The Twitter History of the World (4 page)

@ThePope
@Henry_8 *Unfollowed and Blocked*
11.03am, May 23, 1533

@Henry_8
People have been Tweeting me suggesting I could try and stick with one wife. Lol, it’s political correctness gone mad!
10.23am, June 21, 1533

Henry VIII had six wives. Desperate to produce a male heir, he pleaded with the Pope to grant a divorce from his first wife, Catherine Aragon, but the Pope refused. When Henry divorced her anyway, the Pope excommunicated him.

@Michelangelo
@PopeJuliusII So, I’ve finally finished that painting you wanted me to do on the wall of the Sistine Chapel. Only took me four years.
5.59pm, January 14, 1512

@PopeJuliusII
@Michelangelo On the *wall*? But I said I wanted it on the *ceiling*!
6.02pm, January 14, 1512

@Michelangelo
@PopeJuliusII What, really? #FML
6.04pm, January 14, 1512

Michelangelo’s painting on the roof of the Sistine Chapel, of God giving life to Adam, is one of art’s most iconic images.

@JaneGrey
Just got told I’ve been made Queen. #swag
6.44pm, July 10, 1553

@JaneGrey
Moving into my new posh room at Tower of London. #justcallmeyourmajesty
11.01am, July 11, 1553

@JaneGrey
So, there were some questions in Parliament about my legitimacy as Queen. #amiboverred?
9.11pm, July 15, 1553

@JaneGrey
Can’t sleep. Who is this Mary dudess that people keep talking about?
4.12am, July 17, 1553

@JaneGrey
Not so many of my courtiers are about today. Where’s my lunch, for instance? 
1.11pm, July 18, 1553

@JaneGrey
No longer Queen. Mary took the gig from me. Well, that was fun while it lasted.
11.10pm, July 19, 1553

Lady Jane Grey was Queen of England for just nine days.

@WillShakespeare
2b or not 2b? #thatisthequestion
7.31pm, September 10, 1603

@TwitterBore
@WillShakespeare Let me introduce you to Google www.google.com
7.32pm, September 10, 1603

@WillShakespeare
Feeling a bit ick today, got a sore throat.
7.31pm, September 10, 1603

@TwitterBore
@WillShakespeare Is it hoarse? A hoarse, a hoarse - my kingdom for a horse!
7.32pm, September 10, 1603

@WillShakespeare
@TwitterBore Ok, I get it – you’re familiar with my work. But please stop Tweeting. The notifications keep waking me up and I need to sleep…
7.31pm, September 10, 1603

@TwitterBore
@WillShakespeare …perchance to dream?
7.32pm, September 10, 1603

@WillShakespeare
@TwitterBore Get thee to a nunnery…*Blocks*
7.31pm, September 10, 1603

English playwright and poet William Shakespeare wrote 38 plays, 154 sonnets and several poems. He is widely considered the greatest ever English writer and history’s finest dramatist.

@FrancisBacon
Quite a blizzard out there tonight. Got me thinking: I wonder if freezing could be a good way of preserving meat?
8.54pm, April 9, 1626

@FrancisBacon
Ok, so I’ve stuck a chicken out in the snow to see what happens to the meat. If this works out might pitch it at Dragons’ Den! #excited
9.22pm, April 9, 1626

Francis Bacon died of pneumonia while studying the effects of freezing.

@MatthewHopkins
When there’s something strange, in your neighbourhood, who you gonna call? Witch hunters!
9.11am, February 2, 1640

@YeOldeTweeter
@MatthewHopkins How do you know if someone is a witch, rather than a non-evil
broomstick-bearing
old hag?
9.14am, February 2, 1640

@MatthewHopkins
We tie them up and luzz them in a river. If they sink they are innocent, if they float they’re guilty. Simples!
9.15am, February 2, 1640

@YeOldeTweeter
@MatthewHopkins Oh
9.17am, February 2, 1640

Witch-hunting in Britain reached its peak in the 1640s, when Puritan Matthew Hopkins held hundreds of trials.

@OllyCrom
Managed to get @KingCharles1st tried and executed today. Back of the sodding net!
11.12pm, January 30, 1649

@OllyCrom
Going to make a few changes now I’m in power: I’m banning football, theatre-going and pubs. Sod focus groups, I know how to get popular.
9.31am, December 16, 1653

@OllyCrom
Oh, Happy Christmas by the way!
9.35am, December 16, 1653

@OllyCrom
Got malaria. #FML
5.33am, 3 September 3, 1658

@KingCharles2nd
Going to make a few changes now I’m in power: let’s dig up @OllyCrom’s corpse and hang what remains of it.
9.12am, March 30, 1660

Oliver Cromwell is one of British history’s most contentious figures. He was a key influence in getting Charles I executed and then instituted a puritanical regime. He died of Malaria and was exhumed for a posthumous execution a year later. One can only imagine what that must have looked like.

@IsaacNewton
Just saw an apple fall from a tree. Got me thinking: gravity is a universal force.
11.21am, June 2, 1667

@17thCenturyTweeter
OMG! @IsaacNewton just totally got hit on his head by an apple!
11.22am, June 2, 1667

@IsaacNewton
@17thCenturyTweeter No, I just saw the apple fall. It didn’t hit me on my head.
11.24am, June 2, 1667

@17thCenturyTweeter
@IsaacNewton No. It blates hit you on your head. Amazeballs. I’m, like, wow!
11.25am, June 2, 1667

@IsaacNewton
@17thCenturyTweeter Whatever.
11.29am, June 2, 1667

A mathematician, physicist and the greatest scientist of his era, Isaac Newton discovered simultaneously that gravity is a universal force and that a mythical legend can spread quickly.

@ThomasFarrinor
That nagging doubt you’ve left the oven on #IGetThat
10.21pm, September 2, 1666

@SamuelPepys
Fire in London! I’ll be live-tweeting it…
11.18pm, September 2, 1666

@FireBrigade
One thing we learned the last few days: the whole ‘fighting fire with fire’ idea doesn’t work for real!
9.14am, September 4 1666

The Great Fire of London broke-out when baker Thomas Farrinor’s oven sparked a blaze that went on to destroy over 13,000 homes and make over 65,000 people homeless. The events are
documented in the famous diary of Samuel Pepys.

@WAMozart
Bored. All my mates are either playing football in the park or at home with their Playstations. Might muck about with Dad’s piano…
4.21pm, June 1, 1764

Mozart wrote his first symphony (The Symphony No. 1 in E flat major) at the age of eight.

@ThomasJefferson
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain…
10.11am, July 4, 1776