The Really Big Dates in Western History

By T.L. Winslow (TLW), the Historyscoper™

© Copyright by T.L. Winslow. All Rights Reserved.



-1250 Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses II shows his people that his staff is still mighty
-1194 The Trojan War
-1020 Israel becomes a united monarchy
-922 Israel splits into Israel (north) and Judah (south)
-753 Rome is founded
-722 The Assyrians carry away the Lost Tribes of Israel
-609 The Babylonians conquer the Assyrians and Egyptians
-587 The Babylonians sack Jerusalem and carry away the rest of the Jews
-560 The Bible appears on the scene
-539 The Persians conquer the Babylonians and let the Jews return
-509 The Latins oust the Etruscans from Rome
-480 The Greeks save the West from the Persians
-323 Alexander the Great (b. -356) conquers Persia then dies prematurely
-202 Rome defeats Hannibal of Carthage at the Plains of Zama
-146 Rome conquers Greece and becomes top dog
-71 Spartacus' servile revolt is crushed
-53 The Parthians defeat the Romans at Carrhae (Harran)
-50 Caesar conquers Gaul from the Celts
-44 Caesar is murdered (Mar. 15)
-31 The Pax Romana begins
9 The Germans repel the Romans at the Battle of Teutoberg Forest
30-40 It's Hollywood and it's all about the Oscars
43 The Romans conquer Britain from the Celts
70 The Romans conquer and occupy Jerusalem
106 The Romans conquer Dacia (Romania) - the Roman Empire reaches its maximum extent
135 The Bar Kochba Rebellion is crushed - the Jewish Diaspora begins
180 The Antonine Plague (begun 164) depopulates the Roman Empire, ending the Pax Romana
259 The Sassanid Persians under Sapor (Shapur) I defeat the Romans and stuff the emperor
285 The Roman Empire is partitioned for convenience
312 Constantine I the Great sees Christ and wins the Battle of the Milvian Bridge
313 Christianity becomes the official religion of Rome
330 Roman Emperor Constantine I the Great founds Constantinople
391 Roman Emperor Theodosius I bans the Olympic Games - paganism is kaput
395 The Roman Empire partition becomes permanent
404 Western Roman Emperor Honorius moves the capital to Ravenna
406 The Vandals and other Germanic tribes breach the Rhenish frontiers
410 The Visigoths under Alaric I sack Rome
430 The Vandals under Gaiseric (Genseric) capture Carthage - the Romans lose the Mediterranean
451 Defeat of Attila the Hun
455 The Vandals under Gaiseric (Genseric) sack Rome
476 Rome falls to the Visigoths under Odoacer
493 The Ostrogoths under Theodosius the Great take Italy from the Visigoths
555 The Byzantines take Italy from the Ostrogoths
568 The German Lombards settle depopulated Italy
570 Birth of Muhammad (Year of the Elephant)
632 Death of Muhammad - start of Arab Muslim conquests
711 The Muslims invade Spain
732 Charles Martel saves France from the Muslims
751 The Lombards oust the Byzantines from Italy
754 Pepin III the Short of France defeats the Lombards - beginning of the Papal States
774 Charlemagne of France conquers the Lombards of N Italy
800 The First Reich of the Holy Roman Empire is founded by Charlemagne of France
863 The First Great Schism of the Catholic Church
896 Alfred the Great repels the last Viking invasion of England
911 The Norse Vikings settle Normandy and go Christian
962 The Second Reich of the Holy Roman Empire is founded by Otto I of Germany
1054 The Second Great Schism of the Catholic Church
1066 William of Normandy conquers England
1095 The First Crusade [Godfrey of Bouillon] (-1099)
1118 The Knights Templar are founded
1147 The Second Crusade [Louis VII] (-1149)
1162 Birth of Genghis Khan (d. 1227)
1188 The Third Crusade [Richard I] (-1192)
1202 The Fourth Crusade (-1204)
1204 The Crusaders sack Constantinople and harden the Great Schism
1217 The Fifth Crusade [John of Brienne] (-1221)
1228 The Sixth Crusade [Frederick II] (-1229)
1231 Pope Gregory IX establishes the Inquisition
1248 The Seventh Crusade [Louis IX] (-1254)
1270 The Eighth Crusade [Louis IX] (-1270)
1271 The Ninth Crusade [Edward I] (-1272)
1291 Acre falls - the Crusades end
1307 The Templars are outlawed on Friday the Thirteenth of Oct.
1334 The Black Death
1350 The Italian Renaissance begins
1398 The Mongols under Tamerlane conquer Delhi
1433 The Chinese isolate themselves, allowing the backward West to pass them by
1439 A German named Gutenberg invents printing
1452 Tuscan giant Leonardo da Vinci graces the world with his presence
1453 Constantinople falls to the Ottoman Turks
1492 The Spanish Reconquista is complete, and the Jews are expelled from Spain
1492 A mysterious Italian (Spaniard?) (secret Jew?) named Columbus (Colon) discovers America
1517 A German named Luther launches the Protestant Reformation
1519 Death of Leonardo da Vinci - stick the Renaissance with a fork (1550?)
1521 Cortes of Spain conquers the Aztecs
1531 Pizarro of Spain conquers the Incas
1533 Henry VIII of England breaks with the Roman Catholic Church
1541 The Spanish conquer the Mayans
1543 A Pollock named Copernicus puts the Sun and planets in the right order
1553 The Protestants (Calvinists) stink themselves up by burning Michael Servetus
1571 The Battle of Lepanto frees the Mediterranean from the Ottomans
1588 The Protestant English defeat the Roman Catholic Spanish Armada
1607 English colonization of North America begins at Jamestown
1611 The King James Bible
1623 The First Folio of Shakespeare
1633 The Roman Catholic Church stinks itself up by condemning Galileo
1639 Connecticut starts the Constitution Solution in America
1648 The Peace of Westphalia ends the Thirty Years' War and redraws the map of Europe
1666 Newton's Miracle Year
1683 The Ottomans are turned back at Vienna
1776 The American Revolution
1789 The U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights
1789 The French Revolution
1803 An Englishman named Dalton revives the atomic theory of matter
1806 The Second Reich of the Holy Roman Empire ends
1814 The railroad is invented by a Brit named Stephenson
1815 Wellington defeats Napoleon at Waterloo
1827 Photography is invented by a Frenchie named Niepce
1835 The telegraph is invented by an American named Morse
1844 An American named Wells introduces anesthesia gas to surgery
1857 A Frenchman named Pasteur proposes the germ theory of disease
1859 An Englishman named Darwin reverses the natural order
1861 The American Civil War
1861 A Scot named Maxwell figures out electromagnetism
1865 An Englishman named Lister introduces antiseptics
1866 A Swede named Nobel invents dynamite
1870 End of the Papal States - birth of modern Italy
1879 Thomas Edison of the U.S. invents the electric light
1885 Germans Daimler and Benz invent the modern automobile
1886 The Statue of Liberty is dedicated
1895 An Italian named Marconi invents radio
1903 The Wright Brothers of the U.S. invent the airplane
1905 Einstein's Miracle Year
1914 World War I (Aug. 1)
1917 The October Revolution in Russia (Oct. 24)
1924 The Ottoman caliphate is abolished (Mar. 3)
1929 The Great Stock Market Crash (Black Tuesday) (Oct. 29)
1934 The Third Reich is founded by Adolf Hitler of Germany
1939 World War II (Sept. 1)
1942 Birth of the electronic digital computer and the jet airplane
1945 End of the Third Reich, and birth of the atomic bomb and the U.N.
1948 Birth of Israel (May 14)
1949 Birth of Red China (Sept. 21)
1950 The Korean War (June 25)
1953 Birth of TLW (Jan. 18)
1963 Assassination of JFK (Nov. 22)
1964 The Beatles launch Beatlemania on the Ed Sullivan Show (Feb. 9)
1969 NASA Apollo 11 puts the first men on the Moon (July 20)
1973 The Vietnam War ends (Jan. 28)
1980 The IBM PC is introduced - the information explosion is in full swing
1981 MTV debuts (Aug. 1)
1991 The Soviet Union falls (Dec. 8)
1993 Birth of the World Wide Web
1997 Jennifer Lopez!
2000 The human genome is sequenced
2001 The 9/11 attack changes America forever




© Copyright by T.L. Winslow. All Rights Reserved.