text:
1741

January–March

 * January 13 – Lanesborough, Massachusetts is created as a township.
 * February 13 – Sir Robert Walpole, the Prime Minister of Great Britain, popularizes the term "the balance of power" in a speech in Parliament.
 * February 14 – Irish-born actor Charles Macklin makes his London stage debut as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, pioneering a psychologically realistic style with Shakespeare's text revived, replacing George Granville's melodramatic adaptation The Jew of Venice. Kitty Clive plays the travesti role of Portia.
 * March 9 – War of the Austrian Succession: Prussian troops bring down the Austrian fortress of Glogau (modern-day Głogów in Poland).
 * March 13 – The British Royal Navy takes 180 warships, frigates and transport vessels, led by Admiral Edward Vernon, to threaten Cartagena, Colombia, with more than 27,000 crew against the 3,600 defenders.

April–June

 * April 6 – The New York Slave Insurrection, a plot to set fire to New York City, is discovered.
 * April 10 – War of the Austrian Succession: An Austrian army is defeated by Prussian troops of Frederick the Great in the Battle of Mollwitz.
 * May 4 – Vitus Bering sets out from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to map the coasts of Siberia and Alaska.
 * May 9 – War of Jenkins' Ear: Battle of Cartagena de Indias – Spain's defenders in New Grenada, under the command of General Blas de Lezo, defeat Edward Vernon's Royal Navy force, leading to a British retreat to Jamaica.
 * May 14 – HMS Wager, one of the vessels of George Anson's voyage around the world, is wrecked on the coast of Chile, killing most of the crew who have survived scurvy.
 * May 15 – Nader Shah, Emperor of Persia, narrowly escapes an assassination attempt.
 * May 21 – War of the Austrian Succession: King George II of Great Britain orders the British Army to prepare for an invasion of Prussia to defend his Electorate of Hanover.
 * June 11 – 1741 British general election, begun on April 30, concludes with Prime Minister Robert Walpole's Whigs retaining their majority in the House of Commons but losing 44 seats to candidates who have defected to the new Patriot Whigs to oppose his policies.
 * June 25 – Maria Theresa of Austria is crowned Queen Regnant of Hungary in Bratislava.

July–September

 * July 8 – Jonathan Edwards repeats his Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God sermon at Enfield, Connecticut.
 * July 15 – Alexei Chirikov sights land in Southeast Alaska, and sends some men aboard his ship ashore in a longboat, making them the first Europeans to visit Alaska.
 * August 4–5 – War of Jenkins' Ear: Invasion of Cuba – British Admiral Edward Vernon captures Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, which he renames Cumberland Bay, but which his forces are forced to abandon on December 9.
 * August 10 – Raja Marthanda Varma of Travancore defeats the Dutch East India Company in the Battle of Colachel, ending the Dutch colonial rule in India and marking the first "major" defeat of a European colonial military power in India.
 * August 23 – At least 2,000 die along the shores of the Sea of Japan after a volcanic eruption on an island generated the Kampo Tsunami.
 * September 11 – War of the Austrian Succession: Linz falls to the Bavarian Army.

October–December

 * October 12 – George II, as Elector of Hanover, signs the Neustadt Protocol with France, but fails to inform his British government until after his return from Germany.
 * November 25–26 – War of the Austrian Succession: Franco-Bavarian troops commanded by Maurice of Saxony storm in Battle of Prague city Prague.
 * December 6 (November 25, O.S.) – Elizabeth of Russia becomes czarina after a palace coup.
 * December 7
 * War of the Austrian Succession: Charles Albert of Bavaria has himself proclaimed King of Bohemia.
 * Aleksei Chirikov of Russia presents the first written description of the northwest coast of North America.
 * December 19 – Vitus Bering dies during his expedition, east of Siberia.
 * December 25 – Anders Celsius develops his own thermometer scale, Centigrade, the predecessor of the Celsius scale.

Date unknown

 * Stemmatographia by Hristofor Zhefarovich, regarded as the first Serbian and Bulgarian secular printed book, is printed in Vienna.
 * The Royal Order of Scotland in freemasonry is founded.

Births

 * January 14 – Benedict Arnold, American Revolutionary War general, traitor (d. 1801)
 * January 27 – Hester Thrale, Welsh diarist (d. 1821)
 * February 7 – Henry Fuseli, Swiss painter and writer (d. 1825)
 * March 13 – Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1790)
 * March 17 – William Withering, British physician (d. 1799)
 * March 20 – Jean Antoine Houdon, French sculptor (d. 1828)
 * April 14 – Emperor Momozono of Japan (d. 1762)
 * May 13 – Ingeborg Akeleye, Norwegian noble known for her love life (d. 1800)
 * May 23 – Andrea Luchesi, Italian composer (d. 1801)
 * June 11 – Joseph Warren, American Patriot, physician (d. 1775)
 * June 26 – John Langdon, American politician (d. 1819)
 * September 22 – Peter Simon Pallas, German zoologist (d. 1811)
 * October 4 – Edmond Malone, Irish scholar (d. 1812)
 * October 18 – Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, French general, author (d. 1803)
 * October 24 – Johann August von Starck, German pastor (d. 1816)
 * November 15 – Johann Kaspar Lavater, Swiss physiognomist (d. 1801)
 * Date unknown –
 * Nikolaos Koutouzis, Greek painter, poet and priest (d. 1813)
 * Catherine Antonovna of Brunswick, German-Russian noble (d. 1807)
 * Gelelemend, Lenape chief (d. 1811)

Deaths

 * January 15 – Ramon Despuig, Spanish-born 67th Grandmaster of the Knights Hospitaller (b. 1670)
 * February 13 – Johann Joseph Fux, Austrian composer (b. 1660)
 * February 21 – Jethro Tull, British agriculturist (b. 1674)
 * March 16 – Eleonora Luisa Gonzaga, Tuscan princess (b. 1686)
 * March 17 – Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, French poet (b. 1671)
 * March 31 – Pieter Burmann the Elder, Dutch classical scholar (b. 1668)
 * April 10 – Celia Fiennes, English travel writer (b. 1662)
 * May 21 – Henry Dawnay, 2nd Viscount Downe, Irish peer (b. 1664)
 * May 24 – Lord Augustus FitzRoy, Royal Navy officer during the Battle of Cartagena de Indias (b. 1716)
 * May 25 – Daniel Ernst Jablonski, German theologian (b. 1660)
 * June 14 – Landgravine Caroline of Hesse-Rotenburg, German noble (b. 1714)
 * June 18 – François Pourfour du Petit, French anatomist, ophthalmologist and surgeon (b. 1664)
 * July 3 – Elisabeth Therese of Lorraine, Sardinian queen consort (b. 1711)
 * July 28 – Antonio Vivaldi, Italian composer (b. 1678)
 * August 4 – Andrew Hamilton, American lawyer (b. 1676)
 * August 31 – Johann Gottlieb Heineccius, German jurist (b. 1681)
 * September 7 – Blas de Lezo, Spanish admiral (b. 1689)
 * September 28 – Edward Bayly, Irish politician (b. 1684)
 * October 12 – Joseph Talcott, British Governor of the Connecticut Colony for more than 17 years, since 1724. (b. 1670)
 * November 18 – Stephen Delancey, major colonial New York figure (b. 1663)
 * November 24 – Queen Ulrika Eleonora of Sweden (b.1688)
 * December 14 – Charles Rollin, French historian (b. 1661)
 * December 19 – Vitus Bering, Danish-born explorer (b. 1681)
 * December 21 – Bernard de Montfaucon, French Benedictine monk (b. 1655)
 * December 31 – Andrew Archer, English politician (b. 1659)

title: 1741


text:
1740

January–March

 * January 8 – All 237 crewmen on the Dutch East India Company ship Rooswijk are drowned when the vessel strikes the shoals of Goodwin Sands, off of the coast of England, as it is beginning its second voyage to the Indies. The wreckage is discovered more than 250 years later, in 2004.
 * February 20 – The North Carolina General Assembly incorporates the town of Newton as Wilmington, North Carolina, named for Spencer Compton, 1st Earl of Wilmington and patron of Royal Governor Gabriel Johnston.
 * March 16 – King Edward of the Miskito Indians signs a treaty making his kingdom, located on the coast of modern-day Nicaragua, a protectorate of Great Britain.
 * March 25 – Construction begins on Bethesda Orphanage for boys near Savannah, Georgia, founded by George Whitefield.

April–June

 * April 8 – War of the Austrian Succession: The Royal Navy captures the Spanish ship of the line Princesa off Cape Finisterre and takes her into British service.
 * May 31 – Frederick II becomes King in Prussia upon the death of his father, Frederick William I.
 * June 1 – Plantation Act or Naturalization Act of the Parliament of Great Britain comes into effect providing for Protestant alien immigrants (including Huguenots, and also Jews) residing in the American colonies for 7 years to receive British nationality.
 * June 16 – Pour le Mérite first awarded in Prussia as a military honour.
 * June 26 – War of Jenkins' Ear: Siege of Fort Mose – A Spanish column of 300 regular troops, free Black militia and Indian auxiliaries storms Britain's strategically crucial position of Fort Mose, Florida.

July–September

 * July 7 – Adam Smith sets out from Scotland to take up a scholarship at Balliol College, Oxford.
 * July 11 – Pogrom: Jews are expelled from Little Russia.
 * August 1 – The song Rule, Britannia! is first performed at Cliveden, the country home of Frederick, Prince of Wales, in England.
 * August 17 – Pope Benedict XIV succeeds Pope Clement XII, as the 247th pope.
 * September 8 – Hertford College, Oxford, England, is founded for the first time.

October–December

 * October 9–22 – Batavia Massacre: Troops of the Dutch East India Company massacre 5,000–10,000 Chinese Indonesians in Batavia.
 * October 20 – Maria Theresa inherits the hereditary dominions of the Habsburg monarchy (Austria, Bohemia, Hungary and modern-day Belgium) under the terms of the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713 on the death of her father, Charles VI. Her succession to the Holy Roman Empire is contested widely because she is a woman, but she will reign for 40 years.
 * November 6 – Samuel Richardson's popular and influential epistolary novel, Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded, is published anonymously in London.
 * November 14 – The University of Pennsylvania is officially established.
 * December 16 – Frederick II of Prussia invades the Habsburg possession of Silesia, starting the War of the Austrian Succession.

Date unknown

 * Enfield, North Carolina, is founded.
 * Spain begins construction on Fort Matanzas in the Matanzas Inlet, approximately 15 mi south of St. Augustine, Florida.

Births

 * February 4 – Carl Michael Bellman, Swedish poet, composer (d. 1795)
 * February 15 – Juan Andrés, Spanish Jesuit (d. 1817)
 * February 16 – Giambattista Bodoni, Italian publisher and engraver (d. 1813)
 * February 17 – John Sullivan, American General in the American Revolutionary War, delegate in the Continental Congress (d. 1795)
 * March – Johann van Beethoven, German musician, father of Ludwig van Beethoven (d. 1792)
 * March 16 – Johann Jacob Schweppe, German-born inventor, founder of the Schweppes Company (d. 1821)
 * April 7 – Haym Salomon, Polish-Jewish American financier of the American Revolution (d. 1785)
 * April 14 – Anna Strong, Patriot spy during the American Revolutionary War (d. 1812)
 * May 7 – Nikolai Arkharov, Russian police chief (d. 1814)
 * June 2 – Marquis de Sade, French author, for whom sadism is named (d. 1814)
 * June 24 – Juan Ignacio Molina, Spanish-Chilean Jesuit priest, naturalist, historian, translator, geographer, botanist, ornithologist and linguist (d. 1829)
 * June 27 – James Woodforde, English clergyman and diarist (d. 1803)
 * July 27 – Jeanne Baré, French explorer (d. 1803)
 * August 23 – Emperor Ivan VI of Russia (d. 1764)
 * August 26 – Joseph-Michel Montgolfier, French inventor (d. 1810)
 * September 12 – Johann Heinrich Jung, German writer (d. 1817)
 * September 23 – Empress Go-Sakuramachi of Japan (d. 1813)
 * September 25 – Hercules Mulligan, tailor and spy during the American Revolutionary War (d. 1825)
 * October 29 – James Boswell, Scottish author (d. 1795)
 * October 31 – Philip James de Loutherbourg, English artist (d. 1812)
 * December – Elisabeth Olin, Swedish opera singer  (d. 1828)

Date unknown

 * Ali Pasha of Ioannina, Albanian ruler (d. 1822)
 * Margaret Bingham, Countess of Lucan, born Margaret Smith, English portrait miniature painter and writer (d. 1814)
 * John Milton, American politician and officer of the Continental Army (d. 1817) (earliest estimated date of birth)
 * Septimanie d'Egmont, French salonist (d. 1773)

Deaths

 * January – Louise Élisabeth de Joybert, politically active Canadian governors' wife (b. 1673)
 * January 5 – Antonio Lotti, Italian composer (b. 1667)
 * January 17 – Matthias Buchinger, German artist (b. 1674)
 * January 20 – Niccolò Comneno Papadopoli, Italian jurist of religious law and historian (b. 1655)
 * January 21 – Nicholas Trott, colonial magistrate, South Carolina Chief Justice (b. 1663)
 * January 27 – Louis Henri, Duke of Bourbon, Prime Minister of France (b. 1692)
 * January 29 – Richard Lumley, 2nd Earl of Scarbrough (b. 1686)
 * February 6 – Pope Clement XII (b. 1652)
 * February 23 – Massimiliano Soldani Benzi, Italian artist (b. 1656)
 * February 29 – Pietro Ottoboni, Italian cardinal (b. 1667)
 * March 23 – Olof Rudbeck the Younger, Swedish scientist and explorer (b. 1660)
 * April 28 – Bajirao I, Great Maratha warrior and Prime Minister of Marartha Empire (b.1700)
 * April 23 – Thomas Tickell, English writer (b. 1685)
 * May 17 – Jean Cavalier, French Protestant rebel leader (b. 1681)
 * May 31 – Frederick William I, King in Prussia (b. 1688)
 * June 1 – Samuel Werenfels, Swiss theologian (b. 1657)
 * June 6 – Alexander Spotswood, British governor of Virginia Colony (b. 1676)
 * June 17
 * Theophilus of Corte, Italian Roman Catholic priest, preacher and missionary, canonized (b. 1676)
 * William Wyndham, English politician (b. 1687)
 * June 18 – Piers Butler, 3rd Viscount Galmoye, Anglo-Irish nobleman (b. 1652)
 * July 2 – Thomas Baker, English antiquarian (b. 1656)
 * October 5 – Johann Philipp Baratier, German scholar (b. 1721)
 * October 11 – Princess Magdalena Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst, Duchess of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg (b. 1679)
 * October 20 – Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor (b. 1685)
 * October 28 – Anna, Empress of Russia (b. 1693)
 * December 1 – John Abernethy, Irish Protestant minister (b. 1680)
 * December 20 – Richard Boyle, 2nd Viscount Shannon, British military officer and statesman (b. 1675)
 * December 30 – John Senex, English geographer (b. ca. 1678)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: 1740


text:
1739

January–March

 * January 1 – Bouvet Island is discovered by French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier, in the South Atlantic Ocean.
 * January 3 – A 7.6 earthquake shakes the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in China killing 50,000 people.
 * February 24 – Battle of Karnal: The army of Iranian ruler Nader Shah defeats the forces of the Mughal emperor of India, Muhammad Shah.
 * March 20 – Nader Shah occupies Delhi, India and sacks the city, stealing the jewels of the Peacock Throne, including the Koh-i-Noor.

April–June

 * April 7 – English highwayman Dick Turpin is executed by hanging for horse theft.
 * May 12 – John Wesley lays the foundation stone of the New Room, Bristol in England, the world's first Methodist meeting house.
 * June 13 – (June 2 Old Style); The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences is founded in Stockholm, Sweden.

July–September

 * July 9 – The first group purporting to represent an all-England cricket team, consisting of 11 players from various parts of England, comes to Kent and loses to the renowned Kent team, led by Lord John Sackville.
 * July 12 – The British East India Company signs a treaty with the Maratha Empire to gain the right of free trade within the territory.
 * July 22 – The Ottoman Empire retakes Belgrade from Austria's Habsburg monarchy after winning the Battle of Grocka.
 * August 20 – The Viceroyalty of New Granada, incorporating modern-day Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela is re-established by the royal cedula of King Philip V of Spain, 16 years after it had been dissolved, and adds the territory of Panama as well.
 * September 9 – The Stono Rebellion, a slave rebellion, erupts near Charleston, South Carolina.
 * September 18 – The Treaty of Belgrade brings the Austro-Russian–Turkish War (1735–39) to an end.

October–December

 * October 3 – The Treaty of Niš is signed.
 * October 12 – The town of Utuado, Puerto Rico was founded by Sebastian de Morfi.
 * October 17 – The Foundling Hospital is created in London by royal charter.
 * October 23 – War of Jenkins' Ear: Great Britain declares war on Spain.
 * November 20–22 – War of Jenkins' Ear – Battle of Porto Bello: British marine forces capture the Panamanian silver-exporting town of Portobelo from the Spanish.
 * December 30– Months of unseasonably cold weather begin in Ireland, precipitating the Irish Famine of 1740, known as Bliain an Áir ("The Year of Slaughter"). A January 5 dispatch from Dublin to the Stamford Mercury says "Since last Wednesday we have had the most violent cold Weather that was ever known in this Kingdom; hard Frost began that evening, which has continued ever since with a very stormy Wind at South-East." At least 13% of Ireland's population dies of starvation in the year that follows.

Date unknown

 * Ecuador, part of Real Audiencia of Quito, becomes a part of New Granada, instead of Peru.
 * 84,000 farmers revolt in the province of Iwaki in Japan.
 * A Plinian eruption of Mount Tarumae volcano occurs in Japan.
 * The first Bible in Estonian is published.

Births

 * January 25 – Charles François Dumouriez, French general (d. 1823)
 * February 15 – Alexandre-Théodore Brongniart, French architect (d. 1813)
 * March 16 – George Clymer, American politician and Founding Father (d. 1813)
 * March 19 – Charles-François Lebrun, duc de Plaisance, Third Consul of France (d. 1824)
 * August 31 – Johann Augustus Eberhard, German theologian, philosopher (d. 1809)
 * September 12 – Mary Bosanquet Fletcher, Methodist preacher and philanthropist (d. 1816)
 * October 11 – Grigory Potemkin, Russian military leader, statesman, nobleman and favourite of Catherine the Great (d. 1791)
 * November 2 – Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, Austrian composer (d. 1799)
 * November 8 – Henrik Gabriel Porthan, Finnish professor and historian (d. 1804)
 * November 20 – Jean-François de La Harpe, French critic (d. 1803)
 * December 14 – Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours, French politician (d. 1817)
 * date unknown
 * Antonio Cachia, Maltese architect, engineer and archaeologist (d. 1813)
 * Bénédict Chastanier, French surgeon (d. 1816)
 * Margherita Dalmet, Venetian dogaressa (d. 1817)
 * Paul François Ignace de Barlatier de Mas, French naval captain (d. 1807)
 * Samuel Mason, Revolutionary War soldier, early American outlaw (d. 1803)
 * Karoline Kaulla, German banker (d. 1809)
 * Yelizaveta Belogradskaya, Russian singer and musician

Deaths

 * January 20 – Francesco Galli Bibiena, Italian architect/designer (b. 1659)
 * March 5 – John Joseph of the Cross, Italian saint (b. 1654)
 * March 7 – Anton Maria Maragliano, Italian artist (b. 1664)

 * April 7 – Dick Turpin, English highwayman (hanged) (b. 1705)
 * April 19 – Nicholas Saunderson, English scientist and mathematician (b. 1682)
 * May 10 – Cosmas Damian Asam, German painter and architect during the late Baroque period (b. 1686)
 * June 18 – Charles Frederick, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, Swedish nobleman (b. 1700)
 * June 20 – Edmond Martène, French Benedictine historian and liturgist (b. 1654)
 * July 24 – Benedetto Marcello, Italian composer (b. 1686)
 * September 8 – Yuri Troubetzkoy, Governor of Belgorod (b. 1668)
 * September 12 – Ernest Louis, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt (b. 1667)
 * September 19 – Anne Marie Louise de La Tour d'Auvergne, French princess (b. 1722)
 * October 6 – Françoise Charlotte d'Aubigné, French noble (b. 1684)
 * October 18 – Antônio José da Silva, Brazilian-born dramatist (b. 1705)
 * November 14 – Juan de Galavís, Spanish Catholic archbishop (b. 1683)
 * November 16 – Harry Grey, 3rd Earl of Stamford, English peer (b. 1685)
 * date unknown – Anne Dodd, English news seller, pamphlet shop proprietor (b. 1685)

title: 1739


text:
1738

January–March

 * January 1 – At least 664 African slaves drown when the Dutch West Indies Company slave ship Leusden capsizes and sinks in the Maroni River during its arrival in Surinam. The Dutch crew escapes, and leaves the slaves locked below decks to die.
 * January 3 – George Frideric Handel's opera Faramondo is given its first performance.
 * January 7 – After the Maratha Empire of India wins the Battle of Bhopal over the Jaipur State, Jaipur cedes the Malwa territory to the Maratha in a treaty signed at Doraha.
 * February 4 – Court Jew Joseph Süß Oppenheimer is executed in Württemberg.
 * February 11 – Jacques de Vaucanson stages the first demonstration of an early automaton, The Flute Player at the Hotel de Longueville in Paris, and continues to display it until March 30.
 * February 20 – The Swedish Levant Company is founded.
 * March 28 – Mariner Robert Jenkins presents a pickled ear, which he claims was cut off by a Spanish captain in the Caribbean in 1731, to the Parliament of Great Britain, which votes, 257 to 209, for war against Spain, leading to the War of Jenkins' Ear the following year.
 * March/April – Battle of the Dindar River: Emperor Iyasu II of Ethiopia is defeated by the Funj people.

April–June

 * April 15 – Serse, an Italian opera by George Frideric Handel, premieres in London.
 * April 18 – Spain's Royal Academy of History (Real Academia de la Historia) is established by decree of King Philip V of Spain.
 * April 28 – Pope Clement XII issues the papal bull In eminenti apostolatus, prohibiting Roman Catholics from being members of Masonic societies.
 * May 4 – The Imperial Theatrical School, in modern times known as Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet, is founded under the reign of Empress Anna. It is the first ballet school in Russia and second in the world.
 * May 24 – John Wesley, newly returned from America, experiences a spiritual rebirth at a Moravian Church meeting in Aldersgate, in the City of London, essentially launching the Methodist movement; the day is celebrated annually by Methodists as Aldersgate Day (his younger brother Charles had a similar experience three days earlier).
 * May 25 – The military phase of Cresap's War between the British North American Provinces of Maryland and Pennsylvania is ended when King George II of Great Britain negotiates a cease-fire.
 * June 24 – British inventor Lewis Paul receives a patent for roller cotton-spinning machinery.
 * June 27 – The Spanish Empire's Council of the Indies votes, 6 to 4, to re-establish the Viceroyalty of New Granada, incorporating modern-day Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela and Panama. King Philip V issues the order on August 20, 1738.

July–September

 * July 1 – English metallurgist William Champion is granted a patent for his process of extracting zinc from other materials in a furnace.
 * July 10 – Thomas Pellow of Cornwall finally escapes captivity, 23 years after having been captured by Barbary pirates and held as a slave in Morocco. He arrives in British territory when the ship he is on sails into Gibraltar Bay on July 21, and later recounts his story in the book The Adventures of Thomas Pellow, of Penryn, Mariner: Three and Twenty Years in Captivity Among the Moors.
 * August 10 – Russo-Turkish War (1735–1739): The Russian army begins its attempt to cross the Dniester River and fails after three weeks; it is later decimated by plague.
 * September 18 – Samuel Johnson composes his first solemn prayer (published 1785).

October–December

 * October 22 – The excavation of Herculaneum, a Roman city buried by Vesuvius in AD 79, begins near the Italian city of Resina on orders from King Charles III of Spain to his engineer, Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre.
 * November 18 – The Treaty of Vienna is ratified, ending the War of the Polish Succession. Under the terms of the treaty, Stanisław Leszczyński receives Lorraine in exchange for renouncing the Polish throne.
 * December 27 – After setting off from Rotterdam in August with 240 immigrants to America, the British ship Princess Augusta is wrecked near Block Island off of the coast of the colony of Rhode Island. During the voyage, 200 passengers and seven crew die from illness spread by contaminated water. Another 20 die after the crew leaves and rows to shore. The wreck later becomes the subject of the legend of the "Palatine Light" ghost ship and of John Greenleaf Whittier's 1867 poem "The Palatine".

Date unknown

 * China's Qing government announces that all western businessmen have to use the Cohong in Guangzhou to trade.
 * Pierre Louis Maupertuis publishes Sur la figure de la terre, which confirms Newton's view that the earth is an oblate spheroid, slightly flattened at the poles.
 * Black Forest clockmaker Franz Ketterer produces one of the earliest cuckoo clocks.
 * Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, having completed a law degree, is hired as a court musician by Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia, the future Frederick the Great (Bach will remain in Frederick's service until 1768).
 * Holy Royal Arch is founded.
 * Rémy Martin is granted exclusive permission by King Louis XV of France to plant new vineyards, for impressing him with the quality of his cognac.

Births

 * January 21 – Ethan Allen, American patriot (d. 1789)
 * February 6 – Pierre-Joseph Desault, French anatomist and surgeon (d. 1795)
 * April 12 – Padre Francisco Garcés, Spanish missionary (d. 1781)
 * April 14 – William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1809)
 * May 27 – Nathaniel Gorham, American politician (d. 1796)
 * May 28 – Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, French physician (d. 1814)
 * June 4 – King George III of the United Kingdom (d. 1820)
 * July 3 – John Singleton Copley, American painter (d. 1815)
 * July 20 – Darejan Dadiani, Georgian queen consort (d. 1807)
 * July 22 – Anne d'Yves, writer, participant in the Brabant Revolution (d. 1814)
 * August 28 – Etteilla, French occult cartomancer (d. 1791)
 * September 25 – Nicholas Van Dyke, American lawyer and President of Delaware (d. 1789)
 * October 11 – Arthur Phillip, British admiral and Governor of New South Wales (d. 1814)
 * October 18 – Andrei Bolotov, Russian agriculturalist and memoirist (d. 1833)
 * October 29 – Charles Spalding, Scottish inventor and underwater diver (d. 1783)
 * November 15 – William Herschel, German-born astronomer (d. 1822)
 * December 31 – Charles Cornwallis, 1st Marquess Cornwallis, British general (d. 1805)

Deaths

 * January 6 – Franz Xaver Murschhauser, German composer and theorist (b. 1663)
 * January 24 – Samuel Andrew, American Congregational clergyman, educator (b. 1656)
 * January 27 – Marie Wulf, Danish pietist leader (b. 1685)
 * January 30 – Benoît de Maillet, French diplomat and natural historian (b. 1656)
 * February 9 – Béatrice Hiéronyme de Lorraine, Abbess of Remiremont (b. 1662)
 * February 15 – Matthias Braun, Czech sculptor (b. 1684)
 * February 27 – Henry Grove, English nonconformist minister (b. 1684)
 * March 16 – George Bähr, German architect (b. 1666)
 * March 25 – Turlough O'Carolan, Irish harper and composer (b. 1670)
 * April 9 – Sir Charles Blois, 1st Baronet, English politician (b. 1657)
 * May 1 – Charles Howard, 3rd Earl of Carlisle, English statesman (b. c. 1669)
 * May 15 – Sir John Chesshyre, English lawyer (b. 1662)
 * June 5 – Isaac de Beausobre, French Protestant pastor (b. 1659)
 * June 21 – Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend, English politician (b. 1674)
 * July 8 – Jean-Pierre Nicéron, French encyclopedist (b. 1685)
 * July 28 – Heinrich, Duke of Saxe-Merseburg (b. 1661)
 * September 23 – Herman Boerhaave, Dutch humanist, physician (b. 1668)
 * December 22 – Constantia Jones, English prostitute (executed) (b. c. 1708)

title: 1738


text:
1737

January–March

 * January 5 – Spain and the Holy Roman Empire sign instruments of cession at Pontremoli in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany in Italy, with the Empire receiving control of Tuscany and the Grand Duchy of Parma and Piacenza, in return for Don Carlos of Spain being recognized as King of Naples and King of Sicily.
 * January 9 – The Empires of Austria and Russia enter into a secret military alliance that leads to Austria's disastrous entry into the Russo-Turkish War.
 * January 18 – In Manila, a peace treaty is signed between Spain's Governor-General of the Philippines, Fernándo Valdés y Tamon, and the Sultan Azim ud-Din I of Sulu, recognizing Azim's authority over the islands of the Sulu Archipelago.
 * February 20 – France's Foreign Minister, Germain Louis Chauvelin, is dismissed by King Louis XV's Chief Minister, Cardinal André-Hercule de Fleury
 * February 27 – French scientists Henri-Louis Duhamel du Monceau and Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon publish the first study correlating past weather conditions with an examination of tree rings.
 * March 16 – In Paris, representatives of Spain and Portugal sign an armistice bringing an end to the Spanish–Portuguese War over the area now occupied by the nation of Uruguay and the area now occupied by the state of Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil. The news does not reach the fighting parties until five months later.
 * March 28 – The Battle of Delhi takes place between the Maratha Empire and the Mughals.

April–June

 * April 5 – French Jesuit priest Jean-François Régis is canonized as Saint Regis by the Roman Catholic Church under the reign of Pope Clement XII.
 * April 22
 * In Afghanistan, Persian shah Nader Shah begins the 11-month Siege of Kandahar against the Pashtun Emir of Afghanistan, Hussain Hotak. The surviving Afghanis surrender on March 24, 1738.
 * Lots are first advertised for sale in the new town of Richmond, Virginia, by the placement of a notice by William Byrd in the Virginia Gazette. According to the paper, "... on the North Side of James River, near the Uppermost Landing, and a little below the Falls, is lately laid off by Major Mayo, a Town, called Richmond, with Streets 65 Feet wide, in a pleasant and healthy Situation, and well supply'd with Springs of good Water. It lies near the Publick Warehouse at Shoccoe's, and in the midst of great Quantities of Grain, and all kind of Provisions. The Lots will be granted in Fee Simple, on Condition only of building a House in Three Years Time, of 24 by 16 Feet, fronting within 5 Feet of the Street. The Lots to be rated according to the Convenience of their Situation, and to be sold after this April General Court, by me, William Byrd."
 * May 28 – The planet Venus passes in front of Mercury. The event is witnessed during the evening hours, by the amateur astronomer John Bevis, at the Royal Greenwich Observatory. As of 2006, it is still the only such planet/planet occultation that has been directly observed.
 * June 21 – In Britain, the Theatrical Licensing Act requires plays to be submitted to the Lord Chamberlain for censorship.
 * June 30 – Russo-Turkish War, 1735-1739: Russian forces under Field Marshal Munnich storm the Ottoman fortress of Ochakov, and take prisoner 4,000 Turks.

July–September

 * July 9 – The direct male line of the Medici family becomes extinct, with the death of Gian Gastone de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany.
 * July 12 – Austria enters the Russo-Turkish War as an ally of Russia against the Ottoman Empire.
 * July 17 – The British ship Catherine founders in a storm off of Nova Scotia's Cape Sable Island during its voyage from Ireland to Boston, killing 98 of the 201 people on board.
 * August 4 – Austria's army is defeated by the Ottoman Army and Bosnian defenders in the Battle of Banja Luka.
 * August 15 – The Portuguese frigate Nossa Senhora da Boa Viagem arrives at Maldonado (now in Uruguay) as Captain Duarte Pereira brings the news that the Spanish–Portuguese War ended by an agreement signed on March 16.
 * September 1 – The oldest existing English language newspaper in the world, The News Letter, is founded in Belfast, Ireland.
 * September 20 – Runner Edward Marshall completes his journey in the Walking Purchase, forcing the cession of 1200000 acre of Lenape-Delaware tribal land to the Province of Pennsylvania.

October–December

 * October 7 – At least 300,000 people are killed when a tropical cyclone strikes the Bay of Bengal in India and modern-day Bangladesh. The storm sends 12 m high waves over the Sundarbans delta, and overflows the Hooghly River.
 * October 11 – The first national stage in Sweden opens, when Carl Gyllenborg's play Den svenska sprätthöken is performed in the Swedish language, by the first native actors, on the stage of Bollhuset in Stockholm.
 * October 16 – An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 9.3 occurs off the shore of Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula. Tsunamis up to 60 m high follow in the Pacific ocean.
 * November 4 – The Teatro di San Carlo, the oldest working opera house in Europe, is inaugurated in Naples, Italy.
 * December 24 – General Baji Rao I of the Maratha Empire in India defeats the armies of the rulers of Hyderabad, Oudh, Bhopal and Jaipur in the Battle of Bhopal.
 * December – John Wesley leaves Savannah, Georgia, and returns to England.

Date unknown

 * Benjamin Franklin creates the Philadelphia Police Force – the first city-paid force.
 * The Georg August University of Göttingen in Lower Saxony is opened to students.
 * Our Lady of Guadalupe is designated the patron saint of Mexico City.
 * Lancaster County Prison, Lancaster, Pennsylvania is first constructed, in response to the seven preceding violent years of the ongoing Cresap's War in the Maryland-Pennsylvania boundary dispute and war.

Births

 * January 4 – Louis-Bernard Guyton de Morveau, French chemist, politician (d. 1816)
 * January 23 – John Hancock, American politician and revolutionary (d. 1793)
 * January 29 – Thomas Paine, British-born American patriot and pamphleteer (d. 1809)
 * March 14 – Ioan Nicolidi of Pindus, Aromanian physician and noble (d. 1828)
 * March 23 – Arthur St. Clair, American soldier and politician (d. 1818)
 * April 27 – Edward Gibbon, English historian and politician (d. 1794)
 * May 2 – William Petty, 2nd Earl of Shelburne, Prime Minister of Great Britain (d. 1805)
 * June 20 – Tokugawa Ieharu, Japanese shōgun (d. 1786)
 * August 5 – Johann Friedrich Struensee, Danish royal physician (d. 1772)
 * August 14 – Charles Hutton, English mathematician (d. 1823)
 * August 29 – John Hunter, second governor of New South Wales (d. 1821)
 * September 9 – Luigi Galvani, Italian physician and physicist (d. 1798)
 * September 14 – Michael Haydn, Austrian composer (d. 1806)
 * September 15 – Miklós Küzmics, Hungarian Slovenes writer, Catholic priest (d. 1804)
 * September 19 – Charles Carroll of Carrollton, only Roman Catholic signer of the American Declaration of Independence (d. 1832)
 * December 26 – Prince Josias of Coburg, Austrian general (d. 1815)
 * date unknown –
 * Frances Abington, English actress (d. 1815)
 * Gelelemend, Indigenous American (Lenape) leader (d. 1811)

Deaths

 * January 24 – William Wake, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1657)
 * January 29 – George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney, British soldier (b. 1666)
 * February 14 – Charles Talbot, 1st Baron Talbot of Hensol, Lord Chancellor of Great Britain (b. 1685)
 * March 12 – Charles Alexander, Duke of Württemberg, regent of the Kingdom of Serbia  (1720–1733) (b. 1684)
 * March 16 – Benjamin Wadsworth, American President of Harvard University (b. 1670)
 * March 26 – Vakhtang VI of Kartli, king of the Kingdom of Kartli under the Bagrationi dynasty (b. 1675)
 * May 3 – James Johnston (Secretary of State), diplomat, Secretary of State for Scotland (b. 1655)
 * May 4
 * Eustace Budgell, English writer (b. 1686)
 * Ferdinand Kettler, Duke of Courland and Semigallia (b. 1655)
 * May 10 – Emperor Nakamikado of Japan (b. 1702)
 * May 17 – Claude Buffier, French philosopher and historian (b. 1661)
 * June 6 – Pierre Joseph Garidel, French botanist (b. 1658)
 * July 26 – Henri-Pons de Thiard de Bissy, French Catholic priest, bishop and cardinal (b. 1657)
 * July 9 – Gian Gastone de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1671)
 * July 26 – Johan Cronman, Swedish general (b. 1662)
 * July 27 – Maria Maddalena Martinengo, Italian nun (b. 1687)
 * September 27 – John Sidney, 6th Earl of Leicester, English privy councillor (b. 1680)
 * October 12 – François Catrou, French historian and Jesuit priest (b. 1659)
 * October 26 – Rinaldo d'Este, Duke of Modena (b. 1655)
 * November 11 – Claude de Visdelou, French missionary (b. 1656)
 * November 20 – Caroline of Ansbach, queen of George II of Great Britain (b. 1683)
 * December 11 – John Strype, English historian and biographer (b. 1643)
 * December 18 – Antonio Stradivari, Italian luthier (b. 1644)
 * December 19 – James Sobieski, Crown Prince of Poland (b. 1667)
 * December 21 – Alessandro Galilei, Italian architect, mathematician (b. 1691)
 * December 27
 * William Bowyer, English printer (b. 1663)
 * Victor-Marie d'Estrées, Marshal of France (b. 1660)
 * Date unknown – Sally Mapp, English lay bonesetter

title: 1737


text:
1736

January–March

 * January 12 – George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney, becomes the Second Field Marshal of Great Britain.
 * January 23 – The Civil Code of 1734 is passed in Sweden.
 * January 26 – Stanislaus I of Poland abdicates his throne.
 * February 12 – Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor marries Maria Theresa of Austria, ruler of the Habsburg Empire at the Augustinian Church in Vienna.
 * March 8 – Nader Shah, founder of the Afsharid dynasty, is crowned Shah of Iran on a date selected by court astrologers.
 * March 31 – Bellevue Hospital is founded in New York.

April–June

 * April 14
 * The Porteous Riots erupt in Edinburgh (Scotland), after the execution of smuggler Andrew Wilson, when town guard Captain John Porteous orders his men to fire at the crowd. Porteous is arrested later.
 * German adventurer Theodor Stephan Freiherr von Neuhoff is crowned King Theodore of Corsica, 25 days after his arrival on Corsica on March 20. His reign ends on November 5 when he flees the island.
 * April 19 – A fire in Stony Stratford, England, consumes 53 houses.
 * April – The Genbun era begins in Japan. The era of Kyōhō Reforms ends.
 * May 8 – Frederick, Prince of Wales, marries Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha.
 * May 22 – King George II of Great Britain departs for Europe as part of his duties as Elector of Hanover; his wife, Caroline, Queen Consort rules on his behalf as the Regent for the last time until his return on January 14, 1736.
 * May 26 – Battle of Ackia: British and Chickasaw Native Americans defeat French troops.
 * June 8 – Leonhard Euler writes to James Stirling describing the Euler–Maclaurin formula, providing a disconnection between integrals and sums.
 * June 19 – A French Academy of Sciences expedition, led by Pierre Louis Maupertuis, with Anders Celsius, begins work on measuring a meridian arc in Meänmaa, Finland.
 * June 24 – Witchcraft Act 1735 (9 Geo. 2. c. 5) in Great Britain comes into effect, criminalizing claimants accusing people of practising witchcraft or of possessing magical powers, intended to end legal witch trials in the early modern period in the country.

July–September

 * July 1 – Russo-Turkish War (1735–39): Russian forces under Peter Lacy storm the Ottoman fortress of Azov.
 * August 12 – A fire in Saint Petersburg, capital of the Russian Empire, destroys 2,000 buildings, the city's post office, and several palaces.
 * September 7 – An Edinburgh crowd drags John Porteous out of his cell in Tolbooth Prison, and lynches him.
 * September 29 – The Gin Act 1736 goes into effect, placing a steep tax on the sale of gin and license requirements for its sale, with the intent of reducing consumption of the liquor in Britain. Widely ignored, the Act is repealed in 1743.

October–December

 * October 3 – French scientist Charles Marie de La Condamine and a team of surveyors begin the first measurements at the Equator to determine the exact meridian arc measurement of distance between points separated by one degree of longitude in order to make a precise calculation of the Earth's circumference.  The initial measurements of this French Geodesic Mission to the Equator, made in what is now Ecuador, last until November 3. The same year the French Geodesic Mission to Lapland took place. Both confirm Isaac Newton's prediction that the Figure of the Earth is flattened at the poles.
 * November 5 – King Theodore of Corsica flees the island after a reign of seven months and the kingdom reverts to French control.
 * November 13 – Word of the discovery of silver, south of what is now the U.S.-Mexican border, reaches Sonora Governor Juan Bautista Anza and soon leads to prospectors coming to Nogales to find more silver.  Late in October, a Yaqui Indian prospector, Antonio Siraumea, had discovered large slabs of silver ("Las planchas de plata"), and at the Estancia Arizona, a ranch owned by Captain Bernardo de Urrea.  The region, and later the U.S. territory, and state of Arizona are named for Urrea's ranch.
 * December 7 – Benjamin Franklin builds the first volunteer fire company in Philadelphia.
 * December 26 – Andrew Michael Ramsay gives an oration, in which he relates the heritage and internationalism of Freemasonry to that of the Crusades.

Date unknown

 * Neustrelitz becomes the capital of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.
 * Bushehr is founded in Persia.
 * The Belgrade Fortress is completed.
 * One of the earliest records of use of a bathing machine is made at Scarborough, England.
 * Charles Marie de La Condamine, with François Fresneau Gataudière, makes the first scientific observations of rubber, in Ecuador.
 * Leonhard Euler produces the first published proof of Fermat's "little theorem".
 * Sir Isaac Newton's Method of Fluxions (1671), describing his method of differential calculus, is first published (posthumously) and Thomas Bayes publishes a defense of its logical foundations (anonymously).
 * Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab writes the Kitab at-tawhidt, marking the beginning of Wahhabism.
 * The Haidamakas raid the shtetl of Pavoloch, killing 35.

Births

 * January 7 – Andrew Adams, American judge (d. 1797)
 * January 19 – James Watt, Scottish inventor (d. 1819)
 * January 25 – Joseph-Louis Lagrange, Italian-born mathematician (d. 1813)
 * February 3 – Johann Georg Albrechtsberger, Austrian musician (d. 1809)
 * February 29 – Ann Lee, English-born American religious leader (d. 1784)
 * March 20 – Rama I, First King of Siam (d. 1809)
 * May 8 – Caterina Dolfin, Italian (Venetian) poet (d. 1793)
 * May 10 – George Steevens, English literary critic (d. 1800)
 * May 29 – Patrick Henry, American patriot (d. 1799)
 * June 3 – Sir John Acton, 6th Baronet, Prime Minister of Naples (d. 1811)
 * June 7 – Fermín Lasuén, Spanish missionary (d. 1803)
 * June 14 – Charles-Augustin de Coulomb, French physicist (d. 1806)
 * June 21 – Enoch Poor, American general (d. 1780)
 * June 25 – John Horne Tooke, English politician, philologist (d. 1812)
 * July – Juan Bautista de Anza, Governor of the Spanish Province of New Mexico (d. 1788)

 * August 9 – Louis Joseph, Prince of Condé (d. 1818)
 * August 15 – Alexander Runciman, Scottish painter (d. 1785)
 * August 26 – Jean-Baptiste L. Romé de l'Isle, French geologist (d. 1790)
 * September 15 – Jean Sylvain Bailly, French astronomer (d. 1793)
 * September 16 – Carter Braxton, signer of the American Declaration of Independence (d. 1797)
 * October 27 – James Macpherson, Scottish poet (d. 1796)
 * date unknown
 * Robert Jephson, Irish dramatist (d. 1803)
 * Li Ching-Yuen, Chinese herbalist, martial artist and tactical advisor (d.1933) (claimed)
 * Pierre le Pelley I, Seigneur of Sark (d. 1778)
 * Claudius Smith, American revolutionary (d. 1779)
 * Sir James Tylney-Long, 7th Baronet, English politician (d. 1794)

Deaths

 * January 8 – Jean Leclerc (theologian), Swiss theologian and biblical scholar (b. 1657)
 * January 17 – Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann, German architect (b. 1662)
 * January 31 – Filippo Juvarra, Italian architect (b. 1678)
 * February 1 – James Stanley, 10th Earl of Derby, English politician (b. 1664)
 * February 7 – Stephen Gray, English dyer, astronomer, and scientist (b. 1666)
 * March 16 – Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, Italian composer (b. 1710)
 * March 25 – Nicholas Hawksmoor, British architect (b. c. 1661)
 * April 21 – Prince Eugene of Savoy, French-born Austrian general (b. 1663)
 * April 30 – Johann Albert Fabricius, German scholar and bibliographer (b. 1668)
 * May 9 – Diogo de Mendonça Corte-Real, Portuguese politician (b. 1658)
 * June 6 – Jean Baptiste de La Vérendrye, explorer of New France, eldest son of Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de La Vérendrye (b. 1713)
 * July 1 – Ahmed III, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1673)
 * July 7 – William Hardres, British politician (b. 1686)
 * August 14 – Victor Honoré Janssens, Flemish painter (b. 1658)
 * September 6 – John Porteous, Scottish captain (b. c. 1695)
 * September 16 – Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit, German physicist and inventor (b. 1686)
 * September 26 – Louise Diane d'Orléans, youngest child of Philippe II, Duke of Orleans (b. 1716)
 * October 22 – George Clarke, English politician, architect (b. 1661)
 * November 2 – Louis Antoine de Pardaillan de Gondrin, French duke (b. 1664)
 * December 10 – António Manoel de Vilhena, Portuguese 66th Grandmaster of the Knights Hospitaller (b. 1663)
 * December 12 (burial) – Antonina Houbraken, Dutch draughtswoman (b. 1686)
 * December 22 – Sir William Robinson, 1st Baronet, British politician (b. 1655)
 * December 26 – Antonio Caldara, Italian composer (b. 1670)
 * date unknown
 * Anna Colbjørnsdatter, Norwegian heroine (b. 1667)
 * Chen Shu, Chinese painter (b. 1660)

title: 1736


text:
1734

January– March

 * January 8 – Salzburgers, Lutherans who were expelled by the Roman Catholic Bishop of Salzburg, Austria, in October 1731, set sail for the British Colony of Georgia in America.
 * February 16 – The Ostend Company, established in 1722 in the Austrian Netherlands (modern-day Belgium) to compete for trade in the West Indies (the Caribbean islands) and the East Indies (south and southeast Asia), ceases business as part of the agreement by Austria in the Second Treaty of Vienna.
 * March 12 – Salzburgers arrive at the mouth of the Savannah River in the British Colony of Georgia.

April–June

 * April 25 – Easter occurs on the latest possible date (the next time is in 1886).
 * May 15 – Prince Charles of Spain (later King Charles III) becomes the new King of Naples and Sicily, five days after his arrival in Naples.
 * May 25 – Spanish forces under the command of José Carrillo de Albornoz, 1st Duke of Montemar, defeat the Austrian forces, completing the conquest of the Kingdom of Naples at the Battle of Bitonto.
 * May 27 – French and Swiss troops suppress the slave insurrection in the Danish West Indies on the island of Saint John (part of the modern-day U.S. Virgin Islands) after six months and restore control of the plantations to the Danish owners.
 * June 6 – With the conclusion of the British general election (voting having begun in some constituencies on April 22), the Whigs, led by Prime Minister Robert Walpole, lose 85 seats but retain their majority.
 * June 17 – French troops take Philippsburg, but the Duke of Berwick is killed.
 * June 21 – In Montreal, New France, a black slave known by the French name of Marie-Joseph Angélique is tortured then hanged by the French authorities for allegedly setting a fire that destroyed part of the city.
 * June 30 – War of the Polish Succession: Russian troops take Gdańsk (German: Danzig), which had been besieged since February 1734, after the failure of a French expedition to relieve the city.

July–September

 * July 18 – The Siege of the Austrian fortress of Philippsburg (near Karlsruhe, Germany) by the French Army, ends after eight weeks as its Austrian defenders surrender.
 * August 6 – The armies of Spain and France, led by the Duke of Parma (and future King Charles III of Spain) storm the city of Gaeta in Naples, ending a four-month siege
 * September 28 – Abdu'llah bin Ismail as-Samin is deposed after a 15-year reign as Sultan of Morocco.

October–December

 * October 23 – Jamaica's Governor John Ayscough declares martial law to fight the slave rebellion that began in 1733, then drafts 600 men into the colonial army to march into the Blue Mountains. (→ First Maroon War)
 * October 31 – Chief Tomochichi of the Yamacraw band of the Muscogee Nation ends a successful four and a half month visit to Great Britain, along with Georgia Governor James Oglethorpe and other Yamacraw Indians, after having signed the cession of the area of modern day Savannah, Georgia to the Georgia Company. On June 16, he and the Muscogee delegation (Senauki, Toonahowi, Hillispilli, Umpichi, Apokutchi, Santachi and Stimaletchi) had been welcomed as guests of King George II. The group departs on HMS Aldborough after completing the visit by the largest delegation of Native Americans since 1616.
 * November 5 – The Dzików Confederation is created in Poland.
 * December 24 – A fire destroys the Royal Alcázar of Madrid, the residence of the Spanish royal family, along with more than 400 valuable paintings, 100 sculptures and thousands of documents.

Undated

 * Creation of the Kanem–Bornu Empire after Kanem is taken over by the Sultan of Bornu.
 * Anton Wilhelm Amo becomes the first African to receive a doctorate in Europe and begins teaching at the University of Halle.

Births

 * January 16 – John A. Treutlen, Governor of Georgia (d. 1782)
 * January 20 – Robert Morris, Founding Father of the United States (d. 1806)
 * February 15 – William Stacy, American Revolutionary War officer (d. 1802)
 * February 27 – Thomas Conway, American Revolutionary War general (d. 1800)
 * March 1 – Jeanne de Bellem, heroine of the Brabant Revolution
 * March 19 – Thomas McKean, American lawyer, signer of the Declaration of Independence (d. 1817)
 * April 17 – Taksin, King of Thailand (d. 1782)
 * April – Elsa Beata Bunge, Swedish botanist (d. 1819)
 * May 23 – Franz Mesmer, Austrian physician (d. 1815)
 * July 25 – Ueda Akinari, Japanese author and scholar (d. 1809)
 * August 10 – Naungdawgyi, Burmese king (d. 1763)
 * August 24 – Benjamin Church, first Surgeon General of the United States Army (d. 1763)
 * September 3 – Joseph Wright, British painter (d. 1797)
 * September 17 – Elizabeth Canning, English maidservant and kidnappee (d. 1773)
 * October 7 – Sir Ralph Abercromby, British general (d. 1801)
 * November 2 – Daniel Boone, American frontiersman (d. 1820)
 * December 1 – Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski, Polish aristocrat and patron of the arts (d. 1823)
 * December 17 – Queen Maria I of Portugal (d. 1816)
 * December 21 – Paul Revere, American silversmith, engraver, and Patriot in the American Revolution (d. 1818)
 * December 26 – George Romney, English painter (d. 1802)
 * December 31 – Francisco Manoel de Nascimento, Portuguese poet (d. 1819)
 * date unknown
 * Catharina Ahlgren, Swedish poet, editor and early feminist (d.1800)
 * Ulrica Arfvidsson, Swedish fortune teller (d. 1801)
 * Elżbieta Branicka, Polish szlachta and politician (d. 1800)
 * John Dawson, English mathematician and surgeon (d.1820)
 * Pedro Fages, Spanish soldier, explorer, and Governor of Alta California (d. 1794)
 * Rohal Faqir, Pakistani saint-poet and mystic (d.1804)

Deaths

 * January 6 – John Dennis, English dramatist, critic (b. 1658)
 * February 1 – John Floyer, English physician, writer (b. 1649)
 * February 2 – Charles Calvert, Maryland official (b. 1688)
 * February 9 – Diego de Astorga y Céspedes, Spanish Catholic cardinal (b. 1663)
 * March 1 – Roger North, English biographer (b. 1653)
 * March 16 – Andreas Silbermann, German organ builder (b. 1678)
 * March 21 – Robert Wodrow, Scottish historian (b. 1679)
 * April 1 – Louis Lully, French composer (b. 1664)
 * April 11 – Thomas Fantet de Lagny, French mathematician (b. 1660)
 * April 25 – Johann Konrad Dippel, German alchemist (b. 1673)
 * May 4 – James Thornhill, English painter (b. 1675 or 1676)
 * May 15 – Sebastiano Ricci, Italian painter (b. 1659)
 * May 21 – Philippine Élisabeth d'Orléans, French princess (b. 1714)
 * May 24 – Georg Ernst Stahl, German physician and chemist (b. 1660)
 * June 12 – James FitzJames, 1st Duke of Berwick, illegitimate son of James II of England and French military commander (b. 1670)
 * June 15 – Giovanni Ceva, Italian mathematician (b. 1647)
 * June 17 – Claude Louis Hector de Villars, Marshal of France (b. 1653)
 * June 21 – Marie-Joseph Angélique, African slave
 * July 22 – Peter King, 1st Baron King, Lord Chancellor of England (b. c. 1669)
 * September 8 – Michel Sarrazin, Canadian scientist (b. 1659)
 * October 12 – Simon Henry Adolph, Count of Lippe-Detmold, ruler of the county of Lippe (b. 1694)
 * November 14 – Louise de Kérouaille, Duchess of Portsmouth, French-born mistress of Charles II of England (b. 1649)
 * November 21 – Alexis Simon Belle, French portrait painter (b. 1674)
 * November 23 – Eugene Jean, Count of Soissons, Prince of Savoy (b. 1714)
 * December 5 – Peter Tillemans, Flemish painter (b. c. 1684)
 * December 8 – James Figg, English prizefighter
 * December 28 – Rob Roy MacGregor, Scottish clan chief (b. 1671)
 * date unknown
 * Richard Cantillon, Irish-French economist and author
 * Étienne de Veniard, Sieur de Bourgmont, French explorer (b. 1679)

title: 1734


text:
1733

January–March

 * January 13 – Borommarachathirat V becomes King of Siam (now Thailand) upon the death of King Sanphet IX.
 * January 27 – George Frideric Handel's classic opera, Orlando is performed for the first time, making its debut at the King's Theatre in London.
 * February 12 – British colonist James Oglethorpe founds Savannah, Georgia.
 * March 21 – The Molasses Act is passed by British House of Commons, which reinforces the negative opinions of the British by American colonists.  The Act then goes to the House of Lords, which consents to it on May 4 and it receives royal assent on May 17.
 * March 25 – English replaces Latin and Law French as the official language of English and Scottish courts following the enforcement of the Proceedings in Courts of Justice Act 1730.

April–June

 * April 6
 * After British Prime Minister Robert Walpole's proposed excise tax bill results in rioting over the imposition of additional taxes and the use of government agents to collect them, Walpole informs the House of Commons that he will withdraw the legislation.
 * Royal Colony of North Carolina Commissioners John Watson, Joshua Grainger, Michael Higgins and James Wimble begin selling lots for the town of New Carthage (which is later renamed and is now Wilmington, North Carolina), on the east side of the Cape Fear River.
 * May 1 – The canton system is first introduced in Prussia.
 * May 17 – The Molasses Act receives royal assent and begins to go into effect on June 24.
 * May 26 – The introduction of John Kay's Flying Shuttle which revolutionized the textile industry and marked the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
 * May 29 – The right of Canadians to keep Indian slaves is upheld at Quebec.
 * June 12 – At Schloss Salzdahlum, Prince Frederick of Prussia, the 21-year-old heir to the throne reluctantly marries Duchess Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Bevern in order to avoid prosecution for desertion from the Prussian Army and to be guaranteed the throne. Despite the unhappy marriage Frederick and Elisabeth later reign as King and Queen Consort of Prussia.
 * June 15 – The Danish West India Company buys the island of Saint Croix from France for 750,000 livres.

July–September

 * July 15 – A hurricane off of the coast of the Florida Keys wrecks at least 17 Spanish ships.
 * July 30 – The first Freemasons lodge, the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, opens in what will become the United States of America.
 * August 19 – In Warsaw as Stanislas Leszczynski appears to be on the verge of being elected King of Poland, Russia, Austria and Saxony sign Löwenwolde's Treaty (named for Russian diplomat Karl Gustav von Löwenwolde), pledging to go to war to place Frederick Augustus, son of the late King Augustus II, on the throne.
 * September 12 – Stanislas Leszczynski, who had been King of Poland from 1704 to 1709 until being driven from the throne by King Augustus II, is returned to office by the vote of the Sejm. Russia and Austria protest the election, since King Stanislaus is backed by France and Sweden.
 * September 26 – The Treaty of Turin is signed in Turin as a secret agreement between King Louis XV of France and King Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia.

October–December

 * October 5 – The election of Augustus III, to succeed his father as King of Poland, sparks the War of the Polish Succession.
 * October 10 – France declares war on Austria and Saxony.
 * October 24 – The Battle of Kirkuk starts which will lead to the defeat of the Ottoman army under general Topal Osman Pasha.
 * November 23 – The 1733 slave insurrection on St. John begins: Slaves from Akwamu rebel against their owners in the Danish West Indies.
 * December 19 – Unsuccessful in capturing Baghdad from the Ottoman Empire, Persia's ruler Nader Shah signs the Treaty of Baghdad with the Ottoman Governor, Ahmad Khan Pasha, with the Turks and the Iranians agreeing to restore the boundary between the two empires to the lines before the 1732 Ottoman invasion of Iran.
 * December 25 – The Molasses Act goes into full effect.

Births

 * January 22 – Philip Carteret, British Naval Officer (d. 1796)
 * January 24 – Benjamin Lincoln, major general in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, and politician (d. 1810)
 * March 13 – Joseph Priestley, English scientist and minister (d. 1804)
 * May 4 – Jean-Charles de Borda, French mathematician, physicist, political scientist, and sailor (d. 1799)
 * July 27 – Jeremiah Dixon, English surveyor and astronomer (d. 1779)
 * September 5 – Christoph Martin Wieland, German poet and writer (d. 1813)
 * September 18 – George Read, American lawyer and signer of the Declaration of Independence (d. 1798)
 * October 14 – François Sébastien Charles Joseph de Croix, Count of Clerfayt, Austrian field marshal (d. 1798)
 * October 15 – Lisa Eriksdotter, Finnish visionary
 * November 16 – Siraj ud-Daulah, the last independent ruler of Bengal of undivided India (d. 1757)
 * November 20 – Philip Schuyler, general in the American Revolution, United States Senator from New York, father of Angelica Schuyler Church and Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton (d. 1804)
 * undated – Johanna Löfblad, Swedish actor and singer (d. 1811)

Deaths

 * January 17 – George Byng, 1st Viscount Torrington, English Royal Navy admiral (b. 1663)
 * January 21 – Bernard Mandeville, Dutch-born English economic philosopher (b. 1670)
 * January 22 – Lovisa von Burghausen, Swedish memoirist (b. 1698)
 * January 25 – Gilbert Heathcote, Mayor of London (b. 1652)
 * January 27 – Thomas Woolston, English theologian (b. 1668)
 * February 1 – King Augustus II the Strong of Poland (b. 1670)
 * February 2 – Robert Price (judge), British judge and politician (b. 1653)
 * February 16 – Ulrika Eleonora Stålhammar, Swedish officer (b. 1683)
 * March 4 – Claude de Forbin, French naval commander (b. 1656)
 * April 14 – Ippolito Desideri, Italian tibetologist (b. 1684)
 * April 19 – Elizabeth Hamilton, Countess of Orkney, mistress of William III of England (b. 1657)
 * April 30 – Rodrigo Anes de Sá Almeida e Meneses, 1st Marquis of Abrantes, Portuguese diplomat (b. 1676)
 * May 1 – Nicolas Coustou, French artist (b. 1658)
 * May 3 – Sir Richard Cox, 1st Baronet, England (b. 1650)
 * May 10 – Barton Booth, English actor (b. 1681)
 * May 18 – Georg Böhm, German organist (b. 1661)
 * June 23 – Johann Jakob Scheuchzer, Swiss scholar (b. 1672)
 * July 12 – Anne-Thérèse de Marguenat de Courcelles, French salon holder (b. 1647)
 * August 16 – Matthew Tindal, English deist (b. 1657)
 * August 24 – Pierre-Étienne Monnot, French artist (b. 1657)
 * September 12 – François Couperin, French composer (b. 1668)
 * October 19 – Sir Thomas Molyneux, 1st Baronet, Irish politician (b. 1661)
 * October 25 – Giovanni Girolamo Saccheri, Italian mathematician (b. 1667)
 * October 31 – Eberhard Louis, Duke of Württemberg, (b. 1676)
 * November 11 – Willem Adriaan van der Stel, Dutch colonial administrator (b. 1664)
 * December 2 – Gerard Hoet, Dutch painter (b. 1648)

title: 1733


text:
1731

January–March

 * January 8 – An avalanche from the Skafjell mountain causes a massive wave in the Storfjorden fjord in Norway that sinks all boats that happen to be in the water at the time and kills people on both shores.
 * February 3 – A fire in Brussels at the Coudenberg Palace, at this time the home of the ruling Austrian Duchess of Brabant, destroys the building, including the state records stored therein.
 * February 16 – In China, the Emperor Yongzheng orders grain to be shipped from Hubei and Guangdong to the famine-stricken Shangzhou region of Shaanxi province.
 * February 20 – Louise Hippolyte becomes the second woman to serve as Princess of Monaco, the reigning monarch of the tiny European principality, ascending upon the death of her father Prince Antonio. She reigns only nine months before dying of smallpox on December 29.
 * March 16 – The Treaty of Vienna is signed between the Holy Roman Empire, Great Britain, the Dutch Republic and Spain.

April–June

 * April 1 – Battle of Dabhoi in India is fought between Sarsenapati Trimbakrao Dabhade and Bajirao Peshwa.
 * April 2 – The town of Raynham, Massachusetts in Bristol County is entered as a new town by the governor and court of Massachusetts, New England, America.
 * April 9 – British trader Robert Jenkins has his ear cut off after his ship, Rebecca is boarded by Spanish coast guards at Havana in Cuba. The incident becomes the casus belli for the War of Jenkins' Ear in 1739.
 * April 28 – A fire at White's Chocolate House, near St. James's Palace in London, destroys the historic club and the paintings therein, but is kept from spreading by the fast response of firemen.
 * May 10 – The Pacific Fleet of the Russian Navy is established by order of the Empress Anna of Russia, who directs Grigory Skornyakov-Pisarev to assume command over the new fleet and to develop Okhotsk as a major port.
 * June 4 – The English market town of Blandford Forum is destroyed by fire, with the exception of 26 houses. About one-third of the uninsured losses are paid for by the collection of disaster relief money.

July–September

 * July 1 – Benjamin Franklin and fellow-subscribers start the Library Company of Philadelphia.
 * August 15 – King Frederick William I of Prussia forgives his 19-year-old son, Prince Frederick, who has been confined since November to the town of Küstrin (now Kostrzyn nad Odrą in Poland) for his 1730 attempt to desert from the Prussian Army. Nine years later, having been politically rehabilitated, Prince Frederick succeeds his father as King and is later remembered as "Frederick the Great".
 * August 23 – The oldest known sports score in history is recorded in the description of a cricket match at Richmond Green in England, when the team of Thomas Chambers of Middlesex defeats the Duke of Richmond's team by 119 to 79.
 * September – The first successful appendectomy is performed by English surgeon William Cookesley.
 * September 30 – The village of Barnwell, Cambridgeshire, England, is "burned down entirely" by a fire.

October–December

 * October 23 – A fire at Ashburnham House in Westminster destroys 114 irreplaceable manuscripts (including a manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) and damages 98 others (among them the manuscript of Beowulf). Richard Bentley, the King's librarian and the House's owner, saves the only copy of the Codex Alexandrinus, carrying it under one arm as he leaps from a window. Bentley's ten year labor in translating the Greek Testament is ruined by the blaze. The remaining 844 manuscripts later form the heart of the collections of the British Library.
 * November 25
 * Swiss mathematician Leonhard Euler announces his use of the irrational number e (approximately 2.71828) as the base for the concept of the natural logarithm, describing it in a letter to German mathematician Christian Goldbach.
 * Patrona Halil, an ethnic Albanian and a janissary who instigated a mass uprising in 1730 within the Ottoman Empire that brought Mahmud I to power as the new Sultan, is strangled to death in Mahmud's presence after the rebellion is suppressed.
 * December 21 – The Maharaja Chhatrasal, monarch of Bundelkhand in India (part of the modern-day states of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh) dies at the age of 82. His kingdom is divided into four parts, with one part going to Baji Rao I of the Marathas and the other three going to his three sons: Harde Sah gets the Panna State, Jagat Rai gets the Jaitpur State and Bharti Chand gets the Jaso State.
 * December 29 – Jacques Grimaldi, the husband of the reigning monarch of Monaco, Louise Hippolyte, succeeds to the throne after Louise's death from smallpox. Jacques I rules until his own death in 1751.

Date unknown

 * Royal Colony of North Carolina Governor George Burrington asks the North Carolina General Assembly to pass an act establishing a town on the Cape Fear River, in what is seen as a political move to shift the power away from the powerful Cape Fear plantation class. The town is laid out in 1733, and incorporated as Wilmington in 1740.
 * Laura Bassi becomes the first official female university teacher, on being appointed professor of anatomy at the University of Bologna, at the age of 21.
 * English scientist John Bevis observes the Crab Nebula for the first time in the modern era.
 * The octant is developed by English mathematician John Hadley (it will eventually be replaced as a means of determining latitude by the sextant).
 * The Royal Theatre of Mantua (Italy) is built by architect Ferdinando Galli Bibiena.
 * First deeds for The Queen Inn, Winchester. Hops are grown on the land.

Births

 * January 3 – Angelo Emo, Venetian admiral and statesman (d. 1792)
 * February – Charles Churchill, English poet (d. 1764)
 * March 19 – Gabriela Silang, Filipino rebel leader and heroine (d. 1763)
 * April 8 – William Williams, signer of the United States Declaration of Independence (d. 1811)
 * May 8 – Beilby Porteus, Bishop of London and abolitionist (d. 1809)
 * June 2 – Dorothea Biehl, Danish writer (d. 1788)
 * July 16 – Samuel Huntington, Patriot in the American Revolution and politician (d. 1796)
 * August – Henry Constantine Jennings, English gambler and collector (d. 1819)
 * October 10 – Henry Cavendish, English scientist (d. 1810)
 * November 9 – Benjamin Banneker, African-American astronomer, surveyor of the District of Columbia (d. 1806)
 * November 15 – William Cowper, English poet (d. 1800)
 * December 8 – František Xaver Dušek, Czech composer (d. 1799)
 * December 12 – Erasmus Darwin, English scientist and grandfather of Charles Darwin (d. 1802)
 * December 28 – José de Viera y Clavijo, Spanish writer
 * Nikephoros Theotokis, Greek scholar and theologian (d. 1800)

Deaths

 * January 6 – Étienne François Geoffroy, French chemist (b. 1672)
 * January 20 – Antonio Farnese, Duke of Parma (b. 1679)
 * January 23 – Anna Lohe, Swedish banker (b. 1654)
 * January 27 – Bartolomeo Cristofori, Italian maker of musical instruments (b. 1655)
 * February – Thomas Hancorne, Welsh clergyman and theologian (b. 1642)
 * February 10 – George Carpenter, 1st Baron Carpenter, British Army general (b. 1657)
 * February 15 – Mary of Jesus de León y Delgado, Spanish Dominican lay sister and mystic (b. 1643)
 * February 22 – Frederik Ruysch, Dutch physician and anatomist (b. 1638)
 * March 5 – Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulsi, Sufi academic (b. 1641)
 * March 6 – Johann Melchior Dinglinger, German goldsmith (b. 1664)
 * March 8 – Ferdinand Brokoff, Czech sculptor (b. 1688)
 * March 9 – Frances Talbot, Countess of Tyrconnell, English-born courtier and vicereine of Ireland (b. c. 1649)
 * March 12 – Ernest August, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg (b. 1660)
 * March 23 – Augustus William, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg (b. 1662)
 * April 24 – Daniel Defoe, English writer (b. c. 1660)
 * April 28
 * Johann Theodor Jablonski, German lexicographer (b. 1654)
 * James Olmsted, Connecticut politician (b. 1645)
 * May 1 – Johann Ludwig Bach, German composer (b. 1677)
 * May 11 – Mary Astell, English feminist writer (b. 1666)
 * May 17 – Samuel Bradford, English churchman, Whig politician (b. 1652)
 * June 20 – Ned Ward, English writer, publican (b. 1667)
 * July 18 – Sir Walter Yonge, 3rd Baronet, English politician (b. 1653)
 * August 27 – Eudoxia Lopukhina, Russian Tsarina, divorced spouse of Peter the Great of Russia (b. 1669)
 * December 17 – George Lockhart, Scottish writer, spy and politician, killed in duel (b. 1673)
 * December 20 – Chhatrasal, Maharaja of Madhya Pradesh (b. 1649)
 * December 26 – Antoine Houdar de la Motte, French writer (b. 1672)
 * December 29 – Brook Taylor, English mathematician (b. 1685)

title: 1731


text:
1729

January–March

 * January 8 – Frederick, the eldest son of King George II of Great Britain is made Prince of Wales at the age of 21, a few months after he comes to Britain for the first time after growing up in Hanover. For 23 years, Frederick is heir apparent to the British throne, but dies of a lung injury in 1751.
 * January 19 – At the age of 14, Joseph (José), Prince of Brazil, son of King John V of Portugal, is married to the 10-year-old Princess Mariana Victoria of Spain, eldest daughter of King Philip V of Spain. In 1750, the couple become King Joseph I and Queen Consort Mariana Victoria of Spain.
 * February 14 – King Philip V of Spain issues a royal cedula, directing an effort to offer incentives to families from the Canary Islands for settlements in New Spain north of the Rio Grande in the modern-day U.S. state of Texas (→ Canarian Americans).
 * February 24 (February 13 O.S.) – In the city of Resht in Persia, Russian and Afghani leaders sign a peace treaty, with General Vasily Levashev for Russia and Muhammad Saidal Khan for Afghanistan.
 * February 25 – James Oglethorpe, a member of the British House of Commons, begins service as the Chairman of the Gaols Committee to investigate the conditions of Britain's jails and prisons after the death in Fleet Prison of his friend, Robert Castell. The Oglethorpe Committee's report propels Oglethorpe to fame and leads to the beginning of British penal reforms.
 * March 5 – Abdallah of Morocco becomes the new Sultan of Morocco upon the death of his half-brother, Abu'l Abbas Ahmad. Sultan Abdallah reigns for five years before being deposed for the first time, then returns to the throne five more times between 1736 and 1757.
 * March 19 – John of Nepomuk (Jan Nepomucký) of Bohemia is canonized by Pope Benedict XIII more than 300 years after being tortured and drowned in 1393 by order of King Wenceslaus IV; John becomes patron saint of Roman Catholics in the Czech Republic.
 * March 23 – Johann Sebastian Bach's First Köthen Funeral music premieres at St. Jakob, Köthen, in honor of the funeral of his former employer Leopold, Prince of Anhalt-Köthen. The next morning, Bach's funeral cantata Klagt, Kinder, klagt es aller Welt, BWV 244a premieres at St. Jakob, marking the same occasion.

April–June

 * April 3 – Benjamin Franklin, aged 23, writes the essay "A Modest Enquiry Into the Nature and Necessity of Paper Currency" and later applies the economic principles to backing of paper money used in the United States.
 * April 15 – Johann Sebastian Bach's St Matthew Passion, BWV 244b is performed again, at St. Thomas Church, Leipzig.
 * April 26 – For the first time in its history, the British House of Commons is adjourned for lack of a quorum. On January 5, 1640, it had first fixed the number of members necessary — 40 — for parliamentary business to be transacted.
 * May 8 – A fire breaks out inside the fully walled town of Haiger within the Holy Roman Empire (in the modern-day state of Hesse in Germany) and destroys all the buildings.
 * May 12 – Six English pirates, including Mary Critchett, seize control of the sloop John and Elizabeth while being transported to America to complete their criminal sentences. They overpower their captors but are later captured in Chesapeake Bay by HMS Shoreham and hanged in August.
 * May 17 – Caroline, Queen Consort becomes the first person to rule Great Britain as regent under the Regency Acts, beginning service as the acting monarch when her husband King George II departs Britain for Germany, where he is the Elector of Hanover. Caroline rules until George's return in October.
 * June 1 – Diederik Durven becomes the new Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies (modern-day Indonesia) upon the death of Mattheus de Haan.
 * June 8 – The Botanic Gardens of Pamplemousses, one of the most popular tourist attractions on the island republic of Mauritius, are started by Pierre Barmond, who sets aside thousands of acres for the purpose of preservation of the islands flora. The gardens come to occupy 97 square miles or 251 square kilometers.

July–September

 * July 25 – Seven of the original eight Lords Proprietor of the Province of Carolina sell their shares back to the British crown. The 1710 division of the Province is made permanent and the area is reorganized into the Royal Colonies of North Carolina and South Carolina.
 * July 27 – A fire that breaks out on this day in Istanbul destroys 12,000 houses and kills 7,000 inhabitants.
 * July 30 – Baltimore, Maryland is founded.
 * August 1 – The Comet of 1729, possibly the largest comet based on the absolute magnitude, on record, is discovered by Fr. Nicolas Sarrabat, a professor of mathematics at Marseille.
 * September 29 – The Battle of Damghan begins as the Persian Safavid Army, commanded by General Nader Khan Afshar confronts a larger force of rebel Afghan troops commanded by the Emir Ashraf Hotak.

October–December

 * October 5 – After seven days of battle, the Persians under Nader Khan Afshar make a daring attack through the center of the Emir Ashraf's battalions, killing 12,000 of the Afghans and forcing the remainder to flee, bringing an end to the Battle of Damghan.
 * November 9 – The Treaty of Seville is signed between Great Britain, France, Spain and the Dutch Republic.
 * November 29
 * The Natchez revolt, the worst Native American massacre to take place on Mississippi soil, occurs when Natchez people kill 138 Frenchmen, 35 French women, and 56 children at Fort Rosalie (near modern-day Natchez, Mississippi).
 * The first (wooden) Putney Bridge is completed, as the only fixed crossing of the River Thames between London Bridge and Kingston, England.
 * December 2 – George Frideric Handel's famous opera Lotario is given its first performance, premiering at the King's Theatre in London.
 * December 12 – Under the pretense of a peace offering, the Yazoo and Koroa warriors enter the French settlement at Fort St. Pierre (near modern-day Vicksburg, Mississippi) and kill most of the inhabitants.

Date unknown

 * The third oldest settlement in Mississippi, Port Gibson, is founded by French settlers.
 * Jonathan Swift (anonymously) publishes his satire A Modest Proposal.

Births

 * January 12
 * Lazzaro Spallanzani, Italian biologist (d. 1799)
 * Edmund Burke, Irish statesman and philosopher (d. 1797)
 * January 22 – Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, German author and philosopher (d. 1781)
 * February 26 – Anders Chydenius, Finnish economist, liberal politician and Lutheran priest (d. 1803)
 * May 2 – Catherine the Great, born Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst, empress regnant of Russia (d. 1796)
 * July 4 – George Leonard, American lawyer, jurist and politician (d. 1819)
 * August 10 – William Howe, 5th Viscount Howe, British general (d. 1814)
 * September 6 – Moses Mendelssohn, German-Jewish philosopher (d. 1786)
 * September 15 – Mikiel'Ang Grima, Maltese surgeon (d. 1798)
 * October 6 – Sarah Crosby, English Methodist preacher, the first female (d. 1804)
 * November 17 – Maria Antonia Ferdinanda of Spain, Queen consort of Sardinia (d. 1785)
 * November 21 – Josiah Bartlett, second signer of the United States Declaration of Independence (d. 1795)
 * November 12 – Louis Antoine de Bougainville, French navigator and military commander (d. 1811)
 * November 22 – Helena Dorothea von Schönberg, German industrialist (d. 1799)
 * November 24 – Alexander Suvorov, Russian general (d. 1800)
 * date unknown
 * David Barclay of Youngsbury, English merchant, businessman and banker (d. 1809)
 * Samuel Barrington, British admiral (d. 1800)
 * Mary Woffington, Irish socialite (d. 1811)

Deaths

 * January 11 – Thomas of Cori, Italian Friar Minor and preacher (b. 1655)
 * January 19
 * William Congreve, English playwright (b. 1670)
 * Lorenzo Cozza, Italian Catholic cardinal (b. 1654)
 * January 30 – Lothar Franz von Schönborn, Archbishop of Mainz (b. 1655)
 * January 31 – Jacob Roggeveen, Dutch explorer (b. 1659)
 * February 11 – Solomon Stoddard, pastor of the Congregationalist Church in Northampton, Massachusetts (b. 1643)
 * February 17 – John Ernest IV, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld (b. 1658)
 * March 2 – Francesco Bianchini, Italian philosopher, scientist (b. 1662)
 * March 15 – Elisabeth Eleonore of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Duchess consort of Saxe-Meiningen (b. 1658)
 * March 21 – John Law, Scottish economist (b. 1671)
 * March 18 – Michael Bernhard Valentini, German naturalist (b. 1657)
 * March 21 – Elżbieta Sieniawska, politically influential Polish magnate (b. 1669)
 * April 12 – Louis-Guillaume Pécour, French dancer and choreographer (b. 1653)
 * March 6 – Sir William Lowther, 1st Baronet, of Swillington, British politician (b. 1663)
 * March 26 – Simon de la Loubère, French diplomat (b. 1642)
 * May 4 – Louis-Antoine, Cardinal de Noailles, French bishop (b. 1651)
 * May 17 – Samuel Clarke, English philosopher (b. 1675)
 * June 4 – Sir John Delaval, 3rd Baronet, English politician (b. 1654)
 * June 12 – John Williams, American clergy (b. 1664)
 * June 27 – Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, French harpsichordist and composer (b. 1665)
 * July 16 – Johann David Heinichen, German composer (b. 1683)
 * July 30 – Thomas Tufton, 6th Earl of Thanet, British politician (b. 1644)
 * August 5 – Thomas Newcomen, English inventor (b. 1663)
 * August 31 – John Blackadder, Scottish soldier (b. 1664)
 * September 1 – Richard Steele, Irish writer and politician (b. 1672)
 * September 3 – Jean Hardouin, French scholar (b. 1646)
 * September 7 – William Burnet, British Governor of New York and New Jersey (b. 1688)
 * October 9 – Richard Blackmore, English physician and writer (b. 1654)
 * October 16 – Johann Heinrich Ernesti, German philosopher, theologian (b. 1652)
 * October 30 – William Conolly, Irish politician (b. 1662)
 * November 8 – Joshua Oldfield, English Presbyterian divine (b. 1656)
 * November 11 – John Benedict, Connecticut politician and deacon (b. 1649)
 * December – Doamna Marica Brâncoveanu, princess consort of Wallachia (b. 1661)
 * December 1 – Giacomo F. Maraldi, French-Italian astronomer (b. 1665)
 * December 13 – Anthony Collins, English philosopher (b. 1676)
 * December 22 – Michel Baron, French actor (b. 1653)
 * December 26 – Honoré Tournély, French theologian (b. 1658)
 * December 27 – Olimpia Giustiniani, Italian noblewoman (b. 1641)
 * date unknown – Anastasia Markovych, Ukrainian Hetmana

title: 1729


text:
1727

January–March

 * January 1 – (December 21, 1726 O.S.) Spain's ambassador to Great Britain demands that the British return Gibraltar after accusing Britain of violating the terms of the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht. Britain refuses and the Thirteenth Siege of Gibraltar begins on February 22.
 * January 6 – Martin Spanberg and two other members of the First Kamchatka expedition arrive in Okhotsk, after a journey from Saint Petersburg of almost two years. After the end of winter, the 63-member group, commanded by Vitus Bering, proceeds to the Kamchatka River, to prepare for exploration of the Arctic.
 * January 9 – The world-famous Charité Hospital is established in Berlin, to be used for research and to help the poor. Prussia's King Frederick William I had ordered the conversion of a 16-year old institution, originally built in anticipation of an epidemic of the bubonic plague.
 * January 12 – Abd el-Sayed of Egypt is enthroned, as Pope John XVII of Alexandria becomes the leader of the Coptic Christian Church, as the 105th Pope of Alexandria and Patriarch of the Holy See of St. Mark. He will serve until his death on April 20, 1745.
 * February 2 – Johann Sebastian Bach's solo cantata, Ich habe genug, BWV 82, premieres in Leipzig.
 * February 20 – German composer George Frideric Handel becomes a British subject.
 * February 22 (February 11, 1726 O.S.) – Spain besieges the British-held territory of Gibraltar, in order to recapture it. Britain's Royal Navy begins a blockade of Spanish ports and the unsuccessful siege ends with the signing of a truce on June 24.
 * February – The First Saudi State is founded by Muhammad bin Saud.
 * March 4 – Battle of Halidzor in Armenia: A small group of defenders overcomes a much larger Ottoman Empire army.
 * March 9 – The west African Kingdom of Dahomey, ruled by King Trudo Agaja, conquers and annexes the Kingdom of Xwéda, after King Haffon is killed in battle (three years earlier, Agaja conquered the neighboring state of Allada).
 * March 22 – After 55 years as Sultan of Morocco, Ismail Ibn Sharif dies at the age of 81, prompting a 30-year battle between seven of his sons, for succession to the throne.

April–June

 * April 11 – Johann Sebastian Bach's St Matthew Passion (BWV 244b) premieres at St. Thomas Church, Leipzig.
 * May 12 – History of the Moravian Church: The 18th century renewal: The Brotherly Agreement is adopted by the Moravian Church community at Herrnhut, under the influence of Count Nicolaus Zinzendorf, beginning the Church's renewal.
 * May 31 – The Royal Bank of Scotland is founded by Royal Charter in Edinburgh.
 * June 22 (July 11 Old Style) – George, Prince of Wales, becomes King George II of Great Britain, on the death of his father.
 * June 23 – Spain ceases hostilities after its attempt to recapture Gibraltar from Britain fails. A truce is signed the next day.
 * June 27 – Uxbridge, Massachusetts, is incorporated as a town.

July–September

 * July 1 – In India, Shuja-ud-Din Muhammad Khan becomes the new Nawab of Bengal after the death of his father-in-law, Murshid Quli Khan. At the time, Bengal consists of what is now the nation of Bangladesh and the southeast Indian state of West Bengal and is subservient to the Mughal Empire.
 * July 23 – Seventeen Ursuline Sisters from France land in New Orleans, in the Louisiana territory of New France, after a journey that began on February 22. They later create the orphanage which is the predecessor of Catholic Charities and the Ursuline Academy, the oldest Catholic school in the United States.
 * August 13 – History of the Moravian Church: The 18th century renewal: The Moravian Church community at Herrnhut undergoes a Pentecostalist experience.
 * August 14 – Elections for the House of Commons begin in Great Britain and continue until October 17.
 * August 30 – Anne, eldest daughter of King George II of Great Britain, is given the title Princess Royal.
 * September 8 – A barn fire during a puppet show in the village of Burwell, Cambridgeshire, England, kills 78 people, many of them children. Another report says that all but six of the 160 persons assembled were killed in the accidental fire.

October–December

 * October 11 – George II of Great Britain is crowned. Handel's Coronation Anthems are composed for the event, including Zadok the Priest, which has been played at every subsequent Coronation of the British monarch.
 * October 17 – With voting for the British House of Commons concluding, the Whigs, led by Sir Robert Walpole, increase their supermajority, winning 415 of the 558 seats. The Tories share of Commons decreases from 169 to 128.
 * November 18 – Tabriz earthquake, Persia kills 77,000.
 * November 21 – The Netherlands signs the Treaty of Seville.
 * November 27 – The foundation stone of the Jerusalem's Church in Berlin is laid.
 * December 8 – For the first time since the union of England and Scotland into Great Britain, the Royal Bank of Scotland, which still retains the right to print currency, issues its first pound note, printing paper currency for twenty shillings. The Scottish pound note continues to be printed until 2001 and the smallest denomination now is a five pound note.
 * December 17 – The London Evening Post, a conservative newspaper, publishes its first issue. It continues in regular publication for 70 years.

Date unknown

 * An old woman known as Janet (Jenny) Horne of Loth, Sutherland becomes the last alleged witch in the British Isles to be executed, when she is burned at the stake in Dornoch, Scotland. (Some sources give the date as June 1722.)
 * The first Amish move to North America.
 * 1727–1800 – Lt. Col. Francisco de Mello Palheta smuggles coffee seeds to Brazil in a bouquet, starting a coffee empire.

Births

 * January 2 – James Wolfe, British general (d. 1759)
 * January 25 – Aron Gustaf Silfversparre, Swedish baron (d. 1818)
 * May 10 – Anne Robert Turgot, French statesman (d. 1781)
 * May 14 – Thomas Gainsborough, English artist (d. 1788)
 * July 26 – Horatio Gates, retired British soldier who served as an American general during the American Revolutionary War (d. 1806)
 * August 14
 * Henriette-Anne of France, daughter of King Louis XV of France (d. 1752)
 * Princess Louise-Élisabeth of France, daughter of King Louis XV of France (d. 1759)
 * August 22 – Johann Joseph Gassner, German priest (d. 1779)
 * October 23 – Empress Xiaoyichun of China (d. 1775)
 * November 26 – Artemas Ward, American major general (d. 1800)
 * December 6 – Johann Gottfried Zinn, German anatomist, botanist (d. 1757)
 * December 27 – Arthur Murphy, Irish writer (d. 1805)

Deaths

 * January 17 – Johann Christoph Wichmannshausen, German philosopher (b. 1663)
 * January 24 – Magdalena Stenbock, Swedish salon hostess (b. 1649)
 * February 6 – Charles Boit, Swedish enameller, miniature painter (b. 1662)
 * February 10 – Procopio Cutò, French entrepreneur (b. 1651)
 * February 13 – William Wotton, English scholar (b. 1666)
 * February 22 – Francesco Gasparini, Italian composer (b. 1661)
 * February 23 – Lionel Tollemache, 3rd Earl of Dysart, British politician and nobleman (b. 1649)
 * – Sir Isaac Newton, English scientist (b. 1643)
 * April 15 – George Compton, 4th Earl of Northampton (b. 1664)
 * May 17 – Empress Catherine I of Russia (b. 1684)
 * June 8 – August Hermann Francke, German Protestant minister (b. 1663)
 * June 11
 * Richard Hill of Hawkstone, English statesman (b. 1655)
 * King George I of Great Britain (b. 1660)
 * July 9 – Veronica Giuliani, Italian nun, mystic (b. 1660)
 * July 23 – Simon Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt, Lord Chancellor of Great Britain (b. c. 1660)
 * August 4 – Victor-Maurice, comte de Broglie, French general (b. 1647)
 * August 14 – William Croft, English composer (b. 1678)
 * August 17 – Louis, Duke of Rohan, French noble (b. 1652)
 * August 27 – Aert de Gelder, Dutch painter (b. 1645)
 * September 6 – George Hooper, Bishop of St Asaph Bishop of Bath and Wells (b. 1640)
 * September 7 – Glückel of Hameln, German businesswoman and diarist (b. 1647)
 * September 8 – Giuseppe Bartolomeo Chiari, Italian painter (b. 1654)
 * September 25
 * Jakob Abbadie, Swiss Protestant preacher (b. c. 1654)
 * Sarah Kemble Knight, colonial Massachusetts diarist (b. 1666)
 * October 2 – Johann Conrad Brunner, Swiss anatomist (b. 1653)
 * October 10
 * Charles III, Prince of Guéméné, French nobleman (b. 1655)
 * Robert Rochfort, Irish politician (b. 1652)
 * November 10 – Alphonse de Tonty, French explorer and American settler (b. 1659)
 * December 22 – Louis Phélypeaux, comte de Pontchartrain (b. 1643)
 * December 26
 * Jean-Baptiste de La Croix de Chevrières de Saint-Vallier, Catholic bishop of Quebec (b. 1653)
 * Baltasar de Zúñiga, 1st Duke of Arión, viceroy of New Spain (b. 1658)
 * date unknown
 * Alessio Erardi, Maltese painter (b. 1669)
 * Pietro Erardi, Maltese chaplain and painter (b. 1644)
 * Jesse of Kartli, King of Georgia (b. 1680 or 1681)
 * Basil Matthew II, Syriac Orthodox Maphrian of the East

title: 1727


text:
1726

January–March

 * January 23 – (January 12 Old Style) The Conventicle Act (Konventikelplakatet) is adopted in Sweden, outlawing all non-Lutheran religious meetings outside of church services.
 * January 26 – The First Treaty of Vienna is signed between Austria, the Holy Roman Empire and Spain, creating the Austro-Spanish Alliance in advance of a war against Great Britain.
 * January 27 – On its maiden voyage, the Dutch East India Company frigate Aagtekerke departs from the Dutch Cape Colony on the second leg of its journey to the Dutch East Indies and is never seen again. Aagtekerke had carried with it a crew of 200 men and was lost somewhere in the Indian Ocean.
 * February 8 – The Supreme Privy Council is established in Russia.
 * February 13 – The Parliament of Negrete (between Mapuche and Spanish authorities in Chile) brings an end to the Mapuche uprising of 1723–26.
 * March 2 – In London, a night watchman finds a severed head by the River Thames; it is later recognized to be that of the husband of Catherine Hayes. She and an accomplice are later executed.
 * March 10 – China's Emperor Yongzheng issues a special edict instructing his "Vice Minister of Punishments" Huang Bing to interrogate Qin Daoran, who provides the evidence that Yongzheng's brothers Yintang, Yin-ssu and Yin-ti, had conspired to overthrow the Emperor.
 * March 29 – The first large shipment of slaves is brought to New Orleans as the slave ship L'Aurore arrives with 290 black Africans captured in Gambia. During the 90-day voyage from Gorée in Senegal, 60 of the slaves had died.
 * March 30 – After King Haffon of the West African Kingdom of Whydah (now in Benin) allows Portuguese traders to build Fort São João Batista in the capital at Savi, mercenaries of the Dutch West India Company make a failed attempt to destroy the fort by "throwing two flaming spears over the walls". By 1726, traders from Britain, France, the Netherlands and Portugal are all competing to establish trade with Whydah, which supplies other West Africans to be used as slaves.
 * March 31 – France's first ambassador to Russia, Jacques de Campredon, leaves after four years of trying to negotiate a Franco-Russian alliance with Catherine I and a failed attempt to arrange a marriage between King Louis XV and Catherine's daughter Elizabeth.

April–June

 * May 1 – Voltaire begins his exile in England.
 * June 11 – Louis Henri, Duke of Bourbon, is dismissed from being the Prime Minister of France and Jean Pâris de Monmartel is removed from his position as Guard of the Royal Treasury by King Louis XV. The King selects his former tutor, André-Hercule de Fleury to replace the Duke of Bourbon as his Chief Minister.  Fleury and the Duke of Bourbon had clashed with each other in their services as adviser to the King, and Fleury's departure from the court in protest and led to his recall and the firing of the Duke.

July–September

 * July 11 – André-Hercule Cardinal de Fleury, recalled from exile by King Louis XV of France, banishes Louis Henri, Duke of Bourbon, and Madame de Prie from court.
 * August 7 – Pirate Nicholas Brown is captured near Xtabi, Jamaica.
 * September 6 – An explosion kills all but seven of the 700 passengers and crew on the Portuguese Navy galleon HMFMS Santa Rosa as its cargo of gunpowder blows up. Historians speculate that of the 693 people on the ship, those who weren't killed by the explosion drowned or were killed by sharks as the ship went down off of the coast of Recife.
 * September 11 – French bishop André-Hercule de Fleury, later Prime Minister for King Louis XV of France, is made a Roman Catholic Cardinal by Pope Benedict XIII.
 * September 14 – The Nanfan Treaty of July 19, 1701 between the Iroquois Confederacy and the British Province of New York, is amended by both parties.
 * September 16 – An earthquake strikes Sicily and kills 226 people in Palermo.
 * September 23 – Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, issues an order limiting the number of Jews who can be legally recognized as legitimate householders.
 * September 24 – Permission to celebrate the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, celebrated on July 17, is extended by Pope Benedict XIII to the entire Roman Catholic Church.

October–December

 * October 1 – Juan Bautista de Orendáin y Azpilicueta is appointed again as Secretary of the Universal Bureau (Secretario del Despacho), the equivalent of the Prime Minister of Spain after the retirement of José de Grimaldo.
 * October 5 – Grigore II Ghica becomes the Prince of Moldavia for the first time after Mihai Racoviță steps aside.
 * November 8 – (October 28 Old Style) Jonathan Swift's satirical novel Gulliver's Travels is first published (anonymously) in London; it sells out within a week.
 * November 20 – Callinicus, Metropolitan of Heraclea dies suddenly only one day after being elected the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, the highest office in the Eastern Orthodox Church. Callinicus is said to have paid a record fee to the Ottoman Sultan to guarantee his appointment.
 * November – Mary Toft allegedly gives birth to 16 rabbits in England; the story is later revealed to be a hoax.
 * December 24 – The settlement of Montevideo is founded by the Spaniards in the Viceroyalty of Peru.

Date unknown

 * The Complete Classics Collection of Ancient China, an immense Chinese encyclopedia, is printed using copper-based movable type printing.
 * Muhammad bin Saud becomes head of the House of Saud.
 * The remaining ruins of Liverpool Castle in England are finally demolished.
 * In late 1726, Nader recaptured Mashhad.

Births

 * January 14 – Jacques-Donatien Le Ray, French supporter of the American Revolution (d. 1803)
 * January 17 – Hugh Mercer, brigadier general in the American Continental Army, and a close friend to George Washington (d. 1777)
 * February 4 – Jean-Jacques Blaise d'Abbadie, Director-general of the Colony of Louisiana (d. 1765)
 * February 7 – Margaret Fownes-Luttrell, British painter (d. 1766)
 * March 8 – Richard Howe, British admiral (d. 1799)
 * April 5 – Benjamin Harrison V, signer of the American Declaration of Independence (d. 1791)
 * April 8 – Lewis Morris, American landowner and developer, signer of the United States Declaration of Independence (d. 1798)
 * April 12 – Charles Burney, English music historian (d. 1814)
 * April 20 – Joseph de Ferraris, Austrian cartographer of the Austrian Netherlands (d. 1814)
 * June 3 O.S. – James Hutton, Scottish geologist (d. 1797)
 * June 14 O.S. – Thomas Pennant, Welsh naturalist (d. 1798)
 * June 20 – Louise Henriette of Bourbon, Duchess of Orléans, mother of Philippe Égalité (d. 1759)
 * July 1 – Acharya Bhikshu, Jain saint (d. 1803)
 * July 30 – William Jones (1726–1800), British clergyman, author (d. 1800)
 * August 7 – James Bowdoin, American Revolutionary leader, politician (d. 1790)
 * August 9 – Francesco Cetti, Italian Jesuit scientist (d. 1778)
 * September 1 – François-André Danican Philidor, French composer, chess player (d. 1795)
 * September 2 – John Howard (prison reformer), English philanthropist (d. 1790)
 * September 26 – John H. D. Anderson, Scottish scientist (d. 1796)
 * September 26  – Angelo Maria Bandini, Italian librarian (d. 1803)
 * October 16 – Daniel Chodowiecki, Polish painter (d. 1801)
 * December 4 – Lord Stirling, American brigadier-general during the American Revolutionary War (d. 1783)
 * date unknown
 * Lê Quý Đôn, Vietnamese philosopher, poet, encyclopedist, and government official (d. 1784)
 * Cyprian Howe, American colonel in the American Revolutionary War (d. 1806)
 * Katsukawa Shunshō, Japanese woodblock artist (d. 1792)
 * Jedediah Strutt, English businessman (d. 1797)
 * Lady Anne Monson, English botanist (d. 1776)

Deaths

 * January 2 – Domenico Zipoli, Tuscan-born composer and Jesuit missionary (b. 1688)
 * January 12 – Hercule-Louis Turinetti, marquis of Prié (b. 1658)
 * January 19
 * Franz Beer, Austrian architect (b. 1659)
 * Giovanni Battista Tolomei, Italian Jesuit priest, theologian and cardinal (b. 1653)
 * January 25 – Guillaume Delisle, French cartographer (b. 1675)
 * February 18 – Jacques Carrey, French painter (b. 1649)
 * February 26 – Maximilian II Emanuel, Elector of Bavaria (b. 1662)
 * March 5 – Evelyn Pierrepont, 1st Duke of Kingston-upon-Hull, English politician (b. c. 1665)
 * March 6 – Henrietta Catharina, Baroness von Gersdorff, German noblewoman; poet (b. 1648)
 * March 13 – Alexander Pendarves, British politician (b. 1662)
 * March 14 – Chhatrapati Shivaji Raje Bhonsale 2nd, 5th Maratha Emperor (b. 1696)
 * March 26 – John Vanbrugh, English architect and dramatist (b. 1664)
 * April 26 – Jeremy Collier, English theatre critic, non-juror bishop and theologian (b. 1650)
 * April 28 – Thomas Pitt, British Governor of Madras (b. 1653)
 * May 10 – Charles Beauclerk, 1st Duke of St Albans, English soldier (b. 1670)
 * June 18 – Michel Richard Delalande, French organist, composer (b. 1657)
 * July 3 – Galeazzo Marescotti, Italian Catholic cardinal (b. 1627)
 * July 8 – John Ker, Scottish spy (b. 1673)
 * July 22 – Hugh Drysdale, British Colonial Governor of Virginia
 * July 31 – Nicolaus II Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician (b. 1695)
 * September 22 – Aixinjueluo Yuntang, born Aixinjueluo Yintang, Qing prince (b. 1683)
 * October 29 – Jean Boivin the Younger, French writer (b. 1663)
 * November 22 – Anton Domenico Gabbiani, Italian painter (b. 1652)
 * November 23 – Sophia Dorothea of Celle, queen consort of George I of Great Britain (b. 1666)
 * December 2 – Samuel Penhallow, American colonist, historian (b. 1665)

title: 1726