Wenceslas, a prince of the Premsylid family, is murdered on his way into church - and becomes Bohemia's patron saint

Wank Kon changes the name of his kingdom to Koryo, meaning 'high and beautiful', thus providing the rest of the world with the name Korea

The Byzantine empire enjoys a revival, bringing the Slavs within the Greek Orthodox fold and winning victories against the Muslims

A warlord, Zhao Kuangyin, establishes a new Chinese dynasty - the Song

Harald Bluetooth is baptized a Christian and unites the whole of Denmark as a single kingdom.

The imperial coronation of Otto I by Pope John XII in St Peter's puts in place the formal role of a Holy Roman emperor

Mieszko, pagan chieftain of the Poles, marries a Christian Czech princess and brings all his people into the Roman Catholic fold

The Hungarian king Gezá and his family are baptized as Roman Catholics, beginning a long link between Hungary and Rome

Brian Boru becomes king of Munster and leader of the Irish campaign against the Vikings

Leopold, of the Babenberg family, becomes margrave of Austria and founds a dynasty which lasts for three centuries

Hugh Capet, a Frankish noble elected king of west Francia, establishes the royal dynasty of France.

Hugh Capet is the first in an unbroken line of twelve generations on the throne of France

Vladimir, the prince of Kiev, decides that Greek Orthodoxy is the most suitable religion for the Russian people

A trading centre at Mapungubwe, on the Limpopo, evolves into a state ruled by a king in a zimbabwe

Pope Sylvester II, according to tradition, sends a sacred crown for the coronation of Hungary's first king, St Stephen

Brian Boru, aged 73, achieves a major victory over the Vikings at Clontarf but is killed in his tent after the battle

Canute, joint king of Denmark, is accepted also as king of England after subduing the country and marrying Ethelred's widow

Count Radbot builds himself a 'hawk's castle' or Habichstburg, near Zurich, from which the Habsburg dynasty takes its name

Conrad II is elected as the German king, begining the dynasty variously known as Franconian or Salian

Yaroslav builds up his Russian kingdom and turns his capital, Kiev, into a spectacular Christian city

Edward the Confessor, the rightful heir in the Anglo-Saxon royal line, becomes king of England

Ife emerges as a powerful kingdom in the equatorial forest of the lower Niger

Togrul Beg enters Baghdad and is granted by the caliph the title of sultan, which becomes hereditary in his Seljuk dynasty

Duncan's son, Malcolm, kills Macbeth in battle at Lumphanan - and in the following year is himself crowned at Scone

On his death bed in Westminster, Edward the Confessor designates Harold - foremost among England's barons - as his successor