Untitled timeline

Main

First humans cross into Americas from Asia

33000 B.C. - 8000 B.C.

Corn is developed as a staple crop in highland Mexico

5000 B.C.

First civilized societies develop in the Middle East

4000 B.C.

Corn planting reaches present-day American Southwest

1200 B.C.

Corn cultivation reaches Midwest and southeastern Atlantic seaboard

1000

Norse voyagers discover and briefly settle in northeastern North America

1000

Norse voyagers discover and briefly settle in northeastern North America

Christian crusades arouse European interest in the East

1100 - 1300

Height of Mississippian settlement at Cahokia

1100

Marco Polo returns to Europe

1295

Spain becomes united

1450 - 1500

Díaz rounds southern tip of Africa

1488

Columbus lands in the Bahamas

1492

Treaty of Tordesillas between Spain and Portugal

1494

Cabot explores northeastern coast of North America for England

1498

Da Gama reaches India

1498

Balboa claims all lands touched by the Pacific Ocean for Spain

1513

Ponce de León explores Florida

1513

Martin Luther begins Protestant Reformation

1517

Cortés conquers Mexico for Spain

1519 - 1521

Ponce de León explores Florida

1521

Magellan’s vessel completes circumnavigation of the world

1522

Verrazano explores eastern seaboard of North America for France

1524

Pizarro crushes Incas

1532

Cartier journeys up the St. Lawrence River

1534

John Calvin of Geneva publishes Institutes of the Christian Religion

1536

De Soto explores the Southeast and discovers the Mississippi River

1539 - 1542

Coronado explores present-day Southwest

1540 - 1542

Cabrillo explores California coast for Spain

1542

Elizabeth I becomes queen of England

1558

Iroquois Confederacy founded, according to Iroquois legend

1560 - 1600

English crush Irish uprising

1565 - 1590

Drake circumnavigates the globe

1577

England defeats Spanish Armada

1588

Edict of Nantes

1598

Spanish under Oñate conquer Pueblo peoples of Rio Grande valley

1598 - 1609

James I becomes king of England

1603

Spain and England sign peace treaty

1604

Virginia colony founded at Jamestown

1607

Champlain colonizes Quebec for France

1608

Spanish found New Mexico

1609

Rolfe perfects tobacco culture in Virginia

1612

First Anglo-Powhatan War ends

1614

First Africans arrive in Jamestown Virginia House of Burgesses established

1619

First Africans arrive in Virginia

1619

Pilgrims sail on the Mayflower to Plymouth Bay

1620

Dutch found New Netherland

1624

Virginia becomes royal colony

1624

Population of English colonies in America about 2,000

1625

Charles I dismisses Parliament and persecutes Puritans

1629

Puritans found Massachusetts Bay Colony

1630

Maryland colony founded

1634

Connecticut and New Haven colonies founded

1635 - 1638

Roger Williams convicted of heresy and founds Rhode Island colony

1635 - 1636

Harvard College founded

1636

Pequot War

1637

Anne Hutchinson banished from Massachusetts colony

1638

Connecticut’s Fundamental Orders drafted

1639

Large-scale slave-labor system established in English West Indies

1640 - 1650

English Civil War

1642 - 1648

Louis XIV becomes king of France

1643

New England Confederation formed

1643

Second Anglo-Powhatan War

1644

Act of Toleration in Maryland Charles I beheaded; Cromwell rules England

1649

William Bradford completes Of Plymouth Plantation

1650

New Netherland conquers New Sweden

1655

Charles II restored to English throne

1660

Barbados slave code adopted

1661

Half-Way Covenant for Congregational Church membership established

1662

England seizes New Netherland from Dutch East and West Jersey colonies founded

1664

Carolina colony created

1670

Virginia assembly disfranchises landless freeman

1670

King Philip’s War

1675 - 1676

Bacon’s Rebellion in Virginia

1676

French expedition down Mississippi River under La Salle

1680 - 1690

Mass expansion of slavery in colonies

1680

Popé’s Rebellion in New Mexico

1680

William Penn founds Pennsylvania colony

1681

Royal authority creates Dominion of New England

1686

Glorious Revolution overthrows Stuarts and 1689 Dominion of New England

1688 - 1689

King William’s War (War of the League of Augsburg)

1689 - 1697

Leisler’s Rebellion in New York

1689 - 1691

Salem witch trials in Massachusetts

1692

College of William and Mary founded

1693

College of William and Mary founded

1693

Royal African Company slave trade monopoly ended

1698

Population of English colonies in America about 250,000

1700

Yale College founded

1701

Queen Anne’s War (War of Spanish Succession)

1702 - 1713

Tuscarora War in North Carolina

1711 - 1713

New York City slave revolt

1712

North Carolina formally separates from South Carolina

1712

Yamasee War in South Carolina

1715 - 1716

French found New Orleans

1718

Smallpox inoculation introduced

1721

First edition of Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack

1732

Georgia colony founded

1733

Jonathan Edwards begins Great Awakening

1734

Zenger free-press trial in New York

1734 - 1735

George Whitefield spreads Great Awakening

1738

South Carolina slave revolt

1739

War of Jenkins’s Ear

1739

King George’s War (War of Austrian Succession)

1744 - 1748

Princeton College founded

1746

SevenYears’War (FrenchandIndianWar)

1754 - 1763

Washington battles French on frontier Albany Congress

1754

Braddock’s defeat

1755

Pitt emerges as leader of British government

1757

Battle of Quebec

1759

Britain vetoes South Carolina anti–slave trade measures

1760

Peace of Paris Pontiac’s uprising Proclamation of 1763

1763

Paxton Boys march on Philadelphia Brown College founded

1764

Regulator protests

1768 - 1771

Serra founds first California mission, at San Diego

1769