The sign Libra from the zodiac in the Hunterian Psalter, Glasgow University Library, MS Hunter 229 (U.3.2)

 . Historical Background . 
Woe to the faint of heart, for the historical record is not politically correct.
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TWENTY THIRD CENTURY B.C.
2200 B.C.   Nimrod, the great grandson of Noah, establishes the city of Babel near the Euphrates River, builds a tower, and enlarges his control into a kingdom. He also establishes the cities of Erech, Accad, Calah, and Nineveh.
TWENTY SECOND CENTURY B.C.
2100 B.C.   Epic of Gilgamesh is written during the Third Dynasty of Ur of the Neo-Sumerian Empire. 
NINETEENTH CENTURY B.C.
1866 B.C.  The Battle at the Dead Sea. Amraphel the king of Shinar, Arioch the king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer the king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goiim wage war to exact tribute from the rebellious Bera the king of Sodom, Birsha the king of Gomorrah, Shinab the king of Admah, and Shemeber the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Zoar. Lot and his household are captured. Abraham, Lot’s uncle, allies with the  Amorites and rescues Lot and his family. The king of Sodom and Abraham meet Melchizedek, the King of Salem. (In the Jewish tradition, Melchizedek is the aged Seth, the son of Noah. In the Christian tradition, Melchizedek is a priest according to an eternal order, without beginning or end, and a type of Jesus Christ as described in the New Testament).
1850 B.C.  Sodom and Gomorrah, cities along the Dead Sea made infamous for their sexual depravity - for being depraved beyond redemption - are destroyed by fire and brimstone.
1840 B.C.   Joseph is sold by his brothers to a slave caravan en route to Egypt. His brothers and all of his relatives come into Egypt, and their descendants will become enslaved after his death. In total, the Hebrews stay in Egypt for 430 years. Joseph marries the daughter of Potiphera, the priest of On where the sun god Ra is worshipped, and they have two children: Ephraim and Manasseh​.
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY B.C.
1792-1750 B.C.  Hammurabi rules as the sixth king of the First Babylonian Dynasty and issues 282 laws written on 12 tablets that describe compensatory and punitive damages for law breaking.
1780 B.C.  After the death of Joseph, who had risen to second in command of Egypt,  the families of the Hebrews become enslaved and put to hard labor in building the treasure cities of Pithom, Ramses, and, according to the Septuagint a third city, On.
FIFTEENTH CENTURY B.C.
1440 B.C.  After Moses has an encounter with God, he is tasked to lead the enslaved Hebrews out of Egypt.
1440 B.C.  The God of Israel gives the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai to Moses and to the children of Israel. The sapphire tablets are written in the Paleo Hebrew script.
1400 B.C.  Joshua leads the next generation of freed Hebrews in wars of conquest to displace the seven tribes that had descended from Ham's son Canaan - Amorites, Hittites, Perrizites, Canaanites, Girgashites, Hivites, and Jebusites - occupying the land that  God had promised to Abraham and his children. The sin of the these seven tribes had come to full measure - depraved beyond redemption - with incest, bestiality, and child sacrifice performed in the public worship of Moloch, the god of the underworld. 
THIRTEENTH CENTURY B.C.
1250-1025 B.C.  Judges rule the tribes of Israel.
1220 B.C.  The Stele of Pharaoh Merneptah at Karnak is the first historical record (outside of the Old Testament record) that makes mention of the Israelites. Merneptah states that he defeated the tent dwelling warriors on camels in a punishing war campaign into Canaan. 
1200-1150 B.C. Collapse of Late Bronze Age kingdoms - Hittites, Mycenaeans, Assyrians,  and the Minoans, or "the Sea Peoples," who settled among the people of Israel known as Philistines - believed to have been caused by climate change triggered by volcanic eruption(s) leading to draught, famine, population movements, warfare, and disruption of established trade routes. (This catastrophic dislocation as a result of volcanic eruption(s) could be the source of the legend of Atlantis). 
TWELFTH CENTURY B.C.
1194-1184 B.C.  Paris of Troy abducts Helen, the queen of Sparta, which triggers the Trojan War. Agamemnon leads the kings from the various Greek city states like Odysseus, the king of Ithaca and King Menelaus of Sparta to Troy to do battle. Achilles slays Hector, a prince of Troy, at the gates of that city. The Greeks leave Troy in flames and in ruins, and retrieve Helen.
1100 B.C.  Non intelligible ecstatic language lacking the subject-verb-object convention in human speech makes an appearance in the worship at pagan temples in Byblos. About 400 years later, Plato makes reference to the phenomena of divine possession, visions, and unintelligible utterances. Virgil and Ovid would later recount similar observations.
ELEVENTH CENTURY B.C.
1070 B.C.  Global trade from China to Egypt taking place along the Silk Road and the network of oasis cities, or rest stops, for merchants.
1025-1010 B.C.  Saul is anointed the first King of Israel.
1010-970 B.C.  King David, a warrior and conqueror, is anointed King of Israel. This king from the Iron Age period amidst an agrarian culture suffers from moral failure and the consequences that stem from that, yet pursues God with all of his heart. His psalms embrace perennial values as well as prophecies.
TENTH CENTURY B.C.
Solomon's Temple 
970 B.C.  Solomon, the son of king David, becomes king. He builds the Temple in Jerusalem. He hires Hiram king of Tyre, the Phoenician born from a man of Tyre and a woman from the tribe of Dan, to construct that Temple, which is completed in 960 B.C. Reputed to be the wisest man in the world, he then builds altars for all of the foreign gods of his many wives.
931 B.C.  After Solomon's death, Israel divides into two kingdoms with Judah in the south in control of Jerusalem and Israel in the north with Samaria as its chief city and place of worship.
926 B.C.  Shishak I, the pharaoh of Egypt, raids Jerusalem, plunders the Temple of Solomon of its treasures, returns to Egypt with the spoils, and records his exploits by having his mighty deeds inscribe onto the walls of the temple at Karnak near Luxor.
NINTH CENTURY B.C.
885–850 B.C. The infamous King of Israel Ahab marries Jezebel, a daughter of the King of Tyre, which marks this culture’s low point since the worship of Baal and child sacrifice take place. The prophet Edlijah appears. Their reign of error ends when Ahab dies in battle and Jezebel is pushed out of a window by her own servants. 
EIGHTH CENTURY B.C.
786–746  B.C.  During the reign of Jeroboam II of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, the prophet Jonah goes to the Assyrian capital of Nineveh to preach repentance and warns of that city’s destruction.
776 B.C.  The first Olympic Games are held among the Greeks. This competitive event continues for just over 1,000 years, but ends when  Roman Emperor Theodosius I bans the Olympic Games since they are dedicated to the god Zeus.
770 B.C.  During the Zhou Dynasty and warring states period, the Chinese begin construction of border walls.
753 B.C. The City of Rome is founded. According to one legend, the brothers Romulus and Remus established the city. According to another, a survivor of the Trojan War, Aeneas, was the forefather of Romulus and Remus.
750 B.C. Homer produces the classic epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey.
732 B.C.  The Israelites adopt Aramaic as their native language after their capital city Samaria is captured and they are exiled from Bashan and Gilead under the Assyrian warrior king Tiglath-Pileser III, who also leaves the city of Damascus in complete ruins. 
722 B.C.  Sennacherib (Sargon II), the king of Assyria, invades the Northern Kingdom of Israel and scatters the ten tribes. Sargon II resettles just over 27,000 Israelites into the Khabur region (near what is now Turkey and Iraq), into the land of the Medes in Ecbatana and Rages (north eastern Iran), and into Nineveh the capital of of the Assyrian Empire. In their place, Sargon II plants a people in Samaria known as the Cuthim, who convert to Judaism and come to be known as the Samaritans.
SEVENTH CENTURY B.C.
612 B.C.  Nineveh is destroyed as prophesied by Nahum the prophet of Israel, and the Neo-Assyrian Empire​ ends. The Medes, Chaldeans, renegade Assyrians and Babylonians, and Scythians and Cimmerians lay siege to the city for three months, then sack and destroy the city at the end of a  twelve year war between Babylon and Assyria and civil wars among subjugated peoples.
606 B.C.  Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, invades Jerusalem, and Jehoiakim, the king of Judah, is permitted to stay on the throne. Daniel and others are taken to Babylon.
SIXTH CENTURY B.C.
598 B.C.  Nebuchadnezzar invades Jerusalem a second time. Ezekiel is taken captive.
594 B.C.  Solon initiates democracy among the Greeks.
586 B.C.  Nebuchadnezzar invades Jerusalem a third time and devastates the city.
549-330  B.C. First Zoroastrian culture the Achaemenid Empire spans across Asia Minor, the entire Middle East, northern Egypt, Iraq, and Persia.
547 B.C.  Cyrus the Great of Persia conquers the Greeks of Ionia. 
539 B.C.  The Fall of Babylon. Belshazzar, the reckless son of Nebuchadnezzar, dies the night that Cyrus the Mede takes the city of Babylon for the Achaemenid, or First Persian, Empire.
Second Temple
538 B.C.  The Persian king Cyrus -  Darius the Mede - inherits rulership of an empire of 127 countries spanning from India in the East to Ethiopia and North Africa in the south to Asia Minor in the West. He is the son of Esther and Ahasuerus, allows the exiled Jews to return, and encourages them to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem. Upon their return, the Jews bring with them the classical Hebrew script and mercantile culture.
531 B.C.  Lao Tzu dies. In his lifetime he writes the Tao Te Ching and develops the philosophy of Taoism, which  both direct the culture of the Far East.
520 B.C.  Zerubbabel becomes governor of the Province of Judah, and Joshua becomes the High Priest of the rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem.
FIFTH CENTURY B.C.
492–490 B.C.  First Greco-Persian War. Persian king Darius I invades the Greek mainland of city states.
490 B.C. Battle of Marathon. Persian king Darius I wars with Athenian general Militates, and the Greeks prevail. Greek runners with news of the battle run 25 miles from the battlefield to Athens. 
480–479 B.C.  Second Greco-Persian War. Persian king Xerxes I, the son of Darius I, invades the Greek mainland of city states.
483 B.C.  Siddhārtha Gautama, the Buddha, dies. In his lifetime he synthesizes a set of observations about the nature of life and the means to escape suffering. He proposes the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path. Buddhism spreads in India by a disciple named Ashoka.
480 B.C.  Battle of Thermopylae, fought in Greece. King Xerxes I of Persia with 300,000 soldiers war against King Leonidas of Sparta. Leonidas sends away his army when he realizes he is outnumbered, but stays with 300 Spartans to fight to the death. The Persians then burn the Acropolis in Athens.
479 B.C. Confucius of the Shandong province of China dies. In his lifetime he formulates numerous keen observation of life that are later recorded in the Analects, which directs the culture of the Far East.
475 B.C.  The Jewish Queen of Persia, Esther, reveals her identity to King Xerxes I, pleads for her fellow Jews, and marginalizes Haman as an evil doer, who along with his sons are hanged.
460 B.C.  Anarchy breaks out in Judea, Xerxes' successor Persian King Artaxerxes I sends Ezra to restore order.
458 B.C.  Ezra returns to Jerusalem during the seventh year of the reign of Artaxerxes I.
450 B.C.  Pericles hires the sculptor Pheidias to take charge of the designs of the architects Iktinos, Kalikrates, and Mnesikles for the construction of the Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens.
444 B.C.  Nehemiah returns to Jerusalem during the twentieth year of the reign of Artaxerxes I.
440 B.C.  Herodotus, the father of history, writes the Histories in which he describes a region called Palaistinê - the land of the Philistines, as one of the districts of Syria that includes the mountains of Judea and the Jordan Valley.
431 B.C.  The Peloponnesian War. Athens and Sparta at war. Plague strikes Athens killing one third of its population. Democracy gives way to Spartan tyrants, who seize control of the city in 404 B.C.
FOURTH CENTURY B.C.
399 B.C.  Socrates is charged with leading the youth astray by teaching impiety towards the gods, put on trial, and condemned to death in Athens. 
335 B.C.  Aristotle establishes the Lyceum in Athens.
336-323 B.C.  Alexander the Great, the son of king Philip II and queen Olympia of Macedon, and the student of Aristotle, who promotes the Hellenization of the world, unites Greece, reestablishes the Corinthian League, and quickly builds an empire from Persia, Babylon, and Egypt, across the Mediterranean and Asia Minor to the edge of India.  Alexander the Great leads an army of the Hellenic League and becomes the King of Babylon, King of Asia, King of the Four Quarters of the World. At the age of 32, Alexander dies in Babylon at the palace of Nebuchadnezzar II.  Upon his death, Alexander's kingdom is divided among four of his generals: Cassander takes Macedonia and Greece in the West. Lysimachus takes Thrace and Asia Minor in the North. Seleuceus takes Babylon, Syria, and the area bordering India in the East. Ptolemy takes Egypt, Libya, Arabia, and Palestine in the South.
THIRD CENTURY B.C.
281–246 B.C.  The head librarian of the Library at Alexandira, Demetrios of Phaleron, requests Ptolemy II Philadelphus to secure a translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek for the library’s vast collection. Seventy two translators from the twelve tribes of Israel participate in producing what comes to be known as the Septuagint, or LXX. This Greek language Bible is intended for the Hellenized Jewish community living in Alexandria and those desirous of learning more about the religion of the Israelites. The Septuagint, moreover, becomes the bedrock for the early church and especially the Eastern Greek Orthodox Church.
221 B.C.  Emperor Qin Shi Huang of the Qin Dynasty in China conceives of building a Great Wall to connect with the existing border walls in the north to protect his subjects and territories from raiding barbarians.
220 B.C. - 227 A.D.  Second Zoroastrian culture the Arsacid Empire, also know as the Parthians, which stretches from the eastern portion of Asia Minor to India.
SECOND CENTURY B.C.
168 B.C.  The Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes erects a statue of Zeus and  sacrifices a pig on the altar within the Temple in Jerusalem, which is the  abomination that causes desolation - a theme in Bible prophecy.
167 to 160 B.C. The Jews, led by the Maccabees, rebel against the Seleucid kings. The Maccabean Revolt is the result of a cultural civil war that takes place between the Hellenized Jews and traditional Jews with Judah Maccabee defeating the Seleucid army and apostate Jews, who had abandoned their culture and traditions. Mattathias the Hasmonean kills a soldier, who demanded a ritual sacrifice to a pagan deity and kills a Hellenized Jew for his sacrilege. Mattathias and his five sons seclude themselves. After their father’s death, Judah Maccabee and his armies of dissidents engage in guerrilla warfare directed against Hellenized Jews and pagan altars. After seven battles, Judah Maccabee cleanses the Temple in Jerusalem and his brother Jonathan Maccabee becomes the high priest. The cleansing and rededication of the Temple gives birth to the Festival of Hanukkah.
146 B.C.  The Romans invade Greece, sack Corinth, dissolve the Achaean league, and rule from this point on.
140-37 B.C.  The Hasmonean Dynasty is established by Simon Maccabaeus - the brother of Judah Maccabee, and it rules Judea semi-independent of the Seleucids until 110 B.C. when it becomes fully independent, expands, and becomes the Hasmonean Kingdom. This last autonomous Jewish kingdom ends when Hyrcanus II and his brother Aristobulus II, who rival for power as real power  is consolidated into the hands of the adviser Antipater the Idumaean (the Edomite), who invites the Romans to participate in governmental administration. 
130 B.C.  Johanan Hyrcanus, a Maccabean leader and Jewish High Priest among the Hasmoneans, forces the conversion of Idumea, the Edomites, to Judaism.
FIRST CENTURY B.C.
86 B.C.  The Romans led by the general Lucius Cornelius Sulla sack Athens.
63 B.C.   Gaius Pompeius Magnus, better known as Pompey, conquers Judea during the late stage of the Roman Republic. The Roman conquest of Judea occurs amidst the struggle for succession among the Hasmoneans, who had ruled as Jewish High Priest kings. Antipater, the father of Herod the Great, supports Pompey and thus derives Roman citizenship and the office of procurator of Judea in 47 B.C. As a result of the political maneuvering of Antipater, Judea loses its autonomy and becomes a client state of Rome.
63 B.C.  A group of marginalized Levites known as Zadokites establish an apocalyptic and monastic cult of mendicant celibates known as the Essenes. They write The War Scroll, which outlines a series of future wars between the sons of light made up of the tribes of Levi, Judah, and Benjamin and the sons of darkness made up of the Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites, Amalekites, Philistines, and the people of Kittim (Babylon, Assyria, and Persia).  The sons of darkness are led by Belial (another name for the devil), which are those who profit off of destruction. Yet, when the final battle occurs, the sons of darkness will be no more.
59-53 B.C.  The First Triumvirate during the late Roman Republic is made up of Julius Caesar, Pompey the Great, and Marcus Licinius Crassus.
58–50 B.C.  Gallic Wars. While proconsul of Cisalpine Gaul, Transalpine Gaul, and Illyricum, Julius Caesar wages a seven year campaign against the Celtic tribes in Gaul, Germania, and the island of Britannia and puts down their uprisings and attempts at migration into the Roman Empire. Julius Caesar then writes Commentarii de Bello Gallico, or Commentaries on the Gallic War.
55-54 B.C.   Julius Caesar invades Britannia and reaches south Hertfordshire where he enters into peace treaty with some local Celtic tribes. Caesar installs the Roman friendly Mandubracius as a king of the Celtic tribe known as the Trinovantes. 
52 B.C.   Julius Caesar's legions conquer the holdings of the tribe of Parissi and establish Lutetia, which later comes to be known as the Isle de Paris, or Paris.
49-45 B.C.  Great Roman Civil War. This is a political and military struggle between Julius Caesar and Pompey. Battles are fought in Italy, Greece, Illyria, north Africa, Egypt, and Hispanic. Caesar defeats Pompey in the Battle of Munda and becomes Dictator perpetuo.
47 B.C.   Julius Caesar engages in a quick five day war with King Pharnaces II of Kingdom of Pontus at the Battle of Zela during the Great Roman Civil War. In his report to the Roman Senate he writes the immortal phrase, Veni, vidi, vici.
47 B.C.   Antipater appoints his son Herod the Great to be governor of Galilee.
44 B.C.   Julius Caesar is assassinated. Sixty Roman Senators had conspired to have Caesar, the Dictator perpetual, assassinated. Servilius Casca, Cassius Longinus, Decimus Brutus, Marcus Brutus, and Minucius were among those who plunged their knives into Julius Caesar after he entered the Senate chamber. When he died, Julius Caesar lay at the feet of the statue of his former rival Pompey.  Rome then succumbed to civil war. 
40 B.C.   The Parthians invade Palestine, civil war erupts, Herod the Great flees to Petra, then Egypt, and then to Rome where he secures more power as well as an escort back to Jerusalem with two legions.
37 B.C.  Mark Antony combines his military forces with that of Cleopatra, the Queen of Egypt, in his campaign against the Parthians.  Mark Antony conquers Petra, takes it from the Nabataeans, and then gives the city to Cleopatra as a token of his affection for her.
37 B.C.  The Roman Senate appoints the Edomite, Herod the Great, as King of the Jews. He returns to Judea with two Roman legions, VI Ferrata and III Gallica, which aid in reestablishing his power.  He raises the level of prosperity among the Jews and builds aqueducts, theaters, fortresses, a port city, and public buildings.  He also serves as president of the Olympic Games at the disapproval of the Pharisees.
31 B.C.   Rome’s Second Triumvirate of Octavian, Lepidus and Mark Antony fails. Mark Antony and Cleopatra’s naval fleet engages Octavian’s naval fleet lead by Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa in the Battle of Actium on the Ionian Sea at Actium in Greece. Mark Antony and Cleopatra commit suicide in 30 B.C. 
27 B.C.   Octavian is hailed as Augustus by the Roman Senate. Augustus Caesar, the first Roman Emperor, rules the empire from 27 B.C until 14 A.D. The Roman Empire continues for another 500 years in the West and 1500 years more in the East. 
27 B.C.  Marcus Agrippa, a Roman consul and architect, commissions the construction of the Pantheon in Rome during the reign of Emperor  Augustus Caesar. The temple dedicated to all the gods is rebuilt on a larger scale under the reign of Emperor Hadrian and rededicated in 126 A.D.
Herod's Temple
20 B.C. Herod the Great rebuilds the Temple in Jerusalem by having 1,000 Levites and Cohens, priests working as stone masons, reconstruct a grander temple in one and half years. He also enlarges the courts,  grounds, and out building of the Temple Mount, which takes eighty years to complete.
6 B.C.  During the governorship of Sulpicius Quirinius of Syria and the reign of Herod, Caesar Augustus decrees that a census take place in order to levy a five percent inheritance tax upon the citizens and subjects of the Roman Empire in order to pay for the military. Joseph and Mary return to Bethlehem in compliance with Roman law and unwittingly fulfill the prophecies in the Hebrew scriptures. A brilliant light appears in the heavens - perhaps Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars in conjunction, which moves with each passing night. The magi Balthasar of Arabia, Melchior of Persia, and Gaspar of India come with their entourage and gifts to pay homage to the prophesied and awaited birth of the rightful King of the Jews - Jesus Christ.
FIRST CENTURY A.D.
9   The Roman army led by Publius Quinctilius Varus engages Germanic tribes led by Arminius in the Battle of Teutoburg Forest in Lower Saxony resulting in a victory for the Germanic tribes. Varus commits suicide and his top commanders commit suicide as well rather than be captured. Approximately ten percent of Rome’s imperial army is destroyed in this battle. Rome’s expansion into the lands of the Germanic tribes end due to the heavy cost of stationing an army north of the Rhine River.
​19  Tiberius expels the Jews from Rome.
25-28  Jesus Christ engages in a public ministry and teaches from synagogue to synagogue in Galilee, Judaea, and Samaria concerning the kingdom of God. He gathers disciples as well as an inner circle of twelve. In the concluding days, Jesus Christ makes a triumphal entry into Jerusalem with the people shouting, Hosanna to the son of David! He then cleanses the Temple grounds of merchants and over turns the money tables, which brings tensions to a head. 
28  The apostle Judas Iscariot commits suicide after betraying Jesus Christ for thirty pieces of silver. Judas is buried in the Valley of Hinom outside of Jerusalem.
28 The religious leaders of Jerusalem publicly accuse Jesus Christ of blasphemy, sorcery, and breaking the commandment of Moses. They then plead with Herod that Jesus Christ is a threat to his power and to Rome’s since Jesus Christ claims to be king of the Jews. Jesus Christ is tried in the courts of both Herod, the king of the Jews, and Pontius Pilate, the prefect of the Roman province of Judea under Emperor Tiberius. Though they found no fault in Jesus Christ, the mob of Jews whipped up by their religious leaders demand crucifixion.
40  Philo of Alexandria, a Hellenized Jew, develops a system of understanding the Bible that reconciles Jewish thought with Greek philosophy. He lays the philosophical and theological foundations for Christianty’s allegorical approach to interpreting the Bible. 
NOTE: Four streams of Christianty begin to emerge based on language, culture, and location.  These are Jewish, Aramic, Greek, and Latin with the locus in their major cities being Jerusalem, Damascus, Constantinople, and Rome. Only Rome and Latin Christianity will remain standing as a center of the faith over the long term.
40  Roman Emperor Gaius Caligula orders a statue of him erected on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem in order to promote the cult of the emperor. Caligula appoints Publius Petronius, the governor of Syria, along with two Roman Legions to accomplish the task. Jews engage in protests and plead with Petronius to not carry out the orders of Caligula. Petronius delays. Caligula along with his wife and daughter are assassinated by several officers within the Praetorian Guard led by Cassius Chaerea.  Agrippa then reverses the order to erect the statue. The  Praetorian Guard then pushes Claudius forward as the new emperor.
41  Emperor Claudius forbids Jews in Rome to meet due to disorders arising out of disputes over religion.
43  Emperor Claudius directs his generals Aulus Plautus and Titus Flavius Vespasian to lead four Roman legions of 40,000 soldiers to cross the English Channel, and to invade and subjugate the Celts and Druids on the island of Britannia.  Vespasian leads Legio II Augusta.  Gnaeus Hosidius Geta leads Legio IX Hispana. The other two legions are Legio XIV Gemina and Legio XX Valeria Victoria. Emperor Claudius arrives after the  Battle of the Medway riding an elephant with the Praetorian Guard as an escort. In that battle, Togodumnus and Caratacus lead the Celts and Druids in defense of their island against Plautius, Galba, Sabinus, Geta, and Vespasian.  Plautius becomes the first Roman governor of Britannia. It will take 50 years to subjugate the majority of the inhabitants.
44  The apostle James, son of Zebedee, is beheaded during the reign of the newly appointed governor of Judea, Herod Agrippa.
49  Claudius expels the Jews from Rome.
50   Romans establish the city of London in Britain.
54  The apostle Philip preaches in Carthage and Phrygia. A wife of a Roman proconsul converts, and the proconsul has Philip beaten, imprisoned, and crucified in Heliopolis in Egypt.
56  The Apostle Paul writes a letter, an epistle, to the church in Rome.
60   Romans build baths and a temple in the valley of the River Avon on the island of Britain. Today, it is known as Bath located at the southern part of the Cotswolds.
62   In southern Italy 90 mils south of Rome, a severe earthquake leaves widespread destruction in Pompeii and around the Bay of Naples.
64   Another earthquake hits Naples while Nero is in a debut performance in a public theatre as recorded by Tacitus in Annales. 
Apostolic Fathers, Persecutions, and Apologists
64   A great fire engulfs ten of the fourteen quarters of Rome for six days and seven nights. The citizens of Rome blame the Emperor Nero. Emperor Nero blames the Christians, arrests them, and tortures them to death in the arenas for the amusement of the onlookers. The numerical value, the gematria, of the name Neron Caesar,  is 666. 
65–80 The Didache, or The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, is produced and reflects what the Apostles taught the first generation of those, who heard the Gospel.
66  The apostle Simon Peter is crucified upside down in Rome during the persecutions under the reign of Nero.
66  The apostle Paul preaches across the Roman Empire, among the Greeks and Romans, and is then imprisoned and beheaded in Rome.
​67  Roman senator and general Cestius Gallus surrounds Jerusalem with 30,000 men made up of the XII Fulminate Legion, six supporting cohorts, four cavalry divisions, and additional men of war provided by Agrippa II.  Gallus does not lay siege upon nor attack the city of Jerusalem. He instead withdraws, and Jewish rebels attack his army in retreat. This sign of Jerusalem surrounded by armies that Jesus Christ spoke of triggered the faithful to leave, and thus deliver themselves from the wrath to come in 70 AD.
69  The apostle Andrew preaches in Sythia - the land of cannibals, Greece, Asia Minor, and Thrace. He is tied to a cross and left to die in Patrae in Achaea among the Greeks.
First Roman-Jewish War: The Siege of Jerusalem 
70   Nazarenes, Jewish converts of the Apostles and followers of Jesus Christ, leave Jerusalem prior to the Jewish rebellion and destruction of the Temple, because they believed the prophecy of Jesus Christ about armies surrounding Jerusalem and the abomination of desolation.
70   Amidst growing Jewish protests and riots against taxation, Roman governor Gessius Florus plunders the Temple in Jerusalem of its assets. Jewish rebels over run the city. Client King  Agrippa II flees Jerusalem. Elsewhere, Jews complain to the Romans about Greeks engaged in the ritual sacrifice of birds near a synagogue in Caesarea. Cestius Gallus brings in the Twelfth Legion to put down the rebellion and to restore law and order. Jewish rebels ambush the Roman legion, kill 6,000 troops, and take the Roman eagle at the Battle of Beth Horon. Emperor Nero and the senate appoint Vespasian, a future Emperor, to take four Legions each with 6,000 soldiers plus auxiliaries - a total of 50,000 Roman soldiers - into Palestinia to crush the rebellion. Vespasian is recalled in order to become emperor. The son of Vespasian and future Emperor Titus along with Tiberius Julius Alexander lead the Roman army to put down the ongoing rebellion of Jews in Jerusalem. The Temple in Jerusalem is burned, stones are thrown down, and the city is left in ruins. Across Palestinia, 980 towns are destroyed.  Josephus later writes that 1.1 million non-combatants die in Jerusalem. Many are just pilgrims in the wrong place at the wrong time, and 97,000 others are taken away as slaves. In the aftermath, the Romans plow salt in the fields leaving the land barren and desolate.
70  The Hebrew Old Testament is translated into its sister language Aramaic by Jewish Christians in Edessa and revised in Antioch in the 200s to conform to the Greek Septuagint. The Aramaic Bible is written in the simple language, known as the Peshitta, and used by the Church of the East. The Pashitta, along with the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, becomes one of the four early transmission lines of translations of the Bible. The Old Testament Peshitta contains the Deuterocanonical books as well as 1 Esdras, 3 Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, 2 Baruch, and Psalm 151 . More than 250 copies of the Peshitta, the Bible in Aramaic, survive.
​71   Romans establish the city of York in Britain as military headquarters in the north
72  The apostle Thaddaeus, also known as Jude,  preaches in Armenia, Syria, and Persia, and is crucified in Edessa.
73   The Siege of Masada takes place in the final phase of the First Roman-Jewish War with 960 Jewish rebels lead by Eleazar ben Ya'ir holding out to fight a losing fight against the Roman tenth legion sent by Titus. The Roman governor of Judaea, Lucius Flavius Silva, leads that Roman legion, builds a ramp to the fortified  hill top in the desert, and the Jews end their rebellion by committing suicide.
74  Simon the Canaanite,the Zealot, preaches in Mauritania on the west coast of Africa, and then in Roman Britain where he is crucified. 
75  Joseph ben Matityahu, who is better known as Titus Flavius Josephus, writes The Jewish War and in the year 94 he writes Antiquities of the Jews. Josephus had fought in the First Roman-Jewish War and chronicled the events of the era.
79   Minor earthquakes rumble for four days near the 6,500 foot high Mount Vesuvius, which then erupts and produces a cloud of ash 10 miles high over an 18 hour period. Debris falls from the sky onto the nearby city of Pompeii and about 2,000 people escape. On the western side of Mount Vesuvius, the volcano unleashes deadly gas and hot ash onto the residents of Herculaneum. A second blast buries about 2,000 residents of Pompeii in ash. Pliny the Elder takes a Roman fleet of ships across the Bay of Naples from Misenum to Stabiae, but dies after inhaling toxic gas when he gets on shore. When its over, Pompeii is left buried in ash and Herculaneum is left buried in mud. The erotic imagery throughout the remains of Pompeii  suggests that the city catered to a sexualized culture.
90   Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai, with permission from the Romans, establishes a yeshiva, and holds the Council of Jamnia, the birthplace for what comes to be rabbinic and Talmudic Judaism. Here ben Zakkai and others define the canon of the Hebrew Bible, reject the Greek Septuagint, and place a curse on Jewish converts to Christianity. 
99   Pope Clement I, the Bishop of Rome, writes a letter of reproof to the church at Corinth. Clement was a direct understudy of the Apostle Paul. Clement’s letter to the Corinthians is not admitted into the canon of the New Testament, but it is widely read. The Roman Rite is only practiced in the city of Rome during this period.​
SECOND CENTURY A.D.
100  The apostle John writes the Gospel of John, three epistles to the churches, and the Book of Revelation, which includes the letters to the seven churches of Asia Minor, and dies of natural causes while in exile on the Isle of Patmos. His writings emphasize the divinity of Jesus Christ and also serve to denounce every heresy that existed at the time to undermine the Gospel.
​106  The belief in transmutation, which later comes to be known as transubstantiation - that the eucharist and the wine offered in the Mass become the body and blood of Jesus Christ - is clearly articulated by Ignatius of Antioch in a letter to the Romans. In 150, Justin Martyr will reiterate identical beliefs concerning the eucharist and the wine, which were held by the early Christians.
Second Roman-Jewish War: Kitos War
115  Jews living in Cyrene (Libya), Cyprus, Babylonia, and Egypt engage in widespread rebellions and the slaughter of thousands of Roman citizens across the empire and stationed garrisons in the wake of Emperor Trajan’s war with the Parthian Empire when Osroes I of Parthia deposed Tiridates, the king of Armenia. The Roman general Lusius Quietus methodically defeats the rebellions and is made governor of Judea.
117 EmperorTrajan conquers the region of Mesopotamia thus marking the apex of Roman rule in the world. 
122  Roman Emperor Hadrian visits Britannia, then builds a 73 mile long wall over six years spanning the northern section of the island from New Castle on the North Sea on the east coast to Carlisle on the Irish Sea on the west coast. Three Roman Legions - II Augusta, VI Victoria, and XX Valeria Victrix -  erect the wall to separate the troublesome barbarians in the north from the Romans south of the wall. When completed, 10,000 soldiers are stationed on the wall in fortified mile castles.   
Third Roman-Jewish War:  The Bar Kokhba Rebellion
135   The Bar Kokhba Rebellion is lead by Simon Bar Kochba. The Jewish rebellion is a continuation of the religious and political tensions from the First Roman-Jewish War that resulted in the siege of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple. The Romans construct Aelia Capitolina over the ruins of Jerusalem and a temple of Jupiter on the Temple Mount. Bar Kokhba presents himself to the Jews as a prince and messiah to bring about deliverance and redemption. In response to a small independent state established by the Jews, Roman Emperor Hadrian assembles six legions under the command of General Sextus Julius Severus. The Romans crush the rebellion, 580,000 Jews die, and 50 towns and 985 villages are leveled to the ground.
135   The Romans reorganize the middle eastern province of Roman Syria and Roman Judaea to produce Syria Palestina after the Bar Kokhba Rebellion.
135  Ebionites, from the plural form in Hebrew Ebionim, are the “poor ones,” Jews who believe in Jesus Christ, but not the divinity of Jesus. They reject the writings of Paul. They become persecuted and marginalized after the Bar Kochba Rebellion by both Jews, who reject Jesus as the Messiah of Israel, and Christians, who hold to orthodox teachings.
135   Justin Martyr charges the Jews with calumnies against Christians and blasphemies against God in Dialogue With Trypho (the Jew). The dialogue is set in Ephesus after Trypho fled Jerusalem in the aftermath of the failed rebellion against Rome led by Simon bar Kokhba.
135  Montanus, and his two female companions Priscilla and Maximilla, proclaim a new movement of the Holy Spirit evidenced by ecstatic visions and new revelations of the impending millennium near the town of  Ardabau in Asia Minor.  Believed to be a former priest of Apollo or Cybele the great mother goddess of Phrygia, the teachings and practices of Montanus and his followers, or Montanism, are quickly deemed to be “strange and impious.”
140   The opening lines to the Apostle's Creed "I believe in one God, Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth" is believed to have been formulated as the orthodox and universal response to refute the dualistic teachings of Marcion of Sinope. Among many of Marcion's heretical teachings is the assertion that the deity of the Old Testament and the deity of the New Testament are not the same.
144   Marcion of Sinope is excommunicated from the Church in Rome by his father, the bishop, for rejecting the orthodox doctrine of the deity of Jesus Christ. He held that the incarnation of Jesus was only in appearance and not in the physical form of human beings. He also taught that the teachings of Jesus were out of step with the actions of the God of the Old Testament. He is the first on record to have published a fixed New Testament canon, but with passages that conflicted with his views edited out. See the Gospel of Marcion.  Marcion's gnostic views, Marcionism,  continue in the West for 300 years and serve as the reasons for the Church's formulation of orthodox doctrines and a fixed New Testament canon.
150   Valentinus teaches gnosticism, which spreads across the Roman Empire. This heretical belief system identifies the creator God of the Old Testament as  the imperfect maker of the world of matter. Knowledge of the source of creation, not faith, leads to salvation, or deliverance according to Valentinus. His teachings spread across Rome, Egypt, Asia Minor, Syria, and northwestern Africa. Valentinus is believed to have written the Gospel of Truth, which is one of the  texts from the New Testament apocrypha in the Nag Hammadi library.
150   Justin the Martyr makes reference to the earliest known Christian hymn "O Gladsome Light," which is sung at Vespers. The hymns that develop in the Greek Orthodox Church are rooted in the eight modes of music from the ancient Greeks, and further divided into three further modes: Enharmonic, Chromatic and Diatonic.
150  Tatian, a disciple of Justin Martyr, produces the Diatessaron, which is a single Gospel book made up of the four Gospel accounts harmonized into one coherent narrative of the life and death of Jesus Christ. The Diatessaron, which is written in Aramaic, is used in some of the Churches in the East for about 200 years.
155   Justin Martyr defends and explains the Christian faith to the  Emperor Antoninus Pius and the Roman senate in the First Apology by arguing that the best and noblest ideas of the great scholars and philosophers of the Greco-Roman world had the seeds of the Christian faith. In the Second Apology written during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, he explains and defends Christian belief and worship. Justin Martyr and his disciples are beheaded in 165.
177   Greek philosopher Celsus attacks the Christian faith with allegations that Jesus was a sorcerer and not born of a virgin, but was the son of a Roman soldier named Pantera. The same calumnies and blasphemies are repeated in the Talmud Tosefta Hullin 2:22f. 
177   The Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia, Apollinarius, presides over a synod which condemns the new prophecies of those, who follow the teachings and practices of Montanus, Priscilla, and Maximilla.
180   The first historical reference to a Latin translation of the Bible appears in the Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs. The Old Latin Bible exists in three classes based on usage by location: African, European, and Italian.
185   Irenaeus  of Lyon writes Adversus Haereses, which in English is Against Heresies, where he insists on just four gospel accounts be used. In this work he denounces Valentines and the gnosticism he taught, and which had spread into Europe. Earlier in life Irenaeus  lived in Smyrna and had heard the preaching Polycarp, who was a direct understudy of the Apostle John. Irenaeus advocates for a faith that is straight thinking, i.e., orthodox, and universal, i.e., catholic.
190-198  Theodotus of Byzantium becomes a prominent promoter of the heretical belief that Jesus was adopted by God. Pope Victor condemns the doctrine of adoptionism as heresy.
200  The three tiers of hierarchy in the church becomes normative among the Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches with bishops, priests, and deacons as the administrators of church government. 
220   The Later Eastern Han Dynasty extends the Great Wall of China along the border with the Mongolians. As a result, Huns turn their attacks westward, which causes tribes in Central Asia along their path to also push west.
220   Pope Callixtus I deems the priest Sabellius a heretic due to his rejection of the orthodox definition of the trinity and his assertion that God is instead expressed in three different modes, and then excommunicates him from the church.
220   Hippolytus of Rome, a disciple of Irenaeus, writes Refutation of all Heresies where he identifies at least 33 different gnostic belief systems and attributes several of their sources to Simon the Magician from Samaria, Pythagoras from Greece, and the Brahmins from India.  
240   Origen, the first in depth theologian of the Christian faith, produces the Hexapla, a Hebrew and Greek language Bible with six side by side translations.
240   Cubricus of Persia journeys from Babylonia to India, and develops an eclectic faith system that is dualistic and gnostic. Hi parents were Elcesaites, a sect of Gnostic Ebionites, whose beliefs were a mix of Pantheism, Persian dualism, Judaism, and Christianity all mixed together. He changes his name to Mani and presents himself as an apostle of Jesus Christ. His beliefs, known as Manichean and Manichaeism, quickly spread from Persia to Europe, Central Asia, and China.
275   Bahram I of the Sassanid Empire in Persia has Mani put to death during a period of Zoroastrian revival.
280   The teachings of Mani, or Manichaeanism, reach Rome through the Manichean apostle Psattiq. 
291   Bahram II of the Sassanid Empire in Persia kills Mani’s apostle Sisin and slaughters many of Mani’s followers. 
296   Roman Emperor Diocletian issues a decree of death against the Manichaeans.
300–325  Codex Vaticanus is produced and is the oldest and almost complete manuscript of the Septuagint. See Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Vat. gr. 1209.
303   Emperor Diocletian persecutes Christians over a ten period between 303 and 312 after consulting the Oracle of Delphi, who warns that the Christians are the enemies of the gods.  Priests are persecuted and persuaded to renounce their faith under penalty of death, and their scriptures are destroyed. Felix, the bishop of Aptunga, turns over copies of the Bible to the Romans, who have them burned. Many Christians in North Africa are put to death while others renounce their face amidst the persecutions.
304   The Roman Empire issues an edict requiring the burning of incense to the gods of the empire including the emperor.
305   Antony of Egypt, after selling all he had and becoming a recluse, becomes the head of a monastic group devoted to communal singing, worship, prayer, study of Scripture, and manual labor under.
311   Roman emperor Galerius issues the Edict of Toleration, which officially ends the persecution of Christians initiated under Diocletian.
311   Arius, a priest in Alexandria, Egypt, promotes a schismatic understanding of the nature of Jesus Christ and is therefore deemed a heretic. His unorthodox doctrine on the nature of Christ comes to be known as Arianism or the Arian heresy.
311  Caecilian is elected Bishop of Carthage. Many protest noting his lapse of faith during the persecutions of Diocletian. About 70 bishops form a synod in North Africa and declares the consecration of the bishop Caecilian of Carthage to be invalid. The basis for this decision rests in the schismatic teachings of Donatus and the fact that Felix, the bishop of Aptunga, had participated in the recent consecration of Caecilian as a new bishop of Carthage. The opposing party elects Majorinus as the Bishop of Carthage. This leads to a split in the church of North Africa that lasts until the Islamic conquest.
312   Manichaean monasteries are established in Rome during the papacy of Miltiades, and the belief system spreads across the Empire between 300 and 500.
Constantine the Great
312   Constantine has a vision of a cross of light above the sun with the words, “In this sign conquer.” After the Battle of the Melvin Bridge which crosses the Tiber River in Rome, Constantine becomes the emperor of the West in the final series of civil wars of the tetrarchy. Maxentius loses his seat of power in Rome and the locus of power shifts to the East.
313   Emperor Constantine issues the Edict of Milan, which grants religious tolerance that extends to  Christians.
314   The Synod of Arles takes place in southern Roman controlled Gaul and condemns the practices of rebaptism performed by Donatus and his followers.
315   At the death of  Majorinus, the alternative Bishop of Carthage, Donatus Magnus is elected bishop. The controversy of the validity of a consecration of a bishop or administration of the sacraments of a formerly lapsed priest comes to be known as the Donatus Controversy. Donatus institutes the rebaptism of members of the church, who had been baptized by priests, who had lapsed in their faith during the persecutions. The Donatus churches of North Africa adopt charismatic practices along with public confessions while the traditional churches, which exist side by side in the same cities of North Africa, retain private confessions.
318–322  Emperor Constantine begins 30 years of construction on the Old St. Peter's Basilica in Rome on Vatican Hill at the burial place of Saint Peter, who had been crucified upside down in 64 during the reign of Nero. The site had been a Roman circus was the venue for chariot races under Nero. When completed in 349 it becomes a destination point for pilgrims as well as the venue for papal and imperial coronations.
324  Civil War takes place between Emperor Constantine I and Emperor Licinius in the Battle of Chrysopolis in Asia Minor. After Licinius loses 30,000 men with many others fleeing, he asks Constantine for mercy, which is granted since Licinius is married to Constantine’s half sister. But Constantine later executes Licinius to ensure no rivals and a secure throne as sole Emperor.
324   Emperor Constantine orders excavation of the site in Rome venerated by Christians as the burial place of St. Paul, who was beheaded during the reign of Nero in the year 67. He then constructs the first Basilica of St. Paul outside the Walls.
324   Emperor Constantine relocates the capital of the Roman Empire to Byzantium on the Strait of Bosporus, and renames the city Constantinople, the New Rome.
First Ecumenical Council 
325   Council of Nicea is called by Emperor Constantine, and  318 bishops that include Pope Silvester I and church historian Eusebius the bishop of Caesarea attend to address the Arian heresy - the belief in the East, which denies the divinity of the Son of God and teaches Jesus Christ was just a man. The Nicean Creed develops as the response to clarify the tenets of the orthodox and universal (catholic) faith. Arius is exiled to Illyria. During this period, the Catholic churches in the Latin speaking West were perfectly united with the  Orthodox churches in the Greek speaking East. The Emperor seated in Constantinople will approve the appointment of Popes in Rome between the fourth and eighth centuries, and this practice comes to an end with the coronation of Charlemagne as Emperor of the West in 800.
326   Helena, the mother of the Emperor Constantine, visits the holy sites in Palestinia and is directed by an elderly Jew named Judas to the Temple of Venus as the location of the tomb of Christ and the cross used for the crucifixion. She orders the Roman temple to be destroyed and the board with Pilate’s inscription along with four nails is uncovered. Helena has the wood of the cross cut up into small pieces and orders that they be sent to all the churches. Miracles alleged to be associated with coming into contact with relics from the true cross affirms the use of holy relics within the community of faith. The cross thus becomes confirmed as the symbol of the Christian faith.
331   Emperor Constantine commissions Eusebius to procure 50 Bibles for use at the Church of Constantinople.  Codex Vaticanus may be one of the surviving 50 Bibles.
335   Constantine finishes ten years of building the first Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem where Jesus Christ was crucified, and it becomes a destination point for pilgrims from Europe.
335   Antony of Egypt converts many, who had deviated from the orthodox faith and had embraced Arianism.​
337   Emperor Constantine dies on Pentecost after being formally baptized into the faith.
341   Ulfilas, translates the Latin Bible into the Germanic language of the Goths. His grandparents had been seized by the Goths in a raid on Sadagolthina in Cappadocia in Asia Minor in 264 and then taken north across the Danube River. Ulphilas is raised among the Goths, and learns the language as well as Greek and Latin. He does not translate I and II Kings citing that the Goths already knew how to fight. He converts many to the Arian form of of the faith. Browse the early Gothic Bible.
347   Donatus is exiled to Gaul, where he dies in 355.
350   The number of Donatists now outnumber the number of Orthodox believers in North Africa.
350   Codex Sinaiticus is written in Greek after the death of Emperor Constantine.  It contains the earliest dated New Testament in its entirety. The Septuagint portion contains only parts of the Old Testament and Deuterocanoncial books. The book 4 Maccabees appears, and at the end of the New Testament are two other works: the Epistle of Barnabas and 'The Shepherd' of Hermas. If misdated, Codex Sinaiticus may be one of the 50 Bibles Eusebius procured for  Church of Constantinople. 
354   Hilary of Poitiers writes that the Manichaean belief system has become significant in southern France.
362   Gregory of Nazianzus, the Archbishop of Constantinople, shapes the theology of the trinity and writes the denunciation of the emperor Invectives Against Julian (the apostate). He takes the lead in the Second Ecumenical Council in 381.
361   Apollinaris the Younger, bishop of Laodicea in Syria, denies the humanity of Jesus Christ and insists that two natures could not exist within of Christ. Instead he proposes that Jesus only possessed the mind of God. His beliefs come to be known as Apollinarianism.
367   Athanasius of Alexandria writes the Thirty-Ninth Festal Letter, which distinguishes him as the first on record to list the 27 books of the New Testament. In 382, the Bishop of Rome Pope Damasus I publishes the same list of books as being the New Testament. Earlier in 326, Athanasius becomes the twentieth bishop of Alexandria, defends the doctrine of the Trinity and opposes Arianism. In 325, Athanasius had taken a lead role in the First Council of Nicaea. Over the course of his career, Athanasius suffered five exiles ordered by four different Roman emperors. In response to Athanasius, it is suspected that the monastic communities established by Apa Pachomius and the adherents to gnostic, dualistic, and Arian beliefs hid their library of 52 texts of pseudo graphical gospels, apocalypses, and letters in Nag Hammadi in middle Egypt.
370   Basil, the father of Eastern monasticism, becomes the bishop of Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia when that city’s bishop dies. Basil’s rule for monastic life becomes the basis for the monastic rules in the west later employed by Benedict. Basil defends the early church against heresies. Among his works is De Spiritu Sancto, or Treatise on the Holy Spirit, where Basil makes the case for the divinity of the Holy Spirit and his arguments are used to fight the Arian heresy.
370   Eusebius is believed to have written the Old Latin Codex Vercellensis Evangeliorum, which features the order of the Gospels as Matthew, John, Luke and Mark.  This codex includes a statement that a light suddenly shone when Jesus was baptized. (Et cum baptizaretur, lumen ingens circumfulsit de aqua, ita ut timerent omnes qui advenerant). Moreover, in Luke 23:34 it omits the words: "And Jesus said: Father forgive them, they know not what they do." 
371   Martin of Tours becomes the bishop of Tours. He establishes the Abbey of Marmoutier among the Celts.
375   Ambrose, a bishop of Milan, has his name attributed to the Ambrosian Rite in Milan. The civil servant becomes a bishop while still studying the basics of the faith. He defends the church against the Arian heresy.
NOTE: The thought, values, and direction of the medieval West rests primarily on just four individuals: Ambrose of Milan (b. 339 - d. 397), Augustine (b. 354 - d. 430), Jerome (b. 347 - d.419) , and Pope Gregory the Great (b. 540 - d.604).  
376  Byzantine Roman Emperor Valens permits Visigoths to settle south of the Danube River after the invading Huns took their lands north of the river.
376 - 390  Germanic tribes, the Goths, convert en masse to the Arian form of Christianity.  Their conversion to this heretical form of the faith took place under the reign of the Roman Emperors Constantius II and Valens, both of whom were Arians.  The Goths, who occupy what is now Spain and southern France, will not embrace orthodoxy until 589 with the Third Council of Toledo.
378  Emperor Valens in the East calls on troops for reinforcements from Emperor Gratian in the West to fight the large number of Goths in eastern Asia Minor. Valens does not wait, engages in the Battle of Adrianople, and loses his life along with 40,000 of his men.
380  Pelagius blames the moral laxity of society on Augustine’s theology of divine grace, and asserts that human beings have an innate ability to be, and to do, good to attain salvation. His argument of free will is widely understood to contradict the doctrine of the fall of man and original sin. His teachings come to be known as Pelagianism and are denounced as non orthodox in 418 at the urging of African bishops and the Emperor Honorius, who compel Pope Zosimus to condemn and excommunicate Pelagius for his teachings. 
Second Ecumenical Council 
381   First Council of Constantinople is called by Emperor Theodosius I, and 150 bishops attend to affirm the doctrine of the trinity. Apollinarianism is condemned as a heresy. The vying for preeminence and secondary honor among the five seats of ecclesiastical power among the bishoprics of Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, Constantinople, and Rome sets the stage for the Great Schism that will follow in 1054. 
382  Theodosius I issues a decree of death for Manichaean monks.
382   Eusebius Hieronymus, better known as Jerome, works on updating the Old Latin translation of the Bible at the request of Pope Damasus. Jerome revises the Old Latin, or Vetus Latina, and produces a New Testament as well as two translations of the Psalms. The Roman Psalter, Psalterium Romanum, is Jerome’s first translation. The Gallican Psalter, Jerome’s second translation, is based on the Greek from Origen’s Hexapla. His broader translation work consulted the Greek Septuagint. Jerome cautions that the books from the intertestamental period, the Deuterocanonical books or the Apocrypha, are not divinely inspired, but useful for edification. The translation of the Psalms directly from Hebrew into Latin is finished in 405.  A page from the Old Latin can be seen in the Codex Vercellensis. 
387  Ambrose leads Augustine of Hippo, a Manichaean, in his conversion to Christianity.
391  Emperor Theodosius, Rome's last strong emperor, outlaws paganism, the religious practices from classical antiquity, and makes Christianity the official religion of the empire. His laws abolish the Vestal Virgins of Rome, the Olympic Games, and the Oracle at Delphi. 
397   John Chrysostom, perhaps the most eloquent, popular, and undiplomatic speaker from among the Church Fathers, is appointed Archbishop of Constantinople. He frequently speaks out against wealth and power. A popular preacher of practical Christianity, John had been deacon in Antioch where he had denounced Jews and Judaizing Christians. Among his works, 600 sermons and 200 letters survive. In his eight homilies Adversus Judaeos, or Against the Judaizers, written while a deacon John calls the community of faith to make the distinction between the practices of the church and those of the synagogue.
397  Nynia, a Briton trained in Rome, establishes a church at Whithorn, which is built of stone and painted white, in Dumfries and Galloway in southwestern Scotland where he converts the Picts to Christianity.
400   Visigoths unite under their King Alaric, who conquers Greece and Illyria. In 402 they also attack Italy.
405   Jerome finishes translating the Old Testament from Hebrew into Latin. Jerome's translation comes to be known as the Latin Vulgate, or the common Latin as spoken.
405 The Rhine River freezes solid during the winter. About 100,000 Germanic tribesmen including 30,000 warriors cross over the ice covered river and enter into the Roman Empire. They spread into the Iberian peninsula and into northern Italy.  Within just a few decades of the freezing of the Rhine River and the crossing of the Germanic tribes into the Roman Empire, Rome will be repeatedly sacked, the people of the city will be terrorized, and the Latin speaking Roman Empire in the West will come to an end and give way to Germanic rule of the West.
407   Romans withdraw from Britain.
410   Alaric the Visigoth King, and an Arian, invades and loots Rome making it the first siege on the Eternal City in 800 years.
410   Roman Emperor Honorius brings an end to Roman rule in Britannia since the Roman legions are needed elsewhere. In a letter to the people of Britannia, Honorius tells the people that they must now on their own defend themselves against the Anglo Saxon invaders.
423   Theodoret,the bishop of Cyrrhus on the Euphrates, in upper Syria gathers 200 copies of the Diatesseron for hiding, and instructs the  Churches in the East to instead read from  the  Gospel accounts from the four evangelists. Similarly, Rabbula, the Bishop of Edessa, instructs his priests to just read from the four Gospels as well.
​426  Augustine writes the De ciuitate Dei contra pagans, or the City of God, as an apologetic to defend the orthodox Christian faith and rationalize the the attack of Rome by Alaric the Visigoth King.
429   Vandals invade North Africa, and the Visigoths invade the Iberian peninsula.
429  Germanus, the Bishop of Auxerre, and  Lupus, the Bishop of Troyes, visit Britain for the purpose of eradicating the Pelagian heresy that had crept into the thinking of the British clergy.
430   Nestorius, a priest and monk who became the Patriarch of Constantinople in 428 as a result of the appointment of  Emperor Theodosius II, preaches against the idea of Theotokos, that the Virgin Mary is the Mother of God. Eusebius, and both Philip and Proclus, who each failed in their candidacy for patriarch, condemn Nestorius. 
Third Ecumenical Council 
431   Council of Ephesus is called by Emperor Theodosius II, and between 200 and 250 bishops attend to condemn the teachings of Nestorius, which divide the human and divine natures of Jesus Christ. At this council, the position of Nestorius is condemned and the Virgin Mary is recognized as Theotokos, the Mother of God.  Some of the Churches in the East cease ties with the West as Nestorians. Moreover, the Bible in use by the Churches in the East is in Aramaic, the Peshitta, and contains 22 books of the New Testament, because II Peter, II John, III John, Jude, and the book of Revelation are not accepted.​
434   Attila the Hun becomes king.
439  The Vandals capture Carthage in North Africa, which results in the loss of taxes and grain to Rome.
448  The monk Eutychus of Constantinople is condemned for teaching that the humanity of Jesus Christ was absorbed by His divinity. 
449   Anglo Saxons from mainland Europe arrive and settle southeastern Britain.
450   Possibly in Alexandria, Codex Alexandrinus is produced. It contains the Septuagint, the New Testament, 1 Clement, 2 Clement, 3 and 4 Maccabees, Psalm 151, the 14 Odes, the Epistle of Athanasius to Marcellinus, and a prologue on the Psalms. Dating is approximate. See British Library, MS Royal 1. D. V-VIII, the New Testament portion of Codex Alexandrinus. 
452   Pope Leo rides out of the city of Rome to negotiate with Attila the Hun, who rules the tribes of the  Huns, Ostrogoths, and Alans in Central and Eastern Europe. The pope persuades Attila to not lay siege to the city.
Fourth Ecumenical Council
451   Council of Chalcedon is called by Emperor Marcian, and 520 bishops attend to address the definition of the Godhead. In this council, Nestorius is anathematized marking a division between the Western and Eastern churches in Syria.  The council condemns condemns Docetism, which is the heretical belief that Jesus Christ only appeared to have a physical body, and that as a result was not the incarnation of God according to orthodox teachings. The monk Eutychus is exiled from Constantinople for his heretical teachings.
451  Merovich, the king of the Salian Franks and head of the  Merovingian dynasty, fights against Attila the Hun at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains. 
452  The Huns, "a race savage beyond all parallel," migrate westward and cross the Rhine River. The Germanic tribes conscripted into the Roman army defeat Atilla the Hun at Chalons.
455   Vandals, who are Arians, sack Rome.
BEGINNING OF THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD
The Fall of Rome 
476   The Germanic general Odacer, and an Arian, leads a tribe of Germanic tribes previously loyal to the emperor, kill the emperor's father, attacks Rome, and unseats the last Roman Emperor Augustulus Romulus, which for historians marks the fall of the Western portion of the Roman Empire. The locus of Western power and rule shifts from Roman emperors to Germanic chieftains. Though the city of Rome  falls, the peoples of Europe and even the British Isles will long afterwards continue to see themselves as subjects of Rome. This event marks the beginning of the Dark Ages for the West.
480  Julius Nepos, the last emperor of Rome, dies after ruling for one year. Another emperor in the west will not appear until Charlemagne in the year 800.
496   Clovis, the King of the Franks, is baptized at Reims. The Gallican Rite is practiced among the Franks, until Charlemagne imposes the Roman rite.  His subjects are baptized as well, but their arms are not since they are trained in warfare. Clovis drives out the Visigoths into the Iberian peninsula. 
500   Codex argenteus, the Silver Bible, is produced and most likely written in Ravenna  for the Ostrogothic King Theodoric the Great. Codex argenteusis in the Gothic language, the translation produced by Ulfilas in 341, and contains the four gospels.
529   Benedict of Nursia founds the monastery at Monte Cassino on the ancient site of the temple to Apollo on the road between Rome and Naples under the rules pray and work. In so doing, he establishes the first Western European monastic order in what comes to be known as the Benedictine Order. His rules become the bedrock for Western monasticism.
The Hagia Sophia
532–537   Emperor Justinian builds in Constantinople the great basilica Hagia Sophia, which in Greek means Holy Wisdom. When finished, Justinian proclaims, “Solomon, I have surpassed thee.”
533–554  Byzantine Emperor Justinian tasks his general Belisarius to retake land from the Vandals in Sicily and North Africa (533–534), and from the Ostrogoths in Italy (535–554).
540   Flavius Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator, better known as Cassiodorus, combines scholarship with monasticism. He is an administrator to the court of  the king of the Ostrogoths Theoderic the Great beginning in 501 and the founder of the monastery at Vivarium in southern Italy in 540. At the monastery, the monks make copies of Greek and Roman manuscripts and save classical works in the era of the barbarian invasions.
540   The Persian Sassanids under their king KhosrowI take Antioch from the Byzantine Greeks of the Eastern Roman Empire.
541-542  Bubonic plague spreads from Constantinople and other port cities around the Mediterranean Sea killing approximately 25 million people, or 13 percent of the population.
548   Emperor Justinian begins construction of the Basilica of St. John over the believed burial site of the Apostle John  in Ephesus and has it finished in 565. It, along with the house of the Virgin Mary in Ephesus, become a destination for pilgrims.
Fifth Ecumenical Council
553   Second Council of Constantinople is called by Emperor Justinian I, and 152 bishops attend to address the teachings of Origen on the pre existence of the soul and again those of Nestorius.
563   Columba, an Irish missionary, establishes a monastery on the Isle of Iona.
588   The king of the Lombards, Author, an Arian, marries the catholic Theodelinda, and the Lombards of northern Italy convert to Christianity.
589   Third Council of Toledo takes place, and the Goths, who occupy what is now Spain and southern France,  embrace orthodoxy and the Nicene Creed. 
590   Columbanus, an Irish missionary, establishes Luxeuil Abbey among the Franks and Bobbio Abbey among the Lombards. His monasteries practice the Celtic Rule and the Celtic Rite, which predates him.
597   Pope Gregory I sends Benedictine monk Augustine, with 40 other monks, on a mission to the Anglo Saxons in Britain. Augustine becomes the first Archbishop of Canterbury in Kent. Anglo Saxon King Æthelbert of Kent marries the Christian princess named Bertha, daughter of Charibert, king of the Franks. Princess Bertha brings bishop and chaplain Liudhard with her across the English Channel, and Æthelbert builds St Martin's Chapel in Canterbury. Æthelbert converts and permits the Christian faith to be preached marking the beginning of the Roman rite in Britain. See the Gospel Book of St. Augustine (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, Parker Library, CCCC MS 286).
600   Jewish scribes produce the Masoretic text of the Old Testament.
601   Mellitus becomes the first Bishop of London and Justus becomes the first Bishop of Rochester, which is the result of Pope Gregory I’s mission to the English.
610   On the Arabian peninsula, an angel of light appears to Mohammed ibn Abdullah, better known as Mohammed, he worries that it is Satan, but his first wife Khadijah convinces him that it is just the angel Gabriel.
613   The Sassanids take Damascus from the Eastern Roman Empire.
614    Sassanid Dynasty Persian Shah Khosrau II appoints Shahrbaraz as general to take Palestinia. 20,000 Jews ally with the Persians. They slaughter Jerusalem’s Christian population, which results in 35 mass burial sites around Jerusalem. Constantine had destroyed Hadrian's Temple of Jupiter on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, and in 325 began construction of an octagonal shaped church on the Temple Mount. The Persians and Jews destroy the Greek Orthodox places of worship built by Constantine. The Church of the Holy Sepulcher is damaged by fire. Nehemiah ben Hushiel and Benjamin of Tiberias rule Jerusalem with plans to build the Third Temple. Persians dominate Palestinia for 14 years between 614 and 628.
613   The Sassanids take Alexandria from the Eastern Roman Empire.
616   The Aramaic speaking Churches in the East add the five missing books from their New Testament - II Peter, II John, III John, Jude, and the book of Revelation- into their canon. 
621   Muhammad takes the six year old Aisha as his second wife, but waits until she is nine years old to consummate the marriage.
622   The Hijra, Muhammad’s emigration to Medina, marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar.
627   King Edwin of Northumbria converts to Christianity along with his Anglo Saxon subjects.
627   Roman Emperor Heraclius forms a military alliance with the Turkic tribe of Khazars to war against and defeat the Persians.
628   The Byzantine Greeks under Heraclius defeats the Sassanid king Khosrow II and and has him executed. Heraclitus reclaims the pillaged relics venerated by Christians and takes by the lands that had been taken by the Sassanids.
628   Mohammed and his followers slaughter a community of Jews living near Medina in the oasis city of Khaybar. The basis for the attack was the refusal of Jews to convert to the new religion of Islam and the refusal to recognize Mohammed as a prophet.
630   Mohammed conquers Mecca.
632   Mohammed dies. In his lifetime he encounters many merchants on the Silk Road that come through Mecca and Medina and he is exposed to passages from the Sayings of the Fathers from the Jews, beliefs of those deemed heretics like the Arians, and quotes from the pseudo graphical literature rejected by church fathers to contribute to what becomes the Koran. The religion of Islam that he advances requires sharia law to be implemented in order to create an Islamic community ruled by a caliph. Within just twelve years of his death, Islam spreads across the Eastern Roman Empire known as Byzantium, the Greek speaking half, that includes all of Anatolia, Syria, Palestine,  Upper and Lower Egypt, and North Africa. Muslim pirates on the Mediterranean disrupt the shipping trade routes. The sudden loss of one key product imported from Egypt, papyrus, contributes to the temporary decline of the West. The West adapts by using the far costlier vellum to preserve learning. Manuscript book production slows due to the significant increased cost of vellum. The so-called Dark Ages begin.
633    Isidore of Seville refines the Mozarabic Rite into its final form on the Iberian peninsula among the Visigoths per the directives of the Fourth Council of Toledo just before the Muslim Moors invaded.
635    Muslim Arabs from the Saudi Arabian penninsula launch raids and conquests of Islamic Jihad to spread Islam by pillaging and subjugation. They take the city of Damascus under the leadership of Khalid ibn al-Walid.
635   Alopen, the Nestorian Christian from the Persian Sasanian Empire,  takes the gospel to China’s capital Chang'an during the reign of Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty.
636  Emperor Heraclius leads the Byzantine army in a six day battle against the Rashidun Caliphate of Muslim Arabs at the Battle of Yarmouk near the borders of what is now Syria and Jordan and Syria and Israel. The Byzantine Greeks lose 70,000 men in battle as well as control of Syria, Egypt, Palestinia, and parts of Mesopotamia.   
637   Abu Obeidah besieges Jerusalem. Sophronius the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem surrenders the city under the condition that Khalif Omar come from Mecca in order to ensure that the city’s population is not slaughtered. The Muslines build a four sided wooden Mosque large enough to hold 3,000 people. The Christian population is treated well until 1078, when the Seljuk Muslims capture Jerusalem.
637   Arab Muslims take the Sassanid capital city of Ctesiphon.
642   The Sasanid Dynasty in Persia comes to an end, and the Zoroastrianism faith, which had been the state religion for over a thousand years, is replaced by Islam.
642   Caliph Omar establishes and spreads the Islamic state, and orders the destruction of the classic works produced by the Greeks and Romans, which do not conform to Islamic thought as contained in the Koran.  In 644, the Persian slave of the governor of Basra, Abu Lu’la’ah Firoz, assassinates Omar in Medina.
642–661  Rashidun Caliphate, the first of four Arab caliphates, subjugates a vast empire from the Arabian Peninsula and the entire Middle East, to the Caucasus in the north, North Africa from Egypt to present-day Tunisia in the west, and the Persian plateau (present-day Iran) to Central Asia in the east. Capital cities are Medina between 632 and 656, and then Kufa between 656 and 661.
642  Khazars take Bulgaria. 
 First Arab Khazar War 
642–652  The Khazarians defeat the Muslim Arabs in the Caucasus mountains. Turkic tribe of  Khazars stop Islamic Jihad waged by Muslim Arabs from spreading into eastern Europe through the Volga River, the Danube River, and the Eastern Roman Empire of Byzantium sitting on Asia Minor.
647  Pope Theodore I excommunicates the Patriarch of Constantinople Paul II for objecting to the use of the filioque in the catholic confession of faith. The use of the filioque - that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son - is designed to root out Arians, those who deny the divinity of Jesus Christ.
650   Book of Durrow, an Anglo-Saxon Celtic Gospel Book, is the earliest surviving  decorated insular manuscript. It is likely from Durrow, Ireland or Northumbria.
​661–750 The Umayyad Caliphate, the second of four Arab caliphates, builds upon the Rashidun Caliphate, and adds all of North Africa and the Iberian peninsula, and in the east expands to the southern shores of the Sea of the Khazars (Caspian) and into the western portions of India. Capital cities are Damascus between 661 and 744, Harran between 744 and 750, and also Córdoba between 756 and 1031 when the Umayyads are "in exile ."
664   Synod of Whitby determines that the Roman rite to be the single practice in Britain thus bringing an end to the diverging practices of the Celtic Christian rite. 
Sixth Ecumenical Council
680–681  Third Council of Constantinople is called by Emperor Constantine IV, and 300 bishops attend to denounce the monophysite controversy regarding the  nature and free will of Jesus Christ.
688–691 Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik orders construction of the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem thus replacing Constantine's elaborate Byzantine church, which had stood there.
690  Irish monks,  who are missionaries to the Anglo-Saxons, at the abbey on the Isle of Lindisfarne in Northumbria produce the Echternach Gospels, which are taken by  Willebrord in his flight into Europe. See the Evangiles dits d'Echternach ou de Saint Willibrord, BnF, Latin 9389.
692  The Anglo-Saxon monk Ceolfrid, the abbot of Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Abbey, produces what we call Codex Amiatinus, a complete Vulgate Bible. It is the oldest manuscript of a complete Vulgate Bible. This latin Bible was produced on land granted by Egfrid, the King of Northumbria.
698   Muslim Arabs take Carthage in North Africa, the historic breadbasket of the Roman Empire.
700  Willibrord founds the Benedictine monastery Echternach Abbey in Echternach, a town in Luxemburg, where Gospel Books and later Imperial Bibles will be produced.
705   Umayyad caliph Al-Walid I begins construction of the Great Mosque in Damascus.
715  Irish monks  at the abbey on the Isle of Lindisfarne in Northumbria produce the Lindisfarne Gospels, which are now preserved at the British Library, Cotton MS Nero D.IV. ​This is one of, if not the finest, Anglo-Saxon Celtic gospel books from the period.
711–718   Muslim Arabs from North Africa, Berbers, begin the conquest of the Iberian peninsula.
718   The Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula begins with the Battle of Covadonga. 
Beginning of the Reconquista
 A 770 year period between 711 and 1492 on the Iberian Peninsula in reclaiming  lands taken through Islamic jihad.
721  Battle of Toulouse is led by Duke Odo of Aquitaine against the Umayyads led by the emir of Al-Andalus, Al-Samh ibn Malik al-Khawlani. The Arab siege against Toulouse results in a victory for the Christian army of Aquitaine.
722   Battle of Covadonga reclaims land in the first step in the Renquista, fought by the Visigoth Pelagius of Asturias against the Umayyad leaders Al Qama and Munuza and ending in a horrific slaughter of the Arabs.
722–737   Second Arab Khazar War
726   The volcano on the island of Thera in the Aegean Sea erupts resulting in tsunamis that take the lives of many of those living on the coasts of the mainland. In addition, Byzantium is experiencing military losses in its defenses against Islamic incursions. Emperor Leo III initiates the Iconoclastic Controversy when he places a  ban on religious images icons that were being venerated in the Eastern Church. Leo III orders the destruction of the image of Christ over the Chalke Gate that leads into the Great Palace of Constantinople. The ban on the use of icons is initiated in the belief that the wrath of God will cease, and will continue until 787.
731   Bede writes Ecclesiastical History.
732    Charles Martel stops the rapid conquests of the Muslim Moors representing the Umayyad Caliphate stronghold on the Iberian Peninsula lead by Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi at the Battle of Tours in France. Prior to Tours, the Muslim Moors had taken Narbonne, Nîmes, Carcassonne, most of the Languedoc-Roussillon region, and penetrated into Autun in Burgundy - all in what is now France. (The Battle of Tours is recognized as one of the four key battles that shaped Western culture as decisively Christian and non-Muslim. The other three battles were fought against another Muslim caliphate, the Ottoman Turks. These were the Great Siege of Malta in 1551, the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, and the Battle of Vienna in 1683).​
732    Leo III of Byzantium arranges marriage for his son Constantine V with  Bihar of Khazaria’s daughter, princess Tzitzak. Their child would rule Byzantium as Leo IV, or Leo the Khazar. The alliance between Byzantium and Khazaria is formed to pool resources against their common enemy, Muslim Arabs. Leo III introduces the destruction of religious art, icons, and  thousands of monks leave for Rome.
732   Bubonic plague hits Constantinople killing 200,000 people.
750   The Abbasids under Abdallah ibn Ali overthrow the Umayyads at the Battle of the Zab in Iraq, kill the last Umayyad caliph Marwan II, move the center of power from Damascus to Baghdad, and will rule lover three continents  until 1258.
752-759  Pepin the Short leads against the Umayyads in the Siege of Narbonne in southern Gaul putting the Saracens (Arabs and Berbers) in retreat.
752–804 The Abbasid Caliphate, the third of four Arab caliphates, controls the Middle East and stretches to the eastern edge of the Black Sea, the western and southern shores of the Sea of the Khazars (Caspian), and reaches to the Aral Sea. They control half of Sicily and Crete. Their capital cities are Kufa between 750 and 762, Baghdad between 762 and 796,  809 and 836, and 892 and 1258; Ar-Raqqah between 796 and 809, Samarra between 836 and 892, and Cairo between 1261 and 1517.
756    The Umayyads establish the Emirate of Córdoba on the Iberian peninsula, which serves as a base for Muslim Arab operations  for the Islamic conquest into Europe and continued control of the Mediterranean Sea.
760  In Baghdad, a Jewish group rejects the oral tradition known as the Talmud that shapes Rabbinic Judaism, and come to be known as the Karaites.
768   Charlemagne is crowned King of the Franks and ignites a renaissance of learning and the arts in the palace court at Aachen​. His court will draw upon the artistic streams from the Anglo-Irish (Celtic), Byzantine, and Roman traditions to synthetically produce what will become distinctively Romanesque. The use of figural art in mosaics, frescoes, and manuscripts will distinguish Western art from Jewish and Islamic art throughout the middle ages.  The empire Charlemagne establishes lasts from 768 to 814, which serves to unify Europe and keep Islamic invaders, Viking raids, and Magyar incursions in check.
780   Byzantine Empress Irene ends the attacks on religious icons in the eastern church. 
780   Benedictine monks at the Corbie Abbey north of Paris standardize the Latin calligraphy into what is called Caroline minuscule.  It is widely spread and accepted across Europe between 800 and 1200 until it is displaced by the Gothic black letter style of calligraphy.
784   The emir of al-Andalus Abd al-Rahman I begins construction of the Great Mosque of Cordoba. The mosque is completed in 987.
Seventh Ecumenical Council
787 Second Council of Nicaea is called by Emperor Constantine VI and Empress Irene, and 350 attended to address the iconoclastic controversy in the eastern church. This council holds that the cross should be adored and honored. It also holds that icons are “open books to remind us of God.”
793   Vikings raid the monastery on the Isle of Lindisfarne off the coast of northeastern Britain. The Lindisfarne Gospels, produced by Eadfrith, the Bishop of Lindisfarne between 698 and 721, survive and are now in the British Library, Cotton MS Nero D.IV. See video. 
794   Vikings raid the church at Jarrow, which was home to Bede, who wrote Ecclesiastical History of the English Church.
795   Vikings raid the monasteries on the isles of Skye and Iona in the Hebrides, and Rathlin off the coast of Ireland.
796   Charlemagne appoints Alcuin as the abbot of the Abbey of Marmoutier near Tours, and the abbey becomes a scriptorium.
798  Elipandus, the Archbishop of Toledo, revives the heretical belief that Jesus was adopted by God. Pope Leo III holds a council at Rome that reiterates that the doctrine of adoptionism is heretical.
​799   Vikings raid the monastery of St Philibert’s on the isle of Noirmoutier near the mouth of the Loire River.
BEGINNING OF THE ROMANESQUE PERIOD
800    Charlemagne, the grandson of Charles Martel, is crowned Emperor of the West by Pope Leo III. Charlemagne will come to be known as the father of Europe and first emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (800 - 1806). He builds on the foundations of Imperial Rome, sparks a renaissance of learning in his court at the Palace of Aachen, enforces the Nicene creed, and unifies church practices in the West under his domain to follow the Roman rite . The pope's coronation furthers the schism between the Greek speaking East and the Latin speaking West by offending Empress Irene of Athens in Constantinople, the New Rome.
800  On the Isle of Iona, or perhaps at the Abbey of Kells monks produce the Book of Kells. It is a gospel book based on a Jerome's Latin Vulgate as well as portions using the Vetus Latina. See Book of Kells, Trinity College Dublin, MS 58. This is perhaps the richest example of the Anglo-Saxon Celtic style in manuscripts from the period.
801   Charlemagne takes Barcelona from the Muslims.
807   Ferdomnach of Armagh writes the Book of Armagh in northern Ireland (Codex Ardmachanus, Trinity College Dublin, Ms. 52). It contains the Vulgate, as well as the Vetus Latina rendering for Acts and Paul’s epistles.
812   The Greek speaking Byzantines in the East finally acknowledge Charlemagne as emperor of the Latin speaking West. 
814    The relics of James the apostle, who was beheaded in Jerusalem by King Herod Agrippa I in 44, are believed to have been discovered in Compostela in northern Spain. The Santiago de Compostela becomes a destination point via the Camino de Santiago for pilgrims across Europe especially during the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
815    Byzantine Emperor Leo V the Armenian institutes a second period of Iconoclasm, a ban on religious icons in the eastern church.
830    Magyars leave the Khazars to settle the Carpathian basin, which later becomes Hungary.
832   Caliph Al-Ma’mun of the Abbasid Dynasty orders raids on the Great Pyramid of Giza in search of treasures.
838    Khazar Kagan (king) Bulan converts to Judaism. The Khazarian Khanate becomes a non-Semitic Jewish state in the medieval period. The religion trickles down from the ruling class to the populace of roughly 30 different tribal groups.
840   Vikings establish the city of Dublin in Ireland, which operates as a slave market.
842   Vikings attack London.
843   Byzantine Empress Theodora, widow of the emperor Theophilus, permanently ends attacks on icons in the eastern church.
844   Vikings sail up the Garonne River to Toulouse, and return towards the Atlantic to raid Galicia, which is occupied by the Muslim Moors, but are defeated by the troops sent by emir Abd al-Rhaman II. 
845   Vikings raid Hamburg.
846   Muslim Arabs enter, loot, and damage Old St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.
851   Vikings attack London.
853   Vikings pillage and burn the Abbey of Marmoutier near Tours.
860   Rus Vikings sailing in an armada of 200 ships cross the Black Sea and attack Constantinople.
861   Byzantine Emperor Michel III sends Cyril and Methodius as missionaries to the Khazars in the northeastern region of the Black Sea. They learn the language of the Khazars and many convert to Christianity. 
862   Magyar invasions into Central Europe.​
862   Prince Rostislav of Great Moravia asks Constantinople to send missionaries. Byzantine Emperor Michael III and the Greek Orthodox patriarch Photius appoint Cyril and Methodius to work among the Slavic peoples where they develop the language, produce an alphabet, produce liturgical books, and translate the Latin Bible into the Cyrillic language.
864   Christian Druthmar of Aquitaine, a Benedictine monk, produces the Gospel commentary Expositio in Matthaeum Evangelistam, and asserts that the Gazari, or Khazars, dwell "in the lands of Gog and Magog."
865   Viking Ivar the Boneless takes York from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of East Anglia.
867   Ivar the Boneless captures King Ælla in  Northumbria, and kills him by the Viking's blood eagle method.
868   Ivar the Boneless raids Winchester in the Kingdom of Wessex. Anglo Saxon King  Æthelbald and his brother Alfred defend the kingdom in nine battles.
869  Ivar the Boneless capture East Anglian king Edmund and put him to death for refusing to renounce his faith in Christ. King Edmund is better known as Edmund the Martyr or St. Edmund. 
871-877  Charles the Bald is the King of West Francia between 843 and 877, the King of Italy between 875 and 877, and the Holy Roman Emperor between 875 and 877 as Charles II. He commissions a Great Bible with the Abbaye de Saint-Amand-en-Pévèle that comes to be known as the Second Bible of Charles the Bald, and is now in the Bibliothèque nationale de France. See BnF MS Latin 2. 
871 - 899  Alfred the Great, a Christian, rules as King of Wessex.  
871    Alfred the Great defeats the Vikings at the Battle of Ashdown in Berkshire.
878   Alfred the Great defeats the Vikings in the Battle of Edington.
885   Vikings lay siege on Paris.
886   Alfred the Great negotiates Danelaw Treaty with Guthrum, which formalizes boundaries between Anglo Saxon regions in the south west of England and Viking ruled regions in the north east of England.
890   The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle begins during the reign of Alfred the Great. 
896   Magyars invade Western Europe in pillaging raids.
900   Vikings engage in pillaging raids of the coastal towns along the Mediterranean Sea.
909–1171  The Fatimid Caliphate spans from West Africa along the Barbary Coast along North Africa to Egypt and the Middle East. Capital cities are Mahdia in Tunisia between 909 and 968 and Cairo between 969 and 1171.
910   Magyars defeat Germanic tribes in Battle of Augsburg.
910   Cluny Abbey established and endowed by William the Pious, Duke of Aquitaine. Cluny will come to be the leading Benedictine monastery among 314 spread over France, Poland, Italy, the Holy Roman Empire,  England, and Scotland. Cluny also becomes the training ground for the great clerics of the age.
911    Rollo the Viking lays siege of Chartres, but is defeated at the Battle of Chartres, which results in the Treaty of St.-Claire-sur-Epte.
911    Rollo the Viking warrior leader pledges allegiance, defense, and conversion to the Christian faith to Charles the Simple, the king of France, in exchange for Normandy. Rollo, who is baptized as Robert, colonizes and settles Rouen and the region that becomes Normandy.
912    Rus Vikings with 500 ships sail into the southern part of the Sea of the Khazars (Caspian). The Khazars grant them right of passage in exchange for half of the plunder taken from Muslims. On their return voyage, the Khazars and other groups plunder the Rus Vikings.
912   A Muslim Arab naval fleet defeats the Byzantines off the island of Chios near Ephesus on Asia Minor.
924    Magyars raid western Europe through Bavaria, Swabia, Alsace, Lorraine, Champagne and Franconia. King Henry the Fowler pays tribute to the Magyars for nine years of peace.
926     Magyars launch raids into northern Italy.
929     The Emirate of Córdoba is transformed into the Caliphate of Córdoba. 
929     Henry I defeats the Wends of Eastern Europe, and they convert to Christianity.
955     Otto I defeats the Magyars at the Battle of Lechfeld.
962     Charlemagne’s Empire is renewed under Otto I, who rules Rome and northern Italy, and maintains that popes should be elected with his consent.
968    Norman Vikings raid the western shores of the Iberian peninsula and kill Bishop Sisnando Menéndez of Compostela in Galicia.
969    The Fatimd Caliphate is established in Cairo, and the Caliph Hakem orders the destruction of all Christian churches in his realm. By 1012, over 3,000 churches demolished in Syria, the Holy Land, and Egypt. By 975, the Fatimids control North Africa, Sicily, Palestine, and Arabia making it the most powerful Islamic empire of the period. 
972     Muslim Arab pirates kidnap Maïeul the Abbot of Cluny and hold him until a ransom is paid. French nobles decimate the pirate base at Saint-Tropez on the French Riviera. 
985    Erik the Red, father of Leif Erikson, returns to Iceland after three years of banishment to announce his discovery of Greenland.
987    The prince of Kiev, Vladamir the Great, is baptized into the Christian faith and Byzantine orthodoxy and its musical tradition come to Rus (Russia). This takes place after his envoys experience the celebration of the Eucharist in the Hagia Sophia  (Church of Holy Wisdom) in Constantinople. They returned to the prince with this report, "We knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth, for surely there is no such splendor or beauty anywhere on earth. We cannot describe it to you; we only know that God dwells there among men and that their service surpasses the worship of all other places."
996     Vikings return to again pillage and burn the Abbey of Marmoutier near Tours.
1008    Fatimid Caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah forbids Christians from Palm Sunday processions in Jerusalem.
1009    The Fatimid Caliph al-Hakim orders destruction of Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem .
(Takes the gold, silver, and jewels, and attempts to remove all traces of the existence of the burial place).
1012   Cathar heretics appear in Limousin, but are protected by Duke William IX of Aquitaine from prosecution.
1013    Viking Sweyn Forkbeard attacks the Romano British settlement of Londinium on the River Thames, unsuccessfully in 996 and 1013, but control is gained over the city as well as all of England by his son Cnut the Great in 1016.
1016   England is now in complete submission to the Vikings. The ground is set for the future William the Conqueror to claim the throne of England.
1017  Fatimid caliph al-Hakim proclaims that he is the manifestation of the divine and initiates a reign of terror. His pronouncements becomes the basis of the faith of the Druze and their belief in the eternality of the soul and reincarnation.
1031   Caliphate of Córdoba dissolved.
1033   Robert, the Duke of Normandy, dies in Anatolia on his return from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. He leaves behind a five year old son, William the bastard, who will become William the Conqueror.
1037   Islamicized Seljuk Turks (Mongols), raid, pillage, and butcher civilian populations as they move west as they compete with Muslim Arabs for domination of Islamic regions .
1039-1056  Henry III,  German king (1039  - 1056) and emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (1046 - 1056), brings the Holy Roman Empire to the apex of its political power and control over the papacy.
1040   Song of Roland commemorates the Battle of Roncevaux in 778 against the Muslims, during the reign of Charlemagne. 
1046   Henry III resolves the rivalry among three who claimed the papacy at Synod at Sutri, which he calls, and sees that Suidger, the German bishop of Bamberg, becomes the new pope - Clement II. 
1049  Henry III appoints Leo IX, the pope of the Great Schism.
1050   Princess Godgifu (we know her as Lady Godiva), the sister of King Edward the Confessor and the late Aetheling Alfred, and the wife Lord Leofric, Earl of Mercia under King Edward, rides through Coventry, England naked on a horse, clothed only in her long hair, to protest her husband’s excessive taxes.
1050   The Emperor's Bible, the one used by Henry III, is produced by Benedictine monks at the Echternach Abbey founded by  Willebrord in 700. See Codex Caesars Upsaliensis, Uppsala University, C 93.
1051  Peter Damian writes the book titled Book of Gomorrah in which he outs the homosexual subculture within the church, the so-called "celibate" clergy. 
The Great Schism
1054  The Roman Catholic Church in the West and the Orthodox Churches in the East experience tensions. In 1053, the Patriarch of Constantinople Michael I Cerularius orders all Latin speaking churches practicing the Latin rite in Constantinople closed. Conversely, the Greek speaking churches practicing the eastern Orthodox rite in southern Italy are either closed or forced to conform to the Latin rite. In the West, the Pope functions as the sole administrative head of the Roman Catholic Church. In the East, the Patriarchal model of church governance based on collaboration of the  major seats of ecclesiastical power governs the Orthodox churches.  The Primary issue of the Great Schism is one of authority between Rome and the other bishoprics in Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria, and Constantinople. Secondary issues are rooted in the amendment of the Western Nicene Creed with the filioque and the use of artistic images and icons in the church.
​1055   Seljuk Turks take Bagdad and displace the Persian Abbasids, who had translated redacted portions of the Greek classics.
Investiture Controversy
1056-1122   A struggle for power and control over the higher offices of the church, the Investiture Controversy, takes place between Pope Gregory VII and the Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV.
1059   Pope Nicholas II issues decree In nomine Domini, which defines a fixed papal election process to be held by cardinals thus ending papal nominations of successors and appointments by temporal powers.
1059  The Norman warrior Robert Guiscard conquers southern Italy and Sicily thus repelling the Muslim Arab presence. Pope Nicholas II invests Giscard as Count of Apulia and Calabria  between 1057 and 1059, and then the Duke of Apulia and Calabria and the Duke of Sicily between 1059 and 1085.
1064  Seljuk Sultan Alp Arslan plunders Armenia and destroys its capital city Ani.
1066   William the Conqueror, the great grandson of Rollo the Viking,  takes the throne of England in the Norman Conquest at the Battle of Hastings with the support of Pope Alexander II.  Anglo-Norman Period - they tear down the wooden churches and build stone cathedrals with Roman arches. They go on to establish latin kingdoms in Normandy, England, Sicily, Africa, County of Edessa, and Jerusalem. These Latin Kingdoms displace the Muslim Arab outposts, which served as bases of operations to disrupt trade on the Mediterranean.
1071   A Seljuk Turk Muslim commander captures Byzantine Emperor Romanus at the Battle of Manzikert, and undermines Byzantium’s influence and control over Armenia and Anatolia.​
1073    Pope Gregory VII, Church Reforms and Great Bibles. Central to the church reforms was to eliminate the practice of Simony, the practice of purchasing a church office of bishop that inured to the benefit of the nobility since the noble families had used the church as a vehicle of furthering political control. That practice was associated with the investiture controversy, where the nobility would invest a newly appointed church official with the prestige and authority of the office.
1075   Pope Gregory VII issues the Dictatus Papae, which articulates papal supremacy.
1075   The donation of a Great Bible presented by King Henry IV, king of Germany, to the Benedictine monks at the Hirsau Abbey. King Henry IV went on to become Emperor Henry IV of the Holy Roman Empire and King of the Romans. See this Great Bible at Bavarian State Library, BSB Clm 13001.
1077   Henry IV, while king of Germany, walks from Speyer to Canossa Castle in northern Italy and kneels in the snow for three days and nights as an act of penance in order to reconcile himself with Pope Gregory VII, who had excommunicated him thus signifying a reversal of roles established under Henry III.  See VIDEO.
1078    Seljuk Turks displace the Abbasid Arabs for control of Jerusalem. Christian pilgrimages to the Holy Sepulchre come to a halt.
1078    Osmund, the Norman Bishop of Salisbury, establishes the Sarum Rite in England.
1081   Henry IV invades Rome to unseat Gregory VII and install another pope. 
1081    General Alexius Comnenus seizes the throne in Constantinople and consolidates control over the shrinking Byzantine empire as Emperor Alexius I.
1083-1085    Emperor Henry IV besieges Pope Gregory VII. The pope calls on the Norman duke of Apulia, Calabria and Sicily, Robert Guiscard, who at the time is warring against the Byzantine Emperor Alexius I Comnenus.  Guiscard with 36,000 men escort the pope to safety to the Lateran Palace. The people of Rome riot in protest to the Norman presence. The Normans then sack and burn the city over a three day period.  
1085    Seljuk Turks capture Antioch in Syria.
1085    William the Conqueror commissions the Domesday Book, a landmark in central administration to identify land owners, assess taxes, and conscript soldiers.  The book identifies 13,418 settlements in the English counties south of the rivers Ribble and Tees, which were at the time the borders with Scotland.
1088    University of Bologna established within the Holy Roman Empire under the rule of Henry IV, the King of the Romans and Holy Roman Emperor.​
1090-1120  Lambert of St. Omer compiles an encyclopedia known as the Liber Floridus, the Book of Flowers. The opening sections contain illustrations of the Apocalypse inspired by the events of the Crusades given the reports of blood of the slain in Jerusalem was as high as a horse's bridle.
1092    Seljuk Turks Capture Nicea in Asia Minor, Byzantines face Islamic threat perilously close to Constantinople.
1093    Peter the Hermit makes a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, visits Simeon the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who tells him that he hopes God would send Christians from the West to liberate the Holy Land. Peter the Hermit returns to Rome, informs Urban II of the oppression of Christians by the Seljuk Turks. Urban II in turn authorizes Peter the Hermit to preach a call to crusade in every town and village he passed through in Italy and France.
1094    Envoys of Emperor Alexius Comnenus appeals to Pope Urban II at the Council of of Piacenza to halt the Seljuk Turks from further advancement in Anatolia.
1094   Rodrigo Diaz, the Count of Bivar, a soldier of fortune who is better known as El Cid, conquers Valencia of Al-Andalus that had been ruled by the Almoravid Muslims from Morocco on the Mediterranean coast. Earlier, El Cid becomes the stuff of legend by defeating the armies of the Kingdom of Aragon, and then leading armies into battle in the royal sibling rivalry of the heirs of Ferdinand I, the King of León and the Count of Castile.
THE CRUSADES: 1095-1291
1095    Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont calls for the First Crusade. Pope Urban II stressed the plight of Byzantine Christians at the hands of Seljuk Turks, the molestation of pilgrims, desecration of the holy places in Jerusalem, and called on those guilty of disturbing the peace in Europe to turn their warlike energies toward a holy cause.  Goals are to retake lands taken by Muslims, retake Jerusalem, and make it safe for pilgrims to travel to the Holy Land. At this point in time, Muslims had taken two thirds of Christian lands through Islamic jihad as the motive for conquest. ​
First Crusade - The Prince's Crusade
1095–1099  Four armies were formed and led by the French aristocracy representing well trained knights recruited from among the Franks, the county of Flanders, the Holy Roman Empire, and Apulia-Calabria in southern Italy. The leaders were the princes of northern Europe: Godfrey of Bouillon, Baldwin of Boulogne, Raymond IV of Toulouse, Adhemar of Le Puy, Hugh I of Vermandois, Stephen II of Blois, Robert II of Flanders, Robert II of Normandy, Bohemond of Taranto, and Tancred of Hauteville.  The key battles included the Siege of Nicaea in 1097, the Battle of Dorylaeum in 1097, the Siege of Antioch in 1097, and the Siege of Jerusalem in 1099. This crusade fulfilled its aim of rescuing Jerusalem and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.  The end result of the First Crusade was the establishment of several crusader states with the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (1099 until 1291), the County of Edessa (1098 until 1150), the Principality of Antioch (1098 until 1268), and the County of Tripoli (1109 until 1289. These Latin crusader states allied with the independent Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia (1080 until 1198), which later became a tributary state to the Mongols in 1236.  (See Osprey Publishing video part one and video part two.)

In conjunction with the Prince's Crusade, Peter the Hermit prematurely leads the People's Crusade,  an unqualified rabble of 200,000, who met at the Meuse River bank in France with only nine knights. By the time they reached Constantinople, half of the men had been lost. He rushed across the Bosphorus with 100,000 men against counsel to wait for the professionally trained Crusaders, was defeated and escaped with just 3,000.

Godfrey of Bouillon, a descendant of Charlemagne, becomes the first king of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, and was seen by the unified Western world of Christendom as a messianic figure and inaugurator of a new era in the eschatological scheme of the six ages of history.
1096   Count Emicho massacres of Jews in various towns in the Rhineland.
TWELFTH CENTURY RENAISSANCE
1102-1107  Investiture Controversy takes place between Henry I of England and Pope Paschal II.
1122   The Concordat of Worms, Pactum Calixtinum, is signed by Pope Calixtus II and Holy Roman Emperor Henry V, and settles the Investiture Controversy.
First Lateran Council
1123 Pope Calixtus II 

Second Lateran Council
1139 Pope Innocent II
1143   Peter of Montboissier, the abbot of the Benedictine abbey of Cluny, also known as Peter the Venerable, translates the Koran into Latin. The translation of the Koran, Lex Mahomet pseudoprophete (The Law of Mohammed the False Prophet), becomes required reading for Benedictine monks and for all preachers of the crusades.
1144   The Seljuk Turkic general-Din  Zengi, the governor of Mosul, captures Edessa from the crusader kingdoms. 
Second Crusade 
1147–1149    Bernard of Clairvaux acts as the publicist for the Second Crusade. The Seljuk Turks defeat the battalions of King Conrad of Germany at Dorylaeum.
1154   Nur al-Din, the governor of Mosul, takes Damascus's he defeats the crusader kings Conrad and Louis VII.
1165   The Cathars make their way into England, are known as the Publicans. They are brought before Henry II and a synod of bishops, then condemned for their heresies, beliefs that are counter to the established church. After being beaten and stripped, they are driven into the cold to die.
​1167   The Lombard League, an alliance of 20 urban municipalities, formed to check the land grab attempts of Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarosa.
1169   Nur al-Din’s Muslim forces led by general Shirkuh and his nephew, Saladin, take Cairo.
1170   Henry II of England has the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket put to death.
1171   The last Fatimid caliph al-Adid dies.
1176   The Lombard League defeats the Holy Roman Empire at the Battle of Legnano, which results in the Treaty of Venice. 
Third Lateran Council
1179 Pope Alexander III
1187  Saladin defeats the Crusaders at the Battle of Hattin and seizes Jerusalem along with vast stretches of territory.
Third Crusade -
1189–1192
1192    Richard the Lionhearted and Saladin bring the Third Crusade to an end with the signing of a peace treaty that reestablishes the Kingdom of Jerusalem, but without control of Jerusalem.
Crusade of Henry VI
1197

1199   In response to street preaching and a French translation of the Bible being used  in Metz, from the Lateran Palace in the Vatican Pope Innocent III issues Cum ex injuncto, which opens with "Laymen should not preach, nor organize secret assemblies, nor find fault with priests." In addition, in the encyclical Ea est in fovendis Pope Innocent III calls on the abbots of Citeaux, Morimond, and La Crête, as well as the Bishop of Metz to examine those suspected of heresy with a specific focus on that French translation of the Bible.

Fourth Crusade 
1202–1204
Pope Innocent III calls for the Fourth Crusade.
Crusaders sack Constantinople.
Albigensian Crusade 
1208  A papal legate is murdered by a Cathar in southern France.
1209–1229
Pope Innocent III
 Baltic Crusades
 1211-1225

Children's Crusade
1212  

Fifth Crusade 
1213–1221

1215   Archbishop of Canterbury Stephon Langton writes the Magna Carta on behalf of the disgruntled barons, who demanded that their rights and property be respected by King John of England, who met at Runnymede on the Thames River. Pope Innocent III denounced the barons, annulled the charter, and reprimanded Langston after the king had complained of signing while under duress given that the barons had an army of 2,000 armed knights. Langton reissued the Magna Carta after the death of Innocent III.

Fourth Lateran Council
1215  Pope Innocent III

1227   Archbishop of Canterbury Stephon Langton revises and standardizes the chapter orders of the Latin Vulgate. Prior to that, the chapter breaks within the Latin Vulgate varied based on transmission lines of the text across Europe.
Sixth Crusade 
1228
Holy Roman Emperor King Henry II leads the Sixth Crusade. 
1229    The Council of Toulouse  during the tenure of Pope Innocent III forbids reading translations of the Bible in response to the Albigensian or Cathar heresy. Canon 14 reads: "We prohibit also that the laity should be permitted to have the books of the Old and the New Testament; unless anyone from the motives of devotion should wish to have the Psalter or the Breviary for divine offices or the hours of the blessed Virgin; but we most strictly forbid their having any translation of these books."
Bosnian Crusade 
1235–1241

1244   Kwarezmians destroy Jerusalem, which lead to calls for the Seventh Crusade.
First Council of Lyon
1245 Pope Innocent IV

Seventh Crusade 
1248–1254 Louis IX

Second Council of Lyon
1274 Pope Gregory X 

1290 Jews are expelled from England under King Edward I for lending money with interest in violation of the law of the land, and for clipping coins, a debasement of the currency. The cross the English Channel and return to Normandy, and the word mortgage enters the language for the first time according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

​1291   Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem comes to an end.

Council of Vienne
1311-1312 Pope Clement V

1312   The order of the Knights Templar comes to an end
1323-1328  Pesant Revolt in Flanders. 
1337-1453  Hundred Year's War
1346–1353 Black Death sweeps across Europe, and kills one third of the population.
1362   Ottoman Sultan Murad I establishes elite body guard and fighting force known as the Janissaries, abducted and castrated youth whose only role in life was to learn the art of warfare.
1377   Pope Gregory XI issues bulls denouncing the translation of the Latin Vulgate into English by John Wycliff in England.
1348  Bubonic plague spreads across Damascus, and half the population dies.
1381  Peasant Revolt in England,
1431  Martyrdom of Joan of Arc.
END OF THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD
The Fall of Constantinople  
1453
RENAISSANCE PERIOD BEGINS
The Gutenberg Bible
1455 ​Johannes Gutenberg in partnership with Johann Fust and Peter Schoeffer produce a printed bible using moveable type, a press, and ink mixed with varnish. In Mainz, they produce 180 large editions in a 42 line format. 135 editions are printed on paper and the rest are printed on vellum. And, in Bamberg, they produce 14 smaller editions in a 36 line format. Gutenberg's partner Fust foreclosed on the operations due to a lack of timely repayment on the business loans. Gutenberg laid the groundwork for German innovation, engineering, and technical leadership. Gutenberg, moreover, laid the groundwork for a fixed text of the Latin Vulgate for Western Christendom.

When first published, a Gutenberg Bible sold for 30 gold florins, which amounts to three years of wages for a clerk. Today, a complete original of a Gutenberg Bible sells for $25 to $30 million.

The sign Gemini from the zodiac in the Hunterian Psalter, Glasgow University Library, MS Hunter 229 (U.3.2)