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Portugal. Vasco da Gama has just returned from his first mission to India, and sets sail on a second, but gigantic, mission to the Indies. Old Diaz also embarks, sadly to his death. Thirteen ships with 1,500 men set sail. The profit prospects for pepper,

30,000 titles have already been published with the Gutenberg press.

The Portuguese Pedro Alvares Cabral reaches Brazil in today’s Porto Seguro, then, having resumed his route towards the south-east, he lands in Calicut and Cochin

Until the 15th century, the human species lived on several self-contained islands. Only in the 15th century did it begin to expand on a truly global scale. The first to do so were the Europeans from the western shore of the continent: the Spanish, Portuguese,

The Portuguese established the slave trade between Benin and the Americas. In reality, when they arrived, they found a fully functioning slave market, run by the Arabs since the 2nd century AD.

England. The country converts to coal for home heating, abandoning wood, which had by then decimated the forests, coupled with demand from the Royal Navy.

Venice. In the Republic’s economic budget (excluding Cyprus and the recent acquisitions of Polesine, Cervia, Cremona, and Puglia), presented using double-entry accounting, income and expenditure amount to 1,150,000 gold ducats, of which 230,000 are sales taxes, 100,000 are salt sales, 330,000 are mainland cities, 200,000

The future Western powers (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) controlled just 10% of the earth’s surface and 16% of the population. By 1913, they would control 60% of the land and population and

Portuguese Vasco da Gama returns to Portugal after his first trip to India.

The Turks occupy the Venetian strongholds of Modone and Corone. The two islands were considered Venice’s eyes to the East. Then the Turks invade Dalmatia and plunder Friuli, and once again the smoke from the fires can be seen from the top of St. Mark’s

Girolamo Savonarola was excommunicated by Pope Alexander VI, and the following year he was hanged and burned at the stake as a “heretic, schismatic, and for preaching new things.” His works were placed on the Index of Prohibited Books in 1559. Savonarola’s writings were rehabilitated

John Cabot, on his ship Matthew (named after his wife Mattea), with a crew of only 18 men, including two merchants from Bristol, crossed the Atlantic in 35 days and landed in Newfoundland. Here he planted the English flag, the papal flag, and that of

Vasco de Gama circumnavigates Africa

John Cabot made the first attempt to cross the Atlantic, setting sail from Bristol. This would have been the most convenient route for the English.

The first of the ten gurus of Sikhism becomes a guru. Sri Guru Nanak Dev ji founded Sikhism and, traveling thousands of miles, preached meditation on the name of the Creator. The religion developed and evolved during times of religious persecution, gaining converts from both

In Northern Europe, an indoor version of croquet spread, played on a green mat to simulate grass. It was called billiards.

Leonardo da Vinci completed the painting “The Beautiful Princess.” Five centuries later, the portrait, unknown to its author, was auctioned in 1998 for $18,000 at Christie’s in Manhattan, New York. It sold for $21,850. Collector Peter Silvermann was unable to secure the work, which he

Venice conquers Otranto and Brindisi in Puglia.

Portugal. King John II dies, and, due to a series of incredible circumstances, the throne passes to a close relative, Emmanuel I, known for this reason as “the Fortunate.” With him, the Portuguese will arrive in Goa, India, in 1498, with Vasco da Gama.

Pisa becomes independent and a free republic. The Florentines fail to breach Pisa’s walls, nor even block its trade, as the Arno River provides access to the sea. Columbus has just returned from the Americas, and a few years later, Amerigo Vespucci will also return

Charles VIII of France invades Florence. After Lorenzo de’ Medici’s death two years earlier, Girolamo Savonarola establishes himself as the city’s civil and religious authority, effectively abolishing pagan liberties and reinstating a narrow-minded religious culture.

Francis I: King of France from 1515. Leonardo da Vinci’s last employer.

A document that speaks of an essence distilled in Scotland, bears the signature of King George IV and is believed by many to be the first official document to mention whisky.

Christopher Columbus’s second expedition, toward what he believed to be the eastern reaches of the Indies, set out with 17 ships and more than a thousand men. It marked the beginning of a true colonization, and in just two years led to the Treaty of

Francesco Melzi: he went to work and live with Leonardo da Vinci in 1507, and became practically his surrogate son

Christopher Columbus was probably the first European to see someone smoking. These were the local Native Americans, who smoked tobacco in doses vastly greater than those used in modern cigarettes. It put them into a trance-like state, and was used for this purpose by witch

Columbus reaches the New World. Italian explorer Christopher Columbus sights an island in the Bahamas and believes he has reached East Asia. That same day, the expedition lands and claims the land for Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon, who had sponsored his attempt

The rulers of unified Spain, Ferdinand and Isabella, issued an edict expelling all Jews from the country. Jews had already been living in separate ghettos since at least 1480, to prevent their mixing with the rest of the population. Since France and England were also

The smallpox epidemic among the Indian kingdoms of the Mississippi Plains (present-day Midwest) predates the physical arrival of Europeans by several years, as the germs were brought into the interior by Indian traders. By the time Europeans arrived, the kingdoms had disappeared or were in

Smallpox epidemic among the Indian kingdoms of the Mississippi Plains (present-day Midwest), caused by the arrival of the Spanish along the coast. Note that the epidemic preceded the physical arrival of Europeans by several years, as the germs were brought inland by Indian traders. This

Teide volcano in the Canary Islands has erupted.

Copernicus enrolls at the University of Krakow

Cyprus becomes a Venetian possession

Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon free Spain and Portugal from the Arabs

Pico della Mirandola devoted to the church published the Heptaplus and the De Ente et Uno; increasingly inflamed with mysticism, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola drew closer to Savonarola, who practically became his spiritual advisor.

Christopher Columbus asked the Spanish court for three ships to allow him to reach the Indies by sailing directly west. As he had done three years earlier with the Portuguese king, he was denied. He succeeded only after years of persuasion, and everything suggests that

Bartholomeus Dias rounds the Cape of Good Hope during a storm

Epidemics of “English sweating sickness” are raging in Europe. The disease will eventually disappear completely, long before modern medicine can diagnose it.

Italy. After the death of Muhammad, the Ottoman Empire temporarily ceased to pose a threat, and the Italian states began to squabble again. Venice attacked Ferrara, later supported by Milan and Florence. Initially, it achieved resounding successes, but then the Pope, alarmed, ordered Venice to

Diogo Cao (Portugal) discovers the mouth of the Congo River

After the death of Alfonso V, King of Portugal, his explorers’ southward push continued at a frantic pace of 170 km per year for 46 years. But from then on, it increased to 790 km per year, and in just seven years, under King John

Otranto. The Ottoman occupation of the city ends with nothing achieved. The contenders, with their discord and their war dramas, were merely a mediocre, colorless, and at times miserable backdrop to the apotheosis of a disease that rose to power: the plague, the absolute master

Otranto. After the first diplomatic contacts between the besieged Ottomans and the besieging Aragonese, a Turkish ship sets sail from Otranto for Albania to verify the unconfirmed rumors of the sultan’s death. The rumors are confirmed. The mission returns to Otranto with this certainty: it

Otranto. The assault on the walls of Ottoman Otranto is launched. The Hungarians rush up the ramp enthusiastically, chanting their typical martial songs. The quickest to climb (winning the 500 ducats promised by the Duke of Calabria) is Galeazzo Caracciolo. A furious melee ensues. However,

Otranto. Some Turkish embassies, seeing the Ottomans’ fading interest in holding Otranto, travel to Venice to propose to the Serenissima to occupy Otranto. The deal was extremely attractive to the Doge, as it would have avoided the much-feared siege in the Adriatic Sea. However, it

Otranto. An army of Hungarian mercenaries, composed of 300 knights, 400 infantry, 5 captains, and a robust artillery, was stationed outside the walls of the city, still in Ottoman hands. The Hungarians had been fighting the Ottomans for decades, to counter their advance into the

Leonardo da Vinci designs the parachute

Agreement between the Doge (Venice) and the Papacy (Rome).

The maritime Duchy of Leonardo III Tocco, including the Ionian islands of Santa Maura (Levkas), Cephalonia, Ithaca, Zakynthos, was swept away by the Turkish army, led by Ahmed Pasha “the Toothless”, with the scientific application of the psychological terrorism already used against the Genoese and

Giuliano de Medici: son of Lorenzo, brother of Pope Leo X. He was Leonardo da Vinci’s employer in Rome

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s mother dies and he considers himself free from what is truly dear to him: philosophy, the knowledge of the absolute; from this moment on he goes first to Ferrara (1479-80) then to the University of Padua (1481-82) and at this point

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola goes to Bologna to study canon law

Leonardo da Vinci opens his own shop, essentially starting his own business. It’s a complete failure: in five years, he receives only three commissions, one of which he never even starts, and the other two he fails to complete.

Vlad III, known as Dracula, of the Draculesti family, is killed in battle. The Serenissima (Venice) also sues the Porte (Istanbul) for peace, leaving no further obstacles to Ottoman expansion westward into Europe.

Pope Leo X, Giovanni de Medici. Son of Lorenzo de Medici, elected pope in 1513.

Crimea. After concluding a six-month peace with the Venetians, Ahmed Pasha “the Toothless,” on behalf of the Ottoman Emperor Mehmet II, captures Caffa from the Genoese. The inhabitants are massacred, with a deliberate terrorist effect, which also leads to the surrender of Cembalo and Soldaia

Apogee of the Inca Empire.

Thousands of Ottoman raiders on horseback set fire to villages around Venice.

Venice. Nicola Jensen and Giovanni da Spira publish the first edition using letterpress printing. They take four months to print just one hundred copies of Cicero’s letters. In the second edition, they print 600 copies at the same time. The paper is not made in

Da Canal was held responsible for the Venetian defeat against the Turks at Negroponte by failing to attack in time and instead dropping anchor. Upon his return to his homeland, he was imprisoned and succeeded by Pietro Mocenigo, who carried out raids throughout the Aegean,

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola is born

Louis XII: King of France, conquers Milan in 1499

Mehmet II the Conqueror gathers 80,000 men to wage war on the Wallachians. Led by Vlad (later known as the Impaler), they take cover in the impenetrable Wallachian forests and empty and burn towns and villages, later carrying out guerrilla warfare and sudden attacks. Vlad

Muslims conquer Athens where Mehmet II transforms all the churches and ancient buildings into mosques

Peace of Lodi. An alliance of the five main states of the Italian peninsula was formed: Naples, the Papal States, Florence, Milan, and Venice, with the declared goal of defending Italy from the Turks. For about forty years, Italy truly enjoyed peace, a rare occurrence

Hunyadi routs Firus Bey’s Turks near Szendro

Trade agreement between the Venetians and the Ottomans. In the agreement with the Grand Turk, Venetian merchants maintained access to trade in the East, subject to the payment of an annual tax. The agreement was made possible by Ambassador Extraordinary Lorenzo Moro.

Conquest of Constantinople by the Ottomans (a Turkish tribe driven out by the Mongols). The Byzantine Empire (Eastern Roman Empire) ends. The great and mighty Roman walls of Constantinople, which had protected the city for a thousand years, are demolished by the enormous siege guns

During the siege of Constantinople, stone balls weighing 180 kg and up to 270 kg were hurled from the 60-meter-high tower on the Bosphorus built by Mehmet II onto the few Venetian ships that had dared to break the blockade to exit the Black Sea

First use of cannon in Europe: in the Hundred Years’ War and the siege of Constantinople

In 1452 Borso d’Este (1413-1471) received the title of Duke of Modena and Reggio from Emperor Frederick III and in 1471 the title of Duke of Ferrara from Pope Paul II.

Ludovico Sforza: de facto governor of Milan from 1481 to 1499. Employer of Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci theorizes the airplane, the helicopter, the parachute, and builds tanks and defensive structures. He studies anatomy, physiology, hydraulics, geology.

Piero da Vinci marries Albiera. Piero is the father of Leonardo da Vinci, who was born to Caterina, who Piero marries to Antonio di Piero, known as Accattabriga.

The Muslims overwhelm the Christians in the Battle of Varna and secure possession of Wallachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, and present-day Romania and Bulgaria. This is one of those moments in history where very little is needed to change everything. Without the treachery of a few Genoese

Until 2023, the earliest known appearance of the decimal point was in the interpolation column of a table of trigonometric sines in Christopher Clavius’s Astrolabium (1593). This is a curious place to introduce such a significant new idea, and the fact that Clavius never exploited

Venice introduced, as a common practice, a regular exchange of diplomats with other states for the first time in Italy and Europe. This practice greatly benefited the diplomatic and commercial skills of the Venetians, as well as the culture of the Republic’s citizens. It gradually

Hungarian warrior Hunyadi stands out in the battle against the Turks in Belgrade

Caterina Lippi: an orphan working in the countryside near Vinci, Tuscany, mother of Leonardo da Vinci. She later married Antonio di Piero del Vacha, known as Accattabriga.

Florence. Brunelleschi completes the Duomo’s famous dome: an innovative architectural concept completed with 37,000 tons of material in 4 million bricks.