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731
Year 731
The Venerable Bede, in his monastery at Jarrow, completes his history of the English church and people -
800
Year 800
Beowulf, the first great work of Germanic literature, mingles the legends of Scandinavia with the experience in England of Angles and Saxons -
950
Year 950
The material of the Eddas, taking shape in Iceland, derives from earlier sources in Norway, Britain and Burgundy -
Period: 1300 to 1387
From the year 1300 to 1387
Duns Scotus, known as the Subtle Doctor in medieval times, later provides humanists with the name Dunsman or dunce
William of Ockham advocates paring down arguments to their essentials, an approach later known as Ockham's Razor
A narrator who calls himself Will, and whose name may be Langland, begins the epic poem of Piers Plowman
One of four new yeomen of the chamber in Edward III's household is Geoffrey Chaucer
One of four new yeomen of the chamber in Edward III's household is Geoffrey Chaucer -
1469
Year 1469
Thomas Malory, in gaol somewhere in England, compiles Morte d'Arthur – an English account of the French tales of King Arthur -
Period: 1510 to
From the year 1510 to 1592
Erasmus and Thomas More take the northern Renaissance in the direction of Christian humanism
William Tyndale studies in the university at Wittenberg and plans to translate the Bible into English
The first version of the English prayer book, or Book of Common Prayer, is published with text by Thomas Cranmer
Marlowe and Shakespeare are born in the same year, with Marlowe the older by two months
English poet Edmund Spenser celebrates the Protestant Elizabeth I as The Faerie Queene -
Period: to
From the year 1600 to 1610
Shakespeare's central character in Hamlet expresses both the ideals of the Renaissance and the disillusion of a less confident age
James I commissions the Authorized version of the Bible, which is completed by forty-seven scholars in seven years
William Shakespeare's name appears among the actors in a list of the King's Men
Ben Jonson writes The Masque of Blackness, the first of his many masques for the court of James I
Shakespeare's last completed play, The Tempest, is performed -
year 1616
John Smith publishes A Description of New England, an account of his exploration of the region in 1614
William Shakespeare dies at New Place, his home in Stratford-upon-Avon, and is buried in Holy Trinity Church -
Period: to
From the year 1621 to 1637
John Donne, England's leading Metaphysical poet, becomes dean of St Paul's
John Heminge and Henry Condell publish thirty-six Shakespeare plays in the First Folio
George Herbert's only volume of poems, The Temple, is published posthumously
John Milton's Lycidas is published in memory of a Cambridge friend, Edward King -
Period: to
From the year 1650 to 1690
The poems of Massachusetts author Anne Bradstreet are published in London under the title The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America
Paradise Lost is published, earning its author John Milton just £10
Part I of The Pilgrim's Progress, written during John Bunyan's two spells in Bedford Gaol, is published and is immediately popular
John Locke publishes his Essay concerning Human Understanding, arguing that all knowledge is based on experience -
Period: to
From the year 1700 to 1710
The Augustan Age begins in English literature, claiming comparison with the equivalent flowering under Augustus Caesar
The Tatler launches a new style of journalism in Britain's coffee houses, followed two years later by the Spectator
25-year-old George Berkeley attacks Locke in his Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge -
Period: to
From the year 1711 to 1720
Alexander Pope's Rape of the Lock introduces a delicate vein of mock-heroic in English poetry
Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, with its detailed realism, can be seen as the first English novel -
Period: to
From the year 1721 to 1750
Jonathan Swift sends his hero on a series of bitterly satirical travels in Gulliver's Travels
David Hume publishes his Treatise of Human Nature, in which he applies to the human mind the principles of experimental science
Samuel Richardson's Clarissa begins the correspondence that grows into the longest novel in the English language
Henry Fielding introduces a character of lasting appeal in the lusty but good-hearted Tom Jones -
Period: to
From the year 1751 to 1760
English poet Thomas Gray publishes his Elegy written in a Country Church Yard
Samuel Johnson publishes his magisterial Dictionary of the English Language
James Woodforde, an English country parson with a love of food and wine, begins a detailed diary of everyday life
Laurence Sterne publishes the first two volumes of Tristram Shandy, beginning with the scene at the hero's conception -
Period: to
From the year 1761 to 1770
Fingal, supposedly by the medieval poet Ossian, is a forgery in the spirit of the times
James Boswell meets Samuel Johnson for the first time
English historian Edward Gibbon, sitting among ruins in Rome, conceives the idea of Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
A Society of Gentlemen in Scotland begins publication of the immensely successful Encyclopaedia Britannica
17-year-old Thomas Chatterton, later hailed as a significant poet, commits suicide in a London garret -
Period: to
From the year 1773 to 1789
Oliver Goldsmith's play She Stoops to Conquer is produced in London's Covent Garden theatre
Encouraged by Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine emigrates to America and settles in Philadelphia
Richard Brinsley Sheridan's second play, The School for Scandal, is an immediate success in London's Drury Lane theatre
William Blake publishes Songs of Innocence, a volume of his poems with every page etched and illustrated by himself -
Period: to
From the year 1790 tp 1798
Anglo-Irish politician Edmund Burke publishes Reflections on the Revolution in France
English author Mary Wollstonecraft publishes a passionately feminist work, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
William Blake's volume Songs of Innocence and Experience includes his poem 'Tyger! Tyger! burning bright'
Samuel Taylor Coleridge says that while writing Kubla Khan he is interrupted
English poets Wordsworth and Coleridge jointly publish Lyrical Ballads, a milestone in the Romantic movement -
Period: to
From the year 1804 to 1810
William Blake includes his poem 'Jerusalem' in the Preface to his book Milton
Walter Scott publishes The Lay of the Last Minstrel, the long romantic poem that first brings him fame
Walter Scott's poem Lady of the Lake brings tourists in unprecedented numbers to Scotland's Loch Katrine -
Period: to
From the year 1811 to 1820
Percy Bysshe Shelley is expelled from Oxford university for circulating a pamphlet with the title The Necessity of Atheism
Pride and Prejudice, based on a youthful work of 1797 called First Impressions, is the second of Jane Austen's novels to be published
Percy Bysshe Shelley publishes probably his best-known poem
William Cobbett brings back to England the bones of Thomas Paine
English poet John Keats publishes Ode to a Nightingale, inspired by the bird's song in his Hampstead garden -
Period: to
From the year 1821 to 1840
English author Thomas De Quincey publishes his autobiographical Confessions of an English Opium-Eater
12-year-old Charles Dickens works in London in Warren's boot-blacking factory
English author Frances Trollope ruffles transatlantic feathers with her Domestic Manners of the Americans, based on a 3-year stay
24-year-old Charles Dickens begins monthly publication of his first work of fiction, Pickwick Papers
Charles Dickens' first novel, Oliver Twist, begins monthly publication -
Period: to
From the year 1841 to 1850
English poet Robert Browning publishes a vivid narrative poem about the terrible revenge of The Pied Piper of Hamelin
Friedrich Engels, after running a textile factory in Manchester, publishes The Condition of the Working Class in England
English author William Makepeace Thackeray begins publication of his novel Vanity Fair in monthly parts
Alfred Tennyson's elegy for a friend, In Memoriam, captures perfectly the Victorian mood of heightened sensibility -
Period: to
From the year 1851 to 1860
London physician Peter Mark Roget publishes his dictionary of synonyms, the Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases
Within six weeks of the Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimea, Tennyson publishes a poem finding heroism in the disaster
Tennyson publishes a long narrative poem, Maud, a section of which ('Come into the garden, Maud') becomes famous as a song
Charles Darwin puts forward the theory of evolution in On the Origin of Species, the result of 20 years' research -
Period: to
From the year 1861 to 1870
Charles Dickens begins serial publication of his novel "Great Expectations"
Mrs Henry Wood publishes her first novel, East Lynne, which becomes the basis of the most popular of all Victorian melodramas
Oxford mathematician Lewis Carroll tells 10-year-old Alice Liddell, on a boat trip, a story about her own adventures in Wonderland
English author Matthew Arnold publishes Culture and Anarchy, an influential collection of essays about contemporary society