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Created page with 'File:lighterstill.jpgframe|center ==Etymology== Late Latin modernus, from Latin modo just now, from modus measure *Date: [http://www.wik...'
[[File:lighterstill.jpg]][[File:750px-Colonisation2.gif|frame|center]]
==Etymology==
Late Latin modernus, from Latin modo just now, from modus [[measure]]
*Date: [http://www.wikpedia.org/wiki/16th_Century 1585]
==Definitions==
*1 a : of, relating to, or characteristic of the present or the [[immediate]] [[past]] : contemporary
:b : of, relating to, or characteristic of a period extending from a relevant remote [[past]] to the [[present]] time
*2 : involving recent [[techniques]], [[methods]], or [[ideas]] : up-to-date
*3 capitalized : of, relating to, or having the characteristics of the present or most recent period of [[development]] of a [[language]]
==Description==
'''Modern''' [[history]], or the modern era, describes the historical [[timeline]] after the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_ages Middle Ages]. Modern history can be further broken down into the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_modern_period early modern period] and the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_modern_period late modern period]. Contemporary [[history]] describes the span of historic [[events]] that are immediately relevant to the [[present]] [[time]].

The beginning of the modern era started approximately in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/16th_Century 1500]s. Many major [[events]] caused the Western world to change around the turn of the 16th century, starting with the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_Constantinople Fall of Constantinople] in 1453, the fall of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_Spain Muslim Spain] and the [[discovery]] of the [[America]]s in 1492, and Martin Luther's [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protestant_Reformation Protestant Reformation] in 1517. In England the modern period is often dated to the start of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tudor_period Tudor period] with the victory of Henry VII over Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_modern_Europe Early modern European history] is usually seen to span from the turn of the 15th century, through the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Reason Age of Reason] and [[Age of Enlightenment]] in the 17th and 18th centuries, until the beginning of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Revolution Industrial Revolution] in the late 18th century.