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It was an age reaping the benefits of events of the 1450’s—when Constantiople’s fall to the Turks threatened all of Europe and Gutenberg’s innovation of movable type gave more than a select few the privelege of coming to their own conclusions. In Zwingli’s lifetime—a mere fifty years—scholars of the church questioned the faith as Rome had tought it, and courageous explorers thrust through ancient myths and fears to discover new horizons. It was a world encountering a new kind of trade, including tasty foods from exotic lands. It was a world becoming stronger—in England, France, and Spain. It was a world equipping itself with giants—moneyed families such as the Medici and the Fuggers, geniuses of form such as Michaelangelo, Da Vinci, and Raphael, singleminded leaders such as Columbus, Henry VIII, Ferdinand and Isabella, and Luther. It was an age to give people hope in princely powers as well as in personal ideals. It was an age beginning to change at a faster pace, yet it was an age when one could still burn as a heretic.

1477 Swiss pikemen distinguish themselves at Battle of Nancy, making them much sought after as mercenaries

1480 Ferdinand and Isabella appoint Inquisition against heresy among converted Jews

1480 Ivan III styles himself Czar of the Russians

1482 Portuguese explorers discover bananas on west coast of Africa

1483 Martin Luther born

1484 “At Hammel in Saxony, on the 20th of June, 1484, the Devil, in the likeness of a pied piper, carried away 130 children, that were never after seen.” 

1484 Japan’s shogun Yoshimasa introduces the tea ceremony

1484 Huldrych Zwingli born at Wildhaus (Toggenburg) in Canton of St. Gall

1485 Battle of Bosworth on August 22 ends England’s 15-year Wars of the Roses; Henry VII crowned first king of 117-year Tudor dynasty

1489 Symbols + and – come into use

1490 Beginnings of ballet at Italian courts

1492 Christopher Columbus, with three ships and 78 men set sail on September 6 after first attempt aborted; arrives in the Bahamas, thinking he has reached the East Indies 

1492 Isabella and Ferdinand take Granada from the Moors and expel 200,000 Jews
 
1492 Lorenzo de’ Medici dies
 
1492 Christopher Columbus introduces Europeans to the pineapple, parrots, Indians, peppers, allspice, maize, and sweet potatoes
 
1492 Nuremberg geographer Behaim constructs first terrestrial globe
 
1492 Leonardo da Vinci draws a flying machine
 
1492 Profession of publisher emerges, consisting of typefounder, printer, and bookseller

1493 Maximilian I becomes Holy Roman Emperor

1494 First moblie artillery firing iron cannon balls, used by Charles VIII in Italy

1495 First recorded outbreak of syphilis; infects army of Charles VIII at Naples 

1495 Merchant-investor Jakob Fugger ensures powerful political power through leasing of copper and siver mines 

1495 The Imperial Diet of Worms attempts to modernize the Holy Roman Empire; proclaims Perpetual Peace, and imposes common penny as general tax

1498 Vasco de Cama establishes sea route between Portugal and India 

1498 Savonarola burned at the stake for heresy in Florence

1499 War between Swabian League and Swiss Cantons. Swiss victory forces Treaty of Basel granting Swiss independance 

1499 Granada’s Moors revolt as Inquisitor de Cisneros introduces forced wholesale Christian conversion

1500 Pope Alexander VI proclaims a Year of Jubilee; imposes a tithe for crusade against Turks
 
1500 First human Caesarian operation performed by Swiss pig gelder Jakob Nufer
 
1500 Postal service between Vienna and Brussels established

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