implements, is found preserved in a glacier in the Italian Alps. Known as the 'iceman', he is estimated to be 5,300 years old. The discovery leads to a reappraisal of the boundary between the Bronze and the Stone Age. 1991 The British firm Virtuality launches its first commercial virtual reality products: games machines in arcades where players wear head-mounted displays. 1991 The Canadian writer Douglas Coupland's novel Generation X identifies a generation of disillusioned twentysomethings with little hope for the future. 1991 The Dutch electronics company Philips launches the Compact Disc Interactive (CD-I) in the USA, a multimedia technology that is viewed using a special player on a television set. 1991 The English composer Michael Tippett completes his String Quartet No. 5. 1991 The English composer John Tavener completes his choral work Icon of the Nativity and his chamber work The Last Sleep of the Virgin. 1991 The English philosopher Michael Dummett publishes The Logical Basis of Metaphysics. 1991 The English writer Angela Carter publishes her last novel Wise Children. 1991 The English writer Pat Barker publishes her novel Regeneration, the first part of her Regeneration trilogy. 1991 The film Reservoir Dogs, directed by Quentin Tarantino, is released in the USA, starring Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, and Steve Buscemi. 1991 The film The Commitments, directed by Alan Parker, is released in Britain. Based on the novel by Irish author Roddy Doyle, it stars Robert Arkins, Michael Aherne, Bronagh Gallagher, and Andrew Strong. 1991 The film The Silence of the Lambs, directed by Jonathan Demme, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Thomas Harris, it stars Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins. 1991 The film Thelma and Louise, directed by the English film-maker Ridley Scott, is released in the USA, starring Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis.

1991 The Gulf War is the first war in which laser weapons are used extensively. 1991 The Japanese electronics company Sony launches the Mini Disk in Japan and the USA. It holds 74 minutes of music and is 6.4 cm/2.5 in in diameter. 1991 The Nigerian writer Ben Okri publishes his novel The Famished Road, which wins the Booker Prize. 1991 The number of black–white marriages in the USA has tripled since 1970. 1991 The play Lost in Yonkers, by the US dramatist Neil Simon, is first performed in New York City. It wins him the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. 1991 The play The Madness of George III, by the English writer Alan Bennett, is first performed, in London, England. 1991 The resurgence in use of the hallucinogenic drug LSD in the UK and the USA is accompanied by the development of ambient techno music. 1991 The US Census Bureau reports that from 1984 to 1988 the income of the richest 20% grew by 14% but that nationwide the median income dropped from $37,012 to $35,752. 1991 The US philosopher Thomas Nagel publishes Equality and Partiality. 1991 The US pop singer Michael Jackson releases the album Dangerous. 1991 The US rock group Nirvana releases the album Nevermind; it marks the advent of grunge music, much of it coming from Seattle, Washington. 1991 The US rock group REM releases the single 'Losing My Religion' and the album Out of Time. 1991 The US toy manufacturer Larami introduces the Super Soaker water gun which can shoot jets of water 90 ft/25 m, and Tiger Toys launches the action figure Captain Planet, based on the US television series. 1991 The US writer Adrienne Rich publishes her poetry collection An Atlas of the Difficult World. 1991 The US writer John Ashbery publishes his long poem Flow Chart. 1991 The world population is 5.5 billion, compared with 3.63 billion in 1970. 1991 There are 40 major labour strikes in the USA this year, involving 392,000 workers. 1991 There are 695,000 inmates in US state prisons and 60,000 more in federal

prisons, an 80,000 increase in the prison population over the previous year. 1991 Unemployment in the USA reaches 7.1%, the highest level in six years. 1991 US linguist Noam Chomsky publishes Deterring Democracy. 1991 US pathologist Jack Kervorkian, known as 'Dr Death', publishes Prescription: Medicide: The Goodness of Planned Death, a book advocating physician-assisted suicide. 1991 Women's fashions in the USA include longer hemlines for skirts, often reaching to mid-calf. c. 1991 Computer viruses, programs deliberately constructed and disseminated to damage existing data, become more destructive. The development of 'disinfection' programs takes off as a result. c. 1991 Ecotourism, an attempt to make tourist travel environmentally aware and constructive, goes mainstream with the development of eco package tours. Ecotourism features visits to scenic, 'natural', or endangered environmental sites, with emphasis on balancing the needs of the local economy and the desires of the tourist with environmental needs. Favourite sites are rain forests, African game reserves, and the Galapagos islands. c. 1991 Extreme sports, such as bungee jumping, snowboarding, and sky-surfing, are becoming increasingly popular. c. 1991 Manufacturers begin to introduce more recyclable materials into their packaging. 11–12 January 1992 President Chadli Benjedid of Algeria resigns as armed forces take control to thwart electoral victory by the Islamic Salvation Front. The High Security Council cancels the second round of elections on 12 January. 12 March 1992 Mauritius becomes a republic within the British Commonwealth. 17 March 1992 The white electorate in South Africa votes for constitutional and political reform in a referendum (68.6 % vote in favour). 19 March 1992 The British royal family announces the separation of the Duke and Duchess of York, who were married in 1986. 22 March 1992 The opposition Democrat Party in Albania wins an absolute majority in general elections, ending 45 years of communist rule. 29 March 1992 The comedy Ellen (called These Friends of Mine in the first season) begins on US television, starring Ellen DeGeneres.

30 March 1992 The 1991 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Anthony Hopkins, for The Silence of the Lambs; Best Supporting Actor: Jack Palance, for City Slickers; Best Actress: Jodie Foster, for The Silence of the Lambs; Best Supporting Actress: Mercedes Ruehl, for The Fisher King; Best Director: Jonathan Demme, for The Silence of the Lambs; Best Film: The Silence of the Lambs, directed by Jonathan Demme. 6 April 1992 Isaac Asimov, US science fiction writer, dies in New York City (72). 7 April 1992 The European Community formally recognizes the independence of the former Yugoslav republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina; fighting escalates as the Yugoslav federal air force aids Serb forces. 9 April 1992 A British general election confounds the predictions of opinion pollsters by returning the Conservatives for a fourth term in government, though with a reduced majority of 21. The Conservatives win 336 seats, Labour 271, and the Liberal Democrats 20 (the Conservatives receive 41.9% of votes cast, Labour 34.4%, and the Liberal Democrats 17.8%). 9 April 1992 A federal court in Miami, Florida, finds former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega guilty of several charges of cocaine trafficking and money laundering. On July 10 he receives a 40-year jail sentence. 12 April 1992 The theme park EuroDisney (later Disneyland Paris) opens at Marne-la-Vallée, just outside Paris, France. Development has cost $4.5 billion. 23 April 1992 Princess Anne, the Princess Royal of Britain, is granted a divorce from Captain Mark Phillips. 23 April 1992 Satyajit Ray, Indian film director, dies in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India (70). 29 April 1992 Four white policemen in Los Angeles, California, are acquitted of beating the black motorist Rodney King; between 30 April and 3 May, 58 people die in riots and looting which break out in protest at the acquittals. 12 May 1992 The General Conference of the United Methodist Church declares that homosexual behaviour conflicts with Christian teachings. 24 May 1992 General Suchinda Kraprayaon steps down as Thailand's prime minister following protests demanding reform; the following day a reform bill is introduced into the House of Representatives. 3 June 1992 US presidential candidate Bill Clinton plays the saxophone on the US television programme The Arsenio Hall Show. 3–14 June 1992 The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development is held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is attended by delegates from

178 countries, most of whom sign binding conventions to combat global warming and to preserve biodiversity (the latter is not signed by the USA). 18 June 1992 Thirty-nine people are killed in the 'Boipatong massacre' in South Africa, allegedly by Inkatha supporters. Two days later police fire on black residents in Boipatong. 24 June 1992 The US Supreme Court opens the way for damage suits by cigarette smokers against the tobacco companies when it rules that the warning labels on cigarette packages do not exempt the manufacturers from lawsuits. 1 July 1992 The Roman Catholic Church orders its US bishops to oppose any laws that promote the public acceptance of homosexuality. 1 August 1992 At the Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain, the Jamaican-born British sprinter Linford Christie wins the men's 100-metres title. At the age of 32, he is the oldest-ever winner of the event by four years. 22–26 August 1992 Five nights of serious rioting at a reception centre for asylum seekers in Rostock marks a resurgence of antiforeigner violence in eastern Germany. 24 August 1992 Hurricane Andrew strikes the coast of south Florida, killing 38 people and leaving about 250,000 people without homes and causing $30 billion of property damage. Insurance claims make this the most expensive natural disaster in US history. 27 August 1992 The USA, Britain, and France impose an air exclusion zone in southern Iraq to protect Shiite Muslims from air attacks by the forces of the Iraqi president Saddam Hussein. 28 August 1992 Typhoon Omar strikes Guam, a US territory in the Pacific, damaging about one-eighth of the island's 32,000 homes. 16 September 1992 In a European monetary crisis, the British chancellor of the Exchequer, Norman Lamont, increases the base rate from 10% to 12%, then to 15% in an attempt to defend the pound against speculative selling; sterling, the lira, and the peseta all fall below their Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) floors; sterling is withdrawn from the ERM and allowed to 'float', and the base rate returns to 12% (cut to 9% on 22 September). 17 September 1992 The Italian lira is suspended from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) and the Spanish peseta is devalued by 5%. 18 September 1992 Picket Fences is first broadcast on US television. Set in the fictional small town of Rome, Wisconsin, it stars Kathy Baker and Tom Skerritt, and deals with a range of issues from the topical, such as drunk driving or rape, to the bizarre, such as spontaneous human combustion.

20 September 1992 A French referendum produces a vote narrowly (51.04%) in favour of ratification of the Maastricht Treaty on European, as agreed in the Netherlands on 10 December 1991. 23 September 1992 The comedy Mad About You begins on US television. Based around the lives of a young married couple in New York City, it stars Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt. 25 September 1992 A court in Orlando, Florida allows a 12-year-old boy to divorce his parents, permitting him to be adopted by his foster parents as he wishes. His natural parents had demanded custody. 29–30 September 1992 Angola's first multiparty elections are held; the results, announced on 17 October, give victory for José dos Santos's ruling Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola–Workers' Party (MPLA–PT). 19 October 1992 Petra Kelly, German political activist, cofounder of the Green Party, dies in Bonn, Germany (44). 1 November 1992 Smoking is banned in all public places in France. The ban is generally ignored. 7 November 1992 Bill (William Jefferson) Clinton (Democrat), the governor of Arkansas, wins the US presidential election with 370 electoral college votes. President George Bush (Republican) gains 168 electoral votes and H Ross Perot (Independent) fails to win any, although he takes 19% of the popular vote. In the Congressional elections the Democrats retain control of both chambers. 27 November 1992 Alexander Dubcek, Czechoslovak communist leader 1968–69 whose liberal policies led to the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia (now the Czech and Slovak Republics), dies in Prague, Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic) (70). 30 November–4 December 1992 The South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) wins a landslide victory in elections in Namibia. November 1992 The US national on-line information service Delphi becomes the first national US service to open a gateway to the Internet. 9 December 1992 The separation of Charles and Diana, Prince and Princess of Wales, is announced in Britain. 1992 973,977 people immigrate to and settle in the USA. 1992 A study finds that Americans work 140 more hours a year than in 1970 and that vacation, sick leave, and days off have declined by 15% in the same period. 1992 A survey finds Americans are giving less of their income to charity; in 1979

Americans donated 7% of their after-tax incomes to charity as opposed to just 4% in 1992. 1992 A US survey finds that football is the favourite sport to watch on television, with 38% of the public favouring it, as compared to 16% for baseball and 12% for basketball. 1992 Actor and director Woody Allen and his partner, actor Mia Farrow, go to court in the USA to fight over the custody of their children. 1992 In Sydney, Australia, Liesel Scholem becomes the first person to be awarded damages in compensation for passive smoking suffered in the workplace. 1992 In the USA, 60% of households receive cable television. 1992 Legislation is passed in the USA levying a tax on Digital Audio Tape, Digital Compact Cassette, and MiniDisk recorders and the blank cassettes they use, in order to create a pool of money for copyright holders, allegedly deprived of revenue by home-recording. 1992 Music compact discs begin to outsell cassettes in the USA. 1992 The American Telephone and Telegraph company (AT&T) launches a system of personal telephone numbers in the USA. Subscribers can get a number for life, including numbers created from words, such as 700-FLOWERS. 1992 The American Telephone and Telegraph company (AT&T) launches a personal colour videophone. The 7.5 cm/3 in model was developed by Compression Laboratories in California. 1992 The electronics companies Matsushita and Philips launch the Digital Compact Cassette. 1992 The English artist Damian Hirst creates The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living, a shark preserved in a tank of formaldehyde. 1992 The film The Player, directed by Robert Altman, is released in the USA, starring Tim Robbins, and featuring many Hollywood stars in cameo roles. 1992 The film Unforgiven, directed by Clint Eastwood, is released in the USA. He also stars in it, along with Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman, and Richard Harris. 1992 The film Wayne's World, directed by Penelope Spheeris, is released in the USA, starring Mike Myers and Dana Carvey and based on their regular routine on the US television programme Saturday Night Live. 1992 The French electronics company Micromega, licensed by the Dutch company Philips, launches a recordable compact disc player (at a price of

£4,500). Recordable discs cost £13. 1992 The Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, is opened. Covering 78 acres, it is the biggest shopping mall in the world. 1992 The percentage of Americans living in poverty rises for the second consecutive year, reaching 14.2% of the population. 1992 The play Oleanna, by the US writer David Mamet, is first performed in New York City. 1992 The Rock the Vote campaign, involving groups such as REM, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Pearl Jam, is set up in the USA to encourage young people to vote. The MTV channel is a major supporter of the campaign, running frequent public service advertisements. 1992 The Swiss medical company Ciba-Geigy Pharmaceuticals launches Nicotinell, a nicotine patch for people who want to give up smoking, available over the counter. 1992 The US biologist Philip Leder receives a patent for the first genetically engineered animal, the oncomouse, which is sensitive to carcinogens. 1992 The US company Pharmacal launches Femidom, a female condom originally developed for use in the developing world. 1992 The US composer Elliott Carter completes his work for oboe and harp Trilogy. 1992 The US rock group REM releases the album Automatic for the People. 1992 The use of the drug ecstasy becomes increasingly popular at clubs and raves in the UK and the USA. c. 1992 Companies worldwide begin to market 'clear products' – colour- and often additive-free – to meet a trend for greater simplicity after the excesses of the 1980s. c. 1992 The Belgian fashion designers Dries Van Noten, Ann Demeulemeester, and Martin Margiela 'deconstruct' fashion, producing a range of clothes in drab colours and often unfinished in appearance, in reaction against the over-designed fashions of the 1980s. 1 January 1993 The Czech and Slovak republics become separate sovereign countries. 1 January 1993 The European Community's single market comes into force, establishing the free movement of goods, capital, and services across national

borders, with some restrictions. 3 January 1993 The US president George Bush and the Russian president Boris Yeltsin sign the second Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START II), committing the USA and Russia to dismantle two-thirds of their nuclear warheads. 13 January 1993 Allied forces carry out air strikes against targets in southern Iraq following Iraq's refusal to remove missiles stationed south of the 32nd parallel (the Shiite exclusion zone). January 1993 The science fiction program Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is broadcast on US television. A further Star Trek spin-off, it stars Avery Brooks, Rene Auberjonois, Nana Visitor, Terry Ternell, Colm Meaney, and Siddig El Fadi. 6 February 1993 Arthur Ashe, US tennis player and the first black man to win a major men's singles championship, dies in New York City (49). 11 February 1993 Sir Ranulph Fiennes and Dr Michael Stroud of Britain complete the first unsupported crossing of Antarctica on foot, having covered 2,160 km/1,350 mi in 95 days. 12 March 1993 Prime Minister Paul Keating's Labor Party wins a fifth consecutive victory in the general elections in Australia. 20 March 1993 The United Nations (UN) supervises the evacuation of civilians from the Muslim enclave of Srebrenica in Bosnia-Herzegovina, besieged for almost a year (the siege ends on 18 April). 28 March 1993 The 1992 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Al Pacino, for Scent of a Woman; Best Supporting Actor: Gene Hackman, for Unforgiven; Best Actress: Emma Thompson, for Howards End; Best Supporting Actress: Marisa Tomei, for My Cousin Vinny; Best Director: Clint Eastwood, for Unforgiven; Best Film: Unforgiven, directed by Clint Eastwood. 29 March 1993 Edouard Balladur becomes prime minister of France after victory for the right-wing Rally for the Republic –Union for French Democracy (RPR–UDF) alliance in elections; the ruling Socialist Party retains only 54 of its 252 seats. 31 March 1993 The US unemployment rate is 7%, down from 7.3% the previous year. 19 April 1993 The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) storms the compound of the Branch Davidian cult in Waco, Texas (under siege since 28 February); over 80 people die when cult members set fire to the compound. 6 May 1993 The United Nations Security Council declares 'safe areas' in Sarajevo, Tuzla, Zepa, Goradze, Bihac, and Srebrenica in Bosnia-Herzegovina; in spite of this, Bosnian Serbs attack Goradze and Srebrenica on 30 May.

7 May 1993 Multiparty talks in Johannesburg, South Africa, reach agreement for the holding of nonracial elections by April 1994. 13 May 1993 The USA formally abandons the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), its attempt to build a laser defence system against ballistic missile attack. 16 May 1993 German troops are sent to Somalia as part of the United Nations (UN) peacekeeping force; this is the first time since their incorporation into NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) that they have served outside Europe. 18 May 1993 In a second referendum, Denmark approves the Maastricht Treaty on European union by a narrow majority, following the granting of concessions on its implementation. 24 May 1993 Eritrea formally becomes independent from Ethiopia, after a 30year civil war. 29 May 1993 Five Turkish women are killed in a neo-Nazi arson attack in Solingen, Germany (Turkish demonstrations and rioting throughout Germany in response to this attack continue until 1 June). 5 June 1993 The US jockey Julia Krone rides Colonial Affair to victory in the Belmont Stakes, New York, to become the first woman jockey to win a US Triple Crown race. 25 June 1993 Kim Campbell, Progressive Conservative, becomes the first woman prime minister of Canada, following the resignation of Brian Mulroney. 18 July 1993 Having governed Japan since 1955, the Liberal Democrats lose their overall majority in the general elections. 2 August 1993 Following speculative pressure on currencies in the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM), the mechanism collapses and currencies are allowed to fluctuate within a broad band of 15% on either side of central rates. 5 August 1993 The government of Sudan launches a major offensive against the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), displacing 100,000 people and threatening famine. 6 August 1993 The royal family opens Buckingham Palace, London, England, to the general public. Vistors pay £8 a head. 15 August 1993 Juan Carlos Wasmosy becomes the first elected president of Paraguay since the country's foundation in 1811. 26 August 1993 The US pop singer Michael Jackson, in the face of allegations of child abuse made on 17 August, withdraws from part of his world tour, and loses

his sponsorship from Pepsi on 13 November. He later makes an out-of-court settlement with the boy involved, Jordy Chandler. 5 September 1993 The Algerian runner Noureddine Morceli sets a new world mile record of 3 minutes 44.39 seconds at Rieti, Italy. 9 September 1993 Two hundred civilians are killed when a US helicopter on United Nations (UN) peacekeeping duty fires on a crowd in Mogadishu, Somalia. 10 September 1993 The television programme the X-Files is first broadcast in the USA. Created by Chris Carter, it stars David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson as FBI agents investigating strange phenomena. 16 September 1993 The comedy programme Frasier begins on US television. A spin-off from Cheers, it stars Kelsey Grammer as Dr Frasier Crane, with David Hyde Pierce, John Mahoney, Peri Gilpen, and Jane Leeves. 21 September 1993 The Russian president Boris Yeltsin suspends the Russian parliament and calls elections; the Supreme Soviet defies this action and swears in Alexander Rutskoi as president. 27 September 1993 The White House in Moscow, seat of the Russian parliament, is sealed off by troops (telephone links and water and electricity supplies have already been cut off). 4 October 1993 Rebels holding out in the Moscow parliament building surrender after attacks by pro-Yeltsin forces; a state of emergency remains in force in Russia until 18 October. 8 October 1993 The international community lifts sanctions against South Africa in response to African National Congress (ANC) leader Nelson Mandela's speech of 24 September requesting this. 11 October 1993 Georgia joins the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the last of the former Soviet republics to do so. 21 October 1993 President Melchior Ndadaye (Burundi's first Hutu president) and other senior ministers are killed during an attempted coup by the Tutsidominated army. 25 October 1993 The Liberal Party wins a decisive victory in the Canadian general elections; the Progressive Conservative Party, in office since 1984, retains only two seats, while the Bloc Québecois becomes the second-largest party. 31 October 1993 Federico Fellini, Italian film director, dies in Rome, Italy (73). 1 November 1993 The Maastricht Treaty on European union comes into force;

the European Community becomes the European Union (EU). 17 November 1993 A military coup ends a brief period of civilian rule in Nigeria; defence minister General Sanni Abacha takes over as head of state. 7 December 1993 The Hubble Space Telescope (placed in Earth orbit in 1990) is repaired and reboosted into a nearly circular orbit by five US astronauts operating from the US space shuttle Endeavour – at a cost of $360 million. 12 December 1993 In legislative elections in Russia, the largest share of the vote (22.8%) goes to the ultra-nationalist Liberal Democratic Party of Russia led by Vladimir Zhirinovsky; voters approve President Boris Yeltsin's draft constitution in a simultaneous referendum. 15 December 1993 The 'Uruguay Round' of negotiations for a revised General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT, started in September 1986) end in Geneva, Switzerland; 117 nations agree the GATT Final Act. 1993 37% of black households in the USA fall into the lowest fifth of the population for household income, while 9% of black households fall into in the highest fifth. 1993 A US survey reveals that 51.1 million workers, or 46% of the labour force, use computers for their work; the most popular application is word processing. 1993 In Britain, the government attempts to counter the growth of raves and house parties by placing restrictions on freedom of movement and gatherings in the form of curfews. 1993 In the USA, 68% of black babies and 24% of white babies are born to unmarried mothers. 1993 Legislation is introduced in the Netherlands to protect doctors involved in cases of euthanasia, effectively legalizing the practice. 1993 Men in the USA are 18% more likely to be involved in an accident than women. 1993 Mosaic, the first graphical browser that allows pictures from the Internet to be seen, is developed at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois, USA. 1993 Music compact discs are outselling cassettes in Britain. 1993 Personal computers based on the first 64-bit processor, the Intel Pentium chip, go on sale in the USA. 1993 Personal digital assistants, the Amstrad PenPad and the Apple Newton

MessagePad, are launched. These are electronic personal organizers with the facility to convert handwriting to typed text. 1993 The Australian writer David Malouf publishes his novel Remembering Babylon. 1993 The average US family donates $880, or 2% of total income, a year to charity, up from $790 in 1987. 1993 The British rock group Radiohead releases the album The Bends. 1993 The film Jurassic Park, directed by Steven Spielberg, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Michael Crichton, it stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough, and Bob Peck. 1993 The film Schindler's List, directed by Steven Spielberg, is released in the USA. Based on Thomas Keneally's Booker Prize-winning book Schindler's Ark, it stars Liam Neeson, Ben Kingsley, and Ralph Fiennes. 1993 The film Short Cuts, directed by Robert Altman, is released in the USA. Based on short stories by Raymond Carver, it has an all-star cast, which includes Tim Robbins, Andie MacDowell, Anne Archer, and Jack Lemmon. 1993 The film Trois Couleurs: Bleu/Three Colours Blue, directed by Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Kieslowski, is released in France, starring Juliette Binoche. It is the first in a trilogy of films, and is followed by Trois Couleurs: Blanc/Three Colours White (1994) and Trois Couleurs: Rouge/Three Colours Red (1994). 1993 The Fire Station in Weil An Rhein, Germany, designed by the English architect Zaha Hadid, is completed. 1993 The Icelandic singer Björk releases the album Debut. 1993 The Indian writer Vikram Seth publishes his novel A Suitable Boy in India. 1993 The infant mortality rate in the USA is 8.4 per 1,000 live births, down from 12.6 in 1980. The rate is 16.5 for black babies and 6.8 for white babies. 1993 The Irish writer Roddy Doyle publishes his novel Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, which wins the Booker Prize. 1993 The popularity of grunge music establishes a fashion trend for checked shirts, ripped jeans, and combat boots, the latter often worn with feminine dresses. 1993 The US philosopher Larry S Temkin publishes Inequality. 1993 The US rock singer Sheryl Crow releases the album Tuesday Night Music

Club. 1993 The US writer Adrienne Rich publishes her critical work What is Found There: Notebooks on Poetry and Politics. 1993 The US writer James Merrill publishes his memoir A Different Person Memoir. 1993 The world chess champion Garry Kasparov of Azerbaijan and the number one challenger for his title, the English player Nigel Short, break away from the International Chess Federation (FIDE), the established governing body for the game, to form the Professional Chess Association (PCA). Kasparov was stripped of his FIDE title, which was regained by the former champion Anatoly Karpov of Russia. However, Kasparov, who defeated Short 12.5–7.5 in London, England, for the PCA title, remains widely accepted as the world's number one player. 1993 US astronomers identify part of the dark matter in the universe as stray planets and brown dwarfs. Known as MACHOs (massive astrophysical compact halo objects), they may constitute approximately half of the dark matter in the Milky Way's halo. 1993 US businessman Rupert Murdoch purchases Star TV, a five-channel satellite station based in Hong Kong and broadcasting to an estimated 40 million viewers in Asia. 1993 US religious groups launch True Love Waits, an organization aiming to make pre-marital celibacy attractive to young people. Its effectiveness is unknown, although it garners a lot of publicity. 1993 US writer Gore Vidal publishes United States, Essays 1952–1992. 1993–1994 The US Census Bureau estimates that 17% of US families move house in this period, more than half within the same county. 1 January 1994 The second stage of economic and monetary union in Europe comes into force with the establishment of the European Economic Area, incorporating European Free Trade Association (EFTA) members (except Switzerland and Liechtenstein) into the European Union (EU) free market. 10–11 January 1994 A NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) summit in Brussels, Belgium, launches the 'partnership for peace' programme to encourage cooperation with former members of the Warsaw Pact. 5 February 1994 A Serb mortar attack on the market place in Sarajevo, BosniaHerzegovina, kills at least 68 civilians. 6 February 1994 Jack Kirby, US comic book artist who created over 400 characters including Spiderman, the Incredible Hulk, and Captain America, dies

in Thousand Oaks, California (76). 28 February 1994 A Virginia judge releases Lorena Bobbitt from a mental hospital. The previous month she had been acquitted by reason of insanity of cutting off the penis of her husband, John Bobbitt. 18 March 1994 Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia sign an accord on the creation of a federation of Bosnian Muslims and Croats. 21 March 1994 The 1993 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Tom Hanks, for Philadelphia; Best Supporting Actor: Tommy Lee Jones, for The Fugitive; Best Actress: Holly Hunter, for The Piano; Best Supporting Actress: Anna Paquin, for The Piano; Best Director: Steven Spielberg, for Schindler's List; Best Film: Schindler's List, directed by Steven Spielberg. 24 March 1994 Allegations are made in the US Congress that President Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary may have used their part-ownership of the Whitewater Development Corporation in Arkansas for improper purposes, especially in connection with the failed Madison Guaranty Savings Bank. (The affair, known as 'Whitewatergate', is already being looked into by a special investigator.) 24 March 1994 The warring factions of General Muhammad Farah Aidid and President Ali Mahdi Muhammad in Somalia sign a peace agreement following United Nations-sponsored negotiations; US troops withdraw the following day. 26–27 March 1994 The right-wing Freedom Alliance led by the businessman Silvio Berlusconi wins the parliamentary elections in Italy; Berlusconi becomes prime minister in May. 28 March 1994 Eugène Ionescu, Romanian-born French dramatist whose play La Cantatrice chauve/The Bald Prima Donna (1950) inspired the Theatre of the Absurd, dies in Paris, France (81). 6 April 1994 The presidents of Rwanda and Burundi, Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira, are killed in an air crash; interethnic violence erupts on a huge scale. 10–11 April 1994 NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) makes air strikes on Serbian posts near the United Nations (UN) 'safe area' of Goradze in Bosnia-Herzegovina, but subsequently (17 April) Goradze falls to Serb forces. 22 April 1994 Richard M(ilhous) Nixon, 37th president of the USA 1969–74, a Republican, the first president to resign, dies in New York City (81). 1 May 1994 Ayrton Senna, Brazilian racing car driver, is killed at Imola, Italy, when his car crashes during the San Marino Grand Prix (34).

9 May 1994 A ceasefire is established in Nagorno-Karabakh (an Armenianpopulated enclave in Azerbaijan), with the support of an international peacekeeping force. 10 May 1994 Nelson Mandela is sworn in as the first black president of South Africa. A new cabinet is formed the following day, including representatives from all four racial groups into which the population had been divided under the apartheid system. 13 May 1994 Israel withdraws its military forces from the Jericho area of the occupied West Bank to make way for self-rule by the Palestinian National Authority, as agreed in Washington, DC, in September 1993; five days later, on 18 May, Israeli military forces are withdrawn from the Gaza Strip. 19 May 1994 Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, wife of President John F Kennedy, dies in New York City (64). May 1994 The first genetically engineered food goes on sale in California and Chicago, Illinois. The 'Flavr Savr' tomato is produced by the US biotechnology company Calgene. 1 June 1994 South Africa rejoins the British Commonwealth. 8 June 1994 The US president, Bill Clinton, who studied at Oxford University, England, from 1968 to 1970 but left without taking a degree, returns to Oxford for the award of an honorary doctorate of civil law. 15–18 June 1994 Jimmy Carter, former president of the USA, visits North Korea and helps defuse the crisis over inspection of nuclear facilities. 23 June 1994 France sends troops into Rwanda to protect refugees and support the humanitarian effort, following difficulties in establishing an international force. June 1994 The Dutch electronics company Philips launches films on DVD (digital versatile disk), using technology developed jointly by Philips and Japanese electronics company Sony. June–July 1994 The 15th football World Cup is held in the USA. Brazil wins for a record fourth time, defeating Italy 3–2 on penalties after the game ends scoreless after extra time. The match is watched by a crowd of 94,000 at the Pasadena Rose Bowl, California. 8 July 1994 Kim Il Sung, Korean dictator 1948–94, dies in Pyongyang, North Korea (82). 8 July 1994 The death of the leader of North Korea, Kim Il Sung, prompts a struggle for the succession.

9 July 1994 The government of the People's Republic of China announces that the British colony of Hong Kong's legislative council will be terminated on China's resumption of sovereignty in 1997; it rejects the reform package approved in the colony on 30 June. 16–22 July 1994 Fragments of the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 collide with Jupiter. 18 July 1994 The Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front claims victory in the Rwandan civil war; the following day, Pasteur Bizimungu assumes the presidency, with Hutu Faustin Twogiramunga as prime minister. 25 July 1994 King Hussein of Jordan and Yitzhak Rabin, Prime Minister of Israel, sign a joint declaration in Washington, DC, formally ending conflict between them (on 26 October a peace treaty is signed in a desert ceremony on the border between Jordan and Israel). 11 August 1994 President Fidel Castro of Cuba lifts restrictions on those wishing to leave Cuba, provoking a major exodus from the island; by the end of August, 20,000 people have left. On 19 August the US president Bill Clinton removes automatic refugee status for Cubans fleeing to the USA (and on 9 September restrictions on departures are reintroduced after agreement is reached between Cuba and the USA). 31 August 1994 The Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Northern Ireland announces its complete cessation of violence (the British government lifts its broadcasting ban on representatives of Sinn Fein on 16 September). 22 September 1994 The comedy Friends begins on US television. Based on the lives of six young friends in New York City, it stars Courteney Cox, Jennifer Aniston, Lisa Kudrow, Matt Perry, Matt Le Blanc, and David Schwimmer. 22 September 1994 The medical drama ER begins on US television, starring George Clooney, Anthony Edwards, Noah Wyle, Eriq La Salle, and Julianna Margulies. 28 September 1994 The car ferry Estonia sinks in the Baltic off Finland, an estimated 900 people die. 15 October 1994 President Jean-Bertrand Aristide returns to Haiti after three years in exile; on 17 October he agrees to leave the Roman Catholic priesthood in an attempt to mend his relationship with the Vatican, which opposes his liberation theology and is the only sovereign state to have recognized Raoul Cédras's military regime. 21 October 1994 The USA reaches an agreement with North Korea over its nuclear programme; North Korea agrees to submit to regular inspections, while the USA agrees to finance the modernization of North Korea's domestic nuclear industry and give it diplomatic recognition.

27 October 1994 Mozambique holds multiparty elections; on 19 November the results give victory to President Joaquim Chissano of the Mozambique National Resistance (MNR). October 1994 The Pan American Health Organization declares the Americas to be free of polio. 9 November 1994 Prime Minister Chandrika Kumoratunga becomes the first woman president of Sri Lanka; her mother, Sirima Bandaranaike Kumaratunga, takes over as prime minister. 19 November 1994 The National Lottery, the first regular British national lottery, is launched, under government control and run by Camelot. It is the largest lottery in the world. 11 December 1994 Russian forces invade the breakaway republic of Chechnya. December 1994 The Three Gorges Dam on the Chang Jiang River in China is officially opened. It is the world's largest hydroelectric project. 1994 A US Census Bureau survey finds that 53% of employees are provided with a group health plan and 41% of employees participate in a company pension plan. 1994 About 40 million Americans, one in six, lack health insurance. 1994 According to the US Census Bureau, 12.4% of Americans live in cities with populations of more than one million, 15% live in cities with populations between 50,000 and 99,999, and 18% live in towns of less than 10,000 people. 1994 An estimated 4 million undocumented aliens enter the USA, nearly half of that total into California. 1994 Beef is the most popular meat in the USA, followed by chicken, pork, turkey and fish. 1994 Blacks are 20% more likely than whites to be victims of crime in the USA, and a member of a household with an income of less than $15,000 is more than twice as likely to be a victim of crime as a member of a household with an income of more than $75,000. 1994 Bones of the earliest known human ancestor, a hominid named Australopithecus ramidus, are found in Ethiopia and dated at 4.4 million years old. 1994 California has the largest number of immigrants of all US states, about 208,000 people; New York is next with 144,000. 1994 In the USA 11,912,000 people are arrested, the most common charge being

theft and the next most common being drug-related. 1994 In the USA this year, 138 police officers are killed while on duty. 1994 In the USA's public schools (kindergarten through high school), there are 4.4 million computers in use in classrooms, or one computer for every eleven students. 1994 In the USA, 38.1 million people, or 14.5% of the population, live below the government-defined poverty level. 1994 In the USA, 94% of households have a telephone, 98% have a radio, and 98% have a television. 1994 Of the 804,000 people who immigrate to the USA, 161,000 come from Europe, 293,000 come from Asia, 272,000 come from North America, and 47,000 come from South America. 1994 Palestinian-American critic Edward Said publishes The Politics of Dispossession. 1994 Piercing of noses, navels, tongues, lips, and even nipples becomes increasingly popular in the USA and Europe. 1994 The average person in the USA drinks 131 gallons of nonalcoholic beverages (including 25 gallons of milk and 52 gallons of soft drinks) and 36 gallons of alcoholic beverages a year. 1994 The British progressive rock group Pink Floyd releases the album The Division Bell. 1994 The British rock group Blur releases the album Parklife. 1994 The British rock group Oasis releases the album Definitely Maybe. 1994 The British writer Louis de Bernières publishes his novel Captain Corelli's Mandolin. 1994 The English mathematician Andrew Wiles proves Fermat's last theorem, a problem that had remained unsolved since 1637. 1994 The film Forrest Gump, directed by Robert Zemeckis, is released in the USA, based on the book by Winston Groom and starring Tom Hanks. 1994 The film Four Weddings and a Funeral, directed by Mike Newell, is released in Britain, starring Hugh Grant and Andie MacDowell. 1994 The film Natural Born Killers, directed by Oliver Stone, is released in the

USA, starring Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis. It proves to be controversial, with its proclaimed message of the dangers of media glorification of violence lost in what looks like a celebration of the violence it denounces. 1994 The film Pulp Fiction, directed by Quentin Tarantino, is released in the USA, starring John Travolta, Samuel L Jackson, Uma Thurman, Tim Roth, and Harvey Keitel. It is awarded the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in France. 1994 The films Trois Coleurs: Blanc/Three Colours White, starring Julie Delpy and Zbigniew Zamachowski, and Trois Coleurs: Rouge/Three Colours Red, starring Irène Jacob, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Jean-Pierre Lorit, and Juliette Binoche, are released in France. They are the second and third of a trilogy of films by the Polish film-maker Krzystof Kieslowski. They have been preceded by Trois Coleurs: Blue/Three Colours Blue (1993). 1994 The median household income in the USA is $32,264 – for whites, $34,028; for blacks, $21,027; and for Hispanics, $23,421. 1994 The play Pentecost, by the English dramatist David Edgar, is first performed in Stratford-upon-Avon, England. 1994 The US rock group REM releases the album Monster. 1994 The USA's prisons hold 1,054,000 inmates, an all-time record. Of these, 2,890 are on death row. 1994 The Walt Disney animated film The Lion King is released in the USA. 1994 The World Wide Web, a computer network that allows users to utilize graphical interfaces through Web 'browsers', makes the Internet much more accessible to general users and permits a freedom of information distribution not previously possible. 1994 There are 1,512 commercial television stations in the USA. 1994 There are 198,045,000 cars, trucks, and buses in the USA. 1994 There are 5.88 million people of the Jewish faith in the USA, accounting for 2.3% of the nation's population. New York State has the largest Jewish population, 1.6 million people or 9% of the state's population. 1994 Trials using transfusions of artificial blood begin in the USA. The blood contains genetically engineered haemoglobin. 1994 Twenty-one years after losing the undisputed world heavyweight boxing title, George Foreman knocks out fellow US boxer Michael Moorer in Las Vegas, Nevada, to win the World Boxing Association and International Boxing Federation versions of the crown. At 45 years-old, he is the oldest ever world heavyweight

champion. 1994 US businesses spend $11.9 billion advertising on television. 1994 Woodstock 94 takes place in New York State. A commemoration of the original Woodstock concert 25 years before, it features acts such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Metallica, and Joe Cocker. 1 January 1995 Austria, Finland, and Sweden join the European Union (EU), increasing the Union's population from 345 million to 368 million. 1 January 1995 The Southern Common Market or Mercosur, the world's fourthlargest free-trade grouping comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay, comes into existence. 16 January 1995 The science fiction program Star Trek: Voyager begins on US television. A further Star Trek spin-off, it stars Kate Mulgrew, Robert Belhan, Robert Duncan McNeill, Tim Russ, and Roxann Biggs-Rawson. 24 January 1995 The trial opens of the US former football star O J Simpson for the murder of his former wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman (on 12 June 1994); Simpson is acquitted on 3 October after claims of racial bias in the investigating police force. 29 January 1995 The San Francisco 49ers defeat the San Diego Chargers 49–26 in Miami, Florida, to win an unprecedented fifth Super Bowl. The 49ers quarterback Steve Young throws a record six Super Bowl touchdown passes. 2 February 1995 Fred (Frederick John) Perry, English lawn-tennis player who dominated men's singles tennis in the mid-1930s and was the last Briton to win the men's singles at Wimbledon (1936), dies in Melbourne, Australia (85). 8 February 1995 The president of the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya, Dzhokhar Dudayev, announces that he and his military units are leaving the capital Grozny, conceding its loss; fighting continues to the south and east of the city. 15 February 1995 The Iranian parliament passes a law banning the import, distribution, and private use of satellite reception dishes. 28 February 1995 United Nations (UN) troops withdraw from Somalia, having been unable to end its civil war. 20 March 1995 A release of nerve gas on the underground railway in Tokyo, Japan, kills 12 people, injures about 5,000, and paralyses the rail system; two days later police raid the offices of the Aum Shinrikyo religious sect (founded in 1987) in Kamikuishiki, Honshu.

20 March 1995 The ceasefire in Bosnia-Herzegovina agreed in December 1994 is broken when the Bosnian army attacks Serb positions; Serbs respond with attacks on government forces and Muslim towns (–30 March). 26 March 1995 Seven members of the European Union (Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Spain) remove internal border controls in line with the 1985 Schengen Agreement. 27 March 1995 The 1994 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Tom Hanks, for Forrest Gump; Best Supporting Actor: Martin Landau, for Ed Wood; Best Actress: Jessica Lange, for Blue Sky; Best Supporting Actress: Dianne Wiest, for Bullets over Broadway; Best Director: Robert Zemeckis, for Forrest Gump; Best Film: Forrest Gump, directed by Robert Zemeckis. 19 April 1995 A bomb explodes in a car park underneath a federal office block in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, killing 166 people (including 19 children) and injuring over 400, the worst terrorist attack in US history. Later in the day, Timothy McVeigh is stopped for speeding and subsequently recognized as a suspect bomber. 16 May 1995 Shoko Asahara, leader of the Aum Shinrikyo religious sect (believed to be responsible for the gas attack on the Tokyo subway on 20 March), is arrested in Japan. 24 May 1995 Harold Wilson, Labour prime minister of Britain 1964–70, 1974–76, dies in London, England (79). 25 May 1995 NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) launches airstrikes against the Serbs following their refusal to surrender artillery; in response, Serbs kill 67 people in attacks on the United Nations (UN) safe haven of Tuzla, BosniaHerzegovina. 26 May 1995 Bosnian Serbs begin seizure of United Nations (UN) troops as hostages, in response to the threat of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) air strikes; by June over 377 troops have been taken (they are released 2–18 June). 13 June 1995 President Jacques Chirac of France announces a series of eight nuclear tests at Mururoa Atoll in the Pacific (breaking France's self-imposed halt in testing of April 1992). 29 June 1995 Lana Turner, US actor, dies in Los Angeles, California (74). 11 July 1995 Serbs capture the United Nations (UN)-designated safe area of Srebrenica in eastern Bosnia-Herzegovina; Muslim women and children are moved to Tuzla while men are held back and massacred. 20 July 1995 Serbs and allies attack the United Nations (UN) safe haven of Bihac in northwestern Bosnia-Herzegovina; on 27 July, Croat troops enter Bosnia to

relieve pressure on Bihac. 23 July 1995 The Spanish cyclist Miguel Induráin becomes the first person to win the Tour de France race in five successive years. 23 July 1995 US astronomers Alan Hale and Thomas Bopp discover the Hale-Bopp comet. The brightest periodic comet, its icy core is estimated to be 40 km/25 mi wide. 30 July 1995 Chechen and Russian representatives sign a peace agreement in Grozny, the capital of the breakaway republic of Chechnya. 7 August 1995 At the fifth International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF) World Championships in Gothenburg, Sweden, Jonathan Edwards of Britain becomes the first person to jump over 18 m/59 ft in the triple jump. He sets two new world records of 18.16 m/59.58 ft and 18.29 m/60 ft. 15 August 1995 On the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II, Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama of Japan expresses a 'feeling of deep remorse' and offers a 'heartfelt apology' for Japan's actions in the war. 27 August 1995 The governing body of Rugby Union, the International Rugby Football Board, votes to end the game's 'amateur only' status, to 'put an end to hypocrisy'. 28 August 1995 Serb troops in Bosnia-Herzegovina bombard Sarajevo market place, killing 37 people. 30 August 1995 NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) aircraft begin largescale attacks on Serbian positions in Bosnia; 300 sorties are flown in the first 12 hours, and by 13 September over 800 missions have been completed. August 1995 Microsoft launches Windows 95, a new computer operating system. August 1995 The world's first commercial wave-powered electricity generator begins operating on the River Clyde, Scotland. Known as 'Osprey', it generates 2 megawatts of electricity. 5 September 1995 The first in a series of French nuclear test explosions at Mururoa Atoll in the south Pacific is followed by large-scale riots on Tahiti and protests elsewhere in the Pacific region. 6 September 1995 Cal Ripken, Jr, of the Baltimore Orioles breaks New York Yankee Lou Gehrig's record of playing 2,130 consecutive major league baseball games, which has stood since 1939. 8 September 1995 The US Justice Department announces that it has begun an investigation into possible violation of US pornography laws by Calvin Klein

underwear advertisements. 11 September 1995 Bosnian government forces launch an offensive in western and central Bosnia-Herzegovina, which reduces Serb-controlled territory from 70% to 50%. 13 September 1995 Forbes magazine's annual list of entertainers who earned the most over the past two years include Steven Spielberg ($285 million), Oprah Winfrey ($146 million), The Beatles ($130 million), and magician David Copperfield ($81 million). 16 October 1995 A 'Million Man March' is held in Washington, DC, organized by Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam; an estimated 837,000 black American men attend. 20 October 1995 Willy Claes, secretary general of NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization), resigns after the Belgian parliament votes to lift his immunity from prosecution so that he can be tried for alleged corruption. 22 October 1995 Kingsley Amis, English writer, dies in London, England (73). 30 October 1995 A survey finds that 17% of adults in the USA and Canada have access to the Internet and that 11% of adults have used the Internet in the previous three months. The survey also finds that two-thirds of Internet users are men. 1 November 1995 The former French colony of Cameroon is admitted to the British Commonwealth. 17 November 1995 The last edition of the British newspaper Today, launched in 1986, is published. Its owner, News International, blames its demise on continuing losses (£11 million in its final year). 14 December 1995 The formal signing of the peace plan for Bosnia-Herzegovina takes place at the Elysée Palace, Paris, France; it creates two entities within Bosnia-Herzegovina, a Muslim-Croat federation with 51% of territory and a Serb republic with 49%; a United Nations (UN) peacekeeping force will be replaced by a NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) implementation force. 1995'Britpop' comes to the fore in Britain – white, guitar-based bands, such as Blur, Oasis, and Pulp, playing song-based pop-rock, often influenced by the Beatles and 1960s British pop. 1995 According to the US Census Bureau, the average size of a US household is 2.65 people, down from 3.33 people in 1960. 1995 According to the US Census Bureau, two-thirds of US families with televisions have cable TV.

1995 Britain's oldest merchant bank, Barings, collapses (in administration 26 January) after Nicholas Leeson, a futures trader based in Singapore, accumulates losses of 625 million Greek drachmas; Barings's main operating sections and liabilities for Far East losses are sold to the Netherlands-based Internationale Nederlanden Groep NV for 1 Greek drachma (6 March); Leeson is arrested at Frankfurt Airport, Germany (2 March), and eventually agrees to return to Singapore (29 October) where he pleads guilty to two charges of deception (he is sentenced to 61/2 years in prison on 2 December). 1995 In the USA, 23% of people older than 25 have a college degree, up from 11% in 1970. 1995 In the USA, 23% of citizens have completed at least four years of college (whites, 24%; blacks, 13%; Hispanics, 9.3%). 1995 In the USA, 33.7 million people subscribe to cellular phone services. 1995 In the USA, 64% of married women with children under six work, as opposed to 45% in 1980 and 19% in 1960. 1995 In the USA, 82% of citizens have completed at least four years of high school (whites, 83%; blacks, 74%; and Hispanics, 53%). 1995 Less than 25% of people in the USA smoke, compared to around 40% in the 1960s. 1995 The average per capita income in the USA is $22,788, up from $18,666 in 1990. 1995 The British progressive rock group Pink Floyd releases the album Pulse. 1995 The British rock group the Beatles releases the album Anthology 1 and the single 'Free as a Bird', the first new Beatles single for 25 years. 1995 The British rock group Oasis releases the singles 'Some Might Say' and 'Roll With It' and the album (What's the Story?) Morning Glory. 1995 The British rock group Pulp releases the album Different Class. 1995 The Canadian singer Alanis Morissette releases the album Jagged Little Pill. 1995 The English writer Martin Amis publishes his novel The Information. 1995 The film Apollo 13, directed by Ron Howard, is released in the USA, based on the book Lost Moon by Jim Lovell, and starring Tom Hanks as Lovell along with Bill Paxton, Kevin Bacon, Ed Harris, and Gary Sinise. 1995 The film Sense and Sensibility, directed by the Taiwanese film-maker Ang

Lee, is released in Britain, starring Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet. 1995 The film Shallow Grave, directed by Danny Boyle, is released in Britain, starring Ewan McGregor, Christopher Eccleston, and Kerry Fox. 1995 The film The Madness of King George, directed by Nicholas Hytner, is released in Britain. Scripted by Alan Bennett, it stars Nigel Hawthorne. 1995 The film Waterworld, directed by Kevin Reynolds, is released in the USA, starring Kevin Costner. Costing $175 million, making it the most expensive movie ever, it is not a big enough success to justify its budget. 1995 The Korean-born US artist Nam June Paik creates Cybertown, a global community connected through the Internet. 1995 The Swiss architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron win the competition to design the Tate Gallery of Modern Art at Bankside, London, England. 1995 The US composer Steve Reich completes his City Life, which employs sounds taken from everyday life such as boat horns, street noises, and so on. 1995 The US electronics companies CyberMaxx and Virtual 10 launch virtual reality headsets for home use in the USA. 1995 The US firm Sun Microsystems develops the computer programming language 'Java', which is used to construct World Wide Web sites. 1995 The Walt Disney film Toy Story, the first full-length film made entirely with computer animation, is released in the USA. The Buzz Lightyear toy featured in the film is a huge commercial success. c. 1995 Skateboarding enjoys a revival in the USA and Britain. 8 January 1996 François Mitterrand, Socialist president of France 1981–95 dies in Paris, France (79). 8 January 1996 The Liberian footballer George Weah of A C Milan, Italy, becomes the first African to be voted FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) World Footballer of the Year. He was also the 1995 European and African Footballer of the Year. 9 January 1996 Rebels from the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya take 3,000 people hostage in the Russian town of Kizlar, demanding withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya. The following day 2,870 hostages are released, and the remainder transported towards Chechnya. 15 January 1996 Russian government troops attempt to end the Chechen

hostage crisis by force; over 60 people are killed and some rebels escape with their hostages from the attack on the village of Pervomaiskoye; nine days later, on 24 January, 46 remaining hostages are freed. 27 January 1996 A military coup in Niger led by Colonel Ibrahim Barre Mainassara deposes President Mahamane Ousmane. 9 February 1996 The Irish Republican Army (IRA) explodes a bomb on the Isle of Dogs, east London, England, breaking its ceasefire which has been in force since August 1994; two people die. 19 February 1996 One million people demonstrate in Madrid, Spain, against the violence of the Basque separatist group ETA (Euskadi ta Askatasuna, 'Basque Nation and Liberty'). 9 March 1996 The Petronas Towers, under construction in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, become the tallest buildings in the world. The two identical towers are 451.89 m/1,482.61 ft tall, 8.83 m/29 ft higher than the Chicago Sears Tower. 9 March 1996 The Socialist Jorge Sampaio is inaugurated as president of Portugal, following elections. 12 March 1996 Krzysztof Kieslowski, Polish film director and screenwriter, dies in Warsaw, Poland (54). 13 March 1996 Gunman Thomas Hamilton opens fire in a classroom in Dunblane, Scotland, killing 16 primary school children and their teacher before he shoots himself dead. 19 March 1996 The South African president Nelson Mandela divorces his wife Winnie, who has been linked with the murder of police informers during the apartheid years. 24 March 1996 The comet Hyakutake makes its closest approach, passing within 15.4 million km/9.5 million mi of Earth. It is the brightest comet for decades, with a tail extending over 12 degrees of the sky. 25 March 1996 The 1995 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Nicolas Cage, for Leaving Las Vegas; Best Supporting Actor: Kevin Spacey, for The Usual Suspects; Best Actress: Susan Sarandon, for Dead Man Walking; Best Supporting Actress: Mira Sorvino, for Mighty Aphrodite; Best Director: Mel Gibson, for Braveheart; Best Film: Braveheart, directed by Mel Gibson. 25 March 1996 The European Union (EU) bans the export of British beef abroad following anxiety over the potential for transmission of the BSE infection to humans as CJD (Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease). 15 April 1996 The Truth and Justice Commission, set up to investigate political

crimes committed by all sides during the apartheid era, opens in Johannesburg, South Africa; it is chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. 18 April 1996 Israeli aircraft attack a United Nations (UN) refugee camp at Qana in Lebanon and kill 97 people, beginning Operation 'Grapes of Wrath', a major Israeli offensive against the extremist Muslim organization Hezbollah. 21 April 1996 The rebel Chechen leader Dzhokhar Dudayev is killed during an attack by Russian aircraft on his headquarters south of the Chechen capital, Grozny. 29 April 1996 A United Nations (UN) war crimes tribunal opens in The Hague, the Netherlands, to investigate allegations of crimes against humanity committed during the Yugoslavian civil war. 4 June 1996 The European Space Agency's Arianespace launches the new Ariane 5 rocket from French Guiana, after ten years of development work. It veers off course immediately after takeoff on its maiden flight and is blown up for safety reasons, setting the European space programme back several years. 10 June 1996 All-party talks on the future of Northern Ireland begin at Stormont Castle, Belfast, Northern Ireland; Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), is not admitted because of the IRA's ceasefire violations. 18 June 1996 Binyamin Netanyahu of the Likud Party forms a government in Israel, following the defeat of the Labour Party in elections. 18 June 1996 In a political trade-off, the Russian president Boris Yeltsin appoints his rival presidential candidate Alexander Lebed as his national security advisor in an attempt to win over Lebed's supporters before the second round of voting in presidential elections. 21 June 1996 At a European Union (EU) summit in Florence, Italy, a deal is made for the lifting of the export ban on British beef (involving the slaughter of 147,000 at-risk cattle); in return, Britain ends its obstruction of EU business. 2 July 1996 The US aerospace company Lockheed Martin unveils plans for the X33, a $1 billion wedge-shaped rocket ship. Called the Venture Star, it will be built and operated by Lockheed Martin and will replace the US space shuttle fleet by the year 2012. 17 July 1996 A TWA jumbo jet, en route from New York City to Paris, France, explodes over the Atlantic soon after takeoff from John F Kennedy airport; 230 people are killed. A terrorist bomb is suspected, although later investigation suggests this is probably not the cause. 19 July 1996 Radovan Karadzic, the president of the independent Serb region of Bosnia-Herzegovina, resigns following his indictment on war crimes charges.

25 July 1996 The Tutsi-dominated Burundi army stages a coup, making Major Pierre Buyoya head of state; political parties are banned and freedom of movement is restricted. July 1996 The US engineers Theodore O Poehler and Peter C Searson announce the invention of the first all-plastic battery. It uses polymers instead of conventional electrode materials and has implications for military and space applications as well as its use in consumer devices such as hearing aids and wristwatches. 1 August 1996 At the Olympic Games in Atlanta, Georgia, Michael Johnson of the USA becomes the first man to win both the 200 metres and 400 metres titles at the same Games. In the 200 metres final he sets a new 200 metres world record time of 19.32 sec, breaking his own old record by.34 sec. On the same day, MarieJosé Pérec of France becomes only the second woman to achieve the women's 200 metres and 400 metres double. 6–8 August 1996 Chechen rebels launch a major offensive on Grozny, capturing key points in the capital of the disputed Russian republic. 17 August 1996 The discovery of the bodies of two young girls, victims of paedophile Marc Dutroux, causes a public outcry in Belgium. 29 August 1996 A peace deal ending the war in the Russian breakaway republic of Chechnya postpones a decision on the question of sovereignty until the year 2001. August 1996 At the Olympic Games in Atlanta, Georgia, Carl Lewis of the USA wins the men's long jump to become only the second track and field athlete after US discus thrower Al Oerter to win gold medals at four consecutive Games. His career total of nine gold medals puts him on a par with Paavo Nurmi of Finland and just one short of US athlete Ray Ewry's haul of ten golds, achieved in the discontinued standing jump events between 1900 and 1908. 6 September 1996 The English cyclist Chris Boardman breaks the world one-hour record at the Manchester Velodrome, England, reaching 56.376 km/35.032 mi, an improvement of 1.085 km/0.674 mi on the existing record set by Tony Rominger of Switzerland in November 1994. 10 September 1996 British Foreign and Commonwealth Office documents show that $500 million worth of gold ($6 billion in today's prices) from unknown sources were deposited in Swiss banks during World War II; there is speculation that some belonged to Holocaust victims. 14 September 1996 Bosnia-Herzegovina elects a new legislature reflecting its ethnic complexity; Republika Srpska has its own separate assembly and president, while Alija Izetbegovic becomes president of the collective presidency.

17 October 1996 US researchers from the University of Texas and the Beckman Research Institute based in Hope, California, announce the discovery that cigarette smoke alters a gene which suppresses the uncontrolled growth of cells that cause tumours. It is the first direct evidence for the statistical link between cigarette smoking and cancer. 4 November 1996 Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan is dismissed by President Farooq Ahmed Leghari following corruption allegations. 5 November 1996 Bill Clinton is re-elected president of the USA, defeating Republican nominee Bob Dole with 379 electoral college votes to 159. The popular vote is Clinton 45,590,703; Dole 37,816,307; Reform candidate Ross Perot 7,866,284. The Republicans retain control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. 5 November 1996 The Russian president Boris Yeltsin successfully undergoes a quadruple heart by-pass operation. 15 November 1996 The refugee crisis in Zaire and Rwanda is defused without the need for outside help after Tutsi rebels defeat extremist Hutu militiamen, allowing 700,000 Hutus under their control to return to Rwanda. 28 November 1996 General Radko Mladic steps down as army commander in Republika Srpska, having been indicted by the international tribunal in The Hague, the Netherlands, to stand trial for war crimes. 5 December 1996 Madeleine Albright becomes the first female US secretary of state. 6 December 1996 Cosmonauts aboard the Mir spaceship successfully harvest a small wheat crop, the first plants to be successfully cultivated from seed in space. 19 December 1996 After being charged with corruption and fraud in October, the former Indian prime minister P V Narasimha Rao resigns as leader of the Congress Party. 1996 Scientists from the Scott Polar Institute, using data from the European Space Agency's ERS-1 satellite, discover a 14,000-sq-km/5,400-sq-mi, 125-m/410ft-deep lake, 4 km/2.5 mi under the Antarctic ice sheet. Called Lake Vostok after the Russian ice-drilling station it lies beneath, the ice sheet, which acts as a blanket, and a pressure of 300–400 atmospheres allow the water to remain liquid. 1996 The Canadian writer Margaret Atwood publishes her novel Alias Grace, based on the 19th-century case of a 16-year-old girl convicted of murder. 1996 The death rate from AIDS in the USA falls from 15.6 per 100,000 people to 11.6, a 26% decline. It is the first decline in the 15 years since the pandemic

began. AIDS is no longer the main killer of adults between the ages of 25 and 44 but it remains so for African-Americans in that age group. The number of AIDS cases in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand also reaches a plateau or decreases. 1996 The English writer Doris Lessing publishes her novel Love, Again. 1996 The film Breaking the Waves, directed by the Danish film-maker Lars von Trier, is released in Britain, starring Emily Watson and Stellan Skarsgard. 1996 The film Fargo, directed by Joel Coen, is released in the USA, starring Frances McDormand, William H Macy, Steve Buscemi, and Peter Stormare. 1996 The film Independence Day, directed by Roland Emmerich, is released in the USA, starring Will Smith, Bill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, and Judd Hirsch. 1996 The film Secrets and Lies, directed by Mike Leigh, is released in Britain, starring Brenda Blethyn, Timothy Spall, Phyllis Logan, and Marianne JeanBaptiste. It wins the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival in France. 1996 The film The English Patient, directed by the English film-maker Anthony Minghella, is released in the USA. Based on the novel by Michael Ondaatje, it stars Ralph Fiennes, Kristin Scott Thomas, Juliette Binoche, Willem Dafoe, and Colin Firth. 1996 The film Trainspotting, directed by Danny Boyle, is released in Britain. Based on the novel by Irvine Welsh, it stars Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Johnny Lee Miller, and Robert Carlyle. 1996 The film William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, directed by Australian filmmaker Baz Luhrmann, is released in the USA, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes. 1996 The Irish poet Seamus Heaney publishes his poetry collection The Spirit Level. 1996 The Irish writer Seamus Deane publishes his autobiographical first novel, Reading in the Dark. 1996 The Museum of Modern Art in New York City holds an exhibition of 50 years of photographs by the US photographer Roy DeCarava, who documented the US civil-rights movement and black cultural life in the USA. 1996 The Spanish bullfighter Christina Sanchez becomes the first female matador in Europe. 1996 The US writer Ralph Ellison's short-story collection Flying Home is published posthumously, edited by the US scholar John F Callahan.

1996 Two US dentists discover a new muscle running from the jaw to just behind the eye socket. About 3 cm/1 in long, it helps to support and raise the jaw. 23 January 1997 Switzerland establishes a fund to compensate victims of the Holocaust and their families following the discovery of Nazi gold in Swiss banks. 26 January 1997 The Swiss tennis player Martina Hingis wins the women's singles title at the Australian Open in Melbourne to become (at 16 years 92 days) the youngest winner of a Grand Slam championship title since the English player Lottie Dod won Wimbledon in London, England, in 1887 at the age of 15. 4 February 1997 In a civil trial in Santa Monica, California, the US former football star O J Simpson is found guilty of causing the death of his wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman; the jury awards total damages of $33.5 million to the victims' families. 19 February 1997 Deng Xiaoping, China's 'paramount leader' since 1980–97, chief architect of China's social reform, dies in Beijing, China (93). 27 February 1997 German archaeologist Hartmut Thieme describes three wooden spears recovered from a lignite mine at Schöningen, about 100 km/62 mi east of Hannover, Germany. About 2 m/6.5 ft long, shaped and balanced for throwing in the manner of modern javelins, and carved from a single trunk of spruce, they are 400,000 years old and are the oldest wooden hunting weapons ever found. 27 February 1997 Scottish researcher Ian Wilmut of the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, Scotland, announces that British geneticists have cloned an adult sheep. A cell was taken from the udder of the mother sheep and its DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) combined with an unfertilized egg that had had its DNA removed. The fused cells were grown in the laboratory and then implanted into the uterus of a surrogate mother sheep. The resulting lamb, Dolly, came from an animal that was six years old. This is the first time cloning has been achieved using cells other than reproductive cells. The news is met with international calls to prevent the cloning of humans. 7 March 1997 German miners strike over plans to cut government coal subsidies; four days later (11 March), they bring the city of Bonn to a standstill with massive demonstrations before (12 March) a review of the proposals is promised. 15 March 1997 Rebel Tutsi forces under Laurent Kabila take the key town of Kisangani, Zaire, from troops loyal to President Mobutu Sese Seko. 23 March 1997 The comet Hale-Bopp comes to within 190 million km/120 million mi of Earth, the closest since 2000 BC. NASA launches rockets to study the comet. Its icy nucleus is estimated to be 40 km/25 mi wide, making it at least ten times larger than that of the comet Hyakutake and twice the size of Halley's Comet. 24 March 1997 The 1996 Academy Awards are held. Best Actor: Geoffrey Rush,

for Shine; Best Supporting Actor: Cuba Gooding, Jr, for Jerry Maguire; Best Actress: Frances McDormand, for Fargo; Best Supporting Actress: Juliette Binoche, for The English Patient; Best Director: Anthony Minghella, for The English Patient; Best Film: The English Patient, directed by Anthony Minghella. 30 March 1997 The US comedian Ellen DeGeneres reveals she is homosexual in an episode of her sitcom Ellen. Many advertisers remove their sponsorship and some local television stations refuse to broadcast it. Other people host parties in DeGeneres' honour, seeing the event as a landmark in gay rights as she is the first openly gay lead character on mainstream US television. 31 March 1997 The trial of Timothy McVeigh, charged with the Oklahoma City bombing of 19 April 1995, opens in Denver, Colorado; on 2 June, McVeigh is found guilty and on 13 June he is sentenced to death. March 1997 Two-way TV is launched in Britain, an interactive system that enables viewers to participate in programmes such as game shows. 13 April 1997 Tiger Woods of the USA, aged 21, becomes the youngest-ever winner of the US Masters golf tournament at Augusta, Georgia. As well as setting a new record lowest aggregate score of 270 for the championship, his 12-stroke margin of victory is the highest ever in any of the four major tournaments over 72 holes. 15 April 1997 At least 217 Muslim pilgrims are killed and 1,300 others injured as fire sweeps through a tent city near Mecca, Saudi Arabia. 22 April 1997 Troops storm the Japanese ambassador's residence in Lima, Peru, ending the hostage crisis which began on 17 December 1996; all 14 Tupac Amarú guerrillas are killed. 1 May 1997 The Labour Party led by Tony Blair wins the general election in Britain; Labour wins 418 seats, the Conservatives 165, and the Liberal Democrats 46; the following day John Major resigns as leader of the Conservative Party. 10 May 1997 An earthquake in northern Iran, measuring 7.2 on the Richter scale, kills more than 1,600 people, and makes a further 50,000 people homeless. 16–17 May 1997 Antigovernment Tutsi rebels take Kinshasa, the capital of Zaire, and President Mobutu Sese Seko flees. The country is renamed the Democratic Republic of Congo. 23 May 1997 A Union Charter linking Belarus and Russia and aiming at eventual unification of the two countries is signed by presidents Alexander Lukashenko and Boris Yeltsin. 29 May 1997 The antigovernment Tutsi rebel leader Laurent Kabila is sworn in as president of the Democratic Republic of Congo (Zaire).

12 June 1997 For the first time in the 126-year history of major league baseball, regular season interleague play is introduced with Texas Rangers of the American League playing the San Francisco Giants of the National League at Arlington, Texas, in the inaugural interleague game. The Rangers win by four games to three. 13 June 1997 The Chicago Bulls defeat the Utah Jazz by four games to two to win their fifth National Basketball Association (NBA) championship in seven years. Chicago's Michael Jordan is voted Most Valuable Player in the Playoffs for a record fifth time. 20 June 1997 In a landmark agreement, US tobacco companies agree to settle claims made against them by former smokers by paying $368.5 billion into a compensation fund over the next 25 years. This is in exchange for the industry's immunity from legal action. 25 June 1997 An auction of some of Princess Diana's dresses in New York City raises over $5 million for cancer and AIDS research. 25 June 1997 Jacques Cousteau, French oceanographer who invented the aqualung, dies in Paris, France (87). 26 June 1997 The English mathematician Andrew Wiles is awarded the Wolfskehl Prize for solving Fermat's last theorem. The most notorious problem in mathematics, the Last Theorem was created in the 17th century by the French judge Pierre de Fermat, who studied mathematics in his spare time. In 1908 the German industrialist Paul Wolfskehl bequeathed DM100,000 (£1 million by today's value) to be given to the first person to prove it. 28 June 1997 Evander Holyfield of the USA retains his World Boxing Association (WBA) world heavyweight title in Las Vegas, Nevada, when the challenger Mike Tyson of the USA is disqualified in the third round for biting Holyfield's ear. Tyson is subsequently fined $3 million and banned from fighting but he is allowed to keep his $30-million purse. June 1997 English writer J K Rowling publishes Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, the first book of what becomes her best-selling children's series about a schoolboy wizard. June–November 1997 Plantation owners in Indonesia, burning forests to clear land, cause the worst forest fires in Southeast Asian history. Smoke blankets most parts of Southeast Asia, including Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, and Indonesia, closing airports, offices, and schools. World record levels of atmospheric pollution reach life-threatening levels; up to 20 million people in Indonesia are affected with throat and respiratory inflammations and diarrhoea, and in October in the state of Sarawak, Malaysia, over 10,000 people in one week seek medical help for respiratory complaints. More than 50,000 Indonesian soldiers and civilians along with over 1,000 fire-fighters from Indonesia and Malaysia and specialists from other countries are used to combat the fires which

by September have consumed between 300,000–600,000 hectares/740,300–1,480,000 acres. 2 July 1997 James Stewart, US actor, dies in Beverly Hills, California (89). 4 July 1997 The US spacecraft Mars Pathfinder lands on Mars. Two days later the probe's rover Sojourner, a six-wheeled vehicle that is controlled by an Earthbased operator, begins to explore the area around the spacecraft. July 1997 Building begins on the Millennium Dome, a temporary structure to house a millennium exhibition, designed by British architect Richard Rogers, in Greenwich, London, England. July 1997 The film Men in Black, directed by Barry Sonnenfeld, is released in the USA, starring Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith. 2 August 1997 William S Burroughs, US writer noted for his experimental methods, black humour, explicit homo-eroticism, and apocalyptic vision, author of Naked Lunch, dies in Lawrence, Kansas (83). 4 August 1997 Using computer models, British meteorologist Alan O'Neill demonstrates a connection between the collapse of anchovy fishing in Peru, drought in Australia, and the late arrival of India's monsoons and El Niño, the warm water current off South America's west coast. 7 August 1997 The US Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft reports the discovery of bacteria on Mars, but later reports there was no bacterial life after all. 14 August 1997 Denmark's Kenyan-born runner Wilson Kipketer breaks the English athlete Sebastian Coe's 16-year-old 800-metres world record of 1 min 41.73 sec when he runs a time of 1 min 41.24 sec in Zürich, Switzerland. Ten days later in Brussels, Belgium, he reduces the record to 1 min 41.11 sec. 30 August 1997 The English rock group Oasis releases the album Be Here Now. 31 August 1997 Diana Spencer, princess of Wales, humanitarian, and charity worker, is killed in a car crash in the Place de l'Alma underpass in Paris, France, along with her companion Dodi Fayed, and their driver (36). August 1997 US geneticist Craig Venter and colleagues publish the genome of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori, a bacterium that infects half the world's population and which is the leading cause of stomach ulcers. Complete genomes are increasingly being published as gene-sequencing techniques improve. 1 September 1997 Wisconsin introduces a welfare program called 'Wisconsin Works' or 'W2'. The program assumes that every welfare claimant is capable of some type of work and eliminates automatic welfare entitlement. Wisconsin is the first state to do so.

6 September 1997 Mother Teresa (Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu), Albanian-born Indian ascetic who founded the Order of the Missionaries of Charity, devoted to helping the poor, dies in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India (87). 18 September 1997 The US geneticist Bert Vogelstein and colleagues demonstrate that the p53 gene, which is activated by the presence of carcinogens, induces cells to commit suicide by stimulating them to produce large quantities of poisonous chemicals, called 'reactive oxygen species' (ROS). The cells literally poison themselves. It is perhaps the human body's most effective way of combating cancer. Many cancers consist of cells with a malfunctioning p53 gene. 20 September 1997 The English pop star Elton John releases the single 'Candle in the Wind '97' as a tribute to Diana, Princess of Wales. It goes immediately to number one and becomes the best-selling single of all time. 25 September 1997 British driver Andy Green in the jet-powered Thrust SSC sets a new land speed world record of 1,149.272 km/h/714.144 mph at Black Rock Desert, Nevada. The previous record of 1,019.467 km/h/633.468 mph had been set in 1983 by the Thrust SSC's project leader, British driver Richard Noble. 25 September 1997 The opening episode of the fourth season of the US medical programme ER is performed live, twice, for broadcast to four different time zones in the USA. It stars Anthony Edwards, George Clooney, Julianna Margulies, and Laura Innes. September 1997 The film LA Confidential, directed by Curtis Hanson, is released in the USA, starring Kevin Spacey, Russell Crowe, Guy James, Cromwell Pearce, Kim Basinger, and Danny DeVito. September 1997 The film The Full Monty, directed by Peter Cattaneo, is released in Britain, starring Robert Carlyle, Tom Wilkinson, Mark Addy, Paul Barber, and Steve Huison. September 1997 There is an unprecedented massive outpouring of public grief at the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. Thousands of floral tributes are laid in her memory at Kensington Palace in London, England, and at other locations worldwide. 2 October 1997 The UK scientists Moira Bruce and, independently, John Collinge, and their colleagues show that the new variant form of the brainwasting Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) in humans is the same disease as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE or 'mad cow disease') in cows. 11 October 1997 The English rock group The Verve releases the album Urban Hymns. 15 October 1997 The British car driver Andy Green, driving the 13.7 m-/45 ft-

long jet car Thrust SSC, sets a new land speed record and breaks the sound barrier with two runs of 1214.933 kph/759.333 mph (Mach 1.015) and 126.574 kph/766.609 mph (Mach 1.020) at Black Rock Desert, Nevada. Similar speeds set two days earlier were unofficial because the second run occurred over an hour later. 19 October 1997 The widely acclaimed futuristic branch of New York's Guggenheim Museum, designed by the US architect Frank Gehry, opens in Bilbao, Spain. 15 November 1997 The English pop group the Spice Girls releases the album Spiceworld. 2 December 1997 The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves the irradiation of pork, beef, and lamb following cases of contaminated hamburger meat from Nebraska. 12 December 1997 The US Justice Department orders Microsoft to sell its Internet browser separately from its Windows operating system to prevent it from building a monopoly of Web access programs. December 1997 Lorillard Tobacco Co. pays the family of Milton Horowitz over US $1.5 million, the first time a US tobacco company has ever paid a smokingrelated personal injury claim. December 1997 The film Jackie Brown, directed by Quentin Tarantino, is released in the USA, starring Pam Grier, Samuel L Jackson, Robert De Niro, Bridget Fonda, and Robert Forster. December 1997 The film Titanic, directed by James Cameron, is released in the USA, starring Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, Billy Zane, and Gloria Stuart. Costing over $200 million, it is the most expensive movie made to date. In the last two weekends of the year it grosses over $88 million. 1997 An attempt in the USA to bring in legislation to control the Internet, intended to prevent access to sexual material, is rejected by the supreme court as unconstitutional. 1997 Most camera makers release quality digital cameras that shoot pixels instead of film, making them a low-cost alternative to 35 mm cameras. Sales nearly double from the previous year when 1.7 million cameras were sold worldwide. 1997 The Star Wars film trilogy is relaunched with enhanced special effects and new scenes, as a prelude to a new 3-part 'prequel' by US director George Lucas. 1997 The Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez publishes his novel News of a Kidnapping.

1997 The English historian Orlando Figes publishes A People's Tragedy, a history of the Russian Revolution. 1997 The Tamagotchi toy, a pocket-sized electronic (or virtual) pet that requires daily attention from its owner to continue to function, is launched in Japan. It quickly becomes very popular worldwide, both with children and adults. 1997 The US architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien are chosen to design a new Museum of American Folk Art on West 53rd Street in New York City, planned to open in 2000. 1997 The US writer Philip Roth publishes his novel American Pastoral. 1997 The US writer Thomas Pynchon publishes his historical novel Mason and Dixon. 1 January 1998 The Times newspaper, of London, England, begins serializing a group of previously unpublished poems by British poet Ted Hughes about his late wife, US poet Sylvia Plath. 1 January 1998 Mohammed Rafiq Tarar is elected president of Pakistan in a landslide victory. 1–14 January 1998 At least 1,700 men, women, and children are massacred in Algeria by Islamic fundamentalists. 2–9 January 1998 The FIDE World Chess Championships are decided on a knockout basis for the first time, with reigning champion Anatoly Karpov of Russia winning the tournament. 4 January 1998 The US Secretary of the Treasury announces that the 12-month figures to the end of November 1997 showed a government surplus in taxes. It is the first time the US budget has been balanced in 30 years. 5 January 1998 Lithuanian-American Valdus Adamkus is elected president of Lithuania. He pledges to develop Lithuania's integration with Western Europe and to strengthen its links with the USA. 5 January 1998 Sonny Bono, US singer, songwriter, and politician, is killed in a skiing accident in Lake Tahoe, California (62). 6 January 1998 The US spacecraft Lunar Prospector is launched to gather information on the Moon's resources, structure, and origin. 7 January 1998 Doctors meeting at the World Medical Association's conference in Hamburg, Germany, call for a worldwide ban on human cloning. US president Clinton calls for legislation banning cloning.

12 January 1998 A UK study, conducted on the Atlantic island of St Helena where television was introduced only in 1995, shows that TV violence has had little effect on children. 12 January 1998 Chinese swimmer Yuan Yuan and her coach Zhou Zhewen are sent home from the World Swimming Championships in Perth, Australia, a week after being caught in possession of phials of the human growth hormone somatotrophin, a banned performance-enhancing substance used to build muscle bulk. Four other Chinese swimmers failed precompetition drug tests. 14 January 1998 Russian swimmer Alexander Popov sets a new world record for the 100-m freestyle of 48.93 seconds. 16 January 1998 The World Health Organization (WHO) announces an outbreak of Rift Valley fever in northeast Kenya. Thousands are affected and more than 300 die. The outbreak is triggered by flooding and a subsequent explosion in the mosquito population. 20 January 1998 Veterinarians in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, announce the birth of Rama the 'cama', the first cross between a camel and a llama. It has the long fleece of llama but the strength of a camel; it has no hump. 21 January 1998 An investigation is launched into whether US president Bill Clinton urged Monica Lewinsky, a 24-year-old trainee, to lie under oath and deny that she had an affair with him. Investigations continue until the end of March amid further accusations and denials. 21 January 1998 Pope John Paul II visits Cuba for the first time, where he criticizes the repression of personal and religious freedoms under the communist government of President Fidel Castro. 25 January 1998 Ethiopian runner Haile Gebrselassie reduces his own 3,000 m world record of 7 min 30.72 sec set in Stuttgart on 4 February 1996 by over four and a half seconds with a new time of 7min 26.14 sec, in Karlsruhe, Germany. 25 January 1998 The Denver Broncos defeat the Green Bay Packers 31–24 at the Super Bowl in San Diego. It is their first National Football League (NFL) championship in 38 years. 26 January 1998 Analysis of high-resolution images from the Galileo spacecraft suggests that the icy crust of Europa, Jupiter's fourth-largest moon, may hide a vast ocean that might be warm enough to support life. 26 January 1998 Shinichi Suzuki, Japanese violinist and teacher of the Suzuki method, dies in Matsumoto, Japan (99). 26 January 1998 US and British naval forces begin to assemble in the Gulf and to draw up plans for a bombing campaign against Iraq because Iraqi president Saddam Hussein continues to hinder the work of United Nations (UN) weapons

inspectors. 27 January 1998 Al Schultz of the Space Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, using the Hubble Space Telescope, announces the discovery of a giant planet, larger than the Sun, orbiting Proxima Centauri, the closest star to Earth. It is the first planet outside the Solar System to be directly observed. 30 January 1998 After five years of DNA testing, the Russian government affirms that the human remains excavated at Yekaterinburg, Russia, in 1991 are those of Tsar Nicholas. January 1998 The German Red Cross estimates that 10,000 children a month are dying from malnutrition in North Korea and that 2 million died in 1997. The famine has been caused by poor agricultural practices that have brought environmental catastrophe. January 1998 US writer Toni Morrison publishes her novel Paradise. 4 February 1998 Nearly 4,000 people are killed and 30,000 lose their homes when an earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale hits the mountainous province of Takhar in northern Afghanistan. 7 February 1998 Swiss balloonist Bertrand Piccard, in the balloon Breitling Orbiter, sets a record for the longest nonstop, nonrefuelled flight by an aircraft: 9 days, 17 hours, and 55 minutes. 7–22 February 1998 The 18th Winter Olympic Games are held at Nagano, Japan. They are the largest to date, with over 2,400 athletes from 72 countries taking part. Snowboarding, curling, and women's ice hockey are included as medal sports for the first time. Tara Lipinski of the USA aged 15 years 255 days won the women's figure skating title to become the youngest-ever individual Winter Olympic gold medallist. 8 February 1998 (John) Enoch Powell, charismatic British Conservative politician known for his controversial views on immigration, dies in London, England (85). 9 February 1998 US scientist David Ho reports the discovery of the HIV virus in a 1959 blood sample and suggests that the transfer from ape to human occurred in the late 1940s or early 1950s. 9 February–23 April 1998 Nigeria launches an artillery attack against Sierra Leone's military junta in Freetown, Sierra Leone. Fighting continues for several weeks until ousted president Ahmad Tejan Kabbah returns. 13 February 1998 The Australian Constitutional Convention votes to replace the queen as head of state with a president chosen by a bipartisan parliamentary majority. A public referendum in 1999 will decide whether the country should become a republic.

15 February 1998 Glafkos John Clerides is re-elected president of Cyprus and in March and begins talks with the European Union (EU) on the country's possible accession. 16 February 1998'Billy', a human baby weighing 4 kg/8.8 lb, is born in Tarzana, California, 7.5 years after being conceived. It is the longest time a human embryo has been frozen and later implanted in a woman's uterus. 21 February 1998 England records the highest-ever score in the history of the International Championship in rugby union when they defeat Wales 60–26 at Twickenham in London, England. 23 February 1998 Iraqi prime minister Tariq Aziz and Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general, sign a breakthrough peacekeeping deal to avert war and permit UN weapons inspectors to continue their work. 24 February 1998 British prime minister Tony Blair unveils plans for the inside of the Millennium Dome in Greenwich, London, England. Organizers expect 12 million visitors to the Dome, which will contain 13 exhibitions, a piazza for live performances, restaurants, and shops. 25 February 1998 An international test of education standards finds US highschool students among the worst in maths and science in the industrialized world. 25 February 1998 Switzerland's first legal brothel opens in Zürich. February–March 1998 Hundreds of fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan, the Indonesian portion of Borneo, blanket the islands in smoke. 1 March 1998 Serbia sends troops into the southern province of Kosovo to flush out ethnic Albanian secessionist paramilitaries. Hundreds of men, women, and children are killed over the next few weeks. It is the worst bloodshed to date in Kosovo's nine-year campaign by its Albanian majority to regain their autonomy. 4 March 1998 Roman Catholic priests are outraged when the European Union (EU) requires that Communion wafers have a sell-by date. 5 March 1998 The world's most expensive sculpture, Antonio Canova's Three Graces, is discovered to be permanently disfigured by a hairline crack thought to have occurred when it was last moved. 5 March 1998 US scientists announce that the Lunar Prospector satellite has detected hydrogen in the polar regions of the Moon, probably in the form of water, frozen in craters which never see the Sun. Scientists estimate that as much as 11 million tonnes of water may be present. 10 March 1998 Lloyd Bridges, US actor, dies in Los Angeles, USA (85).

10 March 1998 Thojib Suharto is 're-elected' president of Indonesia despite his deteriorating health and an economy weakened by a sharp decline in value of Indonesian currency. He remains opposed to economic reforms demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which has arranged a $43 billion/£27 billion economic bail-out programme. 11 March 1998 Australian palaeontologists announce the discovery of 800,000–900,000 year-old stone tools made by Homo erectus on the Indonesian island of Flores. They suggest that H. erectus were seafarers and had the language abilities and social structure to organize the movements of large groups to colonize new islands. 12 March 1998 Australian businessman Rupert Murdoch buys the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team for a record $350 million. The sale includes Dodger Stadium. 15 March 1998 Psychology Today magazine reports that 5 million Americans are addicted to the Internet. 15 March 1998 Benjamin McLane Spock, US paediatrician and child psychologist whose book Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care (1946) revolutionized attitudes towards rearing children, dies in San Diego, California (94). 17 March 1998 Zhu Rongji is elected prime minister of China. He quickly announces that he is axing half of its 8 million civil servant jobs to combat budget deficits. Many believe his reforms will mark a new era in Chinese politics. 18 March 1998 The European Commission embarks on a path of historic reform by announcing the phasing out of price supports for agricultural products, the bedrock of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) since its creation in 1962. 19 March 1998 Atal Behari Vajpayee, Nationalist BJP party leader, is elected prime minister of India. He calls for national 'reconciliation and accord', but also threatens that India might install and deploy nuclear weapons. 22–23 March 1998 At the World Cross Country Championships in Marrakesh, Morocco, Paul Tergat of Kenya wins the men's 12 km event for the fourth year in succession. Sonia O'Sullivan of Ireland wins both the women's 4 km and 8 km races. 23 March 1998 Russian president Boris Yeltsin dismisses all 29 of his ministers including two of its pivotal figures – Viktor Chernomyrdin, the prime minister, and his most aggressive free-marketeer, Anatoly Chubais, the first deputy prime minister. The government crises lasts until April 24 when the state Duma bows to president Yeltsin's will and endorses Sergey Kiriyenko as prime minister. 23 March 1998 The 1997 Academy Awards are held. Best picture: Titanic; Best Director: James Cameron for Titanic; Best Actress Helen Hunt for the film As Good as it Gets; Best Actor: Jack Nicholson for As Good as it Gets.

23 March–1 April 1998 Forest fires in Brazil destroy 51,800 sq km/20,000 sq mi of highland savannah and rainforest. Heavy rains finally quench the fires. 27 March 1998 The US manufacturing company Pfizer gets approval from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for its pill Viagra, which can cure male impotence. It becomes the fastest-selling prescription drug in US history. 29 March 1998 The Vasco da Gama bridge across the Tagus River north of Lisbon, Portugal, is officially opened. It is the longest bridge in Europe: 18 km/11.25 mi long with 12 km/7.5 mi of bridges and viaducts. March 1998 A new genre of magazines sweep the USA. Known as 'microniche' magazines they cater to small markets such as interracial couples and women suffering breast cancer. March 1998 The US armed Forces begin trials to replace metal dog tags with smartcards. The plastic cards have computer chips embedded in them which contain information on the enlisted person's blood group, allergies, and so on, which medical personnel can read with a hand-held computer. March 1998 There is a growing trend in US courts for the use of computer generated evidence. Lawyers use them, for example, to simulate complicated genetic techniques or to help juries visualize injuries. March 1998 US pop singer Madonna releases a new album, Ray of Light, her first album of original songs since Bedtime Stories in 1994. 2 April 1998 US software company Knowledge Adventure introduce a product called 'JumpStart Baby' which is designed for nine-month-old babies to play on their parents' laps. 'Lapware' is the fastest-growing sector in the software market. 4 April 1998 British jockey Carl Llewellyn riding Earth Summit wins the Grand National at Aintree, Liverpool, England. 5 April 1998 France defeats Wales 51–0 at Wembley Stadium in London, England, to complete its second consecutive Five Nations rugby union championship grand slam. 5 April 1998 The world's largest suspension bridge, linking Kobe and Awaji Island in Japan, opens to traffic. It costs £2.2. billion and is 3.9 km/2.4 mi long. 7 April 1998 Tammy Wynette, US country singer, dies in Nashville, Tennessee (55). 10 April 1998 Ireland, Britain, and the political parties in Northern Ireland reach a peace agreement over Northern Ireland involving the devolution of a wide range of executive and legislative powers to a Northern Ireland Assembly.

12 April 1998 Mark O'Meara of the USA, aged 41, wins the US Masters golf tournament at Augusta, Georgia. Fellow US golfer Jack Nicklaus, aged 58 and competing in the event for the 40th consecutive year, finishes in sixth place. 12 April 1998 The US Census Bureau reports that 26 million Americans, nearly one in ten, is an immigrant. Most come from Central or South America. 14 April 1998 US vice-president Al Gore announces plans for Internet2, a highspeed data communications network which will serve the main US research universities, and bypass the congestion on the Internet. 15 April 1998 Pol Pot, Cambodian dictator and leader of the Khmer Rouge communist Movement, who was responsible for the deaths of 1.7 million Cambodians, dies, reportedly of heart failure, in a Khmer Rouge camp near the border of Cambodia and Thailand, while attempting to escape international efforts to capture him and try him for genocide (73). 16 April 1998 US scientists at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory develop a solar cell that can split water into hydrogen and oxygen. It is seen as a breakthrough in the generation of alternative fuels. 17 April 1998 An iceberg 40 km/25 mi long and 4.8 km/3 mi wide breaks off from the Larson B ice shelf in Antarctica. Global warming is thought to be the cause. 19 April 1998 Linda McCartney, US-born British businesswoman and photographer, dies of cancer, near Tucson, Arizona (56). 22 April 1998 Scientists at the Public Health Laboratory Service in London, England, report the discovery of a bacterium Pseudonas aeruginosa that is resistant to all known antibiotics. It causes a wide range of infections in people with impaired immune systems. 23 April 1998 James Earl Ray, US gunman who pleaded guilty to the 1968 assassination of black civil rights leader Martin Luther King JR, dies in prison in Nashville, Tennessee (70). 23 April 1998 The first cash machines to use 'iris recognition technology' to identify the user and dispense money, enter service in Swindon, England. 24 April 1998 The largest public execution in recent history takes place in a football field in Kigali, Rwanda, when 22 people are shot for their part in the massacre of 500,000 Hutus in 1994. 28 April 1998 UK researchers at Guy's Hospital in London, England, announce the development of a vaccine against Streptococcus mutans the bacterium that causes tooth decay. They hope it will be incorporated into toothpaste to eradicate decay.

April 1998 The 1998 John M Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion is awarded to British businessman and philanthropist Sigmund Sternburg. April 1998 The play The Iceman Cometh, by US writer Eugene O'Neill opens at the Almeida Theatre in London, England, directed by Howard Davies and starring Kevin Spacey. April 1998 The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction is awarded to US writer Philip Roth for his novel American Pastoral. April 1998 The Pulitzer Prize for Music is awarded to Aaron Jay Kernis for his String Quartet No. 2, Musica Instrumentalis. April 1998 The Pulitzer Special Award goes to the late US composer George Gershwin for his contributions to music in the USA. April 1998 US writer John Irving publishes his novel A Widow for One Year. 7 May 1998 The International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) launches its Year of the Woman Athlete by staging the first-ever mixed athletics meeting in the Gulf State of Qatar where strict adherence to Muslim doctrine has hitherto prevented women from taking part in sport except in segregated, closed arenas. 12 May–12 July 1998 To combat the rise of expensive, technologically sophisticated stages, the Battersea Arts Centre in London, England, stages all its performances in the dark. 13 May 1998 India conducts three nuclear tests escalating the nuclear arms race in south Asia. 13 May 1998 The European Parliament approves a ban on all tobacco advertising and sponsorship. 15 May 1998 US singer and Academy Award-winning actor Frank (Francis Albert) Sinatra, considered by many critics to be the preeminent singer of this century, dies in Beverly Hills, California (82). He made some 1,800 recordings, gathered nine Grammy Awards, and appeared in at least 60 films. 16 May 1998 A fortnight after becoming the first foreign manager to win the English league championship, Frenchman Arsène Wenger, leads his Arsenal side to a 2–0 victory over Newcastle United at Wembley Stadium in London, England, in the FA Cup final. Arsenal become only the second club after Manchester United to win two league and cup 'doubles', having previously performed this feat in 1971. 20 May 1998 Real Madrid of Spain defeats Juventus of Italy 1–0 at Amsterdam, the Netherlands, to win the European Cup for a record seventh time.

21 May 1998 Indonesian president Suharto resigns after a week of riots in Jakarta in which much of the city is burned. He is replaced by his vice president Bucharuddin Jusuf Habibie. 24 May 1998 The Swedish-registered EF Language wins the Whitbread round-theworld yacht race. 28 May 1998 Pakistan explodes five nuclear devices. Afterwards, president Rafiq Tarar suspends the country's constitution and declares a state of emergency. US president Clinton announces wide-ranging economic sanctions. 29 May 1998 Barry Goldwater, US senator, 1953–64 and 1969–87, and Republican presidential candidate in 1964, dies in Phoenix, Arizona (89). May 1998 The film Deep Impact opens, directed by Mimi Leder and starring Robert Duval, Tea Leoni, Elija Wood, Morgan Freeman, and Leelee Sobienski. May 1998 The film Godzilla opens, directed by Roland Emmerich, starring Mathew Broderick, Jean Reno, and Harry Shearer. 16 June 1998 The Supreme Court of Massachusetts votes 4–3 to uphold the trial judge's decision to reduce the sentence of British nanny Louise Woodward, who was accused of murdering Matthew Eappen, an 18-month-old baby in her care, from second-degree murder to manslaughter. 22 June 1998 The Hong Kong government announces an emergency £2.5 billion rescue package in an effort to prevent the country's failing economy from affecting the rest of the world. 25 June 1998 The US software company Microsoft releases its operating system Windows 98. 25 June 1998 US president Bill Clinton arrives in China for a nine-day visit, the first by a US president since the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989. 2 July 1998 Hong Kong's Chek Lap Tok Airport, which has the largest passenger terminal in the world, is officially opened. US president Bill Clinton is one of the first to land there. The airport operates in chaos for the first few weeks. 4 July 1998 Astronomers from the University of Hawaii discover the first asteroid entirely within the Earth's orbit; it is 40 m/130 ft in diameter. 5 July 1998 US tennis player Pete Sampras wins the men's single tennis championship at Wimbledon, England. Czech tennis player Jana Novotna wins the women's singles title. 7 July 1998 Two Japanese satellites, using sensors and lasers, perform the first automatic docking of a space vehicle.

8 July 1998 US archaeologists in Aqaba, Jordan, announce the discovery of the world's oldest Christian church, built by the Christian community of Ayla in the late 3rd century. 11 July 1998 Researchers at the Fermi National Accelerator laboratory in Batavia, Illinois, announce the discovery of the tau neutrino, the least stable elementary particle of the lepton class. 12 July 1998 France wins the football World Cup defeating Brazil 3–0. The following day 500,000 people fill the Champs Elysées to celebrate the victory. 17 July 1998 A 10-m/30-ft tidal wave hits the north coast of Papua New Guinea, inundating several villages and killing an estimated 6,000 people. Of the survivors 70% are adults; a generation of children is wiped out. 17 July 1998 The last tsar of Russia, Tsar Nicholas II, and his family are buried in St Petersburg, Russia, 80 years after their murder at Yekaterinburg, Russia. Russian president Boris Yeltsin makes a public apology after initially refusing to attend the ceremony. 20 July 1998 An inquiry into the murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence, who was stabbed to death in London, England, on 22 April 1993, concludes that he was killed by racist thugs and that police investigations were incompetent and plagued by racism. 24 July 1998 The film Saving Private Ryan, directed by Stephen Spielberg and starring Tom Hanks, opens in the USA. 29 July 1998 After four days of fighting, Serb forces overrun the Yugoslav province of Kosovo, routing the Kosovo Liberation Army, who are fighting for Kosovo autonomy. Over 100,000 Albanians are displaced. 29 July 1998 Thirteen factory workers in Ohio win the world's largest lottery prize, $161 million/£108 million. The Powerball lottery is played in 21 US states. July 1998 By early July approximately a third of the 200,000 Serbs living in the former Yugoslavian state of Kosovo have left the province, while ethnic Albanians have returned to fight Serbian forces. July 1998 English writer J K Rowling publishes Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, the second book of her best-selling children's series about a schoolboy wizard. 15 August 1998 A car bomb explodes in Omagh, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, killing 28 people, including 15 women and 8 children, in Northern Ireland's worst terrorist act to date. The Irish Republican Army (IRA) militant splinter group the Real IRA later admit responsibility.

17 August 1998 US president Bill Clinton testifies before a grand jury about his alleged affair with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. The grand jury is to determine whether or not Clinton perjured himself in January by denying allegations of sexual relations with Lewinsky and whether or not he tried to obstruct the course of justice by telling her and others to deny the affair. After more than four hours of testimony, Clinton makes a televised speech in which he admits he did have an 'inappropriate' relationship with Lewinsky but denies that he told anyone to lie about it. 21 August 1998 The film The X Files is released, directed by Rob Bowman and starring David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson. 23 August 1998 Russian president Boris Yeltsin sacks his entire government for the second time in five months and returns Viktor Chernomyrdin, whom he previously fired and who is considered responsible for the country's economic downfall, as interim prime minister. 27 August 1998 The Russian government's decision to stop propping up the ailing rouble leads to uncertainty about the future of President Boris Yeltsin and the entire reform process, causing global stock markets to plummet. 31 August 1998 Mourners commemorate the first anniversary of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, by laying flowers and messages at her home at Kensington Palace, London, at her burial site at Althorp, and at the site of the fatal car crash in Paris, France. 8 September 1998 Congolese rebels abandon peace talks with the government in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, after being denied direct communication with Laurent Kabila, the president they are trying to oust. 8 September 1998 Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams and Ulster first minister David Trimble hold talks in Northern Ireland, the first meeting between a Sinn Fein leader and an Ulster Unionist leader since 1922. 9 September 1998 Flooding continues to threaten Dhaka, Bangladesh's capital, as thousands of troops and civilians attempt to fortify an embankment protecting the city. The rains, which began on 10 July, are the worst in Bangladesh's history, causing more than 850 deaths and making a quarter of the 124 million population homeless. 9 September 1998 The Royal Opera House in London, England, announces that it will close owing to serious financial problems, cancelling almost all of its 1999 performances, in an emergency measure to help rescue the debt-ridden company. 11 September 1998 Russian president Boris Yeltsin names foreign minister Yevgeny M Primakov as his compromise candidate for the position of prime minister, after the Duma (parliament) repeatedly rejects his first choice, Viktor Chernomyrdin.

11 September 1998 The US independent counsel Kenneth Starr releases his report on his case against President Bill Clinton, in which he charges the president with perjury, abuse of power, obstruction of justice, and witness tampering, and recommends impeachment proceedings. Before the report is made public, first to Congress and then via the Internet, Clinton makes a speech in which he expresses contrition for his relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky and for misleading the American people about it. 12 September 1998 Australian tennis player Patrick Rafter wins the men's singles title and US tennis player Lindsay Davenport wins the women's singles title in the US Open tennis tournament in New York City. 13 September 1998 Nikola Poplasen, leader of the Serb Radical Party, is elected president of the Serb republic in Bosnia-Herzegovina. 21 September 1998 Florence Griffith Joyner, US athlete, triple gold medal winner at the 1988 Olympics, dies in Mission Viejo, California (38). 27 September 1998 Social democrat Gerhard Schroeder unseats Helmut Kohl as German chancellor after 16 years in power. 8 October 1998 Britain, the USA, and their European allies issue a final warning to Serbian president Slobodan Miloševic that unless he complies with a six-point ultimatum, NATO countries will respond with air strikes. The ultimatum includes an end to offensive operations, withdrawal of Serbian forces in Kosovo, the withdrawal of heavy weapons, cooperation with the International War Crimes Tribunal, the freedom of safe return for refugees, and a start to peace negotiations. 15 October 1998 Line 14 of the Paris Métro opens with fully automated, driverless trains, linking the right and left banks of the Seine river. 16 October 1998 Northern Ireland first minister David Trimble, leader of the Ulster Unionists, and SDLP leader John Hume, share the Nobel Peace Prize for their work in negotiating the Good Friday agreement for peace in Northern Ireland. 28 October 1998 General Pinochet, Chilean dictator 1973–89, wins a high-court battle against his arrest for torture offences under his regime, and against his detention in England, where he went for medical treatment. 29 October 1998 Ted Hughes, English poet laureate, dies in Devon, England (68). October 1998 The Portuguese writer José Saramago wins the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is the first writer in Portuguese to win the prize. October 1998 US biologist French Anderson announces a technique that could cure inherited diseases by inserting a healthy gene to replace a damaged one. He

calls for a full debate on the issue of gene therapy, which brings with it the dilemma of whether it is ethical to enable the choice of physical attributes such as eye colour and height. 1 November 1998 Finnish racing driver Mika Hakkinen, in a McLaren Mercedes, wins the Formula 1 world championship with his victory at the Japanese Grand Prix in Suzuka. 2 November 1998 The Spanish-born tenor Placido Domingo is named artistic director of the Los Angeles Opera. He will assume his post in 2000. 2 November 1998 Tropical storm Mitch rages through Honduras with a death toll of as many as 5,000 people there and more than 7,000 people in total, including victims in neighbouring El Salvador and Nicaragua. In the worst storm to hit Central America this century, floods and landslides cause mass destruction. 6 November 1998 Hurricane Mitch continues its path of destruction in Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, leaving at least 11,000 dead and 2 million homeless. 14 November 1998 At least 14 people are reported killed and hundreds more injured in two days of violent clashes between government security forces and protesters in Jakarta, Indonesia, as the country heads unsteadily towards democracy. 16 November 1998 Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu announces that he is suspending the withdrawal of Israeli troops from the West Bank until PLO leader Yasser Arafat publicly retracts a pledge to declare a Palestinian state next May. 23 November 1998 The European Commission ends the ban on the export of British beef imposed in March 1996 after the discovery of the link between BSE and Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, a fatal illness affecting humans. The ban formally comes to an end on 1 August 1999. 24 November 1998 US chat show host Oprah Winfrey and two partners launch the first cable television station targeted exclusively at a female audience. 30 November 1998 Deutsche Bank announces its acquisition of Bankers Trust of America, creating the biggest financial institution in the world, but resulting in the loss of 5,500 jobs in London, England, and New York City. 3 December 1998 Eleven European countries cut their interest rates to 3 percent in preparation for the launch of the euro in January 1999. 10 December 1998 The first genetic blueprint for a whole multicellular animal – a nematode worm – is completed. The 97 million-letter code, which is published on the Internet, is for a tiny worm called Caenorhabditis elegans. The study began 15 years previously and cost £30 million.

14 December 1998 US president Bill Clinton, on a peace mission to the Middle East, is the first US president to visit a Palestinian territory when he meets Palestinian Liberation Organization head Yasser Arafat on the Gaza Strip. In a show of hands the Palestinian National Council affirms its renunciation of violence against Israel. 16 December 1998 In Operation Desert Fox, the USA and the UK launch air strikes against Iraq for failing to cooperate with UN weapons inspections. 19 December 1998 The US House of Representatives impeaches President Bill Clinton over allegations of perjury and obstruction of justice in the Monica Lewinsky case. He is only the second president to be impeached in US history, following Andrew Johnson 120 years ago. The case is scheduled to go before the Senate in January 1999. December 1998 A painting by contemporary British artist Lucian Freud, Naked Portrait with Reflection, sells at Sotheby's in London, England for £2.8 million. It is the highest price ever paid for a contemporary work in Europe. 1 January 1999 The single European currency, the euro, is launched in 11 participating European Union (EU) countries: Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, and Spain. It performs strongly when trading begins on 4 January. 9 January 1999 Astronomers from San Francisco State University announce the discovery of three more planets orbiting around neighbouring stars, bringing the total number of known planets outside our Solar System to 17. 11 January 1999 Ted Hughes posthumously wins the T S Eliot Prize for Birthday Letters, a collection about his relationship with Sylvia Plath and the best-selling volume of poetry ever. 14 January 1999 The impeachment trial of US president Bill Clinton opens in the Senate in Washington, DC. It is the first-ever impeachment trial of an elected US president. The president is charged with perjury and obstruction of justice in his testimony about his relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. 17 January 1999 The bodies of 45 ethnic Albanians are discovered outside the village of Recak in Kosovo. The massacre threatens to plunge the region into fullscale war. 23 January 1999 NASA scientists photograph light emitted by a gamma-ray burst for the first time. 24 January 1999 The International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive board announces that six members should be expelled in the continuing scandal over

the Salt Lake City, Utah, bid for the 2002 winter games. It is alleged that the members, from Ecuador, Kenya, Sudan, Chile, Mali, and the Republic of the Congo, took gifts from Salt Lake City's Olympic bid committee. The IOC also announces major anticorruption reforms, including a change in the way cities bid to host the games. 25 January 1999 An earthquake measuring six on the Richter scale hits western Colombia, flattening the city of Armenia. Initial counts estimate more than 1,000 dead. 25 January 1999 Iraqi reports claim that US warplane missiles kill 11 and injure 59 people in the southern city of Basra. The Pentagon reports that the missiles were launched after an Iraqi ground radar tracked the planes, which were on routine surveillance flights, and fired on them. 29 January 1999 In a shootout with Serb security forces, 24 ethnic Albanians die in the village of Rugovo, in Kosovo. NATO gives the warring parties a three-week deadline to negotiate a plan for autonomy for the region. 4 February 1999 Both republican and loyalist paramilitary groups issue warnings of fresh violence, threatening Northern Ireland peace efforts and the Good Friday Agreement. The Irish Republican Army (IRA) also reveals that some of its weapons were stolen by republican extremists. 6 February 1999 US heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson begins a one-year prison sentence for a road-rage attack in August 1998. In the likely event that he will not be allowed to fight again, after serving three years in prison for rape and being banned from boxing for 17 months for biting Evander Holyfield's ear, he faces financial ruin, with more than $20 million in debts. 7 February 1999 Hussein bin Talal, King of Jordan 1953–99, dies in Jordan (63). 7 February 1999 Serbs and ethnic Albanian leaders from Kosovo meet at Rambouillet chateau outside Paris, France, to begin peace talks, with the threat of NATO attacks if they do not find a peaceful solution to the violence in the region within two weeks. 8 February 1999 Iris Murdoch (Jean Iris Bayley), novelist and philosopher, one of the most influential writers of the 20th century, dies in Oxford, England (79). 12 February 1999 After a month-long impeachment trial, the US Senate acquits President Bill Clinton of perjury and obstruction of justice, 55–45 and 50–50. The charges would have needed a two-thirds majority to dismiss the president from office. 16 February 1999 The Northern Ireland Assembly approves a plan for the province's new government structure, which would give it control over local issues such as taxation and law enforcement. The Assembly's First Minister, David Trimble, insists, however, that no executive for the Assembly can be formed

until the IRA starts to decommission its weapons. 17 February 1999 Representatives of the Ulster Unionist Party and Sinn Fein hold bilateral talks for the first time. They meet to resolve the dispute over the decommissioning of Irish Republican Army (IRA) weapons, but make no significant progress. February 1999 Scientists succeed in slowing down the speed of light from its normal speed of 299,792 km/186,282 mi per second to 61 km/38 mi per hour, opening up potential for the development of high-precision computer and telecommunications technologies, as well as for the advanced study of quantum mechanics. 1 March 1999 An international treaty banning the use of antipersonnel land mines, signed by 133 countries, comes into effect, marked by a ceremony at the United Nations headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. 3 March 1999 Former White House intern Monica Lewinsky appears in a television interview with US journalist Barbara Walters, in her first interview since the scandal broke about her relationship with US president Bill Clinton. An estimated 70 million viewers watch the interview, on the ABC programme 20/20, making it the news programme with the largest-ever television audience. 7 March 1999 Stanley Kubrick, director, producer, screenwriter, and cinematographer, dies (70). His final film, Eyes Wide Shut, an erotic psychodrama starring husband and wife Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, is scheduled for release on 16 July. 12 March 1999 Yehudi Menuhin, US born British violinist and conductor, dies in Berlin, Germany (82). 16 March 1999 All 20 members of the European Commission announce their intention to resign, following the European Parliament's report condemning their performance. Commission president Jacques Santer repeats his denial, however, that the commissioners are guilty of fraud and mismanagement. 18 March 1999 Ethnic Albanian representatives sign a peace agreement in Paris, France, designed to end the conflict with the Serbian government over the autonomy of Kosovo. Serbian delegates, however, refuse to sign the accord because of its inclusion of a planned NATO peacekeeping force in the region. 20 March 1999 Serbian forces launch an attack against ethnic Albanians in the central Drenica region of Kosovo, a stronghold of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), which is fighting for independence for the province. The Serbian forces shell and burn villages, and reportedly detain and kill ten men in the village of Srbica. At least 40,000 ethnic Albanians are forced to flee the area. 21 March 1999 The 71st annual Academy Awards are held in Los Angeles, California, hosted by US actor and comedian Whoopi Goldberg. Best Picture:

Shakespeare in Love; Best Director: Steven Spielberg for Saving Private Ryan; Best Actor: Roberto Benigni for Life is Beautiful; Best Actress: Gwyneth Paltrow for Shakespeare in Love; Best Supporting Actor: James Coburn for Affliction; Best Supporting Actress: Judi Dench for Shakespeare in Love; Best Original Screenplay: Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard for Shakespeare in Love. 24 March 1999 NATO launches air strikes against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, starting off a bombing campaign prompted by Serbian president Slobodan Miloševic's refusal to sign a peace accord with ethnic Albanians over the area of Kosovo. It is NATO's first assault on a sovereign nation in its 50-year history. 25 March 1999 Russia and China denounce the NATO air strikes against Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, demanding a political rather than military solution to the conflict in Kosovo. 26 March 1999 A jury in Oakland County, Michigan, convicts US doctor Jack Kevorkian, a crusader for the legalization of physician-assisted suicide, of seconddegree murder for killing Thomas Youk, a patient who was terminally ill and sought Kevorkian's help in killing himself. The death was videotaped and broadcast on the CBS television news programme 60 Minutes in November 1998. Although Kevorkian claims to have assisted 130 people in committing suicide, by providing a machine that lets the patient administer his or her own lethal injection, this was the first case in which Kevorkian injected the patient himself. 29 March 1999 A computer virus spreads via e-mail to more than 100,000 computers around the world. Named Melissa, it reportedly spreads more widely and quickly than any previous virus. March 1999 Russian scientists at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research at Dubna create ununquadium (atomic number 114). March 1999 Scientists discover a previously undetected fault running under Los Angeles, California, that could potentially cause a major earthquake. The Puente Hills fault extends for 40 km/25 mi. 1 April 1999 The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reports that more than 160,000 ethnic Albanians have fled Kosovo and another 260,000 have fled their homes since the NATO bombing campaign began a week earlier. 4 April 1999 As the refugee crisis worsens in the Yugoslav republic of Kosovo, several NATO members agree to plans to airlift up to 110,000 ethnic Albanian refugees out of the region. More than 400,000 ethnic Albanians have fled the region since NATO began air strikes on 24 March. 5 April 1999 Former Libyan intelligence officers Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, the suspects charged with the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988, arrive in the Netherlands to stand trial. The handover results in the automatic end to United Nations sanctions against

Libya, whose leader Moamer al-Khaddafi had refused for ten years to release the suspects to stand trial. 9 April 1999 Niger president Ibrahim Barre Mainassara is assassinated by members of his presidential guard at the airport in the capital, Niamey. A military government led by Daouda Wanke, head of the presidential guard, takes power. 11 April 1999 Indian military forces conduct a test launch of a ballistic missile that is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. Three days later Pakistan conducts two similar launches, renewing international concerns over the possibility of a nuclear arms race in south Asia. 12 April 1999 Foreign ministers from NATO's 19 member countries meet for the first time since bombing began in Kosovo. They pledge to continue the bombing campaign until Yugoslav president Slobodan Miloševic withdraws his forces from Kosovo and allows ethnic Albanian refugees to return safely. 12 April 1999 US federal judge Susan Webber Wright rules that President Bill Clinton is in contempt of court for lying about his relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky during the Paula Jones sexual harassment case. 15 April 1999 British home secretary Jack Straw rules that the extradition case against former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet may proceed. 17 April 1999 A nail bomb explodes in Brixton Market in London, England, injuring at least 40 people. A member of the Combat 18 neo-Nazi group, which has been linked to several racist attacks, claims responsibility. 17 April 1999 Indian prime minister Atal Vajpayee, leader of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, resigns after his government loses a vote of confidence in parliament. 20 April 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, two pupils of Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, kill 13 people and injure more than 30 others using guns and bombs in a five-hour rampage. They then kill themselves. 25 April 1999 A nail bomb explodes in the East End of London, England, in the heart of the city's Bangladeshi community, injuring six people. The incident is linked to the nail bomb explosion in Brixton a week earlier. 28 April 1999 Vuk Draskovic is dismissed as deputy prime minister of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, after a televised speech in which he claims that the Yugoslav government is ready to accept a peace settlement in the conflict over the province of Kosovo and that NATO could not be defeated. 1 May 1999 A nail bomb explodes in the 'Admiral Duncan', a gay pub in Soho, London, England, killing three people and injuring 73. The incident is linked to similar nail bomb explosions in April in Brixton and the East End.

2 May 1999 British engineer David Copeland is charged with planting the three nail bombs in London that killed three people and injured more than 100. He was arrested the previous day at his house in Cove, near Farnborough, Hampshire, where police found bags of nails and explosives. 4 May 1999 The fiercest tornadoes in the USA for more than ten years strike Oklahoma and Kansas, causing at least 36 deaths and 700 injuries, shattering thousands of homes, and destroying whole neighbourhoods. 6 May 1999 Devolution elections are held in Scotland and Wales, and local elections are held in England. The Labour Party is the largest party in the Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly, but fails to win an overall majority in either, as the Scottish National Party and Plaid Cymru in Wales, both nationalist parties, gain large numbers of seats. 9 May 1999 NATO leaders insist that their bombing campaign against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia will continue, despite the accidental bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. The embassy bombing provokes the biggest demonstrations in Beijing since the protests in Tiananmen Square ten years ago. 10 May 1999 A team of French scientists unearth what is believed to be the world's largest fossil of a land mammal. The fossil, which is 5.5 m/18 ft high and 7 m/23 ft long, is from the Baluchitherium, a 15–20 tonne mammal that looked like a rhinoceros and lived 30 million years ago. 11 May 1999 Government forces in Congo drop five bombs on the city of Goma, headquarters of rebel forces, killing 39 people and injuring 47. Doctors report that half of the casualties were children. 12 May 1999 Russian president Boris Yeltsin sacks his prime minister, Yevgeny Primakov, and Primakov's cabinet. The Russian Duma (parliament) declares that there is no basis for the dismissal and moves for Yeltsin's resignation. 12 May 1999 The new Scottish Parliament comes into existence in Edinburgh. It is Scotland's first parliament for nearly 300 years. 13 May 1999 Scottish secretary Donald Dewar is elected Scotland's new first minister by the Scottish Parliament. His place in the cabinet is taken by the transport minister John Reid. 17 May 1999 NATO spokesperson Jamie Shea announces that NATO will continue its policy of air strikes and demands for Serb withdrawal from Kosovo, while British foreign secretary Robin Cook presses the need for ground troops. The possible use of ground troops is seen as a divisive issue within NATO. 18 May 1999 The German and Italian governments announce that they do not support the use of NATO land troops against Serb forces in Kosovo, furthering the

rift among the NATO nations. 19 May 1999 The long-awaited prequel Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace opens to great fanfare in the USA, directed by George Lucas and starring Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, and Samuel L Jackson. It earns a record-breaking $28.5 million/£17.8 million in its first 24 hours. 25 May 1999 An all-party report from the US Congress claims that Chinese spies have infiltrated US weapons intelligence, stealing data on every major US nuclear warhead in recent years. 26 May 1999 Indian fighter jets bomb mountain peaks in Kashmir, targeting Pakistani guerrillas who have captured key positions in the disputed region. It is India's first bombing of an enemy since 1971, when India and Pakistan went to war. May 1999 The United Nations World Health Organization announces that AIDS is now the world's leading infectious killer and the leading cause of death in Africa. 1 June 1999 The Russian space agency orders the cosmonauts aboard the Mir space station to return to Earth in August, abandoning the problem-ridden space station. 3 June 1999 Leaders of the European Union nations sign a common defence policy, including the possibility of creating an EU Military Staff and a military committee based in Brussels, Belgium, with the power to mount peacekeeping operations. NATO secretary general Javier Solana is appointed head of the common foreign and security policy. 3 June 1999 South African vice-president Thabo Mbeki of the African National Congress (ANC) is elected president of South Africa, replacing Nelson Mandela, who is retiring. 3 June 1999 The president of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Slobodan Miloševic formally accepts a peace plan devised by the European Union and Russia, after 72 days of NATO bombing. NATO plans to continue bombing until Serb forces begin to withdraw from the disputed region of Kosovo. 6 June 1999 Peace talks between Yugoslav and NATO military leaders are deadlocked when the Yugloslavs reject terms of a seven-day withdrawal out of Kosovo. NATO continues its bombing campaign, insisting it will not stop until Yugoslav president Slobodan Miloševic agrees to NATO's terms. 8 June 1999 The first democratic elections for 44 years are held in Indonesia, amid reports of corruption and irregularities. 9 June 1999 Abdullah II is crowned king of Jordan, inheriting the kingdom from his father, King Hussein, who died in February.

10 June 1999 As Serb troops start to withdraw from Kosovo, NATO general secretary Javier Solana officially declares an end to the alliance's 78 days of bombing in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, marking an end to the war. NATO makes final preparations for Operation Joint Guardian, the largest peacekeeping force in modern history, which will facilitate the return of up to one million ethnic Albanian refugees to their homes in Kosovo. 11 June 1999 Russian troops are the first to enter Serbia and move toward Kosovo, prompting NATO concerns about possible clashes between Russian and Western troops in the province. 12 June 1999 British, German, French, and US NATO troops enter the province of Kosovo in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and arrive in the capital, Priština, to liberate the province from Serb forces. British paratroopers encounter 200 Russian troops stationed at Priština's airport as NATO and Russia enter peace negotiations. 16 June 1999 Ethnic Albanian refugees begin to return in large numbers to their homes in Kosovo, surprising United Nations officials who thought they would wait for fear of hidden mines and other dangers. 17 June 1999 Cardinal (George) Basil Hume, Britain's most senior Catholic cleric, Archbishop of Westminster 1976–99, the first Benedictine monk to be the Archbishop of Westminster since 1850, dies of stomach cancer in London, England (76). 18 June 1999 The Group of Seven (G7) industrialized nations unveils a $100 billion package of debt relief for developing countries, at the end of a three-day economic summit in Cologne, Germany. 18 June 1999 United Nations forensic investigators enter Kosovo to gather evidence of killings and torture of ethnic Albanians by Serb forces. The British government estimates that 10,000 ethnic Albanians were killed. 19 June 1999 Prince Edward, the youngest son of Queen Elizabeth, marries Sophie Rhys-Jones at St George's Chapel, Windsor, England. The Queen gives them the titles Earl and Countess of Wessex. 22 June 1999 In one of the biggest upsets in the history of tennis at Wimbledon, Australian unknown Jelena Dokic, ranked 122 in the world, beats top seed Martina Hingis of Switzerland 6–2, 6–0. 23 June 1999 According to the 1999 World Disasters Report, published by the Red Cross, refugees from environmental disasters such as drought, floods, and deforestation totalled 25 million in 1998, outnumbering war refugees for the first time. 30 June 1999 A midnight deadline is set in Northern Ireland for agreement over

the setting up of the power-sharing executive of the Northern Ireland Assembly. British and Irish leaders, as well as US president Bill Clinton, work to hammer out an agreement to break the deadlock over the decommissioning of Irish Republican Army (IRA) weapons. Sinn Fein agrees to decommission three months after the executive is established. The proposal includes the offer of an IRA statement that the terrorist group fully backs Sinn Fein's position. The midnight deadline passes without full agreement. June 1999 India intensifies its military campaign, including air strikes using laserguided bombs, against Islamic infiltrators in northern Kashmir. The Indian government claims that the infiltrators are backed by Pakistani troops. 1 July 1999 Queen Elizabeth II formally opens the Scottish Parliament, the first Scottish legislature in nearly 200 years. 2 July 1999 Mario Puzo, US writer, author of the novel The Godfather (1969) and co-writer with Francis Coppola of the screenplay of the film of the same name (1972), dies in Bay Shore, New York (78). 3 July 1999 Former British futures trader Nick Leeson is released from prison in Singapore, after serving a little more than half of a six and a half year prison sentence for fraud and forgery when his losses led to the collapse of Barings Bank in 1995. 4 July 1999 In a meeting with US president Bill Clinton, Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif pledges to restore the line of ceasefire between Pakistani and Indian forces in the disputed region of Kashmir. Muslim forces, however, vow to continue fighting, and the Indian government rejects foreign intervention in solving the crisis. 6 July 1999 Ehud Barak, head of the One Israel alliance party, is sworn in as prime minister of Israel, succeeding Binyamin Netanyahu. 14 July 1999 The European Commission votes to formally end its ban on beef exports from Britain after veterinary officials reported that the epidemic of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) is under control. 14 July 1999 The Ulster Unionist Party rejects a peace plan proposed by British prime minister Tony Blair and Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern and refuses to attend the meeting scheduled for the following day to set up a new cabinet in Northern Ireland. The party's refusal to attend the meeting blocks the formation of the cabinet. 16 July 1999 John (Fitzgerald) Kennedy Jr, political magazine editor and only surviving son of former US president John F Kennedy, dies near Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, when his aeroplane crashes (38). His wife, Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, and his wife's sister, Lauren Bessette, also die. 18 July 1999 The US Census Bureau reports that the world population has

reached 6 billion. July 1999 English writer J K Rowling publishes Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, the third book of her best-selling children's series about a schoolboy wizard. July 1999 The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) crash-lands the spacecraft Lunar Prospector on the Moon, in order to stir up debris that can be analysed for evidence of water vapour. 9 August 1999 Russian president Boris Yeltsin dismisses Sergei Stepashin as premier less than three months after he took position. Yeltsin names ally and supporter Vladimir Putin as Stepashin's successor. 10 August 1999 An Indian fighter jet shoots down a Pakistani naval plane in a border area, killing all 16 people aboard. The incident increases the friction between the two nations over the disputed region of Kashmir. 11 August 1999 A total solar eclipse occurs in England. The path of the eclipse passes over Cornwall, England – the first total solar eclipse visible there since 1927. The eclipse is marred by poor visibility due to clouds and rain. 17 August 1999 An earthquake measuring 7.4 on the Richter scale strikes a densely populated industrial area of northwestern Turkey, near Izmit. The initial death toll rises to 2,000, but will exceed 13,000 by the following week. 23 August 1999 German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder formally inaugurates Berlin as the new capital of Germany. The German parliament held its final session in Bonn in July. 26 August 1999 The official death toll from an earthquake that struck northwestern Turkey on 17 August 1999 rises to 13,009, with at least 26,000 people injured. 30 August 1999 A historic vote is held in East Timor to decide between remaining part of Indonesia or becoming an independent state. The United Nations (UN) estimates that more than 90% of the 450,000 people who registered turn out to vote. August 1999 Torrential rains in the Philippines cause floods and landslides that kill at least 160 people. 3 September 1999 Nine press photographers who were charged with manslaughter and negligence for their role in chasing the car in which Diana, Princess of Wales, died in 1997, are cleared of all charges by a French court in Paris. 4 September 1999 In a referendum, the people of East Timor vote

overwhelmingly for independence from Indonesia. Within hours of the announcement of the result, militiamen create roadblocks and enter the capital, Dili. 5 September 1999 The day after the East Timorese vote for independence, militiamen kill more than 20 people in the capital, Dili. Mounting violence creates up to 150,000 refugees, a quarter of the population. The United Nations (UN) Security Council plans to send a mission to Jakarta to put pressure on the Indonesian government to halt the violence. 12 September 1999 The Indonesian government yields to international pressure to allow a United Nations (UN) peacekeeping force into East Timor. The decision comes after statements by the UN linking the military to the recent atrocities, and a plan announced by the UN Human Rights Commissioner to set up a tribunal to deal with war crimes. 20 September 1999 The first international peacekeepers arrive in East Timor from Australia and Britain to liberate the territory from Indonesia. September 1999 The short list for the Booker Prize for fiction is announced: J M Coetzee, Disgrace; Anita Desai, Fasting, Feasting; Michael Frayn, Headlong; Andrew O'Hagan, Our Fathers; Ahdaf Soueif, The Map of Love; and Colm Toíbín, The Blackwater Lightship. 3 October 1999 Austria's far right Freedom party increases its number of seats in parliamentary elections, becoming the second largest party in government in Austria. The party campaigned under an anti-immigration platform, and its leader, Jörg Haider, is a Nazi sympathizer. 5 October 1999 In Britain's worst rail crash for 10 years, two commuter trains crash near Paddington Station, London, England. 31 people died, and 150 were injured. The crash is blamed on human error; the driver went through a red warning signal. 25 October 1999 South African writer J M Coetzee wins the Booker Prize for his novel Disgrace. He is the only writer to win the award twice, having also gained it in 1983 for his novel The Life and Times of Michael K. 26 October 1999 The Dutch parliament votes 49–26 to end the ban on brothels imposed in 1912. The law, which will go into effect in 2000, will legalise the Netherlands' sex industry. 27 October 1999 Gunmen enter the parliament in Yerevan, Armenia, and shoot dead Vazgen Sarkisyan, the country's prime minister, as well as three top government officials. 29 October 1999 A European Union scientific committee rejects French claims that British beef can not be considered safe and rules that current regulations for the British beef do not need to be changed or tightened.

30 October 1999 A cyclone hits the eastern coast of India, causing mass flooding and leaving millions of people homeless. The initial death toll is 232. October 1999 A Russian expedition led by scientist Bernard Buigues discovers the carcass of a 23,000-year-old woolly mammoth frozen in Siberia. The carcass is flown to Khatanga, Russia, where scientists plan to clone the mammoth using an elephant as a surrogate mother. October 1999 Irish poet Seamus Heaney publishes Beowulf: A New Translation. 3 November 1999 Scientists from the UK and China announce that they have identified fossils of two previously unknown species of fish in southern China that are 530 million years old. The find proves that vertebrates are at least 50 million years older than previously thought. 6 November 1999 Australia defeat France 35–12 at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff, Wales, to win the 1999 Rugby Union World Cup. 9 November 1999 The government of Saudi Arabia announces plans to issue identity cards to women. Currently women are listed on the identity cards of their male next of kin. 17 November 1999 Scientists from the University of Washington in Seattle, USA, publish data showing that the Arctic icecap has shrunk by around 40% over the past 50 years, probably due to global warming. The Canadian Wildlife Service reports that polar bears in the area are in danger of starving to death because of their shortened hunting season. 19 November 1999 The animated film Toy Story 2 is released, directed by John Lasseter and featuring the voices of Tom Hanks and Tim Allen. 20 November 1999 China launches its first spacecraft, an uncrewed vehicle that travels for 21 hours in space, from the Jinquan satellite centre in the northwest province of Gansu. 21 November 1999 Quentin Crisp, performer, gay icon, and author of The Naked Civil Servant, dies in Chorlton-cum-Hardy, South Manchester, England (90). 25 November 1999 The Taliban government of Afghanistan opens the first state schools for girls, around the capital, Kabul. 28 November 1999 Russian troops fire on the Chechnyan capital of Grozny with bombs, rockets, and shells, killing hundreds of people and destroying large areas of the city, in their worst attack on the Chechen capital since the war began two months ago. 30 November 1999 Activists protest against free trade in Seattle, Washington,

disrupting the annual World Trade Organisation meeting, in the biggest demonstration in the USA since the Vietnam War. Riot police use red pepper gas to disperse demonstrators, and a state of emergency is declared. 30 November 1999 British artist Steve McQueen wins the Turner Prize for his black-and-white silent film Deadpan, inspired by the comedian Buster Keaton. November 1999 The film The Cider House Rules, based on the 1985 novel by John Irving, is released, directed by Lasse Hallstrom and starring Charlize Theron and Michael Caine. 2 December 1999 Northern Ireland's first all-inclusive power-sharing cabinet meets for the first time, in Belfast. Irish First Minister Bertie Ahern signs away articles two and three of the Irish constitution, giving up his country's territorial claim to Northern Ireland. 6 December 1999 An international court in Arusha, Tanzania, convicts Hutu leader George Rutaganda of genocide, extermination, and murder for his role in the deaths of thousands of Tutsis in Rwanda in 1994. He is sentenced to life in prison. 6 December 1999 Residents of the besieged Chechen capital, Grozny, are warned by Russian troops that they have five days to leave the city, or risk death. Western leaders condemn the action and warn the Russian government against an all-out attack on the city. 7 December 1999 Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah, the two Libyans accused of murdering 270 people in the air crash over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, appear before a Scottish court in the Netherlands. It is their first public court appearance following the crash 11 years ago. 12 December 1999 US writer Joseph Heller, author of the novel Catch-22 (1961), dies in Long Island, New York (76). 19 December 1999 Severe flash flooding washes away entire villages along the Caribbean coast of Venezuela in the country's worst national disaster for 50 years. The initial death toll is more than 5,000. 25 December 1999 A storm hits northern France, causing the most violent winds ever recorded in the area, killing at least 31 people, and causing severe damage in the capital, Paris. 25 December 1999 The film The Talented Mr Ripley is released, directed by Anthony Minghella and starring Matt Damon, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jude Law, Cate Blanchett, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. 31 December 1999 The Portuguese territory of Macau is handed over to China after 442 years of colonial rule.

December 1999 Pokémon trading cards, based on a character in a video game created in Japan, are set to become the most popular toy for Christmas in the USA. 1999 The new UK minimum wage of £3.60 per hour, announced in June 1998, comes into effect. 1 January 2000 The Millennium Dome in Greenwich, London, England, opens to the public, and is scheduled to remain open throughout 2000. Some 12,500 people visit it on the opening day. 1 January 2000 The new millennium is celebrated across the world, with fireworks, street parties, ceremonies, and speeches. The millennium bug does not appear to make a large impact, and despite fears of acts of extremism and terrorism, the global celebration passes peacefully. 11 January 2000 British home secretary Jack Straw announces that the British government will not extradite former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to stand trial in Spain for crimes against humanity, because a medical team ruled that he showed signs of senility and was medically unfit to do so. 14 January 2000 The film Girl, Interrupted is released, directed by James Mangold and starring Winona Ryder, Angelina Jolie, Whoopi Goldberg, Vanessa Redgrave, Brittany Murphy, and Clea DuVall. 18 January 2000 Former German chancellor Helmut Kohl resigns in disgrace his honorary leadership of the Christian Democratic Union after he refuses to identify the source of DM 2 million/£ 635,000/$1 million which he secretly received on behalf of the party when he was chancellor. 19 January 2000 Hedy Lamarr (born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler), US film actor, dies in Florida (86). 21 January 2000 The film Angela's Ashes, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir by Irish-born American Frank McCourt, is released, directed by Alan Parker and starring Robert Carlyle, Shane Murray-Corcoran, and Emily Watson. 30 January 2000 US tennis champion Andre Agassi defeats Russian opponent Yevgeny Kafelnikov 3–6, 6–3, 6–2, 6–4 to win the men's singles title at the Australian Open in Melbourne. 30 January 2000 US tennis player Lindsay Davenport defeats Czech opponent Martina Hingis 6–1, 7–5 to win the women's singles title at the Australian Open in Melbourne. January 2000 Bill Gates, the world's richest man, resigns his position as chief executive of the computer company Microsoft to become the company's chief software architect.

3 February 2000 Peter Mandelson, the Northern Ireland secretary, announces that the British government will reimpose direct rule over Northern Ireland unless the Irish Republican Army (IRA) begins decommissioning its weapons within a week. 6 February 2000 Foreign Minister Tarja Halonen of the Social Democratic Party is elected Finland's first woman president. 11 February 2000 The British government suspends Northern Ireland's new power-sharing government after the Irish Republican Army (IRA) fails to begin decommissioning weapons. 11 February 2000 The film The Beach is released, based on the novel by Alex Garland, directed by Danny Boyle, and starring Leonardo DiCapprio. 11 February–22 February 2000 The space shuttle Endeavour carries out a mission in which it scans the Earth's surface with radar signals to create a detailed topographical map of the world. 12 February 2000 Charles M(onroe) Schulz, cartoonist, creator of the 'Peanuts' comic strip, dies in Santa Rosa, California (77). 14 February 2000 Tornadoes hit southwest Georgia, USA, killing 18 people and injuring more than 100. 29 February 2000 After a playground argument, a six-year-old boy shoots and kills six-year-old Kayla Rolland in front of their classmates and teacher at Buell Elementary School in Morris Mount Township, near Flint, Michigan. 11 March 2000 An explosion in the Barakova mine in Sukhodolsk, Ukraine, kills 82 people, in Europe's worst mining disaster for 20 years. 12 March 2000 In a speech unprecedented for its sweeping apology, Pope John Paul II seeks forgiveness for the Catholic Church for 2000 years of violence against and persecution of Jews and other minority groups, and women. 16 March 2000 A Pakistani judge convicts Javed Iqbal, Pakistan's most notorious serial killer, of murdering 100 children and sentences him to be strangled, chopped up into pieces, and dissolved in acid in front of the parents of his victims. 17 March 2000 Some 530 people die in the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God church in Kanungu trading centre in Rukungiri, western Uganda. At first the deaths are treated as a mass suicide, but the discovery of mutilated and strangled corpses leads the authorities to suspect murder. 17 March 2000 The film Erin Brockovich is released, directed by Steven Soderbergh and starring Julia Roberts, Aaron Eckhart, Albert Finney, Marg

Helgenberger, and Scarlett Pomers. 26 March 2000 Acting Russian president Vladimir Putin is elected president of Russia. 26 March 2000 The Academy Awards are held in Los Angeles, California. Best Picture: American Beauty, Best Director: Sam Mendes for American Beauty, Best Actor: Kevin Spacey for American Beauty, Best Actress: Hilary Swank for Boys Don't Cry, Best Supporting Actor: Michael Caine for The Cider House Rules, Best Supporting Actress: Angelina Jolie for Girl, Interrupted, and Best Original Screenplay: Alan Ball for American Beauty. 28 March 2000 Anthony Powell, writer and literary critic, dies in Frome, Somerset, England (94). 1 April 2000 Court-appointed mediator Richard Posner announces that efforts to settle the US government's monopoly case against US software company Microsoft out-of-court have failed. 3 April 2000 US district judge Thomas Penfield Jackson rules against US software company Microsoft in the anti-trust case brought by US state governments. Shares in the company fall by 15%. 6 April 2000 Nawaz Sharif, the deposed prime minister of Pakistan, is sentenced to life in prison for terrorism and hijacking in a plot against General Pervez Musharraf, the military leader who ousted him from power in 1999. 14 April 2000 The Nasdaq (high tech-dominated) stock exchange on Wall Street, New York, experiences a record one-day fall after a week of heavy selling of Internet (dot.com) shares. 15 April 2000 A white farmer and two members of Zimbabwe's main opposition party are killed by supporters of president Robert Mugabe, who continues to condone seizures of white farms by black war veterans. 18 April 2000 After a shootout that according to neighbours lasts nearly three hours, white Zimbabwean farmer Martin Olds is shot dead by black squatters intending to seize his farm, further plunging the country into turmoil. 21 April 2000 The Russian parliament ratifies the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty. The US Senate refused to ratify the treaty in 1999. 22 April 2000 In a pre-dawn raid, heavily-armed US federal agents seize six-yearold Cuban Elian Gonzalez from his relatives in Miami, Florida, who have defied a justice department order to surrender him. He is later reunited with his father at an airbase near Washington, DC. 23 April 2000 Rebel Filipinos of the Abu Sayyaf, a Muslim militia fighting for

independence from the majority Catholic Philippines, take 21 people hostage from a Malaysian diving resort and take them to the southern Philippine island of Jolo. 23 April 2000 Scottish racing driver David Coulthard, driving a Mercedes McLaren, wins his second successive British Grand Prix title, at Silverstone, England. 27 April 2000 Talks in London, England, between officials from Zimbabwe and British foreign secretary Robin Cook aimed at restoring peace in Zimbabwe end in a deadlock after the Zimbabwean delegation refuse to make a commitment to end the violence. 30 April 2000 English boxing champion Lennox Lewis defeats US boxer Michael Grant in the 2nd round of their fight at Madison Square Garden, New York City, to retain his heavyweight boxing title. April 2000 Veterans of Zimbabwe's civil war, supported by the President Robert Mugabe's government, take over farms owned by whites. 4 May 2000 A computer virus nicknamed the 'love bug', sent as an attachment claiming to be a love letter, strikes computer systems around the world, closing down an estimated one-tenth of the world's servers. 4 May 2000 Independent candidate Ken Livingstone is elected mayor of London. He wins a total of 776,427 votes against 564,137 for Steven Norris, the Conservative candidate. The other candidates, including Labour's Frank Dobson and Liberal Democrat Susan Kramer, are eliminated after a first round of counting. 5 May 2000 Revolutionary United Front rebels in Sierra Leone take UN peacekeepers hostage in their campaign against the government. They seize 208 Zambian peacekeepers, bringing the total number of UN hostages to 318. 6 May 2000 The IRA offers to open its hidden arms dumps to inspection as part of a peace agreement to restore self-rule to Northern Ireland. The arsenals would be opened for inspection by Cyril Ramaphosa, the former secretary general of the African National Congress (ANC), and Martti Ahtisaari, the former president of Finland. 7 May 2000 Vladimir Putin is sworn in as the second president of modern Russia. It is the first time that the Russian government has changed hands peacefully and democratically. 12 May 2000 The Tate Modern art gallery opens at Bankside, London, England. 13 May 2000 A massive blast at a fireworks warehouse in Enschede, Netherlands, kills 20 people and injures more than 600.

14 May 2000 US mothers gather in Washington, DC, on Mother's Day for the Million Mom March to support stricter gun control laws. Among the speakers are three mothers of children who were killed in the Dunblane massacre in Scotland. 21 May 2000 (Arthur) John Gielgud, legendary Shakespearean actor, dies nears Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire (96). 22 May 2000 British prime minister Tony Blair announces the birth of his son, Leo, who is the first child to be born to a serving prime minister in 150 years. 29 May 2000 The military declares martial law in Fiji, while nationalist gunmen continue to hold prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry hostage in parliament in the capital, Suva. May 2000 The film Gladiator is released, directed by Ridley Scott and starring Russell Crowe and Joaquin Phoenix. 10 June 2000 Hafez al Assad, president of Syria 1970–2000, dies in Damascus (69). 13 June 2000 North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and South Korean leader Kim Dae Jung meet for the first time at a peace summit in Pyongyang, North Korea. It is the first time that leaders of the two countries have met in 55 years. 18 June 2000 US golfer Tiger Woods wins the US Masters golf tournament at Pebble Beach, California. 19 June 2000 During an inspection of a Dutch lorry at Dover, England, customs officers discover the dead bodies of 58 Chinese illegal immigrants. 23 June 2000 A fire blazes through a backpacker's hotel in Queensland, Australia, killing 15 people. It is thought to have been caused by arson. 26 June 2000 Scientists working on the Human Genome Project in London, England, and Washington, DC, announce that they have completed the first draft of the entire structure of human DNA. 27 June 2000 The opposition Movement for Democratic Change party gains 57 seats in Zimbabwe's parliament, just five short of the elected total for the ruling Zanu-PF party. While the opposition and observers condemn the electoral process as corrupt, President Mugabe celebrates his party's narrow victory and vows to continue his policy of seizing and redistributing land. 28 June 2000 After seven months in the USA, six-year-old disputed Cuban exile Elian Gonzalez returns to Cuba with his father who was granted custody by a US federal court earlier in the month. 30 June 2000 David Copeland, the engineer's assistant who planted nail bombs

which killed three people and injured 139 others in London, England, is sentenced to six life terms of imprisonment. June 2000 The animated film Chicken Run is released, directed by Nick Park and Peter Lord (of Wallace and Gromit fame), and starring the voices of Mel Gibson and Jane Horrocks. 2 July 2000 France's national soccer team win the European championship, beating Italy 2–1 in the final in Rotterdam, Netherlands, to add to their 1998 World Cup success. 6 July 2000 FIFA, football's world governing body, announces in controversial circumstances that the 2006 World Cup will be staged in Germany rather than South Africa. 8 July 2000 At the Wimbledon tennis tournament, Venus Williams of the USA defeats Lindsay Davenport, also of the USA and the defending champion, 6–3, 7–6 to take the title, having earlier met her sister, Serena Williams, in the semi-final. 8 July 2000 English writer J K Rowling publishes her new book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the fourth in a hugely successful children's series. 9 July 2000 Pete Sampras of the USA beats Pat Rafter of Australia to win his seventh men's singles tennis championship at Wimbledon and his 13th Grand Slam title. 14 July 2000 The film X-Men is released in the USA, directed by Bryan Singer, and starring Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen. 17 July 2000 Bashar al Assad is installed as the new president of Syria following a referendum, succeeding his late father. 23 July 2000 Tiger Woods, the 24-year-old US golfer, wins the 2000 British Open at St Andrews, Scotland, with a record score of 19 under par (269) for the four rounds. He is the youngest ever player to win all four of golf's major championships. 25 July 2000 An Air France Concorde jet, chartered to a German tour company, crashes soon after take-off from Paris, France, killing all 109 passengers and crew, and four people on the ground. 4 August 2000 Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, celebrates her 100th birthday in London, England. She becomes the first centenarian in royal history. 5 August 2000 Alec Guinness, the English Oscar-winning actor and star of dozens of films including Bridge on the River Kwai and Star Wars, dies in Midhurst, England (86).

8 August 2000 The Supreme Court of Chile confirms that Augusto Pinochet no longer has parliamentary immunity, laying the former dictator open to prosecution for human rights offences during his rule. 20 August 2000 US golfer Tiger Woods wins the USA PGA championship at Valhalla, Louisville, Kentucky, becoming only the second man in history after Ben Hogan in 1953 to win three major golfing titles in one season. 23 August 2000 A Gulf Air Airbus A320 with over 140 people on board crashes into the sea just off Bahrain on a flight from Cairo, Egypt. All passengers and crew die in the crash. August 2000 A Russian nuclear-powered submarine, the Kursk, sinks to the bottom of the Barents Sea during a naval exercise. Despite international help, efforts to rescue the 118 crew members fail, and the Russian authorities are heavily criticized for their handling of the crisis. August 2000 The worst forest fires for half a century rage across many western states of the USA. 8 September 2000 US scientists announce that the hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic has reached a record size of 28 million sq km/11 million sq mi. 10 September 2000 The 1999–2000 Emmy Awards for television are held. Best Drama Series: The West Wing; Best Comedy Series: Will & Grace; Best Actor in a Drama: James Gandolfini, for The Sopranos; Best Actress in a Drama: Sela Ward, for Once and Again; Best Actor in a Comedy: Michael J Fox, for Spin City; Best Actress in a Comedy: Patricia Heaton, for Everybody Loves Raymond. 13 September 2000 US bank Chase Manhattan buys J P Morgan, once the dominant financial power on Wall Street, for over $30 billion/£20.5 billion. The merged bank is named J P Morgan Chase. 28 September 2000 In a referendum in Denmark, voters reject the adoption of the European Union's single currency, the euro. September 2000 An estimated 15 million people in northeast India and Bangladesh are displaced by severe flooding that also claims around 700 lives. September 2000 Citigroup, the largest US financial firm, announces its intention to buy Texas-based Associates First Capital for $31 billion. 1 October 2000 The 27th Olympic Games close in Sydney, Australia. The USA wins 39 gold medals; Russia, 32; China, 28; Australia, 16; Germany, 14; France and Italy, 13 each; Netherlands, 12; Cuba and Great Britain, 11 each. 1 October 2000 The Aga Khan's racehorse Sinndar wins the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe at the Longchamp racecourse in Paris, France, becoming the first horse

to win this race, the English Derby, and the Irish Derby in the same season. 5 October 2000 The autobiography of the legendary Beatles pop group, The Beatles Anthology, is published. 6 October 2000 In the face of widespread strikes and street protests, Slobodan Miloševic concedes defeat after September's presidential election in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and acknowledges the victory of opposition candidate Vojislav Koštunica. 6 October 2000 The comedy film Meet the Parents is released in the USA, directed by Jay Roach, and starring Robert de Niro and Ben Stiller. 8 October 2000 Europe's women golfers beat the USA team in Scotland to claim the Solheim Cup for the first time since 1992. 8 October 2000 German motor-racing driver Michael Schumacher wins the Japanese Grand prix, clinching the World Drivers' Championship for the third time in his career and becoming the Ferrari team's first champion driver since 1979. 10 October 2000 Sirimavo Bandaranaike, the world's first woman prime minister, dies in Sri Lanka (84). 13 October 2000 The Nobel Prize for Peace is awarded to the South Korean President, Kim Dae Jung, for promoting reconciliation with North Korea and supporting human rights in South Korea and East Asia. 17 October 2000 A major exhibition of 109 works of art by some of the world's greatest painters opens at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, France. The collection was received by the museum from an anonymous donor. 25 October 2000 Having claimed victory in a flawed presidential election, Ivorian military dictator Robert Guei is swept from power by mass popular revolt and replaced by his electoral rival Laurent Gbagbo. 31 October 2000 A Singapore Airlines jumbo jet crashes in flames while taking off in a typhoon from Chiang Kai-chek international airport in Taipei, Taiwan, killing an estimated eighty passengers and crew. October 2000 A drawing by Michelangelo depicting a heavily draped woman is found at Castle Howard, North Yorkshire, England, during a routine insurance valuation by an expert from Sotheby's. It is valued at up to £8 million. October 2000 Alpine regions of Italy and Switzerland are devastated by flooding and landslides after days of heavy rain, claiming around 40 lives. October 2000 Violent clashes between Palestinians and Israeli security forces

and settlers in the West Bank, Gaza, and Israel claim more than one hundred and fifty lives (most of them Palestinians). US and other international efforts at mediation fail to bring about a ceasefire as the future of the whole Middle East peace process hangs in the balance. 7 November 2000 Canadian writer Margaret Atwood wins the UK literary Booker Prize for her novel The Blind Assassin. 8 November 2000 Pablo Picasso's painting Femme aux bras croisés/Woman with crossed arms fetches US$39 million at Christie's saleroom in New York. At twice its pre-sale estimate, it is the highest price ever paid at auction for the Spanish artist's work. 8 November 2000 South Korea's second biggest car manufacturer, Daewoo Motor, goes into receivership. 11 November 2000 In Austria, over 150 people are killed in a fire in a funicular train carrying skiers through a tunnel above the resort of Kaprun, near Salzburg. 17 November 2000 The family film How the Grinch Stole Christmas is released in the USA, directed by Ron Howard, and starring Jim Carrey, Molly Shannon, and Christine Baranski. 25 November 2000 Australia wins the rugby league World Cup for the sixth successive time, beating New Zealand 40–12 in the final in Manchester, England. Wales and England were the beaten semi-finalists. 28 November 2000 The £20,000 Turner Prize for contemporary art is awarded to German-born photographer Wolfgang Tillmans. November 2000 Amid allegations of high-level corruption, Alberto Fujimori submits his resignation as president of Peru from Japan where he says he will stay. Speaker of the Congress Valentin Paniagua is later elected as caretaker president and swears in a new cabinet. November 2000 An album of the greatest hits of the legendary Beatles pop group, featuring 27 number one singles, is released and goes straight to the top of the UK album chart. November 2000 US presidential and congressional elections are held on 7th November. The presidential contest is the closest in living memory and by the end of the month, with recounting still going on in Florida and both the Democrat Al Gore and the Republican George W Bush launching legal challenges, the poll is no nearer resolution. Hillary Clinton, wife of the current president, is elected as senator for New York State, but Republicans retain overall control of Congress. 3 December 2000 Australia's cricket team breaks the existing world record of 11 consecutive Test victories as they beat the West Indies in the second game of a

five-match series. 5 December 2000 French and Kenyan scientists announce that they have unearthed the fossilized remains of humankind's earliest known ancestor dating back 6 million years in Kenya. Christened 'Millennium Man', the find predates previous discoveries by more than 1.5 million years. 10 December 2000 Spain's national tennis team claims the Davis Cup for the first time, following their victory in the final against Australia in Barcelona. 11 December 2000 At the end of a four-day summit meeting in Nice, France, leaders of the 15 member states of the European Union agree on new voting rules and other institutional changes to pave the way for other countries to join the EU from 2005. 11 December 2000 England's cricket team wins the third and final Test against Pakistan in Karachi to clinch the series. It is an England side's first win in Pakistan in 39 years. 12 December 2000 US baseball star Alex Rodriguez signs the richest contract in sporting history, agreeing a $250 million deal to join the Texas Rangers. 13 December 2000 Five weeks after the disputed US presidential election, a ruling by the Supreme Court effectively cancels recounts in Florida. This hands the White House to the Republican Party candidate George W Bush. 22 December 2000 US pop star Madonna marries English film director Guy Ritchie in a private ceremony at Skibo Castle in the Scottish Highlands. 23 December 2000 In parliamentary elections in Serbia, a coalition of reformist opposition parties wins a decisive victory over former president Slobodan Miloševic's ruling Serbian Socialist Party. 27 December 2000 The merger of pharmaceutical giants Glaxo Wellcome and SmithKline Beecham is completed, creating the world's largest drugs company, GlaxoSmithKline. December 2000 The drama film Cast Away is released in the USA, directed by Robert Zemeckis and starring Tom Hanks. 11 January 2001 Scientists in the USA announce that they have created the world's first genetically modified monkey, a baby rhesus called ANDi. The achievement could hasten the development of new treatments for a range of human diseases. 20 January 2001 George W Bush of the Republican Party is sworn in as the 43rd president of the USA. Outgoing president Bill Clinton leaves office with immunity from criminal prosecution for lying about his sexual liaisons with Monica

Lewinsky. 23 January 2001 Matthew Kneale wins the UK Whitbread overall book of the year award for his novel English Passengers. 24 January 2001 In India, more than 30 million Hindus bathe in the Ganges river at the climax of the six-week Kumbh Mela religious festival, which is held every 12 years. This occasion is thought to be the largest religious gathering in history. 26 January 2001 The state of Gujarat in western India is devastated by an earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Richter scale, killing as many as 20,000 people. 28 January 2001 In American football's Super Bowl XXXV, the Baltimore Ravens beat the New York Giants 34–7 in Tampa, Florida. 31 January 2001 A Scottish court sitting in the Netherlands finds one of two Libyan suspects, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, guilty of murdering 270 people when a Pan-Am airliner blew up over Lockerbie in December 1988. His codefendant is found not guilty. January 2001 In war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo, President Laurent Kabila is assassinated in the capital, Kinshasa, reportedly by one of his own bodyguards. His eldest son, major-general Joseph Kabila, subsequently takes over the presidency. January 2001 President of the Philippines Joseph Estrada, whose impeachment trial on charges of corruption collapsed, is forced out of office by popular protest backed by the military. He is replaced by vice-president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. 5 February 2001 At Sotheby's auction house in London, England, an early portrait painting by Egon Schiele is sold for £7.7 million (a record for the Austrian artist), and a late work by Monet, Le Bassin aux Nympheas/The Waterlily Pond, fetches nearly £5.3 million. 6 February 2001 In Israel's prime ministerial election, right-wing Likud party candidate Ariel Sharon wins a landslide victory over Ehud Barak of the Labour Party, prompting speculation about the future of the Middle East peace process. 9 February 2001 The horror film Hannibal is released in the USA, directed by Ridley Scott, and starring Anthony Hopkins, Julianne Moore, and Gary Oldman. 13 February 2001 Oil giant BP Amoco announces annual profits of £9.7 billion, the biggest ever by a UK company and the third-largest corporate earnings ever recorded. 16 February 2001 US and British warplanes bomb targets around Baghdad in Iraq, in an operation described as a defensive measure to protect their patrols over no-fly zones from Iraqi anti-aircraft batteries. It provokes widespread

international criticism. 18 February 2001 A US FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) agent, Robert Hanssen, is arrested and accused of having traded secrets to Russia for 16 years in one of the biggest security breaches in US history. 18 February 2001 Balthus (Balthasar Klossowski), renowned but controversial Polish-born French figurative painter, dies in Switzerland (92). 22 February 2001 At the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, sitting at The Hague in the Netherlands, mass rape is judged to be a war crime and a crime against humanity for the first time in legal history. 25 February 2001 Donald Bradman, the Australian batsman considered to be the greatest cricketer of the 20th century, dies in Adelaide, Australia (92). 25 February 2001 The BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) film awards are held in London, England. Best Picture: Gladiator; Best Director: Ang Lee for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Best Actor: Jamie Bell for Billy Elliot; Best Actress: Julia Roberts for Erin Brockovich; Best Supporting Actor: Benicio Del Toro for Traffic; Best Supporting Actress: Julie Walters for Billy Elliot. February 2001 An outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, a highly infectious virus that affects cloven-hoofed animals, spreads rapidly across farms in the UK, prompting a block on livestock movements and a European Union ban on British meat, milk, and livestock exports. February 2001 The 'first draft' of the human genome sequence is unveiled by two rival teams of scientists. Results from the Human Genome Organization (an international public consortium) and Celera Genomics (a commercial organization) suggest that human beings have about 30,000 genes. 17 March 2001 Around 90 surviving drawings by Italian artist Sandro Botticelli, illustrating Dante's Divine Comedy, are brought together for the first time in 500 years in an exhibition at the Royal Academy in London, England. 20 March 2001 In Brazil the world's largest offshore oil platform (producing around 5% of the country's oil output) sinks after an explosion killing ten workers. 23 March 2001 After 15 years in space (many more than originally planned), Russia's Mir orbital station is deliberately crashed into the Pacific Ocean, disintegrating as it passes through the Earth's atmosphere. 24 March 2001 In the world's most lucrative horserace, US entry Captain Steve wins the US$6 million Dubai World Cup in the United Arab Emirates. 25 March 2001 The Academy Awards are held in Los Angeles, California. Best picture: Gladiator; Best director: Steven Soderbergh for Traffic; Best actor:

Russell Crowe for Gladiator; Best actress: Julia Roberts for Erin Brockovich; Best supporting actor: Benicio Del Toro for Traffic; Best supporting actress: Marcia Gay Harden for Pollock; and Best Original Screenplay: Cameron Crowe for Almost Famous. March 2001 In the Middle East, violent clashes between Palestinians and Israeli forces show no sign of abating. As the Palestinian uprising completes its sixth month, the death toll from shootings, shelling, and bomb attacks passes 450. March 2001 US president George W Bush's Republican administration declares that it will not implement the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions and climate change (which the USA signed, but did not ratify). The European Union, Canada, and Japan condemn the move. 1 April 2001 In the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, former president Slobodan Miloševic is arrested at his fortified villa in Belgrade on charges of corruption and abuse of power. The arrest followed 36 hours of negotiations during a police siege. 2 April 2001 Germany's third-largest bank, Dresdner, accepts a takeover offer worth US$20 billion from German insurance company Allianz. 3 April 2001 American International Group, one of the world's largest insurance companies, makes a US$23 billion takeover bid for American General Corporation, trumping an earlier rival offer from UK insurer Prudential. 7 April 2001 In the annual English Grand National horserace at Aintree, Red Marauder ridden by Richard Guest wins at odds of 33–1. Only 4 horses out of 40 starters complete the course. 8 April 2001 US golfer Tiger Woods wins the US Masters at Augusta, Georgia, becoming the first golfer to win four consecutive major professional championships. 10 April 2001 The Netherlands becomes the first country in the world to legalize euthanasia as the upper house of parliament gives final endorsement to legislation. 19 April 2001 A group of 39 multinational pharmaceutical firms abandon their court action against South Africa's government over the provision of generic drugs to combat AIDS. 30 April 2001 A Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying the first space tourist, US financier Dennis Tito, docks with the International Space Station. Tito pays US $20 million for the privilege. April 2001 A US military spy plane collides with a Chinese fighter jet, after which the jet crashes (killing the pilot) and the spy plane is forced to land on China's Hainan Island. The US crew are later allowed to fly home, but the plane

is detained. 13 May 2001 In Italy's parliamentary elections, the centre-right Casa delle Libertà (House of Freedoms) coalition led by media magnate Silvio Berlusconi, wins a solid majority in both the lower house and the senate. 19 May 2001 English rugby union champions Leicester beats Stade Français of France 34–30 in Paris, France, to win the Heineken European Cup, the third time in four seasons that an English club has won the trophy. 23 May 2001 In the European Champion's League football cup final in Milan, Italy, Bayern Munich of Germany beats Valencia of Spain in a penalty shoot-out following a 1–1 draw after extra time. 24 May 2001 In the USA, Senator James Jeffords of Vermont announces his resignation from the Republican Party to sit as an independent, leaving the Democratic Party in control of the senate and undermining the administration of President George W Bush. May 2001 One of the most famous paintings by French artist Paul Cézanne, Montagne Sainte Victoire/Sainte Victoire Mountain (1887), is sold at auction in New York City for US$38 million. May 2001 The animated film Shrek is released in the USA, directed by Andrew Adamson and Victoria Benson, and starring the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, and Cameron Diaz. 1 June 2001 King Birendra of Nepal, his wife, and six other members of the royal family are shot dead in a palace in Kathmandu by his son, Crown Prince Dipendra, in a row over marriage. Dipendra then shoots himself, and he and another member of the royal family die on 4 June from injuries sustained in the massacre. 3 June 2001 Anthony Quinn, Mexican-born US film actor, best known for his performance in Zorba the Greek (1964), dies in Boston, Massachusetts (86). 5 June 2001 Australian author Kate Grenville is awarded the Orange Prize for women writers for her novel The Idea of Perfection (2001). 7 June 2001 European Union (EU) plans for future enlargement are thrown into confusion as voters in a referendum in the Republic of Ireland (a member state) reject the Treaty of Nice, which was signed by the governments of the existing EU countries in December 2000. 8 June 2001 In presidential elections in Iran, the reformist Muhammad Khatami is re-elected in a landslide victory over the country's conservative clerical establishment.

11 June 2001 Timothy McVeigh, the man convicted killing 168 people in the Oklahoma bomb atrocity in 1995, is executed by lethal injection in Terre Haute, Indiana. 14 June 2001 A watercolour by English painter J M W Turner, View of Heidelberg with Rainbow (c. 1840), fetches a record £2 million at auction in London, England. 15–16 June 2001 A two-day summit of European Union heads of government, mainly on the issue of future enlargement, in Göteborg, Sweden, is overshadowed by violent clashes between anti-capitalist protestors and local police. In the riots, 3 people are shot and 600 arrested. 27 June 2001 Jack Lemmon, US Academy Award-winning actor and comedian who starred in such memorable films such as Some Like It Hot (1959), The Apartment (1960), and The Odd Couple (1968), dies in Los Angeles, California (76). 28 June 2001 Finding in favour of software giant Microsoft, a US appeals court overturns an earlier court decision that the group should be broken up into separate companies. However, the court agrees that Microsoft has illegally maintained its computer operating system monopoly. 29 June 2001 Deposed Yugoslav dictator Slobodan Miloševic is extradited to the United Nations War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague, Netherlands, to face charges of atrocities and ethnic cleansing in the Balkans. The move splits the federal Yugoslav government, as Prime Minister Zoran Zizic and his Montenegrin allies resign. 30 June 2001 Chet Atkins, US country music guitarist and record producer, dies in Nashville, Tennessee (77). 3 July 2001 General Electric's proposed takeover of Honeywell, the largest industrial merger ever announced, is rejected by the European Commission despite the approval of US regulators. 9 July 2001 French international footballer Zinedine Zidane becomes the world's most expensive player upon his transfer for £46 million from Juventus of Italy to Real Madrid of Spain. 9 July 2001 In Chile, the kidnapping and murder case against former military dictator Augusto Pinochet collapses as a court rules he is mentally unfit to face trial, bringing to an end lengthy efforts to try him for human rights abuses. 10 July 2001 A drawing of a horse and rider by Italian painter Leonardo da Vinci sells at auction in London, England, for over £8.14 million, equalling the world record price for an old master drawing. 13 July 2001 The International Olympic Committee awards Beijing, China, the

right to host the 2008 Olympic Games, ahead of Toronto, Canada; Paris, France; and Istanbul, Turkey. The decision prompts criticism around the world because of China's record on human rights. 14 July 2001 The British Lions lose the third rugby union Test by 29–23 and the series to Australia. 16–23 July 2001 At a major conference on climate control in Bonn, Germany, 186 states – not including the USA – reach agreement on implementing the 1997 Kyoto protocol on global warming. 18 July 2001 The adventure film Jurassic Park III is released in the USA, directed by Joe Johnston, and starring Sam Neill, William H Macy, and Téa Leoni. 20–22 July 2001 The leaders of the Group of Eight (G8) major industrial countries and Russia hold their annual summit in Genoa, Italy. It is overshadowed by clashes between anti-capitalist protesters and riot police in which around 500 people are injured and one shot dead. The police are accused of brutality. 23 July 2001 Indonesia's People's Consultative Assembly votes unanimously to force out President Abdurrahman Wahid, for alleged corruption and incompetence. Wahid is replaced by his deputy, Megawati Sukarnoputri. 27 July 2001 The science fiction film Planet of the Apes is released in the USA, directed by Tim Burton, and starring Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth, and Helena Bonham Carter. 2 August 2001 The United Nations War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague, the Netherlands, sentences Radislav Krstic, the Bosnian Serb general who oversaw the 1995 massacre of Muslims at Srebrenica, to a record 46 years in prison for genocide. 3 August 2001 The action film Rush Hour 2 is released in the USA, directed by Brett Ratner, and starring Jackie Chan, Chris Tucker, and John Lone. 10 August 2001 The comedy film American Pie 2 is released in the USA, directed by James Rogers, and starring Jason Biggs, Shannon Elizabeth, and Alyson Hannigan. 20 August 2001 Fred(erick) Hoyle, English astronomer, scientist, and science fiction writer, dies in Bournemouth, England (86). August 2001 In Macedonia a fragile peace accord is signed between the government and leaders of the ethnic Albanian minority. Under the agreement a NATO force is deployed to oversee the disarmament of Albanian rebels. A British soldier serving in the force is killed. August 2001 The results of an international medical study indicate that a simple

combination therapy involving aspirin and a blood-thinning drug could represent the biggest breakthrough against heart disease in 20 years. August 2001 The World Athletics Championships take place in Edmonton, Canada. The USA wins nine gold medals; Russia six; and Kenya and Cuba three each. Triple jumper Jonathan Edwards wins Britain's only gold medal. 1 September 2001 England's football team wins an historic victory against Germany in Munich by 5–1 in a World Cup qualifying game. Michael Owen scores a hat-trick. The Republic of Ireland beats Holland 1–0 in Dublin, the Irish capital, to end the latter's hopes of qualification. 2 September 2001 At the Belgian motor racing grand prix Michael Schumacher of Germany becomes the most successful driver in Formula 1 history with his 52nd career victory, overtaking the previous record set by France's Alain Prost. 2 September 2001 Christiaan Barnard, South African pioneer of heart transplant surgery, dies in Cyprus (78). 3 September 2001 It is revealed that English author Fay Weldon's latest book The Bulgari Connection has been sponsored by an Italian jewellery manufacturer, the first instance of a literary figure being directly commissioned by a commercial company to write a novel. 4 September 2001 Hewlett-Packard and Compaq, two of the world's largest information technology groups, announce a $20 billion merger. 4 September 2001 The UK telecommunications group Marconi reveals huge losses and dismisses its chief executive, Lord Simpson, and its chairman, Roger Hurn. 11 September 2001 In the world's worst-ever terrorist atrocity, Islamic extremists launch suicide attacks on landmarks in the USA using hijacked civil airliners. Two aircraft are flown into the twin towers of New York's World Trade Center, which subsequently collapse, and another hits the Pentagon (defence department) in Washington, DC. A fourth jet crashes in Pennsylvania before reaching any specific target. Around 3,000 people are thought to have been killed in the attacks and ensuing devastation. 11–30 September 2001 The US government calls the 11 September terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, DC, an act of war and pledges military retaliation against known terrorist networks and their state sponsors. With its allies' backing, US forces begin to concentrate around Afghanistan where the chief suspect, Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda organization, are thought to enjoy the protection of the hard-line Islamic Taliban regime. 20 September 2001 A major exhibition of surrealist art, Surrealism: Desire Unbound, opens at Tate Modern in London, England.

September 2001 Asia's first suspected case of BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or mad cow disease) is reported on a farm in Chiba, near Tokyo in Japan. September 2001 Following a week of violent clashes between Christians and Muslims in the city of Jos in Nigeria, around 500 people are feared dead and over 900 wounded. September 2001 The Israeli–Palestinian confrontation in the Middle East reaches its first anniversary, having claimed nearly 900 lives to date. 6 October 2001 England's football team secures automatic qualification for the 2002 World Cup finals with a 2–2 draw against Greece in Manchester, England. Scotland beats Latvia at home but fails to qualify and Craig Brown announces his resignation as coach. 7–31 October 2001 Claiming conclusive evidence that Saudi-born terrorist Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network were behind the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington, DC, the US and UK launch sustained air attacks against targets controlled by the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban regime in Afghanistan for refusing to surrender the terrorist leader. 8 October 2001 Two British scientists, Paul Nurse and Timothy Hunt, and US scientist Leland Hartwell share the 100th Nobel Prize for Medicine for their work on cell division, which aids cancer therapy and tumour diagnosis. 11 October 2001 Trinidad-born British novelist V S Naipaul wins the Nobel Prize for Literature. 12 October 2001 Lord Hailsham of St Marylebone (Quintin Hogg), lawyer, leading figure in the UK Conservative Party, and former Lord Chancellor, dies in London, England (94). 12 October 2001 The 2001 Nobel Prize for Peace is awarded to the United Nations and secretary general Kofi Annan. 17 October 2001 Australian writer Peter Carey wins a second UK Booker Prize for Fiction with his book True History of the Kelly Gang. 20 October 2001 In the climax to the delayed Six Nations rugby union championship, Ireland beats England 20–14 in Dublin. England wins the tournament but fails to achieve a grand slam. 25 October 2001 Microsoft, the world's largest software company, launches Windows XP, a new version of its dominant computer operating system. 26 October 2001 US defence contractor Lockheed Martin wins the biggest military order in history, worth up to US$200 billion, to develop the Joint Strike

Fighter for the US and UK armed forces. October 2001 In the Middle East a fragile ceasefire between Israelis and Palestinians breaks down after mutual attacks and killings. Israel's far-right minister of tourism, Rehavam Zeevi, is assassinated in East Jerusalem, and Israeli forces make armoured incursions into Palestinian-controlled towns before beginning a measured withdrawal under pressure from the USA. October 2001 In the USA fear of biological terrorism spreads as cases of exposure to anthrax by mail are confirmed in Florida, New York, and in Washington, DC, where a contaminated letter is sent to the leader of the Senate Tom Daschle and the House of Representatives is temporarily closed. 2 November 2001 The animated comedy film Monsters, Inc. is released in the USA, directed by Peter Docter, and featuring John Goodman, Billy Crystal, Mary Gibbs, and James Coburn. 4 November 2001 In the climax to baseball's World Series in the USA, the Arizona Diamondbacks unexpectedly beat the New York Yankees in Phoenix, Arizona, to take the title by four games to three. 4 November 2001 The 2000–01 Emmy Awards for television are held. Best Drama Series: The West Wing; Best Comedy Series: Sex in the City; Best Actor in a Drama: James Gandolfini, for The Sopranos; Best Actress in a Drama: Edie Falco, for The Sopranos; Best Actor in a Comedy: Eric McCormack ,for Will & Grace; Best Actress in a Comedy: Patricia Heaton, for Everybody Loves Raymond. 7 November 2001 Air France and British Airways resume commercial Concorde services to the USA, more than a year after flights were grounded following a fatal air crash in Paris, France. 12 November 2001 The US city of New York suffers further tragedy in the wake of the terrorist attacks on 11 September as an American Airlines passenger aircraft crashes into the residential neighbourhood of Queens, killing about 265 people. 16 November 2001 Based on one of a series of best-selling books by English author J K Rowling, the fantasy film Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone goes on general release in the UK and, as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, in the USA. Directed by Chris Columbus, it stars Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson, together with a host of established actors. 17 November 2001 English boxer Lennox Lewis regains his world heavyweight title from Hasim Rahman of the USA by a knockout in Las Vegas, Nevada. 21 November 2001 The European Commission fines eight of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies, including Roche and BASF, a record US$750 million (the largest penalty it has ever imposed) for price fixing in the market for vitamins.

25 November 2001 Advanced Cell Technology, a US biotechnology company based in Massachusetts, announces that it has successfully created a human embryo through cloning, for the purpose of developing stem cells. 29 November 2001 A painting by English painter Joshua Reynolds, Portrait of Omai, is sold at auction in London, England, for £10.3 million, a record price for his work. 29 November 2001 George Harrison, English musician, songwriter, and film producer, and member of the legendary Beatles pop group of the 1960s, dies in Los Angeles, California (58). November 2001 Supported by the continuing US air campaign in Afghanistan, opposition Northern Alliance forces make rapid territorial gains against the fundamentalist Taliban regime, which only retains Kandahar by the end of the month. The deployment of US ground troops begins, but the location of the alQaeda terrorist leader, Osama bin Laden, remains uncertain. The United Nations calls a meeting of rival Afghan factions in Bonn, Germany, to establish an interim government. International concerns are voiced over the killing of captured Taliban fighters near Mazar-e Sharif. November 2001 US oil companies Phillips Petroleum and Conoco announce a US $15 billion merger, creating the world's sixth-largest private oil firm. 2 December 2001 France's national tennis team wins the Davis Cup with an overall 3–2 victory over Australia. 2 December 2001 The troubled energy and financial-trading group Enron, once the USA's seventh-largest corporation, files for protection from its creditors. It is the largest US company ever to go bankrupt. 8 December 2001 In the Sri Lankan city of Colombo, Zimbabwe's cricket team suffers a record defeat in the history of one-day international matches. Within just 20 overs they are dismissed for 38 runs and Sri Lanka take only 26 deliveries to win the game. 9 December 2001 The £20,000 Turner Prize for contemporary art is awarded to English artist Martin Creed for his minimalist work Lights Going On and Off. 11 December 2001 China formally joins the World Trade Organization (WTO) after 15 years of negotiations. 13 December 2001 US president George W Bush announces his intention to withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with Russia, which has been the cornerstone of nuclear deterrence since 1972. 13–31 December 2001 A terrorist assault on India's parliament in Delhi leaves 14

people dead, including the attackers. India blames Islamic militants and accuses Pakistan of sponsoring them, triggering a military build-up by both countries in the disputed territory of Kashmir. 15 December 2001 The Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy reopens to tourists after nearly 12 years of restoration work to reduce the monument's famous lean and make it structurally safe. 19 December 2001 The adventure film The Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring, an adaptation of the first part of the fantasy trilogy written by J R R Tolkien, goes on worldwide release. Directed by Peter Jackson, its cast is led by Elijah Wood and Ian McKellen. December 2001 As the USA maintains its air campaign in Afghanistan against pockets of Taliban and al-Qaeda resistance, other Afghan ethnic factions agree at a meeting in Bonn, Germany, on a new interim government which is subsequently inaugurated under the leadership of Hamid Karzai, a Pathan (or Pashtun) chief. A multinational peacekeeping force begins to deploy in the capital, Kabul, but al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden continues to evade capture. 1 January 2002 The single European currency becomes a reality in 12 member states of the European Union as euro notes and coins are introduced officially to replace national currencies. The United Kingdom, Denmark, and Sweden remain outside the eurozone. 21 January 2002 Peggy Lee, renowned US jazz singer, dies in Los Angeles, California (81). 22 January 2002 English author Philip Pullman wins the UK Whitbread overall Book of the Year award for his children's book The Amber Spyglass. 22 January 2002 In the biggest retail failure in US corporate history, the Kmart Corporation files for bankruptcy protection against its creditors. 26 January 2002 The exhibition Paris: Capital of the Arts 1900–68 opens at the Royal Academy, London, England. 3 February 2002 In American football's Super Bowl, the New England Patriots unexpectedly beat the St Louis Rams 20–17. 8–24 February 2002 The 19th Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City, Utah, attended by about 2,350 competitors representing 80 National Olympic Committees. Germany wins 12 gold medals; Norway, 11; the USA, 10; and Russia and Canada each win 6. Great Britain wins a gold (for the women's curling team) for the first time in 18 years and a first-ever medal in a snow event. The games are tainted by accusations of favouritism by judges and drug taking by some medal winners. 9 February 2002 The exhibition Van Gogh and Gauguin – The Studio of the South

opens at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. 10 February 2002 In the football final of the African Nations Cup in Bamako, Mali, Cameroon retains the trophy by beating Senegal on penalties. 20 February 2002 A fire in an overcrowded train near Cairo, Egypt, claims over 370 lives in the country's worst rail disaster. 20 February 2002 The Brit Awards for popular music are held in London, England. Best British Group: Travis; Best British Album: No Angel by Dido; Best British Single: 'Don't Stop Moving' by S Club 7; Best British Male Solo Artist: Robbie Williams; Best British Female Solo Artist: Dido; Best British Newcomer: Blue; Best International Male Solo Artist: Shaggy; Best International Female Solo Artist: Kylie Minogue; Best International Group: Destiny's Child; Best International Newcomer: The Strokes; Best International Album: Fever by Kylie Minogue. 24 February 2002 The BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) film awards are held in London, England. Best Picture: Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring; Best Director: Peter Jackson for Lord of the Rings: the Fellowship of the Ring ; Best Actor: Russell Crowe for A Beautiful Mind; Best Actress: Judi Dench for Iris; Best Supporting Actor: Jim Broadbent for Moulin Rouge; Best Supporting Actress: Jennifer Connelly for A Beautiful Mind. 27 February 2002 The US Grammy Awards for popular music are held in Los Angeles, California. Record of the Year: 'Walk On' by U2; Album of the Year: O Brother, Where Art Thou by various artists; Song of the Year 'Fallin'' by Alicia Keys; Best New Artist: Alicia Keys; Best Female Vocal Performance: Nelly Furtado (pop), Lucinda Williams (rock), Alicia Keys (R&B); Best Male Vocal Performance: James Taylor (pop), Lenny Kravitz (rock), Usher (R&B); Best Rap Solo Performance: Missy Elliott. 1 March 2002 In the 12 European Union member states that make up the euro zone, all remaining national banknotes and coins cease to be legal tender as the transition to the single European currency is completed. 1 March 2002 The European Space Agency's environmental satellite Envisat, the most sophisticated environmental laboratory ever put into space, is launched into orbit successfully from French Guiana in South America. 5 March 2002 The French media group Vivendi Universal unveils a 13.6 billion deficit for 2001, the largest annual loss in French corporate history. 9–19 March 2002 Robert Mugabe claims re-election as president of Zimbabwe after a campaign marred by alleged ballot rigging and intimidation of opponents of the ruling ZANU-PF regime. International condemnation of the result is reinforced by Zimbabwe's suspension from the Commonwealth for a year, a move backed by the influential African states of Nigeria and South Africa.

23 March 2002 In the world's most lucrative horserace, the Godolphin stable's Street Cry wins the US$6 million Dubai World Cup in the United Arab Emirates. 24 March 2002 The 2002 Academy Awards are held in Hollywood, California. Best Picture: A Beautiful Mind; Best Director: Ron Howard for A Beautiful Mind; Best Actor: Denzel Washington for Training Day; Best Actress: Halle Berry for Monster's Ball; Best Supporting Actor: Jim Broadbent for Iris; Best Supporting Actress: Jennifer Connelly for A Beautiful Mind; and Best Animated Feature Film: Shrek. 25–26 March 2002 A series of earthquakes in northern Afghanistan kill at least 2,000 people and leave around 30,000 homeless. 30 March 2002 Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother dies at Royal Lodge in the grounds of Windsor Castle, England (101). March 2002 In the midst of continuing Hindu–Muslim clashes in the state of Gujarat in India, leading to some 800 deaths, the Indian supreme court bars all religious activity from taking place at a disputed site in Ayodhya that is sacred to both faiths. March 2002 Israeli cities are rocked by a series of Palestinian suicide bombings, and Israeli military forces respond by invading Palestinian territory. Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat remains besieged in his headquarters in Ramallah as hopes of a political resolution recede further. March 2002 The collapse of a huge ice shelf, part of the Antarctic Peninsula, is recorded by satellite. It causes alarm among environmentalists concerned by the pace of global warming. 8 April 2002 In Germany's biggest post-war corporate collapse, the KirchMedia group files for bankruptcy. 11 April 2002 In the prestigious 2002 Hans Christian Andersen Awards for children's fiction, announced at the Bologna Book Fair in Italy, UK nominees Aidan Chambers and Quentin Blake win gold medals for author and illustrator respectively. 21 April 2002 In the first round of the presidential election in France, JeanMarie Le Pen, the leader of the far-right Front National (FN; National Front), comes second to the centre-right incumbent Jacques Chirac. Prime Minister Lionel Jospin of the Parti Socialiste (PS; Socialist Party) comes third and drops out of the race. Le Pen's unexpected success sparks anti-fascist street demonstrations across the country. 24 April 2002 AOL Time Warner Inc., the world's biggest media company, reports losses of US$54.2 billion in the first quarter of 2002, the largest in corporate history.

26 April 2002 The comedy film About a Boy, based on Nick Hornby's successful novel, is released in the UK. It is directed by Chris and Paul Weitz, and stars Hugh Grant, Toni Collette, and Nicholas Hoult. April 2002 In the Middle East Israel maintains its military assault on Palestinian towns in the West Bank amid accusations of atrocities by its forces, particularly in Jenin. United Nations efforts to despatch a fact-finding team are rebuffed by the Israelis. The US tries to broker a deal for the release of Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat from confinement in his headquarters in Ramallah. A stand-off between Israeli and Palestinian forces in Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity continues. 5 May 2002 In the second round of the French presidential election, the centreright incumbent Jacques Chirac, wins by a landslide with 82.2% of the vote (the highest ever margin of victory in the Fifth Republic) over Jean-Marie Le Pen, the leader of the far-right Front National (FN; National Front). Socialist voters, although traditional opponents of Chirac, switch allegiance following the earlier elimination of their own candidate, Lionel Jospin, reflecting their hostility to Le Pen's perceived fascism. Nevertheless, Le Pen attracts 5.5 million votes (720,000 more than in the first round) in an 80% turnout. 11 May 2002 The exhibition MatissePicasso, comparing the work of Spanish artist Pablo Picasso and French painter Henri Matisse, opens at Tate Modern, London, England. 15 May 2002 In the European Champions League football cup final in Glasgow, Scotland, Real Madrid of Spain beats Germany's Bayer Leverkusen 2–1 to win the competition for the third time in five seasons. 17 May 2002 The earliest manuscript draft of German composer Ludwig van Beethoven's Ninth Symphony (popularly known as the 'Choral Symphony') sells for £1.3 million pounds – a world record for his work – at auction in London, England. 20 May 2002 East Timor achieves formal independence from Indonesia and becomes a nation state under the recently-elected president Xanana Gusmão, the former guerrilla leader of the Revolutionary Front for an Independent East Timor (FRETELIN). Indonesia's claim to sovereignty after its military occupation in 1975 was never recognized by the United Nations, which has administered the territory since 1999 when the East Timorese voted for secession in a referendum despite violent intimidation by pro-Indonesian militias. 24 May 2002 During a European tour taking in Germany, Russia, France, and Italy, US president George W Bush visits Moscow, Russia, and signs a strategic arms control agreement with Russian president Vladimir Putin reducing longrange nuclear warheads by two-thirds over ten years. 25 May 2002 English rugby union champions Leicester beat Munster of Ireland 15–9 at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, Wales, to win the Heineken European Cup.

26 May 2002 In presidential elections in Colombia, Alvaro Uribe wins an outright victory with 53% of the vote. A dissident member of the Partido Liberal Colombiano (PLC; Columbian Liberal Party), Uribe campaigned as an independent candidate promising law and order and the suppression of the violent left-wing guerrilla movement Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC; Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia). The official PLC candidate, Horacio Serpa, wins only 32% of the vote. 28 May 2002 Vodafone, the world's largest mobile phone operator, announces an annual loss of £13.5 billion, the largest in British corporate history. May 2002 In the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, a USbrokered deal ends Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat's five-month confinement in his Ramallah compound. A stand-off between Israeli forces and Palestinian fighters in Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity is also resolved as Israel agrees to their deportation to European destinations. Palestinian suicide attacks on Israelis invite further retaliatory measures by the Israeli military, and the prospect of political progress remain slim. May 2002 Telecommunications giant NTT announces Japan's largest-ever corporate loss of US$6.49 billion for the year. May 2002 The action film Spider-Man goes on general release, directed by Sam Raimi, and starring Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, and Willem Dafoe. May 2002 The science fiction film Stars Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones goes on general release, directed by George Lucas, and starring Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, Hayden Christensen, Christopher Lee, and Samuel L Jackson. 11 June 2002 Paul McCartney, one of the two surviving members of the legendary Beatles pop group, marries former model Heather Mills in the grounds of Castle Leslie in County Monaghan in the Republic of Ireland. 11 June 2002 US author Ann Patchett is awarded the Orange Prize for women writers for her novel Bel Canto. 11–19 June 2002 In Afghanistan a loya jirga (grand tribal council) of around 1,500 delegates from across the country convenes in the capital, Kabul, to elect a new government. Hamid Karzai, an ethnic Pathan and leader of the United Nations-endorsed interim administration since the armed overthrow of the Taliban regime in December 2001, is elected as president for 18 months. The former monarch Muhammad Zahir Shah, deposed in 1973, renounces any political role in the new administration. Despite the approval of a new government, the council proceedings expose deep regional and tribal divisions. 13 June 2002 The 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty between the USA and the then Soviet Union lapses as the US's notification to Russia in December 2001 of its intention to withdraw comes into effect. Despite Russian opposition and

wider international concern, the US government claims that the treaty – long considered an important check on the global proliferation of long-range and nuclear weapons – is an outdated relic of the Cold War era. The US move clears the way for the development of its controversial National Missile Defense (NMD) system. 16 June 2002 In the concluding round of parliamentary elections in France the centre-right wins a landslide victory, taking 399 of the National Assembly's 577 seats. The Union pour la Majorité Présidentielle (UMP; Union for the Presidential Majority), supporting the recently re-elected president Jacques Chirac, secures 355 seats, the Union pour la Démocratie Française (UDF; Union for French Democracy) 29 and other right-wing candidates 15 seats. The left loses its former parliamentary majority as the Parti Socialiste (PS; Socialist Party) drops by 101 seats to 140 and its allies muster only a further 38. 20 June 2002 A retrospective of the work of Lucian Freud, widely regarded as Britain's greatest living painter, opens at Tate Britain in London, England. 22 June 2002 About 230 people are killed and some 12,000 made homeless as an earthquake hits Qazvin province in north-west Iran. 24 June 2002 Canadian historian Margaret MacMillan becomes the first woman to win the £30,000 Samuel Johnson Prize, the UK's largest non-fiction award, for her study Peacemakers: the Paris Conference of 1919 and its Attempt to End War. 30 June 2002 Brazil wins the football World Cup for the fifth time with a 2–0 defeat of Germany in the final in Yokohama, Japan. The Brazilian striker Ronaldo scores both goals, taking his tally for the tournament to eight, and he wins the Golden Boot award. June 2002 Forest fires rage across the western USA, particularly in Arizona where more than 375,000 acres are scorched by the end of June. June 2002 In the Middle East suicide bombings of Israeli targets by Palestinian militants continue, killing 17 people in Megiddo and 25 in two incidents in Jerusalem. Israeli forces reoccupy many towns in the West Bank in reprisal, and a raid on the town of Nablus results in the death of a senior Palestinian bomb maker, Muhamad al-Taher. Despite the announcement of political and financial reform of the Palestine National Authority (PNA), the US government calls for the removal of the current Palestinian leadership as a condition for future negotiation of Palestinian statehood. However European and Arab governments disagree with the US stance. 1 July 2002 A Boeing 757 freight airliner and a Tupolev 154 passenger jet carrying mainly children from Russia to Spain collide in midair over Lake Constance on the German-Swiss border killing over 70 people. The conduct of Swiss air traffic controllers comes under investigation.

1 July 2002 The International Criminal Court, the world's first permanent tribunal to try cases of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, comes into existence. Based in The Hague in the Netherlands, its powers are not retrospective. Despite ratification of the treaty establishing the court by over 70 countries, the USA refuses to recognize its jurisdiction without protection from prosecution for its personnel serving in United Nations (UN) peacekeeping missions. 2 July 2002 At his sixth attempt, US millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett becomes the first man to fly a balloon solo and non-stop around the world, crossing the west Australian coastline in his Spirit of Freedom after covering more than 19,000 miles in just less than two weeks. 10 July 2002 A painting by the 17th-century Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens, The Massacre of the Innocents, becomes the most expensive picture ever sold as it fetches £49.5 million at auction in London, England. 11 July 2002 The discovery in Chad of a 7 million-year-old fossilized skull belonging to a hominid is announced by researchers, potentially challenging traditional theories of human evolution. 21 July 2002 Germany's Michael Schumacher becomes world motor racing champion for the fifth time at the French grand prix, equalling the Argentinian Juan Manuel Fangio's record set in the 1950s. Driving for Ferrari, Schumacher secures the championship with six races still remaining. 22 July 2002 WorldCom, the giant US telecommunications group which is under investigation by the US Securities and Exchange Commission for an accounting scandal exposed in June, becomes the largest US company ever to file for bankruptcy protection. However, the action is not expected to impact on its services to customers. 23 July 2002 Rowan Williams, archbishop of Wales, is confirmed as successor to George Carey as the archbishop of Canterbury and head of the Anglican Church on Carey's retirement in October 2002. 26 July 2002 The comedy film Austin Powers in Goldmember is released in the USA and UK, directed by Jay Roach, and starring Mike Myers, Beyoncé Knowles, and Michael Caine. July 2002 The comedy film Men in Black II is released. It is directed by Barry Sonnenfeld and stars Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith. 5 November 2002 Voters in the USA elect a new House of Representatives, a third of the Senate, and 36 state governors. The Republican Party makes significant gains, increasing its majority in the House to 227 of the 435 seats, and winning back control of the Senate with 51 of the 100 seats. Republican president George W Bush becomes the first president to make mid-term gains in both houses of Congress in nearly 70 years. The Democrats win three extra

governorships in the gubernatorial elections. 15 November 2002 At the end of the week-long 16th congress of the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing, State President Jiang Zemin hands over the party leadership to his deputy Hu Jintao at the head of a new nine-strong Politburo Standing Committee. Jiang retires from the Politburo but retains substantial power as chair of the Central Military Commission, effectively the commander-inchief of the armed forces. 15 November 2002 Myra Hindley, child murderer and one of Britain's most infamous prisoners, dies in Bury St Edmunds, England (60). 19 November 2002 The Prestige, an ageing, single-hulled oil tanker, breaks up and sinks about 130 miles off the north-west coast of Spain. Some escaped oil threatens local fishing grounds and coastal ecosystems, and there is concern that the estimated 70,000 tonnes of oil still within the ship on the seabed may leak and rise to the surface. 23 November 2002 English sailor Ellen MacArthur becomes the first Briton to win the Route de Rhum solo transatlantic yachting race from St Malo, France, to Guadeloupe, and in a record time of 13 days, 13 hours and 31 minutes. 25 November 2002 United Nations (UN) arms inspectors return to Iraq after a four-year absence to search for evidence of weapons of mass destruction that the Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein is suspected of developing. The return of the inspectors, led by Swedish diplomat Hans Blix, follows earlier unanimous UN Security Council support for a resolution demanding full Iraqi compliance. 28 November 2002 As a month of continuing attacks within Israel by Palestinian militants and suicide bombers draws to a violent close, a major terrorist action is mounted against Israeli targets in the Kenyan city of Mombasa. An Israeli-owned tourist hotel is destroyed by a car bomb, killing some 15 Israelis and Kenyans, while an Israeli charter airliner narrowly escapes being shot down by groundlaunched missiles after taking off from the city's airport. The involvement of the al-Qaeda terrorist network is widely suspected. November 2002 The action film Die Another Day, featuring British secret agent James Bond, goes on general release. It is directed by Lee Tamahori and stars Pierce Brosnan, Halle Berry, Toby Stephens, and Rosamund Pike. November 2002 The children's film Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, based on one of a series of best-selling books by British author J K Rowling, goes on general release. It is directed by Chris Columbus and stars Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson. 2 January 2003 23-year-old Briton Andrew Cooney becomes youngest person to walk the 1,127 km/700 mi to the South Pole from the edge of Antarctica. 12 January 2003 Fifteen-year-old British teenager Sebastian Clover becomes the

youngest person to sail single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean, completing a 4,320-km/2,700-mi voyage from Tenerife to Antigua in his yacht Reflection. 12 January 2003 Maurice Gibb, musician and singer with the hugely successful British pop music trio the Bee Gees, dies in Miami, Florida (53). 19 January 2003 The 60th Golden Globes ceremony is held in Los Angeles, California. Best drama picture: The Hours; Best musical or comedy picture: Chicago; Best actors: Jack Nicholson (drama) for About Schmidt and Richard Gere (musical or comedy) for Chicago; Best actresses: Nicole Kidman (drama) for The Hours and Renée Zellweger (musical or comedy) for Chicago; and Best director: Martin Scorsese for Gangs of New York. 23 January 2003 Descent into Limbo, a rare painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Andrea Mantegna, sells for about US$28 million at auction in New York City. It is more than double the previous record for a work by the 15th century painter. 25 January 2003 In the Australian Open women's tennis final in Melbourne, Serena Williams of the USA beats her sister Venus in three sets. She becomes only the fifth woman to hold all four major tennis titles simultaneously. 26 January 2003 In American football's Super Bowl, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the Oakland Raiders 48–21 in San Diego, California. 28 January 2003 British biographer Claire Tomalin wins the £30,000 UK Whitbread Book of the Year award for Samuel Pepys: the Unequalled Self. 28 January 2003 General elections in Israel, prompted by the collapse of the government in October 2002, return Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud party to power, doubling its seats in the 120-member Knesset (parliament) from 19 to 37. Other right-wing and religious parties muster another 30 seats. The Labour Party retains only 19 seats and the secular Shinui party wins 15. The remaining 19 seats are shared between five other minor groupings. The voter turnout is the lowest ever. January 2003 In the Middle East, two Palestinian suicide bombers kill 22 people and injure more than 100 in an attack on Tel Aviv-Yafo in Israel. In response, the Israeli government bars Palestinian delegates from attending a diplomatic conference in London organized by British prime minister Tony Blair. Towards the end of the month, the Israeli army mounts its deepest punitive incursion into Palestinian Gaza City since 1994. 1 February 2003 The US space shuttle Columbia explodes and breaks up on reentry into the Earth's atmosphere. The crew of six US and one Israeli are all killed in the disaster. 4 February 2003 The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia ceases to exist as the two remaining republics in the old Yugoslav federation officially become a new

constitutional entity called Serbia and Montenegro. Both republics will have their own presidents and governments, but share a common central administration for defence and foreign affairs. 9–28 February 2003 The six-week-long Cricket World Cup, being staged in South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Kenya, begins. The early stages are marred by England's withdrawal from their opening fixture in Zimbabwe due to political and security issues and by the exclusion of Australian bowler Shane Warne following a positive drugs test (for which he receives a one-year ban from the sport). 17 February 2003 In Belgium thieves raid a diamond centre in Antwerp, the gem trading capital of the world, emptying 123 of 160 vaults and escaping with a haul valued at an estimated £68 million. It is thought to be the biggest ever diamond theft in the city. 19 February 2003 The Titian exhibition, covering the works of one of the greatest painters of the Italian Renaissance, opens at the National Gallery in London, England. 20 February 2003 The Brit Awards for popular music are held in London, England. Best British Group: Coldplay; Best British Album: Rush of Blood to the Head by Coldplay; Best British Single: 'Just a Little' by Liberty X; Best British Male Solo Artist: Robbie Williams; Best British Female Solo Artist: Ms Dynamite; Best British Breakthrough Act: Will Young; Best International Male Solo Artist: Eminem; Best International Female Solo Artist: Pink; Best International Group: Red Hot Chili Peppers; Best International Breakthrough Artist: Norah Jones; Best International Album: Eminem; Outstanding Contribution: Tom Jones. 23 February 2003 The BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) film awards are held in London, England. Best Picture: The Pianist; Best Director: Roman Polanski for The Pianist; Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis for Gangs of New York; Best Actress: Nicole Kidman for The Hours; Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Walken for Catch Me If You Can; Best Supporting Actress: Catherine Zeta Jones for Chicago. 23 February 2003 The US Grammy Awards for popular music are held in New York City. Record of the Year: 'Don't Know Why' by Norah Jones; Album of the Year: Come Away With Me by Norah Jones; Song of the Year 'Don't Know Why' by Jesse Harris; Best New Artist: Norah Jones; Best Female Vocal Performance: Norah Jones (pop), Sheryl Crow (rock), Mary J Blige (R&B); Best Male Vocal Performance: John Mayer (pop), Bruce Springsteen (rock), Usher (R&B); Best Female Rap Solo Performance: Missy Elliott; Best Male Rap Solo Performance: Nelly. 24 February 2003 An earthquake measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale in the western Chinese province of Xinjiang kills over 260 people, injures about 1,000 more, and makes thousands homeless. It is the worst earthquake in China for more than 50 years.

27 February 2003 Rowan Williams is officially enthroned as the 104th archbishop of Canterbury and head of the Anglican Church at Canterbury Cathedral, England. February 2003 Divisions emerge within the European Union (EU) and NATO over policy towards the disarmament of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq. France and Germany reject the UK's and other countries' support for US-led military action against Iraq which would pre-empt ongoing United Nations (UN) investigations into Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Meanwhile, mass anti-war demonstrations are staged around the world. At the end of February the USA and UK table a new draft UN resolution to pave the way for an assault on Iraq. Other Security Council members, including Russia and China, remain unconvinced of the need for military action. 2 March 2003 Sailing's prestigious America's Cup is won by a European nation for the first time, as the Swiss-owned boat, Team Alinghi, secures the trophy with the completion of a 5–0 victory over the holders, Team New Zealand, in Auckland. 6 March 2003 Media group Vivendi Universal announces a loss in 2002 of billion, the largest in French corporate history.

23.3

11 March 2003 The International Criminal Court, the world's first permanent tribunal to provide justice in cases of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, is formally inaugurated in The Hague, Netherlands, as 18 judges are sworn in. The USA continues to reject the court's jurisdiction. 15–16 March 2003 Having previously assumed the chair of the Chinese Communist Party at the 16th congress in November 2002, Hu Jintao becomes State President of China. Wen Jiabao becomes prime minister, replacing Zhu Rongji. 20–31 March 2003 Despite inconclusive inspections for weapons of mass destruction and failure to win United Nations Security Council backing for military action to forcefully disarm Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq, the USA and UK launch air strikes on Iraqi strategic targets, particularly in the capital Baghdad. French and German opposition to the action causes serious friction in the Western alliance, and Russia similarly expresses dissent. By the end of March, as the Iraqi government remains defiant and reports of increasing civilian casualties provoke worldwide concern, US ground forces from bases in the Gulf advance on Baghdad to confront the elite troops of the Iraqi Republican Guard. Meanwhile, British forces surround Iraq's second city of Basra in the south of the country. 23 March 2003 Australia wins the Cricket World Cup, beating India by 125 runs in the one-day final in Johannesburg, South Africa. 23 March 2003 The 75th Academy Awards are held in Hollywood, California. Best picture: Chicago; Best director: Roman Polanski for The Pianist; Best actor: Adrien Brody for The Pianist; Best actress: Nicole Kidman for The Hours; Best

supporting actor: Chris Cooper for Adaptation; Best supporting actress: Catherine Zeta Jones for Chicago; and Best animated feature film: Spirited Away. At the ceremony there are several anti-war interventions in protest at the US attack on Iraq. 29 March 2003 In the world's richest horserace, the Godolphin stable's Moon Ballad, ridden by Frankie Dettori, wins the US$6 million Dubai World Cup in the United Arab Emirates. 29–30 March 2003 In the final round of matches in the Six Nations rugby union championship, France beats Wales 33–5 in Paris, and Scotland beats Italy 33–25 at Murrayfield. England achieves the Grand Slam in defeating Ireland 42–6 in Dublin. March 2003 A killer pneumonia-like virus identified as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), seemingly originating in China and south- east Asia and responsible for over 70 deaths so far, spreads more widely as cases are reported across Europe and North America. 4 May 2003 After 135 days sailing, Britain's 28-year-old Emma Richards becomes the first woman, and youngest person, to complete the five-leg Around Alone race (around the world) as she crosses the finishing line in Newport, Rhode Island. 6 May 2003 In the Roses, a portrait by the French Impressionist painter Pierre Auguste Renoir dating from the early 1880s, sells for US$23.5 million at auction in New York City. 12 May 2003 Suicide bombers in the Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh target three compounds housing Western expatriate workers and their families, killing at least 34 people including themselves. About 190 are injured. The operation is believed to have been planned and executed by the al-Qaeda international terrorist network. 12–14 May 2003 In two terrorist incidents in Russia's troubled republic of Chechnya, suicide bombers believed to be Chechen separatists target a government security service building and, two days later, attempt to kill the Moscow-backed head of the Chechen administration at a Muslim festival. Around 80 people are believed killed in the attacks. 16 May 2003 In Casablanca, Morocco, 12 suicide bombers thought to be Islamic fundamentalists linked to the al-Qaeda international terrorist network kill about 30 other people and injure many more in five coordinated explosions at a hotel, a nightclub, a Jewish community centre and cemetery, and the Belgian consulate. 19 May 2003 The US telecommunications group WorldCom, which filed for bankruptcy protection in July 2002, agrees to pay a record US$500 million penalty to financial regulators in the USA to settle charges that it overstated profits in an accounting fraud. 21 May 2003 A major earthquake measuring 6.7 on the Richter scale in northern

Algeria kills at least 2,200 people and injures thousands more. 22–31 May 2003 Contrasting with the deep divisions in the United Nations (UN) Security Council in the run-up to the US-led war in Iraq against the regime of Saddam Hussein, the 15-member body adopts a new resolution (by 14 votes to 0, with Syria not participating) granting wide interim governing powers over Iraq to the USA, including a role for a UN special representative, and lifting sanctions imposed on Iraq almost 13 years ago following the invasion of Kuwait. As the month ends, the failure to unearth conclusive evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction leads to increasing criticism of the US and UK's case for going to war. 28 May 2003 In the European Champions League football cup final staged in Manchester, England, AC Milan beats Juventus of Turin in a penalty shoot-out following a goalless draw after extra time. It is the first occasion that two Italian clubs have met in the final of the competition. 30 May 2003 The animated film Finding Nemo is released in the USA, directed by Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich, with the voices of Albert Brooks, Ellen DeGeneres, and Alexander Gould. May 2003 Concern over the international spread of the SARS virus (severe acute respiratory syndrome) continues as Taiwan reports an increase in cases and the virus unexpectedly resurfaces in Toronto, Canada, in a second outbreak. 2 June 2003 The spacecraft Mars Express, built by the European Space Agency (ESA), takes off from a launch pad in Kazakhstan carrying the Beagle 2 lander on its way to Mars. It is Europe's first exploration mission to another planet. 3 June 2003 US author Valerie Martin is awarded the £30,000 Orange Prize for women writers for her novel Property. 7 June 2003 The Derby, one of the Classic annual events in the horseracing calendar which is run at Epsom, England, is won by Kris Kin ridden by Kieron Fallon. 9 June 2003 English academic T J Binyon wins the £30,000 Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction for Pushkin, his biography of the Russian poet. 12 June 2003 A US-Ethiopian team of scientists reports in Nature magazine the discovery in the Afar region of Ethiopia of three skulls of Homo sapiens from 160,000 years ago, representing the oldest fossils yet found of modern humans and an important link in human ancestry. 12 June 2003 Gregory Peck, one of Hollywood's most enduring and popular film stars and particularly remembered for his role in To Kill a Mockingbird, dies in Los Angeles, California (87). 16 June 2003 Airbus, the European aeroplane manufacturing consortium, signs a

huge contract with Dubai-based Emirates Airline to supply 41 wide-body jets worth around US$12.5 billion. 16 June 2003 Labelled the UK's first 'designer baby', James Whitaker is born by Caesarean section in Sheffield, England, the first product of genetic-matching IVF treatment to be born in Britain. The procedure, performed in the USA after the UK Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority refused to sanction it in August 2002, gives the parents hope of saving their other son from a rare form of anaemia. 17 June 2003 England's international football captain David Beckham moves from Premier League champions Manchester United to Real Madrid of Spain for a transfer fee of about £25 million. 21 June 2003 The English writer J K Rowling publishes her new book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the fifth in a hugely successful children's series. 23–24 June 2003 The spread of the deadly SARS virus (severe acute respiratory syndrome) is seemingly being brought under control as the World Health Organization (WHO) lifts warnings against travel to the two previously worst affected areas of Beijing and Hong Kong in China. 29 June 2003 Katharine Hepburn, US film star for more than fifty years and winner of four Academy Awards for Best Actress, dies in Old Saybrook, Connecticut (96). 5 July 2003 In the women's singles final of the Wimbledon tennis tournament in England, defending champion Serena Williams of the USA beats her sister Venus in three sets. Australian Todd Woodbridge, partnering Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden, equals the record of eight Wimbledon men's doubles titles. 6 July 2003 Roger Federer becomes the first Swiss player to win the final of the men's singles tennis tournament at Wimbledon in England, beating unseeded Mark Philippoussis of Australia in straight sets. Martina Navratilova of the USA, winning in the mixed doubles final at 46 years of age, equals US tennis player Billie Jean King's record of 20 Wimbledon trophies. 7 July 2003 Following a two-week delay due to bad weather and technical problems, the USA's latest Mars rover is launched from Cape Canaveral space centre aboard a Delta II rocket. Opportunity, and another rover vehicle Spirit which was launched the previous month, are due to land on the planet in early 2004. 8 July 2003 Despite a successful separation after about 50 hours of pioneering neurosurgery in the Raffles hospital, Singapore, Ladan and Laleh Bijani, conjoined Iranian twins sharing a skull cavity, die from massive loss of blood. 9 July 2003 The adventure film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black

Pearl is released in the USA, directed by Gore Verbinski, and starring Johnny Depp, Geoffrey Rush, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightley. 10 July 2003 A self-portrait of the Dutch master Rembrandt that had been hidden by overpainting for more than 300 years is bought at auction in London, England, for £6.9 million by a US casino owner. 20 July 2003 US golfer Ben Curtis, a 250–1 outsider making his debut in a major championship, wins the 132nd British Open tournament at Sandwich in Kent, England. 22 July 2003 Qusay Hussein, fugitive son and heir apparent of deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, is killed by US special forces in Mosul, northern Iraq (37). 22 July 2003 Uday Hussein, fugitive son of deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein renowned for violence and cruelty, is killed by US special forces in Mosul, northern Iraq (39). 27 July 2003 Bob Hope, British-born US comedian, one of the most enduring and best-loved figures of stage and screen, dies in Toluca Lake, California (100). 27 July 2003 US cyclist Lance Armstrong wins his fifth successive victory in the 4,800 km/3,000-mi Tour de France competition to equal the current record. 11–13 August 2003 In Afghanistan the international peacekeeping force in the capital, Kabul, is placed under the strategic command of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization). It is the Western Alliance's first ground mission outside Europe. Two days later Afghanistan suffers its most violent day in several months, leaving at least 64 people dead in a series of incidents including clashes in Khost province between government forces and rebel supporters of the former Taliban regime and the terrorist bombing of a civilian bus in Lashkargah in the south of the country. 13 August 2003 In Europe's biggest ever lottery payout, an anonymous player wins a 66 million (£48.5 million) jackpot in Italy's SuperEnalotto. 14 August 2003 One of the worst-ever power failures in North America blacks out the northeastern USA and Canada for hours, prompting government investigations into the US electricity supply system. August 2003 Having agreed to pay US$2.7 billion in compensation to the families of the 270 people killed in the bombing in 1988 of a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie in Scotland, the Libyan government accepts responsibility for the terrorist incident in a letter to the United Nations (UN) Security Council, paving the way for the lifting of UN sanctions. At the end of the month Libya also reaches agreement with France on reparations for the 1989 bombing of a French airliner over Niger.

August 2003 Hopes of an end to Liberia's 14-year civil war increase during August following the arrival of West African peacekeeping forces, later supported by 200 US marines, and the resignation and departure into exile of President Charles Taylor. Rebel factions and government representatives sign a power-sharing agreement appointing Gyude Bryant, an industrialist and cleric, to lead a new transitional administration. August 2003 In a continuing series of violent incidents in Iraq since the US-led overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime, 11 people are killed as a bomb explodes outside the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad, Iraq's oil export pipeline to Turkey is targeted by saboteurs, a bomb destroys the United Nations (UN) headquarters in the capital (killing 22 people including Sergio Vieira de Mello, the head of the UN mission), and a leading Shia cleric, Ayatollah Mohammad Bakr al-Hakim, and 100 others die in a bomb attack on a mosque in the holy city of Najaf. 8 September 2003 England's cricketers beat the visiting South Africans at the Oval by nine wickets in the fifth and final Test to square the series. The match marks the retirement of England's Alec Stewart from Test cricket. 9–10 September 2003 Argentina defaults on a US$2.9 billion debt payment to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the single largest non-payment of a loan in the IMF's history. The following day the Argentinian Government agrees a three-year recovery plan with the IMF, including the refinancing of US$21 billion worth of debt. 12 September 2003 Typhoon Maemi hits South Korea around the city of Busan. It is the worst typhoon to strike the country in a century, claiming over 120 lives and causing extensive damage. 14 September 2003 Swedish voters reject a proposal to adopt the European Union (EU) single currency, the euro, by 56% to 42% in a referendum, despite widespread support for the move among Sweden's political establishment and industrial sector. Of the EU's 15 current member states, only Sweden, the UK, and Denmark remain outside the euro zone. 15 September 2003 US pop star Madonna publishes a morality story for children entitled The English Roses. The book has the widest simultaneous release in publishing history – it is released in over 100 countries and 30 languages. 18–19 September 2003 Hurricane Isabel strikes the eastern seaboard of the USA, causing widespread destruction, power and transport disruption, and flooding, particularly in Virginia, North Carolina, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and the federal capital of Washington, DC. At least 30 deaths are blamed on the storm. 21 September 2003 The 2002–03 Emmy awards for television are held in Los Angeles, California. Best Drama Series: The West Wing; Best Comedy Series: Everybody Loves Raymond; Best Actor in a Drama: James Gandolfini for The Sopranos; Best Actress in a Drama: Edie Falco for The Sopranos; Best Actor in a Comedy: Tony Shalhoub for Monk; Best Actress in a Comedy: Debra Messing for

Will and Grace; Best mini-series: Taken; Best made-for-TV movie: Door to Door. 26 September 2003 The island of Hokkaido in northern Japan is struck by powerful earthquakes measuring up to 8.0 on the Richter scale, some of the strongest tremors in the world during 2003. Nearly 600 people are injured. 28 September 2003 A massive power failure across Italy brings the whole country with the exception of Sardinia to a standstill for hours. A breakdown of electricity lines from neighbouring Switzerland and France is thought responsible. 28 September 2003 Kenyan athlete Paul Tergat sets a new world running record for the marathon in Berlin, Germany, taking 43 seconds off the previous record set by Khalid Khannouchi of the USA in 2002. September 2003 Violence continues in the Middle East as Israeli forces target leaders of the militant Islamic Hamas organization and Palestinian suicide bombers kill 15 Israelis in attacks in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv-Yafo. Meanwhile Ahmed Qureia takes over as prime minister of the Palestine National Authority as Mahmoud Abbas resigns having lost a power struggle with President Yassir Arafat. With the peace process in tatters, the Israeli government threatens to exile or otherwise 'remove' the Palestinian president. A United Nations Security Council resolution rebuking Israel for the threat is vetoed by the USA. 2 October 2003 South African novelist J M Coetzee is awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. 5 October 2003 The Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe, Europe's biggest horse-race staged at Longchamp in Paris, France, is won by the Aga Khan's colt Dalakhani ridden by French jockey Christophe Soumillon. 6 October 2003 British scientist Peter Mansfield is awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for pioneering work on medical scanners. He shares the prize with Paul Lauterbur of the USA. 7 October 2003 Standing for the Republican Party, Austrian-born US film actor Arnold Schwarzenegger is voted into office as governor of California in a special recall election, replacing the incumbent Democrat Gray Davis. 7 October 2003 The Nobel Prize for Physics is shared between British scientist Tony Leggett and two Russians, Alexei Abrikosov and Vitalii Ginzburg, for research on the behaviour of materials at very low temperatures. 8 October 2003 British-born Clive Granger, emeritus professor at the University of California, USA, shares the Nobel Prize for Economics with Robert Eagle of the USA. 10 October 2003 Australian cricketer Matthew Hayden scores 380 runs in a Test match innings against Zimbabwe in Perth, breaking the previous record of 375 for the highest ever individual score in international cricket.

10 October 2003 Shirin Ebadi, an Iranian lawyer and human rights campaigner, wins the Nobel Prize for Peace. She is the first Muslim woman to receive the award. 11 October 2003 England's footballers qualify at the top of their group for the 2004 European Championship finals following a 0–0 draw against Turkey in Istanbul, although the match is marred by a half-time brawl between opposing players. The match preparations are overshadowed by the England team's angry response to the exclusion of Rio Ferdinand from the squad for allegedly contravening drug-testing procedures. 12 October 2003 Germany's Michael Schumacher clinches a record sixth world formula one motor racing championship following the Japanese grand prix at Suzuka. 14 October 2003 Controversial expatriate Australian author Peter Finlay, who writes under the name DBC Pierre, wins the prestigious UK literary Man Booker prize for his darkly satirical novel Vernon God Little. 15 October 2003 China becomes the third country to put a man in space after Russia and the USA as its first crewed spacecraft, navigated by Lt-Col Yang Liwei, touches down in inner Mongolia at the end of a 21-hour mission. 16 October 2003 The Taipei 101 office block in Taiwan's capital city becomes the world's tallest building as the pinnacle is installed on the 511 m/1,676 ft-high building, overtaking the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, by 50 m/165 ft. 24 October 2003 British Airways' fleet of supersonic Concorde jets retires from commercial service after nearly 28 years. The occasion is marked by a triple landing at London's Heathrow airport. 25–30 October 2003 Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the billionaire head of Russia's biggest oil company Yukos and an open critic of Russian president Vladimir Putin, is arrested for alleged fraud and tax evasion, which is widely viewed as a political manoeuvre. At the end of the month Russian prosecutors order the freezing of 44% of Yukos' stock, while Alexander Voloshin, Putin's chief of staff and a top Kremlin advocate of the industrial sector, resigns in protest at Khodorkovsky's arrest. 27 October 2003 Bank of America announces a US$47 billion takeover of US rival FleetBoston Financial. The combined company will be the second largest bank in the USA after Citigroup in terms of assets. 31 October 2003 Asia's longest-serving elected leader, Mahathir bin Mohamad, steps down after 22 years as authoritarian prime minister of Malaysia and head of the Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Melayu Bersatu (United Malays National Organization). He is succeeded by his deputy prime minister Abdullah Badawi.

October 2003 In Iraq the search for ex-dictator Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction continues without significant result. After months of argument, the United Nations Security Council votes to provide a mandate for US-led occupation forces, and an international conference is held in Madrid, Spain, to raise finance for the reconstruction of Iraq. Meanwhile, Iraqi insurgents and suicide bombers maintain daily attacks on US and other targets, including the International Red Cross, killing and wounding dozens of people. By the end of the month more US soldiers have been killed since the official end of the war than before it. October 2003 In the Middle East a Palestinian suicide bomber kills 20 Israelis and Arabs in a restaurant in Haifa. Israeli military retaliation includes the first direct air attack on Syrian territory since 1973 and subsequent heavy assaults on Palestinian targets in Gaza. Palestinian militants launch a bomb attack on a US embassy convoy driving through Gaza, killing three US officials. Israel's army chief of staff is critical of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's policies towards the Palestinians. 2 November 2003 The US Episcopal Church consecrates Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire. The appointment of an open homosexual to the position sparks hostility within the worldwide Anglican communion, particularly among churches in Africa. 2–23 November 2003 In the former Soviet republic of Georgia, increasing political protest following legislative elections dismissed by opposition parties as fraudulent leads eventually to the resignation of long-serving president Edvard Shevardnadze in a bloodless transfer of power. Nino Burdzhanadze, speaker of the parliament, becomes acting president pending new elections planned for January 2004. 4 November 2003 An early 20th century painting by Italian artist Amedeo Modigliani, Reclining Nude (On Her Left Side), is sold for a record auction price of £16 million in New York City. 8 November 2003 Terrorists believed to be Islamic militants linked to the alQaeda international network strike in Saudi Arabia as suicide bombings kill at least 18 people and injure 120, mainly Arab expatriates, in attacks on a residential compound in the capital Riyadh. 15 November 2003 Suicide bombings at two synagogues in Istanbul, Turkey, kill at least 25 people and injure over 300, mainly local passers-by. The bombers are thought to be Turkish Kurds with possible links to the al-Qaeda international terrorist network. 20 November 2003 Just five days after two terrorist attacks on synagogues in Istanbul, Turkey, suicide bombers strike in the city again, targeting the British consulate and the local headquarters of the UK-based bank HSBC. 30 people are killed, including the British consul Roger Short, and some 450 are injured. Islamic

extremists with links to the al-Qaeda international terrorist network are thought responsible. 22 November 2003 Australia inflicts a third consecutive rugby league Test defeat on Great Britain by 18–12 in Huddersfield, England, to complete a successful Ashes series. 22 November 2003 England wins the rugby union World Cup for the first time, beating the host nation Australia in the final in Sydney by 20–17 after extra time. 26 November 2003 The United Nations (UN) International Atomic Energy Agency adopts unanimously a resolution condemning Iran for its 18-year cover-up of an illicit nuclear development programme. Despite Iran's recent assurances of cooperation and transparency, future breaches of its non-proliferation obligations could trigger referral to the UN Security Council and the imposition of sanctions. 30 November 2003 Australia's tennis team wins the Davis Cup with a 3–1 victory over Spain in the final in Melbourne. 5 December 2003 In Russia suicide bombers attack a crowded commuter train in the northern Caucasus close to the rebel republic of Chechnya, killing over 40 people. 7 December 2003 English transvestite artist and potter Grayson Perry wins the £20,000 Turner Prize for contemporary art. 7 December 2003 Parliamentary elections are held in Russia, resulting in a landslide victory for parties that support President Vladimir Putin. Of these, Edinaja Rossija (United Russia) wins 222 of the 450 seats in the State Duma and Rodina (Motherland) takes 37. The ultranationalist Liberalno-Demokraticeskaya Partiya Rossii (LDPR; Liberal-Democratic Party of Russia) increases its representation to 38 seats, while the main opposition Kommunisticeskaya Partija Rossijkoi Federacii (KPRF; Communist Party of the Russian Federation) drops to 53 seats. 12–13 December 2003 European Union (EU) leaders at a summit meeting in Brussels, Belgium, fail to agree on countries' voting powers in the proposed new constitution for an enlarged EU from May 2004. The main protagonists are Poland and Spain on one side and Germany and France on the other. 17 December 2003 The adventure film The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King, an adaptation of the third part of the fantasy trilogy written by J R R Tolkien, goes on general release. Directed by Peter Jackson, its star cast is led by Elijah Wood and Ian McKellen. 19 December 2003 Libya's leader, Moamer al-Khaddhafi, confirms that his regime has sought to develop weapons of mass destruction but, following negotiations with the USA and UK, plans to dismantle all covert programmes and open the country's sites to international inspection.

22 December 2003 The USA confirms its first case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE or mad cow disease) at a farm in the state of Washington, leading to a widespread ban by other countries on US beef imports. 25 December 2003 Beagle 2, the small British space probe aboard the European Space Agency's Mars Express craft, is scheduled to touch down on the surface of the planet Mars but fails to return a radio signal, raising concerns that it may have crashed or malfunctioned. 26 December 2003 An earthquake measuring 6.7 on the Richter scale devastates the Iranian town of Bam in the southeast of the country. The death toll of at least 28,000 is expected to rise further. 27 December 2003 Italy's giant dairy company Parmalat is declared insolvent after a hole in its accounts estimated at up to 10 billion comes to light. Company founder Calisto Tanzi is arrested for suspected financial crimes. December 2003 In Iraq, the fugitive former dictator Saddam Hussein is captured alive and without resistance by US troops near his home town of Tikrit on 13 December, although this fails to herald an end to guerrilla and suicide attacks against the US-led military occupation. 4–31 January 2004 Two US space probes, Spirit and Opportunity, land successfully on Mars to begin investigations into whether the planet ever had water and if it could have supported life. By the end of the month there remains no contact with the British Beagle 2 probe which should have touched down on Mars on 25 December 2003. 14 January 2004 New York-based bank J P Morgan Chase announces a takeover worth nearly US$60 billion of Chicago-based rival Bank One. The combined company will become the second-largest banking operation in the USA after Citigroup. 25 January 2004 The 61st Golden Globes ceremony is held in Los Angeles, California. Best drama picture: The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King; Best musical or comedy picture: Lost in Translation; Best actors: Sean Penn (drama) for Mystic River and Bill Murray (musical or comedy) for Lost in Translation; Best actresses: Charlize Theron (drama) for Monster and Diane Keaton (musical or comedy) for Something's Gotta Give; and Best director: Peter Jackson for The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King. British television's The Office wins the best TV comedy award. 27 January 2004 English novelist Mark Haddon wins the £30,000 UK Whitbread Book of the Year award for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, about on an autistic teenager. 31 January 2004 Roger Federer of Switzerland beats Russia's Marat Safin in Melbourne to win the men's Australian Open tennis championship in straight sets.

1 February 2004 About 250 people are trampled to death in a stampede of Muslim worshippers in Mina, near the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia, during a ritual of the annual hajj pilgrimage. 1 February 2004 In American football's 38th Super Bowl, the New England Patriots beat the Carolina Panthers 32–29 in Houston, Texas. 2 February 2004 In the Middle East, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon announces that he will remove all Jewish settlements in Gaza as part of his plan to disengage unilaterally from territories occupied since 1967, leaving a rump self-governing Palestinian state behind Israel's controversial West Bank security wall. 6 February 2004 A suspected suicide bomb attack on a rush-hour metro train in Moscow, Russia, kills at least 39 people and injures 100 more. The government blames Chechen separatist terrorists. 8 February 2004 The US Grammy Awards for popular music are held in Los Angeles, California. Record of the Year: 'Clocks' by Coldplay; Album of the Year: Speakerboxxx/The Love Below by Outkast; Song of the Year 'Dance With My Father' by Richard Marx and Luther Vandross; Best New Artist: Evanescence; Best Female Vocal Performance: Christina Aguilera (pop), Pink (rock), Beyoncé (R&B); Best Male Vocal Performance: Justin Timberlake (pop), Dave Matthews (rock), Luther Vandross (R&B); Best Female Rap Solo Performance: Missy Elliott; Best Male Rap Solo Performance: Eminem. 11 February 2004 A major exhibition of the work of the 16th-century Spanish painter El Greco (Doménikos Theotokopoulos) opens at the National Gallery in London, England. 15 February 2004 The BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) film awards are held in London, England. Best Picture: The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King; Best Director: Peter Weir for Master and Commander: the Far Side of the World; Best Actor: Bill Murray for Lost in Translation; Best Actress: Scarlett Johansson for Lost in Translation; Best Supporting Actor: Bill Nighy for Love Actually; Best Supporting Actress: Renée Zellweger for Cold Mountain. 17 February 2004 The Brit Awards for popular music are held in London, England. Best British Group: The Darkness; Best British Album: Permission to Land by The Darkness; Best British Single: 'White Flag' by Dido; Best British Male Solo Artist: Daniel Bedingfield; Best British Female Solo Artist: Dido; Best British Breakthrough Act: Busted; Best International Male Solo Artist: Justin Timberlake; Best International Female Solo Artist: Beyoncé; Best International Group: the White Stripes; Best International Breakthrough Artist: 50 Cent; Best International Album: Justified by Justin Timberlake; Outstanding Contribution: Duran Duran. 17 February 2004 US mobile-phone operator Cingular takes control of rival

AT&T Wireless with a US$41 billion cash offer, forcing Britain's Vodafone out of the bidding. It is the largest cash acquisition in US corporate history. 20 February 2004 Hardline religious conservatives regain control of Iran's parliament in elections from which most secular and reformist candidates had earlier been disqualified by the supervisory Islamic Council of Guardians. Despite reformist calls for a boycott of the poll, about 50% of the eligible electorate turn out to vote. 24 February 2004 An earthquake registering 6.5 on the Richter scale strikes northern Morocco around the Mediterranean port of Al Hoceima, killing 570 people and leaving around 20,000 homeless. 25 February 2004 The controversial religious film The Passion of the Christ is released in the USA, directed by Mel Gibson, and starring Jim Caviezel, Monica Bellucci, and Maria Morgenstern. It is criticised for alleged anti-semitism and graphic violence. 29 February 2004 The 76th Academy Awards are held in Hollywood, California. Best picture: The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King; Best director: Peter Jackson for The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King; Best actor: Sean Penn for Mystic River; Best actress: Charlize Theron for Monster; Best supporting actor: Tim Robbins for Mystic River; Best supporting actress: Renée Zellweger for Cold Mountain. The Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King, with 11 awards, is the first film to win every category that it was nominated for. February 2004 Iraq suffers a wave of suicide bombings and insurgent attacks in Irbil, Iskandariya, Baghdad, Falluja and Kirkuk, killing about 230 people during February. Meanwhile, the US and UK governments each set up an inquiry into intelligence failures about Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of mass destruction. The UK government's case for war is further undermined as it abandons the prosecution of an employee who leaked information about US and UK plans to bug United Nations Security Council delegations in the run-up to the war – further claims about which are aired publicly by former cabinet minister Clare Short. 1 March 2004 HSBC reports profits of £7.8 billion for 2003, a 33% increase on the previous year and the largest ever made by a British bank. 1–14 March 2004 In Russia, President Vladimir Putin appoints unknown bureaucrat Mikhail Fradkov as prime minister, replacing Mikhail Kasyanov who was dismissed in February. Two weeks later, Putin secures a second presidential term as he is returned in national elections with 71% of the vote. His nearest rival, Communist Party candidate Nikolai Kharitonov, gets 14%. 11 March 2004 Terrorist bomb attacks on the railway system in Madrid, Spain, leave about 200 people dead. The Spanish government initially accuses the Basque separatist organisation Euskadi ta Askatasuna (ETA; Basque Homeland and Liberty), although later evidence suggests that Islamic extremists linked to the al-

Qaeda international terror network may have been responsible. 14 March 2004 Spain's ruling conservative Partido Popular (PP; Popular Party) is defeated in a general election as the Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE; Spanish Socialist Workers' Party) wins back power unexpectedly with 42.6% of the vote and 164 of the parliamentary seats in the 350-member Congress of Deputies. The election is overshadowed by an earlier devastating terrorist attack in Madrid. 15 March 2004 US astronomers announce the discovery of Sedna, the most distant object orbiting the Sun and the largest to be found in the Solar System since the planet Pluto in 1930. 18 March 2004 At the Cheltenham horse-racing festival in England, Best Mate trained by Henrietta Knight and ridden by Jim Culloty wins the classic Gold Cup steeplechase for a record-equalling third year in a row. 25 March 2004 A major exhibition of Islamic art, Heaven on Earth – Art from Islamic Lands, opens at the Hermitage Rooms in Somerset House, London, England. 27 March 2004 In the final round of the Six Nations rugby union championship, France achieves the Grand Slam in defeating England 24–21 in Paris. In the other two games Ireland secures the Triple Crown by beating Scotland 37–16 in Dublin and Wales beats Italy 44–10 in Cardiff. 27 March 2004 The champion US horse Pleasantly Perfect, ridden by Alex Solis, wins the US$6 million Dubai World Cup, the world's richest horserace, staged in the United Arab Emirates. 29 March 2004 The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) welcomes seven new members, as Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia formally join the western political and military alliance. Their accession brings the total membership of NATO to 26 countries. 29 March 2004 The Republic of Ireland becomes the first country in the world to introduce a nationwide ban on smoking in every workplace. 3 April 2004 The racehorse Amberleigh House, ridden by Graham Lee and trained by Ginger McCain, wins the English Grand National steeplechase run annually at Aintree, Liverpool. 12–14 April 2004 Brian Lara, captain of the West Indies cricket team, sets a new record score of 400 not out against England in the fourth and final Test in Antigua, although the match ends in a draw and England win the series to retain the Wisden Trophy. 14–17 April 2004 In a major shift of US policy towards the Middle East, President George W Bush endorses Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon's unilateral plan to

evacuate Jewish settlements from the Gaza Strip while holding on to larger settlement blocs in the occupied West Bank, and accepts that Israel will not make a full and complete return to its pre-1967 borders. Three days later Israeli forces assassinate Abdel Aziz Rantissi, the new leader of the militant Islamist Hamas movement who succeeded Sheikh Ahmed Yassin who was also killed by the Israelis the previous month. 15 April 2004 Tim Berners-Lee, the British-born scientist credited with inventing the Internet's World Wide Web, is named as the first winner of the Millennium Technology Prize, backed by the government of Finland and worth £600,000. 24 April 2004 A referendum is held in the ethnically divided island of Cyprus on a United Nations (UN) plan for political reunification based on a proposed federation of two largely autonomous states. Although the Turkish Cypriot community endorses the plan, about 75% of the majority Greek Cypriot population rejects it, confirming fears that Cyprus will join the European Union (EU) on 1 May 2004 as a partitioned nation. 27 April 2004 A 17th century Indian Mogul jade flask, inset with emeralds and rubies and lined with gold and silver, is sold at auction in London, England, for £2.9 million, a record price for any Indian work of art. 1 May 2004 The European Union (EU) expands to cover 450 million citizens as eight central European states – the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia – together with Cyprus and Malta, become full members of the organization. The enlargement from 15 to 25 countries is the biggest in EU history. 5 May 2004 Boy With a Pipe, painted by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso in 1905, becomes the world's most expensive piece of art as it is sold at auction in New York City for US$104 million. 10–22 May 2004 At the end of parliamentary elections in India, the Indian National Congress, led by Italian-born Sonia Gandhi, wins a surprise victory taking 145 of 543 elected seats. The Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) retains only 138 seats (down from 182 in the 1999 elections) and its leader, Atal Behari Vajpayee, resigns as prime minister. Sonia Gandhi declines the premiership and nominates Manmohan Singh, an economist and a Sikh, to become prime minister of a Congress-led coalition. His government is sworn in on 22 May. 19 May 2004 The animated film Shrek 2 is released in the USA, directed by Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury, and Conrad Vernon, and featuring the voices of Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, and Cameron Diaz. 22 May 2004 At the 57th annual Cannes Film Festival in France, the controversial documentary film Fahrenheit 9/11 by US director Michael Moore attacking US president George W Bush's foreign policy and war in Iraq, wins the top Palme d'Or award.

22–27 May 2004 Floods and mudslides following torrential rain in the border area between the Dominican Republic and Haiti reportedly kill some 2,000 people and leave thousands more homeless. 26 May 2004 Porto of Portugal beats Monaco 3–0 in the European Champions League football cup final staged in Gelsenkirchen, Germany. 31 May 2004 The children's film Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, based on one of a series of best-selling books by English author J K Rowling, is released in the UK. It is directed by Alfonso Cuarón and stars Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson. May 2004 At the start of May, Islamic extremists in Saudi Arabia kill five foreign workers in a terrorist raid through the port of Yanbu. In a further attack against Western interests at the end of the month, suspected al-Qaeda militants take about 50 foreign hostages in a residential compound after a violent rampage through the city of Khobar. Saudi commandos storm the compound and free the hostages but three of the four assailants escape. At least 22 civilians are killed in the two-day stand-off. These attacks in the world's biggest oil-producing country raise fears of further rises in the already escalating price of crude oil. 5 June 2004 For the second year running Irish jockey Kieren Fallon, riding North Light, wins the 225th Derby, one of the Classic events in the horseracing calendar which is run at Epsom, England. 5 June 2004 Ronald Reagan, former actor turned Republican politician and 40th President of the USA 1981–89, dies in California (93). 8 June 2004 British author Andrea Levy is awarded the £30,000 Orange Prize for women writers for her novel Small Island. 10 June 2004 Ray Charles, legendary US soul, blues, and jazz singer, dies in Beverly Hills, California (73). 15 June 2004 Australian writer Anna Funder wins the £30,000 Samuel Johnson Prize for non-fiction for Stasiland, a book about former East Germany's secret police. 21 June 2004 SpaceShipOne (SS-1) becomes the world's first crewed commercial craft in space. Taking off from the Mojave desert in California, the privatelybuilt SS-1 piloted by Mike Melvill breaks out of Earth's atmosphere to briefly touch the edge of space at an altitude of 100 km/62 mi. 30 June 2004 The science fiction film Spider-Man 2 is widely released. It is directed by Sam Raimi and stars Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, and Alfred Molina. June 2004 The United Nations Security Council adopts a US-drafted resolution

endorsing the transfer of sovereignty in Iraq to an interim government under new prime minister Ayad Allawi and new president Sheikh Ghazi al-Yawer pending elections. The new government will share responsibility for security matters with the US-led multinational forces. Meanwhile, dozens of people are killed in insurgent attacks, car bombings and hostage executions, and sabotage disrupts Iraqi oil exports. The formal handover of power to the Iraqi government takes place two days early on the 28 June, following which former dictator Saddam Hussein is arraigned before an Iraqi court to face charges of crimes against humanity. 1 July 2004 Marlon Brando, iconic US Academy Award-winning cinema actor who starred in films such as On the Waterfront (1954), The Godfather (1972), and Apocalypse Now (1979), dies in Los Angeles, California (80). 3 July 2004 In the women's singles final of the Wimbledon tennis tournament in England, 17-year-old Maria Sharapova of Russia beats the defending champion Serena Williams of the USA in straight sets. 4 July 2004 Greece is the unexpected winner of football's 2004 European Championship, beating the host country Portugal 1–0 in the final in Lisbon. 7 July 2004 A painting of a young woman in a yellow shawl by 17th-century Dutch artist Jan Vermeer fetches £16.2 million at auction in London, England. 9–14 July 2004 A committee of inquiry chaired by Lord Butler delivers its report on the UK government's justification for going to war against Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq in 2003. It criticises the seriously flawed quality of intelligence about Iraqi weapon capabilities, but finds that there was no deliberate attempt on the part of the government to mislead and apportions no blame to individuals. The Butler report follows a few days after a more damning assessment of US intelligence failures on Iraq by the US Senate Intelligence Committee. 10 July 2004 Past Things and Present, an exhibition of the last 20 years of work by Jasper Johns who is widely regarded as the greatest living US artist, opens at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh. 18 July 2004 US golfer Todd Hamilton unexpectedly wins the 133rd British Open tournament at Troon in Ayrshire, Scotland, defeating Ernie Els of South Africa, ranked number two in the world, in a four-hole play-off. 20 July 2004 Microsoft, the world's largest computer software company, announces the largest return of cash to shareholders in corporate history, planning to hand back up to US$75 billion over four years. 25 July 2004 US cyclist Lance Armstrong wins a record sixth successive victory in the 4,800-km/3,000-mi Tour de France competition. July 2004 Monsoon rains in South Asia cause the worst flooding in a decade. By the end of the month about 1,500 people are believed to have died in India,

Bangladesh and Nepal. 13 August 2004 The 28th Olympic Games open in Athens, Greece, attended by more than 10,500 competitors representing 202 national teams in 301 medal events. 18–19 August 2004 Google, the world's largest Internet web search engine, makes its stock market debut after its initial public offering (IPO) is approved by the US Securities and Exchange Commission. However, it cuts the price range for its IPO and the number of shares for sale, valuing the company at about US$23 billion rather than the US$35 billion previously anticipated. 29 August 2004 Germany's Michael Schumacher continues his record-breaking motor-racing career as he wins the formula one championship for a seventh time despite only coming second in the Belgian grand prix at Spa-Francorchamps. 29 August 2004 The 28th Olympic Games come to an end in Athens, Greece. The USA wins 35 gold medals; China, 32; Russia, 27; Australia, 17; Japan, 16; Germany, 14; France, 11; and Italy, 10. August 2004 In the Middle East, Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon announces an expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank. However, his intended withdrawal from the Gaza Strip is then rebuffed by his Likud party, which refuses to allow him to invite the opposition Labour Party into a coalition government that might have backed his plan. At the end of the month a double suicide bombing in Beersheba in southern Israel by Palestinian Hamas militants kills at least 16 people and injures about 100 more. August 2004 Violence continues in Iraq. At the start of the month Christian churches in Baghdad and Mosul are bombed by Muslim insurgents. Three weeks of heavy fighting then erupts between US and Iraqi government troops against militia forces loyal to militant Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the holy city of Najaf before a peace deal is brokered by Iraq's most senior Shia figure, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. Meanwhile, a national conference of politicians and other representatives meets to choose members of an interim Iraqi parliament, and two critical reports about the abuse of Iraqi detainees by US forces are published. 6 February 2005 In American football's 39th Super Bowl, the New England Patriots beat the Philadelphia Eagles 24–21 in Jacksonville, Florida. 7 February 2005 English sailor Ellen MacArthur completes her record-breaking, single-handed journey round the world in a 70-foot catamaran, reaching the finishing line off northern France at the end of a 27,000-mile voyage in just under 72 days. She cuts more than a day off the previous record set in February 2004. 9 February 2005 The Brit Awards for popular music are held in London, England. Best British Group: Franz Ferdinand; Best British Album: Hopes and Fears by Keane; Best British Single: 'Your Game' by Will Young; Best British Male Solo

Artist: The Streets; Best British Female Solo Artist: Joss Stone; Best British Breakthrough Act: Keane; Best International Male Solo Artist: Eminem; Best International Female Solo Artist: Gwen Stefani; Best International Group: Scissor Sisters; Best International Breakthrough Artist: Scissor Sisters ; Best International Album: Scissor Sisters by Scissor Sisters; Outstanding Contribution: Bob Geldof. 10 February 2005 Arthur Miller, prolific US prize-winning playwright, most famous for Death of a Salesman and The Crucible, dies in Roxbury, Connecticut (89). 10 February 2005 The exhibition Turner Whistler Monet, including the 19th century landscape art of French impressionist Claude Monet, US painter James McNeill Whistler, and English artist J M W Turner, opens at Tate Britain, London, England. 12 February 2005 The BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) film awards are held in London, England. Best Picture: The Aviator; Best Director: Mike Leigh for Vera Drake; Best Actor: Jamie Foxx for Ray; Best Actress: Imelda Staunton for Vera Drake; Best Supporting Actor: Clive Owen for Closer; Best Supporting Actress: Cate Blanchett for The Aviator. 13 February 2005 In Iraq, the provisional results of the parliamentary elections on 30 January are released, confirming victory for the United Iraqi Alliance of Shia Muslim-led parties with 48% of the votes and 140 of the 275 seats in the new National Assembly. The Kurdish Unity List wins 26% of the vote and 75 seats, and interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi's Iraqi List takes 40 seats with a 14% vote share. The disaffected Sunni Muslim minority, which largely boycotted the elections, loses its position as the traditional political elite. 13 February 2005 The US Grammy Awards for music are held in Los Angeles, California. Record of the Year: 'Here We Go Again' by Ray Charles and Norah Jones; Album of the Year: Genius Loves Company by Ray Charles and various artists; Song of the Year: 'Daughters' by John Mayer; Best New Artist: Maroon 5. The late Ray Charles'Genius Loves Company collects a record eight awards overall. R&B performer Alicia Keys takes four awards. 15 February 2005 In response to the European Airbus consortium's new A380 superjumbo jet unveiled in January 2005, US aircraft manufacturer Boeing presents the first of its new generation of long-range airliners at its plant in Seattle. The 777-200LR will be the first passenger jet capable of flying non-stop from London, England, to Sydney, Australia. 22 February 2005 An earthquake in Kerman province in southeastern Iran, with a magnitude of 6.4 on the Richter scale, kills over 500 people. 27 February 2005 The 77th Academy Awards are held in Los Angeles, California. Best picture: Million Dollar Baby; Best director: Clint Eastwood for Million Dollar Baby; Best actor: Jamie Foxx for Ray; Best actress: Hilary Swank for Million Dollar Baby; Best supporting actor: Morgan Freeman for Million Dollar Baby; Best

supporting actress: Cate Blanchett for The Aviator. 28 February 2005 Banking group HSBC records profits of £9.6 billion for 2004, a 37% increase on the previous year and the largest annual profit so far recorded by a British company. February 2005 Guarded optimism about reviving the Middle East peace process follows the declaration by Israel's prime minister Ariel Sharon and new Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas of an end to violence at a meeting in Egypt. However, a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv-Yafo later in the month, killing four Israelis, threatens to reignite hostilities. The Palestinian Parliament meanwhile approves a new reformist cabinet under Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia. 3 March 2005 US millionaire adventurer Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly around the world on a solo, non-stop journey without refuelling aboard the specially-designed Virgin Atlantic GlobalFlyer aircraft. Between take-off and landing at Salina in Kansas, he sets a record of just over 67 hours. 13–31 March 2005 Disputed parliamentary election results in Kyrgyzstan provoke violent demonstrations in the south of the country and then in the capital, Bishkek, by opponents of autocratic President Askar Akayev, who flees the country. The Supreme Court cancels the election results and the old parliament (elected in 2000) nominates Kurmanbek Bakiyev, a leading opposition figure, as acting prime minister and president. Another opponent of the Akayev regime, Felix Kulov, meanwhile endorses the newly-elected parliament and the Constitutional Court overrules the Supreme Court decision. The new parliament subsequently confirms Bakiyev as prime minister and presidential elections are planned for mid-2005. 18 March 2005 At the Cheltenham horseracing festival in England, the Irish favourite Kicking King, ridden by Barry Geraghty, wins the classic Gold Cup steeplechase. 19 March 2005 In the final round of the Six Nations rugby union championship, Wales achieves the Grand Slam for the first time in 27 years, beating Ireland 32–20 in Cardiff. In the other two games England defeats Scotland 43–22 at Twickenham and France beats Italy 56–13 in Rome. 26 March 2005 James (Lord) Callaghan, Labour Party politician who, uniquely, held all four of the main UK offices of state – chancellor of the exchequer (1964–67), home secretary (1967–70), foreign secretary (1974–76) and prime minister (1976–79) – dies in Ringmer, England (92). 26 March 2005 The US horse Roses In May, ridden by John Velazquez, wins the tenth Dubai World Cup, the world's richest horserace, staged in the United Arab Emirates. 28 March 2005 The west coast of Sumatra in Indonesia, still struggling to recover from the earthquake and tsunami on 26 December 2004, is hit by another huge

under-sea tremor. Although this earthquake, measuring 8.7 on the Richter scale, does not trigger a tidal surge, it devastates the islands of Nias and Simeulue. Over 400 people are confirmed dead with many missing. 2–8 April 2005 At the end of a 27-year reign, the Polish- born Roman Catholic Pope John Paul II (Karol Wojtyla) dies in the Vatican. Six days later, his funeral attracts 2 million mourners as well as heads of state from all around the world. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, becomes the first primate of the Protestant Church of England ever to attend a papal funeral. 5 April 2005 Saul Bellow, US novelist and winner of both the Nobel and Pulitzer literature prizes, dies in Brookline, Massachusetts (89). 7–8 April 2005 The loss-making MG Rover group, the last independent British volume car maker, suspends production at its Longbridge plant in Birmingham, England, and goes into administration following the failure to secure a joint venture deal with Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation, China's largest manufacturer. 9 April 2005 The annual English Grand National steeplechase horserace run at Aintree, Liverpool, is won by Hedgehunter, the favourite, ridden by Ruby Walsh. 19 April 2005 The conclave of Roman Catholic cardinals elects Joseph Ratzinger, an orthodox conservative theologian, as the new Pope in succession to the deceased John Paul II. The German-born cardinal adopts the title of Benedict XVI. April 2005 Following weeks of political negotiations, the Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani is elected president of Iraq by the new parliament and Ibrahim alJaafari, from the Shia community, becomes prime minister. At the end of April, parliament ratifies a new government, reflecting Shia prominence but with Kurdish, Sunni, and Christian representation. Nevertheless, the political progress is marred by a violent escalation of the opposition insurgency. 5 May 2005 In a general election in the UK, Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour Party retains power for an unprecedented third term, but with a much reduced House of Commons majority of 67 seats and with only 35.2% of the vote in a 61% turnout. Labour wins 356 seats, the Conservative Party 197, the Liberal Democrats 62, the Scottish National Party 6, Plaid Cymru 3, Respect 1, Health Concern 1, and independent 1. In Northern Ireland, the Democratic Unionist Party wins 9 seats (becoming the dominant Unionist party), Sinn Fein 5, the Social Democratic and Labour Party 3, and the Ulster Unionist Party 1. 15 May 2005 The action/fantasy film Star Wars: Episode Three – Revenge of the Sith has its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival before going on worldwide release. It is directed by George Lucas and stars Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, and Hayden Christensen. 16 May 2005 In the conservative Arab state of Kuwait, the National Assembly passes legislation granting women the right to vote and stand for office in

elections. 17 May 2005 Kylie Minogue, the internationally popular Australian singer, announces that she is beginning treatment for breast cancer and cancelling further appearances. 20 May 2005 Scientists at Newcastle University report that they have successfully cloned a human embryo as part of their stem cell research into new treatments for diabetes, having been granted a licence by the UK Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority in August 2004. Pro-life groups criticize such work as unethical. 22 May 2005 At the 58th annual Cannes Film Festival in France, the Belgian directors Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne win the top Palme d'Or award for their film L'Enfant. 25 May 2005 Liverpool football club wins the European Champions League cup final, staged in Istanbul, Turkey, beating AC Milan of Italy 3–2 on penalties following a 3–3 draw at the end of extra time. 25 May 2005 The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline, which runs for about 1,800 km from Azerbaijan through Georgia to Turkey's Mediterranean coast, is officially opened. The pipeline was built by a consortium led by BP of the UK at a cost of US$4 billion. 29 May 2005 The European Union's new constitution, which was signed by EU leaders in October 2004 but is subject to ratification by all 25 member states in order to come into force, is derailed as French voters reject it in a national referendum by a 55% to 45% margin. The continuation of the ratification process in other member states is thrown into doubt. 2 June 2005 Albanian novelist Ismail Kadare wins the first Man Booker International prize for literature. The award, to be presented every two years, is worth £60,000. 4 June 2005 The Derby, one of the Classic annual horseracing events, is run at Epsom, England. Motivator, the 3-1 favourite ridden by Johnny Murtagh, wins decisively by five lengths. 7 June 2005 US author Lionel Shriver is awarded the £30,000 Orange Prize for women writers for her novel We Need to Talk About Kevin. 13 June 2005 US singer Michael Jackson, one of the world's biggest pop stars, is found not guilty by a court in Santa Maria, California, on all charges of child molestation at the end of a long trial. 14 June 2005 Jamaican sprinter Asafa Powell sets a new world record of 9.77 seconds for the 100 metres in Athens, Greece.

14 June 2005 Jonathan Coe wins the £30,000 Samuel Johnson Prize for nonfiction for Like a Fiery Elephant, his biography of the avant-garde English novelist B S Johnson. 20 June 2005 Jack Kilby, US electrical engineer, Nobel Prize winner and acknowledged co-inventor of the microchip, dies in Dallas, Texas (81). June 2005 The fantasy action film Batman Begins is widely released. It is directed by Christopher Nolan and stars Christian Bale, Michael Caine, and Liam Neeson. 2 July 2005 Live8, an international rock music charity event emulating the 1984 Live Aid campaign and targeted against continuing global poverty, attracts 1.1 million people to concerts around the world and is watched on television by 2 billion people. 2 July 2005 US tennis player Venus Williams beats top seed Lindsay Davenport, also of the USA, in three sets in the women's singles final of the Wimbledon tournament in England. 3 July 2005 Switzerland's Roger Federer wins his third successive men's singles title at the Wimbledon tennis tournament, beating Andy Roddick of the USA in three sets in the final. 6 July 2005 The International Olympic Committee, meeting in Singapore, selects London, England, as the host city for the 30th Olympic Games, to be staged in the summer of 2012. London narrowly beats Paris, France, in the final round of voting. 7 July 2005 In a major coordinated terrorist attack on London, England, three bombs explode on the city's underground railway network and another on a bus, killing 56 people including the bombers. Three of the suicide bombers are subsequently identified on surveillance cameras as British Muslims. 9 July 2005 In the final Test of the rugby union series in Auckland, New Zealand, the All Blacks inflict a third successive defeat on the visiting British and Irish Lions, winning 38–19. 16 July 2005 English writer J K Rowling publishes Harry Potter and the HalfBlood Prince, the sixth book of her best-selling children's series, with record sales reported. 17 July 2005 US golfer Tiger Woods wins the 134th British Open tournament at St Andrews, Scotland, to claim the tenth major championship of his career. 24 July 2005 US cyclist Lance Armstrong wins a record seventh successive victory in the 2,200-mile Tour de France and retires from professional racing.

26–31 July 2005 Record rainfall across the Indian state of Maharashtra, particularly in its capital Mumbai, causes flooding, landslides, and building collapses, leading to an estimated 1,000 deaths. 1 August 2005 King Fahd of Saudi Arabia dies after 23 years on the throne of the oil-rich, pro- Western, Islamic state. He is succeeded by his half-brother Abdullah, the former crown prince and de facto ruler for the last ten years due to Fahd's failing health. 6–14 August 2005 The World Athletics Championships are held in Helsinki, Finland. The USA wins 14 gold medals, Russia wins 5 and Ethiopia 3. The British team's single gold medal is won by Paula Radcliffe in the marathon on the final day. 9 August 2005 The US space shuttle Discovery returns safely to Earth from its mission to the International Space Station, following an unprecedented spacewalk by one of the astronauts to carry out external safety repairs in orbit. The shuttle's delayed landing is switched from Florida to California because of bad weather. 11 August 2005 Australian bowler Shane Warne claims a record 600 Test wickets during the third match of the Ashes cricket series against England at Old Trafford, Manchester. 19 August 2005 The 158,000-ton cruise liner Freedom of the Seas is launched in Finland, taking over from the Queen Mary 2 as the world's largest passenger ship. 29–31 August 2005 The southern states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama on the Gulf coast of the USA are lashed by Hurricane Katrina. The low-lying city of New Orleans is devastated by flooding as levees are breached, trapping thousands of residents, cutting off access to essential supplies, and prompting looting and violence. Damage to energy installations along the Gulf and the threat of shortages meanwhile contribute to the continuing record rise in oil prices. At the end of the month, with the death toll from one of the worst natural disasters in US history still unknown, the government declares a public health emergency. 31 August 2005 About 1,000 Iraqi Shia pilgrims attending a religious commemoration are killed in a stampede across a bridge over the Tigris river in Baghdad, reportedly following rumours of an impending suicide bomb attack. August 2005 In the Middle East, the withdrawal of all Israeli settlers from Gaza and areas of the West Bank is completed despite some settler resistance to Israeli troops overseeing the evacuation operation. Israel's finance minister Binyamin Netanyahu resigns in protest at the government's withdrawal policy and vows to challenge Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for leadership of the Likud party. 8–22 September 2005 Amid allegations of corruption, personal political rivalries and stalled economic reform, Ukraine's president Viktor Yushchenko dismisses

the government led by Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko after less than nine months in office. Yuri Yekhanurov, the President's proposed replacement as prime minister, is initially rejected by parliament but late approved on a second ballot. 12 September 2005 England's cricketers regain the Ashes with a 2–1 overall victory against the visiting Australians as the fifth and final Test ends in a draw at the Oval in London. 18 September 2005 In Afghanistan, despite scattered violence by supporters of the former Taliban regime and reports of intimidation and corruption, elections for a new 249-seat parliament and 34 provincial councils are held across the country. The voter turnout is about 50%. 18 September 2005 The 2004–05 Emmy awards for television are held in Los Angeles, California. Best Drama Series: Lost; Best Comedy Series: Everybody Loves Raymond; Best Actor in a Drama: James Spader for Boston Legal; Best Actress in a Drama: Patricia Arquette for Medium; Best Actor in a Comedy: Tony Shalhoub for Monk; Best Actress in a Comedy: Felicity Huffman for Desperate Housewives; Best mini-series: The Lost Prince. 20 September 2005 Simon Wiesenthal, Austrian Holocaust survivor and veteran hunter of Nazi war criminals after World War II, dies in Vienna, Austria (96). 23–30 September 2005 Only about three weeks after Hurricane Katrina battered the southern states on the Gulf coast of the USA and flooded the city of New Orleans, Hurricane Rita strikes Louisiana again and also Texas. However, Rita is less ferocious and the federal and state authorities, stung by accusations of inaction and complacency in the Katrina disaster, are better prepared, implementing a civil evacuation to minimize casualties. By the end of the month, the death toll from Hurricane Katrina is believed to have reached about 1,200, much less than originally feared. 25 September 2005 Spain's Fernando Alonso becomes the youngest champion in the history of Formula 1 motor racing as his third-place finish in the Brazilian grand prix at Interlagos is enough to secure the 2005 world title. 28 September 2005 Roman Abramovich, a wealthy Russian businessman based in London, England, sells his majority stake in the giant oil firm Sibneft to the statecontrolled Russian gas monopoly Gazprom for $13.1 billion. It is Russia's largest ever takeover deal. 2 October 2005 The Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe, Europe's biggest horserace which is run at Longchamp in Paris, France, is won by Hurricane Run ridden by Irish jockey Kieren Fallon. 3 October 2005 Australian scientists Barry Marshall and Robin Warren share the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine.

4 October 2005 The Nobel Prize for Physics is awarded to US professor Roy Glauber for his research on light particles and also jointly to professors John Hall of the USA and Theodor Hänsch of Germany for their contributions to laser-based spectroscopy. 4–9 October 2005 As Hurricane Stan strikes Central America, torrential rain leads to mudslides and flooding, particularly in Guatemala. The official death toll is put at nearly 800 people, with some 130,000 made homeless. 5 October 2005 Three scientists share the Nobel Prize for Chemistry – Yves Chauvin of France and Robert Grubbs and Richard Schrock of the USA – for work on organic synthesis. 7 October 2005 The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to the International Atomic Energy Agency and its Egyptian head, Mohamed ElBaradei. 8–31 October 2005 A massive earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale strikes Kashmir, devastating Pakistani-administered areas of the disputed territory in particular. By the end of the month over 70,000 victims are thought to have died, with many remote areas yet to be reached by relief aid agencies. As the Himalayan winter approaches, more than 3 million people are without shelter, threatening to compound the humanitarian disaster. 10 October 2005 Game theorists Robert Aumann of Israel and Thomas Schelling of the USA share the Nobel Prize for Economics. 10 October 2005 Irish writer John Banville wins the £50,000 Man Booker literary prize for his novel The Sea. 13 October 2005 British playwright Harold Pinter wins the Nobel Prize for Literature. 13–14 October 2005 In Russia's volatile Caucasian region, Islamic militants launch a series of armed attacks on the town of Nalchik in the republic of Kabardino-Balkaria. More than 100 people are killed in two days of fighting before the security services regain control. Chechen separatists claim responsibility. 26 October 2005 A major retrospective of the work of 17th-century Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens – Rubens: a Master in the Making – opens at the National Gallery, London, England. 27 October–14 November 2005 In France's worst social unrest for nearly 40 years, rioting and violence in a poor, mainly immigrant suburb of Paris spreads daily over three weeks to towns and cities across the country, highlighting problems of unemployment and ethnic discrimination and forcing the government to declare a state of emergency to regain control of the streets.

31 October 2005 O2, a leading UK mobile phone operator, agrees a £17.7 billion takeover by Telefónica of Spain, the world's fifth largest telephony group. October 2005 In Iraq, a new constitution is only narrowly approved with Shia and Kurdish support in a national referendum on 15 October due to Sunni Arab opposition. On 19 October the trial of Saddam Hussein for mass murder opens in Baghdad, although the former dictator refuses to acknowledge the court's legality. Meanwhile, as the Iraqi insurgency continues, the death toll of US troops in Iraq passes the 2,000 mark. October 2005 Spreading from Asia, a dangerous strain of bird flu with the potential to trigger a pandemic affecting humans reaches Europe as cases of the disease are identified during the month in Romania, Turkey and Greece. 1 November 2005 A late 19th-century painting by French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, called La blanchisseuse, sells for $22.4 million at auction in New York, USA. It is a record price for his work. 12 November 2005 The exhibition China: The Three Emperors 1662–1795, featuring imperial treasures from the Qing dynasty, opens at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, England. 22 November 2005 Two months after inconclusive parliamentary elections, Angela Merkel, the leader of Germany's centre-right Christlich-Demokratische Union (CDU; Christian Democratic Union), is formally elected by the Bundestag (Federal Assembly) as the country's first female chancellor at the head of a 'grand coalition' with the centre-left Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands (SPD; Social Democratic Party of Germany). 25 November 2005 George Best, Northern Irish football icon who played for Manchester United and Northern Ireland in the 1960s and 1970s, dies in London, England (59). 26 November 2005 The West Indian cricketer Brian Lara, who already holds the record for the highest individual Test score, becomes the most prolific run-scorer in Test history during a match against Australia in Adelaide. He surpasses the previous record set by Australia's Allan Border. 27–28 November 2005 Surgeons in Amiens, France, perform the world's first face transplant on a woman patient badly disfigured in a dog attack. November 2005 The children's film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, based on one of a series of best-selling books by English author J K Rowling, is widely released. It is directed by Mike Newell and stars Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson. November 2005 There is a major realignment of Israeli politics during November. Amir Peretz is elected as the new leader of the Labour Party in place of Shimon Peres and declares his intention to withdraw from the coalition

government, triggering early elections to be held in March 2006. Later in the month, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, facing opposition from within his own Likud party over his policies towards the Middle East peace process, breaks away to form a new centrist party called Kadima (Forward) and is joined by Shimon Peres. 3 December 2005 Pakistan beats England's visiting cricketers by an innings and 100 runs in Lahore in the third and final Test to win the series 2–0. 4 December 2005 Croatia's tennis team wins the Davis Cup for the first time with a 3–2 victory over the Slovak Republic in the final in the Slovak capital of Bratislava. 5 December 2005 Scottish artist Simon Starling wins the prestigious £25,000 Turner Prize for contemporary art. December 2005 The fantasy adventure film The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, based on the work of British author C S Lewis, is widely released. It is directed by Andrew Adamson and stars Tilda Swinton, Georgie Henley, Skandar Keynes, William Moseley and Anna Popplewell. December 2005 The science fiction adventure film King Kong is widely released. It is directed by Peter Jackson and stars Naomi Watts, Jack Black and Adrien Brody.