Modern Era
Battle of Puebla (1862): The Real Story of Cinco de Mayo
Mexican victory; the French assault on the hill forts of Puebla was repulsed, delaying the French advance on Mexico City by about a year.
All Articles
Every Chronicle article on world history, newest first: battles, empires, disasters, discoveries and revolutions.
Modern Era
Edison's Light Bulb (1879): Lighting the World with Electricity
Edison's team produced a practical high-resistance carbon-filament lamp and built an electric lighting system around it, while Joseph Swan developed a rival lamp in Britain.
Modern Era
July Revolution (1830): The Three Glorious Days in Paris
Charles X abdicated and went into exile; Louis-Philippe of Orléans became King of the French, founding the July Monarchy.
Middle Ages
Moa Extinction: How New Zealand's Giant Birds Disappeared
All nine moa species and their predator, Haast's eagle, became extinct, one of the fastest human-caused megafauna extinctions known.
Middle Ages
Mutapa Empire: Founding of the Kingdom of Mwene Mutapa
A Shona state centred on the northern Zimbabwe plateau took over much of the region's gold trade and became the main African power met by the Portuguese in south-east Africa.
Middle Ages
Founding of the Bahmani Sultanate (1347) in the Deccan
The Deccan broke away from the Delhi Sultanate and became an independent Muslim kingdom for nearly two centuries.
Middle Ages
The Tale of Genji: Murasaki Shikibu's Heian Masterpiece
A 54-chapter prose tale of court life became the most celebrated work of Japanese literature and is often described as the world's first novel.
Middle Ages
Founding of Cairo (969): The Fatimid City of al-Qahira
The Fatimids conquered Egypt and founded al-Qahira as their walled royal city; from 973 it was the capital of the Fatimid caliphate.
Middle Ages
Salisbury Cathedral: Early English Gothic and the Tallest Spire
A cathedral built almost entirely in one style within a generation, later crowned by the tallest church spire in Britain.
Middle Ages
Viking Raid on Lindisfarne (793): Start of the Viking Age
Norse raiders plundered the monastery and killed or enslaved monks; the attack shocked Christian Europe and is the conventional start of the Viking Age.
Middle Ages
Alexios I Komnenos: The Komnenian Restoration of Byzantium
Alexios stabilised the Byzantine Empire, recovered western Anatolia with crusader help and founded a dynasty that ruled until 1185.
Early Modern
Great Plague of Marseille (1720): Plague Ship and Plague Wall
Bubonic plague killed an estimated 40,000-50,000 people in Marseille and about 90,000-120,000 across Provence before dying out in 1722.