Literature
Works and institutions of written literature: poems, novels, plays, grammars and dictionaries, and their publication.
Category: Culture
- c. 800 BCEThe Greeks adopt the alphabet
Around 800 BCE the Greeks adapt the Phoenician script, using some consonant signs for vowels: the first alphabet to write both. The oldest substantial inscriptions, such as the Dipylon vase and Nestor's Cup, date to about 740-730 BCE.
- c. 750 BCEThe Iliad and the Odyssey take shape
The Iliad and Odyssey take form around the 8th to 7th century BCE, probably in oral tradition. Dates are disputed, from the 8th century (Janko) to no earlier than 660 (West). Whether a single Homer existed is unresolved.
- c. 600 BCESappho writes on Lesbos
The lyric poet Sappho is active on Lesbos around 600 BCE. About 650 lines survive of the roughly 10,000 she is thought to have composed, and the Ode to Aphrodite is the only complete poem. She gives her name to the Sapphic stanza.
- c. 534 BCEThespis wins the first tragedy contest (traditional)
Tradition says that in 534 BCE tragedy competitions begin at Athens's City Dionysia and Thespis wins the first. Ancient writers make him the first actor. The works attributed to him are considered forgeries.
- 472 BCEAeschylus stages The Persians
In 472 BCE Aeschylus, who fought at Marathon and Salamis, stages The Persians, the earliest surviving play, about the Persian defeat. It wins first prize.
- 468 BCESophocles defeats Aeschylus
In 468 BCE Sophocles wins first prize at the Dionysia over Aeschylus. Seven of his plays survive complete. According to Aristotle he adds a third actor according to Aristotle.
- 458 BCEAeschylus's Oresteia
In 458 BCE Aeschylus stages the Oresteia, the only complete tragic trilogy to survive: Agamemnon, The Libation Bearers and The Eumenides. He dies at Gela in Sicily in 456 or 455.
- 431 BCEEuripides stages Medea
In 431 BCE Euripides presents Medea at the Dionysia, where it places third. He first wins a prize only in 441, and eighteen or nineteen of his plays survive. He dies in Macedon in 406.
- c. 430 BCEHerodotus writes the Histories
Herodotus of Halicarnassus writes his Histories, on the Greco-Persian Wars and the peoples around them, in the 430s-420s BCE. Cicero calls him the "Father of History", while critics called him a storyteller. Nothing in the text is dated after 430.
- 423 BCEAristophanes stages The Clouds
In 423 BCE the comic playwright Aristophanes presents The Clouds, which caricatures Socrates, and it comes third. Only a revised version survives. Eleven of his forty plays remain, the only complete Old Comedy.
- c. 400 BCEThucydides writes the History of the Peloponnesian War
Exiled from Athens after failing to save Amphipolis in 424, Thucydides writes a history of the war from 431 to 411, where it breaks off. He revises it after 404, relies on eyewitnesses and leaves the gods out. His speeches are reconstructions.
- c. 75Josephus writes The Jewish War
About 75 CE Josephus begins The Jewish War, finished in Greek by 78, under Flavian patronage. It is the main source for the revolt and the Temple's fall, but he writes with political aims, and many of his figures are doubted.
- c. 370The Bible is translated into Gothic
In the 4th century the Arian bishop Wulfila, probably with a team, translates much of the Bible into Gothic, in the Balkans. The best-known manuscript is the Codex Argenteus, now in Uppsala.
- 382 – 405Jerome translates the Bible into Latin: the Vulgate
Commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382, Jerome revises the Latin Gospels and later translates the Old Testament from Hebrew, finishing by 405 in Bethlehem. He doubted the status of the deuterocanonical books.
- c. 405 – c. 434Mesrop Mashtots and the Armenian Bible
Around 405 Mesrop Mashtots creates the Armenian alphabet. A first Bible translation from Syriac follows (c. 411), then a revision from Greek completed c. 434.
- 799 – 801Alcuin revises the Vulgate text at Tours
Around 799–801 Alcuin of York, abbot of Marmoutier at Tours under Charlemagne, has Bibles prepared from a corrected Vulgate. The aim is to recover Jerome's text, though his changes were probably modest.
- 863Cyril and Methodius begin translating the Gospels into Slavonic
Arriving in Great Moravia in 863, the brothers Cyril and Methodius translate the Gospels and liturgical books into Old Church Slavonic, using the Glagolitic script they devised.
- c. 1205Stephen Langton's chapter divisions shape the modern Bible
Around 1205 the English theologian Stephen Langton divides the Vulgate into the chapters still used in most Bibles. They spread through the Paris Bibles of the 13th century. Verse numbers come only in the 1550s.
- c. 1298 – 1299Marco Polo dictates his Travels to Rustichello da Pisa in a Genoese prison
Held prisoner by Genoa, Polo dictates an account of his journeys to the romance writer Rustichello da Pisa. The book, in French, is later known as Il Milione. Tradition links his capture to Curzola (1298).
- c. 1302Francesco Pipino translates Marco Polo's Travels into Latin
The Dominican friar Francesco Pipino produces a Latin version of the Travels, one of the earliest translations and a source for the book's wide circulation in manuscript across Europe.
- c. 1308Dante meets Aristotle in Limbo
In Inferno IV, written about 1306-1310, Dante places Aristotle in Limbo among the virtuous pagans, with Socrates and Plato beside him, and calls him "the master of those who know". Avicenna and Averroes are also there.
- c. 1382 – c. 1388The first complete English Bible, the Wycliffite Bible, is made
Around 1382 a first English Bible is translated from the Latin Vulgate in the circle of John Wycliffe at Oxford; a freer revision follows c. 1388. Wycliffe's own part in the translation is disputed.
- January 1417Poggio Bracciolini finds Lucretius' De rerum natura
The humanist Poggio Bracciolini discovers a manuscript of Lucretius' poem De rerum natura in a German monastery, probably Fulda. Poggio never named the place, and the find became a landmark of Renaissance manuscript hunting.
- 1465The first dated books printed in Italy appear at Subiaco
German printers Konrad Sweynheym and Arnold Pannartz, working at Subiaco near Rome, print Cicero's De oratore (September 1465) and Lactantius' Divinae institutiones (October 1465), the first dated books printed in Italy.
- 1466Mentelin prints the first German Bible in Strasbourg
In 1466 Johannes Mentelin prints in Strasbourg the first Bible in German, a High German translation from the Vulgate. It is reprinted at least thirteen times before 1518, well before Luther.
- 1469John of Speyer begins printing in Venice
John of Speyer, granted a five-year printing monopoly by the Venetian Senate, prints Cicero's Epistolae ad familiares, the first book printed in Venice and the start of the city's printing trade.
- 1492Antonio de Nebrija publishes the first grammar of Castilian
Antonio de Nebrija publishes his Gramática de la lengua castellana in Salamanca, the first grammar of a modern European vernacular. 1492 is the conventional start of the Spanish Golden Age.
- 1494Aldus Manutius founds the Aldine Press in Venice
The scholar-printer Aldus Manutius founds the Aldine Press in Venice. Its first publication, in March 1495, is Constantine Lascaris' Greek grammar Erotemata with a Latin translation.
- 1498Aristotle's Poetics reaches print
Giorgio Valla's 1498 Latin translation is the first printed Poetics, and the Aldine Press prints the Greek text in 1508. Medieval readers had known the work through Averroes, whose reading made tragedy the art of praise. Castelvetro's Italian editions follow in 1570 and 1576.
- c. 1499La Celestina is printed in Burgos
The earliest known edition of the Comedia de Calisto y Melibea, later called La Celestina and attributed to Fernando de Rojas, appears in Burgos c. 1499; some scholars date it 1500.
- April 1501Aldus Manutius prints a pocket Virgil in italic type
In April 1501 the Aldine Press issues Virgil in a small octavo format, set in a new italic type cut by Francesco Griffo, the first italic type made for Aldus.
- 1516Erasmus publishes the first Greek New Testament on sale
In 1516 Desiderius Erasmus's Novum Instrumentum, with the Greek text beside his own Latin, is printed by Johann Froben in Basel. Its Greek became the basis of the Textus Receptus used by Luther and the King James Bible.
- September 1522Luther publishes his German New Testament
Luther's German New Testament, the 'September Bible', appears in Wittenberg in September 1522. His complete Bible follows in 1534 from Hans Lufft's press, and helps move German toward a standard written form.
- 1526Tyndale's English New Testament is printed at Worms
The first complete printed English New Testament, translated by William Tyndale, appears at Worms in 1526. Bishop Tunstall has copies bought and burned; Tyndale is arrested at Antwerp in 1535 and burned near Vilvoorde in October 1536.
- 1527 – c. 1561Las Casas writes his Historia de las Indias
Las Casas works on his history of the first decades of Spanish colonisation in the Caribbean from 1527 and finishes it around 1559-1561. He restricts its publication for forty years, and it is not printed until 1875.
- 1534Luther publishes his complete German Bible
In 1534 Martin Luther completes his translation of the Old Testament, and the full Bible appears in Wittenberg. It helps establish High German as a literary language and remains widely used.
- 1535Coverdale's Bible, the first complete printed English Bible, appears
In 1535 Miles Coverdale's translation, built largely on Tyndale and Latin and German versions, is printed on the Continent. Research in 1997 identified the printer as Merten de Keyser of Antwerp.
- 1535Olivétan's French Bible is printed at Neuchâtel
In 1535 Pierre Robert Olivétan, a cousin of Calvin, publishes at Neuchâtel the first French Bible translated from Hebrew and Greek rather than Latin. Calvin writes its Latin preface; it is the first French Protestant Bible.
- March 1536Calvin publishes the first Institutes of the Christian Religion in Basel
The first, Latin edition of Calvin's Institutes appears at Basel in March 1536. He expands it repeatedly, with a French edition in 1541 and a fifth, final Latin edition at Geneva in 1559.
- April 1539The Great Bible is published and ordered into every English church
The first edition of the Great Bible, edited by Myles Coverdale for Thomas Cromwell and largely based on Tyndale, appears in April 1539. Cromwell's 1538 order puts a copy of the Bible in English in every church.
- 1543Boscán and Garcilaso's poems bring Italian verse to Spain
Barcelona prints Boscán's works with those of Garcilaso de la Vega, who died in 1536. Their Italian-style sonnets and hendecasyllables transform Spanish poetry.
- June 9, 1549The first Book of Common Prayer is imposed in England
Parliament passes the Act of Uniformity on 21 January 1549, and the first Book of Common Prayer, largely edited by Thomas Cranmer, must be in use from Whitsunday, 9 June. Cranmer's stricter revision follows in 1552.
- 1554The anonymous Lazarillo de Tormes launches the picaresque novel
La vida de Lazarillo de Tormes appears anonymously in 1554, with editions printed in Burgos, Alcalá de Henares and Antwerp. It founds the picaresque genre of rogue narrators.
- 1559Paul IV's Index bans the complete works of about 550 authors
The 1559 Index issued under Paul IV bans the entire works of about 550 authors, including Erasmus, Machiavelli, Aretino and Rabelais, and unapproved Bible editions. An earlier Roman list of 1557 had been withdrawn; Trent's revised Index followed in 1564.
- 1559Ramusio's Navigationi et viaggi prints an Italian text of Marco Polo
The second volume of Giovanni Battista Ramusio's Delle navigationi et viaggi (1559) includes an Italian version of Polo's Travels, a widely used text of the book in the Renaissance.
- 1569Alonso de Ercilla publishes the first part of La Araucana
The first part of Alonso de Ercilla's epic poem La Araucana is printed in Madrid in 1569. It recounts the Spanish war against the Mapuche in Chile, in which Ercilla fought.
- 1569Casiodoro de Reina publishes the first complete Spanish Bible
In 1569 Casiodoro de Reina, a former Spanish monk turned Protestant, prints the first complete Spanish Bible in Basel, the 'Biblia del Oso'. Cipriano de Valera revises it in 1602, the basis of the Reina-Valera.
- 1579The Corral de la Cruz opens as Madrid's first permanent theatre
Built in 1579, the Corral de la Cruz becomes Madrid's first permanent playhouse. Such open-air corrales de comedias gave Golden Age drama a stable public stage.
- 1581Ivan Fedorov prints the Ostrog Bible, the first complete Church Slavonic Bible
In 1581 Ivan Fedorov prints at Ostroh, under Prince Konstanty Ostrogski, the first complete Bible in Church Slavonic, also the first in Cyrillic type. It becomes a model for later Russian editions.
- 1599Mateo Alemán publishes Guzmán de Alfarache
The first part of Mateo Alemán's Guzmán de Alfarache appears in Madrid in 1599. A bestseller across Europe, it popularises the picaresque novel after Lazarillo de Tormes.
- 1605Cervantes publishes the first part of Don Quixote
El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha is published in Madrid in 1605. Often called the first modern novel, it parodies chivalric romances and is the Golden Age's best-known work.
- 1609Lope de Vega sets out his rules for the new Spanish drama
Lope de Vega's verse treatise Arte nuevo de hacer comedias (1609) defends mixing tragedy and comedy and breaking the classical unities. It codifies the comedia nueva.
- 1611Covarrubias publishes the Tesoro de la lengua castellana
Sebastián de Covarrubias's Tesoro de la lengua castellana o española appears in Madrid in 1611, the first major dictionary of Spanish, with etymologies and cultural lore.
- 1611The King James Bible is published
Approved at the Hampton Court Conference in 1604, the Authorized Version is made by about 47 scholars and published in 1611 by Robert Barker. It draws on Tyndale and the Geneva Bible and long dominates English Bible reading.
- 1613Cervantes publishes the Novelas ejemplares
Miguel de Cervantes publishes twelve short stories as the Novelas ejemplares in Madrid in 1613, bringing the Italian novella to Spanish literature in an original form.
- c. 1613Luis de Góngora writes the Soledades, peak of culteranismo
Góngora composes the Soledades c. 1613, a dense, Latinate poem that circulates in manuscript. It defines culteranismo and sparks a long literary feud with Quevedo.
- 1615Cervantes publishes the second part of Don Quixote
The Segunda parte del ingenioso caballero don Quijote de la Mancha appears in Madrid in 1615, a year before Cervantes died, answering a spurious 1614 sequel by 'Avellaneda'.
- 1626Quevedo's picaresque novel El Buscón is published
Francisco de Quevedo's satirical picaresque novel El Buscón is first printed in Zaragoza in 1626, though written much earlier, c. 1604. It is a masterpiece of conceptismo.
- c. 1630Tirso de Molina's El burlador de Sevilla introduces Don Juan
El burlador de Sevilla, attributed to Tirso de Molina and dated c. 1630, stages the first literary version of the Don Juan legend, a seducer punished by a stone guest.
- c. 1635Calderón de la Barca writes La vida es sueño
Pedro Calderón de la Barca's philosophical drama La vida es sueño, written c. 1635 and printed in 1636, explores fate and free will. It is a high point of Spanish Baroque theatre.
- 1637The Dutch Statenvertaling is published
Ordered by the Synod of Dort in 1618 and paid for by the Dutch Republic, the Statenvertaling appears in 1637. It is the first Dutch Bible made directly from Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek, and the Reformed Church's standard text.
- May 25, 1681Calderón de la Barca dies, closing the Golden Age
Pedro Calderón de la Barca dies in Madrid on 25 May 1681. Many scholars take his death as the cultural end of the Spanish Golden Age; others end it at the 1659 Treaty of the Pyrenees.
- 1881 – 1885The Revised Version updates the King James Bible
A British committee of over fifty scholars publishes the Revised Version New Testament in 1881 and the Old Testament in 1885. The New Testament follows the Westcott–Hort Greek text, drawing on Vaticanus and Sinaiticus.
- 1898Eberhard Nestle publishes his Greek New Testament
In 1898 Eberhard Nestle issues the first edition of the critical Greek New Testament that, as the Nestle–Aland text (now NA28), underlies most modern translations and biblical scholarship.
- 1952The Revised Standard Version is published
After its 1946 New Testament, the National Council of Churches issues the complete Revised Standard Version in 1952, updating the American Standard Version while keeping the Tyndale–King James tradition. A Catholic edition follows in 1965–66.
- 1978The New International Version Bible is completed
A project launched by a 1965 conference and taken over by the New York Bible Society in 1967 issues its New Testament in 1973 and the complete New International Version in 1978. Over 500 million copies have been printed.