1214
Philip Augustus triumphs at Bouvines
On a sweltering Sunday in Flanders, the French king's infantry and knights routed a coalition of Otto IV, King John, and the Flemish counts. Bouvines ended Angevin ambitions in France, doomed John's continental claims, and let Philip style himself Augustus without irony. The battle confirmed France as western Europe's foremost military power and pushed John's furious barons toward the confrontation at Runnymede.
Dogen born in Kyoto
The future founder of Soto Zen Buddhism in Japan was born into a branch of the imperial Minamoto family. Orphaned young, he would cross to Song China for training and return to teach a uniquely Japanese version of seated meditation that endures today. His masterwork, the Shobogenzo, written in Japanese rather than scholarly Chinese, remains one of the most demanding philosophical texts in any language.
Roger Bacon born in Somerset
The English friar who would experiment with gunpowder, criticize the schoolmen for their ignorance of Greek and Arabic, and speculate about flying machines and optical instruments was born in a country village. His curiosity would earn him both fame and imprisonment by his own Franciscan order. His writings on experimental science anticipated the empirical method by centuries, though few of his contemporaries understood their significance.
Peking Man fossils entombed by war
The Jin capital Zhongdu, besieged by Mongol armies, saw its surrounding hills scarred by siege lines and refugee camps. Beneath those hills lay the Zhoukoudian caves with their half-million-year-old hominid fossils, unknown to either side and undisturbed for seven more centuries until modern archaeology arrived. The irony of two civilizations destroying each other above the bones of their common ancestor would await future contemplation.