Filippo Brunelleschi's dome for Florence Cathedral is completed, an emblematic engineering feat of the Renaissance.
Returning from exile, the banker Cosimo de' Medici becomes the de facto ruler of Florence; the Medici become major patrons of Renaissance art.
Johannes Gutenberg develops metal movable-type printing in Mainz, launching Europe's printing revolution.
Captured and tried by a pro-English church court, Joan of Arc is burned at the stake; she was rehabilitated in 1456 and canonized in 1920.
French forces joined by Joan of Arc force the English to abandon the siege of Orléans, a turning point of the Hundred Years' War.
Ottoman forces under Sultan Mehmed II capture Constantinople, ending the Byzantine Empire.
The Czech church reformer Jan Hus is condemned as a heretic by the Council of Constance and burned at the stake, sparking the Hussite movement.