redneck
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Ok, what does everyone think are the five most important events of the last 1,000 years? please try not be be very broad about what you pick. IE don't say the Renaissance, but use a spacific part of the Reneaissance. for me I'm going to list the 5 events I feel are most important.1-The Plague of 1347.The Black death wipped out 1/3 to 1/4 of Europe, Asia, and Africa in a matter of months. there has been very few pandemics in world history which have had such an effect on man kind. before the plague Europe was still in the darkages for the most part, it had started to come out of them a bit but much of society was still rooted firmly in the church and in religion. the Plague hurt the church a lot, many people lost faith in the clergy and even in the Monarchs of Europe which lead to the loosening of the iron tight grip that they had on Europe. It also had another effect which is rarely talked about, and that is with all the death there was a lot of land to be had, and cheaply. many peasants were able to buy land, and begin farming it for themselves, instead of relying on the feudal systems which were in place before. this lead to the decrease in power for the nobility and an increase in goods and trade for the entire economy as a whole.2-The fall of Constantinople in 1453.With the fall of Constantinople to the turks, the last refuge of the Roman empire ended. For centuries while the rest of Europe was in the darkages, the Eastern part of the Roman Empire florished, but once Constantinople fell, choas reigned down upon Eastern Eruope. This also solidified Ottoman control of the middleEast, and North Africa. it helped bring another age of enlightenment to places such as Baghdad, and Alexandria, which had become in disarray after the Mongol raids of the 12th and 13th centuries. With control of Constaninople the Ottomans also had control of the land trade routes to Asia, this would force European nations to look elsewhere and spur the age of exploration.3-The conquest of MexicoWhen Cortez conquered the Aztecs it gave Spain a huge empire, a lot of gold and a lot of other valuble resources. the talens of adventure also would drive thousands more ventureseekers to try their hand in the new world. this would lead to a vast explosion of people comming to the new world and it's eventual colonization. the money which Spain made from the new world also reserrected an old crinimal activity which had been dying down in the Mediterranean; Piracy. While Piracy wasn't as big as it was portrayed in the movies, it did cause a significant problem which lead to new technologies to prevent Piracy. the process of getting stuff from new world to old world would also lead to the discovery of the Gulf Stream and the trade winds, which helped increase traffic of the time but as since helped us understand a lot more about Earth itself.4-The American Revolution.This was the begining of the end of Colonization for Europe. After the treaty of Paris in 1783 there was a huge increase in the number of rebellions in the New World which would lead to its complete decolonization. of corse the American Revolution also gave birth to the United States, which became a beacon for many ideas and peoples which would eventually help the US to become a world power.5-The assasination of Archduke Ferdinand in 1914.This event is one of the single most important events in modern history. if you look close enough this is the event which would set of a series of chain reactions which we are still feeling today. it's most notible for setting off World War One. but the events of WWI lead to World War II, which was the most distructive war in History. After WWII the US and USSR vyied for power during the coldwar, both nations stepped on a lot of feed and thats a huge reason why we have some of the problems we have today, such as terrorism and general distrust of Americans.
