The 16th Century was the Age of Exploration and Reformation. During the 17th Century, worldwide commerce exploded.

1504 David sculpted by Michelangelo 1513 Niccolo Machiavelli wrote The Prince 1520 Martin Luther excommunicated 1523 St. Ignatius Loyola develops Spiritual Exercises 1535 Thomas More executed 1555 Nostradamus wrote Centuries 1555 St. Teresa of Avila experienced religious awakening 1579 Philip Sidney wrote Defence of Poesie 1601 Baltasar Gracián born 1602 Cervantes wrote Don Quijote 1605 Shakespeare completed Macbeth 1605 Francis Bacon wrote Advancement of Learning 1611 John Donne wrote Valediction: Forbidding Mourning 1628 William Harvey explained blood circulation 1633 Galileo Galilei recants his discovery that the earth orbits the sun 1642 Blaise Pascal invents calculator 1643 Taj Mahal completed 1644 Descartes produced The Principles of Philosophy 1645 Oliver Cromwell given the title Lord Protector 1656 Benedict de Spinoza excommunicated 1660 Christopher Wren founded the Royal Society 1666 Moličre finishes Misanthrope 1667 John Milton finishes Paradise Lost 1679 Edmund Halley cataloged the southern stars 1682 Pennsylvania founded by William Penn 1685 Johann Sebastian Bach born 1687 Isaac Newton's three laws of motion 1689 Matsuo Basho travels The Narrow Road to the Deep North 1690 John Locke finished Human Understanding 1690 Publick Occurrences published 1693 Dom Pérignon invented 1693 William Congreve wrote The Old Bachelor 1714 Alexander Pope wrote The Rape of the Lock 1735 Carolus Linnaeus published Systema Naturae 1742 George Frideric Handel composed Messiah 1746 Denis Diderot wrote Pensees philosophiques 1758 Voltaire gave the world Candide MORE ERAS B.C. | 12th-15th Century | Wild West | Jazz Age | Great Depression | 1950s | 1960s