«« The Thinkery

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c. 250,000 BC	modern humans emerge in Africa	[ Africa ]
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c. 120,000 BC	earliest cave paintings we know of are located in a South African cave	[ Africa ]
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c. 100,000 BC	modern humans migrate to the Middle East	[ Middle East ]
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c. 75,000 BC	modern humans arrive in Southeast Asia and China	[ Asia ]
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c. 40,000 BC	modern humans arrive in Europe, living alongside Neanderthals	[ Europe ]
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c. 39,000 BC	earliest cave paintings we know of in Europe are located in Spain	[ Europe ]
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c. 28,000 BC	Neanderthals become extinct in Spain	[ Europe ]
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c. 16,000 BC	Humans cross the Bering Strait to Alaska over a land bridge exposed by the warming planet	[ North America ]
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c. 15,000 BC	Ice Age ends & average temperatures rise by ~15 degrees C	[ Global ]
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c. 14,000 BC	period of global cooling known as the Younger Dryas	[ Global ]
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c. 14,000 BC	Humans reach South America	[ South America ]
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c. 12,000 BC	ceramic arts begin in Japan	[ Asia ]
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c. 11,500 BC	the Clovis culture begins in the North American Great Plains	[ North America ]
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c. 10,200 BC	early permanent settlements in Mureybet, what is today modern Syria	[ Middle East ]
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c. 10,000 BC	agriculture develops in the Yellow River Valley and other sites in China	[ Asia ]
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c. 9600 BC	global temps rise again -- by 7 degrees C in less than a decade -- and stay high, causing the Long Summer we remain in plus setting stage for the Neolithic Revolution	[ Global, Middle East ]
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c. 9500 BC	Domestic plants in use in Jericho (Palestine), and Syria	[ Middle East ]
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c. 7000 BC	invention of textiles in Egypt	[ Africa, Middle East ]
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c. 6500 BC	farming begins spreading into Europe from the Middle East	[ Europe, Middle East ]
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c. 5000 BC	cultivation of tin as a metal resource	[ ]
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c. 5000 BC	cultivation of rice begins in Asia	[ Asia ]
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4241 BC	The Egyptians begin to use the "Nile Year" of 365 days as their calendar year	[ Africa ]
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c. 3800 BC	cultivation of bronze kicks off the Bronze Age	[ Global ]
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c. 3750	fishing villages established in Peru	[ South America ]
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c. 3500 BC	large cities of Ur and Uruk have emerged in Mesopotamia and modern Iraq	[ Middle East ]
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c. 3000 BC	The Persians bring us the invention of wine, the gift that keeps on giving to civilization to this day	[ Middle East ]
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3114 BC	starting date of the Long Count calendar of the Mayan civilization, the significance of which is not known (long precedes emergence of Mayan society)	[ South America ]
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c. 2980 BC	great pyramid of Zoser built for the first king of the Third Dynasty in Egypt	[ Africa, Middle East ]
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2980 - 2900 BC	the Egyptian Third Dynasty; Zoser is the first King	[ Africa, Middle East ]
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c. 2500 BC	Egyptians building pyramids at Giza	[ Africa, Europe ]
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c. 2500 BC	Arctic people have campsites from North America to Greenland	[ North America ]
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c. 2500 BC	Society of the Harappans of the Indus Valley is flourishing in modern-day India and Pakistan	[ Central Asia, Asia ]
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c. 2500 BC	Acupuncture is invented in China	[ Asia ]
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c. 2500 - 900 BC	Minoan civilization in Crete relies on religion to explain physical phenomena	[ Europe ]
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c. 2330	Ur, Uruk, and other wealthy Sumerian cities fell to the conqueror Sargon from northern Mesopotamia	[ Middle East ]
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2296 BC	The Chinese record the earliest sighting of a comet	[ Asia ]
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2180 BC	Severe drought disrupts the communities of the Nile	[ Africa ]
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c. 2100 BC	Hebrew patriarch Abraham leaves Ur (Sumer) with his clan	[ Middle East ]
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2090 BC	King Shulki of Ur issues laws	[ Middle East ]
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c. 2000 BC	Power in Egypt shifts from Memphis to Thebes, expanding the kingdom southward into Nubia (modern-day Ethiopia)	[ Africa ]
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c. 2000 BC	The last woolly mammoths die out and the species go extinct	[ Global ]
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c. 2000 BC	Minoan civilization is flourishing on Crete	[ Europe ]
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c. 2000 BC	Epic of Gilgamesh composed	[ Middle East, Africa ]
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c. 2000 - 600 BC	Peak of the Sanskrit language, one of the oldest Indo-European languages whose extant records still exist	[ ]
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1792 BC	Hammurabi releases his Code of laws	[ Middle East ]
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c. 1600 BC	Stonehenge being used as a religious center in England	[ Europe ]
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c. 1580 - 1350 BC	Egypt's New Kingdom ascends following the thwarting of invaders	[ Africa, Middle East ]
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c. 1500 BC	Olmec civilization developing in modern-day Mexico	[ South America ]
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c. 1500 BC	oldest surviving sundial extant in Egypt	[ Africa ]
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1361 BC	an account of an eclipse in China is the first known recorded account of an eclipse by any people	[ Asia ]
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c. 1300 BC	the Hebrews establish the Kingdom of Israel	[ Middle East ]
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1292 - 1225 BC	reign of Rameses II in Egypt	[ Africa ]
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c. 1250 - 750 BC	the Greek Dark Ages	[ Europe ]
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c. 1200 BC	The Iron Age begins almost simultaneously around the world, in the Middle East, Europe, and India	[ Middle East, Europe, Global ]
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c. 1200 BC	The Israelites, one of several Semitic tribes, are being held as slaves in Egypt	[ Middle East, Africa ]
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c. 1200 BC	archaeologists' positioning of events thought to form the basis of the Trojan War, and Homer's subsequent retelling of it in the Iliad several centuries later	[ Europe ]
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1120-256 BC	Under the Rites of Chou in China, the expanding bureacracy is charged with mapping all of the provinces	[ ]
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c. 1100 BC	The Babylonia creation myth, Enûma Eliš, describes the primal state of the world as a watery mass	[ Middle East ]
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1025 BC	Saul becomes king of Israel	[ Middle East ]
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1000 BC	David becomes King of Israel	[ Middle East ]
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960-925 BC	Solomon succeeds his father as king of Israel	[ Middle East ]
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c. 900 BC	high point of Etruscan culture in the Mediterranean	[ Europe, Middle East ]
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c. 800 BC	the Celts move into modern-day England	[ Europe ]
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800 BC	city of Rome founded by Romulus and Remus	[ Europe ]
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776 BC	First Olympic games held	[ Europe ]
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721 BC	Israel falls to Assyria and the Hebrews are exiled	[ Middle East ]
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c. 700 BC	Greek poet Hesiod's Theogony relates how the gods created the universe	[ Europe ]
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663 - 525 BC	Twenty-Sixth Egyptian Dynasty	[ Africa ]
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624 - 546 BC	Philosopher Thales of Miletus posited that water is the fundamental substance making up the universe	[ Europe ]
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614 BC	Assyria collapses	[ Middle East ]
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594 BC	Solon of Athens reform government to allow all citizens to participate, making him the "father of democracy"	[ Europe ]
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584 BC	Nebuchadrezzar II sacks the kingdom of Judah and carries off many of its people as slaves to Babylon	[ Middle East, Africa ]
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c. 560 BC	Siddharta Gautama born in India, later to become the Buddha; founder of Buddhism	[ Asia ]
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c. 550 BC	the Jews are permitted to return to Jerusalem	[ Middle East ]
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534 BC	first recorded performance of Greek tragedy; prize won by Thespis	[ Europe ]
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525 - c. 456 BC	life of the great Greek tragic playwright Aeschylus	[ Europe ]
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510 BC	Roman Republic formed when the citizens overthrew king Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, aka Tarquin the Proud	[ Europe ]
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c. 500 BC	first Mayan cities develop in what is today southern Mexico and Central America	[ South America ]
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c. 500 BC	An upsurge in airborne pollutants is detected by the Greenland Ice Core Project, as Roman mining heats up and indicates economic expansion	[ ]
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c. 500 BC	Buddha gives his first sermon in the Deer Park at Sarnath	[ ]
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c. 500 BC	The Dao de Ching is written by philosopher Lao Tzu	[ Asia ]
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c. 496-406 BC	life of the middle of the great Greek tragic trio, Sophocles	[ Europe ]
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490 BC	Persian King Darius loses a decisive Battle of Marathon, beginning the waning of the empire	[ ]
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485-406 BC	life of the final member of the Greek tragedy trio of playwrites, Euripedes	[ Europe ]
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c. 485-410 BC	life of the Sophist philosopher Protagoras	[ Europe ]
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c. 480 to 420 BC	life of Herodotus, one of Greece's great historiographers	[ Europe ]
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c. 460 to 404 BC	life of Thucydides, another of Greece's great historiogrphers	[ Europe ]
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c. 450 BC	approximate height of the Persian Empire	[ Middle East ]
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c. 450-c. 357 BC	life of Greek comic playwright Aristophanes	[ Europe ]
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c. 432 BC	Babylonian lunar calendar discovered: the Metonic cycle	[ Middle East ]
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431-404 BC	Peloponnesian War	[ Europe ]
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428-347 BC	life of Plato	[ Europe ]
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c. 400 BC	kingdom of Aksum formed in modern-day Ethiopia; an independent & developed kingdom that traded internationally & had ideological paralells to Rome	[ Africa ]
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c. 400 BC	the Cynic school of philosophy forms in Athens	[ Europe ]
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c. 400 BC	Leucippus and Democritus conclude the cosmos is made up solely of atoms and empty space	[ Europe ]
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c. 400 BC	Greek scholars understood the world as a globe, not a flat disc	[ Europe ]
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384-322 BC	life of Artistotle, famed Greek philosopher	[ Europe ]
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356 - 323 BC	Life of Alexander the Great	[ ]
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334 BC	Alexander the Great marches into Persia, sacks and burns the great city of Persepolis	[ ]
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332 BC	Alexander the Great conquers Egypt	[ Africa, Middle East ]
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322 BC	Artistotle dies in Greece — last of the great Greek philosophers, after Socrates and Plato	[ Europe ]
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c. 300 BC	Zeno founds the Stoic school of philosophy in Athens	[ Europe ]
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c. 300 BC	Epicurus founds the Epicurean school of philosophy in Athens	[ Europe ]
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c. 300 BC - 300 AD	Japanese Yayoi era	[ ]
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c. 276 - 195 BC	life of Eratosthenes, one of the great ancient geographers of ancient Greece	[ Europe ]
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c. 273-232	Reign of emperor Asoka in Tibet; he made Buddhism the national religion of his people	[ Asia ]
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234 - 149 BC	life of Cato the Elder in Rome: the first historian to write in Latin	[ Europe ]
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227 BC	Sicily becomes the first Roman province, taken in a two decades'-long war with Carthage	[ ]
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221 BC	Imperial Era begins in China	[ Asia ]
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218 BC	Hannibal leads a Carthaginian army through Spain and Gaul to attack the Romans, who had used a pretext to turn a minor dispute into a decades-long war	[ ]
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205 - 125 BC	Life of Polybius	[ ]
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c. 200 BC	The Romans develop paved roads, greatly improving transportation	[ Europe ]
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190 BC	A Roman army first sweeps into Asia, pulverizing a local despot	[ ]
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c. 165 - 127 BC	life of Hipparchus of Nicaea, one of the greatest Greek astronomers	[ Europe ]
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148 BC	Rome establishes direct rule over the territory of Macedon	[ ]
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133 BC	plebeian tribune Tiberius Gracchus is murdered by Roman senators for proposing a commission to investigate redistribution of land from the wealthy senatorial class to the citizen-soldiers who were suffering from vast income inequality	[ Europe ]
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91-87 BC	Social War in Rome again brings land and economic reform to the fore	[ Europe ]
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84 - 44 BC	Cicero is writing his philosophical works in Rome; known as one of the best Roman orators, his stylistic influence on the Latin language persists for hundreds of years	[ Europe ]
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70 - 19 BC	life of Virgil	[ ]
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49 BC	Republic of Rome becomes the Roman Empire when Julius Caesar overthrows the Republic	[ Europe ]
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48 BC	Julius Caesar burns the great library at Alexandria	[ Africa, Europe ]
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46 BC	Caesar proposes the Julian calendar to replace the Roman calendar, which remains predominant until it is gradually replaced by the Gregorian calendar proposed in 1582	[ ]
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44 BC	Julius Caesar is murdered by disgruntled senators Brutus & Cassius, and a new civil war breaks out between Caesar's supporters, Mark Anthony & Octavian, and his foes	[ Europe ]
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43 BC - 17 AD	life of the Roman poet Ovid	[ Europe ]
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31 BC	Octavian defeats Mark Anthony & Cleopatra at the battle of Actium after they together had defeated the opposing forces in Rome	[ Europe, Africa ]
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30 BC	Egypt becomes a part of the Roman Empire	[ Africa, Middle East, Europe ]
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28 BC	Octavian is hereafter known as Augustus Caesar	[ Europe ]
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27 BC	Julius Caesar Augustus becomes the first emperor of Rome, ruling for 45 years	[ Europe ]
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4 BC	Seneca born in Rome	[ Europe ]
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