THE DAY IN HISTORY · MAY 31
May 31 in history
What happened on May 31: 3 moments from the Maps of History atlases, in 1223, 1891 and 1945, each linked to the map that shows it.
— Battle of the Kalka River
31 May 1223 — Three Rus princes and their Cuman allies chase a feigned retreat for nine days, then are annihilated at the Kalka. The captured princes are suffocated under the victory platform. Then the raiders simply leave — and the Rus conclude it was a passing horror, and change nothing.
READ THIS MOMENT → · SEE IT ON THE MONGOL EMPIRE MAP → · THE FULL STORY →
In Vladivostok the heir, Nicholas, lays the first stone of the Trans-Siberian Railway — three weeks after a Japanese policeman’s sabre scarred his forehead at Ōtsu.
READ THIS MOMENT → · SEE IT ON THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION MAP →
— Brno death march
30–31 May 1945 — About 20,000 German-speaking residents of Brno, most of them women, children and old people, are driven on foot toward the Austrian border. Estimates of the dead run from about 1,700 to more than 5,000. In 2015 the city council formally expressed its regret. Remember them.
READ THIS MOMENT → · SEE IT ON THE UPROOTED MAP → · THE FULL STORY →
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