SortStack #2725 — 2033-11-24

By year · Order from earliest to most recent.

1. Athenian soldiers defeat the Persians at the Battle of Marathon 490 BCE

   The legend of a messenger running about 40 km to Athens with news of victory — then dropping dead — inspired the modern marathon race.

2. Cleopatra, the last pharaoh of Egypt, dies 30 BCE

   Cleopatra lived closer in time to the Moon landing than to the construction of the Great Pyramid — the pyramids were already ancient to her.

3. Joan of Arc is burned at the stake in Rouen 1431

   She was about nineteen years old. A retrial cleared her name 25 years later, and she was made a saint nearly five centuries after her death.

4. England defeats the Spanish Armada 1588

   Storms did more damage than English guns — far more Spanish ships wrecked on the coasts of Scotland and Ireland than were sunk in battle.

5. 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.

6. The Wall Street Crash wipes out the stock market boom 1929

   The market didn't permanently regain its pre-crash peak until 1954, a quarter of a century later.

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