This timeline includes every date in the Artefact textbook.
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8,000 - 3,000 BC Mesolithic (Middle Stone) Age.
7,000 BC People first came to Mount Sandel in Co. Derry.
3,500 BC First farmers in Ireland.
2,300 BC First use of metal in Ireland.
753 BC Rome was founded by Romulus and Remus.
509 BC Rome is declared a republic (it had been a kingdom since its foundation).
270 BC The Roman Republic finally conquers all of the Italian peninsula.
500 BC Iron replaced bronze and the Celts arrived in Ireland.
71 BC A slave rebellion against Roman rule is organised by Spartacus.
45 BC Julius Caesar introduces a new calendar which lasts unaltered until 1582.
1 AD Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem.
33 AD Christ is executed on a cross at Calvary.
312 AD Emperor Constantine lifts the ban on Christianity in the Roman Empire.
431 Bishop Palladius was sent to Ireland.
432 St. Patrick begins his work in Ireland. St. Patrick died in 461.
476 The Roman Empire collapses.
500 St. Enda founded the first Irish monastery on Inis Mor.
The Dark Ages begins in Europe following the collapse of the Roman Empire.
650 Work began on the Book of Durrow.
795 The first recorded Viking attacks on Ireland take place.
800 Approximate date for the Book of Kells.
841 First Viking settlement founded on the south bank of the Liffey (Dublin).
1014 Gaelic clans under High King Brian Boru fought a Viking army under Sitric Silkenbeard at the Battle of Clontarf.
1028 First Viking bishop of Dublin was appointed.
1066 William of Normandy defeated Harold, Earl of Hereford at the Battle of Hastings. William the Conqueror was crowned king on Christmas Day, 1066.
1167 Dermot MacMurrough is stripped of his kingdom by Rory O'Connor.
1169 MacMurrough invaded Ireland with a force of 40 knights, 360 archers and 500 foot soldiers.
1171 MacMurrough died and Strongbow became King of Leinster. Henry II invaded in September fearing Strongbow had become too powerful.
1172 Christ Church Cathedral was built (finished in 1191).
1190 Dublin devastated by fire.
1224 A conduit was built to bring fresh water into Dublin.
1305 Watchmen appointed to patrol streets of Dublin to deal with the city's waste.
1320 University established at St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin.
1347 The Black Death hits Europe killing approximately 25 million people in three years.
1348 Black Death ravaged Dublin. A three-day quarantine was enforced on anyone entering the city. Mass burials took place in the Blackpitts area.
1389 Cosimo de Medici is born. He died in 1464.
1449 Lorenzo de Medici was born. He died in 1492.
1450 Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press.
1451 Christopher Columbus was born in Genoa, Italy. He died in 1506.
1452 Leonardo da Vinci is born.
1453 The Fall of Constantinople occurred in May.
1475 Michelangelo was born near Florence. He died in 1564.
1482 Leonardo da Vinci goes to work for the Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza.
1483 Martin Luther was born in Saxony, Germany. He died in 1546.
1492 Christopher Columbus reached the Americas.
1494 Pope Alexander VI forced Spain and Portugal to sign the Treaty of Tordesillas which divided the New World between them.
1496 Michelangelo moved to Rome following the death of Lorenzo de Medici.
1497 Vasco da Gama continued up the east African coast and reached Calicut in India. John Cabot landed in Newfoundland, Canada and claimed it for the English king, Henry VII.
1499 Leonardo da Vinci returns to Florence where he paints the Mona Lisa.
Columbus is removed as Governor of the Spanish colonies in the New World following complaints about his treatment of the natives.
1501 Michelangelo returns to Florence after winning a competition to carve the David statue from a block of marble. He beat Leonardo da Vinci in that competition.
1502 Henry Tudor (later Henry VIII) marries Catherine of Aragon, the widow of his older brother Arthur.
1508 Michelangelo began work on the Sistine Chapel, commissioned by Pope Julius II.
1509 Henry VIII became king of England following the death of his father, Henry VII. He reigned until 1547.
1514 Andreas Vesalius is born. He wrote On the Fabric of the Human Body. He died in 1564 (same year as Michelangelo).
1516 Leonardo da Vinci moves to France at the invitation of King Francis I.
1517 Johann Tetzel arrived in Wittenberg selling indulgences prompting the Reformation.
1519 Leonardo da Vinci dies.
Ferdinand Magellan set out to prove the world was round. His voyage lasted three years (although he didn't survive) until 1522.
There were approximately 489 cities in the Aztec Empire by this year. Hernan Cortes landed with 11 ships and 500 soldiers ultimately leading to the destruction of the Aztec Empire.
1521 Martin Luther is excommunicated. He was summoned to the Diet of Worms this year also.
1528 Francisco Pizarro is granted a commission to conquer the Incas by King Charles I of Spain.
1531 Ulrich Zwingli launched the Reformation in Switzerland.
1532 Francisco Pizarro invaded the Incan Empire with only 180 men and 27 horses.
1533 Henry VIII breaks with the Church of Rome to marry his second wife, Anne Boelyn.
1534 Henry VIII established the Church of England with himself as supreme head following the Act of Supremacy.
Ignatius Loyola founded the Society of Jesus (Jesuits).
The Fitzgerald Rebellion under the leadership of Silken Thomas (son of the Lord Deputy) takes place in Ireland.
1536 Henry VIII closed down all monasteries and nunneries and confiscated all land and property held by the Catholic Church under the Act of Dissolution.
1537 King Christian III established Lutheranism as the official religion of Norway and Denmark.
1541 Jean Calvin was invited to Geneva to establish the Presbyterian Religion.
1545 The Council of Trent first met to address the abuses in the Catholic Church. It continued its work until 1563.
1547 Edward VI succeeds (his father) Henry VIII as king of England.
1553 Mary becomes queen of England following the untimely death of her brother, Edward VI.
1555 The Peace of Augsburg was signed which allowed the ruler of each state to decide the religion of the state.
1558 Elizabeth I succeeds her older sister Mary as queen of England. She reigned for 45 years until 1603.
1564 Galileo was born in Pisa. He died in 1642.
1568 The Dutch began fighting for independence from the Spanish. This conflict lasted until 1648.
1569 The first Desmond Rebellion led by James Fitzmaurice Fitzgerald takes place in Munster.
1571 The Netherlands becomes Protestant.
1572 John Knox introduces Presbyterianism to Scotland.
1578 William Harvey is born. He discovered that the heart pumps blood around the body. He died in 1657.
1579 The second Desmond Rebellion, again led by James Fitzmaurice Fitzgerald, takes place in Munster with the aid of troops sent by Pope Gregory XIII. It was finally defeated in 1583.
1585 The Anglo-Spanish War started. It lasted until 1604.
1588 The Spanish Armada saw the attempted invasion of England by Spain. It failed.
1594 Beginning of the Nine-Years War in Ulster. It ended in 1603.
1601 King Philip II of Spain sent 4,000 troops to Kinsale, Co. Cork to assist Hugh O'Neill during the Nine-Years War.
1603 The Treaty of Mellifont was signed by the Ulster Gaelic clans and the English Crown ending the Nine-Years War.
Queen Elizabeth I died and was succeeded by her cousin James I.
1605 From c.25 million, the population of South America has fallen to c.3 million as a consequence of colonisation by European conquistadores.
1607 The Flight of the Earls takes place where Hugh O'Neill and other Ulster chiefs left Ulster for Europe.
1609 Beginning of the Ulster Plantation.
1610 Galileo publishes The Starry Messenger which was a study of the planets.
1618 The Thirty-Years War breaks out in the Holy Roman Empire between Catholic and Protestant states. It ended in 1648.
1632 Galileo published Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems which supported Copernicus' book called On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres.
1641 Rebellion in Ulster when thousands of Protestants were massacred.
1642 Abel Tasman was the first European to discover Tasmania and New Zealand.
1648 The Peace of Westphalia was signed bringing to an end the Thirty-Years War. It reinforced the Peace of Augsburg, 1555.
1690 King William III defeated King James II at the Battle of the Boyne.
1732 George Washington was born in Virginia. He died in 1799.
1756 Beginning of the Seven Years' War between Britain and France which was fought in America. It ended in 1763.
1759 George Washington married Martha Dandridge.
1763 Theobald Wolfe Tone was born in Dublin. He died in 1798.
1765 The Stamp Act and Quartering Act passed the British government. The Stamp Act was withdrawn in 1766.
1767 Townshend Acts imposed on the American colonies which placed taxes on tea, glass, paint and lead.
1770 A Boston mob protesting the Townshend Act was faced down by British soldiers resulting in five deaths in the so-called Boston Massacre.
1773 In December the Sons of Liberty, dressed as Native Americans, dumped 342 crates of East India Company tea into Boston Harbour in an event known as the Boston Tea Party.
1774 The First Continental Congress met in September.
1775 In April, General Gage sent 800 troops to seize weapons at Concord, near Boston. This prompted the ride of Paul Revere who warned the Americans that the British were coming.
Daniel O'Connell was born in Co. Kerry. He died in 1847.
1776 On July 4th, the Second Continental Congress issued the Declaration of Independence. They had already chosen George Washington to be commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. Washington suffered military defeat at New York, but was successful at Princeton and Trenton.
1777 General Howe's British forces of 18,000 men captured Philadelphia, home of the Continental Congress. A month later, the American General Gates defeated 8,000 British troops at Saratoga. Following his defeat at Philadelphia, Washington established a base at Valley Forge during the winter of 1777/1778.
1778 The French sent 6,000 troops and weapons to America to disrupt British supply lines.
1781 Lord Cornwallis and his 7,000 British troops were surrounded by 9,000 American and 5,000 French troops at the decisive Battle of Yorktown. Cornwallis surrendered to Washington.
1783 The Treaty of Paris was signed by the British and Americans ending the War of Independence.
1789 George Washington is elected first US President. He served two terms.
On May 5th, the French Estates General met for the first time since 1614. Six weeks later, the Third Estate formed the National Assembly and swore the Tennis Court Oath promising to stay together until a constitution for France was drawn up. On July 14th, the Bastille was stormed. In October, the royal family were forced from Versailled to the Tuileries Palace in Paris.
1791 In June Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette fled to Paris but were caught at Varennes.
Wolfe Tone wrote An Argument on Behalf of the Catholics of Ireland.
1792 The French National Assembly declared war on Austria. Also in January, the Society of United Irishmen began publishing The Northern Star. In September, the new National Convention declared France a republic.
1793 In January, Louis XVI was executed. Marie Antoinette suffered a similar fate nine months later. In April, The National Convention set up the Committee of Public Safety. Between June 1793 and July of 1794, over 16,000 people were guillotined.
Britain declared war on France in this year also.
1794 On July 27th, Robespierre was arrested and executed within a few hours.
1795 The British government banned the United Irishmen.
1796 Wolfe Tone travelled to France to seek military support. In December, a French fleet of 43 ships and 15,000 men under General Hoche sailed to Ireland.
British General Lake landed in Ulster where his soldiers went from town to town demanding food. They also tortured residents and burned towns.
1798 Lord Edward Fitzgerald (Dublin planner of the rebellion) was captured in May. The rebellion still went ahead on May 23rd.
Henry Joy McCracken led 4,000 Presbyterian rebels into battle on June 6th but were defeated. The rebels at Vinegar Hill were defeated by General Lake on June 21st and the leaders hanged.
1801 Dublin parliament votes to abolish itself under the terms of the Act of Union. The population of Ireland was 5.5 million at this point.
The population of Britain was 9 million.
1803 Rebellion organised by Robert Emmet.
1804 Napoleon Bonaparte declared himself Emperor of France.
1811 Daniel O'Connell founded the Catholic Board to campaign for Catholic emancipation.
1815 Having conquered most of Europe, Napoleon was defeated at the Battle of Waterloo.
1823 Daniel O'Connell founded the Catholic Association to campaign not just for Catholic emancipation but for tenants' rights as well.
1828 Daniel O'Connell won a seat at Westminster for Co. Clare.
1829 The Emancipation Act allowed Daniel O'Connell to take his seat in Westminster.
1830 Daniel O’Connell set up the Repeal Association to campaign for repeal of the Act of Union.
1838 Daniel O'Connell managed to have the cost of tithes lowered, and to make the amount payable to the landlord instead of the Church of Ireland.
1841 Population of Ireland stood at 8.1 million.
Daniel O'Connell was elected the first Catholic Lord Mayor of Dublin.
Between 1841 and 1850, c.910,000 Irish emigrated to the US.
1843 ‘Monster meeting’ at Clontarf is banned by the British Government.
1845 In November, British Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel sent enough maize to Ireland to feed one million people, but many still couldn't afford to buy it.
1846 Two-thirds of the potato in Ireland was lost to blight forcing people to use up what stores they had. 400,000 people were employed by public works schemes set up by the British government to help victims of the famine. The Quakers set up soup kitchens in Waterford, Enniscorthy, Limerick, Clonmel and Youghal.
Charles Stewart Parnell was born in Co. Wicklow.
1847 There was virtually no blight in Ireland, but people had no seed to plant resulting in a tiny crop of potatoes.
There were 200,000 people in workhouses by this year. The government set up soup kitchens similar to those established by the Quakers in 1846.
Daniel O’Connell makes his final speech in the House of Commons. He went on a pilgrimage to Rome and died in May.
Also in this year, 250,000 Irish emigrated to the US.
1848 Young Irelanders Rebellion.
1850 Approximately 40,000 more Irish people died from starvation this year than died in 1846.
1851 The population of Britain is now 22 million.
1858 The IRB was founded by James Stephens.
1874 The Home Rule Party was founded by Issac Butt.
1875 In a by-election held in Meath, Parnell won a seat in the House of Commons.
1880 The Home Rule Party won 63 seats in the British General Election.
1881 Parnell was sent to Kilmainham Gaol for political agitation.
1882 In May, Parnell and Gladstone signed the Kilmainham Treaty which gave tenants access to land courts. Parnell promised to discourage violence. Four days after the treaty was signed, the Invincibles killed the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Lord Frederick Cavendish and his Under-Secretary, Thomas Burke. This event became known as the Phoenix Park Murders.
The Home Rule Party became known as the Irish Parliamentary Party.
1884 All men who owned or rented property worth £10 or more were granted the right to vote in elections. This increased the number of voters in the United Kingdom by over 300,000.
On November 1st, the GAA was established at a meeting in Hayes Hotel, Thurles, Co. Tipperary.
1885 The Home Rule Party won 86 of 105 Irish seats at Westminster.
In February, the GAA agreed new rules for football, hurling, athletics and wrestling.
1886 Parnell allied with Gladstone and the Liberal Party to make Gladstone Prime Minister again. As a result, Gladstone proposed the First Home Rule Bill in April of that year. The bill was defeated in June by 341 to 311 votes in the House of Commons.
1887 False accusations of supporting the Phoenix Park murders were made against Parnell by The Times newspaper. Parnell was paid compensation as a result and received a standing ovation in the House of Commons.
1891 Parnell married Katherine O’Shea but died of pneumonia just five months later in October, aged 45.
1892 Douglas Hyde helped form the Irish Literary Society to promote new literary works.
1893 Home Rule was attempted for a second time albeit unsuccessfully. However, this time it managed to pass through the House of Commons and was only defeated in the House of Lords.
Eoin MacNeill and Dougles Hyde founded the Gaelic League (now Conradh na Gaeilge). They also founded the League’s newspaper, An Claidheamh Soluis.
1894 Gladstone retired from politics.
1899 Yeats, Lady Gregory, Edward Martin and George Moore established the Irish Literary Theatre, later renamed the Irish National Theatre Society.
1900 The Irish Parliamentary Party was reunited under John Redmond after the Parnellite split of 1891.
1904 The Irish National Theatre Society opened the Abbey Theatre in Dublin.
1905 The Ulster Unionist Party was founded by Col. E. J. Saunderson.
Sinn Fein was founded by Arthur Griffith.
1908 All Irish universities were open to women for the first time.
1911 By this year, 89.6% of the population of Ireland was Catholic. By contrast, 56.33% of the population of Ulster was Protestant.
The Parliament Act is passed in Westminster limiting the power of veto of the House of Lords to only two years.
1912 The Third Home Rule bill was passed in the House of Commons but again vetoed by the Lords, however, this time it could only be prevented for two years.
On September 28th, the Ulster Solemn League and Covenant was signed by 474, 414 people in opposition to the introduction of Home Rule.
The Balkan Wars took place (ended in 1913).
1913 Jones’ Road football ground was purchased by the GAA and renamed Croke Park.
The Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and the Irish Volunteer Force (IVF) were founded in January and November resp. The formation of the IVF was suggested by Eoin MacNeill in an article entitled The North Began which was published in An Claidheamh Soluis. MacNeill became Chief-of-Staff.
1914 In April the Larne gun-running took place where 35,000 guns and 5 million rounds of ammunition were brought into the province to support the UVF. In July, 900 rifles and 25,000 rounds of ammunition were smuggled into Howth aboard the Asgard to support the IVF.
Archduke Franz Ferdinand of the Austro-Hungarian Empire was assassinated in Sarajevo on June 28th.
Cumann na mBan was founded to support the independence movement.
World War I was declared on August 4th.
The Home Rule bill became law on September 18th, but was postponed until the war ended.
1915 The Entente Powers' attempt to invade Turkey through the Dardanelles failed resulting in the slaughter of 40,000 British soldiers.
1916 The Easter Rising began on Easter Monday, April 24th. Between May 3rd and 12th, 15 of the rebels were executed in Kilmainham Gaol. Sir Roger Casement was executed on August 3rd.
1917 Eamon DeValera won a by-election in Co. Clare replacing the IPP MP Major William Redmond (brother of John) who had been killed in World War I.
The Russian Government was overthrown by the Bolsheviks in October.
The United States entered World War I on the Entente side.
1918 The Conscription Crisis occurred in May.
In December, Sinn Fein won 73 out of 105 Westminster seats in the General Election. The IPP won only 6 seats.
Countess Markievicz became the first woman elected to Westminster.
World War I ended on November 11th (at 11am).
1919 27 Sinn Feil MP’s met at the Mansion House on January 21st to form the First Dail. The first shots of the War of Independence were fired in Soloheadbeg, Co. Tipperary on the same day.
The Treaty of Versailles was agreed in June, officially ending World War I.
Benito Mussolini founded the Italian Fascist Party.
1920 The British Government passed the Government of Ireland Act.
The Black and Tans were formed in the Spring.
Tomas MacCurtain, Sinn Fein Lord Mayor of Cork was assassinated by British forces on March 20th.
Terence MacSwiney (who succeeded MacCurtain as Lord Mayor) died in Brixton Prison after 74 days on hunger strike on October 25th.
Kevin Barry was hanged on November 1st for his part in an ambush in which a British soldier was killed.
Bloody Sunday occurred on November 21st when Collins’ Squad killed 13 British agents working in Dublin. The British retaliated by opening fire on a crowd in Croke Park, killing twelve.
Tom Barry and the West Cork Brigade killed 18 Auxiliaries in Kilmichael, Co. Cork on November 28th. Cork City centre was burned in retaliation.
1921 The IRA burned the Customs House on May 25th.
The truce ending the War of Independence came into effect on July 11th. Negotiations to bring about the Treaty lasted from October until December with the Treaty signed on December 6th.
The Unionists refused to join the Irish Free State.
Lenin and the Bolsheviks gained control of Russia following the defeat of the White Army.
1922 The Treaty debate ended on January 7th with a vote of 64 - 57 in favour of the Treaty.
Rory O’Connor led a group of Irregulars who occupied the Four Courts.
Pro-Treaty TD’s won the General Election held in June by 92 to 36 Anti-Treaty TD’s.
On June 28th Collins began to attack the Four Courts. Within two days the Irregulars had surrendered, and within the week had yielded the other buildings in Dublin city.
Cork fell to the Free State Army on August 12th. Arthur Griffith died on this day from a brain haemorrhage.
Michael Collins was killed at Beal na Blath on August 22nd.
The Free State government passed the Special Powers Act in October.
Mussolini became Italian Prime Minister on October 28th.
The Constitution of the Irish Free State gave the vote to all women and men over the age of 21.
Russia was renamed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) by the Bolsheviks.
Josef Stalin was appointed General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
1923 Liam Lynch was killed in April.
Frank Aiken persuaded the IRA to agree to a ceasefire on May 24th.
Pro-treaty Sinn Fein renamed themselves Cumann na nGaedheal.
Mussolini passed the Acerbo Law in Italy.
The Nazi Party organised the Beer Hall Putsch in Munich in November.
1924 Soviet leader Lenin died on January 24th.
1925 Cumann na nGaedheal established An Garda SÃochána.
1926 Eamon deValera, Frank Aiken, Sean Lemass and other opponents of the Treaty formed Fianna Fail.
1927 Stalin started the collectivisation of all land in the USSR.
1928 Stalin became absolute ruler of the Soviet Union. The first Five Year Plan was introduced in the USSR.
The Nazi Party won 12 seats in the General Election.
1929 Cumann na nGaedheal built a hydroelectric power station at Ardnacrusha.
The Wall Street Crash occurred in October which led to the Great Depression.
1932 Following the General Election Fianna Fail formed a government. They remained in power for sixteen years.
A ‘marriage bar’ was introduced in the Irish public sector which meant that women who became teachers were forced to retire as soon as they got married.
The Nazi Party won 230 seats in the General Election in July. This fell to 196 seats in the November election.
1933 Hitler is sworn in as German Chancellor on January 30th. The Reichstag Fire occurs in February. Hitler called another election in March after which he passed the Enabling Act. The Gestapo was set up by Hermann Goring and led by Heinrich Himmler.
Dachau was the first forced labour camp used by the Nazis.
Hitler withdrew Germany from the League of Nations.
The Fianna Fail government introduced pensions for widows and orphans.
The second Five Year Plan was introduced in the USSR.
1934 The Soviet secret police, the Cheka, were renamed the NKVD. They ran the gulags where over one million people died by 1953. Stalin began the purge of the Communist Party.
The Night of the Long Knives took place in Germany on June 30th.
The movie Triumph of the Will about the 1934 Nuremberg Rally was made by Leni Riefenstahl.
A peace-ballot took place in Britain where the majority of people supported the idea of appeasement with Germany.
1935 The Fianna Fail government introduced unemployment assistance.
The Conditions of Employment Act limited the number of women in any industry.
The Nuremberg Laws were passed in Germany. The Anglo-German Naval Agreement was signed. Conscription was introduced in Germany.
1936 The IRA was banned.
Stalin organised the Show Trials which lasted until 1938. The first trial was known as the Trial of the Sixteen.
Hitler ordered the occupation of the Rhineland in March.
The Berlin Olympics took place.
Japan became an ally of Nazi Germany.
1937 The second Show Trial in the USSR was known as the Trial of the Seventeen. The Soviet Red Army was purged, and literacy rates reached 75% (from 56% when the Bolsheviks took power). Women made up 50% of the Soviet workforce.
The Volkswagen (people’s car) was manufactured in Germany.
1938 The Economic War ended with the Anglo-Irish Treaty.
German unemployment fell to c.100,000 from six million in 1932.
Hitler threatened the Austrian Chancellor with war unless he admitted Nazis to his government. This led to the Anschluss.
The Munich Conference took place in September.
The Night of the Broken Glass (Kristallnacht) took place in Germany on November 9th.
The third Five Year Plan was introduced in the USSR. The third Show Trial, known as the Trial of the Twenty-One began in March.
1939 The Emergency Powers Act was passed by the Fianna Fail government which helped keep Ireland out of World War Two.
Hitler broke the terms of the Munich Agreement in March and took over the rest of Czechoslovakia.
The Nazi-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact was signed on August 23rd.
Germany invaded Poland on September 1st, and Britain declared war on Germany on September 3rd.
1940 The first ghetto was set up in Lodz, Poland on February 8th.
Germany took over Denmark and Norway in April. On May 10th, the attack on Belgium, the Netherlands and France began. Italy declared war on France in June. German forces entered Paris on June 14th.
The Battle of Britain began in August (and aerial bombing of Britain lasted until May 1941).
The City of Coventry was nearly destroyed by German bombs on November 14th.
1941 Belfast was bombed four times in April and May.
Operation Barbarossa began on June 22nd.
Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour on December 7th, the United States entered World War Two.
1942 The Wannsee Conference was held in January where 11m Jews were sentenced to death. It resulted in the establishment of death camps like Auschwitz and Treblinka.
Ration books were introduced to Britain.
By late summer, German forces that had taken Kiev, advanced towards the oilfields of the Caucasus.
The Russian army began to encircle the Germans by mid-winter.
Between October and November the British defeated the German Afrika Korps at El Alamein in Egypt.
1943 91,000 soldiers of the German Sixth Army surrendered to the Russians in February.
The Axis Powers were encircled in Tunisia and surrendered in May.
1944 The D-Day landings took place on June 6th.
Allied troops took control of Rome in June.
The Red Army launched Operation Bagration which drove the Germans from the USSR between June and August.
Majdanek extermination camp in Poland was liberated by the Soviets on July 23rd.
Paris was liberated on August 25th.
Germany launched the Battle of the Bulge in December.
1945 The Red Army liberated Auschwitz on January 27th.
The city of Dresden was destroyed by Allied bombs on February 14th.
The Allies crossed the Rhine into Germany in March.
President Roosevelt died on April 12th.
Benito Mussolini was assassinated on April 28th.
Adolf Hitler died on April 30th.
VE Day was celebrated on May 8th.
The USAF dropped two Atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August bringing Japanese involvement in World War II to an end. VJ Day occurred on August 15th.
The United Nations was established.
1946 Only 2.5% of married Irish women were in employment as opposed to 25% in Britain.
1947 Truman Doctrine announced.
Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg formed Benelux.
1948 The Berlin Blockade started on June 24th.
The State of Israel was established.
The OECC was established to administer Marshall Plan funds. Ireland joined this organisation.
1949 The Berlin Blockade ended in May.
NATO was established.
The Council of Europe was established in Strasbourg. Ireland joined this organisation.
The first Soviet Atomic bomb was detonated.
The Chinese Civil War ended in victory for the Communists.
The Soviet Union launched Comecon to give aid to other communist countries.
1950 The Korean War started.
1952 The ECSC was established.
1953 A truce was agreed between North and South Korea.
Workers on strike in East Berlin were attacked by Soviet tanks stationed in the city.
1954 The Viet Minh under Ho Chi Minh forced the French out of Vietnam.
1955 Ireland joined the United Nations.
The Warsaw Pact alliance was set up.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott started in the US in December.
1956 The Hungarian Uprising against the USSR took place.
1957 The Treaty of Rome established the EEC.
The USSR launched Sputnik on October 4th.
The first US satellite, Vanguard, exploded on the launchpad in December.
US troops were sent to Little Rock, Arkansas, to protect nine black students who had enrolled in an all-white high school.
1958 The EEC officially came into being on January 1st.
The US launched the Explorer satellite on February 1st.
1960 The Irish government passed the Broadcasting Authority Act which set up an independent authority to run radio and television in Ireland.
1961 The population of Ireland fell to its lowest ever level of 2.8 million.
Britain, Ireland and Denmark applied for membership of the EEC.
US and anti-Castro Cubans invaded Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in April.
Yuri Gagarin successfully orbited the Earth on April 12th.
The Berlin Wall was built in August.
TelefÃs Eireann was launched on December 31st.
Ireland applied to join the European Economic Community (EEC).
1962 Ireland was elected to the Security Council of the United Nations.
John Glenn in Friendship 7 became the first American to orbit the Earth in February.
Pope John XXIII called the Second Vatican Council.
The Cuban Missile Crisis occurred.
1963 Terence O'Neill became Prime Minister of Northern Ireland.
250,000 Americans assembled in Washington to hear Dr. Martin Luther King’s I have a dream speech.
1964 The Civil Rights Act was passed in the US.
1965 Terence O'Neill met with Sean Lemass which was the first time the heads of government had met on the island since 1920.
Civil Rights marchers in Selma, Alabama (USA) were attacked by police.
The Voting Rights Act was passed in the US.
1966 Donagh O'Malley introduced free education and free transport for students.
1967 The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association was formed.
1968 The number of US troops in Vietnam reached 550,000 (from 16,000 under President Kennedy).
Soviet troops crushed the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia.
1969 Terence O'Neill was succeeded as Northern Ireland Prime Minister by James Chichester-Clark.
The Battle of the Bogside happened in Derry.
Apollo 11 landed on the Moon on July 20th.
1970 The Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) was formed by Gerry Fitt and John Hume.
Women now made up 25% of the workforce in Ireland.
1971 Rev. Ian Paisley founded the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).
Northern Ireland Prime Minister Brian Faulkner introduced internment in August as the violence worsened.
The Irish Women’s Liberation Movement was founded by Nell McCafferty, Mary Kenny and Nuala O’Faolain.
1972 Bloody Sunday occurred in Derry on January 30th when 14 civilians were killed and another 13 seriously injured.
The Northern Ireland Parliament was prorogued in March.
24,000 students sat the Leaving Certificate which was up from 8,600 in 1961.
The Commission on the Statues of Women recommended the removal of the ‘marriage bar’ in Ireland.
A ceasefire agreement was signed between the US, the North Vietnamese and the government of South Vietnam.
1973 Ireland and Great Britain joined the European Economic Community (EEC) on January 1st. Between then and 2015, Ireland received €74.3 billion from the EU. In the same time-frame, Irish farmers received €54 from the CAP.
Elections took place for a new Northern Ireland Assembly.
In December the Sunningdale Agreement was signed by Brian Faulkner (Unionist Party), Gerry Fitt (SDLP), Edward Heath (British Government) and Liam Cosgrave (Irish Government).
The US withdrew their troops from Vietnam.
1974 The Northern Ireland Executive took office in January.
The Ulster Workers Council organised a general strike.
Dublin and Monaghan were bombed by the UVF in May killing 33 and injuring 300 people.
The IRA bombed pubs in Birmingham in November killing 21 and injuring 182 people.
The Anti-Discrimination Act banned paying men more than women for the same work in Ireland.
1975 The Khmer Rouge led by Pol Pot took over the government of Cambodia. Approximately 2m Cambodian citizens were killed between 1975 and 1979.
North Vietnam launched a full-scale invasion of the South and captured the capital, Saigon, in April.
1977 The Employment Equality Act outlawed discrimination on the basis of sex or marital status in Ireland..
1979 Maire Geoghegan-Quinn became Ireland’s first female government minister when she was appointed Minister for the Gaeltacht.
1980 Workers in Poland formed Solidarity.
1981 Greece joined the EEC.
The Hunger Strikes started in the Maze Prison.
1985 The Anglo-Irish Agreement was signed.
1986 Spain and Portugal joined the EEC.
The Single European Act was agreed.
1990 Mary Robinson was elected President of Ireland.
1992 The Maastricht Treaty was agreed.
1993 The Downing Street Declaration was signed in December.
The ban on contraception was abolished.
Mary Harney became the first woman to lead a political party in Ireland when she was elected leader of the Progressive Democrats.
1994 The IRA called a ceasefire in August. The Loyalists called one in October.
1995 Austria, Sweden and Finland joined the EC.
1996 Divorce was introduced to Ireland.
1997 Mary Harney became the first female Tanaiste in Ireland.
Mary McAleese was elected President of Ireland.
The Treaty of Amsterdam was agreed.
1998 The Good Friday Agreement was signed at Easter.
2000 Women in Ireland made up 40% of the workforce, but 55% of university students.
2001 The Treaty of Nice was agreed.
2002 The Euro was introduced.
2005 The IRA announced an end to its campaign.
2007 Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness were elected First and Deputy First Ministers of Northern Ireland.
Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU.
2010 Germany finally paid off its war debt under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, 1919.
2011 Susan Denham became Ireland’s first female Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
2013 Croatia joined the EU.