Anonymous portrait, likely of Marlowe, at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 1585.

1400  Johann Fust (or Faust) is born in Mainz, Germany: he later becomes an important printer and a business partner of Johannes Gutenberg.

1450  In Mainz, Johannes Gutenberg devises the first prototype of the movable-type printing press, sparking off the printing revolution.

1480  Johann Georg Faust (a.k.a. Georgius of Helmstadt) is born in Germany: he later becomes a travelling physician and magician.

1517  On 31 October, Martin Luther, a professor of theology at the University of Wittenberg, Germany, nails his 95 Theses to the door of All Saints’ Church, attacking corruption in the church, the supremacy of the Pope and other Catholic doctrines

1530s Thomas Wyatt’s sonnets start circulating at the court of Henry VIII and popularize Petrarchism in England. His friend, Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, translates Petrarch’s poems in English and innovates the English form of the sonnet, later known as the Elizabethan or Shakespearian sonnet. The iambic pentameter becomes the poetic form par excellence in English verse.

1558  Elizabeth Tudor becomes Queen of England after the death of her half-sister, Mary I.

1559  The Act of Settlement severs Anglicanism from the Roman Catholic Church

– The definitive edition of John Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion is published, in which the Protestant reformer sets out the principles of predestination.

1565  Arthur Golding publishes his landmark translation of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, with stories involving Prometheus, Icarus, and other overreachers.

1568  Christopher ‘Kit’ Marlowe is born in 1568 in Canterbury, Kent, the son of John Marlowe, a shoemaker, and Katherine Marlowe née Arthur, the daughter of farmers from Dover. He is baptised at St George’s Church, Canterbury, on 26 February 1564.

– William Shakespeare is baptised two months later in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire.

1570  Pope Pius excommunicates Elizabeth I and calls on Catholics to overthrow her.

1572  Travelling players are banned in England, unless they are under the patronage of a nobleman; this accelerates the development of professional theatre and the building of playhouses.

– The St Bartholomew’s Day massacre in Paris.

1576  The Lord Howard’s Men, a troupe of actors is formed, named after their patron, Charles Howard, 1^st Earl of Nottingham.

1580  Marlowe becomes a pupil at King’s School, Canterbury.

1581  Marlowe starts studying at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and earns a B.A. in 1584.

– Elizabeth’s I first anti-Catholic laws are issued.

Portrait of Edward Alleyn, 1626.

1585  Lord Howard becomes England’s Lord High Admiral, and the Lord Howard’s Men playing company changes its name to the Admiral’s Men. Edward Alleyn becomes their star actor.

– Machiavelli’s The Prince is translated in English for the first time.

1587  Mary, Queen of Scots, is executed after plotting against Elizabeth I.

– The Privy Council intervenes in Marlowe’s favour for the Cambridge University authorities to grant him a Master of Arts degree.

– Marlowe moves to London.

– The Children of the Chapel perform Dido, Queen of Carthage, Marlowe’s first play, which is published posthumously in 1594.

– The theatre entrepreneur Philip Henslowe builds the Rose theatre in Bankside, Southwark. The Rose is where Christopher Marlowe and the Admiral’s Men perform most of their plays.

– Tamburlaine the Great, Marlowe’s second play, is performed by the Lord Admiral’s Men at the Rose Theatre in London and published in 1590.

– An apocryphal biography of Johann Georg Faust, entitled Historia von D. Johann Fausten, is published in Germany by one Johann Spies. The book comes to be known as the German Faustbook.

1588  The Spanish Armada attempts to invade England and is destroyed.

1589  On September 18, Marlowe is imprisoned at the Newgate prison with his poet friend Thomas Watson after they accidentally killed in a man during a street brawl; Marlowe is exonerated two weeks later.

– The Jew of Malta, Marlowe’s third play, is performed by the Lord Admiral’s Men at the Rose Theatre in London, and published posthumously in 1633.

– Ballad of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus the great Cunngerer is published by one Richard Jones.

1590  Marlowe shares lodgings with the playwright Thomas Kyd.

– Marlowe and William Shakespeare co-author the three plays of Henry VI.

1592  In January, Marlowe is accused of counterfeiting money in the Netherlands.

– Thomas Kyd’s play The Spanish Tragedy is performed for the first time.

– The German Faustbook is adapted into English by one L. F. Gent and published under the title The Historie of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus.

– An epidemic of bubonic plague breaks out in London until 1594.

London theatres ca. 1600.

1593  The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, Marlowe’s fourth play is performed by the Admiral’s Men at the Rose Theatre in London.

– Marlowe is arrested after being accused of being part of ring of counterfeiters in Flushing.

– In May 1593, Thomas Kyd accuses Marlowe of being a heretic and of being the author of blasphemous writings. The Privy Council issues a warrant for Marlowe’s arrest.

– On 30 May, Marlowe is killed in Deptford, southeast London, at the age of 29. He is buried several days later in an unmarked grave at St Nicholas’s graveyard, Deptford.

– Edward II, Marlowe’s fifth play, is performed, likely just a few weeks after his death, and published posthumously in 1594.

1594  The Massacre at Paris, Marlowe’s sixth and last play, is performed by the Lord Admiral’s Men at the Rose Theatre in London, and published posthumously later the same year.

1598  Marlowe’s unfinished poem Hero and Leander is printed posthumously by the scholar and poet George Chapman.

1599  Marlowe’s Amores, his translation from Latin of Ovid’s first book of poetry, is publicly burnt in London by order of the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury.

1600  Marlowe’s The First Book of Lucan, a translation of an epic poem by the Roman poet Lucan, is printed posthumously.

1603  Elizabeth I dies, and James VI of Scotland becomes James I, King of England.

1604  A first quarto edition of Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus is printed by the London printer Valentine Simmes, its title page attributing the play to “Ch. Marl.” The text is commonly referred to as the A text.

Title page of 1620 printing of Doctor Faustus

1616  A longer quarto edition of Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus is printed. The text is commonly referred to as the B text.

1642  Playhouses are closed across England due to the English Civil War and Puritans’ opposition to drama. Playhouses open again in 1660 with the Restoration.

1667   John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost is published.

1687  William Mountford publishes a farcical remake of Marlowe’s play, entitled The Life and Death of Dr. Faustus, Made into a Farce with the Humours of Harlequin and Sacaramouche.

1808  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe publishes Faust, Part One.

1832  Goethe’s Faust, Part Two is published posthumously.

1846  French composer Hector Berlioz’s La damnation de Faust is first performed in Paris.

1859  French composer Charles Gounod’s opera Faust debuts in Paris.

1896  William Poel’s Elizabethan Stage Society performs Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, with a prologue written by the poet Algernon Swinburne.

1926  The German filmmaker F.W. Murnau releases the silent film Faust – a German Folktale.

1936  Orson Welles directs and plays in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus at the Maxine Elliott Theatre in New York city, as part of the Federal Theatre Project.

– Robert Johnson’s classic blues song “Crossroads” is released.

1946      Doctor Faustus is included in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s repertory for the first time.

1947  The German writer Thomas Mann publishes the novel Doktor Faustus.

1965  Jerzy Grotowski directs a memorable production of Doctor Faustus in Opole, Poland.

1966  Nevill Coghill directs a production of Doctor Faustus at Oxford University, starring Richard Burton in the title role and Elizabeth Taylor as Helen of Troy. A film version, codirected by Coghill and Burton, is released one year later.

1974  John Barton directs a memorable RSC production of Doctor Faustus at Stratford-upon-Avon, starring Ian McKellen in the title role.