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The 1500s

788 sourced entries across 10 years, inside the 16th century. Each year below opens its own page; the lines under it are that year’s highest-ranked entries.

1500 CE87 entries

  • April 22 – Portuguese navigator Pedro Álvares Cabral and his crew on 13 vessels arrive in Brazil, anchoring at Monte Pascoal and naming the country Vera Cruz. Cabral claims the land for the Kingdom of Portugal.
  • August 23 – Francisco de Bobadilla, appointed to replace Admiral Christopher Columbus as Spanish Governor-General of the New World, arrives at Santo Domingo on the island of Hispanola. Bobadilla issues an order directing Christopher and Bartolomeo Columbus to appear before him at Santo Domingo.
  • Although other reports exist, it is thought that the last wolf in England is killed this year, making the species extinct in that country. The wolf is thought to have been killed in Allithwaite, in Cumbria. However, reports of wolf sightings and laws concerning wolf bounties exist in rural areas of the north until the 18th century.

1501 CE92 entries

  • March 25 – Portuguese navigator João da Nova discovers Ascension Island. It is definitely sighted and named on May 20, 1503 (Feast of the Ascension) by Afonso de Albuquerque.
  • December 22 – (1 Jumada al-Thani 907 AH) Ismail I is enthroned as the first Shah of Iran, choosing Tabriz as his capital, founding the Safavid dynasty in northern Iran. He declares Shi'ism the official and compulsory religion, under penalty of death.
  • December 31 – First Battle of Cannanore: João da Nova fleet engaged the fleet of the Zamorin in a battle outside of the Cannanore harbor, the first Portuguese naval battle in the Indian Ocean.

1502 CE71 entries

  • April 14 – The formal coronation of Ivan the Great as Grand Prince of Moscow (encompassing most of the Russian people's territory) to reflect that he is the nation's sole ruler. Ivan had been co-ruler of Moscow from 1449 to 1462, ruler from 1462 to 1471 and 1490 to 1498, and co-ruler with his eldest son (Ivan the Young, 1471-1490) and his grandson, Dmitry Ivanovich from 1498 onward.
  • April – Gerald FitzGerald, later Earl of Kildare, at the age of 15, played the principal role in the funeral ceremony for Henry VII's eldest son Arthur, Prince of Wales in Worcester Cathedral.
  • May 9 – Christopher Columbus leaves Cadiz in Spain for his fourth and final trip to the New World, taking with him 147 men on his flagship, Capitana and the companion ships Gallega, Vizcaína, and Santiago de Palos. He explores Central America, and discovers the Isthmus of Panama and the land now occupied by Honduras, and Costa Rica, and possibly the island of St. Lucia as well

1503 CE84 entries

  • April 2 – The Kingdom of Cochin (ruled by a Portuguese-installed raja, Unni Ramman Koyil II in modern-day India's Kerala state) is invaded by 50,000 Nair troops of the Zamorin of Calicut.
  • May 20 (Feast of the Ascension) – Ascension Island is first definitively sighted, by Portuguese admiral Afonso de Albuquerque.
  • October 1 – Fort Emmanuel is christened at Cochin after Afonso de Albuquerque obtained permission to be able to build it. It is the first European fort in India, in addition to being the first Portuguese fort.

1504 CE80 entries

  • July 3 – The siege of Cochin in India by the invading forces of Calicut ends as the Portuguese and Cochin defenders defeat the invaders. Calicut loses 5,000 dead in battle and another 13,000 to disease, while Cochin and Portugal sustain minimal losses.
  • September 8 – Michelangelo's sculpture of David is unveiled in Florence.
  • December 8 – (approximate date) Islamic scholar Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah issues the Oran fatwa for Muslims in Spain (1 Rajab 910 AH in Islamic calendar, Gregorian date is approximate).

1505 CE81 entries

  • March 25 – Appointed as the Viceroy of Portuguese India by King Manuel I of Portugal, Dom Francisco de Almeida departs from Portugal with an armada of 22 ships and 1,500 men, according to one estimate by João de Barros.
  • July 24 – Travelling to India, a group of Portuguese explorers led by Francisco de Almeida, with 22 ships and 1,500 men, sack the city-state of Kilwa in East Africa, killing the Emir Abraham for failing to pay tribute. Almeida installs Mohammed Ankoni as the new ruler.
  • August 15 – The Portuguese State of India is founded in what is now the state of Kerala, after the Kingdom of Portugal takes over territory of the Bijapur sultanate at Calicut.

1506 CE67 entries

  • January 14 – The classical statue of Laocoön and His Sons is unearthed in Rome. On the recommendation of Giuliano da Sangallo and Michelangelo, Pope Julius II purchases it, and places it on public display in the Vatican a month later.
  • February 9 – Henry, Prince of Wales is made a Knight of the Golden Fleece by Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor.
  • April 19 – The Lisbon Massacre begins in Portugal with three days of violence, in which thousands of Jews are tortured and killed by Catholics.

1507 CE77 entries

  • March 1 – Eleven months after the Lisbon Massacre, King Manuel I of Portugal issues an edict permitting the cristãos-novos ("New Christians", Portuguese Jews who had been forced to convert to Christianity) to freely emigrate from the kingdom.
  • November 26 – Pope Julius II issues a damnatio memoriae forcing the members of the House of Borgia out of control of the Papal States.
  • 21 December – Henry VII arranges a marriage between his younger daughter, Mary Tudor and Habsburg Archduke Charles.

1508 CE68 entries

  • March 13 – The oldest annual foot race in Europe, the "Red Hose Race", is run for the first time, taking place in Scotland at Carnwath, Lanarkshire.
  • May 8 – Italian renaissance artist Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni of Florence signs a contract with the Vatican to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling, in return for a promised fee of 3,000 gold ducats (equivalent in 2023 to more than U.S. $600,000).
  • December – Michelangelo begins painting the Sistine Chapel ceiling in the Holy See of Rome, on a commission by Pope Julius II (signed May 10).

1509 CE81 entries

  • April 15 – The French army under the command of Louis XII leave Milan to invade Venetian territory. Part of the War of the League of Cambrai and the Italian Wars.
  • June 11 – Luca Pacioli's De divina proportione, concerning the golden ratio, is published in Venice, with illustrations by Leonardo da Vinci.
  • September 11 – Portuguese fidalgo Diogo Lopes de Sequeira becomes the first European to reach Malacca, having crossed the Gulf of Bengal.