1502

Italian translation of Herodotus' Histories made for Count Matteo Maria Boiardo and published in Venice, Aldine Press in 1502.

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Year 1502 (MDII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.

Events

January–June

• January 1 – Portuguese explorers, led by Pedro Álvares Cabral, sail into Guanabara Bay, Brazil, mistaking it for the mouth of a river, which they name Rio de Janeiro.
• May 11 – Christopher Columbus leaves Cadiz, Spain for his fourth and final trip to the 'New World'. He explores Central America, and discovers St. Lucia (possibly),^[1] the Isthmus of Panama, Honduras, and Costa Rica.
• May 21 – Portuguese navigator João da Nova discovers the uninhabited island of Saint Helena.

July–December

• July – Ismail I becomes Shah of Azerbaijan,.^[2]
• August 14 – Christopher Columbus lands at Trujillo and names the country 'Honduras'.
• September – A Greek and Italian parallel text edition of Herodotus' Histories done for Count Matteo Maria Boiardo is published in Venice by Aldus Manutius.
• September 18 – Christopher Columbus lands at Costa Rica.
• November 7 – Columbus reaches the coast of Honduras and passes south to Panama.
• December 26 – Cesare Borgia kills Ramiro D'Orco; this incident is referenced in Machiavelli's The Prince
• December 31 – Cesare Borgia (son of Pope Alexander VI) occupies Urbino, where he imprisons two potentially treacherous allies, Vitellozzo and Oliveretto; he executes them the next morning.

Date unknown

• The first African slaves brought to the New World arrive at the island of Hispaniola (modern-day Haiti and Dominican Republic).
• Bristol merchants return from Newfoundland (first so named this year from a letter) to England carrying three native people and cod from the Grand Banks.^[3][4]
• Moctezuma II is elected emperor of the Aztecs, following the death of Ahuitzotl.
• Meñli I Giray defeats the Golden Horde and sacks their capital, Sarai.
• Wittenberg University is founded.
• In Germany, Peter Henlein of Nuremberg uses iron parts and coiled springs to build a portable timepiece.
• In Italy, Asher Lämmlein declares that the Jewish Messiah will arrive in the next 6 months, resulting in the 'year of penance.'
• The King's School, Macclesfield, England, is founded by Sir John Percyvale.
• Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa is proceeded to licentiate.
• Wilhelm Bombast moves to Villach with his son, Paracelsus.

Births

• January 7 – Pope Gregory XIII (d. 1585)
• January 20 – Sebastian de Aparicio, Spanish colonial industrialist and saint in Mexico (d. 1600)
• February 2 – Damião de Góis, Portuguese philosopher (d. 1574)
• March 4 – Elisabeth of Hesse, Hereditary Princess of Saxony (d. 1557)
• March 18 – Philibert of Chalon, French nobleman (d. 1530)
• March 20 – Pierino Belli, Italian soldier and jurist (d. 1575)
• April 2 – Susanna of Bavaria, German noble, House of Wittelsbach (d. 1543)
• April 10 – Otto Henry, Count Palatine of Neuburg (1505-1559) and Elector Palatine (1556-1559) (d. 1559)
• April 25 – Georg Major, German Lutheran theologian (d. 1574)
• June 2 – Guillaume Bigot, French writer (d. 1550)
• June 6 – King John III of Portugal (d. 1557)
• July 26 – Christian Egenolff, German printer (d. 1555)
• July 27 – Francesco Corteccia, Italian composer (d. 1571)
• August 14 – Pieter Coecke van Aelst, Flemish painter (d. 1550)
• September 13 – John Leland, English antiquarian (d. 1552)
• September 14 – Louis II, Count Palatine of Zweibrücken, Duke of Zweibrücken from 1514 to 1532 (d. 1532)
• December 6 – Anna of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Duchess consort of Pomerania (d. 1568)
• December 13 – George III, Landgrave of Leuchtenberg (d. 1555)
• date unknown
  • Anthony Maria Zaccaria, Cremonese founder of the Barnabite Order and saint (d. 1539)
  • Takeno Joou, Japanese tea practicer of the Sengoku period (d. 1555)
  • Miguel López de Legazpi, Spanish conquistador (d. 1572)
  • Pedro Nunes, Portuguese mathematician (d. 1578)
  • Francesco Spiera, Protestant Italian jurist (d. 1543)
• probable
  • Elizabeth Blount, mistress of King Henry VIII of England (d. 1540)
  • Cuauhtémoc, last Aztec ruler (Tlatoani) of Tenochtitlán and the last "Aztec Emperor" (d. 1525)
  • Blaise de Lasseran-Massencôme, seigneur de Montluc, marshal of France (approximate date; d. 1577)
  • Henry Percy, 6th Earl of Northumberland, English courtier (d. 1537)

Deaths

• March – Francesco Laurana, Dalmatian-born sculptor (b. c. 1430)
• April 2 – Arthur, Prince of Wales, English prince, eldest son of Henry VII of England (b. 1486)
• May 6 – James Tyrrell, English knight, alleged murderer of the princes in the Tower (executed) (b. c. 1450)
• September 1 – Sōgi, Japanese Buddhist priest and poet (b. 1421)
• November 13 – Annio da Viterbo, Italian Dominican friar and scholar (b. 1432)
• December 31 – Vitellozzo Vitelli, Italian condottiero (b. c. 1458)
• date unknown
  • Ahuitzotl, Aztec ruler of Tenochtitlan
  • Octavien de Saint-Gelais, French churchman, poet and translator (b. 1468)
  • Gwerful Mechain, Welsh erotic poet (b. c. 1460?)

References