1020s

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	10th century – 11th century – 12th century
Decades:	990s 1000s 1010s – 1020s – 1030s 1040s 1050s
Years:	1020 1021 1022 1023 1024 1025 1026 1027 1028 1029
Categories:	Births – Deaths – Architecture Establishments – Disestablishments

1020s: events by year

Contents: 1020 1021 1022 1023 1024 1025 1026 1027 1028 1029

By place

Asia

• Goryeo and the Liao Dynasty exchange embassies following a seven-year territorial dispute.
• The massive Kandariya Mahadeva Hindu Temple is completed in the Chandela capital of Khajuraho.

Europe

• The city of Saint-Germain-en-Laye is founded.
• Henry II of Germany conducts his third Italian military campaign .
• Canute the Great codifies the laws of England.

By place

Europe

• Upon the death of Olof Skötkonung, he is succeeded by his son Anund Jakob as king of Sweden.

Asia

• Al-Muizz ibn Badis begins to rule Ifriqiya in his own right.
• The Song Dynasty Chinese military has one million registered soldiers, an increase since the turn of the 11th century when the Song military only had nine hundred thousand soldiers.

By topic

Religion

• Aethelnoth, Archbishop of Canterbury, is received at Rome.
• Several Catharists are killed in Toulouse.
• The Synod of Pavia issues decrees against non-celibate clergy and against simony.
• Robert II the Pious burns some canons of St. Croix in Orléans, for holding that the world is inherently evil.

By place

Europe

• The Judge-Governor of Seville takes advantage of the disintegration of the caliphate of Córdoba, and seizes power as Abbad I, thus founding the Abbadid dynasty.
• Abd ar-Rahman V is proclaimed Caliph at Córdoba.

Asia

• The Ghaznavid Empire occupies Transoxiana.

Africa

• Soon after returning from Mecca, the Tarsina king of Zanata, a mountain kingdom between Algeria and Morocco, is killed in battle.

By place

Europe

• The Salian Dynasty of the Holy Roman Empire is founded by Conrad II.
• April 19 – Pope John XIX succeeds Pope Benedict VIII (his brother) as the 144th pope.
• After several years in the Peninsula, Roger of Toeni, a Norman knight, leaves the battlefields of the Ebro Vally and heads back to France. It ends what historians have described as a early crusade.

Asia

• The world's first paper-printed money, which later greatly benefits the economy of the Song Dynasty, originates in the Sichuan province of China.
• Emperor Mahmud of Ghazni sacks the Hindu religious center of Somnath, slaughtering over 50,000 people and carrying off vast amounts of treasure.

By place

Europe

• April 18 – Boleslaw I Chrobry is crowned as the first king of Poland.
• Failure of the North African Zirid dynasty's attempts to retake Sicily.

Asia

• Srivijaya, a partly Buddhist kingdom based in Sumatra, is attacked by the Chola Empire of southern India in a dispute over trading rights in South-east Asia. It survives, but declines in importance.
• Constantine VIII succeeds his brother Basil II as Byzantine Emperor.

By place

Europe

• Archbishop Ariberto crowns Conrad II King of Italy in Milan.
• Pietro Barbolano becomes Doge of Venice.
• Henry VI becomes king of Bavaria (later Henry III, Holy Roman Emperor).
• The Battle of the Helgeå is fought in Scandinavia.

Asia

• A Zubu revolt against the Liao Dynasty is suppressed, with the Zubu forced to pay an annual tribute.

By place

Europe

• March 26 – Pope John XIX crowns Conrad II Holy Roman Emperor.
• May 14 – Henri I is crowned king of France at Reims Cathedral.
• Aldred becomes abbot of Tavistock.

Asia

• The Tibetan calendar begins.
• As recorded in the Song Shi, the Song Dynasty Chinese engineer Yan Su reinvents the 3rd-century South Pointing Chariot, a mechanical-driven compass vehicle.
• Civil war begins in Japan.
• Bagrat IV becomes king of Georgia

By place

Europe

• April 14 – Henry III, son of Conrad II, is elected king of the Germans.
• King Sancho III of Navarre conquers Castile.
• Cnut becomes King of Norway

Byzantine Empire

• November 12 – Dying Emperor Constantine VIII of the Byzantine Empire marries his daughter Zoe of Byzantium to his chosen heir Romanus Argyrus.
• November 15 – Romanus Argyrus becomes Eastern Roman Emperor as Romanus III.