Timeline

Pre-History
Year Unknown - The First of the "Precursors" find the Beacon and begin to "colonize" Beacon Space.

Year Unknown - A regime of alien jailers transforms Kardakouk into an aquatic prison and fills it with prisoners of many different races. Then they disappear out into the sector, their fate is unknown.

Recorded History
The recorded history of Beacon Space, all events are dated in years proceeding the beginning of the game (ergo, a date is x years ago). There is no standard calendar reckoning in Beacon Space,

Year 1035 - The Beacon Activates
Year 1027 - The Bleed spills over into our dimension.

Year 942 - A great flash of light could be seen from every corner of the galaxy that Beacon Space is within

Year 918 - First Instance of Gate Travel
Year 882 - The first gate accident occurs where hazardous material passing through one gate ignites when in contact with the gate energy killing everyone aboard said ship.

Year 829 - A group devotes themselves to re-routing where a gate leads to, with little success, but involves many wild tries/methods.

Year 820 - A new type of cargo ship is invented to best use these gates.

Year 789 - Major Wave of Colonists
Year 782 - The First "Precursor" ruin is discovered.

Year 704 - A diplomatic incident where one species resembles the prey/food species of another species present in a negotiation over territory.

Year 685 - A number of colonies discover similar plant and animal life with no fossil records, suggesting their biospheres were artificially created by the Precursors.

Year 676 - Space Piracy goes into full swing

Year 665 - The Bleed is discovered

Year 654 - Humans Arrive
Year 635 - Humans make peaceful contact with the first species they meet, which then introduce them to the Gates.

Year 627 - A common drug for several alien species (their version of aspirin) is found to be a potent psychotropic among humans, leading to a drug epidemic among local colonists.

Year 623 - Humans invent the first True AI

Year 610 - Humans attempt to colonize an "unsettled" world populated by sentient plants with a parasitic life cycle. The entire colony is converted.

Year 597 - A group of linguists of different species get together to make translation guides between the most common sector languages.

Year 513 - The Glitch
''A month-long period where the entire Gate network went dark without explanation. After reactivating, nearly half the known points in the network were missing. No explanation for the event is ever agreed upon.''

Year 415 - One of the more populated worlds sees the rise of a doomsday cult that claims the Glitch is a divine punishment by the same force that destroyed the Precursors.

Year 408 - A Supernova destroys a system.

Year 387 - An effort is made to restore one of the off-network gates, and it goes spectacularly wrong. (could be person error, could be system issues still present, that would be tbd)

Year 379 - The Great Migration
A massive migration of megafauna across Beacon Space

Year 377 - An alien species captures a number of megafauna and begin experimenting with ways to turn them into bioengineered FTL ships.

Year 306 - A pod of megafauna passes through a Bleed-infused nebula, emerging on the other side with strange capabilities and increased aggression.

Year 289 - The study and hunting of the newly arrived megafauna leads to ubiquitous and flagrant infractions over established borders.

Year 286 - Hunting starts in full force, as the rapid increase in quantity of the creatures is seen as a plague with no check.

Year 252 - Many recent arrivals to beacon space have their ships hacked by explorers/archaeologists searching for maps and information pertaining to ruins

Year 228 - The Beacon Wars
Series of conflicts between now defunct sector powers.

Year 189 - One of the major powers retreats into the unknown parts of beacon space, despite cautions against it, and has not been heard from since.

Year 145 - An ancient invasion fleet suddenly exits from a gate in the middle of a major battle, overwhelming both participants and capturing a planet.

Year 131 - Human militarists launch an invasion of several worlds in an attempt to seize their resources.

Year 119 - A settled world is bombed to ruin in a retaliatory strike. The immense loss of life is seen as a turning point in public support for the various faction war machines.

Year 101 - The Era of Peace Begins
Year 84 - A group claims to have found a record of the location of earth, but it's a major scam and a lot of people get very angry over it.

Year 27 - A trade dispute threatens to escalate into outright war.