Chronology
Five thousand years, end to end
22 records shown
- 3100 BCECivilization
Unification of Upper and Lower Egypt
Giza
Tradition credits King Menes with joining the two lands and founding the first dynasty at Memphis.
↓ next - 2560 BCEMonument
Construction of the Great Pyramid
Giza
Khufu's tomb at Giza rose to 146 metres and stayed the tallest structure on earth for 3,800 years.
↓ next - 1754 BCEPolitical
The Code of Hammurabi
Babylon
282 laws cut into a two-metre basalt stele, published where any literate subject could read them.
↓ next - 776 BCECultural
The First Olympic Games
Olympia
A single foot race at the sanctuary of Zeus becomes the Greek world's shared calendar.
↓ next - 508 BCEPolitical
Athenian Democracy Established
Athens
Cleisthenes reorganises Attica into ten tribes and hands sovereignty to the assembly of citizens.
↓ next - 432 BCEMonument
The Parthenon Completed
Athens
Fifteen years of work on the Acropolis end with a temple whose columns are deliberately imperfect.
↓ next - 399 BCEPolitical
The Trial of Socrates
Athens
A jury of 501 Athenians condemns a philosopher for impiety; he drinks hemlock rather than flee.
↓ next - 283 BCEDiscovery
Founding of the Library of Alexandria
Alexandria
The Ptolemies attempt to collect every book in the world in one harbour city.
↓ next - 130 BCEDiscovery
The Silk Road Opens
Chang'an
Han envoys reach Central Asia and stitch together a 6,400 km commercial and cultural corridor.
↓ next - 44 BCEPolitical
The Assassination of Julius Caesar
Rome
Sixty senators stab the dictator perpetuo at the Theatre of Pompey on the Ides of March.
↓ next - 30 BCEBattle
Actium and the End of Ptolemaic Egypt
Alexandria
After defeat at Actium, Cleopatra VII dies and Egypt becomes a Roman province.
↓ next - 330 CEPolitical
The Founding of Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantine dedicates a new Rome on the Bosphorus, at the hinge of Europe and Asia.
↓ next - 476 CEPolitical
The Fall of the Western Roman Empire
Rome
Odoacer deposes Romulus Augustulus and sends the imperial regalia east.
↓ next - 1453Battle
The Fall of Constantinople
Constantinople
After a 53-day siege, Ottoman forces breach the Theodosian Walls and the Roman Empire ends.
↓ next - 1455Discovery
Gutenberg Prints the Bible
Wittenberg
Movable metal type turns the reproduction of text from a craft into an industry.
↓ next - 1503Cultural
Leonardo Begins the Mona Lisa
Florence
A portrait of a Florentine merchant's wife, carried unfinished across the Alps and never delivered.
↓ next - 1512Cultural
The Sistine Chapel Ceiling
Florence
Michelangelo finishes four years of fresco over 500 square metres of Vatican ceiling.
↓ next - 1517Cultural
Luther's Ninety-Five Theses
Wittenberg
An academic objection to indulgences becomes, via the printing press, a continental schism.
↓ next - 1521Battle
The Fall of Tenochtitlan
Tenochtitlan
A siege, an epidemic, and tens of thousands of indigenous allies end the Mexica empire.
↓ next - 1760–1840Discovery
The Industrial Revolution
Manchester
Coal, steam and the factory system reorganise work, cities and population in eighty years.
↓ next - 1789Political
The French Revolution Begins
Paris
The storming of the Bastille turns a fiscal crisis into the founding event of modern politics.
↓ next - 1969Discovery
Apollo 11 Lands on the Moon
Cape Canaveral
Eight years after the commitment, two people walk on another world and come back.
Range shown: 3100 BCE — 1969 CE