Ferdinand and Isabella order the Jews of Castile and Aragon to convert or leave their kingdoms.
Date given in the Julian calendar.
Emir Muhammad XII surrenders to Ferdinand and Isabella, ending the last Muslim state on the Iberian Peninsula.
Lorenzo "the Magnificent", ruler of Florence and patron of artists such as Botticelli and Michelangelo, dies.
Christopher Columbus's Spanish-sponsored expedition makes landfall on an island in the Bahamas.
Spain and Portugal agree to divide newly found lands outside Europe along a meridian in the Atlantic.
The Portuguese navigator Bartolomeu Dias became the first European to sail around the southern tip of Africa, proving the Indian Ocean could be reached by sea.
Vasco da Gama's fleet left Lisbon, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, sailed up the East African coast and reached Calicut, opening a direct sea route between Europe and Asia.