Classical Antiquity (8th C BCE - 476 CE)
Medieval Period (476 - 1453) Renaissance (1453 - 1660) Enlightenment (1660 - 1798) Romanticism (1798 - 1837) Victorianism (1837 - 1901) Modernism (1901 - 1945) Postmodernism (1945 - ) |
700s BCE: Homer
460 – 377 BCE: Hippocrates 131 – 201 CE: Galen 313—Roman Emperor legalizes Christianity; beginning of hospitals 476—Fall of Western Roman Empire 1348—Bubonic Plague 1440—Gutenberg Printing Press 1453—Fall of Constantinople, Eastern Roman Empire 1493 – 1542: Paracelsus 1495—First Syphilis Pandemic 1620—Francis Bacon Novum Organum 1641—René Descartes’s Meditations on First Philosophy 1660--Restoration of Charles II 1704—Sir Isaac Newton’s Opticks 1752—Murder Act (dissection of murderers) 1772—Nitrous Oxide 1803—Thomas Percival’s Medical Ethics 1805—Morphine 1816—Stethoscope 1832—Anatomy Act (Dissection of unclaimed bodies) 1834—“Scientist” coined 1837—Queen Victoria crowned 1846—Anesthetic (diethyl ether, William Morton) 1847—American Medical Association adopts the Code of Medical Ethics; Chloroform 1858—Medical Act (regulates qualifications of physicians) 1859—Charles Darwin The Origin of Species 1860s—Germ theory increasingly popularized (Louis Pasteur) 1864—Contagious Diseases Act (criminalizes prostitution) 1865—Carbolic acid used as antiseptic (Joseph Lister); Criminal Law Amendment Act (raises age of consent) 1876—Medical Act (revised, allows women) 1881—“Vaccine” coined 1896—X-Ray 1899—Sir William Osler’s “Aequanimitas”; Aspirin 1901—Queen Victoria dies 1914 – 1918: World War I 1928—Penicillin 1939 – 1945: World War II 1944—Tuberculosis antibiotic 1972—Medicare and Medicaid |