A naturalistic style of Buddhist sculpture develops in the Gandhara region, part of modern Pakistan

Sculptors in the Roman empire develop the most brutally realistic convention in the history of portraiture

The bronze equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, on the Capitol in Rome, begins a long European tradition of public sculpture

Ardashir, the Persian king, commissions a relief of himself in triumphant mood - carved high on a rock face at Naqsh-e Rustam

Small ivory panels, with Gospel scenes carved in relief, provide a delicate beginning to the story of Christian sculpture

Caves along the Silk Road are decorated with a profusion of carvings in the traditions of Mahayana Buddhism

The huge stone heads standing on Easter Island are carved and erected at some time between the sixth and seventeenth century AD

Lively and often fantastic figures, cunningly fitted around the capitals of columns, show the vigour of Romanesque sculpture

Buddhist, Hindu and Jain shrines are carved from the rock in the cave temples of Ellora, in India

The biblical kings and queens in the west porch of Chartres cathedral are a striking early example of Gothic sculpture

The Yoruba people of Ife create extraordinary sculptures in brass

A huge bronze sculpture, known as Daibutsu and cast in Kamakura, depicts Amida, the Amitabha Buddha of Pure Land Buddhism

Nicola Pisano completes a pulpit for Pisa, borrowing details from Roman sarcophagi - an early example of a new interest in the classical past

Philip II of Burgundy commissions from Netherlands sculptor Claus Sluter a work, the Well of Moses, which launches the northern Renaissance

The linen drapers of Florence commission a statue of St Mark from Donatello, who carves for Orsanmichele the first free-standing Renaissance sculpture

24-year-old Michelangelo provides for St Peter's in Rome an exquisite Pietà – the Virgin holding on her lap the dead Christ

The people of Benin begin a lasting tradition of sculpture in brass, melted down from objects brought by traders

Michelangelo begins work in Florence on a tall thin slab of marble, which he transforms into David

Pope Julius II summons Michelangelo to Rome to create the pope's own elaborately sculpted tomb

Bernini's youthful Pluto and Proserpina, suggesting soft flesh in cold marble, introduces the lively tradition of baroque sculpture

Wood-carver Grinling Gibbons arrives from Holland to begin an immensely successful career in England

The Flemish-born sculptor Michael Rysbrack creates a momument to Newton in Westminster Abbey

Johann Joachim Winckelmann publishes a book on Greek painting and sculpture which introduces a new strand of neoclassicism

Catherine the Great founds the Hermitage as a court museum attached to the Winter Palace in St Petersburg

Italian sculptor Antonio Canova sets up his studio in Rome and begins producing finely modelled nudes in the Greek style