| THE SECOND MILLENIA |
| AD 1000 -- AD 2000 |
1000 A.D. -- 1100 A.D.
Early 1000's
| A series of roads is built by Native Americans to connect towns in and around what is now Chaco Canyon, NM. Built by clearing rubble, the roads sometimes have paved surfaces and curbs. Some are 30 feet wide and often completely straight, sometimes scaling cliff faces with stairways cut into the rock. |
1000 A.D.
| Inhabitants of Easter Island begin erecting stones. |
| Heroic poem "Beowulf" is written in Old English.
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| Christianity reaches Iceland and Greenland
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| Spiritual center of Judaism switches from Mesopotamia to Spain
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| Maya civilization in Yucatan Peninsula is at its climax.
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| Leif Ericson, son of Eric the Red, reportedly discovers America (Nova Scotia)
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| Indian mathematician, Sridhara recognizes the importance of the zero.
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| Chinese perfect gunpowder invention, made of charcoal, sulfur, and potassium nitrate.
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"Click here for the story of Little Lizard" (1021)
1050
| Stormy lakes of East Africa inspire fisherman around Lake Victoria (the largest lake in Africa) to develop double-ended canoes with no prow or stern powered by up to 20 seated paddlers. |
"Click HERE for the story of Benedict IX -- The Boy Pope" (1047)
1000 -- 1050
| In the era of Song China, where women's work was needed less than in the countryside, foot-binding (the wrapping of young girl's feet with cloth bandages to keep them small) is introduced.. |
1004
| Japanese scribe Murasaki Shikibu pens "The Tale of Genji" -- the First Novel. |
1006 -- 1007
| The most spectacular example of funerary towers popular in Iran during the 11th and 12th Centuries is the 167 foot high Gubad -i-Qabus in northeastern Iran, built of brick in a star-shaped design. |
1027
| William the Conqueror is born. |
1040
| Duncan of Scotland is murdered by MacBeth, who becomes King. |
1041 -- 1048
| Bi Sheng devises earliest movable type for printing in China. The clay characters are reusable, but the effort is painstaking. |
1042
| Pope Urban II, whose call for a Christian war to recapture the Holy Land from the Muslims sets off the FIRST of the Crusades, in 1095, was born. |
1046
| Reform Papacy begins. |
1050
| Arabs bring the Decimal System to Spain. (System we still use in America.) |
1050's
| Cahokia, with a population of about 10,000, is the largest of the towns in the Mississippi Valley, in central North America. In the southwest, Chaco Canyon pueblos reach their peak before declining in the mid-12th Century. |
1054
| Beginning of split between the Roman and Eastern Orthodox Churches. |
1057
| MacBeth is murdered by Malcolm. (What comes around goes around.) |
1066
| Duke William of Normandy, with only a few thousand troops behnd him, crosses the English Channel to eventually conquer England, and become King. This was the last time England was conquered by a foreign force. |
| Appearance of a comet, later named Halley's Comet was first observed.
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1086
| Chinese scientist Shen Kua gives account of magnetic compass for navigation. |
