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Period: Jan 1, 1485 to
Renaissance
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Aug 22, 1485
Richard lll is killed in battle
Richard III (2 October 1452 – 22 August 1485) was King of England from 1483 until his death in 1485 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, marks the end of the Middle Ages in England. He is the subject of the play Richard III by William Shakespeare. -
Jan 1, 1492
Christopher Columbus reached the Americas
Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer, navigator, and colonizer, citizen of the Republic of Genoa. Columbus completed four round-trip voyages between Spain and the Americas, all of them under the sponsorship of the Crown of Castile. These voyages marked the beginning of the European exploration and colonization of the American continents, and are thus of enormous significance in Western history. -
Jan 1, 1503
Leonardo Da Vinci paints the Mona Lisa
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". -
Jan 1, 1516
Thomas More's Utopia is published
A work of fiction and political philosophy by Thomas More published in 1516 in Latin. The book is a frame narrative primarily depicting a fictional island society and its religious, social and political customs. -
Jan 1, 1543
With the Supremacy Act, Henry Vlll proclaims himself head of Church of England
The title was created for King Henry VIII, who was responsible for the Engliish 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. The Act of Supremacy confirmed the King's status as having supremacy over the church. -
Nov 17, 1558
Elizabeth l becomes queen of England
Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana or Good Queen Bess, the childless Elizabeth was the fifth, last monarch of the Tudor dynasty, and daughter of Henry VIII. Elizabeth's reign is known as the Elizabethan era. The period is famous for the flourishing of English drama, led by playwrights such as William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe, and for the seafaring prowess of English adventurers such as Francis Drake. -
Apr 23, 1564
William Shakespeare, the Bard of Avon, is born
William Shakespeare (26 April 1564 (baptised) – 23 April 1616) was an English poet, pla writer, 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". -
Globe Theatre is built in London
The Globe Theatre was a theatre in London associated with William Shakespeare. It was built in 1599 by Shakespeare's playing company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, It was destroyed by fire in 1613. A second Globe Theatre was built on the same site by June 1614 and closed in 1642. -
Shakespeare writes King Lear and Macbeth
Tragedies written by William Shakespeare. King Lear descends into madness after disposing of his estate between two of his three daughters because of their flattery, bringing tragic consequences for all. Macbeth dramatizes the corrosive psychological and political effects produced when evil is chosen as a way to fulfill the ambition for power. -
First permanent English settlement in North America (Jamestown, Virginia)
Some 100 English colonists arrive along the west bank of the James River in Virginia to found Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in North America. Dispatched from England by the London Company, the colonists had sailed across the Atlantic aboard the Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery. -
Shakespeare's sonnets are pubished
Shakespeare's sonnets are a collection of 154 sonnets, dealing with themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty and mortality, first published in a 1609 quarto entitled SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS. -
King James bible is published
The King James Version (KJV), commonly known as the Authorized Version (AV) or King James Bible (KJB), is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England begun in 1604 and completed in 1611.First printed by the King's Printer Robert Barker, this was the third translation into English to be approved by the English Church authorities. -
The Mayflower lands at Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts
Over a hundred travelers embarked on the voyage of the Mayflower in September 1620. They set up camp not too far from Plymouth Rock.In the landmark Mayflower Compact of 1620, the Pilgrims decided that they would rule themselves, based on majority rule of the townsmen. -
Newspapers are first published in London
English started printing their own papers in London, they reverted to the pamphlet format used by contemporary books. The publication of these newsbooks was suspended between 1632 and 1638 by order of The Star Chamber. After they resumed publication, the era of these newsbooks lasted until the publication of the Oxford Gazette in 1665. -
John Milton begins Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. 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 (in the manner of Virgil's Aeneid) with minor revisions throughout and a note on the versification. It is considered by critics to be Milton's major work, and helped solidify his reputation as one of the greatest English poets of his time. -
Puritan Commonwealth ends; monarchy is restored with Charles ll
The Restoration of the English monarchy began in 1660 when the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under Charles II after the Interregnum that followed the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. The term Restoration is used to describe both the actual event by which the monarchy was restored, and the period of several years afterwards in which a new political settlement was established.
