SortStack #1213 — 2029-10-04

By year · Order from earliest to most recent.

1. Emperor Constantine dedicates Constantinople as the new Roman capital 330

   Built on the old Greek city of Byzantium, it remained an imperial capital for over a thousand years and is now Istanbul, Turkey's largest city.

2. Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species 1859

   The entire first print run sold out to booksellers on the first day. Darwin had sat on the theory for some twenty years before a rival's letter forced his hand.

3. Germany invades Poland, beginning the Second World War 1939

   Britain and France declared war two days later — then months of eerie quiet followed on the Western Front, a period nicknamed the 'Phoney War.'

4. The Second World War ends with the surrender of Japan 1945

   The same year saw the first atomic bombs, the founding of the United Nations, and the deaths of Roosevelt, Hitler, and Mussolini within three weeks of each other.

5. Hijacked airliners destroy the Twin Towers in New York 2001

   The attacks grounded all civilian flights over the US for days — the first time in aviation history American skies were essentially emptied.

6. NASA's Curiosity rover lands on Mars 2012

   It was lowered to the surface on cables by a hovering rocket-powered 'sky crane' — a landing sequence engineers nicknamed the 'seven minutes of terror.'

← All puzzles · Play today’s SortStack