Most names of historical periods should not be capitalized.
• early antiquity; modern history; the
colonial period
Do, however, capitalize proper names.
• the Victorian era; Roman history; the
Civil War era
Here is a partial list of capitalized and lowercased
names of historical events, groups, and periods:
- the Arab League
- the Boston Tea Party
- Communist
- Democrat (member of the party)
- the Democratic Party
- the Depression
- the European Union (the EU)
- Fascist
- the GOP
- the Great Depression
- the Green Party
- the Industrial Revolution
- the Left
- Nazi
- Nazism
- the New Deal
- NAFTA (North American Free Trade Association)
- NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization)
- Progressive movement
- the Progressive Party
- Prohibition
- Reconstruction
- Republican (member of the party)
- the Republican Party
- the Right
- Socialist (member of the party)
- the Socialist Party
- anarchist
- bolshevism
- the civil rights movement
- the cold war
- communism
- democracy
- democratic
- fascism
- independent
- left wing
- moderate
- progressive
- right wing
Spell out centuries and millennia; do not capitalize
them.
• the fifth millennium; the eighteenth
century
Decades are usually written using numbers. If the context
is unclear, you might want to spell out the decade in full.
• the 20s; the 1990s
• the twenties; the nineteen-nineties
