The 17th century marks the midway point of the Early Modern period of Europe and was characterized by the Baroque cultural movement, the French Grand Siècle dominated by Louis XIV, and the beginning of modern science and philosophy, including the contributions of Galileo Galilei, René Descartes, Blaise Pascal, and Isaac Newton. Europe was torn by warfare throughout the century, by the Thirty Years' War, the Great Turkish War, the end of the Dutch Revolt and the English Civil War among others. European colonization of the Americas began in earnest. In the east, the period saw the flowering of the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal empires, the beginning of the Edo period in feudal Japan, and the violent transition from the Ming to the Qing Dynasty in China.
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