Bougainville at Tahiti
Bougainville's account creates the myth of Tahitian paradise
In April 1768 Louis Antoine de Bougainville's expedition, the first French circumnavigation, spent nine days on Tahiti. His picture of the island as a 'New Cythera' of natural happiness inspired Diderot and made Tahiti Europe's symbol of an earthly paradise.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 18th century
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Europe
- 1755 Lisbon earthquake — 13 years earlier
- 1756–1763 Seven Years' War — 12 years earlier
- c. 1760 Start of the Industrial Revolution — 8 years earlier
- 1769 Watt's steam engine — 1 year later
- 1789 Storming of the Bastille — 21 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1762 Accession of Catherine the Great — 6 years earlier
- 1764 Founding of the Hermitage — 4 years earlier
- c. 1768 Extinction of Steller's sea cow — same year
- 1772–1795 Partitions of Poland — 4 years later
- 1774 Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca — 6 years later
Middle East
- 1747 Ahmad Shah Durrani founds the Afghan state — 21 years earlier
Asia
- 1755–1758 The Dzungar genocide — 13 years earlier
- 1757 Battle of Plassey — 11 years earlier
- 1761 Third Battle of Panipat — 7 years earlier
Americas
- 1776 US Declaration of Independence — 8 years later
- 1781 Surrender at Yorktown — 13 years later
- 1787 US Constitution — 19 years later
- 1791–1804 Haitian Revolution — 23 years later
Alive at the time
- Voltaire (aged 74)
- Benjamin Franklin (aged 62)
- James Cook (aged 40)
- Catherine the Great (aged 39)
- George Washington (aged 36)
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (aged 19)
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (aged 12)
- Carl Linnaeus (aged 61)
- Leonhard Euler (aged 61)
- Louis XV (aged 58)