1453

Year 1453 was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.

Events of 1453

* April - Therapia and Studius are taken by the Ottomans in preparation for the assault on Constantinople, as are the Princes' Islands, by the Ottoman fleet under Admiral Baltoghlu.
* April 2-May 29 - Siege and Fall of Constantinople (now Istanbul): The Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II the Conqueror ends the Byzantine Empire by capturing the city.
* May-June: Epibatos and Selymbria also fall to the Turks after the final fall of Constantinople.
* July 17 - Battle of Castillon: The French under Jean Bureau defeat the English under the Earl of Shrewsbury, who is killed.
* October 19 - The Hundred Years' War comes to a close with the French recapture of Bordeaux, leaving the English retaining only Calais on French soil.
* Johann Gutenberg invents the movable type printing press.

Births

*September 1 - Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, Spanish general and statesman (d. 1515)
*October 13 - Edward of Westminster, Prince of Wales (d. 1471)
*November 22 - Jacob Obrecht, Flemish composer (d. 1505)
*"probable"
**Afonso de Albuquerque, Portuguese admiral (d. 1515)

Deaths

* February 28 - Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine (b. 1400)
* May 29
**Constantine XI, last Byzantine Emperor ("last Roman Emperor")
**Giovanni Giustiniani, Italian captain, Lucas Notaras, last "Megas Doux" of the Byzantine Empire
**Ecumenical Patriarch Athanasius II of Constantinople (all killed in, or shortly after, the siege of Constantinople)
* June 2 - Alvaro de Luna, Constable of Castile
* July 17 - John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, English military leader
* July 20 - Enguerrand de Monstrelet, French chronicler
* December 24 - John Dunstaple, English composer (b. 1390)