| Pre-Raphaelite Events | Year | Other Events |
|---|
 Founding of P. R. B. magazine The Germ; only four issues published
|  | Herbert Spencer initiates the beginnings of Sociology
|
Meaning of P. R. B. is revealed to Press, generating hostile criticism
| Public Libraries Act passed in Britain
|
Dyce commends Pre-Raphaelite work to Ruskin
| Cast iron railway bridge opened at Newcastle
|
| | California becomes a state
|
| | | |
Hunt and Millais paint in open air
|  | Great Exhibition at Crystal Palace
|
Brown begins 'Pretty Baa Lambs'
| J. M. W. Turner dies
|
Pre-Raphaelite paintings badly received at Royal Academy; reaction prompts Ruskin's letter to 'The Times' and pamphlet 'Pre-Raphaelitism'
| Population of UK: 20.8 million Population of America: 23 million
|
| | Gold found in Australia
|
| | John Ruskin: The Stones of Venice
|
| | | |
Woolner emigrates to Australia
|  | Franklin Pierce elected fourteenth President of USA
|
Munro: 'Paolo & Francesca'
| Harriet Beecher Stowe: Uncle Tom's Cabin
|
Brown: design and study for 'The Last of England'
| Louis Napoleon proclaimed Emperor as Napoleon III
|
| | | |
Burne-Jones & Morris meet at Exeter College, Oxford
|  | Levi Strauss sells jeans to miners in the USA
|
Millais travels to Scotland with Ruskin and his wife Effie; elected associate of Royal Academy
| Queen Victoria takes chloroform during childbirth - anaesthetic becomes popular
|
P. R. B. meets to draw portraits for Woolner
| Smallpox vaccination compulsory
|
| | | |
Burne-Jones & Morris visit northern France and decide to become artists
|  | Crimean War begins, Britain and France against Russia
|
Rossetti meets Ruskin; spends summer with Siddal
| Working Men's college founded in London
|
Hunt goes to Egypt and the Holy Land
| Russia: battles of Balaclava and Inkerman
|
| | | |
| Burne-Jones & Morris discover 'Morte d'Arthur' |  | Australian colonies become self-governing
|
Millais marries Effie Grey after her annulment from Ruskin; settle in Perth, Scotland
| Florence Nightingale improves hygiene in military hospitals during Crimean War
|
| | Exposition Universelle held in Paris
|
| | | |
Morris & friends launch Oxford & Cambridge Magazine (twelve issues published)
|  | Second Opium War begins between Britain and China
|
Burne-Jones receives lessons from Rossetti
| George Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde, and Sigmund Freud born
|
| | Crimeam War ends
|
| | | |
Manchester Art Treasures exhibition includes Pre-Raphaelites
|  | Victoria and Albert Museum and National Portrait Gallery open
|
Rossetti, Morris, Burne-Jones, Hughes and others decorate the Oxford Union
| Royal Navy destroys Chinese fleet
|
Brown organises P. R. exhibition
| Indians mutiny against British rule
|
| | Divorce made easier in Britain
|
| | | |
Hogarth Club founded by Brown, Rossetti, Hunt and others; Burne-Jones first exhibits there
|  | New York Symphony Orchestra gives its first public concert
|
Morris publishes first poetry, The Defence of Guenevere
| British make peace with India |
| | Transatlantic telephone cable installed
|
| | | |
Morris marries Jane Burden and moves to Red House, Bexleyheath, built by Webb
|  | Charles Darwin: On the Origin of Species by Natural Selection
|
Burne-Jones visits Italy
| Work begins on Suez Canal
|
| | Arthur Conan Doyle and A. E. Housman born |
1850s 
