The first hominids appear in Central Africa, of course, naturally in the nude.

The oldest stone tools mark the beginning of the Stone Age.

Homo erectus appears. Already for his earliest representatives, the use of stone equipment is proven, later individuals also used fire.

Homo erectus was so adaptable,  to be able to spread from Africa via the Near East to India, today's China (“Homo erectus pekinensis” resp. “Peking Man)” and Southeast Asia (“Homo erectus erectus” resp. “Java Man), as well as to Southern and Central Europe ("Out-of-Africa” theory). The late representatives of “Homo erectus” – but they are often assigned to “Homo heidelbergensis” – can already be described as a hunter-gatherer, because eight wooden, at least 270,000 years old spears (the Schöningen spears) were discovered in the pen brown coal pit Schöningen in the administrative district of Helmstedt, Germany. Published on 21 April 2020, an article “Fund in Schöningen – Wurfstock des Homo heidelbergensis entdeckt” (wissenschaft.de) reports, that archaeologists have found of a throwing stick, a technical precursor of the spears, also in the pen brown coal pit Schöningen [en: “A 300,000-year-old throwing stick from Schöningen, northern Germany, documents the evolution of human hunting” (nature.com)].

In Europe, homo neanderthalensis resp. Neanderthal developed from homo erectus via intermediate stages of homo heidelbergensis and homo steinheimensis, a species of the genus homo, perfectly adapted to the specific environmental conditions of the Ice Age. Neanderthals are rated today (contrary to to earlier assumptions) as culturally developed: For the first time, cultic practices of them are verifiable in Central Europe, for example burials are documented with grave goods (e.g. in La Ferrassie). Neanderthals developed a technique ofstone working, in which no longer only tools were made out of cores of flintstone, quartzite, or other rocks, but also the sharp-edged flakes were further processed. A special case of processing so-called “preformed” cores is the Levallois technique.

First appearance of Homo sapiens in Africa. About 100,000 years ago, modern humans reached the eastern Mediterranean, 70,000 years ago Southeast Asia.

Ethnology assumes, that around this time, “body shame”, “shame of sexual action”, and then “genital shame” arose, and people began to separate themselves from the community for the activities of excretion and sexual union. Over the next 95,000 years, most societies slowly began to cover their genital and anal zones.

Oldest articles of virtu like the Venus of 'Willendorf' and cave painting in the Chauvet cave prove the artistic creativity of the genus homo sapiens.

The human species of Neanderthals dies out. According to a theory, because his intellectual and technical skills did not allow him to invent multi-layered clothing – mandatory to survive during the Ice Age. The genes of humans living today are based between 0.5 and 2% on the genome of Neanderthal. This means, that there must have been a lot of mixing between homo neanderthalensis and homo sapiens.

From India, within a few centuries, the perception spreads, that the male sperm is the source of the woman's foetus. Subsequently, the phallus becomes the new symbol of fertility and the object of religious worship worldwide. As a result, the previously predominantly matriarchal forms of society are gradually being replaced by patriarchal ones.

For the “Old Kingdom” of Egypt (around 4500 BC), it is certain that people usually were nude in everyday life. The only exceptions were people senior in hierarchy, such as the Pharaoh's civil servants, who were sweating there aprons all day long, instead of working. The same applies to the simultaneous cultures in Mesopotamia: The upper classes dressed themselves, the ordinary people often lived without clothes. Only in the following millennia, clothing then became common step by step.

One of the last major matriarchal societies, the Minoan Empire in Crete, drowns after a catastrophic tsunami.

Trousers are invented. At the same time as the first cavalry warriors appeared in the Eastern European steppes, the legwear was created. Probably the oldest trousers in the world were found together with bridles in a tomb in China. The trousers is tailered to allow for a wide spreading of the legs, as riders need it. This made the essential advantage over the hitherto customary, wrapped apron, which significantly restricted the mobility of the legs.

In Sparta, Greece, you are nude at sports. This affects initially only the boys, a short time later, also the girls. However, training for girls and boys took place only seperated by gender.

At the Olympic Games, the apron is abolished as the (until then only) item of clothing of the athletes. From now on, the athletes competed only completely nude (except for horse races). Also the Isthmian Games (in Corinth) and the Pythian Games (in Delphi) were soon performed in the nude.

The 'gymnasion' becomes an established institution for athletic training and exercise in Athens, in particular wrestling. Of course, the training was done in the nude. The gymnasion was usually in the immediate vicinity of the 'Palaistra', the meeting place for spiritual-philosophical training.

At the age of 32, 'Mahavira' decides, to take off all clothes and wander around as a nude ascetic. The wandering life lasted for twelve years and the texts depict vividly adversities of the weather and hostilities of people. After 12 years, he attained omniscience and continued to teach the religion of Jainism he founded. According to their founders, the Digambaras – "air-clad” monks in the south of India – are still traditionally unclothed today.

Alexander the Great encounters during his India campaign a group of gymnosophists – nude philosophers, who considered people's pursuit of wealth and luxury to be the source of all earthly evil and therefore renounced all their goods including clothes.

In Rome, the first spas are being errected. The use is separated by gender. Men bathed nude, women wore at least in Rome a kind of bikini (panties and breast scarf).

Year of birth of Jesus of Nazareth.

Jesus is crucified being naked together with two criminals. He dies at the cross.

In the spas of Rome, the common nude use by people of both sexes prevails.

Flavius Theodosius I (347-395), Christian emperor in the Eastern Roman Empire, abolishes the Panhellenic Olympics, the oracle of Delphi, the mysteries of Eleusis, and numerous other pagan customs, thus destroying the foundations of paganism in the East – and thus also the practice in many ancient sports competitions to compete in the nude.

The spas of the Roman Empire degenerate into sites of sexual debauchery.

Augustine writes his “Confessions”, the story of his sinful past and his purification to be a believing servant of God. In the 9^th book, chapter 6, he praises the strength of character of a barefoot person.

The bathing culture in Rome was ruined, even because of the shortage of water caused by the destruction of the aqueducts by peoples invading Italy.

Drama groups and moving singers are travel across the country. They bring messages from distant areas and entertain the population with mystery plays. It is sometimes easy, a free chest or a free upper body provide for rare stimuli and challenge the church to damnatory sermons, the authorities to prohibitions.

Christian crusaders annoy after victorious battles by massive rape orgies on Saracen women. In doing so, they far outnumber the Muslims, who are less aggressive in reverse victories.

Christian crusaders bring the practice of steam baths and bathhouses from Orient back to Central Europe. The use is strictly separated by gender. Children up to 6 years (Also boys! That's unheard of!) may be taken to the women's baths.

Francis of Assisi completely undressed during a trial on the cathedral square of Assisi, in order to substantiate his renunciation of all earthly goods. He also renounced his father, a wealthy merchant, and devoted himself entirely to the heavenly values.

Francis (Francis of Assisi) is canonised.

The duty of virtue and morality is increasingly imposed on women because of constant sermons in the church.

Inquisition begins. Investigations with a legally questionable background have led to convictions, mostly death sentences, without legal legitimacy based solely on faith and ideology-based arbitrariness. The end of the inquisition is stated as around 1850.

Medieval bathhouses are used as such only to a small extent, most houses of this kind are brothels at the same time.

In the period from 1450 to 1750, the age of witch hunts lasted in Central Europe. Witches were accused of being in league with the devil and causing all sorts of bad things for their fellow human beings. As a rule, they were subjected to torture and degrading “witch trials” and were often burned naked at the stake.

People bath in rivers, lakes, and also in the sea usually in the nude. Not until about 100 years later, the first nude bathing bans in rivers, at least within cities such as Frankfurt or Paris are decreed. They remained practically without effect for centuries.

Christopher Columbus reaches the “West Indies” in the Caribbean and meets the first Indian tribes, who live (almost) clothes-free and worship nature religions.

The Indian tribe of the Yanomami is discovered in today's Brazil. The Yanomami men's clothing consists of a simple lumbar cord without apron and is used, to tie up the penis with a loop around the foreskin. On festive occasions, they wear magnificent feather trimming on the shoulders and upper arms. The women are nude and wear a lumbar cord, which is used to attach various small objects.

After the victory over King Atahualpa, soldiers of the Spanish conquistador Pizarro broke the Inca culture's firmly established rule of bathing separately according to sex, mingled naked with almost 100 bathing Inca women and raped everyone. In this way, they document the superiority of the “civilised Christian peoples” over the “naked savages”.

Maria de Medici, Queen of France, gives birth to the heir to the throne, Ludwig, in the presence of the most important representatives of the French nobility, because the first childbirth of the French queen had to be made in public, in order to prove the legitimate birth of the heir | heiress to the throne.

Although the 'braies' as underpants for men was common since the early Middle Ages, underpants for women were invented not earlier than around 1650 – until then women wore only petticoats, …
… and this also to some extent far into the 20^th century:
“My own memory goes back to the 1950s, when market women still walked to the gutter behind their booth and without lifting their skirts, urinated through the petticoats into the gutter. Of course, this was only possible without underpants."
 – Helmut

The Englishman Benjamin Beale from Kent invented the “bath carriage”, with which ladies are driven into the open water, to step down a staircase into the water there – protected from looks of others. The carriages remained in use at some places until about 1930.

After Johann von Wolfgang Goethe accompanied the two young counts of Stollberg, his former travel companions, in a village near Darmstadt, Germany, for nude bathing, he himself went swimming with them nude in Lake Lucerne. While 100 years ago, the practice of swimming nude was still commonplace and accepted in Switzerland, it now caused massive criticism.

To stop the widespread nude bathing, the first outdoor swimming pool was opened in Mannheim. Under control of the bathing supervision, decent full-body clothing could be enforced for bathing here.

‘Fidus’, whose real name is Hugo Höppener, leaves the preschool of the Munich Academy and joins the painter and nature apostle Karl Wilhelm Diefenbach (1851-1913) as a student. Both worked hard for a life in harmony with nature, the renunciation of any religion, exercise in the fresh air and the practice of naturism and a meatless diet.

Heinrich Pudor publishes his book “Nackende Menschen, Jauchzen der Zukunft” [en: “Nude people, jubilation of future”], the first important German-language work on naturism in Germany.

The first naturist association is founded in Essen, Germany.

Richard Ungewitter publishes the book “Die Nacktheit” [en: “Nudity”], in which he formulated the central approaches and demands of the awakening “culture of nudity”.

The public bathing beach Wannsee in Berlin, Germany, was opened as one of the first family baths. The prescribed swimwear, however, had to cover shoulders and knees.

Richard Ungewitter publishes the book “Nackt” [en: “Nude”], in which he reflects on the public reaction to his book “Die Nacktheit” [en: “Nudity”], published in 1906, and presents new experiences and demands. Here, he also talks about his nude hikes in the Black Forest, Germany.

The Odenwald School in Germany arose in close connection with the movement on educational reforms at the beginning of the 20^th century. It was founded on 14 April 1910. At the time, there were only 14 students, who were all housed in the Goethe House. Their concept was initially characterised by the principles of the “working” school. Examples therefor are the introduction of a course system and the abandonment of age groups. Other features of the educational concept of the school included – long before the emergence of anti-authoritarian education – calling the teachers by their first names. In physical education, boys and girls practised nude together until a certain age. The Odenwald School went bankrupt in 2015. In the history of the Odenwald School, there has been long-term sexual abuse of students by teachers. Prominent ex-alumni are Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Wolfgang Hildesheimer, Klaus Mann, Wolfgang Porsche, and Beate Uhse.

On the summit of the Hoher Meißner (highest mountain in northeast Hesse) gathers the 'Freideutsche Jugend' [en: 'Free German Youth'] together with delegations of the 'Wandervogel-Bünde' [en: 'Associations of aficionados of hiking'] on 12 October for the 1^st 'Freideutscher Jugendtag' {en: 'Free German day of youth'} as a counter-event to the 100^th anniversary celebrations of the Battle of Leipzig. Fidus' 'Lichtgebet' is distributed as a postcard among the participants. The conclusion is the 'Meißner Erklärung' [en: Meißner Declaration].

The Priory Gate School, founded 1919 in England, pursued the reform pedagogical concept with elements of a naturist pedagogy very consistently. Every child got the full opportunity for self-development. Theodore J. Faithfull, founder and head of the school, saw in this individualistic approach an alternative to established schools, which he believed worked to over-adapt students. Part of the concept of this boarding school was nudity at sports, at (sun) bathing as well as, for example, during drawing lessons. The school's headquarters was initially Sudbury (Suffolk), later moving to Walsham Hall in Walsham-le-Willows, near Bury St Edmunds.

With “Nacktheit und Kultur” [en: “Nudity and culture”] as well as “Nacktheit und Aufstieg” [en: “Nudity and advancement”], Ungewitter begins his assimilation of nazi ways of thinking and ideals. Therefore, he is from then suspect for naturists.

Adolf Koch, a gym teacher in Berlin, founds the first institution for physical education in the nude and subsequently further 12 of this kind in Germany.

A similar approach as the Priory Gate School in 1919, pursued the Summerhill school, founded by Alexander Sutherland Neill in 1927. Even in this first “democratic school”, sports in the nude was an integral part, but as voluntary as just the lessons themselves.

Bertrand Russell, together with his wife Dora Black, founded the libertarian experimental Beacon Hill School, where students, on an equal footing with teachers in the school parliament, determined school practice. This also included the joint physical education in the nude of boys and girls.

In Germany, the 'Lichtschulheim Lüneburger Land' (LLL) was also founded in 1927 in 'Glüsingen' ('Lüneburg' Heath). The educator Walter Fränzel thus realised his plan, to found a high school in the countryside, in which he could implement all his reform ideas. For sports, games and sunbathing, he leased an area nearby with forest around. Part of his concept was i.a. the permanent stay “in constitutional air within forest and heath”, organic connection of life with instruction, the friendly-companionable relationship of teachers and students, moreover the “acclimatisation to wind and weather particularly by being in the nude for gymnastics, morning runs, sports, and games in the spirit of naturism”. In 1933, the Nazis shut the school down.

The German 'Zwickel-Erlass' [en: 'Gusset Edict'] regulates the prescribed swimwear in German baths. It is considered as the last inappropriate state intervention against personal freedom before Hitler's dictatorship.

Like all associations, naturist associations were also banned, if they did not incorporate nazi objectives into their statutes. From then on, naturist goals went hand in hand with efforts at 'race hygiene' [nazi term for eugenics].

The sociologist Norbert Elias completes his 2-volume work “Über den Prozess der Zivilisation” [en: “On the process of civilisation”]”, in which he traces the social history of nudity, shame, and decency from antiquity to modern times. He saw the development of loose customs of antiquity to the prudery of the 19^th century as an inevitable accompaniment to the ongoing process of civilisation.

An order of the state repeals the interdiction to bathe in the nude.

The association “Deutscher Verband für Freikörperkultur” (DFK) [en: German Association of Naturists] is founded as governing body of the naturist associations in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG).

German actress Hildegard Knef triggers a scandal with a short nude scene in the movie “The sinner”, which the Catholic Church attacked also because of the theming of prostitution and suicide. “From today's perspective, the film is rather boring, cheerless and overloaded with problems, and even then did not inspire by its story or its quality. In the end, it owed its attraction to the fact, that people considered it a scandal. Churches with their moralizing forefingers involuntarily advertised for the movie, and the bigger the commotion became, the more people wanted to see the movie.”

The German naturist association “Deutscher Verband für Freikörperkultur” (DFK) [en: “German Naturist Association”] honours Richard Ungewitter's achievements with an honourary membership despite his close ties to the nazi ideology.

The miniskirt conquers the fashion scene and gives conservative circles a very, very tiny pretence for a scandalous theme.

Karol Woytila (later Pope John Paul II), archbishop and professor for catholic social ethics, authored his fundamental work 'Liebe und Verantwortung' [en: Love and responsibility], still relevant today as it was then, in which he formulated the assessment of human nudity by the Catholic Church: “Because of being created by God, the human body can remain nude and uncovered, and, untouched, still preserves its splendour and beauty."

Oswalt Kolle conquers the cinemas of the world with his educational films, which made the results of the Kinsey reports accessible to a broad audience.

The English Garden in Munich becomes a meeting place for hippies and naturists around the Monopteros, who for the first time used a public park for sunbathing in the nude. The example has formed a precedent in many other major cities, so that today naturist zones have been originated in numerous public urban parks.

The youth movement of the '68 generation creates the climate for naked provocations with the slogan “Make Love, Not War”, hippie villages and anti-authoritarian approaches.

'Streakers' hit the headlines with nude runs in bustling city centres or – especially – at events like football matches or at a parade in honour of the British Queen.

Nude bathing is accepted as normal at countless, tolerated nude beaches and bathing lakes.

Ethnologist Hans Peter Duerr publishes the first of five volumes of his response to Elias' work “On the Process of Civilisation”, titled “Nacktheit und Scham – der Mythos vom Zivilisationsprozess” [en: “Nudity and shame – the Myth of the Civilisation Process”]. Duerr disproves Elias on many counts and comes to the opposite conclusion, that the shamefacedness of people from ancient Greece to the 19^th century has always remained the same. The currently sinking threshold of shame would presuppose a very high degree of civilisation.

Peter Niehenke, doctor of sociology based in Freiburg (Breisgau), Germany, begins his active campaign against the adverseness against nudity in our society. His nude jogging initially stirs only some Freiburg citizens, but reached Niehenke quickly nationwide attention. His messages like “The perversion of shame” accuse the “grotesque misrepresentation of our values”. With his performances, he does not always achieve a common agreement.

The Higher Regional Court of Karlsruhe, Germany, condemns the “nude jogger of Freiburg”, Peter Niehenke, for harassing the public. Niehenke was jogging nude in the Freiburg city area. Qualified lawyers soon remarked, that a similar judgment would henceforth be unthinkable, since the procedure was very significantly influenced by the person of the presiding judge and this form of expression was not comprehensible and not legally compliant.

Among naturists in Germany, a group of hikers in the nude emerges. Their aim is, to hike in the nude in nature on remote, little frequented tracks. They distinguish their attitude deliberately from the provocative approach of Peter Niehenke. The judgement of the Higher Regional Court Karlsruhe, which concerns nude actions within built-up areas, is kept out of focus, because they choose consequently hiking tracks in the great outdoors. A priest in the German Siegerland (area named after the Sieg River) founds the initiative 'Nacktwandergruppe Siegerland' [en: 'Nude hiking group Siegerland'].

The first nude hike on Whit Sunday takes place in the 'Rothaar' Montains, Germany. From then on, it will become a well known venue for naturists to meet and hike.

In France, naturists founded and get registered the association APNEL, whose goal is the decriminalisation of nudity in public spaces. The French legislation knows only the offence “sexual deed in public” and sets harmless simple nudity equal to this offence – an inexcusable blunder of the French legislator. However, in recent years (since about 2010), you may notice a slow changing of this legal practice – perhaps, a result to which also the work of APNEL has contributed.

Nude hikers in Germany cause broad interest by media. Radio, press, and television report several times. In the Harz Mountains, the first German eductional nude hiking trail is planned.

In Germany, the pentecost nude hike takes place for the 6^th time in the Rothaar Montains on Whit Sunday. 52 hikers in the buff aged between 8 and 72 years participate.

A French hiking group with 62 participants: Hike in the buff in the south of France with the highest figure of participants so far.

In Harz Mountains, Germany, near the Wipper Dam, the first educational nude hiking trail, the so-called “Naturistenstieg”, is inaugurated. German press agency “dpa” and local press are present to document that event. Their pictures, on which Horst inaugurates this naturist trail, are on the news across the globe.

Precisely 10 years after the first nude hike in Siegerland, German film author Christian Dassel is present with his team to accompany 25 naturists during their hike between Forsthaus Hohenrodt and Obernau Dam in Siegerland.

He is producing a film as episode “Das Siegerland” [en: “The Sieg River district”] for the public TV series “Wir in NRW” [en: “We in North Rhine-Westphalia”].

Nude hiking and biking tours in several regions of Germany like Münsterland, Thuringia, Saxon Switzerland, Lüneburg Heath, Sauerland, Rothaargebirge, Westerwald, Pfälzer Wald, Rhön Mountains, Vogelsberg, Teutoburger Wald, and many other regions ensure a wider spread of the idea of naturist hiking – and partly triggered hot local discussions. Television, radio, and press report several times. Alfons, the humorous Frenchman, very well known since years by his own format in German public TV, presents hiking in the buff as subject of one of his 'Puschel TV' emissions:
Alfons: “You're hiking pretty fast, I'm sweating a lot!”
natury: “You do not wear clothes when hiking!”
Alfons: “Oh, sorry!”

Thanks to reporting by media ongoingly since at least 2008 and due to a lot of relaxed communication at many nudevents during encounters with other people wearing clothes, most people show, that they are well informed, and react normal: Increasingly often, others greet nude hikers, bikers etc. at first, spontaneously say something like “Glad to see you again – have missed you already!”, start a conversation about a topic of their interest or ask for a hint how to get where they want to get – without even mentioning nudity.

The idea of being naktiv, as Richard Foley likes to call living an active nude lifestyle in the great outdoors, has spread internationally: Naturists from abroad have already participated in nudevents in Germany spanning several days, NEWT is famous since long time for attracting an international community of naturists – founded in the European Alps, since long time taking place in Austria, in 2019 also in Spain. The idea has spread to Romania and to the USA – Corona / COVID-19 related restrictions might postpone certain plans, however, the idea will continue to circulate in the long run …