History by Century

Siddhartha Gautama's teachings under the Bodhi Tree founded Buddhism — now 500 million followers. He rejected both extreme asceticism and luxury, proposing a 'Middle Way' that remains radical.

Cleisthenes introduced a system where all free male citizens voted directly on laws. The concept was so unprecedented it had no word in any other language — 'democracy' is Greek.

In 13 years, Alexander built the largest empire the world had yet seen — spreading Greek language and culture from Egypt to the borders of India. He was 32 when he died, his empire undefeated.

China's first emperor standardized script, currency, and measurements across a continent — creating a unified state that has lasted, in various forms, for 2,200 years.

Rome salted the earth of Carthage and sold its 50,000 survivors into slavery — eliminating its only rival in the western Mediterranean and beginning unchallenged Roman dominance.

23 senators stabbed Caesar on the Ides of March, fearing he would make himself king. Their act backfired — it ended the Republic they were trying to save and led directly to the Roman Empire.

Rome crushed the Jewish revolt and destroyed the Second Temple — the center of Jewish life. The diaspora that followed scattered Jewish communities across three continents for 2,000 years.

Under Emperor Trajan, Rome ruled from Scotland to Mesopotamia — 5 million square kilometers. One in five people alive on Earth was a Roman subject. It was the peak of ancient Western civilization.

The Edict of Milan transformed Christianity from a persecuted sect into the religion of the most powerful empire in the world — reshaping 2,000 years of Western history.

When the last emperor Romulus Augustulus was deposed by a Germanic chieftain, it ended 1,200 years of Roman rule in the West. Historians still debate whether Rome 'fell' or slowly transformed.

The Angel Gabriel's words to Muhammad in a cave near Mecca began a religion that would reach 2 billion followers. Within 100 years of his death, Islam had spread from Spain to Central Asia.

Charles Martel halted the Muslim army that had swept through Spain. Historians debate whether this battle truly 'saved' Christian Europe — but it marked the furthest Islamic military penetration into Western Europe.

The raid on Lindisfarne monastery announced a new force in European history. Vikings would go on to settle Iceland, Greenland, North America, and found the cities of Dublin, Kyiv, and Normandy.

Born into slavery, Temujin united the Mongol tribes and launched conquests that would kill 40 million people and create the largest land empire in history — connecting Europe and China for the first time.

The plague killed one-third of Europe's population in five years — upending feudalism, empowering survivors with higher wages, and accelerating social change that helped spark the Renaissance.

The Ottoman conquest ended the 1,100-year Byzantine Empire, cut off the Silk Road to Europe, and forced European powers to seek sea routes to Asia — directly triggering the Age of Exploration.

Columbus died believing he had reached Asia. His voyages triggered the Columbian Exchange — the largest transfer of plants, animals, and diseases in history, reshaping populations on every continent.

Luther's 95 Theses — nailed to a church door or perhaps just mailed — fractured Western Christianity. The religious wars that followed killed millions and reshaped the map of Europe.

Newton's laws of motion and universal gravitation explained how planets orbit, how tides work, and why objects fall — creating the framework for all of modern physics and engineering.

Two revolutions within 13 years overthrew monarchy and aristocracy as the default form of government, establishing democracy and human rights as ideals that would eventually spread worldwide.

Evolution by natural selection offered a scientific explanation for life's diversity without a creator — the most consequential idea in biology and one of the most contested in human history.

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand triggered a cascade of alliances into the first industrialized world war — 20 million dead, empires dissolved, and conditions set for an even deadlier sequel.

The Manhattan Project's weapons killed 200,000 people and ended WWII — but also began the nuclear age, in which human civilization acquired the ability to destroy itself for the first time.

Apollo 11 carried humanity off its home planet for the first time. Armstrong's 'one small step' was watched by 600 million people — a third of all humans alive — in the largest shared moment in television history.

The wall's fall symbolized the end of the Cold War that had defined global politics for 45 years. Within two years, the Soviet Union — which had split the atom, launched the first satellite, and threatened nuclear war — ceased to exist.

Nearly 3,000 deaths triggered two decades of global war on terror, mass surveillance, and seismic shifts in geopolitics, immigration, and civil liberties that continue reshaping the world today.