1610 – 1620s

Events in the 1610s 13

• 1467 – 1615 Sengoku — the Warring States age A century of civil war among rival daimyo The Sengoku ("Warring States") period was the most violent age in Japanese history, as feudal lords (daimyo) fought ceaselessly for territory and power. From this chaos rose three great unifiers — Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Tokugawa Ieyasu — who step by step reunited the country.
• 1541 – 1614 El Greco Mannerism · Greece / Spain El Greco (October 1, 1541 – April 7, 1614) was a Greek painter who settled in Toledo, Spain, and developed a distinctive Mannerist style with elongated figures and dramatic colour. He was rediscovered by modernists in the 20th century.
• 1547 – 1616 Miguel de Cervantes Spanish novelist Cervantes wrote Don Quixote, often considered the first modern novel and a cornerstone of Western literature.
• 1551 – 1618 Giulio Caccini Italian composer and singer Giulio Caccini was a pioneering member of the Florentine Camerata whose collection Le nuove musiche helped define the new monodic style that led to the birth of opera.
• 1552 – 1612 Hans Leo Hassler German Renaissance composer Hans Leo Hassler was the leading German composer of his generation who studied in Venice and brought Italian Renaissance style back to Germany. His sacred and secular works were widely performed.
• 1554 – 1612 Giovanni Gabrieli Venetian Renaissance composer Giovanni Gabrieli was a nephew of Andrea Gabrieli and one of the most influential composers of the late Renaissance. His polychoral motets and instrumental canzonas were widely admired.
• 1564 – 1616 William Shakespeare English playwright and poet Shakespeare created plays and sonnets that remain central to world literature, exploring universal themes of human nature.
• 1566 – 1613 Carlo Gesualdo Italian Renaissance composer Carlo Gesualdo was an Italian prince and composer notorious for his intensely chromatic madrigals and his personal life. His harmonic language was far ahead of his time.
• 1571 – 1610 Caravaggio Baroque · Italy Caravaggio (September 29, 1571 – July 18, 1610) was an Italian Baroque painter who revolutionised art with his radical use of chiaroscuro (light and shadow) and brutal realism. He killed a man in 1606 and died a fugitive at 38.
• 1573 – 1616 Johann Hermann Schein German Renaissance composer Johann Hermann Schein was a German composer who applied Italian madrigal and concerto techniques to German sacred and secular music, anticipating the Baroque style.
• 1609 – 1619 Kepler's laws of planetary motion Elliptical orbits — planets move in ellipses, not circles Between 1609 and 1619, Johannes Kepler published three laws describing planetary motion: (1) planets move in elliptical orbits with the Sun at one focus; (2) a planet sweeps equal areas in equal times; (3) the square of a planet's orbital period is proportional to the cube of its distance from the Sun. Based on Tycho Brahe's meticulous observations, these laws replaced 2,000 years of circular orbit theory and gave Newton the data to derive universal gravitation.
• 1614 Napier invents logarithms Mirifici Logarithmorum Canonis Descriptio — calculation transformed In 1614, John Napier of Edinburgh published his description of logarithms — a mathematical tool that converts multiplication into addition, dramatically reducing the labour of complex calculation. Kepler described logarithms as a gift from God. The concept led directly to the slide rule and underpinned all scientific calculation for 350 years, until electronic calculators. Napier also introduced the decimal point in its modern form.
• 1618 – 1648 Thirty Years' War Religious war in the Holy Roman Empire One of the most devastating wars in European history ravaged the German states, causing massive destruction and population loss.