Must Know Dates: Era 2

1453

Ottomans capture Constantinople
- Allowed for Ottoman expansion into Europe
- Muslim expansion into Europe

1450s

Printing Press in Europe (Gutenberg)
- Helped to spread knowledge and ideas across Europe during the Renaissance
- Paper production for plays and literature

c.1480s

Height of Aztec Empire
- 5 to 6 million people
- Successful agricultural methods, technological advances, controlled lots of land

1488

Dias rounds Cape of Good Hope
- First European to round the southern tip of Africa
- New sea route from Europe to Asia

1492

Columbus/Reconquista of Spain
- Spain expelled Muslims from the Iberian Peninsula
- Columbus helped to expand Spain's power to the Americas

1502

1st African slaves to Americas
- Beginning of hundreds of years of slavery in Americas
- Large migration

1517

Martin Luther/ Protestant Reformation
- Resulted in the creation of the Christian branch of Protestantism
- Martin Luther: created Protestantism

1519-1521

Cortez conqeured the Aztecs
- End of Aztec empire, beginning of Spanish rule
- Increased trade, wipeouts of Aztecs, spread of diseases, migration

1521-1523

Magellan circumnavigates the Earth
- Expanded knowledge about the world
- Opened up the rest of the world to Europe
- Expanded Portuguese power

1529

1st unsuccessful Ottoman siege of Vienna (Suleiman the Magnificient)
- Beginning of the end of Ottoman rule in Europe

1533

Pizarro topples the Inca
- End of the Inca empire, beginning of Spanish colonization

1545

Discovery of silver at Potosi
- Potosi silver mine became source of silver for 60% of world's supply
- center of Spanish Empire wealth

1571

Battle of Lepanto (Ottoman naval defeat)
- Christian naval force beats the Muslim Ottomans
- Beginning of religious warfare in the Mediterranean

1571

1st Manila Galleon (global trade of silver)
- Luxury goods and spices traded in the Americas for New World Silver

1588

Spanish Armada
- Defining moment in Elizabeth I's rule
- Secured Protestant rule in England

1600

Battle of Sekigahara (beginning of Tokugawa Shogunate)
- Largest battle in Japanese feudal history
- Started Tokugawa Shogunate

1607

Foundation of Jamestown
- First permanent English settlement in the Americas

1618-1648

30 Years War (continential Europe fought over Catholicism trying to be imposed on Protestant peoples)
- Divided Germany into several different states, and strengthened France as a power

1644-1911

Qing Dynasty
- Final imperial dynasty of China
- Large prosperity and increased trade and exploration for the Chinese

1652

Cape Town Colony founded by Dutch
- Supplied ships on the journey to China
- Began Dutch expansion into Africa (apartheid too)

1683

2nd unsuccessful Ottoman siege of Vienna (Mehmet IV)
- End of Turkish expansion into Europe

1689

Glorious Revolution/English Bill of Rights (was a basis for later American Bill of Rights)
- Permanently establish the Parliament as the ruling power of England
- Bill of Rights: framework for Americans, created free speech and elections