1401
Birth of Catherine of Valois. She is the great-grandmother of Henry VIII.

1402
John Hus becomes Rector of the University of Prague.

1403
Henry V, the son of King Henry IV of England led the royal army to victory over the rebellious Percy family.

1404
Innocent VII is elected Pope. He is the third of the Great Schism Popes.

1405
Bishop Angelo Correr was elevated to the College of Cardinals and became Papal Secretary. The next year he will become Pope.

Birth of Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini, he was the eldest of eighteen children. He would grow up to Pope Pius II.

1406
Gregory XII is elected Pope. He was Cardinal Angelo Correr. He was a learned and widely read octogenarian, of exemplary austerity but vicillating character. He owed his elevation to keen concern he had previously shown for the restoration of unity.

1409
John Hus calls the Papacy the Institute of Satan. The Hussite Heresy begins. The King of Bohemia turned the University of Prague over to the Czechs, in which Hus was rector. This action angered the German teachers and students. They left and established the University of Leipzig. The Germans called Hus a notorious heretic. The Hussites taught that the Church consisted of the predestined only and claimed St. Peter was never Head of the Church. They denied that the clergy received authority from Christ, and held that mortal sin deprives every ruler of jurisdiction.

1410
John XXIII is anti-Pope.

1411
The sentence of Excommunication was pronounced before John Hus. He continued his propagation of heretical errors and incited his countrymen to revolt.

Sigismund becomes Holy Roman Emperor.

1412
John Hus left Prague, after an Interdict was issued and took refuge in Austi.

1413
Birth of St. Joan of Arc.

Henry V becomes King of England. He restored Sir Henry Percy’s son to his lands and titles. The new King also honorably had the remains of King Richard II reburied at Westminster Abbey. King Henry V enters into negotiation with King Charles VI of France for his daughter, Catherine of Valois’ hand in marriage. She was only twelve at the time. Henry demanded a large dowry and the French regions of Aquitane and Normandy. King Charles VI rejected this proposal.

1414
Emperor Sigismund persuaded anti-Pope John XXIII to convoke the Council of Constance.

Jacob of Mies formulates Utraquism teaching. This was the principle dogma and one of the four articles of the Calixtines or Hussites. Utraquism, briefly stated means: "Man, in order to be saved, must receive Holy Communion, when he wishes and where he wishes, under the forms of bread and wine." This was said by Huss to be of Divine precept. Huss claimed to eat the receive only the Sacred Host is not "drinking" but "eating" the Blood of Christ.

The Flagellants are condemned at Erfurt.

The Ecumenical Council of Constance. This was the sixteenth General Council of the Church. It was attended by two hundred Bishops and Prelates. This Council was the Reformation of the Church. The Council condemned the Schism created by the other three candidates for Pope and rejected the Hussite's dogma of Utraquism.

John Hus refused to recant his heretical teaching and errors and was turned over to the Secular Arm of the Authorities and condemned to death. He was burned at the stake. The Council also deposed anti-Popes John XXIII, Benedict XIII, and accepted the abdication of Gregory XII. John XXIII accepted his deposition.

1415
Father Nicholas Eymeric launches his last attack on the Lullists.

King Henry V of England invaded France and forced compliance with his terms.

Henry V defeated the French at the Battle of Agincourt. King Henry V made his brother John, Duke of Bedford, lieutenant of England.

Henry the Navigator commanded the expedition which captured Ceuta, Portugal’s first overseas conquest. It was there that he won his Knightly Spurs.

1416
Jerome of Prague, a Hussite, was burned at the stake.

John of Lancaster, the Duke of Bedford, defeated the French at the Seine River.

1417
Martin V becomes Pope ending the forty year Great Schism. He is the sole member of the powerful Colonna to become Pontiff, he was Cardinal Oddo Colonna. He was Protonotarty under Pope Urban VI.

King Henry V of England joined forces with Sigismund and began the conquest of Normandy.

King Henry V had the leader of the Lollard heresy, Sir John Oldcastle executed.

1418
Pope Martin V ratifies the Council of Constance.

Pope Martin V publishes seven reforms dealing with taxation and abuse of Papal provisions.

Guido Di Pietro, better known as Fra Angelico, entered the Dominic Convent in Fiesole.

1419
Sigismund I becomes King of Bohemia.

King Henry V captured Rouen.

Death of the former anti-Pope, John XXIII.

Death of St. Vincent Ferrer.

1419-1436
The Hussite Wars brought turmoil to Bohemia.

1420
The Hussites are now called the Utraquists.

A Peace Treaty was signed at Troyes, France between England and France. Henry V marries Charles VI’s daughter, Catherine of Valois. Henry was aided in his quest by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy.

Death of Blessed Elizabeth the Good. She is noted for the frequent supposedly diabolical manifestations of which she was the object and for the reputed length of time during which she would abstain completely from food. She was a Franciscan Tertiary.

St. John of Capestrano was Ordained a Priest.

1421
King Henry V of England left his brother Thomas in Normandy as Duke. The French rose up in opposition and defeated the Duke. Henry V returned to France for a third campaign but became ill and died the next year.

1422
Charles VII becomes King of France.

John of Lancaster, the Duke of Bedford was designated as the Protector and Defender of the Kingdom for young King Henry VI.

Henry VI becomes King of England.

The first great painter of the Renaissance, Masaccio joined the Painters Guild in Florence. Masaccio paints the famous, Madonna and Child with Saints. The painting is on display at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.

1423
Gentile Da Fabriano painted his famous Adoration of the Magi.

Masaccio painted his famous Madonna with St. Ann. The painting is also on display at the Uffizi Gallery.

1424
John of Lancaster and Philip the Good defeated the Dauphin of France at Verneuil.

Alfonso V took the Holy Grail from Saragossa to Valencia.

1425
Fra Angelico becomes a Dominican Friar using the name Giovanni Da Fiesole.

1426
Masaccio created the beautiful Altar piece for the Santa Maria Del Carime Chapel.

1427
Masaccio began painting the fresco series for the Brancacci Chapel in Santa Maria Del Carmine, in Florence. Among the famous frescoes is his masterpiece, the Expulsion from Paradise. Masaccio collaborated with another famous artist, Masolino, in producing these fine works of art. Also included as his masterpiece and in the same series of frescoes is his famous, The Tribute Money.

1428
The English seized Orleans, the last important stronghold of France.

Death of the first great Renaissance artist, Masaccio.

1428-1433
Fran Angelico paints The Madonna of the Star, and Christ in Glory surrounded by Saints and Angels.

1429
Saloniki (Thessolonica) fell into the hands of the Turks.

St Joan of Arc led the French troops in battle. The French were victorious in Orleans over the English. St. Joan became known as the Maid of Orleans.

1430
The treacherous Burgundians captured St. Joan of Arc in battle and sold her to the English for $110,000 Crowns. St. Joan was taken to Rouen, where she was tried as a heretic by the order of John of Lancaster. She was found guilty under the most shady of circumstances and condemned to be burned at the stake.

Birth of Edmund Tudor. He was the son of Catherine of Valois and her Welsh lover of lower birth, Owen Tudor. The couple, never married but did have four children. Edmund is the grandfather of Henry VIII.

At the Monastery of the Church of the Assumption where the image of Our Lady of Czestochowa had been since 1382, a group of Hussites, who embraced extravagant heresies, invaded the Monastery, plundering the richly decorated sanctuary. Among the articles they took, was the Image of Our Lady of Czestochowa. They placed it in a wagon and proceeded a short distance when the horses refused to move. Recalling a similar incident that happened to Prince Ladislaus some fifty years earlier and realizing that the portrait was to blame, the heretics threw the protrait to the ground where it broke into three pieces. One of the robbers drew his sword and inflicted two deep gashes on the image. While preparing to inflict a third, he fell to the ground and died a miserable agonizing death. The two marks on the cheek of the Virgin, together with the previous injury to the throat made by a Tarter's arrow, have resisted repeated attempts at reconstruction. Regardless of what combinations of paint are used to the techniques employed, the scars have always reappeared.

1431
St. Joan of Arc was burned at the stake as a heretic. Her death was Martyrdom.

The Council of Basle. This was a troubled local Council convoked by Pope Martin V, who died before it was ratified. The Council sought reconciliation with the Eastern Church and dealt independently with the Hussite heretics. The Council did allow the reception of Holy Communion in both species to all who had reached the age of discretion and were in a state of grace, on the following conditions: 1). That the Hussites confess that the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ werecontained whole and entire under the form of bread and under that of wine; and

2)that they retractthe staement of Holy Communion under both forms is necessary for salvation. To this some of the Hussites agreed, and were known as the Calixtines, from their use of the chalice.

Eugene IV becomes Pope.

1435
Death of John of Lancaster. He was ultimately responsible for bringing St. Joan of Arc to trial as a heretic.

1436
The Hapsburgs, also spelled Habsburg, of Bohemia initiated a compromise with the Hussites ending the Hussite Wars. The future generation of the Hapsburgs became Protestants in the next centuryThe Dominicans move to the Convent of San Marco in Florence.

Fra Angelico painted many of the frescoes for the Convent.

1437
Henry the Navigator was responsible for a disastrous attack on Tangier. This siege caused the death of his brother, Fernando. He is Beatified as Blessed Ferdinand.

The Holy Grail was given to the Cathedral of Valencia and placed in a reliquary.

Death of Catherine of Valois.

Death of Holy Roman Emperor, Sigismund.

1438
The Ecumenical Council of Florence. This was the seventeenth General Council of the Church. Two hundred Bishops and the Greek Emperor John Palaeologus attended. The Council declared the supremacy of the Pope over the whole Church. The submission of the Eastern and Russian schismatic Bishops was also received and the Council reaffirmed the Canon of the Bible, forty-six Old Testament and twenty-seven New Testament Books.

1438-1806
The Archduchy of Austria became the most important state in the Holy Empire.

1439
Felix V is anti-Pope.

Pope Eugene IV proclaims Cardinal John Torquemada Defender of the Faith.

The Council of Ferrara. The Council Prelates declared all further action of the Council of Basle to be null and void. The Ecclessiastical teaching of Purgatory was discussed and written about. Seven hundred Greek Prelates also attended, eager to return to the Church. Twelve sessions on Filoque were held. The Greek Fathers admitted the orthodoxy of Filoque but maintained that it should not have been added to the Creed. This Council virtually accomplished nothing.

Fra Angelico created his Altar Pioece at San Marco, the Madonna flanked with Angels and Saints that seem to share common space.

1441
The building of the King’s College Chapel was proposed.

1444
The Military Orders of St. Hubert was founded in Bavaria by Gerard V, Duke of Julich.

1445
Fra Angelico is summoned to Rome by Pope Eugene IV to paint frescoes for the Chapel of the Sacrament in the Vatican.

1446
The Flagellants were condemned at Nordhausen.

The Diet of Frankfurt.

1447
Fra Angelico with his pupil Benozzo Gozzoli, painted frescoes for the Cathedral at Orvieto.

Nicholas V becomes Pope. He was Cardinal Tommaso Parentucelli. His father was a doctor and he tutored wealthy Florentine families. He had been Bishop of Bologna.

1447-1449
Fra Angelico paints the famous Scenes from the lives of the Saints Stephen and Lawrence in the Chapel of the Pope at the Vatican.

1448
The Concordat of Vienne. This agreement gave the Pope rights to Ecclessiastical appointments in Germany.

1448-1455
Pope Nicholas V founds the Vatican Library.

1449
Richard Neville becomes the Earl of Warwick, England. He was called the Kingmaker. He was the eldest son of the first Earl of Salisbury. The Earldom of Warwick had belonged to his wife’s family.

Anti-Pope Felix V abdicates his claim on April 7 of this year in return for an honorable status.

1449-1452
Fra Angelico served as Prior of the Dominican Convent in Fiesole.

1450
The French retake Normandy.

Fra Angelico painted his world renown fresco, The Annunciation.

1451
Birth of Isabella of Spain.

Birth of Christopher Columbus.

The French take Guienne.

1453
Ladislaus was crowned King of Hungary shortly after the death of King Hunyady.

The Flagellants were condemned at Sangerhausen.

Marguerite of Charny bequeathed the Holy Shroud to Duke Ludovico of Savoy, who built an ornate Chapel to house the Sacred relic in Chambery, France.

The One Hundred Years War between England and France ended. Thousands of lives were lost. England lost most of its land on the European Continent.

1455
Callistus III becomes Pope.

The Wars of the Roses begin. Two Royal families, the House of Lancaster and the House of York war with each other for the English Throne.

The printing press is invented. Gutenberg prints the first Bible.

On June 3, Pope Callistus III solemnly canonized St. Vincent Ferrer at the Dominican Church of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, in Rome.

Death of Fra Angelico, March 18.

1456
Death of Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond. He never got to see his son, Henry VII.

Richard Neville, who supported the House of York, was given the governorship of Calais in France.

Death of St. John of Capestrano.

1457
Birth of Henry VII.

The Bohemian Brethren Heresy begins Founded by a layman of the Bohemian nobility, Peter Chelczicky. These heretics denied the Doctrine of Transubstantiation and rejected tradition. They held that the Bible is the only guide to Heaven.

The Ottomans, led by Muhammad II, captured Constantinople, ending Byzantine Rule.

1458
Pius II becomes Pope. He was Cardinal Enea Silvio Piccolomini, from Sienna. He was the Secretary to Cardinal Domenico Capranica at the Council of Basle. He also traveled with or for Cardinal Niccolo Albergati on diplomatic errands.

Matthias, the son of the late King Hunyady, becomes King of Hungary.

Henry the Navigator, the Constant Prince, took part in the capture of Alcacer.

1458-1490
Matthias Hunyadi rules Hungary and helped make it a center of Italian Renaissance culture.

1460
The sentence against St. Joan of Arc was reversed and her innocencs was proclaimed.

Death of Henry the Navigator. He was the fourth son of John I, King of Portugal by Queen Philippa. It is not a man of war or of politics that Henry the Navigator won fame, but as an initiator of continuous maritime exploration. One of his objectives was to learn the extent of the Muslim religion and power.

The House of York defeated the House of Lancaster at Northampton.

1461
Louis XI becomes King of France.

Edward IV claims the English Throne after deposing and imprisoning King Henry VI in the Tower of London.

1464
Paul II becomes Pope. He was Cardinal Pietro Barbo. He was the nephew of Pope Eugene IV and was made Cardinal-Deacon at the age of twenty-three.

Cardinal Francesco Della Rovere, the future Pope Sixtus IV let it be known that he regarded the Holy Shroud to be authentic.

1469
Ferdinand V, of Aragon, marries Isabella I of Castile. The marriage united the two Kingdoms.

Death of artist and former Carmelite monk, Fra Filippo Lippi. He masterpiece was The Madonna and Child, painted in 1455.

1470
Richard Neville, at odds with King Edward IV, whom he one time supported, fled to France and allied himself with Margaret of Anjou, the wife of the deposed Henry VI.

The Earldom of Warwick invades England as a Lancastrian a defeated Edward IV.

Henry VI, of the House of Lancaster reclaims the English Throne.

Pope Paul II issues a General Summons to Crusade against the Turks led by Mehemet II.

The Dominican Order begins to spread the Rosary throughout the Church.

1471
Sixtus IV becomes Pope. He was Cardinal Francesco Dell Rovere. He was a Franciscan and granted King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain permission to hold the Spanish Inquisition. He was a sought-after preacher and an acute theologian.

Henry VI of the House of Lancaster took refuge in Brittany and died later this year.

1473
Birth of Nicholas Copernicus.

The Sistine Chapel was built by Pope Sixtus IV. The Chapel’s art treasures are the wonder of the universe.

1474
Death of Henry IV of Spain. He was the brother of Queen Isabella. Isabella of Spain, at the age of twenty-three, receives the Crown of San Fernando. The Coronation officially made Isabella Queen of Castile and Leon. Her succession was contested by Alfonso V of Portugal, who supported the claim of Isabella’s niece, Juana La Beltraneja.

Alfonso V attacks Castile and Leon. He was defeated by the Castilian army led by King Ferninand V.

Fra Thomas De Torquemada becomes the Queen’s confessor.

Death of the Franciscan theologian, St. Bonaventure.

1475
Death of Dominic priest, Father Alan De Rupe. The Dominican’s devotion to the Rosary was chiefly based on a vision of father Alan De Rupe.

The Holy Year Jubilee is proclaimed by the Holy See. Every twenty-five years the Church celebrates a Holy Year.

Birth of Michelangelo, the great Renaissance artist.

1476
Pope Sixtus IV approves the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

1477
The Hapsburg family of Austria gain control of Belgium.

Ferdinand V becomes King of Aragon. He and his Queen, Isabella set the foundation of Spain’s future greatness.

1478
Ferdinand and Isabella receive permission from Pope Sixtus IV to begin the Spanish Inquisition.

1480
Pladeletina is appointed Librarian of the Vatican Library by Pope Sixtus IV.

The Italian mainland falls to the Turks.

1481
The Ottoman Empire commanded by Sultan Bayezid II, extended from the Danube River to southern Anatolia. The Ottoman Turks were the leading naval power in the Mediterranean region.

The Flagellants, who had been making a habit out of being condemned, were condemned again at Halberstadt.

1482
Portuguese seaman begin stopping at the mouth of the Congo River. Portugal established diplomatic relations with the Kongo Kingdom; which then ruled the coastal region. Representatives from this Kingdom visited Portugal and the Vatican. The Kingdom was soon converted to Christendom. Many Kongo men became Catholic priests.

Pope Sixtus IV Canonizes St. Bonaventure.

The feast of Our Lady of Sorrows was officially placed in the Roman Missal under the title of "Our Lady of Compassion."

1483
Birth of Guicciardini, the greatest Italian historian of the Renaissance.

Birth of Raphael, the famous artist.

Charles VIII becomes King of France.

The Spanish Inquisition begins. Pope Sixtus IV names Fra Thomas De Torquemada Inquisitor General for Castile and Leon.

Edward V becomes King of England. The young King was entrusted to the care of his uncle, Richard III. Edward V and his brother Richard, Duke of York, were then imprisoned at the Tower of London where they were murdered. The reports claim that Richard III may have poisoned them.

Henry Tudor VII went to Wales and gathered an army of supporters.

Richard III, ascends to the English Throne. He was the last Plantagentet King.

1484
Innocent VIII becomes Pope. He was Cardinal Giovanni Battista Cibo. His father was a Roman Senator. He was the uncle of the future Pope, Julius II.

The first Auto De Fe in Spain. This was an edict of Faith. Inquisitor Peter Arbues is stabbed while praying his Midnight Matins, dying twenty-four later, praising and glorifying God. He is St. Peter Martyr.

Birth of Arthur Tudor. He was Henry VII’s eldest son. It was he who was betrothed to Catherine of Aragon. This betrothal, which we will see a bit later, was the reason for the Papal dispensation that allowed Henry VIII to marry Catherine.

1485
The Battle of Bosworth. This was the last battle of the Wars of the Roses. Henry VII, of the House of Tudor, claims the English Throne. With France’s help, he is victorious in this battle where Richard III, the last Plantagenet King, was killed.

Perdo Luis, the eldest son of Rodrigo Borgia, acquired the Duchy of Gandia in the Kingdom of Valencia.

Death of Dona Felipa Columbus, the wife of Christopher.

Birth of Catherine of Aragon.

Leonardo Da Vinci paints the famous, Madonna of the Rocks.

1486
Pope Innocent VIII formerly recognizes Henry VII as rightful King of England.

Birth of Johann Eck.

After the death of his wife, Christopher Columbus went to Spain in 1485. His good friends, Friar Antonio De Marchena and Bishop Diego De Daze, of Placentia, influenced Queen Isabella to hear the proposals of Christopher Columbus. At this first meeting, the Queen denied the Genoese man’s request for sponsoring his voyage. It was about this time that Christopher Columbus met Dona Beatriz Enriquez De Arana. She bore him his second son, Fernando. Next to his brother Bartholomew, Fernando was the most gifted of the Colombos.

1488
Fray Thomas De Torquemada establishes the Inquisitional Court.

A new Turkish offensive begins to terrorize all of Christendom.

1489
Giovanni De Medici, the future Pope Leo X, began studying law at Pisa.

Savonarloa came to Florence and began his career of reform as Prior of the Dominican Church of San Marco.

1490
Death of King Matthais of Hungary. He is succeeded by Ladislaus II. He was chosen with influence of Cardinal Thomas Bakocz.

1491
Birth of Henry VIII.

Cardinal Thomas Bakocz was appointed to the Bishopric at Erlau by King Ladislaus.

Nicholas Copernicus entered the University of Krakow. He studied liberal arts for four years and did not earn a Degree. He later went to Italy to study medicine and law.