1367
Confederation of Cologne unites the Hanseatic League
Seventy-seven Hanseatic towns signed a mutual defense pact and imposed a trade embargo on Denmark, forcing King Valdemar IV to negotiate. The confederation marked the League's political zenith - a network of merchants dictating terms to kings - though it held no army, no territory, and no sovereign beyond commerce itself.
Vijayanagara Empire builds Hampi's great temples
Under Bukka Raya I, the Hindu empire of southern India expanded its capital at Hampi into a monumental city of granite temples, bazaars, and irrigation tanks spread across a boulder-strewn landscape on the Tungabhadra River. Hampi's Vittala Temple, with its musical pillars and stone chariot, became the empire's architectural crown.
Black Prince wins at Nájera
Edward of Woodstock crossed the Pyrenees in winter and crushed Henry of Trastamara at a river crossing in La Rioja. Du Guesclin was captured. Pedro the Cruel was restored to Castile briefly. The Black Prince contracted dysentery from which he never fully recovered, becoming an invalid for the rest of his life.
Urban V briefly returns the papacy to Rome
Tired of Avignon's reputation and pressed by Petrarch, Catherine of Siena, and Italian envoys, Pope Urban V crossed the Alps and entered a half-ruined Rome where cattle grazed among the basilicas. He would last three years before fleeing back to Provence, terrified of Italian factional violence and homesick for Avignon's gardens and its far more comfortable palace.
Trastamara assassinates Pedro the Cruel
In a tent outside Montiel after the Black Prince had returned to Aquitaine, Henry of Trastamara wrestled his half-brother Pedro and stabbed him in the face. Henry became king of Castile, tied France permanently as an ally, and founded the dynasty that would merge crowns with Aragon a century later.