The 6th century

1,710 sourced entries across 100 documented years, grouped into 10 decades. A century here runs 1900–1999 rather than 1901–2000, so its decades sit inside it exactly.

Decades

By subject

A few of the years

  • 500Approximate year of the invention of the bee skep in Ireland.
  • 512The first written text in the Arabic alphabet is recorded at Zabad (Syria).
  • 524May 1 – King Sigismund of Burgundy is executed at Orléans after an 8-year reign, and is succeeded by his brother Godomar. He rallies the Burgundian army and begins plundering Frankish territory.
  • 538March 12 – Siege of Rome: King Vitiges of the Ostrogoths ends his siege (after 374 days) and abandons Rome. He retreats with his Gothic army northeast along the Via Flaminia.
  • 552July 11 – First year of the Armenian calendar.
  • 564August 22 – Columba reports seeing the Loch Ness Monster at the River Ness (according to the "Life of St. Columba").
  • 576The Göktürks under Tardu cross the Cimmerian Bosporus into the Crimea, and besiege the city of Panticapaeum (Ukraine).
  • 588First Perso-Turkic War: A Persian army (12,000 men) under Bahrām Chobin, supported by Cataphracts (heavy cavalry), ambush the invading Turks, and win a great victory at the Battle of the Hyrcanian Rock.