In 1294 Pope Celestine V resigned five months after his election.
The hermit, chosen after a two-year conclave, longed to return to his cell, but his successor Boniface VIII kept him in custody until he died.
More amazing facts
- 1288 · 1326 The oldest surviving gun is Chinese, made no later than 1288, and weighs 3.5 kg. Europe's first picture of a cannon appears only in Walter de Milemete's English manuscript of 1326.
- 1291 Murano glass exists because of fear of fire.
- 1293 The founder of Majapahit won with the help of Kublai Khan's army, then drove it out. In 1293 Raden Wijaya got the Mongol force on Java to crush his rival, then turned on the Mongols themselves.
- 1298 Marco Polo's book was written down by someone else: his cellmate.
- 1299 · 1903 The Ottoman state, founded around 1299, still existed when the Wright brothers made the first airplane flight: the sultanate was abolished only in 1922.
- 1300 · 1303 Dante booked a place in Hell for a living pope.