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Jan 1, 1485
Richard III is killed in battle
Richard III (2 October 1452 – 22 August 1485) was King of England from 1483 until his death in 1485, at the age of 32, in the Battle of Bosworth Field. He was the last king of the House of York and the last of the Plantagenet dynasty. His defeat at Bosworth Field, the last decisive battle of the Wars of the Roses, marked the end of the Middle Ages in England. He is the subject of the fictional historical play Richard III by William Shakespeare. -
Jan 1, 1492
Christopher Columbus reaches the Americas
Columbus led his three ships - the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria - out of the Spanish port of Palos on August 3, 1492. His objective was to sail west until he reached Asia (the Indies) where the riches of gold, pearls and spice awaited. His first stop was the Canary Islands where the lack of wind left his expedition becalmed until September 6. -
Jan 1, 1503
Leonardo da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
is a half-length portrait of a woman by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci, which has been acclaimed as "the best known, the most visited, the most written about, the most sung about, the most parodied work of art in the world". The painting, thought to be a portrait of Lisa Gherardini, the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, is in oil on a white Lombardy poplar panel, and is believed to have been painted between 1503 and 1506. Leonardo may have continued working on it as late as 1517. -
Jan 1, 1516
Thomas More's Utopia is published
The work begins with written correspondence between Thomas More and several people he had met on the continent. More chose these letters, which are communications between actual people, to further the plausibility of his fictional land. In the same spirit, these letters also include a specimen of the Utopian alphabet and its poetry. The letters also explain the lack of widespread travel to Utopia; during the first mention of the land. -
Jan 1, 1543
With the Supremacy Act, Henry VIII proclaims himself head of the Church of England.
The title was created for King Henry VIII, who was responsible for the English Catholic church breaking away from the authority of the Roman Catholic Church after the Pope excommunicated Henry in 1533 over his divorce from Catherine of Aragon. By 1536, Henry had broken with Rome, seized the church's assets in England and declared the Church of England as the established church with himself as its head. -
Jan 1, 1558
Elizabeth I becomes queen of England
Elizabeth was the daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, his second wife, who was executed two and a half years after Elizabeth's birth. Anne's marriage to Henry VIII was annulled, and Elizabeth was declared illegitimate. Her half-brother, Edward VI, ruled until his death in 1553, bequeathing the crown to Lady Jane Grey and ignoring the claims of his two half-sisters, Elizabeth and the Roman Catholic Mary, in spite of statute law to the contrary. -
Jan 1, 1564
William Shakespeare. the Bard of Avon, is born
April, 26 1564 (baptised) Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet, and the "Bard of Avon" His extant works, including collaborations, consist of approximately 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. -
Globe Theatre is built in London
Evidence suggests that it was a three-storey, open-air amphitheatre approximately 100 feet in diameter that could house up to 3,000 spectators. In 1988–89, the uncovering of a small part of the Globe's foundation suggested that it was a polygon of 20 sides. The Globe was built in 1599 using timber from an earlier theatre, The Theatre, which had been built by Richard Burbage's father, James Burbage, in Shoreditch in 1576. -
Shakespeare writes King Lear and Macbeth
King Lear depicts the gradual descent into madness of the title character, after he disposes of his kingdom giving bequests to two of his three daughters based on their flattery of him, bringing tragic consequences for all. Macbeth dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those who seek power for its own sake. -
First permanent English settlement in North America is established at Jamestown, Virginia
The settlement was located within the country of Tsenacommacah, which was administered by the Powhatan Confederacy, and specifically in that of the Paspahegh tribe. The natives initially welcomed and provided crucial provisions and support for the colonists, who were not agriculturally inclined. Relations with the newcomers soured fairly early on, leading to the total annihilation of the Paspahegh in warfare within 3 years. Mortality at Jamestown itself was very high due to disease and hunger. -
Shakespeare's sonnets are published
Shakespeare's Sonnets is the title of a collection of 154 sonnets accredited to William Shakespeare which cover themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty and mortality. It was first published in 1609. The first 17 poems, are traditionally called the procreation sonnets, while other sonnets express the speaker's love for a young man. The final two sonnets are allegorical treatments of Greek epigrams referring to the "little love-god" Cupid. -
King James Bible is published
The King James Version of the Bible, released in 1611, was authorized by King James in order to have as accurate a translation as possible, which could be printed and widely circulated. The original Old Testament writings were in Hebrew and the New Testament in Greek. Jerome (5th century) translated the Bible into Latin, called the Vulgate, which has become the official Roman Catholic Bible. -
The Mayflower lands at Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts
Plymouth Rock is the traditional site of disembarkation of William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims who founded Plymouth Colony in 1620. It is an important symbol in American history. There are no contemporaneous references to the Pilgrims' landing on a rock at Plymouth, and it is not referred to in Edward Winslow's Mourt's Relation (1620–21) or in Bradford's journal Of Plymouth Plantation. -
Newspapers are first published in London
During the 17th century, there were many kinds of publications that told both news and rumours. Among these were pamphlets, posters, ballads etc. Even when the news periodicals emerged, many of these co-existed with them. A news periodical differs from these mainly because of its periodicity. The definition for 17th century newsbooks and newspapers is that they are published at least once a week. -
John Milton begins Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton (1608–1674). The first version, published in 1667, consisted of ten books with over ten thousand lines of verse. A second edition followed in 1674, arranged into twelve books with minor revisions throughout and a note on the versification. It is considered by critics to be Milton's major work, and it helped solidify his reputation as one of the greatest English poets of -
Purtain Commonwealth ends; monarchy is restored with Charles II
The Commonwealth was the period from 1649 onwards when England, along later with Ireland and Scotland, was ruled as a republic following the end of the Second English Civil War and the trial and execution of Charles I. The republic's existence was declared through "An Act declaring England to be a Commonwealth", adopted by the Rump Parliament on 19 May 1649. The Restoration was both a series of events in April–May 1660 and the period that followed it in British history.
