1769: Watt receives the patent on his condensing steam engine

1760: George II king of Great Britain

1774: Goethe's 'Die Leiden des jungen Werthers' published

1776: US Declaration of Independance

1781: Kant's 'Kritik des reinen Vernunft' published

1787: first night of Mozart's 'Don Giovanni' (Prague)

1789: French revolution

1795: France occupies the Netherlands

1804: Napoleon emperor of France

1806: Napoleon makes his brother Louis the first king of the Netherlands

1815: Battle of Waterloo

1831: 'Tiendaagse Veldtocht' (Ten Days Campaign) into seperatist Belgium

1837: Victoria queen of Great Britain

1839: first railroad in the Netherlands

1840: Willem II king of the Netherlands

1848: riots throughout Europe

1849: Willem III king of the Netherlands

1849-'53: Thorbecke revises the constitution of the Netherlands 

1853-'56: Crimean War

1859: Darwins's 'The Origin of Species' published

1861: Italy united, by Garibaldi, under king Victor Emanuel II

1861-'65: American Civil War

1865: first night of  Wagner's 'Tristan und Isolde' (Munich)

1869: first Vatican Council

1871: Germany united, by Otto von Bismarck, under emperor Wilhelm I

1879: Edison invents the lightbulb

1883: Eruption of Krakatoa (Indonesia)

1889: Van Gogh paints his 'Self-portrait with bandaged ear'

1898: Wilhelmina queen of the Netherlands