Dates - a timeline to 1800 (this page)

Dates from 1800 to 1850

Dates from 1850 to 1900

Print calendar for month of any year (interface to Unix "cal" command)

[410] [1492] [1498] [1503] [1515] [1517] [1534] [1543] [1558] [1559] [1588] [1598]
[1607] [1620] [1621] [1623] [1625] [1626] [1628] [1629]
[1630] [1631] [1633] [1634] [1635] [1636] [1637] [1638] [1639] [1640] [1641]
[1642] [1644] [1645] [1646] [1647] [1648] [1649] <-Scarlet Letter period
[1650] [1651] [1653] [1654] [1656] [1656] [1657] [1658] [1659]
[1660] [1661] [1662] [1667] [1675] [1676] [1677] [1678]
[1680] [1681] [1684] [1685] [1686] [1687]
[1688] [1689] [1691] [1692] [1693] [1694]
[1700] [1701] [1702] [1703] [1721] [1727] [1734]
[1736] [1740] [1748] [1749] [1754] [1758] [1773]
[1775] [1776] [1784] [1791] [1793] [1794]
[1795] [1796] [1797] [1798] [1799] [1800] [1803]
Hawthorne born-> [1804] [1805] [1806] [1807] [1808] [1809] [1810] [1811]
[1812] [1814] [1816] [1817] [1818] [1819] [1820]
[1821] [1822] [1823] [1824] [1825] [1826] [1827] [1828] [1829] [1830] [1831]
[1832] [1833] [1834] [1835] [1836] [1837] [1838] [1839] [1840] [1841]
[1842] [1843] [1844] [1845] [1846] [1847] [1848] [1849]
[1850] [1851] [1852] [1853] [1854] [1855] [1856] [1857]
[1858] [1859] [1860] [1861] [1862] [1863] [1864]<-Hawthorne dies
[1865] [1866] [1869] [1870] [1871] [1872] [1874] [1876] [1877]
[1878] [1879] [1882] [1884] [1885] [1886] [1888] [1889] [1891] [1895]
[1900] [1903] [1926] [1934]

410: Rome, Italy: Alaric and Visigoths sack imperial city for last time
1492: Oct 12....Bahamas: Christopher Columbus lands in New World
1498: Florence, Italy: daVinci finishes Last Supper
1503: Florence, Italy: daVinci paints Mona Lisa
1515: England: Sir Thomas More publishes Utopia
1517: Oct. 31...Germany: Luther begins Protestant Reformation
1534: England: Henry VIII separates Anglican church from Rome
1543: Spain: first Protestant burned at stake in Inquisition; Italy: Vesalius accurately describes human anatomy
1553: England: Protestants John Hooper and Thomas Cranmer executed at orders of Mary Tudor, seeking to return to Roman Catholicism
1558: England: Elizabeth takes the crown of Mary Tudor
1559: England: Anglican church restored; Book of Common Prayer published
1588: England: Spanish Armada defeated
1598: April 15...Paris: Henri IV signs Edict of Nantes, recognizing Protestant rights
1603: England: James I assumes the crown from Elizabeth
1607: May 24...Jamestown, Va.: first permanent British settlement in North America
1620: Dec 22....Plymouth, Mass.: Pilgrims land at Plymouth Rock
1621: Plymouth, Mass.: Gov. John Carver dies, succeeded by William Bradford (until 1657)
1623: Portsmouth, N.H.: Strawberry Banke founded
1625: England: James I dies; Charles I reigns; England: Plague called the Black Death
1626: Salem, Mass.: Roger Conant moves settlement here
1628: Plymouth, Mass.: Miles Standish attacks Merrymount settlement, where Thomas Morton had given guns and liquor to Indians
1629: England: Charles I dissolves Parliament; cloth trade slumps; bad harvests
1630: Boston: Gov. Winthrop establishes new colony, assumes control from Endecott; Boston, Salem: Major William Hathorne is one of original settlers
1631: Boston, Salem: Roger Williams arrives; Massachusetts: All male church members eligible to vote
1633: Boston: Puritan ministers John Cotton, Thomas Hooker arrive
1634: Boston: William and Anne Hutchinson follow John Cotton
1635: Massachusetts: Roger Williams banished after disputes with magistrates; Boston: Anne Hutchinson holds meetings in home after chapel
1636: Massachusetts: Henry Vane elected governor; Massachusetts: John Endecott leads troops against Pequots in start of war; Massachusetts: Roger Williams flees to Rhode Island; Massachsetts General Court authorizes Harvard College
1637: Cambridge, Mass.: Synod attacks Hutchinson and followers; John Winthrop defeats Henry Vane as governor; Hutchinson banished; Connecticut: After Pequot attacks, troops destroy main Pequot village; Nov. 7...Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard College officially founded
1638: Exeter, N.H.: John Wheelwright founds town after banished from Massachusetts; Portsmouth, R.I.: Hutchinson and other Antinomians found town
1639: Scotland: First Bishops' War against rebellious Presbyterians
1640: England: Charles I calls "Short" and "Long" Parliaments to raise funds in war against Presbyterian Puritans
1641: Massachusetts: Bay Psalm Book published; Massachusetts adopts law code Body of Liberties; Massachusetts: Richard Bellingham becomes governor
1642: June...Boston: The Scarlet Letter (fiction) starts as Hester Prynne stands on scaffold; England: Civil War breaks out with Puritans against Charles I; much church art taken down or destroyed
1643: May 19...New England Confederation formed of colonies of Massachusetts Bay, New Haven, Plymouth; Italy: Evangelista Torricelli invents mercury barometer; England: Puritan-controlled Parliament establishes Westminster Assembly of Divines for religious reform; Hooker, Cotton, and Davenport decline to return from New England; New York: Anne Hutchinson killed in Indian attack
1644: March...Boston: John Winthrop's Journal records execution of Mary Latham for adultery, along with confessed partner James Britton; England: John Milton publishes Areopagitica; Paris: Rene Descartes publishes Principia Philosophia; China: Ming dynasty ends; England: Presbyterians assume majority of Parliament against Congregationalists; Massachusetts: General Court divides into two houses; New England: Roger Williams publishes The Bloody Tenet of Persecution; John Cotton publishes The Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven
1645: England: Puritan New Model Army wins at Naseby; Parliament establishes Presbyterianism; May 14...Boston: Thomas Dudley elected governor; Late summer...Boston: in The Scarlet Letter Hester Prynne fictionally visits Governor Bellingham
1646: New England Primer published around this period; England: Charles I surrenders; England: Charles Fox starts Quaker movement; Cambridge, Mass.: Cambridge Assembly in New England to define colonial church; England: Westminster Confession defines basic Calvinist beliefs of Puritans; October...Nonantum, Mass.: John Eliot delivers first sermon in Indian language
1647: Boston: Nathaniel Ward publishes The Simple Cobbler of Agawam, ridiculing female fashions; John Cotton publishes The Bloody Tenent Washed
1648: Charlestown, Mass.: Margaret Jones is first executed as witch; Oct. 18...Boston: Cobblers form first union in North America; England: Charles I escapes, defeated in Second Civil War; Edinburgh: Westminster Catechism adopted; England: Congregationalists assume control of Parliament; Cambridge, Mass.: Congregational form of church ordered in New England Way; Boston: Book of Laws and Liberties, detailed law code, adopted
1649: Mar. 26...Boston: John Winthrop dies; Early May...Boston: (in The Scarlet Letter fictionally) Minister keeps vigil on scaffold in marketplace as Gov. Winthrop fictionally dies; a few days later...Boston, sea coast: Hester Prynne meets Roger Chillingworth; several days later...Dorchester, in forest outside Boston: Hester meets Arthur Dimmesdale; three days later...Boston, marketplace: Hester and Pearl watch procession, listen to Election Day sermon, and Dimmesdale confesses and dies on scaffold; within the year...Boston: Roger Chillingworth dies, leaves fortune to Pearl Prynne, and Hester Prynne disappears; England: Charles I executed, Commonwealth established
1650: London: first tea brought to England; Oxford: first coffee shop opens in England; England: Oliver Cromwell becomes lord general; Salem, Mass.: Anne Bradstreet publishes The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung up in America
1651: Natick, Mass.: John Eliot founds village for Indian converts; Massachusetts: three Baptists fined and banished
1653: England: Cromwell dissolves Long Parliament, becomes Lord Protector
1654: Jamaica: Cromwell sends military expedition; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard President Henry Dunster resigns after declaring Baptist ideas; Boston: Richard Bellingham again becomes governor
1656: Massachusetts: Quakers arrive, are arrested, and banished; Boston: Mistress Ann Hibbins put to death as witch
1657: New England: Half-Way Covenant resolves membership in churches
1658: England: Richard Cromwell becomes lord protector after Oliver dies; conflict renews; Massachusetts: Death penalty enacted for Quakers
1659: Boston: Quakers William Robinson and Marmaduke Stevenson are hung
1660: Boston: Quaker Mary Dyer hangs; England: Charles II restores monarchy; some Puritan leaders leave for New England
1661: New England: Charles II halts Quaker executions; Massachusetts: John Eliot is censured for antimonarchical ideas
1662: ?"many years after" 1649...Boston: Hester Prynne (character in The Scarlet Letter) fictionally returns; Danvers, Salem, Mass.: Witchcraft hysteria reigns; England: Anglicanism reestablished
1667: England: John Milton publishes Paradise Lost
1675: New England: Metacom begins King Philip's War
1676: February..Concord, Mass.: praying Indians forcibly expelled to concentration camp on Deer Island, Boston; New England: King Philip's War mostly ends with killing of Metacom; Boston: Great fire consumes most of city
1677: Massachusetts absorbs Maine
1678: England: John Bunyan publishes Pilgrim's Progress
1680: New Hampshire becomes royal colony separate from Massachusetts
1681: Boston: Baptists meet with General Court's permission; England: Dissenters to Anglicanism are persecuted
1684: Massachusetts charter revoked after complaints to king
1685: New England: Joseph Dudley named acting governor for Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire; England: James II succeeds Charles II
1686: Dominion of New England: Sir Edmund Andros becomes governor
1687: Dominion of New England: Connecticut and then New York and New Jersey are added; Andros antagonizes colonists by taxes, Anglicanism, and arbitrary rule
1688: ?"many, many years" after 1649..Boston: Hester Prynne of The Scarlet Letter fictionally dies and is fictionally buried next to Rev. Arthur Dimmesdale in King's Chapel burying ground; England: William and Mary take over in Glorious Revolution; James II flees; Salem, Mass.: Worshipful Major William Hathorne ordered by court to carry out severe whipping on Hester Craford for fornication and bearing an illegitimate child
1689: April 19...Concord, Boston: Andros imprisoned after rebellion; England: Declaration of Rights insures some religious freedom; Port Royal, Canada: William Phipps leads expedition to capture French fort
1691: Massachusetts: New royal charter including Plymouth and royal governor, Phipps
1692: Salem, Mass.: John Hathorne is a magistrate in witch trials
1693: Massachusetts: last person executed for witchcraft dies; Boston: Cotton Mather publishes Wonders of the Invisible World
1694: Plymouth, Mass.: law calls for exposure of letter A on gown for adultery
1700: U.S.: first Conestoga wagons built; Cambridge, Mass.: Increase Mather, Harvard president since 1685, forced out by liberals
1701: New Haven, Conn.: Yale University established
1702: New England: Cotton Mather (son of Increase and grandson of Richard) publishes Magnalia Christi Americana
1703: Boston: Samuel Sewall, a magistrate in previous witch trials, stands before congregation and confesses errors
1721: Boston: Cotton Mather and Dr. Zabdiel Boylston, opposed by Benjamin Franklin and his brother, advocate inoculation against smallpox epidemic
1727: Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard establishes Hollis chair in mathematics and natural philosophy
1734: Northampton, Mass.: Jonathan Edwards starts Great Awakening religious revival
1736: Feb. 29...England: Ann Lee (founder of Shakers) born
1740: New England: George Whitefield tours and revivalism spreads
1748: Bilston, England: John Wilkinson builds first blast furnace
1749: London: Henry Fielding publishes Tom Jones; Ball bearings first patented; U.S.: Benjamin Franklin invents lightning rod
1754: New England: Jonathan Edwards publishes Freedom of the Will
1758: New England: Jonathan Edwards dies
1760: Salem, Mass.: Surveyor Jonathan Pue dies
1773: Dec. 16...Boston: Tea Party dumps tea in harbor in tax protest
1775: Apr. 18...Boston-Lexington, Mass.: midnight ride of Charles Dawes and Paul Revere warn of Redcoats coming to destroy munitions of colonists; Apr. 19...Concord, Mass.: British repelled at North Bridge, retreat to Boston, Revolutionary War begins; May 10...Fort Ticonderoga, New York: Ethan Allen's irregular forces, with Benedict Arnold, capture fortress and guns are hauled to besiege British in Boston; May 19....Salem, Mass., 27 Union St.: Nathaniel Hathorne (Hawthorne's father) born
1776: July 4...Philadelphia: Declaration of Independence published
1784: Jan. 14...U.S.: Ratification of Treaty of Paris ends Revolutionary War
1791: Dec. 15...Washington, D.C.: Bill of Rights adopted
1793: Jan. 9...Philadelphia: first successful balloon flight, by Jean-Pierre-Francois Blanchard, witnessed by Washington; Feb. 12...Washington, D.C.: Fugitive Slave Law enacted by Congress
1794: U.S.: Benjamin Franklin publishes Autobiography; March 14...U.S.: Eli Whitney patents cotton gin; July-Nov....U.S.: Whisky Rebellion against federal taxes
1795: Feb. 13...North Carolina: first state university opens; May 19...London: James Boswell dies
1796: England: Edward Jenner discovers vaccine for smallpox; London: ballet dancers first perform with toe shoes
1797: June 24...N.J.: Charles Newbold patents cast iron plow
1798: Austria: Aloys Sonefelder invents lithography
1799: Salem, Mass.: Peabody Museum founded; Nov. 29..Amos Bronson Alcott born; Dec. 14...Virginia: George Washington dies
1800: April 2...Vienna: Beethoven performs 1st Piano Concerto and 1st Symphony; April 14..Washington, D.C.: Congress establishes library; Paris: first coffee percolator invented; March 20...Alessandro Volta publishes description of first battery
1803: May 25...Boston, Mass.: Ralph Waldo Emerson born
1804: May 14...St. Louis: Jefferson sends Lewis and Clark to explore Louisiana Purchase to the Pacific; July 4.... Salem, Mass., 27 Union St.: Nathaniel Hathorne, Jr., born to Nathaniel Hathorne and Elizabeth Clarke Manning Hathorne; U.S.: Alexander Hamilton killed by Aaron Burr in duel

Other chronologies online