Extinction of Steller's sea cow
A giant of northern seas is gone 27 years after its discovery
Georg Steller described this giant sea cow, up to 8 m long, during Bering's expedition in 1741. Fur hunters killed it for meat, and by the generally accepted estimate it was gone by 1768, just 27 years after discovery, early in Catherine II's reign.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 18th century
Did you know
Steller's sea cow was discovered in 1741 and wiped out in just 27 years: the last was apparently killed in 1768, the year Cook set off on his first voyage.
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
Middle East
- 1747 Ahmad Shah Durrani founds the Afghan state — 21 years earlier
Asia
- 1757 Battle of Plassey — 11 years earlier
Americas
- 1776 US Declaration of Independence — 8 years later
- 1787 US Constitution — 19 years later
- 1791–1804 Haitian Revolution — 23 years later
Oceania
- 1768–1771 Cook's first voyage — same year
- 1788 First Fleet arrives in Australia — 20 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)