1285
Philip IV the Fair becomes King of France
On the death of his father Philip III, the seventeen-year-old prince inherited the French throne. Reserved and enigmatic, he would pick fights with popes, English kings, and Knights Templar, and reshape the French state through a generation of clever lawyers. His chief advisors, the legists Nogaret and Flotte, transformed the French monarchy into a bureaucratic machine whose reach extended into every corner of the kingdom.
Second Mongol invasion of Vietnam defeated
A Yuan army under Prince Toghan pushed into Dai Viet and occupied the capital Thang Long, only to be worn down by Tran guerrilla tactics and tropical heat. General Tran Hung Dao counterattacked and drove the Mongols back in chaos across the border. Tran Hung Dao's military treatise, written for his officers, is the earliest surviving Vietnamese manual of guerrilla warfare and strategic defense.
Lalibela rock churches venerated
A generation after their carving under the Zagwe dynasty, the monolithic rock-hewn churches of Lalibela were already places of pilgrimage for Ethiopian Christians. The new Solomonic dynasty claimed them; monks tended their trough-like drains; worshippers walked the underground tunnels. The eleven churches, each carved from a single block of volcanic tuff, represent one of the most extraordinary feats of architecture in the medieval world.
Honorius IV elected pope
The Savelli cardinal Giacomo was elected pope at Perugia, taking the name Honorius IV despite being crippled by gout and unable to stand at his own coronation. His short pontificate was marked by attempts to reform the Franciscan order and manage the war over Sicily. Despite his physical infirmity, he proved an energetic administrator who reorganized papal finances and promoted missionary work in Asia.