A thematic collection

Catastrophe

Every event in the Terralore archive tagged catastrophe — plague, famine, earthquake and other disasters. 121 of them, drawn from 85 nations, running from 2500 BCE to 2025. Indexed below by period; each period opens the full text, with the sources every entry was verified against and a link back to the chronicle it came from.

Events
121
Nations
85
Earliest
2500 BCE
Latest
2025
Densest period
The 2010s15 events
Africa
33
Europe
33
Asia
32
North America
16
Oceania
6
South America
1

Each period below opens a page holding those events in full — summary, era and citations. Every entry is the same record, with the same sources, as the one on its nation’s chronicle.

2 events · 2 nations

The 3rd millennium BCE

Every theme in the 3rd millennium BCE →

  1. c. 2500 BCE

    The temple builders disappear · Malta

  2. c. 2500 BCE

    The desert returns · Niger

All 2 events in the 3rd millennium BCE →

4 events · 4 nations

The 2nd millennium BCE

Every theme in the 2nd millennium BCE →

  1. c. 1900 BCE

    Decline of the Harappan cities · India

  2. c. 1900 BCE

    Decline of the Harappan cities · Pakistan

  3. c. 1200–1100 BCE

    Bronze Age collapse and the Greek Dark Ages · Greece

  4. c. 1180 BCE

    Bronze Age collapse · Türkiye

All 4 events in the 2nd millennium BCE →

1 event · 1 nation

The 6th century

Every theme in the 6th century →

  1. Destruction of Scupi · North Macedonia

All 1 events in the 6th century →

1 event · 1 nation

The 7th century

Every theme in the 7th century →

  1. Joya de Ceren buried by ash · El Salvador

All 1 events in the 7th century →

2 events · 2 nations

The 10th century

Every theme in the 10th century →

  1. The Classic Maya collapse · Belize

  2. Classic Maya collapse · Guatemala

All 2 events in the 10th century →

2 events · 2 nations

The 13th century

Every theme in the 13th century →

  1. Mongol destruction of Merv · Turkmenistan

  2. St. Lucia's flood · Netherlands

All 2 events in the 13th century →

2 events · 2 nations

The 14th century

Every theme in the 14th century →

  1. The Black Death reaches England · United Kingdom

  2. The Black Death reaches Norway · Norway

All 2 events in the 14th century →

3 events · 3 nations

The 15th century

Every theme in the 15th century →

  1. The Norse settlements vanish · Greenland

  2. St. Elizabeth's flood · Netherlands

  3. Decline and abandonment · Zimbabwe

All 3 events in the 15th century →

3 events · 3 nations

The 16th century

Every theme in the 16th century →

  1. Collapse of the Taino · Haiti

  2. Depopulation of the Bahamas · Bahamas

  3. Collapse of the Taino · Cuba

All 3 events in the 16th century →

4 events · 4 nations

The 17th century

Every theme in the 17th century →

  1. León Viejo abandoned · Nicaragua

  2. Extinction of the dodo · Mauritius

  3. The Great Dubrovnik earthquake · Croatia

  4. Port Royal earthquake · Jamaica

All 4 events in the 17th century →

8 events · 7 nations

The 18th century

Every theme in the 18th century →

  1. Smallpox devastates the Khoekhoe · South Africa

  2. The great Lisbon earthquake · Portugal

  3. The Kourou expedition · France

  4. The Great Bengal Famine · Bangladesh

  5. Santa Marta earthquakes ruin Antigua · Guatemala

  6. The Laki eruption · Iceland

  7. The Móðuharðindin famine · Iceland

  8. Smallpox devastates Aboriginal peoples · Australia

All 8 events in the 18th century →

1 event · 1 nation

The 1820s

Every theme in the 1820s →

  1. Loropéni settlement abandoned · Burkina Faso

All 1 events in the 1820s →

2 events · 2 nations

The 1840s

Every theme in the 1840s →

  1. The Great Famine (An Gorta Mór) · Ireland

  2. The Great Irish Famine · United Kingdom

All 2 events in the 1840s →

1 event · 1 nation

The 1860s

Every theme in the 1860s →

  1. Zariba slave and ivory raids · South Sudan

All 1 events in the 1860s →

2 events · 2 nations

The 1870s

Every theme in the 1870s →

  1. Depopulation by introduced disease · Vanuatu

  2. Measles epidemic devastates Fiji · Fiji

All 2 events in the 1870s →

1 event · 1 nation

The 1890s

Every theme in the 1890s →

  1. The rubber regime and the Force Publique · DR Congo

All 1 events in the 1890s →

4 events · 4 nations

The 1900s

Every theme in the 1900s →

  1. Famines kill at least 100,000 · Cape Verde

  2. Kishinev pogrom · Moldova

  3. Shark Island and the concentration camps · Namibia

  4. Scorched earth and the Great Hunger · Tanzania

All 4 events in the 1900s →

1 event · 1 nation

The 1910s

Every theme in the 1910s →

  1. The Armenian Genocide · Armenia

All 1 events in the 1910s →

5 events · 5 nations

The 1930s

Every theme in the 1930s →

  1. The Kazakh famine (Asharshylyk) · Kazakhstan

  2. The Holodomor and the Soviet famine · Russia

  3. The Holodomor · Ukraine

  4. Stalinist terror and Kurapaty · Belarus

  5. The Great Repression · Mongolia

All 5 events in the 1930s →

14 events · 12 nations

The 1940s

Every theme in the 1940s →

  1. The June deportation · Estonia

  2. The Holocaust · Germany

  3. The June 1941 deportations · Latvia

  4. Mass deportations to Siberia · Lithuania

  5. Bengal famine · India

  6. Deportation of the Hungarian Jews · Hungary

  7. Confiscation under the Beneš decrees · Liechtenstein

  8. Great Vietnamese Famine · Vietnam

All 14 events in the 1940s →6 more not shown here

3 events · 3 nations

The 1950s

Every theme in the 1950s →

  1. North Sea flood and the Delta Works · Netherlands

  2. The Batepá massacre · São Tomé and Príncipe

  3. Great Leap Forward and the great famine · China

All 3 events in the 1950s →

5 events · 5 nations

The 1960s

Every theme in the 1960s →

  1. Cotton monoculture and the death of the Aral Sea · Uzbekistan

  2. The Skopje earthquake · North Macedonia

  3. Reprisals against the Tutsi · Rwanda

  4. The Great Sahel drought · Niger

  5. The 13 May communal riots · Malaysia

All 5 events in the 1960s →

5 events · 5 nations

The 1970s

Every theme in the 1970s →

  1. Mass killings under Amin · Uganda

  2. The Ikiza mass killings · Burundi

  3. Mass killing and exile · Equatorial Guinea

  4. The Cambodian genocide · Cambodia

  5. The Jonestown tragedy · Guyana

All 5 events in the 1970s →

7 events · 7 nations

The 1980s

Every theme in the 1980s →

  1. The great famine · Ethiopia

  2. An estimated two million dead · South Sudan

  3. The Chernobyl disaster · Belarus

  4. Chernobyl disaster · Ukraine

  5. Spitak earthquake · Armenia

  6. Ntega and Marangara killings · Burundi

  7. Mass killing of Isaaq civilians (Isaaq genocide) · Somaliland

All 7 events in the 1980s →

8 events · 7 nations

The 1990s

Every theme in the 1990s →

  1. Retreating Iraqis torch the oil fields · Kuwait

  2. Famine and Operation Restore Hope · Somalia

  3. The Arduous March famine · North Korea

  4. The killing begins · Rwanda

  5. Genocide against the Tutsi · Rwanda

  6. Pyramid scheme collapse and unrest · Albania

  7. Hurricane Mitch · Honduras

  8. Mass expulsion of Kosovo Albanians · Kosovo

All 8 events in the 1990s →

5 events · 5 nations

The 2000s

Every theme in the 2000s →

  1. Destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas · Afghanistan

  2. Cyclone Zoe strikes Tikopia · Solomon Islands

  3. Indian Ocean tsunami · Sri Lanka

  4. Post-election violence · Kenya

  5. Conakry stadium massacre · Guinea

All 5 events in the 2000s →

15 events · 13 nations

The 2010s

Every theme in the 2010s →

  1. Catastrophic earthquake · Haiti

  2. The rainforests are listed in Danger · Madagascar

  3. The dzud kills millions of livestock · Mongolia

  4. Tohoku earthquake and Fukushima disaster · Japan

  5. The Ebola epidemic · Liberia

  6. The Ebola epidemic · Sierra Leone

  7. Gorkha earthquake · Nepal

  8. Cyclone Pam devastates the islands · Vanuatu

All 15 events in the 2010s →7 more not shown here

10 events · 7 nations

The 2020s

Every theme in the 2020s →

  1. A second great earthquake · Haiti

  2. Drought and famine in the Grand Sud · Madagascar

  3. Honiara riots · Solomon Islands

  4. UN estimates 377,000 war-related deaths · Yemen

  5. Drought, famine risk and renewed offensive · Somalia

  6. Human cost of the war · Syria

  7. ICJ provisional-measures order in South Africa v. Israel · Palestine

  8. UN Special Rapporteur's 'Anatomy of a Genocide' · Palestine

All 10 events in the 2020s →2 more not shown here