Timeline |
|
1802 |
Napoleon becomes first consul for life in France |
1804 |
Napoleon crowns himself emperor of France |
1814 |
The Congress of Vienna creates the Concert of Europe |
1815 |
Napoleon defeated at Waterloo |
1830 |
July Ordinances in France are followed by a revolution, which forces Charles X to abdicate |
1839-1842 |
Opium War: British defeat Chinese, opening China to the West |
1848 |
Year of revolution in Europe |
June 1848 |
“June Days,” Revolutionaries are beaten by the army in Paris |
December 1848 |
Louis Napoleon is elected president of the Second Republic in France |
1848 |
Karl Marx publishes the Communist Manifesto |
1851 |
Louis Napoleon overthrows the Second Republic in France, becomes Napoleon III |
1853 |
U.S. naval forces open Japan to the West |
1857 |
Sepoy Rebellion: Britain replaces East India Company and governs India directly |
1864 |
Marx founds the First International Working Men’s Association |
1866 |
Italian unification is mostly complete (Rome added in 1870) |
1866 |
Austro-Prussian War, victorious Prussia organizes the North German Confederation |
1867 |
Second Reform Bill passed in Britain, doubling the electorate |
1869 |
Suez Canal opened |
1870-1871 |
Franco-Prussian War |
18 January 1871 |
German Unification is complete; Second Reich proclaimed |
1876 |
Stanley sets up posts in the Congo for Leopold II of Belgium |
1881 |
Tsar Alexander II assassinated in Russia |
1882 |
Britain occupies Egypt |
1884 |
Berlin Conference sets up guidelines for Africa |
1884 |
Reform Bill in Britain grants vote to nearly all English men |
1889 |
Second International Working Men’s Association founded |
1903-1905 |
Russo-Japanese War; victorious Japanese a modern power |
28 June 1914 |
Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria assassinated at Sarajevo |
4 August 1914 |
Germany invades Belgium |
August 1914 |
Russians invade East Prussia and are defeated by Germans at Tannenberg |
September 1914 |
First Battle of Marne saves Paris |
February 1916 |
Germans fail to capture fortress town of Verdun |
July-November 1916 |
Battle of the Somme |
March 1917 |
Tsarist regime overthrown in Russia |
6 April 1917 |
United States declares war on Germany |
November 1917 |
Bolsheviks, led by Lenin, take control of Russia |
March 1918 |
Russia signs Treaty of Brest—Litovsk, withdraws from the war |
March-June 1918 |
Germans launch last great offensive, advance to within 56 miles of Paris |
8 August 1918 |
British victory at Amiens |
11 November 1918 |
Germany signs armistice, ending World War I |
January 1919 |
Paris Peace Conference |
28 June 1919 |
Germany signs Treaty of Paris |
1921-1928 |
New Economic Plan in Russia |
1922 |
Mussolini and fascists rise to power in Italy |
1924 |
Lenin dies, succeeded by Stalin |
1928 |
First of Stalin’s five-year plans begins rapid industrialization of Russia |
1929 |
Collectivization of agriculture in Russia |
1933 |
Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany |
1936-1939 |
Spanish Civil War |
March 1938 |
Germany annexes Austria |
September 1938 |
Munich Agreement; Hitler allowed to annex Sudetenland |
March 1939 |
Germany invades Czechoslovakia |
September 1939 |
Germany invades Poland, World War II begins |
22 June 1940 |
France surrenders |
August-September 1940 |
Battle of Britain |
June 1941 |
Germany launches offensive against the Soviet Union |
7 December 1941 |
Japan attacks Pearl Harbor; United States enters the war |
1941-1945 |
Holocaust; Nazi regime murders six million Jews |
1942 |
Tide of battle turns in Allies’ favor |
September 1943 |
Italy surrenders |
6 June 1944 |
D-Day, Allies land at Normandy |
August 1944 |
Paris is liberated |
January 1945 |
Soviet troops invade Germany |
March-April 1945 |
Allies penetrate Germany |
7 May 1945 |
Germany surrenders |
August 1945 |
United States drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki; Japan surrenders |
1947 |
Cold War begins; Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan inaugurated |
1949 |
NATO founded; Soviet Union acquires atomic bomb |
1957 |
European Economic Community founded |
1961 |
Berlin Wall built |
1968 |
Prague Spring |
1985 |
Gorbachev becomes leader of the Soviet Union |
1988 |
Communist dictatorship in Poland ends |
1989 |
Year of revolution in Europe; communist regimes ousted in Eastern Europe |
Key Comparisons
1. Industrialization in Great Britain and on the Continent of Europe
2. The development of mass politics in Great Britain and on the Continent of Europe
3. The unification of Italy and the unification of Germany
4. German aspirations in World Wars I and II
5. The nature of war in World Wars I and II
6. Economic and political developments in Western and Eastern Europe after World War II
Thematic Change/Continuity
Economic changes
The Second Industrial Revolution and growth of the middle class The creation and expansion of the British Empire
The rise of the United States and the Soviet Union as the dominant economic forces after World War II
Integration of the European economy
Economic continuities
British leadership maintained (until World War II)
Social/cultural changes
Death of the belief in progress in European culture
Rise and spread of globalization
Social/cultural continuities
Antisemitism
Political changes
Development of mass politics
Rise of extreme nationalism
Creation of the Soviet Union and the Iron Curtain
Dominance of the United States and Soviet Union after World War II
Political continuities
Western European leadership in progress towards democratization