18th century

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: General history

Millennium: 1st millennium - 2nd millennium - 3rd millennium
Centuries: 17th century - 18th century - 19th century
Decades: 1700s 1710s 1720s 1730s 1740s 1750s 1760s 1770s 1780s 1790s

As a means of recording the passage of time, the 18th century refers to the century that lasted from 1701 through 1800 in the Gregorian calendar.

Some history scholars will sometimes specifically refer to the 18th century as 1715- 1789, denoting the period of time between the death of Louis XIV of France and the start of the French Revolution, or even 1688-1789, denoting the period of time between the Glorious Revolution in England and the start of the French Revolution. British historians such as Frank O'Gorman sometimes refer to the "Long Eighteenth Century" running from the Revolution of 1688 to the Great Reform Act of 1832.

The storming of the Bastille, July 14, 1789, an iconic event of the French Revolution.
Enlarge
The storming of the Bastille, July 14, 1789, an iconic event of the French Revolution.

Events

1700s

Union flag of The Kingdom of Great Britain
Enlarge
Union flag of The Kingdom of Great Britain

1710s

1720s

  • 1720: The South Sea Bubble
  • 1721: Robert Walpole became the first Prime Minister of Great Britain ( de facto).
  • 1721: Treaty of Nystad signed, ending the Great Northern War.
  • 1722- 23: Russo-Persian War
  • 1722: Afghans conquered Iran, ending the Safavid dynasty.
  • 1722: Kangxi Emperor of China died.

1730s

Qianlong Emperor
Enlarge
Qianlong Emperor
  • 1733- 38: War of the Polish Succession
  • 1735- 99: The Qianlong Emperor of China oversaw a huge expansion in territory.
  • 1736: Nadir Shah assumed title of Shah of Persia and founded the Afsharid dynasty. Ruled until his death in 1747.
  • 1739: Nadir Shah defeated the Mughals and sacked Delhi.

1740s

  • 1740: Frederick the Great crowned King of Prussia.
  • 1740- 48: War of the Austrian Succession
  • 1741: Russians began settling the Aleutian Islands.
  • 1745: Second Jacobite Rebellion in Scotland began.
  • 1747: Ahmed Shah Durrani founded the Durrani Empire in modern day Afghanistan.

1750s

  • 1750: Peak of the Little Ice Age
  • 1755: The Lisbon earthquake
  • 1756- 63: Seven Years' War fought among European powers in various theaters around the world.
  • 1757: Battle of Plassey signaled the beginning of British rule in India.

1760s

Frederick II the Great, King of Prussia
Enlarge
Frederick II the Great, King of Prussia
  • 1760: George III became King of Britain.
  • 1762- 96: Reign of Catherine the Great of Russia.
  • 1766- 99: Anglo-Mysore Wars
  • 1767: Burmese conquered the Ayutthaya kingdom.
  • 1768: Gurkhas conquered Nepal.
  • 1768- 1774: Russo-Turkish War
  • 1769: Spanish missionaries established the first of 21 missions in California.
  • 1769- 73: The Bengal famine of 1770 killed one third of the Indian population.

1770s

1780s

1790s

  • 1791- 1804: The Haitian Revolution
  • 1792- 1815: The Great French War started as the French Revolutionary Wars which lead into the Napoleonic Wars.
  • 1792: New York Stock & Exchange Board founded.
  • 1793: Upper Canada bans slavery.
  • 1795: Pinckney's Treaty between the United States and Spain granted the Mississippi Territory to the US.
  • 1796: British ejected Dutch from Ceylon.
  • 1797: Napoleon's invasion and partition of the Republic of Venice ended over 1,000 years of independence for the Serene Republic.
  • 1798- 1800: Quasi-War between the United States and France.
  • 1799: Napoleon staged a coup d'état and became dictator of France.
  • 1799: Dutch East India Company is dissolved.

Significant people

  • Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Italian mathematician
  • Ahmad Shah Abdali, Afghan King
  • Ueda Akinari, Japanese writer
  • Jean le Rond d'Alembert, French mathematician, physicist and encyclopedist
  • Queen Anne, British monarch
  • Aurangzeb, Mughal Emperor
  • Johann Sebastian Bach, German composer
  • George Berkeley, Irish empiricist philosopher
  • Pierre Beaumarchais, French writer
  • Jeremy Bentham, English philosopher and reformer
  • Daniel Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician and physicist
  • William Blake, English artist and poet
  • François Boucher, French painter
  • Edmund Burke, British statesman and philosopher
  • Robert Burns, Scottish poet
  • Giacomo Casanova, Venetian adventurer, writer and womanizer
  • Catherine the Great, Russian Tsaritsa
  • Cao Xueqin, Chinese writer
  • Alexis Clairault, French mathematician
Samuel Johnson
Enlarge
Samuel Johnson
  • William Hogarth, English painter and engraver
  • David Hume, Scottish philosopher
  • Thomas Jefferson, American statesman
  • Edward Jenner, English inventor of vaccination
  • Jiang Tingxi, Chinese artist and scholar
  • Samuel Johnson, British writer and literary critic
  • Joseph II, Austrian Emperor
  • Kangxi Emperor, China
  • Immanuel Kant, German philosopher
  • Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, French writer
  • Joseph Louis Lagrange, Italian-French mathematician and physicist
  • Pierre Simon Laplace, French physicist and mathematician
  • John Law, Scottish economist
  • Mikhail Lomonosov, Russian scientist
  • Antoine Lavoisier, French chemist
  • Adrien-Marie Legendre, French mathematician
  • Alphonsus Liguori, Italian bishop, founder of Redemptorists, Saint
  • Carolus Linnaeus (Carl von Linné), Swedish biologist
  • Louis XV of France, French monarch
  • Louis XVI of France, French monarch
  • James Madison, American statesman
  • Maria Theresa of Austria, Austrian Empress
  • Marie Antoinette, Austrian-born French Queen
  • Michikinikwa, Miami tribe chief and war leader
  • Honoré Mirabeau French writer and politician
  • Charles de Secondat, baron de Montesquieu, French thinker
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian composer
  • Nadir Shah, Persian King
  • Thomas Paine, British intellectual
  • Peter I of Russia (Peter the Great), Russian Tsar
  • Pius VI, Roman Pope
  • François-André Danican Philidor, French composer and chess master
  • Marquis of Pombal, Portuguese Prime Minister
  • Alexander Pope, British poet
  • Qianlong Emperor, China
  • Francis II Rákóczi, prince of Hungary and Transylvania, Revolutionary leader
  • Jean-Philippe Rameau, French composer
  • Bartolomeo Rastrelli, Italian-born Russian architect
  • Sir Joshua Reynolds, British painter
  • Maximilien Robespierre, French revolutionary leader and dictator
  • Jean-Jacques Rousseau, French writer and philosopher
  • Marquis de Sade, French writer and philosopher
  • Domenico Scarlatti, Italian composer.
  • Friedrich Schiller, German writer
  • John Small, English cricketer
  • Adam Smith, Scottish economist and philosopher
  • Laurence Sterne, British writer
  • Edward "Lumpy" Stevens, English cricketer
  • Alexander Suvorov, Russian military leader
  • Emanuel Swedenborg, Swedish scientist, thinker and mystic
  • Jonathan Swift, Anglo-Irish satirist
  • Toussaint L'Ouverture, Haitian revolutionary leader
  • Túpac Amaru II, Peruvian revolutionary
  • Kitagawa Utamaro, Japanese printmaker and painter
  • Antonio Vivaldi, Italian composer
  • Voltaire, French writer and philosopher
  • Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab, Arab islamic theologian and founder of Wahhabism
  • Robert Walpole, British Prime Minister
  • George Washington, American general and first President of USA
  • James Watt, Scottish scientist and inventor
  • Antoine Watteau, French painter
  • John Wesley, British churchman, founder of Methodism
  • Mary Wollstonecraft, British writer and feminist
  • William Pitt, British Prime Minister
  • Yuan Mei, Chinese poet, scholar and artist
  • Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf, German religious writer and bishop

See Founding Fathers of the United States

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

The Spinning Jenny
Enlarge
The Spinning Jenny
  • 1709: The first piano was built by Bartolomeo Cristofori
  • c. 1710: Steam Engine invented by Thomas Newcomen
  • 1717: The diving bell was successfully tested by Edmond Halley, sustainable to a depth of 55 ft.
  • c. 1730: The sextant navigational tool was developed by John Hadley in England, and Thomas Godfrey in America
  • 1736: Europeans discovered rubber - the discovery was made by Charles-Marie de la Condamine while on expedition in South America. It was named in 1770 by Joseph Priestly
  • c. 1740: Modern steel was developed by Benjamin Huntsman
  • 1741: Vitus Bering discovered Alaska
  • 1745: The Leyden jar invented by Ewald von Kleist was the first electrical capacitor
  • 1751 - 1785: The French Encyclopédie
  • 1755: The English Dictionary by Samuel Johnson
  • 1764: The Spinning Jenny created by James Hargreaves brought on the Industrial Revolution
  • 1761: The problem of Longitude was finally resolved by the fouth chronometer of John Harrison
  • 1768 - 1779: James Cook mapped the boundaries of the Pacific Ocean and discovered many Pacific Islands
  • 1776: The Wealth of Nations, foundation of the modern theory of economy, was published by Adam Smith
  • 1779: Photosynthesis was first discovered by Jan Ingenhouse of the Netherlands
  • 1798: Edward Jenner publishes a treatise about smallpox vaccination
  • 1799: Rosetta stone discovered by Napoleon's troops.

Decades and years

1690s 1690 1691 1692 1693 1694 1695 1696 1697 1698 1699
1700s 1700 1701 1702 1703 1704 1705 1706 1707 1708 1709
1710s 1710 1711 1712 1713 1714 1715 1716 1717 1718 1719
1720s 1720 1721 1722 1723 1724 1725 1726 1727 1728 1729
1730s 1730 1731 1732 1733 1734 1735 1736 1737 1738 1739
1740s 1740 1741 1742 1743 1744 1745 1746 1747 1748 1749
1750s 1750 1751 1752 1753 1754 1755 1756 1757 1758 1759
1760s 1760 1761 1762 1763 1764 1765 1766 1767 1768 1769
1770s 1770 1771 1772 1773 1774 1775 1776 1777 1778 1779
1780s 1780 1781 1782 1783 1784 1785 1786 1787 1788 1789
1790s 1790 1791 1792 1793 1794 1795 1796 1797 1798 1799
1800s 1800 1801 1802 1803 1804 1805 1806 1807 1808 1809
Millennium Century
4th BC: 40th BC 39th BC 38th BC 37th BC 36th BC 35th BC 34th BC 33rd BC 32nd BC 31st BC
3rd BC: 30th BC 29th BC 28th BC 27th BC 26th BC 25th BC 24th BC 23rd BC 22nd BC 21st BC
2nd BC: 20th BC 19th BC 18th BC 17th BC 16th BC 15th BC 14th BC 13th BC 12th BC 11th BC
1st BC: 10th BC 9th BC 8th BC 7th BC 6th BC 5th BC 4th BC 3rd BC 2nd BC 1st BC
1st:   1st   2nd   3rd   4th   5th   6th   7th   8th   9th 10th
2nd: 11th 12th 13th 14th 15th 16th 17th 18th 19th 20th
3rd: 21st 22nd 23rd 24th 25th 26th 27th 28th 29th 30th
4th: 31st 32nd 33rd 34th 35th 36th 37th 38th 39th 40th
Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/18th_century"