Mendaña reaches the Solomon Islands
Spaniards sought Solomon's gold and named the islands for it
Álvaro de Mendaña's expedition sailed from Callao in search of the fabled southern continent and in February 1568 reached Santa Isabel. The Spaniards spent six months exploring the archipelago, clashed with islanders over food and returned empty-handed, but rumours of riches gave the islands the name of Solomon. Mendaña's second voyage, in 1595, ended with his death on Santa Cruz.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 16th century
Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Europe
- 1543 Copernicus publishes heliocentrism — 25 years earlier
- 1571 Battle of Lepanto — 3 years later
- 1572 St Bartholomew's Day Massacre — 4 years later
- 1582 Gregorian calendar — 14 years later
- 1588 Defeat of the Spanish Armada — 20 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1547 Ivan IV crowned Tsar — 21 years earlier
- 1555–1561 Saint Basil's Cathedral — 13 years earlier
- 1569 Union of Lublin — 1 year later
- 1582 Yermak's conquest of Sibir — 14 years later
Africa
- 1591 Battle of Tondibi and fall of Songhai — 23 years later
Asia
- 1556 Shaanxi earthquake — 12 years earlier
- 1556 Akbar and the Second Battle of Panipat — 12 years earlier
- 1592–1598 Imjin War — 24 years later
Americas
- 1545–1548 Cocoliztli epidemic — 23 years earlier
Alive at the time
- Ivan the Terrible (aged 38)
- Elizabeth I (aged 35)
- Akbar the Great (aged 26)
- Tokugawa Ieyasu (aged 25)
- Miguel de Cervantes (aged 21)
- William Shakespeare (aged 4)
- Galileo Galilei (aged 4)
- Selim II (aged 44)
- Philip II of Spain (aged 41)
- Yermak Timofeyevich (aged 36)