The 1890s: X-rays, cinema and the Olympic Games reborn

In November 1895, the German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen noticed that a new kind of invisible ray could pass through flesh but not bone. Within weeks, he had made an X-ray image of his wife's hand. Doctors began using X-rays almost immediately. In 1901, Röntgen received the first Nobel Prize in Physics.

On 28 December 1895, Auguste and Louis Lumière showed short films to a paying audience in a Paris café, using their Cinématographe. It is often seen as the birth of cinema.

From 1895, the Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi sent signals by radio waves over growing distances. In 1897 he founded a wireless company, and in 1901 he received a signal across the Atlantic.

In 1898, Marie and Pierre Curie discovered two new radioactive elements, polonium and radium. Marie Curie later became the first person to win Nobel Prizes in two sciences.

In April 1896, the first modern Olympic Games were held in Athens, revived by Pierre de Coubertin. About 240 athletes from 14 countries took part.

Rudolf Diesel patented his engine in the 1890s, and it soon powered ships, trains and trucks.