1521: Spanish conquistadors led by Hernán Cortés capture Aztec Emperor Cuauhtémoc in Tenochtitlan, bringing the Aztec Empire to an end 1536: Buddhist monks from Kyoto’s Enryaku-ji Temple set fire to 21 Nichiren temples throughout Kyoto in the Tenbun Hokke Disturbance (Traditional Japanese date: July 27, 1536) 1642: Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens discovers Mars’s southern polar […]
1121: Battle of Didgori: Georgian army under King David the Builder wins a decisive victory over the renowned Seljuk commander Ilghazi 1480: Ottoman troops conquer Otranto in southern Italy after a 15-day siege, killing 12,000, enslaving 5,000, and beheading 800 Christians for refusing to convert to Islam 1851: American inventor Isaac Singer patents his famous […]
3114 BC: 3114-08-11 BCE is traditionally considered the start date of the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar, used by several pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilizations, notably the Maya 1945: Allies refuse Japan’s offer to surrender on the condition that Emperor Hirohito retains his status 1954: Formal peace treaty ends over seven years of fighting in Indochina between the […]
612 BC: Fall of Nineveh to the Babylonians and the forces of Medes, leads to the sack of one of the greatest cities in the world, the destruction of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, and the death of King Sinsharishkun [date approximate] 610: Traditional date of Laylat al-Qadr / Night of Power when Muslims believe the Quran […]
48 BC: Caesar’s Civil War: Julius Caesar decisively defeats Pompey the Great at the Battle of Pharsalus, forcing Pompey to flee to Egypt 378: Battle of Adrianople: Gothic rebel army defeats Roman forces under Emperor Valens, who is killed 1790: Robert Gray’s Columbia Rediviva returns to Boston after a 3-year journey as the first American […]
1509: Emperor Krishnadeva Raya is crowned, beginning the rejuvenation of the Vijayanagara Empire in southern India 1609: Galileo Galilei presents his telescope to the Venetian Senate in Venice 1786: US Congress unanimously chooses the dollar as the monetary unit for the United States of America 1945: Soviet Union declares war on Japan during World War […]
1461: Ming Dynasty Chinese military general Cao Qin stages a coup against the Tianshun Emperor 1714: Battle of Gangut: Russian Navy wins its first major victory during the Great Northern War against Sweden 1782: Commander of the Continental Army, George Washington, creates two Honorary Badges of Distinction and a Badge of Military Merit (now the […]
1661: Treaty of The Hague is signed, whereby the Dutch Republic sells New Holland (Brazil) to Portugal for 63 tons of gold 1890: Murderer William Kemmler becomes the first person executed by electric chair at Auburn Prison in New York 1945: Atomic bomb is dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima by the US B-29 […]
910: The last major Viking army to raid England, led by King Edward and Earl Æthelred, is defeated at the Battle of Tettenhall by the allied forces of Mercia and Wessex 1305: Scottish resistance leader William Wallace is captured by the English near Glasgow and transported to London for trial and execution 1583: Humphrey Gilbert […]
1558: The first printing of the Zohar in Spain popularizes the Jewish study of Kabbalah The Bellingshausen expedition’s two sloops-of-war, Mirny and VostokRussian Antarctic Expedition 1821: Russian Antarctic expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen returns to Kronstadt after being the first to circumnavigate Antarctica 1914: US President Woodrow Wilson issues his “Proclamation of Neutrality” […]
