2nd millennium

From left, clockwise: in 1492, Italian navigator Christopher Columbus; the American Revolution; The French Revolution; the Atomic Bomb from World War II; an alternate source of light, the light bulb; for the first time, a human being sets foot on the moon in 1969 during the Apollo 11 moon mission; aeroplanes become the most-used way of transport though the skies; Napoleon Bonaparte, in the early 19th century, affects France and Europe on subjects of expansionism and modernization; Alexander Graham Bell's telephone; in 1348, the Black Death kills over 100 million people worldwide, and over half of Europe, in two years. (Background: An excerpt from the Gutenberg Bible, the first major book printed in the West using movable type, in the 1450s)

Millennia:	1st millennium 2nd millennium 3rd millennium
Centuries:	11th century 12th century 13th century 14th century 15th century 16th century 17th century 18th century 19th century 20th century

The second millennium was a period of time that began on January 1, 1001 and ended on December 31, 2000 of the Gregorian calendar. It was the second period of one thousand years in the Anno Domini or Common Era.

It encompassed the High and Late Middle Ages, the Mongol Empire, the Renaissance, the Baroque era, the early Modern Age, the age of Enlightenment, the age of colonialism, industrialization, the rise of nation states, and the 19th and 20th century with the impact of science, widespread education, and universal health care and vaccinations in many nations. The centuries of expanding large-scale warfare with high-tech weaponry (of the World Wars and nuclear bombs) were offset by growing peace movements, the United Nations, plus doctors and health workers crossing borders to treat injuries and disease, and the return of the Olympics as contest without combat.

Scientists prevailed in explaining intellectual freedom; humans took their first steps on the Moon during the 20th century; and new technology was developed by governments, industry, and academia across the world, with education shared by many international conferences and journals. The development of movable type, radio, television, and the internet spread information worldwide, within minutes, in audio, video, and print-image format to inform, educate and entertain billions of people by the end of the 20th century.

The Renaissance saw the beginning of the second migration of humans from Europe, Africa, and Asia to the Americas, beginning the ever-accelerating process of globalization. The interwoven international trade led to the formation of multi-national corporations, with home offices in multiple countries. International business ventures reduced the impact of nationalism in popular thought.

The world population doubled over the first seven centuries of the millennium (from 310 million in 1000 to 600 million in 1700) and later increased tenfold over its last three centuries, exceeding 6 billion in 2000. Consequently, unchecked human activity had considerable social and environmental consequences, giving rise to extreme poverty, climate change and biotic crisis.

Calendar

The 2nd millennium was a period of time that began on January 1, 1001, and ended on December 31, 2000. It was the second period of one thousand years in the Anno Domini or Common Era.

The Julian calendar was used in Europe at the beginning of the millennium, and all countries that once used the Julian calendar had adopted the Gregorian calendar by the end of it. So the end date is always calculated according to the Gregorian calendar, but the beginning date is usually according to the Julian calendar (or occasionally the proleptic Gregorian calendar).

Stephen Jay Gould argued that it is not possible to decide if the millennium ended on December 31, 1999, or December 31, 2000. The Associated Press reported that the third millennium began on January 1, 2001, but also reported that celebrations in the US were generally more subdued at the beginning of 2001, compared to the beginning of 2000.

The second millennium is perhaps more popularly thought of as beginning and ending a year earlier, thus starting at the beginning of 1000 and finishing at the end of 1999. Many public celebrations for the end of the millennium were held on December 31, 1999 – January 1, 2000—with few on the actual date a year later.

Civilizations

The civilizations in this section are organized according to the UN geoscheme.

Civilizations of the 2nd millennium AD

Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
Fatimid Empire Mamluk Sultanate Almoravid dynasty Almohad dynasty Sultanate of Ifat Sultanate of Hobyo Sultanate of the Geledi Warsangali Sultanate Ayyubids Saadi dynasty Mali Empire Songhai Empire Sokoto Caliphate Funj sultanate of Sinnar Ashanti Empire Kingdom of Dahomey Ottoman Empire Oyo Empire. Benin Empire Kongo Empire Merina Kingdom Buganda Empire Kingdom of Rwanda Kingdom of Burundi Empire of Kitara Mutapa Empire Maravi Empire Luba Empire Lunda Empire Zulu Empire Kingdom of Nri Kingdom of Bonny Opobo Onitsha Kalabari Kingdom Jukun	Maya civilisation Toltec Mississippian culture Vinland Chimú Kingdom of Cuzco Aztec Empire Inca Empire Iroquois Confederacy Muisca Confederation United States of America Haiti United Provinces of the River Plate Argentina Paraguay Gran Colombia Colombia Venezuela Ecuador Chile Perú Mexican Empire Federal Republic of Central America Empire of Brazil Canada Cuba Panamá	Afsharid dynasty Chola Dynasty Empire of Japan Tondo Dynasty Goryeo Hoysala Empire Jin dynasty Joseon Dynasty Khmer Empire Liao dynasty Mongol Empire Ming Dynasty Mughal Empire Mysore empire Ottoman Empire Pagan Kingdom Qing Dynasty Safavids Seljuks Song dynasty Vijayanagara Empire Western Xia Yuan (Mongol) Dynasty Zand dynasty First Philippine Republic Republic of Pakistan Republic of India Republic of Bangladesh Republic of Sri Lanka Republic of Philippines	Byzantine Empire (330–1453) Kingdom of England Kingdom of Scotland Kingdom of Great Britain United Kingdom Holy Roman Empire Kingdom of France Kingdom of Bosnia (1154-1463) French colonial empire (1605–1960) Dutch Empire (1543–1975) Kingdom of Hungary (1000–1526) Crown of Aragon Crown of Castile Ottoman Empire (1299–1922) Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396) Kievan Rus (880-1150) Kingdom of Serbia (1217-1346) Serbian Empire (1346-1371) Kingdom of Poland Spanish Empire (1402–1975) Portuguese Empire (1415–2000) Habsburg Empire (1526–1867) Austro-Hungarian Empire (1867-1918) British Empire (1583–1997) Kingdom of Italy (1861-1946) German Empire (1871-1918) Third Reich (1933-1945) Russian Empire (1721-1917) Soviet Union (1922-1991)	Tuʻi Tonga Empire (c.950-1865)

Events

The events in this section are organized according to the UN geoscheme.

Events of the 2nd millennium AD

	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
11th century	1043 Eze Nri Ìfikuánim becomes first king of Nri Kingdom 1054 Almoravid dynasty established 1060 Kingdom of Kanem converts to Islam	1000 Cahokia (present-day Illinois, USA) becomes regional chiefdom of Mississippian culture	1005 Treaty of Shanyuan signed 1008 The Tale of Genji completed 1044 Gunpowder recipe published	1054 The East–West Schism divides the Christian church 1088 The foundation of the first University 1095 First Crusade
12th century	1143 Almohad dynasty take control from the Almoravids 1171 Salah-ad-Din deposes Fatimid ruler of Egypt and establishes the Ayyubid dynasty 1173 Ayyubids capture Qasr Ibrim in Nubia	1100 Toltecs establish capital at Tula 1124 Arnaldur appointed first bishop of Greenland 1175 Destruction of Toltec civilization	1117 The magnetic compass is used at sea 1120 Meng Yuanlao describes four-star dining in Kaifeng 1150 Construction of Angkor Wat 1192 Defeat of Prithviraj Chauhan in second Battle of Tarain	1143 Establishment of the Kingdom of Portugal 1169 Averoes translates Aristotle
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
13th century	1200 Kingdom of Mwenemutapa established in Zimbabwe 1203 Sumaguru Kante of Sosso conquers kingdom of Ghana 1250 Mamluk soldiers take Egypt from the Ayyubids	1200 Chichén Itzá abandoned 1200 Kingdom of Cuzco founded 1200 Expansion of Chimú state of Chimor	1206 Genghis Khan Builds an Empire	1215 Magna Carta 1260 Dedication of the Cathedral at Chartres 1279 Establishment of the oldest bourders in Europe today, the Portuguese boundering	1200 Tahitians colonize Hawaii
14th century	1324 Musa's pilgrimage to Mecca 1365 Crusade led by king of Cyprus sacks Alexandria 1375 Kingdom of Songhai breaks away from Mali	1315 Founding of Tenochtitlan 1350 Norsemen abandon Greenland 1350 War between Inca and Chimú	1350 Coffee was first brewed 1368 Zhu Yuanzhang ousts the Mongols from power	1348 Black Plague 1350 Emergence of fashion 1382 Wycliffe's Bible	1300 Polynesian immigration to New Zealand 1300 Hawaiians develop class structure 1300 Huge stone statues erected on Easter Island
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
15th century	1400 capital of Sayfawa Dynasty moved to Borno 1400 Funj settled Alodia 1496 Spain conquers Melilla, Morocco	1428 Aztecs conquer Atzcapotzalco, ally with Texcoco and Tlacopan, become the dominant state in Mexico 1470 Incas conquer Chimú empire 1492 Voyages of Christopher Columbus	1407 Work begins on Forbidden City, Beijing 1431 Ayutthaya conquers Angkor	1413 The invention of modern linear perspective 1453 Ottoman conquest of Constantinople 1455 Gutenberg Bible printed 1494 Luca Pacioli publishes the first work on accounting 1498 Vasco da Gama discovers sea route to India 1500 Discovery of Brazil by Pedro Álvares Cabral	1400 Tongans build ceremonial centre at Muʻa
16th century	1509 African slaves arrive in the Americas 1517 Ottomans capture Egypt 1535 Holy Roman Emperor Charles V conquers Tunis 1546 Songhai Empire takes Niani	1535 Europeans discover tobacco 1537 Europeans discover potatoes 1545 The discovery of silver in the Andes mountains	1555 Rise of the Mughal Empire in South Asia;	1517 The Ninety-Five Theses published 1541 Publication of Quartic function on the Ars Magna (Gerolamo Cardano) 1543 Publication of On the Structure of the Human Body 1596 Invention of the toilet	1550 Maoris of New Zealand build fortified enclosures
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
17th century	1600 Kingdom of Rwanda founded 1600 Dahomey Kingdom founded 1644 Start of the Char Bouba	1607 Virginia colony founded 1624 Manhattan island purchased from Native Americans 1697 Last Mayan resistance defeated	1610 Tea spreads to the world 1637 Japanese prohibition against European contact	1603 First performance of Hamlet 1610 Galileo publishes his observations of Jupiter 1666 Discovery of gravitation	1600 Tu'i Konokupolu dynasty take power in Tonga 1642 Abel Tasman sights New Zealand
18th century	1700 Maravi Empire tears apart 1754 Usman dan Fodio is born 1799 Discovery of the Rosetta Stone	1742 Native American revolt against Spanish in Peru 1776 United States Declaration of Independence published	1751 Chinese occupy Tibet 1760 Rise of the British Rule in India	1722 Bach composed the Well-Tempered Clavier 1769 Invention of the steam engine 1796 The first vaccination	1795 Formation of the Kingdom of Hawaii
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
19th century	1869 The Suez Canal opens 1879 Battle of Isandlwana 1896 Battle of Adwa	1821 Bolívar liberates Venezuela 1876 Menlo Park opens 1876 First telephone transmission	1868 End of Japanese seclusion	1830 First steam railway 1859 Origin of Species 1882 Germ theory proven	1840 Treaty of Waitangi signed 1845 New Zealand land wars 1845 Formation of the Kingdom of Tonga by Taufaʻahau
20th century	1956 Suez Crisis 1967 Six-Day War 1994 End of apartheid	1903 First controlled, powered airplane flight 1908 Ford builds the Model T 1928 First television broadcast 1942 Creation of the world's first nuclear reactor	1917 The Russian Revolution 1934 Mao's long march 1945 Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 1947 Partition of India 1971 Formation of Bangladesh 1992 Destruction of the Babri Mosque by Hindus	1901 First transatlantic radio transmission 1906 Alberto Santos-Dumont realizes the first officially recorded powered flight in Europe 1914 Beginning of World War I 1918 End of World War I 1922 Establishment of Italian Fascism 1928 Discovery of penicillin 1933 Adolf Hitler appointed Chancellor of Germany 1939 Beginning of World War II 1945 End of World War II	1915 Australians and New Zealanders serve in the Gallipoli Campaign 1985 Nuclear Free Zone established in New Zealand 2000 Autonomous Bougainville Government established

Significant people

The people in this section are organized according to the UN geoscheme.

	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
11th century	Humai ibn Salamna Eze Nri Ìfikuánim Yahya ibn Ibrahim	Eight Deer Jaguar Claw Leif Eriksson	Abū Rayḥān al-Bīrūnī Abu Ḥasan al-Haytham Omar Khayyám Khwaja Abdullah Ansari Al-Juwayni Atiśa Rajendra Chola I Shen Kuo	Pope Gregory VII William the Conqueror Basil II Samuel El Cid
12th century	Abd al-Mu'min Saladin Dunama I	Manco Cápac	Genghis Khan Khublai Khan Abdul-Qadir Gilani Muhammad al-Idrisi	Frederick Barbarossa Dante Alighieri Richard I of England Henry II of England Hildegard of Bingen
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
13th century	Sundiata Keita Dunama Dabbalemi Mansa Uli		Muhammad Rumi Moinuddin Chishti Shah Jalal	Thomas Aquinas Leonardo Fibonacci Francis of Assisi Pope John XXII William Wallace	Roy Mata
14th century	Musa I of Mali Muhammad Ture Ibn Khaldun Baibars Kato Kintu	Acamapichtli	Ibn Taymiyyah Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani Yongle Emperor Madhava Timur Osman I	Filippo Brunelleschi Marco Polo Leonardo Bruni Jan Hus Geoffrey Chaucer Guillaume de Machaut
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
15th century	Ilunga Tshibinda Sonni Ali Zara Yaqob	Christopher Columbus Moctezuma I	Muḥammad Khaldun Mehmed II The Great Muhammad Babur Hongxi Emperor Chaitanya Mahaprabhu	Leonardo da Vinci Johannes Gutenberg Nicolaus Copernicus Niccolò Machiavelli Filippo Brunelleschi Joan of Arc Lorenzo de' Medici Giovanni Domenico Cassini Henry VII of England Isabella of Castile
16th century	Idris Aloma Orompoto Ahmad al-Mansur	Amerigo Vespucci Atahualpa Cuauhtémoc Hernán Cortés Francisco Pizzaro	Humayun Akbar The Great Mohammad Salim Jahangir Shah Jahan Xu Guangqi	Galileo Galilei William Shakespeare Martin Luther Michelangelo Elizabeth I of England Suleiman the Magnificent Manuel I of Portugal Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor Miguel de Cervantes
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
17th century	Wegbaja Osei Tutu Okomfo Anokye	Powhatan Pocahontas Squanto Roger Williams John Winthrop Anne Hutchinson Samuel de Champlain Juana Inés de la Cruz Peter Claver	Kangxi Emperor Muhammad Alamgir Bahadur Shah I Jahandar Shah Shah Jahan II Matsuo Basho	Isaac Newton Johannes Kepler René Descartes Francesco Redi Marcello Malpighi Peter the Great Antonio Vivaldi Charles I of England and Scotland Pedro Calderón de la Barca
18th century	Usman Dan Fodio Opoku Ware I Dossou Agadja	George Washington Benjamin Franklin Thomas Jefferson James Madison Alexander Hamilton Túpac Amaru II José Celestino Mutis	Tipu Sultan Muhammad Shah Ahmad Shah Bahadur Qianlong Emperor Raja Ram Mohan Roy Siraj ud-Daulah	Napoleon Alessandro Volta Adam Smith Cesare Beccaria Immanuel Kant Catherine the Great Gian Lorenzo Bernini Louis XVI of France Lazzaro Spallanzani Mozart Beethoven Sake Dean Mahomed Voltaire Marie Antoinette	Kamehameha I
	Africa	Americas	Asia	Europe	Oceania
19th century	Moshoeshoe I Shaka Menelik II	Thomas Edison Abraham Lincoln Simón Bolívar Francisco de Paula Santander George Washington Carver Susan B. Anthony Landell de Moura	Ali bey Huseynzade Empress Dowager Cixi Mangal Pandey Swami Vivekananda Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar	Charles Darwin Carl Friedrich Gauss Marie Curie Alfred Nobel Guglielmo Marconi Victoria Otto von Bismarck Karl Marx Giacomo Leopardi Florence Nightingale	Te Kooti
20th century	Nelson Mandela Hassan al-Banna Sayyid Qutb Gamal Abdel Nasser Mo Ibrahim Desmond Tutu	Franklin D. Roosevelt Elvis Presley Bob Dylan Neil Armstrong John F. Kennedy Martin Luther King, Jr. Jonas Salk Michael Jackson	Mahatma Gandhi Mao Zedong Muhammad Ali Jinnah Hirohito Muhammad Iqbal Chiang Kai-shek Abul A'la Maududi Rabindranath Tagore Abul Kasem Fazlul Huq Jagadish Chandra Bose	Albert Einstein Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Joseph Stalin Winston Churchill Enrico Fermi Vladimir Lenin Mikhail Gorbachev Pablo Picasso Yuri Gagarin The Beatles	Donald Bradman Howard Florey Banjo Paterson Margaret Battye Douglas Mawson

See also

• Lists of people by nationality
• Category:People by century
• Category:People by nationality and period
• Gottlieb, Agnes Hooper; Henry Gottlieb; Barbar Bowers; Brent Bowers (1998). 1,000 Years, 1,000 People: Ranking the Men and Women Who Shaped the Millennium. Kodansha International. ISBN 1-56836-253-6. 

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

Inventions, discoveries and introductions

Communication and Technology	Mathematics and Science	Manufacturing	Transportation and Space exploration	Warfare
Printing press Thermometer Electrical battery Telegraph Photography Telephone Animation Television Computer Transistor Satellite Internet Electrostatic generator	Accounting Probability Calculus Vaccination Atomic theory Anesthesia Natural selection Genetics Special relativity Penicillin DNA Quantum mechanics Electricity	Canned food Plastic Assembly line Sliced bread Frozen food Nuclear reactor Food processor Finite geometry	Barometer Bicycle Steam engine Steam turbine Internal combustion engine Steam locomotive Human flight Moon landing Space shuttle Space station GPS navigation	Longbow Rockets Aircraft carrier Nuclear weapon Submarine Tanks Firearms

Centuries and decades

11th century	1000s	1010s	1020s	1030s	1040s	1050s	1060s	1070s	1080s	1090s
12th century	1100s	1110s	1120s	1130s	1140s	1150s	1160s	1170s	1180s	1190s
13th century	1200s	1210s	1220s	1230s	1240s	1250s	1260s	1270s	1280s	1290s
14th century	1300s	1310s	1320s	1330s	1340s	1350s	1360s	1370s	1380s	1390s
15th century	1400s	1410s	1420s	1430s	1440s	1450s	1460s	1470s	1480s	1490s
16th century	1500s	1510s	1520s	1530s	1540s	1550s	1560s	1570s	1580s	1590s
17th century	1600s	1610s	1620s	1630s	1640s	1650s	1660s	1670s	1680s	1690s
18th century	1700s	1710s	1720s	1730s	1740s	1750s	1760s	1770s	1780s	1790s
19th century	1800s	1810s	1820s	1830s	1840s	1850s	1860s	1870s	1880s	1890s
20th century	1900s	1910s	1920s	1930s	1940s	1950s	1960s	1970s	1980s	1990s