14th century

As a means of recording the passage of time, the 14th century was that century which lasted from 1301 to 1400.

Events

• The transition from the Medieval Warm Period to the Little Ice Age
• Beginning of the Ottoman Empire, early expansion into the Balkans
• The Avignon papacy transfers the seat of the Popes from Italy to France
• The Great Famine of 1315-1317 kills millions of people in Europe
• Being forced out of previous locations, the Aztec found the city of Tenochtitlan in 1325
• The Hundred Years' War begins when Edward III of England lays claim to the French throne in 1337.
• Black Death kills about one third of European population (1347 - 1351)
• The end of Mongol Yuan Dynasty in China and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty (1368)
• The heresy of Lollardy rises in England
• The Great Schism of the West begins in 1378, eventually leading to 3 simultaneous popes.
• An account of Buddha's life, translated earlier into Greek by St John of Damascus and widely circulated to Christians as the story of Barlaam and Josaphat, became so popular that Buddha (under the name Josaphat) was made a Catholic saint.
• Singapore emerges for the first time as a fortified city and trading centre of some importance.
• Reunification of Poland under Ladislaus I of Poland
• Peasants' Revolt in England
• Islam reaches Terengganu, on the Malay Peninsula.
• The Hausa found several city-states in the south of modern Niger.
• The Mali Empire expands westward and conquers Tekrur.
• The poet Petrarch coins the term Dark Ages to describe the preceding 900 years in Europe, beginning with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 410 through to the renewal embodied in the Renaissance.
• The Scots win the Scottish Wars of Independence.
• Union of Krewo between Poland and Lithuania.
• Work begins on the Great Enclosure at Great Zimbabwe, built of uncemented, dressed stone. The city's population is now between 10 000 and 40 000.
• Beginning of the Renaissance in Italy
• Abacus first used in China.

Significant people

• Mansa Musa Malian king
• Giovanni Boccaccio, Italian author
• Edward III, King of England
• Hafez Persian poet
• Kazimierz III the Great King of Poland
• Guillaume de Machaut, French composer and poet
• Geoffrey Chaucer, English poet
• Don Juan Manuel, Spanish author
• Francesco Petrarch, Italian poet and writer
• William of Ockham, English Franciscan friar and philosopher
• Dante Alighieri, Italian poet and writer
• King Robert I of Scotland (Bruce)
• Charles Robert, knight king of Hungary
• Ibn Battuta, Muslim traveler

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

• music of the Ars nova
• The technique of knitting
• Foundation of the University of Cracow

Decades and years