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France's Charles VIII dies April 8 at age 27 after accidentally cracking his head on the lintel of a passageway in the castle of Amboise while preparing a new expedition to invade Italy. Having no male heir, he is succeeded by his Valois cousin the duc d'Orléans, 36, who will reign until 1515 as Louis XII. The new king led a revolt against Charles more than a decade ago and was imprisoned from 1488 to 1491. His accession unites the duchy of Orléans with the royal domain, and his lieutenant general in Normandy, Georges d'Amboise, 37, is made cardinal and first minister to the crown. A descendant of the first duke of Milan, Louis lays claim to the duchy (see 1499).
Eberhard II, duke of Württemberg, dies and is succeeded by his Alsatian-born kinsman Ulrich, 11, who will be declared of age in 1503, rule until 1519, and rule again from 1534 until his death in 1550 (see 1514).
Bengal's Husayn Shah Ala ad-din conquers the neighboring states of Kamrup and Assam, which he incorporates into his realm (see 1493; 1516).
Spaniards in the Caribbean ship some 600 cannibal Caribs home to Spain to be sold into slavery (see 1494).
Christopher Columbus sets sail from Sanlucar May 30 on a third voyage to the New World, this time with six ships (see 1496). His fleet divides into two after arriving June 19 at Gomera in the Canary Islands, with three ships heading straight for Hispaniola with supplies for the colonists there; Columbus sails southwest from the Cape Verdes July 4, is becalmed in the Doldrums, comes close to running out of water, discovers the 1,864-square-mile (4,828-square-kilometer) island of Trinidad July 31, naming it for the Holy Trinity, and lands at what may be the mouth of the Orinoco River on the South American mainland. Sailing out of the Gulf of Paria August 13, he sights a 300-square-kilometer island that he calls Bella Forma (it will later get the name Tobago, a corruption of tobacco grown by the Carib inhabitants). He sights the 133-square-mile (345-square-kilometer) island of Grenada August 15 (he calls it Concepción) and arrives in poor health off southern Hispaniola August 19. He finds that colonists at the new city of Santo Domingo have revolted against his rule and is able to restore harmony only on terms that leave him with little authority. The Spanish settle some 200 new colonists on Hispaniola (see Bobadilla, 1500).
Portuguese explorer-scientist Duarte Pacheco Pareira touches the South American coast. He will write in 1505 of a vast continent extending south from 70° north latitude.
John Cabot and his son Sebastian travel along the coast Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and points south on a second voyage with a fleet of six ships (see 1497).
Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama's discovery of an all-water route to India and the Spice Islands (or Clove Islands) frees Europe from dependence on Venetian middlemen in the spice trade (see 1453; 1497). He lands at Calicut, where Arab spice dealers, fearful of losing their monopoly, give him a rude reception, and he establishes a sea route that Portugal will control for nearly a century (see 1499; 1501).
Savonarola is burned at the stake for heresy May 23 in Florence's Piazza della Signoria off the Via Condotta (see 1497).
Painting: The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci is completed for Milan's Ludovico Sforza in the monastery refectory adjoining the Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie; The Discovery of Honey by Piero di Cosimo; Baptism of Christ (triptych) and Judgment of Cambyses by Dutch painter Gerard David; The Apocalypse (woodcuts) by Nuremberg painter-engraver Albrecht Dürer, 27, is the first book published by an artist from his own designs. Dürer has visited Italy and brought ideas of linear perspective to northern Europe.
Flemish composer Loyset Compère, 53, wins appointment as dean of Cambrai's St. Géry Cathedral. A French citizen since 1494, he sang in the duke of Milan's chapel choir in the mid-1470s, became chantre ordinaire to the late Charles VIII of France a decade later, and will become provost at Douai's St. Pierre Cathedral in 1500.
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