Islamic Ascendancy
570 A Muhammad born
610 Gabriel calls Muhammad to be a prophet of Allah
622 Muhammad’s flight from Mecca to Medina
632 Muhammad dies
638 Jerusalem surrenders to Muslim military
711 Muslims invade Spain
717 Caliph Umar II begins first general persecution of nonMuslims
726 John of Damascus leaves public office, enters monastery
732 Charles Martel defeats Muslim armies at Tours (Poitiers)
781 Nestorian Patriarch Timothy I debates Caliph Mahdi
807 Caliph Harun al-Rashid orders destruction of all newer churches
850 Caliph Mutawakkil forces Christians to wear yellow patches
956 Seljuk Turks embrace Islam
988 Prince Vladimir of Kiev adopts Christianity, stopping Islam’s advance into Eastern Europe
1009 Fatimid Caliph Hakim destroys Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem
1025 Muslim raiders level a temple of Shiva in Gujarat, India
1055 Seljuk Turks capture Baghdad, ending a stable Islamic dynasty
1071 Byzantines lose major battle at Manzikert
1091 Seljuk Turks drive Christian priests out of Jerusalem
Crusades
1099 First Crusade recaptures Jerusalem
1118 Military Order of Knights Templar formed to protect Holy Land pilgrims
1147 German knights of Second Crusade suffer major defeat at Dorylaeum, in Asia Minor
1169 Saladin comes to power in Egypt
1187 Saladin’s forces crush crusader army, take Jerusalem
1191 England’s Richard the LionHeart negotiates access to Jerusalem
1204 Fourth Crusade sacks Constantinople, an allied city
1216 Jacques de Vitry named bishop of Acre
1219 Francis of Assisi preaches to Saladin’s nephew
1238 Thomas Aquinas writes Summa Contra Gentiles, an apologetic aimed at Islam
1244 Christian settlers forced out of Jerusalem
1261 Byzantines regain Constantinople
1291 Fall of Acre ends Christian power in Holy Land
Ottoman Rise and Fall
1300 Sultan Osman I founds Ottoman Empire in presentday Turkey
1315 Christian missionary Ramon Llull stoned by Muslim crowd in Algeria
1389 Christian Prince Lazar of Serbia defeated and killed at first Battle of Kosovo
1393 Muslim forces overrun Bulgaria
1453 Ottoman Turks take Constantinople
1492 Spanish capture Grenada, ending Reconquista
1509 Portuguese fleet sinks Muslim fleet in battle near India
1520 Sulaiman the Magnificent comes to power
1529 First Islamic siege of Vienna
1683 Second siege of Vienna
1736 First of many territorial wars with Russia
1854 Ottomans and Russians face off in Crimean War
1878 Ottomans lose Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Bulgaria due to Slavic uprising
1911 Italians win Libya
1915 Turks begin brutal campaign against Armenian Christians
1917 Balfour Declaration, backed by many Western Christians, proposes Jewish homeland
1919 Ottomans lose Syria, Palestine, Arabia, and Mesopotamia in Treaty of Versailles
1924 Kemal Ataturk abolishes caliphate, founds secular Republic of Turkey
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