1556-1605: Akbar the Great
Akbar hosts an assembly with priests of different religions at his House of Faiths in Fatehpur Sikri, illustration from Akbarnama, Nar Singh, ca. 1605 The Mughal Emperor Akbar is famous…
Category: Timeline Stories
All timeline stories.
Episode XIV: ‘Universal Peace’ – Religious tolerance in the Mughal empire
Episode 14 leaves the West and heads to 16th and 17th Century India and the Mughal empire. In particular, the rule of Akbar the Great. A century before John…
1632: Galileo and the Inquisition
Cristiano Banti (1857): Galileo facing the Roman Inquisition (Public Domain) In 1632, the astronomer Galileo Galilei is arrested by the Roman Inquisition. His recent book Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World…
1600: The Execution of Giordano Bruno
The philosopher Giordano Bruno is best known for his revolutionary cosmology. According to Bruno, the Sun is the centre of an infinite universe where creation takes place indefinitely. In…
1573: The Warsaw Confederation Act
On 28 January 1573, the Sejm of Poland-Lithuania passes the Warsaw Confederation Act. It includes a clause on religious freedom: “…we mutually promise for ourselves and our successors forever ……
1568: The Edict of Torda
Aladár Körösfői Kriesch (1896): “The Proclamation of the Act on Religious Freedom at the 1568 Session of the Transylvanian Diet. The Edict of Torda is one of the first…
1572: The St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre
François Dubois, A masacre de San Bartolomé, painted between 1572-1584 (Public Domain) On St. Batholomew’s Day in August 1572, royal troops execute the Huguenot leaders attending a wedding in…
1559: The Index of Forbidden Books
Index Librorum Prohibitorum, Venice, 1564 (Public Domain) Paul IV issues the first papal Index of Forbidden Books in 1559. It bans the entire writings of 550 authors, including Erasmus,…
1553: The execution of Miguel Serveto
Copper engraving of Serveto and his execution by Christian Fritzsch, c. 1740 The Spanish theologian and polymath Miguel Serveto is burned alive in Calvins’s Geneva in October 1553. Because…
1542: The Roman Inquisition
In 1542, Pope Paul III signs the papal bull launching the Roman Inquisition. For the next two centuries, the inquisitors conduct at least 50,000 secret trials. Around 1,250 are executed.