November 1: the day Lisbon fell into ruins

On this day in 1755, terror came to Lisbon, the capital of Portugal. In the morning there was a terrible earthquake that turned a large city into ruins. This tragic event took the lives of 90 thousand people. The tremors were not limited to: the city was engulfed by fire, and then it was hit by a tsunami.

The consequences of the disaster were of great political importance for the country and the world as a whole. Portugal suspended colonial conquests and had to focus on reconstruction. The earthquake destroyed many churches, bringing Enlightenment theologians to the question of God's cruelty. Later this event was interested in the philosopher Immanuel Kant, who created his own theory about the causes of the tragedy. Despite the erroneous conclusions, the brochure written by Kant is one of the first important documents in the field of seismology.