996A teenage king becomes emperor in Rome
On 21 May 996 the sixteen-year-old German king Otto III was crowned emperor in Rome. The man who placed the crown on his head was Pope Gregory V, Otto’s own cousin and former chaplain, whom the young king had just helped to the papal throne. It was an unusually close partnership between the two great powers of medieval Europe.
Otto had been king since the age of three, with his mother Theophanu and grandmother Adelaide governing for him. As emperor he dreamed of reviving the glory of ancient Rome, setting up court in the city and styling himself a servant of the apostles. His reign was short: he died in 1002, aged just 21, without an heir.
Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Britannica: Gregory V ↗
1674Poland’s nobles elect Jan Sobieski king
In the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth kings were not born but chosen, by thousands of nobles gathered in a field near Warsaw. On the afternoon of 21 May 1674 the Bishop of Kraków proclaimed their choice: Jan Sobieski, the commander who had routed an Ottoman army at Chocim (Khotyn) the year before, would be King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.
The war with the Ottomans delayed his coronation at Wawel in Kraków until early 1676. Sobieski’s greatest moment came in 1683, when he led the relief army that broke the Ottoman siege of Vienna. His summer palace at Wilanów, on the edge of Warsaw, is now a museum devoted to him.
Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Museum of King Jan III’s Palace at Wilanów ↗
1927Lindbergh lands in Paris after crossing the Atlantic alone
At 10.21pm Paris time on 21 May 1927 a small silver monoplane touched down at Le Bourget airfield. Its pilot, 25-year-old American airmail flyer Charles Lindbergh, had left New York 33 and a half hours earlier and flown about 3,600 miles without a stop and without a companion, the first person to do so across the Atlantic.
A crowd estimated at more than 100,000 surged across the field to greet him, and souvenir hunters tore strips of fabric from the aircraft before French airmen rescued it. The flight won Lindbergh the $25,000 Orteig Prize and instant world fame. His plane, the Spirit of St. Louis, now hangs in the National Air and Space Museum in Washington.
Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum: Spirit of St. Louis ↗
1998Suharto steps down in Indonesia
On the morning of 21 May 1998 Suharto, president of Indonesia for 32 years, announced his resignation, and his vice-president B. J. Habibie was sworn in to replace him. The Asian financial crisis of 1997 had wrecked the value of the rupiah and exposed deep weaknesses in an economy long run for the benefit of a well-connected few.
Student protests grew through the spring, and after soldiers shot dead demonstrators at Trisakti University in Jakarta on 12 May, the capital was swept by riots. With the army no longer behind him, Suharto had little choice. His fall opened the way to free elections and the era Indonesians call Reformasi.
Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: Britannica: Suharto ↗
2006Montenegro votes for independence
On 21 May 2006 voters in Montenegro were asked whether their republic should leave the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro, the last remnant of the old Yugoslavia. The European Union had set a high bar: independence needed at least 55 per cent of the vote. The result was 55.5 per cent in favour, on a turnout of about 86 per cent.
International observers from the OSCE judged the vote to be broadly in line with democratic standards. Montenegro’s parliament declared independence on 3 June, Serbia accepted the outcome within days, and on 28 June the country joined the United Nations as its 192nd member state.
Read the full storyHistory & Timeline →Source: OSCE/ODIHR: Montenegro Referendum, 21 May 2006 ↗
