Events and ideas: 1800-1900
* EVENTS 1837 Victoria becomes Queen of United Kingdom 1840 Penny post founded 1846 Potato blight leads to Irish Famine 1850 Alfred, Lord Tennyson succeeds William Wordsworth as poet laureate (right...
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1,000 years of intellectual history
Ancient texts reintroduced to Europe through Moorish Spain 1,000 years ago triggered an intellectual odyssey in the West that has transformed our world. Starting as a trickle, with the logical,...
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Towards a rebirth
A thousand years ago western civilisation stood at a low ebb, with much knowledge lying neglected in the libraries of remote monasteries or in Arab archives. Anthony Kenny charts the resurgence in...
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The erosion of astrology
Astrology was first a scientific subject, rather than a superstition. It arose from the application by the Ancient Greeks of philosophical and scientific structure to data first collected by the...
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Knowledge equals power
The revisiting of classical texts in 15th-century Europe made a humanist education essential for the elite. But in the 17th century, as technology became crucial to individual and national prosperity...
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The witch persecution
Between 1450 and 1750, about 100,000 people were accused of witchcraft in Europe. Of these, about 40,000 were executed. The period of the persecution began with witchcraft being defined as a crime in...
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Events and ideas: 1345-1500
* EVENTS 1348 Black Death (below) arrives in Europe, ultimately killing much of the population. 1378 Great Schism begins with rival popes in Avignon and Rome 1381 Poll tax sparks English Peasants...
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Events and ideas: 1500-1600
* EVENTS 1504 Leonardo paints Mona Lisa 1506 St Peter's basilica begun in Rome (right) 1509 Michelangelo takes three years to paint ceiling of Sistine Chapel 1517 Martin Luther defies the pope with...
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Events and ideas: 1600-1700
* EVENTS 1605 Guy Fawkes arrested as Gunpowder Plot fails (right) 1609 Galileo uses first complete telescope 1618 Pan-European Thirty Years' War begins 1620 Pilgrim Fathers set sail in Mayflower for...
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Events and ideas: 1900-2000
* EVENTS 1901 Queen Victoria dies 1914 First world war breaks out 1917 October revolution in Russia leads to communism 1919 Treaty of Versailles brings peace between Germany and the Allies 1929 Stock...
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Costed recommendations
Year 1 Cash Longer Term Cash Costs and Resource (Pounds m) Costs (Pounds m) Further education Recommendation 6 Increase bursary entitlement of further education students 15 15 Recommendation 25...
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Let there be Newton
While some pundits doubt whether the 17th-century revolution in science took place, advances in knowledge were undeniably made. Robert Fox surveys an epoch of change, from Galileo's vision of a...
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An optical illusion
Was the 18th century just a dull trough, when dwarves were perched on the shoulders of the giants of the 17th century's scientific revolution? Far from it, argues Roy Porter, it is our history of the...
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All together
In the popular imagination, the Romantics stand in solitary contemplation of an unknowable universe. But, argues Richard Holmes, Wordsworth was not lonely as a cloud - collaboration was central to...
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Utterances on utopianism
The form of debate used by the Enlightenment that seems most remote from us, namely utopianism, in fact, has a great deal to offer in the post-millennium era. How were scientific and technological...