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15th Century Timeline: 1401 to 1500

1401 Timur conquers Damascus and reconquers Baghdad.

1402 Timur wins a great battle at Angora (Ankara). He is concerned about having helped Christians by defeating a Muslim army. He sends envoys to the Christian knights ruling Smyrna and demands that the knights convert to Islam or pay tribute. They refuse both, and Timur attacks and orders the city's entire population, including women and children, annihilated. The heads of the defeated, it would be said, are displayed in a pyramid.

1405 A Ming dynasty emperor, Yongle (or Zhu Di) orders one of his eunuchs, Zheng He, a Muslim who has traveled to Mecca and knows the world a little better than others in China, to sail a fleet of ships on the high seas in pursuit of his cousin, the former emperor.

1406 China's emperor, Zhu Di, sends troops that begin an eighteen-year attempt to conquer Annam (Vietnam).

1406 The geography of Ptolemy, an ancient Greek, is introduced in Europe. This holds that the earth is the center of the universe and that all heavenly bodies revolve around it in perfect circles.

1407 London has a new institution - a place for the insane called Bethlehem hospital.

1408 In Britain, John Wyclif's England language bible has been published.

1409 Prelates meet at Pisa to name a pope to replace the two claiming to be pope. The two existing popes refuse to step aside.

1410 A Germanic force, the Teutonic Knights, are trying to gain control of Poland. The knights are allied with the kings of Bohemia and Hungary. Their army has volunteer "crusaders" and numbers around 27,000. An army of 39,000 fighting for the Polish king, Wladyslaw Jagiello, includes Lithuanians, Ruthenians and Tatars in addition to Poles, and they defeat the Germans. The Teutonic Knights decline in power and Eastern Europe does not become a German colony.

1413 In England, followers of John Wyclif, dead since 1384, hold that the Bible is the only rule of faith. They appeal to the Catholic clergy to return to the simple life of the early Church. They oppose war, the doctrine of transubstantiation, confession, and images in worship. They march on London, and Henry V, fearing social disorder, suppresses the movement.

1415 John Hus, a Czech and former dean of philosophy at the University of Prague, travels to the Council of Constance to propose his reforms for the Church. Upon his arrival he is tried for heresy and burned at the stake.

1415 Prince Henry of Portugal, with a fleet of 200 ships and 20,000 men, captures the port of Ceuta from the Moors.

1416 Dutch fishermen are using drift nets.

1419 Lately the Portuguese have been building latine-rigged ships, which can tack into the wind. They are are exploring waters off the coast of northern Africa, and they lay claim to the island of Madiera.

1420 The Portuguese are fighting inhabitants of the Canary Islands, south of Madiera.

1421 In Austria, Jews are imprisoned and expelled.

1421 In Florence, the first patent is granted - for a barge with hoists, used for hauling marble.

1422 In Japan, a Zen teacher, Ketsugan, is performing exorcisms.

1425 Zen temples in Japan are contributing to cultural diffusion by importing Chinese literature, aritistic styles and religious ideas.

1428 Pope Martin V orders John Wyclif's bones exhumed and burned.

1428 King Alfonso V, king of Naples and Sicily, orders Jews in Sicily to convert to Catholicism.

1429 The Hundred Years' War is still on, and, in May, Joan of Arc defeats the English at Orleans. In August she enters Paris in triumph.

1431 Some Englishmen see Joan of Arc as truly a witch and as an agent of the devil - a common response to adversity in this age. Joan is captured. The English turn her over to ecclesiastic authorities - the Inquisition - and at the French town of Rouen, then under English rule, Joan is burned at the stake.

1431 Admiral Zheng He of China leads a fleet of 52 ships, with nearly 30,000 men, to the east coast of Africa.

1433 The Songhai have rebelled against the Mali Empire and are disrupting Mali's trade on the Niger River. Mali is in decline. The Songhai are able to sack and occupy Timbuktu.

1434 In this pre-industrial age the biggest business is banking, and in the Tuscan city of Florence a banking family, the Medici, begins to dominate the city politically.

1434 Portuguese start sailing past Cape Bojador, beyond which had been considered a "Sea of Darkness" from which no European had returned.

1435 Amid rebellion and turmoil, Sweden's parliament meets for the first time, to be dominated by noble families and the body that maintains Swedish national identity.

1436 From the Caucasus region, al-Ashraf Qaytbay, at the age of twenty, is brought to Egypt as a slave, purchased by a merchant for recruitment as a Mameluke warrior. He is an able horseman, and his gifts are to catch the eye of Egypt's leading militarists.

1439 Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church leaders agree to reunify these two branches of Christianity. The Russians do not agree and the Russian Orthodox Church is to remain independent of the Vatican in Rome.

1441 In one of their caravels, the Portuguese transport around 200 slaves from Africa to Portugal.

1448 In China, hyperinflation reduces the value of paper money 97 percent.

1448 On a small island known as Arguin (Arguim), rougly 700 kilometers south of Cape Bojador, the Portuguese build a castle and establish the first European trading post in Africa.

1448 The Russian Orthodox Church becomes independent of the Patriarch of Constantinople.

1450 In Kyoto, the Ryoanji Zen temple is built. It has a garden of fifteen rocks on raked white sand - an austerity to aid meditation.

1450 The wealthiest state on Africa's east coast, Zimbabwe, is abandoned after having suffered from overgrazing, eroded farmlands and a loss of timber. Kingdoms neighboring Zimbabwe are conquered by Mwene Mutapa.

1452 In Europe, metal plates are being used in screw-type presses.

1453 Constantinople had its power destroyed by the Fourth Crusade in 1204, and it has been declining economically, in population and military strength. Using European artillery experts, and European artillery, the Ottoman Turks break through Constantinople's walls. Disciplined Muslim forces capture the city, ending the reign of Eastern Orthodox Christianity there and that city's thousand years as the heart of what had been the remains of the Roman Empire.

1453 The French capture Bordeaux, the last place the English hold except for the port city of Calais, on the English channel. The Hundred Years' War ends without a formal treaty signed and no renouncing of rights to the French throne by an English king. Nationalism had increased, and common people in England are upset at what they see as England having lost the war. With the end of the Hundred Years' War, trade revives and economic depression ends.

1453 Forty-one Jews are burned at the stake in Breslau, Poland.

1455 In the German town of Mainz, Johann Gutenberg, using metal type in a screw-type printing press, prints the "Gutenberg" Bible.

1455 With humanistic leanings and an enthusiasm for literature and art, Pope Nicholas V has in the last five years given rebirth to the Vatican Library - putting it on course to becoming one of the largest libraries in the world. He dies at age 58.

1456 Judges and commissioners in the archbishop's palace in the city of Rouen declare that Joan of Arc was innocent of the charges that led to her execution - after nineteen years of appeal and almost one year of hearings. The Archbishop declares the case ended.

1456 The Ottoman Turks overrun Athens, begin a stay that will last 400 years, and they turn the Parthenon into a mosque.

1459 The Ottoman Turks have taken control of all Serbia.

1461 Two families, both descended from King Edward III (who reigned from 1327 to 1377 and was of the Plantagenet dynasty) have been at war for years. One family is the House of York the other the House of Lancaster. This is the War of the Roses. Edward, from the House of York, defeats the Lancastrians at Mortimor's Cross. He is proclaimed king and ascends the throne as Edward IV.

1461 King Loius XI of France creates a postal service.

1463 The Ottoman Turks expand into Bosnia. They execute Bosnia's king, Stefan Tomasevic - the last of the Kotromanic dynasty. Assassination, as a means of resistance to foreign rule, is viewed by the Serbs of Bosnia as a heroic act.

1464 The Songhai and Mali Empire fight over Timbuktu, with great loss of life. The Songhai win and the Mali Empire is more obviously in decline.

1466 An Albanian, George Kastrioti, also known as Skanderbeg, has led another successful resistance against an Ottoman invasion, and he is a hero across Christendom.

1467 In Japan a dispute over succession of the Ashikaga shogunate begins the Onin War, which exacerbates the strife between regional warlords (daimyo).

1468 Skanderbeg has been ill and dies in bed, and the Ottomans absorb Albania.

1468 In Egypt, al-Ashraf Qaytbay, becomes the Mameluke sultan. He buys 46,000 more slaves from the his area of origin - the Caucusus. These slaves are normally from ages ten to 20, shipped through the Turkish straits. It is a trade in the hands of the Genoese.

1469 Ferdinand of Aragon marries Isabella of Castile.

1472 Benin is a walled city several kilometers wide in a forested region inland from where the Niger River empties into the Atlantic Ocean. Its king, Ewuare trades captives taken in battle, delivering them as slaves to the Portuguese.

1472 On one of his journeys the Mameluke sultan, Qaytbay, is rushed by peasants. He waves back his bodyguards, greets them and allows them to clutch at his garments. It was his way with the common people of Egypt and the common people's response to power and authority despite the habit of previous rulers to ignore them.

1477 France's Louis XI gains control of Burgundy.

1477 In Japan the Onin War ends. The shogunate is weakened and power shifts to feudal warlords (daimyo).

1478 A conspiracy, that includes the Archbishop of Pisa and has the support of Pope Sixtus IV, leads to an attack on the Medici while they are in church. The Archbishop and several others are hanged. Pope Sixtus puts Florence under the interdict and excommunicates the Medici leader of Florence, Lorenzo de Medici. The pope forms a military alliance with the King of Naples, and Lorenzo's diplomacy prevents an attack.

1479 After four years of war, Spain accepts monopoly trade for Portugal along Africa's Atlantic coast and Portugal acknowledges Spain's rights in the Canary Islands.

1479 The Ottoman Turks and Venice have been at war since 1463. Venice is defeated militarily and gives up that part of its empire, along the Adriatic Sea, that the Ottoman Turks occupy.

1480 Leonardo da Vinci of Florence, age 28, of invents the parachute. No airplanes exist to make if practical.

1480 Moscow's Ivan III feels strong enough to refuse to pay tribute to the Mongols

1481 Louis XI of France gains the territories of Anjou, Bar Mine and Provence.

1480 Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain employ the Spanish Inquisition to investigate whether converted Jews are secretly clinging to Judaism.

1481 Two Latvian monarchs are executed for murdering the Polish king, Kazimierz IV.

1482 Portuguese have founded new trading settlements on Africa's "Gold Coast." They are trading ironware, firearms, textiles and food for gold, ivory, food and slaves.

1482 The Ottoman Turks occupy Herzegovina and join it administratively with Bosnia. Its nobles and a large percentage of its peasants are to accept Islam.

1482 Cairo is one of the largest cities and wealthiest cities and is much admired by western travelers.

1483 Edward IV of England has died. His son succeeds him as Edward V, and he is murdered. The Duke of Gloucester, the youngest brother of Edward IV, usurps the throne and is crowned Richard III.

1483 Pope Innocent VIII issues a statement deploring the spread of witchcraft and heresy in Germany. He orders that cats belonging to convicted witches be burned as well as the witches.

1485 Henry Tudor, a relative of the Lancaster family, defeats Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth. The Tudor family takes power and is crowned Henry VII.

1485 Henry VII marries Elizabeth of York, uniting the Lancaster and York families. The War of Roses is over.

1491 King Charles VIII of France invades Brittany and forces 14-year-old Ann of Brittany to marry him, adding Brittany to French territory.

1492 Ferdinand and Isabella do their part in a war against Islam - they annex Granada. Also they expel all Jews from Spain. And the voyage they are paying for, led by Christopher Columbus, sets sail for China by going westward.

1493 Christopher Columbus returns from the Caribbean, and later in the year he sails back to the Caribbean.

1494 Kings were doing what kings had been doing for ages: pursuing wealth, territorial expansion and control over people. This year the agent of the Spanish monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella, Columbus, begins using people of the Caribbean as slaves.

1494 Piero de Medici has ruled since death of his father, Lorenzo, in 1492. He makes a peace with French, who have invaded Tuscany (in which Florence is located). A political rising drives him into exile. Florence is in anarchy. A Dominican priest, Savonarola, is anti-Renaissance. He is opposed to popular music, art and other worldliness.

1496 Jews are expelled from Syria.

1496 Sultan Qaytbay dies at the age of 53 followed by grand amirs competing to succeed him.

1497 Boys working under Savonarola collect from homes things associated with moral laxity: mirrors, cosmetics, pictures, books, fine dresses, the works of immoral poets. Savonarola has these burned. Renaissance art work is lost. Pope Alexander VI excommunicates Savonarola.

1497 In Scotland, children are required by law to go to school

1498 Toothbrushes appear in China.

1498 Vasco da Gama reaches India.

1498 Savonarola is hanged. An enraged crowd burns Savonarola at the same spot where he ordered his bonfire.

1498 Columbus sails from Spain with six ships on his third voyage to the Americas.

1498 Jews are expelled from Nuremberg and Bavaria.

1498 The Ottoman Turks invade Dalmatia and devastate land around Zara. Venice goes to war again against the Ottoman Turks.

1500 Portugal settles the islands of Sao Tome and Principe off the Atlantic coast of Africa.