- South America
Rebuilding and the party system
Paraguay slowly rebuilds after the war as foreign capital returns and land is sold off; the Colorado and Liberal parties emerge to dominate national politics.
Era: Rebuilding and the Chaco War
Sources: History of Paraguay · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- South America
The era of Guzman Blanco
The Liberal caudillo Antonio Guzman Blanco dominates Venezuela, modernising Caracas and centralising power while ruling through personal authority.
Era: Caudillos, the Federal War and the Rise of Oil
Sources: Venezuela · Encyclopaedia Britannica, Venezuela: A Country Study · U.S. Library of Congress, Federal Research Division
- North America
Liberal revolution
Justo Rufino Barrios and the Liberals seize power, launching coffee-based modernisation and the expropriation of communal and Maya lands.
Era: Coffee and the Liberal Dictatorships
Sources: Guatemala: History (Postcolonial period and after) · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Asia
Ottoman garrison established
The Ottoman Empire extended its presence into eastern Arabia and placed a garrison on the Qatari peninsula, beginning several decades of nominal Ottoman authority.
Era: The Rise of the Al Thani and the 1868 Agreement
Sources: Qatar: History (Persian Gulf, Oil, Gas) · Encyclopaedia Britannica, The Battle of Al-Wajba (The Founder) · Government of Qatar (qatar.qa)
- North America
Abolition of slavery
Spain abolishes slavery in Puerto Rico, a reform widely linked to the pressure generated by the Lares revolt.
Era: Plantation, Abolition, and the End of Spanish Rule
Sources: The Grito de Lares: The Rebellion of 1868 · Library of Congress
- Africa
Zanzibar bans the seaborne slave trade
Under British pressure Sultan Barghash signs a treaty prohibiting the maritime slave trade and closing the Stone Town slave market, though domestic slavery endures for decades.
Era: The Portuguese and Omani Zanzibar
Sources: Slavery in Zanzibar · Wikipedia, Zanzibar Outlaws Slavery · EBSCO Research Starters
- Europe
Constitution on the settlement millennium
On the thousandth anniversary of the settlement, Denmark granted Iceland a constitution and increased control over domestic affairs, though executive power remained with the crown.
Era: National Awakening, Home Rule and Sovereignty
Sources: History of Iceland, 1840s to the Second World War · nordics.info (Aarhus University), Þingvellir and the Independence Campaign · Þingvellir National Park (official)
- Europe
The Roman Question
For nearly six decades the popes refused to recognise the Italian state's seizure of Rome, leaving the church-state dispute known as the Roman Question unresolved.
Era: The Loss of Rome and the Roman Question
Sources: Roman question · Encyclopaedia Britannica, Lateran Treaty · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Africa
Khama III becomes kgosi of the Bangwato
The Christian reformer Khama III takes the Bangwato chieftainship, banning liquor and aligning his powerful morafe with the missionaries.
Era: Missionaries, Boers and Mounting Pressure
Sources: Khama III · Encyclopaedia Africana, History of Botswana · Wikipedia
- Africa
Mbandzeni becomes king
Mbandzeni (Dlamini IV) ascends the throne; his reign coincides with an influx of European concession-seekers into the kingdom.
Era: The Concessions Era and Foreign Control
Sources: Mbandzeni (Dlamini IV) · Wikipedia, Mbandzeni (Dlamini IV) · Encyclopaedia Africana
- North America
The Indian Act
The Indian Act consolidated federal control over the lives, lands, and governance of First Nations peoples, becoming a central instrument of assimilation and dispossession that remains in force in amended form.
Era: Confederation and nation-building across the continent
Sources: First Nations and Indigenous peoples in Canada · The Canadian Encyclopedia, Truth and Reconciliation Commission reports · National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation
- North America
The Porfiriato
Porfirio Diaz rules Mexico for over three decades, modernising the economy while entrenching authoritarian government and land inequality.
Era: Reform, Porfiriato, and Revolution
Sources: Benito Juarez · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Europe
League of Prizren
Founded at Prizren in response to the Congress of Berlin, the Albanian League sought to unify the Albanian lands into one autonomous unit and to resist their partition among neighbouring states.
Era: Five Centuries of Ottoman Rule and the National Awakening
Sources: Albanian League (League of Prizren) · Encyclopaedia Britannica, Albania: Nationalism, Ethnicity, Culture · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Europe
Austro-Hungarian occupation
The Congress of Berlin authorised Austria-Hungary to occupy and administer Bosnia and Herzegovina, ending effective Ottoman rule while leaving nominal sovereignty in Istanbul.
Era: Habsburg Rule, Sarajevo 1914 and the Yugoslav Kingdom
Sources: Bosnia and Herzegovina: History · Encyclopaedia Britannica, Bosnia and Herzegovina: Ottoman Bosnia · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Europe
Treaty of Berlin dismembers the state
The Congress of Berlin revised San Stefano, splitting Greater Bulgaria into a small autonomous principality, the separate province of Eastern Rumelia, and Macedonia left under Ottoman rule, the foundational grievance of Bulgarian nationalism.
Era: San Stefano, Berlin and the Making of Modern Bulgaria
Sources: Bulgaria: Treaties of San Stefano and Berlin · Encyclopaedia Britannica, San Stefano, Treaty of (1878) · Encyclopedia.com
- Africa
True Whig Party dominance begins
From 1878 the True Whig Party, the party of the Americo-Liberian elite, held power virtually without interruption for more than a century, marginalising the indigenous majority.
Era: The republic and the True Whig order
Sources: True Whig Party · Wikipedia, Liberia — History (Colonialism, Civil War, Reconstruction) · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Asia
Sheikh Jassim succeeds as ruler
Jassim bin Mohammed Al Thani formally succeeded his father, an event commemorated as Qatar's National Day and marking the consolidation of the tribes under Al Thani leadership.
Era: Between the Ottomans and Britain: The 1916 Protectorate
Sources: The Battle of Al-Wajba (The Founder) · Government of Qatar (qatar.qa), Sheikh Mohammed bin Thani — Qatar's Rulers · The Amiri Diwan, State of Qatar
- Europe
The Land League and the Land War
The Irish National Land League, founded in 1879 with Charles Stewart Parnell as president, mobilised tenant farmers against landlordism, opening the 'Land War' over rents and ownership.
Era: Union, Famine and the National Movement
Sources: Charles Stewart Parnell and the Home Rule Movement · University of Delaware Library (Easter Rising exhibition)
Politics & Power in the 1870s
Every event in the Terralore archive tagged politics and power — dynasties, constitutions, revolutions and changes of regime, narrowed to the 1870s — 18 of them, drawn from 17 nations, running from 1870 to 1879. Each entry keeps the sources it was verified against and links back to the chronicle it came from.
- Events
- 18
- Nations
- 17
- Earliest
- 1870
- Latest
- 1879
- Europe
- 6
- Africa
- 4
- North America
- 4
- Asia
- 2
- South America
- 2
Every entry below is the same record, with the same sources, as the one on its nation’s chronicle.