section_path: Terminology
section_name: Terminology
paragraph_text: Terminology
  
  Eras can not easily be defined. 1500 is an approximate starting period for the modern era because many major events caused the Western world to change around that time: from the fall of Constantinople (1453), Gutenberg 's moveable type printing press (1450s), completion of the Reconquista (1492) and Christopher Columbus 's voyage to the Americas (also 1492), to the Reformation begun with Martin Luther 's Ninety-five Theses (1517).
  
  The term "modern" was coined shortly before 1585 to describe the beginning of a new era.
  
  The term "early modern" was introduced in the English language by American historians at the turn of the 20th century (around 1900). It was long thought that the concept was invented either in the 1930s to distinguish the time between the Middle Ages and time of the late Enlightenment (1800), or that "early modern" was not coined until the mid-20th century and only gained substantial traction in the 1960s and 1970s. Nipperdey (2022) pointed to its widespread usage by American historians around 1900 already, adding: 'In the interwar years the term permeated all areas of professional activity from textbooks and graduate school seminars to conferences, research articles, and job descriptions.' The difference between "early modern" and just "modern" was defined by the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution.
  
  Sometimes distinct from the modern periods themselves, the terms " modernity " and " modernism " refer to a new way of thinking, distinct, from previous ways of thinking such as medieval thinking.
  
  The European Renaissance (about 1420–1630) is an important transition period beginning between the Late Middle Ages and Early Modern Times, which started in Italy.
  
  " Postmodernism ", coined 1949, on the other hand, would describe rather a movement in art than a period of history, and is usually applied to arts, but not to any events of the very recent history. This changed, when postmodernity was coined to describe the major changes in the 1950s and 1960s in economy, society, culture, and philosophy.
  
  These terms stem from European History; in worldwide usage, such as in China, India, and Islam, the terms are applied in a very different way, but often in the context with their contact with European culture in the Age of Discoveries.