Exploration & Expansion in the 7th century

56 sourced entries, 600 CE to 698 CE, oldest first. Also see Exploration & Expansion across every century or everything else in the 7th century.

• 600Germanic and Slavic peoples have tremendous population growth, with the Slavs colonizing the Balkan Peninsula.source
• 600The Navigatio Sancti Brendani Abbatis (Voyage of St. Brendan the Abbott) recounts a 7-year trip to a land across the sea by the Irish saint and a band of acolytes about this time.source
• 600The Germanic peoples, due to the more abundant food supply available, use the "moldboard" plow, introduced by the Slavs in Eastern Europe. The plow works the land with horses and oxen.source
• 600Venice continues as an independent realm, having been built up from fishing villages and settled by fugitives.source
• 600The Middle Horizon period starts in the Andes.source
• 600Early settlers from the Marquesas build the Alakoko fishpond and taro fields on Kauai, Hawaii.source
• 600Dorestad, lying in a fork between two branches of the Rhine, is established by the Franks as a trade center.source
• 601The Lombards under King Agilulf expand into Northern Italy, establishing a settlement with the Franks and maintaining intermittent relationships with Rome.source
• 605Amshuvarma becomes king of the Licchavi in Nepal. He is credited for opening trade routes to Tibet. His ruling period is known as the "Golden Period".source
• 608Sui dynasty Emperor Yang of Sui expresses the desire to control routes to the West, leading to two and a half centuries of Chinese military and trading activities in Central Asia.source
• 610Columbanus and Gallus begin their missionary work in Bregenz, near Lake Constance (Switzerland).source
• 610The Volga Bulgaria arises on the territory of modern Russia, being the first civilization in the region to arise from the Early Slavs (approximate date).source
• 615The Slavs under Chatzon attack in longboats along the coasts of Thessaly, western Anatolia, and various Greek islands. They besiege the Byzantine city of Thessaloniki in a combined land and sea attack. The Slavs with their families encamp before the city walls.source
• 615Several of Muhammad's followers begin to emigrate to the Aksumite Empire. They found a small colony there, under the protection of the Christian Ethiopian emperor Așhama ibn Abjar.source
• 620The town of Cholula is founded in central Mexico (later said to be the oldest continuously occupied town in all of North America).source
• 621Islamic tradition says Muhammad visited heaven aboard the winged mount Buraq, in the Isra wal-Miraj, (the Night Journey), from Mecca to Jerusalem, then to heaven from Jerusalem's Temple Mount, then back to Mecca.source
• 622September 9 or June 17 – The Islamic prophet Muhammad secretly leaves his home in Mecca to make the Hijrah (emigrate) to Yathrib (later renamed by him Medina), along with his companion Abu Bakr. They take refuge in the Cave of Thawr south of Mecca for three days, departing on September 13 or June 21.source
• 622The Western Turks conquer the Oxus valley and cooperate with Heraclius against Persia, taking Khorasan (modern Afghanistan).source
• 624Zayd ibn Haritha, the Sahabi and military commander for Muhammad is sent on an expedition to Dhat Irq near Mecca. He then carries out the Al-Qarada raid of a caravan of Meccan merchants after discovering their trade route and captures more that 100,000 dirhams worth of goodssource
• 625King Pulakeshin II of Chalukya receives Persian envoys, who are sent by King Khosrau II at Badami (southern India).source
• 629Summer – Muhammad, Islamic unifies all nomadic tribes of the Arabian Peninsula, converts them to Islam and prepares an expedition against the Jews.source
• 629The Maya military outpost of Dos Pilas (Guatemala) is founded, in order to control trade routes in the Petexbatún region. Bʼalaj Chan Kʼawiil is installed as its leader by his father, K'inich Muwaan Jol II, the ruler of Tikal.source
• 629Xuanzang, Chinese Buddhist monk, sets out for India from the Tang dynasty capital Chang'an on a pilgrimage.source
• 630Yngling King Olof Trätälja founds a colony in Värmland. He is expelled from his native Västergötland (in modern-day Sweden) (according to the Ynglingatal).source
• 630Xuanzang, Chinese Buddhist monk (bhikkhu), travels across the Gobi Desert to Kumul. Following the Tian Shan mountain range of Central Asia westwards, he arrives in Turpan.source
• 631Emperor Tai Zong sends envoys to the Xueyantuo, vassals of the Eastern Turkic Khaganate, bearing gold and silk in order to obtain the release of enslaved Chinese prisoners, who were captured during the transition from the Sui to the Tang dynasty from the northern frontier. The embassy succeeds in freeing 80,000 men and women, who are safely returned to China.source
• 631Xuanzang, Chinese Buddhist monk, crosses the Indus River at Hund and travels to Kashmir ("Heaven on Earth") in northwestern India (approximate date).source
• 632Xuanzang, Chinese traveler, writes about two huge statues of Buddha carved out of a mountainside in the Bamiyan Valley (Afghanistan).source
• 636The city of Basra (modern Iraq) is founded on the Shatt al-Arab, at the head of the Persian Gulf. The port will become a major trading center for commodities from Arabia, India, and Persia.source
• 638Abu Musa al-Asha'ari, companion (sahabah) of Muhammad, establishes Hafar al-Batin, located in the northeastern region of the Arabian Peninsula. He orders the digging for new wells, along this desert route that Muslims travel from Iraq to Mecca for the Hajj (pilgrimage).source
• 640Disibod, Irish monk and hermit, arrives as a missionary in Francia. He begins his religious work in the Vosges and Ardennes.source
• 647Emperor Taizong of the Tang dynasty sends a Chinese mission to study Indian techniques of sugar manufacturing, at Bihar in the Ganges Valley.source
• 649Muawiyah ibn Abi Sufyan, governor of Syria, develops an Arab navy in the Levant and uses it to confront the Byzantine Empire in the Aegean Sea. It is manned by Monophysitise Christian, Coptic and Syrian Christian sailors.source
• 650The Khazar Khaganate extends from the Dnieper to the Caspian Sea, and establishes the city, Itil, as its capital on the shore of the Caspian. Northward it extends to the headwaters of the Volga. Their rulers accept the Jewish religion, apparently to assert their independence from both Muslims and Christians (approximate date).source
• 650According to legend, the Polynesian traveller Ui-te-Rangiora sailed south into the Southern Ocean where they sighted ice floes and icebergs, eventually naming the area Te tai-uka-a-pia.source
• 650Jamaica is settled by the Ostinoid people, ancestors of the Taíno. They were farmers, potters, and villagers with socially complex societies. These people lived near the coast and extensively hunted turtles and fish.source
• 653Emperor Kōtoku sends an embassy to the court of the Tang dynasty in China. Japanese ambassadors, priests and students sail for the capital Chang'an, but some of the ships are lost en route.source
• 655Arab armies conquer Khurasan (Iran), and the Silk Road along Transoxiana (Central Asia).source
• 658The Chinese Buddhist monks Zhi Yu and Zhi You recreate several south-pointing chariots, for the Japanese prince Tenji. This is a 3rd-century device made by Ma Jun, and acts as a mechanical-driven directional-compass vehicle (according to the Nihon Shoki).source
• 658Emperor Constans II undertakes an expedition to the Balkan Peninsula, and defeats the Avars in Macedonia. He temporarily reasserts Byzantine rule, and resettles some of them in Anatolia to fight against the Rashidun Caliphate (approximate date).source
• 660The March of the Slavs, centred north of modern Klagenfurt, preserves independence and is first mentioned in historical sources, known as Carantania (Austria).source
• 662Muslim Conquest: Arab forces of the Umayyad Caliphate resume the push to capture Persian lands, and begin to move towards the lands east and north of the plateau, towards Greater Khorasan (Iran) and the Silk Road along Transoxiana.source
• 663Mount Fuji is estimated to have been first climbed by a monk in this year.source
• 666Chinese Buddhist monks Zhi Yu and Zhi Yuo craft more south-pointing chariot vehicles (a non-magnetic, mechanical-driven directional-compass vehicle that incorporates the use of a differential).source
• 668Asparukh, leader of the Utigurs, leaves the Ongal area to Kotrag, and leads his people into Moesia in Northern Bulgaria (approximate date).source
• 668Chinese troops sent by the Tang dynasty emperor Gao Zong complete their expedition in the Korean Peninsula. Leaders of the expedition have been selected by the emperor's powerful concubine Wu Zetian. The kingdom of Goguryeo is overthrown; the Unified Silla period starts.source
• 668Mezezius, Byzantine general and patrikios ("first patrician"), is proclaimed emperor by the army in Syracuse. Constantine IV organizes an expedition to suppress the military revolt in Sicily.source
• 671Yijing, Chinese Buddhist monk, travels by boat from Guangzhou, and visits the capital of the partly Buddhist kingdom of Srivijaya in Palembang (Indonesia). He stays for 6 months to study Sanskrit grammar and the Malay language.source
• 677The Onogur Bulgars are scattered by the Khazars, who then establish a great Steppe empire, centered on the Lower Volga. The Onogurs depart to the Pannonian Plain.source
• 680The emporium (market town) of Dorestad is founded near the mouth of the Rhine, and soon becomes a major trading settlement in the North Sea region (approximate date).source
• 680The Book of Durrow is created, probably in Northumbria or on the island of Iona in the Scottish Inner Hebrides.source
• 682The wandering ex-Wessex sub-king, Cædwalla, seeks St. Wilfrid as his spiritual father, but does not convert to Christianity.source
• 682The West Saxons, led by King Centwine, drive the Britons of Dumnonia (West Country) to the sea (possibly around Bideford).source
• 684King Ecgfrith of Northumbria sends a punitive expedition to Ireland under his ealdorman Berht, laying waste to the territory of Meath, ruled by High King Fínsnechta Fledach.source
• 697Radbod, king of the Frisians, retreats to the island of Heligoland in the North Sea (approximate date).source
• 698Qapaghan Qaghan conquers parts of Transoxiana (Central Asia).source