History Timeline
Scroll through major world events from ancient history to today.
3200 BCE
Sumerians in Mesopotamia develop the first known writing system, cuneiform.
2560 BCE
The Great Pyramid of Giza is completed
1754 BCE
Babylon's King Hammurabi issues one of the earliest written law codes.
295 BCE
The Great Library of Alexandria is founded in Egypt.
221 BCE
Qin Shi Huang unifies China under a single empire for the first time.
220 BCE
Construction of the Great Wall of China begins
27 BCE
The Roman Empire is established
825 CE
Baghdad's House of Wisdom becomes a leading center of science and scholarship.
1215 CE
England's Magna Carta limits the king's power and establishes early legal rights.
1440 CE
Gutenberg invents the printing press
1492 CE
Christopher Columbus's voyage reaches the Americas.
1789 CE
The French Revolution begins, reshaping France's government.
1837 CE
The electric telegraph allows messages to travel almost instantly over long distances.
1879 CE
Thomas Edison patents a practical, long-lasting electric light bulb.
1903 CE
The Wright brothers achieve the first powered, controlled airplane flight.
1945 CE
World War II ends.
1957 CE
The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite.
1969 CE
Humans land on the Moon
1975 CE
The first mass-market personal computers become available.
1983 CE
The modern Internet protocol (TCP/IP) is adopted
1989 CE
The Berlin Wall falls
1991 CE
The World Wide Web becomes publicly available
2003 CE
The Human Genome Project is completed
2007 CE
The first modern smartphone launches
2020 CE
The World Health Organization declares COVID-19 a global pandemic.
