The last months of 1600 shaped two island nations: in October the Battle of Sekigahara opened the way to 265 years of Tokugawa rule in Japan, and on 31 December Elizabeth I chartered the East India Company.
The events
- Battle of Sekigahara1600 · Sekigahara. Tokugawa Ieyasu defeated a coalition of western daimyo and became Japan's de facto ruler. Named shogun in 1603, he founded the Tokugawa shogunate, based in Edo, which kept Japan at peace for two and a half centuries.
- East India Company founded1600 · London. On 31 December 1600 Elizabeth I granted London merchants a monopoly on trade with Asia. The East India Company began with pepper and textiles and by the mid-19th century ruled most of India with its own army. After the Indian Rebellion of 1857 its territories passed to the British Crown.
More amazing facts
- 1598 · 1605 While False Dmitry I ruled in Moscow (1605–1606), the first part of Don Quixote came out in Madrid.
- 1599 · 1673 High heels were made for men. Persian horsemen used them to grip their stirrups, and after Shah Abbas’s embassy to Europe in 1599 aristocrats copied the style.
- 1600 · 1601 Some scientists think the 1600 eruption of Peru's Huaynaputina caused the cooling behind Russia's Great Famine of 1601–1603, which helped spark the Time of Troubles.
- 1600 · 1826 Janissary officers had kitchen titles: a company commander was the çorbacı, the "soup server". The cauldron was sacred to the corps, and overturning it signalled revolt.
- 1600 Ninja did not wear black suits.
- 1601 · 1609 The most accurate pre-telescope sky survey came from a man who never looked through a telescope.