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DATES IN ART HISTORY

When we start out at the very beginning, prehistory, it is unwritten. There was no record keeping and no way to keeping track of time yet, time still exists. When you attach a year to an event or try to time stamp an era, we will use BCE or CE. BCE means "Before Common Era" and CE means "Common Era." You may also know these terms, respectively, the same as BC and AD. BC refers to "Before Christ" and AD refers to "Anno Domini", which means "the year of our Lord." These are Christian terms and because we are looking at the world's history not the history of Christians, it is more inclusive and correct to use the terms BCE and CE. When you're writing dates, it is imperative that you write BCE if you're referring to anything before the year 1. It is not necessary to write CE, except when you mean to be perfectly clear. This will happen often at the turn such as during the Ancient Roman era. Another example, if you mean to write 1333BCE during the Egyptian Armarna period and you leave off BCE, you're writing 1333, which is during the Renaissance. BIG difference. 

BEFORE COMMON ERA
25,000 Paleolithic
​5000   Neolithic
3000   Sumeria
2500   Old Kingdom Egypt
            Cycladic
1900   Babylon
1500   New Kingdom Egypt
           Minoan
1333   Armana Period Egypt
1250   Mycenean
900     Geometric Greek
700     Orientalizing Greek
550     Archaic
           Etruscan
539     Persia
480     Severe Greek
450     Classical Greek
350     Late Classical Greek
250     Hellenistic Greek
           Roman Republic

COMMON ERA
​250     Roman Imperial
250     Roman Late Empire
350     Early Christian
550    Byzantine
622    Beginning of Islam
600    Merovingian
800    Carolingian
1000   Ottonian
1100   Romanesque
1140   Early Gothic
1200   High Gothic
1250   Late Gothic
1300   Giotto/ Early Ren.
1450   15th c. Italian Ren.
1450   15th c. N. Euro. Ren.
1515   High Renaissance
1530   Mannerism
1550   16th c. N. Euro. Ren.
1650   Counter Ref. Baroque
           N. Bourgeois Baroque
           N. Aristocratic Baroque

 

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1730   Rococo
1750   18th c. styles
1800   Neoclassical
1830   Romanticism
1837   Photography
1850   Realism
1874   Impressionism
1886   Post-Impressionism
1890s Symbolism
1900  Art Nouveau
1905   Fauvism
1910   Cubism
1914   Futurism/German Exp.
1916   Dada
1925  Harlem Renaissance
1930  Constructivism/      
​           Suprematism
1930   Surrealism/ Bauhaus
1930  DeStijl
1930  Mexican Muralists
1950   Abstract Expressionism
1960   Pop Art, Happenings
1970   Earth Art
1980   Post Modernism- present

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