World History

In 2026, the world's third-smallest country changed its name from Nauru to Naoero to return to the spelling and pronunciation that align with its national language.

Queen Elizabeth II ordered the US national anthem played at Buckingham Palace in the days after 9/11.

Welcome to Gander, a tiny town of around 10,000 people in Newfoundland, which took in nearly 7,000 passengers for days after the 9/11 attacks grounded all air travel in the US.

Osama bin Laden declared jihad—a call for armed struggle framed as a religious duty—against the US in 1996.

See intact objects found in the wreckage of Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania after its 40 passengers and crew stormed the cockpit, stopping the hijackers from reaching their likely target, the US Capitol Building.

Vladimir Putin was the first world leader to call Bush after 9/11, and visited the US two months later.

Decades of instability in the Middle East, including the Soviet-Afghan war, gave rise to al-Qaeda.

The treaty's Article 5 requires mutual defense, but not necessarily military action.

The origins of Ukrainian identity are a matter of historical debate.

Protests in Ukraine from 2013 to 2014 set the stage for the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

NATO was founded in 1949.

See an animated map of the entire Cold War.

See the major Egyptian monuments in high definition.

Explore the roughly 190 Egyptian pharaohs across 31 dynasties.

China doubled its nuclear stockpile between 2020 and 2025, with plans for further expansion.

As of 2025, every NATO member spent at least 2% of GDP on defense, a target the alliance had been pushing toward for over a decade.

Language and regional differences are faults lines in Ukraine's conflict.

British economist John Maynard Keynes originally proposed a global currency called the bancor.

The United Nations was founded in San Francisco in 1945.

The US dollar became the world's reserve currency, backed by gold, after 44 nations gathered in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, in 1944 with the intention of rebuilding the global economy.

See South Korea's nighttime light usage, which far surpasses that of North Korea.

The first combat-deployed submarine vessel debuted during the American Revolution.

Protesters in Boston tossed chests of a type of Chinese black tea called Bohea.

Hear how the US and Iran went from close allies to bitter adversaries after the 1979 revolution.

The attack at Pearl Harbor led to the world's first around-the-world commercial flight.

Japan's imperial expansion in Asia in the 1930s set the stage for war with the US.

See a visualization of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Explore an interactive map of WWII shipwrecks.

Historians estimate that only 1% of shipwrecks have been discovered.

Ceasefires rarely produce a total cessation of violence.

Watch a 3D animation of Pompeii's final day.

See unused gladiator helmets discovered in Pompeii.

Colosseum spectators needed tickets and social rank to get a good seat.

See where the 100 million barrels of crude oil the world consumes daily end up.

OPEC's 1973 embargo sparked the first global energy shock.

OPEC (the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries) has grown from five to 12 members since 1960.

The Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan fell after a brutal 75-day siege.

The Aztecs worshipped a vast pantheon of more than 200 gods.

The Continental Army invaded Canada in an attempt to seize Montreal and Quebec City in 1775.

Experience 14 billion years of important moments in world history with this scrollable interactive timeline.

Tarring and feathering was a violent form of vigilante justice in Colonial America.

Experts believe Peggy Shippen played a larger role than originally thought in her husband Benedict Arnold's treasonous plot.

See a timeline of colonial settlement in North America.

European leaders pursued appeasement of Hitler in the 1930s, hoping to avoid war.

The treaty that ended the First World War laid the groundwork for the Second.

King George III was Britain's longest-reigning male monarch.

King George III assembled a 65,000-volume personal library.

Ukraine once had the third-largest nuclear arsenal—and gave them all up by 1996.

Read the New York Times 2016 obituary of Fidel Castro, the defining figure of the Cuban Revolution.

Pre-revolution Cuba was prosperous—and deeply unequal.