text:
1769

January–March

 * February 2 – Pope Clement XIII dies, the night before preparing an order to dissolve the Jesuits.
 * February 17 – The British House of Commons votes to not allow MP John Wilkes to take his seat after he wins a by-election.
 * March 4 – Mozart departs Italy, after the last of his three tours there.
 * March 16 – Louis Antoine de Bougainville returns to Saint-Malo, following a three-year circumnavigation of the world with the ships La Boudeuse and Étoile, with the loss of only seven out of 330 men; among the members of the expedition is Jeanne Baré, the first woman known to have circumnavigated the globe. She returns to France some time after Bougainville and his ships.

April–June

 * April 13 – James Cook arrives in Tahiti, on the ship HM Bark Endeavour, preparing for the 1769 Transit of Venus observed from Tahiti on June 3. After the voyage, the data is found to be inaccurate in determining the distance between the Sun and Earth.
 * April 29 – Scottish inventor James Watt is granted a British patent for "A method of lessening the consumption of steam in steam engines" – the separate condenser, a key improvement (first devised by Watt in 1765) and the basis for the Watt steam engine which stimulates the Industrial Revolution.
 * May 9 – France conquers Corsica.
 * May 14 – Charles III of Spain sends Spanish missionaries, who found California missions in San Diego, Santa Barbara, San Francisco and Monterey, and begin the settlement of California.
 * May 19 – Cardinal Giovanni Vincenzo Antonio Ganganelli is elected as the 249th pope, succeeding the late Clement XIII and choosing to take the regnal name of Pope Clement XIV.
 * June 3 – A transit of Venus is followed five hours later by a total solar eclipse, the shortest such interval in historical times. The transit is viewed by King George III of Great Britain, at the Kew Observatory.
 * June 7 – Frontiersman Daniel Boone first begins to explore modern-day Kentucky.

July–September

 * July 3 – Richard Arkwright patents a spinning frame in England, able to weave fabric mechanically.
 * July 16 – Father Junípero Serra founds Mission San Diego de Alcalá, the first of the 21 California missions.
 * July 20 – Recently appointed as the Governor of Spanish Louisiana, Irish-born soldier of fortune Alejandro O'Reilly sails into the French fort of La Balize with 21 Spanish ships, along with 2,056 soldiers, cannons and ammunition, and informs French Louisiana Governor Charles Philippe Aubry of his royal commission to take Louisiana on behalf of the King of Spain.
 * August 3 – The party of Gaspar de Portolà becomes the first white group to set foot in the area now known as Santa Monica, California.
 * August 16 – Pope Clement XIV issues the papal bull Dominus ac Redemptor, ordering the dissolution of the Jesuits.
 * August 18 – Brescia Explosion: The city of Brescia, Italy is devastated when the Church of San Nazaro is struck by lightning. The resulting fire ignites 200,000 lb (90,000 kg) of gunpowder being stored there, causing a massive explosion, which destroys 1/6 of the city and kills 3,000 people.
 * September – Massive droughts in Bengal lead to the Bengal famine of 1770, in which ten million people, a third of the population, will die, the worst natural disaster in human history (in terms of lives lost).
 * September 6–9 – David Garrick holds a Shakespeare Jubilee festival at Stratford-upon-Avon in England.
 * September 10 – Russo-Turkish War (1768–74): Russian forces take the Ottoman fortress of Chocim in Bukovina.

October–December

 * October 1 – James Cook names White Island, off the coast of New Zealand.
 * October 7 – James Cook lands in New Zealand, at Poverty Bay.
 * October 9 – In the first encounter between the Māori people and Europeans (at the future site of Gisborne, New Zealand), one Maori is shot and killed after he steals a sword from one of the officers of the Cook expedition. Several more Māori are killed in fighting the next day.
 * October 23 – Nicolas-Joseph Cugnot demonstrates a steam-powered artillery tractor (see drawing) in France.
 * November 1 – A party of the expedition of Spanish explorer Gaspar de Portola becomes the first Europeans to reach San Francisco Bay. Sergeant Jose Francisco de Ortega and his group accidentally discover the area while searching for Drakes Bay in Alta California.
 * November 12 –The Gorkhali Army conquer the last standing Malla Kingdom of Bhaktapur marking the end of The Malla dynasty in Nepal.
 * November 21 – Ireland's House of Commons rejects a spending bill passed by Great Britain's parliament, by a 94–71 margin.
 * December 13 – Dartmouth College is established in Hanover, New Hampshire, as John Wentworth, the Royal Governor, conveys a charter from King George III of Great Britain.
 * December 22 – The Sino-Burmese War (1765–69) is ended by a truce.

Date unknown

 * The Authorized King James Version of the Bible is published in England in the Oxford standard text, edited by Benjamin Blayney.
 * First recorded use of 'literally' as a metaphorical intensifier.

Births

 * January 1
 * Marie Lachapelle, French obstetrician (d. 1821)
 * Jane Marcet, British science writer (d. 1858)
 * January 2 – Nannette Streicher, German piano maker, composer, music educator and writer (d. 1833)
 * January 10 – Michel Ney, French marshal (d. 1815)
 * February 23 – Princess Pauline of Anhalt-Bernburg; German regent and social reformer (d. 1820)
 * March 1 – François Séverin Marceau-Desgraviers, French general (d. 1796)
 * March 2 – DeWitt Clinton, American politician and naturalist, 6th Governor of New York (d. 1828)
 * March 4 – Muhammad Ali of Egypt, Egyptian ruler (d. 1849)
 * March 10 – Joseph Williamson, English philanthropist, builder of the Williamson Tunnels (d. 1840)
 * March 23 – William Smith, English geologist, cartographer (d. 1839)
 * March 29 – Jean-de-Dieu Soult, French marshal (d. 1851)
 * April 3 – Christian Günther von Bernstorff, Danish and Prussian statesman and diplomat (d. 1835)
 * April 9 – Jakob Heinrich Laspeyres, German lepidopterist (d. 1809)
 * April 10 – Jean Lannes, French marshal (d. 1809)
 * April 13 – Thomas Lawrence, English painter (d. 1830)
 * April 14 – Barthélemy Catherine Joubert, French general (d. 1799)
 * April 25 – Marc Isambard Brunel, French-British engineer (d. 1849)
 * May 1 – Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, British general, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1852)
 * May 6 – Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany (d. 1824)
 * June 5 – Marianne Kirchgessner, German musician (d. 1808)
 * June 18 – Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh, British statesman, diplomat, and soldier (suicide 1822)
 * July 28 – Hudson Lowe, Irish-born soldier and future jailer of Napoleon on Saint Helena (d. 1831)
 * August 15 – Napoleon Bonaparte, French Emperor (d. 1821)
 * August 23 – Georges Cuvier, French naturalist and zoologist; known as the Father of Paleontology (d. 1832)
 * August 31 – David Hosack American physician and botanist, a Hamilton family doctor (d. 1835)
 * September 14
 * Alexander von Humboldt, German explorer, scientist (d. 1859)
 * Karl Salomo Zachariae von Lingenthal, German jurist (d. 1843)
 * October 6 – Isaac Brock, British general, administrator (d. 1812)
 * December 13 – James Scarlett Abinger, English judge (d. 1844)
 * December 23 – Martin Archer Shee, Irish painter (d. 1850)
 * December 26 – Ernst Moritz Arndt, German writer, poet (d. 1860)
 * date unknown
 * James Dadford, English canal engineer
 * John Bellingham, assassin of British Prime Minister Spencer Perceval (d. 1812)
 * Howqua, Chinese merchant (d. 1843)
 * probable
 * John Henry Colclough, Irish revolutionary (d. 1798)

Deaths

 * January 5 – Charles Sackville, 2nd Duke of Dorset, English cricketer (b. 1711)
 * February 2 – Pope Clement XIII (b. 1693)
 * March 6 – Andrew Lauder, Burgess of the Royal Burgh of Lauder (1 August 1737) (b. 1702)
 * March 28 – Johann Friedrich Endersch, German cartographer (b. 1705)
 * April 5 – Marc-Antoine Laugier, French Jesuit priest, architectural theorist (b. 1713)
 * April 13 – Anna Canalis di Cumiana, morganatic spouse of Victor Amadeus II of Savoy (b. 1680)
 * April 20 – Chief Pontiac, Ottawa chief (murdered) (b. c. 1719)
 * April 21 – John Gilbert Cooper, British poet and writer (b. 1722)
 * May 14 – Iyoas I, Emperor of Ethiopia.
 * June 1 – Edward Holyoke, American President of Harvard University (b. 1689)
 * June 28 – Elisabeth Stierncrona, Swedish noble (b. 1714)
 * August 1 – Jean-Baptiste Chappe d'Auteroche, French astronomer (b. 1722)
 * August 2 – Daniel Finch, 8th Earl of Winchilsea, English politician (b. 1689)
 * August 29 – Edmond Hoyle, English game expert (b. 1672)
 * September 22 – Antonio Genovesi, Italian philosopher (b. 1712)
 * September 23 – Michel Ferdinand d'Albert d'Ailly, French astronomer (b. 1714)
 * September 27 – Anna Karolina Orzelska, Polish adventurer (b. 1707)
 * November 3 – Diane Adélaïde de Mailly, third of the five famous French de Nesle sisters (b. 1713)
 * November 16 – Henry Paget, 2nd Earl of Uxbridge (b. 1719)
 * November 23 – Constantine Mavrocordatos, Prince of Wallachia and Prince of Moldavia (b. 1711)
 * November 27 – Kamo no Mabuchi, Japanese poet, philologist (b. 1697)
 * December 8 – Joseph Friedrich Ernst, Prince of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (b. 1702)
 * December 13 – Christian Fürchtegott Gellert, German poet (b. 1715)
 * December 30 – Nicholas Taaffe, 6th Viscount Taaffe, Austrian soldier (b. 1685)
 * date unknown
 * King Suremphaa of Assam
 * Birgitte Sofie Gabel, Danish noble (b. 1746)

title: 1769


text:
1768

January–March

 * January 9 – Philip Astley stages the first modern circus, with acrobats on galloping horses, in London.
 * February 11 – Samuel Adams's circular letter is issued by the Massachusetts House of Representatives, and sent to the other Thirteen Colonies. Refusal to revoke the letter will result in dissolution of the Massachusetts Assembly, and (from October) incur the institution of martial law to prevent civil unrest.
 * February 24 – With Russian troops occupying the nation, opposition legislators of the national legislature having been deported, the government of Poland signs a treaty virtually turning the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth into a protectorate of the Russian Empire.
 * February 27 – The first Secretary of State for the Colonies is appointed in Britain, the Earl of Hillsborough.
 * February 29 – Five days after the signing of the treaty, a group of the szlachta, Polish nobles, establishes the Bar Confederation, to defend the internal and external independence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth against Russian influence, and against King Stanisław II Augustus.
 * March 1 – King Louis XV of France decrees that all cities and towns in the kingdom will be required to post house numbering on all residential buildings, primarily to facilitate the forced quartering of troops in citizens' homes.
 * March 17
 * Britain's Superintendent of Indian Affairs, Sir William Johnson, concludes a peace agreement with the leaders of the Six Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy (the Mohawk, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga, Seneca and Tuscarora tribal nations) of the northern American lands, and with Chiefs Oconostota and Attakullakulla of the Cherokee nation in the southern American lands.
 * Prithvi Singh begins a reign of 10 years as the new Raja of Jaipur (part of the modern-day Indian state of Rajasthan), 12 days after the death of Madho Singh.
 * March 27 – Catherine the Great of Russia dispatches troops under General Pyotr Krechetnikov to intervene in a civil war in Poland, at the request of Poland's King Stanisław II Augustus, a move that will ultimately lead to the Partitions of Poland.

April–June

 * April 4 – The Cotopaxi volcano erupts in what is now Ecuador, at the time part of the Spanish Viceroyalty of Nueva Granada, covering the towns of Hambato and Tacunga with ash, but not causing fatalities.
 * April 5 – The New York Chamber of Commerce, first of its kind in the American colonies, is founded by 20 New York merchants at Bolton and Sigel's Tavern at 54 Pearl Street in New York City. Former New York City mayor John Cruger Jr. is elected the Chamber's first president.
 * May 10 – Massacre of St George's Fields: John Wilkes is imprisoned for writing an article for The North Briton, severely criticizing King George III of Great Britain. This action provokes protesters to riot; in the Southwark district of London, troops fire on the mob, killing seven.
 * May 15 – After the Treaty of Versailles, the island of Corsica is ceded by Genoa to France.
 * June 14 – The largest mass meeting ever held in New England, up to this time, takes place at the Old South Church to support a petition demanding that the British remove a ship which has been hindering navigation in Boston Harbor.
 * June 20 – Russo-Turkish War (1768–74): Russia captures the fortress of Bar.

July–September

 * July 1–3 – Louis Antoine de Bougainville, on his circumnavigation westbound, sails through the Bougainville Strait and along the north shore of Bougainville Island in the Solomons.
 * July 14 – The massacre of Polish people (most likely by the Russians) at the village of Balta, now a part of Ukraine but at the time an Ottoman Empire town on the frontier with Poland, leads to the Russo-Turkish War.
 * July 18 – "The Liberty Song", the first American patriotic song, is published in the Boston Gazette and includes the refrain "In freedom we're born".
 * July 25 – The Imperial Court of China's Emperor Qianlong and his three senior grand councilors, Fuheng, Yenjisan and Liu T'ung-hsun, issues a directive to officials in the Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Shandong provinces warning them about the need to respond to rumors of sorcery.
 * August 7 – The palace of the Ottoman Grand Vizier is destroyed by a fire in Constantinople
 * August 26 – James Cook departs from Plymouth aboard HMS Endeavour on his first voyage of discovery.
 * August 27 – Almost all merchants and traders in the British colony of New York sign a pact not to import British manufactured goods as long as the Townshend Acts are in effect, nor to do business with nonassociators to the pact.
 * August 30 – A fire burns much of the Library of the Vatican.
 * September 16 – Louis XV of France appoints René de Maupeou as Chancellor (an office he will hold until 1790), and orders him to crush the judicial opposition.
 * September 22–29 – The Massachusetts Convention of Towns, assembling in Boston, resolves on a written objection to the impending arrival of British troops rather than more militant action but causes panic in London.

October–December

 * October 1 – The British Army's 29th Infantry Regiment of foot soldiers, which will carry out the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770, arrives in Boston Harbor along with three other regiments. The 700 foot soldiers march through the Massachusetts colony's capital as a show of force and begin their occupation. Within a year, there will be "nearly 4,000 armed redcoats in the crowded seaport of 15,000 inhabitants."
 * October 4 – The Sultan Mustafa III of the Ottoman Empire begins the Russo-Turkish War after the Russians refuse to withdraw troops from Poland.
 * October 14 – William Pitt resigns from his position as Prime Minister of Great Britain.
 * October 15 – A powerful hurricane sweeps across Cuba during the Festival of Santa Teresa, killing hundreds of people. Spain's King Carlos III begins a precedent of ordering the colonial government to fund disaster relief, a task previously left to the Catholic Church.
 * October 17 – Representatives of the Cherokee nation sign the Treaty of Hard Labour with British representative John Stuart and relinquish all claims to the land between the Ohio River and the Allegheny Mountains, now the United States state of West Virginia.
 * October 29 – French colonists in Louisiana refuse to accept the colony's acquisition by Spain and begin an uprising that forces Spanish Governor Antonio de Ulloa to flee.
 * November 5 – The Treaty of Fort Stanwix is signed between the five nations of the Iroquois Confederacy (the Mohawk, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga, and Seneca) relinquishing their claims to territory south of the Ohio River to the British.
 * December 1 – The slave ship Fredensborg sinks off Tromøya, Norway.
 * December 10
 * The Royal Academy is founded in London, with Joshua Reynolds as its first President.
 * The first of the weekly numbers of the Encyclopædia Britannica, edited by William Smellie, are published in Edinburgh; one hundred are planned.
 * December 15 – The king's refusal to sign state documents results in the December Crisis (1768) in Sweden.
 * December 21 – King Prithvi Narayan Shah unifies several small kingdoms to establish modern-day Nepal; this kingdom will collapse in 2008.

Date unknown

 * The Petit Trianon, originally designed for Madame de Pompadour, is completed in the park of the Palace of Versailles, and inaugurated by Louis XV of France.
 * New Smyrna, Florida, the largest attempt at colonization by the British in the New World, is founded by Dr. Andrew Turnbull.
 * The Steller's sea cow, discovered on Bering Island in 1741, is driven to extinction.
 * The Complete Farmer: Or, a General Dictionary of Husbandry, written by "A Society of Gentlemen", a group of members of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts in Britain, concludes publication in weekly numbers and is first published in book form.
 * Shaikh Mohamed bin Khalifa Al Utbi, the ancestor of the Al Khalifa family, builds his castle, named Sabha in Zubarah, after an ancestral fort in central Arabia.The construction of the castle consolidated his rule and authority over Zubarah and neighboring tribes.
 * The Battle of Simaisma, fought in the village of Simaisma in Qatar, takes place after Shaikh Mohamed bin Khalifa of Zubarah refuses to pay taxes to Al Musalam clan who were the representatives of the Bani Khalid tribe in Qatar. The Battle of Simaisma, ended with victory for Shaikh Mohamed and the people of Zubarah, while the Al Musalam and their seat of power Al Howeila witnessed devastation and loss.

Births

 * January 1 – Maria Edgeworth, Irish novelist (d. 1849)
 * January 7 – Joseph Bonaparte, King of Naples and Spain (d. 1844)
 * January 17 – Smith Thompson, American politician, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (d. 1843)
 * January 28 – King Frederick VI of Denmark (d. 1839)
 * February 12 – Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1835)
 * February 13 – Édouard Mortier, Duke of Trévise, French marshal (d. 1835)
 * March – Tecumseh, Native American (Shawnee) chief (d. 1813)
 * March 21 – Joseph Fourier, French mathematician, physicist (d. 1830)
 * March 22 – Melesina Trench, Irish born writer and socialite (d. 1827)
 * May 3 – Charles Tennant, Scottish chemist, industrialist (d. 1838)
 * May 17
 * Caroline of Brunswick, queen of George IV of the United Kingdom (d. 1821)
 * Henry Paget, 1st Marquess of Anglesey, English general (d. 1854)
 * June 9 – Samuel Slater, American industrialist (d. 1835)
 * June 20 – William Findlay, American politician (d. 1846)
 * June 24 – Lazare Hoche, French general (d. 1797)
 * June 29 – Vincenzo Dimech, Maltese sculptor (d. 1831)
 * July 4 – Adam Karl August von Eschenmayer, German philosopher (d. 1852)
 * July 20 – Praskovia Kovalyova-Zhemchugova, Russian serf, actress and opera soprano (d. 1803)
 * July 27 – Charlotte Corday, French murderer of Jean-Paul Marat (d. 1793)
 * August 6 – Jean-Baptiste Bessières, French marshal (d. 1813)
 * August 29 – – John Fawcett, British actor (d. 1837)
 * September 4 – François-René de Chateaubriand, French writer, diplomat (d. 1848)
 * September 23 – William Wallace, Scottish Mathematician (d. 1843)
 * September 28 – Pauline Léon, French feminist, radical (d. 1838)
 * October 2 – William Beresford, 1st Viscount Beresford, British general and politician (d. 1854)
 * October 6 – Josef Madersperger, Austrian tailor, inventor and sewing machine pioneer (d. 1850)
 * October 31 – María Isidra de Guzmán y de la Cerda, Spanish scholar (b. 1803)
 * November 3 – Karađorđe Petrović, leader of the First Serbian Uprising against the Ottoman Empire, founder of the Serbian Karađorđević dynasty (d. 1817)
 * November 18
 * Zacharias Werner, German religious poet (d. 1823)
 * José Marchena Ruiz de Cueto, Spanish writer (d. 1821)
 * November 21 – Friedrich Schleiermacher, German theologian (d. 1834)
 * date unknown – Marie-Jeanne de Lalande, French astronomer, mathematician (d. 1832)
 * Wang Zhenyi, Chinese astronomer
 * María Remedios del Valle, Argentine soldier and patriot (d. 1847)
 * Amelia Griffiths, British phycologist (d. 1858)

Deaths

 * January 20 – Sir Walter Bagot, 5th Baronet (b. 1702)
 * February 1 – Sir Robert Rich, 4th Baronet, British cavalry officer (b. 1685)
 * February 2 – Robert Smith, English mathematician (b. 1689)
 * February 8 – George Dance the Elder, British architect (b. 1695)
 * February 17 – Arthur Onslow, English politician (b. 1691)
 * February 29 – John Mitchell, colonial American physician and botanist (b. 1711)
 * March 1 – Hermann Samuel Reimarus, German philosopher, writer (b. 1694)
 * March 3
 * Francis Fauquier, English statesman and Royal Governor of Virginia since 1758 (b. 1703)
 * Nicola Porpora, Italian composer (b. 1686)
 * March 11 – Giovanni Battista Vaccarini, Italian architect (b. 1702)
 * March 18 – Laurence Sterne, Irish writer (b. 1713)
 * April 9 – Sarah Fielding, English writer (b. 1710)
 * April 19 – Canaletto, Italian artist (b. 1697)
 * April 29 – Georg Brandt, Swedish chemist, mineralogist (b. 1694)
 * May 30 – Harry Grey, 4th Earl of Stamford, British earl and politician (b. 1715)
 * June 8 – Johann Joachim Winckelmann, German classical scholar, archaeologist (b. 1717)
 * June 15 – James Short, Scottish mathematician (b. 1710)
 * June 19 – Benjamin Tasker, Provincial Governor of Maryland (b. 1690)
 * June 28 – George Hadley, English lawyer and amateur meteorologist (b. 1685)
 * July 6 – Conrad Beissel, German-born American religious leader (b. 1691)
 * July 11 – José de Nebra, Spanish composer (b. 1702)
 * July 24 – Nathaniel Lardner, English theologian (b. 1684)
 * August 3 – Thomas Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1693)
 * August 17 – Vasily Trediakovsky, Russian poet (b. 1703)
 * September 2 – Antoine Deparcieux, French mathematician (b. 1703)
 * September 11 – Joseph-Nicolas Delisle, French astronomer (b. 1688)
 * October 1 – Robert Simson, Scottish mathematician (b. 1687)
 * October 8 – Pierre Simon Fournier, French typographer (b. 1712)
 * October 17 – Louis VIII, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt (b. 1691)
 * October 28 – Michel Blavet, French flutist (b. 1700)
 * October 31 – Francesco Maria Veracini, Italian composer (b. 1690)
 * November 14 – John Bristow, English merchant, politician (b. 1701)
 * November 16 – Hans von Lehwaldt, German general (b. 1685)
 * November 17 – Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st Duke of Newcastle, Prime Minister of Great Britain (b. 1693)
 * December 8 – Jean Denis Attiret, French Jesuit missionary, painter (b. 1702)
 * December 14 – Ulla Tessin, Swedish countess (b. 1711)
 * December 20 – Carlo Innocenzo Frugoni, Italian poet (b. 1692)
 * date unknown – Elsie Marley, English alewife (b. 1713)

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

title: 1768


text:
1766

January–March

 * January 1 – Charles Edward Stuart ("Bonnie Prince Charlie") becomes the new Stuart claimant to the throne of Great Britain, as King Charles III, and figurehead for Jacobitism.
 * January 14 – Christian VII becomes King of Denmark-Norway.
 * January 20 – Burmese–Siamese War: Outside of the walls of the Thailand capital of Ayutthaya, tens of thousands of invaders from Burma (under the command of General Ne Myo Thihapate and General Maha Nawatra) are confronted by Thai defenders led by General Phya Taksin. The defenders are overwhelmed and the survivors take refuge inside Ayutthaya. The siege continues for 15 months before the Burmese attackers collapse the walls by digging tunnels and setting fire to debris. The city falls on April 9, 1767, and King Ekkathat is killed.
 * February 5 – An observer in Wilmington, North Carolina reports to the Edinburgh newspaper Caledonian Mercury that three ships have been seized by British men-of-war, on the charge of carrying official documents without stamps. The strict enforcement causes seven other ships to leave Wilmington for other ports.
 * February 13 – John Mills is elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, with Benjamin Franklin as one of his sponsors.
 * February 15 – Protesting against the Stamp Act 1765, members of the New York City Sons of Liberty travel to Pennsylvania and set fire to a British supply of tax stamps before the stamps can be taken to distributors in the province of Maryland.
 * February 18 – Meermin Slave Mutiny: Captive Malagasy people seize a Dutch East India Company slave ship in the Indian Ocean.
 * February 20 – The Pennsylvania Gazette reports that a British sloop off Wilmington, North Carolina, has seized a sloop sailing from Philadelphia, and another sailing from Saint Christopher, on the charge of carrying official documents without stamps. In response, local residents threaten to burn a Royal Man-of-War attempting to deliver stamps to Wilmington, forcing the ship to return to the mouth of the Cape Fear River.
 * February 23 – Lorraine and Bar become French again, on the death of Stanisław Leszczyński, King of Poland and last Duke of Lorraine.
 * February – Ferocious wolf attacks occur in France, such as the Beast of Gévaudan or Wolves of Périgord.
 * March 5 – Antonio de Ulloa, the first Spanish governor of Louisiana, arrives in New Orleans.
 * March 18 – American Revolution: The British Parliament repeals the Stamp Act, which has been very unpopular in the British colonies; the persuasion of Benjamin Franklin is considered partly responsible. The Declaratory Act asserts the right of Britain to bind the colonies in all other respects.

April–June

 * April 3 – Seventeen days after the Stamp Act's repeal in London, news reaches America of the decision.
 * April 9
 * African slaves are imported directly into the American colony of Georgia for the first time, as the sloop Mary Brow arrives in Savannah with 78 captives imported from Saint-Louis, Senegal.
 * American botanist John Bartram completes his first exploration and cataloging of North American plants after more than nine months.
 * April 17 – King Carlos III of Spain issues a royal cédula from Aranjuez to round up all ethnic Chinese in the Philippines and to move them to ghettoes in various provinces.
 * May 29 – In a paper read to the Royal Society, British theoretical chemist Henry Cavendish first describes his process of producing what he refers to as "inflammable air" by dissolving base metals such as iron, zinc and tin in a flask of sulfuric acid or hydrochloric acid, drawing the conclusion that the vapor that was released is different from air. Seven years later, French chemist Antoine Lavoisier bestows the name "hydrogen" on the gas.
 * May 30 – The Theatre Royal, Bristol, opens in England. Also this year in England, the surviving Georgian Theatre (Stockton-on-Tees) opens as a playhouse.
 * June 4 – On the occasion of the 28th birthday of King George III, members of the Sons of Liberty in Manhattan erect a liberty pole as a protest for the first time. The historic symbol, a tall "wooden pole with a Phrygian cap" is placed "on the Fields somewhere between Broadway and Park Row". British soldiers cut down the pole in August.

July–September

 * July 1 – François-Jean de la Barre, a young French nobleman, is tortured and beheaded, before his body is burnt on a pyre, along with a copy of Voltaire's Dictionnaire philosophique nailed to his torso, supposedly for the crime of not saluting a Roman Catholic religious procession in Abbeville, and for other sacrileges, including desecrating a crucifix.
 * August 10 – During the occupation of New York, members of the 28th Foot Regiment of the British Army chop down the liberty pole that was erected by the Sons of Liberty on June 4. The Sons of Liberty put up a second pole the next day, and that pole is cut down on August 22.
 * August 13 – A hurricane sweeps across the French island colony of Martinique, killing more than 400 people and destroying the plantation owned by Joseph-Gaspard de La Pagerie, the father of the future French Empress Joséphine.
 * September 1 – The revolt in Quito (at this time part of Spain's Viceroyalty of Nueva Granada; the modern-day capital of Ecuador) is ended peacefully as royal forces enter the city under the command of Guayaquil Governor Pedro Zelaya. Rather than seeking retribution from the Quito citizens over their insurrection that has broken the monopoly over the sale of the liquor aguardiente, Zeleaya oversees a program of reconciliation.
 * September 13 – The position of Patriarch of the Serbs, established on April 9, 1346 as the authority over the Serbian Orthodox Church, is abolished by order of Sultan Mustafa III of the Ottoman Empire; the patriarchate is not re-established until 1920 following the creation of Yugoslavia at the end of World War One.
 * September 23 – John Penn, the Colonial Governor of Pennsylvania and one of the four Penn family owners of the Pennsylvania land grant, issues a proclamation forbidding British American colonist residents from building settlements on lands in the west "not yet purchased of the Nations" of the Iroquois Indians.

October–December

 * October 1 – Crown Prince Gustav of Sweden weds Princess Sophia Magdalena of Denmark. They become King Gustav III and Queen Consort Sophia of Sweden upon his ascension to the throne in 1771.
 * October 4 – France formally cedes its rights to the Malouines Islands to Spain. On March 24, Spain renames the islands the Malvinas, and in 1833, the United Kingdom re-colonises the recently abandoned territory and renames it the Falkland Islands.
 * November – Raja Lumu consolidates his claim to the Selangor Sultanate by marriage to the niece of the Sultan of Perak.
 * November 10 – The last Colonial governor of New Jersey, William Franklin, signs the charter of Queen's College (later renamed Rutgers University).
 * November 27 – A British sloop-of-war is searching all vessels passing near Cape Lookout, North Carolina, and some vessels have been seized, according to an observer in New York City, in the Province of New York, reporting to the Pennsylvania Gazette.
 * November 29 – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart returns to Salzburg, after the Mozart family grand tour of Europe.
 * December 2 – The Law on the Freedom of Printing abolishes censorship in Sweden and guarantees freedom of the press, making Sweden the first country of the world to introduce constitutional protection of press freedom, and to pass wide-ranging freedom of information legislation.
 * December 5 – James Christie holds the first sale at Christie's auction house in London.
 * December 25 – Mapuches in Chile launch a series of surprise attacks against the Spanish starting the Mapuche uprising of 1766.

Date unknown

 * Childsburgh, the Orange County, North Carolina seat laid out as Corbin Town in 1754, and renamed in 1759, is renamed Hillsborough, in honor of Wills Hill, 1st Marquess of Downshire, Earl of Hillsborough.
 * Dr. James Fordyce's two-volume compendium Sermons to Young Women is published in London.

Births

 * January 1 – Magdalena Rudenschöld, Swedish conspirator (d. 1823)
 * January 3 – Nguyễn Du, Vietnamese poet (d. 1820)
 * January 6 – José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia, Supreme Leader of Paraguay (d. 1840)
 * January 17 – Joseph Kinghorn, Particular Baptist Minister (d. 1832)
 * February 11 – Henry Fourdrinier, British engineer, inventor (d. 1854)
 * February 14 – Thomas Malthus, English demographer, economist (d. 1834)
 * February 24 – Samuel Wesley, English organist and composer (died 1837)
 * April 1 – François-Xavier Fabre, French painter of historical subjects (d. 1837)
 * April 6 – Charles-Louis de Fourcroy, French Consul at A Coruña, Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur (d. 1824)
 * April 22 – Anne Louise Germaine de Staël, French author (d. 1817)
 * May 11 – Isaac D'Israeli, English literary scholar (died 1848)
 * May 30 – Robert Darwin, medical doctor and father of Charles Darwin (d. 1848)
 * June 13 – Jean-Frédéric Waldeck, French cartographer (d. 1875)
 * July 8 – Dominique Jean Larrey, French surgeon, innovator in battlefield medicine (d. 1842)
 * July 9 – Jacob Perkins, American physicist, inventor and engineer (d. 1849)
 * July 21 – Thomas Charles Hope, Scottish chemist, discoverer of strontium (d. 1844)
 * August 6 – William Hyde Wollaston, English chemist (d. 1828)
 * September 6 – John Dalton, English chemist and physicist (d. 1844)
 * September 25 – Armand-Emmanuel de Vignerot du Plessis, Duc de Richelieu, Prime Minister of France (d. 1822)
 * October 3 – John Walbach, French baron and officer in the United States Army, with a military career spanning over 57 years (d. 1857)
 * October 23 – Emmanuel de Grouchy, Marquis de Grouchy, French marshal (d. 1847)
 * November 2 – Joseph Radetzky von Radetz, Austrian field marshal (d. 1858)
 * November 9 – Edward Abbott, Australian soldier, politician and judge (d. 1832)
 * November 12 – Daniel Sykes, English politician (d. 1832)
 * November 16 – Rodolphe Kreutzer, violinist and composer (d. 1831)
 * December 3 – Barbara Fritchie, U.S. patriot in the Civil War (d. 1862)
 * December 23 – Wilhelm Hisinger, Swedish physicist and chemist (d. 1852)
 * December 29 – Charles Macintosh, Scottish inventor of a waterproof fabric (died 1843)
 * date unknown – Lolotte Forssberg, Swedish courtier (d. 1840)

Deaths

 * January 1 – James Francis Edward Stuart, The Old Pretender to the British throne (b. 1688)
 * January 9 – Thomas Birch, English historian (b. 1705)
 * January 13 – King Frederick V of Denmark (b. 1723)
 * January 19 – Giovanni Niccolò Servandoni, French architect and painter (b. 1695)
 * January 21 – James Quin, English actor (b. 1693)
 * February 5 – Count Leopold Joseph von Daun, Austrian field marshal (b. 1705)
 * February 23 – Stanisław Leszczyński, King of Poland (b. 1677)
 * March 7 – Ercole Lelli, Italian painter of the late-Baroque (b. 1702)
 * March 10 – Jane Colden, American botanist (b. 1724)
 * April 4 – John Taylor, English classical scholar (b. 1704)
 * April 7 – Tiberius Hemsterhuis, Dutch philologist, critic (b. 1685)
 * May 5 – Jean Astruc, French physician, scholar (b. 1684)
 * May 8 – Samuel Chandler, English non-conformist minister (b. 1693)
 * May 20 – Malhar Rao Holkar, Indian nobleman (b. 1693)
 * May 22 – Hedvig Strömfelt, Swedish psalm writer (b. 1723)
 * June 13 – Isaac Norris (statesman), American politician (b. 1701)
 * June 22 – Carlo Zimech, Maltese priest and painter (b. 1696)
 * June 24 – Adrien Maurice de Noailles, 3rd Duke of Noailles, French soldier (b. 1678)
 * July 9 – Jonathan Mayhew, American minister, patriot (b. 1720)
 * July 11 – Elisabeth Farnese, queen of Philip V of Spain (b. 1692)
 * July 14 – František Maxmilián Kaňka, Czech architect (b. 1674)
 * July 17
 * Giuseppe Castiglione, Italian missionary to China (b. 1688)
 * Samuel Finley, American clergyman and educator (b. 1715)
 * September 3 – Archibald Bower, Scottish historian (b. 1686)
 * September 13 – Benjamin Heath, English classical scholar (b. 1704)
 * September 23 – John Brown, English divine and author (b. 1715)
 * November 7 – Jean-Marc Nattier, French painter (b. 1685)
 * November 9 – Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer, Dutch composer (b. 1692)
 * December 12 – Johann Christoph Gottsched, German writer (b. 1700)

title: 1766


text:
1763

January–March

 * January 27 – The seat of colonial administration in the Viceroyalty of Brazil is moved from Salvador to Rio de Janeiro.
 * February 1 – The colonial authorities in the Province of North Carolina establish Mecklenburg County from the western portion of Anson County. The county is named for Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, who married George III in 1761.
 * February 10 – Seven Years' War – French and Indian War: The Treaty of Paris ends the war, and France cedes Canada (New France) to Great Britain.
 * February 15 – The Treaty of Hubertusburg puts an end to the Seven Years' War between Prussia and Austria, and their allies France and Russia.
 * February 23 – The Berbice Slave Uprising starts in the former Dutch colony of Berbice.
 * March 1 – Charles Townshend becomes President of the Board of Trade in the British government.

April–June

 * April 6 – The Théâtre du Palais-Royal, home to the Paris Opera for almost 90 years, is destroyed in an accidental fire.
 * April 16 – George Grenville takes office as the new Prime Minister of Great Britain, after the Earl of Bute resigns amid criticism over Britain's concessions in the Treaty of Paris.
 * April 18 – Marie-Josephte Corriveau is hanged near her home at Saint-Vallier, Quebec before being gibbeted after being found guilty by a military tribunal of twelve officers of murdering her husband. She becomes famous in French Canadian folklore as "la Corriveau".
 * April 19 – Teedyuscung, known as the "King of the Delaware Indians" (the Lenape tribe) is assassinated by arsonists who burn down his home in Pennsylvania while he is sleeping, in an apparent retaliation for signing the Treaty of Easton to relinquish Lenape claims to the Province of New Jersey.
 * April 23 – The controversial Issue 45 of John Wilkes's satirical newspaper The North Briton is published as a response to a speech four days earlier by King George III praising the end of the Seven Years' War. In what will become a test case for freedom of speech, Wilkes, a member of Parliament, is arrested for libel of the King and imprisoned, then exiled to France.
 * April 27 – Outraged by the British success in taking control of land in North America formerly occupied by the French, Pontiac, chief of the Odawa people, convenes a conference near Detroit and convinces the leaders of 17 other nations of the need to attack British outposts.
 * May 7 – Chief Pontiac begins "Pontiac's War" by attacking the British garrison at Fort Detroit, but the surprise attack is given away by a young native girl who informs the British of the plan. Two days later he begins the Siege of Fort Detroit.
 * June 2 – Pontiac's War: At what becomes Mackinaw City, Michigan, Chippewas capture Fort Michilimackinac by diverting the garrison's attention with a game of lacrosse, then chasing a ball into the fort.
 * June 28 – A magnitude 6.2 earthquake shakes Hungary and Slovakia, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent). Damage is limited, but 83 are killed.

July–September

 * July 7 – The British East India Company declares Mir Qasim, the Nawab of Bengal, to be deposed.
 * July 9 – The Mozart family grand tour of Europe began, lifting the profile of child prodigy Wolfgang Amadeus.
 * August 2 – Mir Qasim is routed at Odwa Nala. He flees to Patna, where he massacres the English garrison, but is subsequently defeated at Katwa, Murshidabad, Giria, Sooty, Udayanala and Munger.
 * August 3 and 4 – Amsterdam banking crisis: The spectacular bankruptcies of Leendert Pieter de Neufville and Johann Ernst Gotzkowsky lead to a financial contagion and affected in the days after many merchants in Amsterdam, Hamburg, Berlin and Stockholm.
 * August 5 – Pontiac's War – Battle of Bushy Run: British forces led by Henry Bouquet defeat Chief Pontiac's Indians at Bushy Run, in the Pennsylvania backcountry.
 * August – Fire in Smyrna, Ottoman Empire, destroys 2,600 houses.
 * September 1 – Catherine II of Russia endorses Ivan Betskoy's plans for a Foundling Home in Moscow.

October–December

 * October 7 – The Royal Proclamation of 1763 is issued by George III of the United Kingdom, restricting the westward expansion of British North America, and stabilizing relations with the indigenous peoples of the Americas, by barring white settlement of lands west of the Appalachian Mountains.
 * November 24 – Bayes' theorem is first announced.
 * December 2 – Touro Synagogue, Newport, Rhode Island, is dedicated; by the end of the 20th century, this will be the oldest surviving synagogue in North America.
 * December 14 – The Paxton Boys massacre six Conestoga Indians in their homes in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. When the 16 survivors are sheltered in the Lancaster workhouse (jail), the Paxton Boys ride into town and kill them as well, on December 27.

Date unknown

 * Little Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Ottoman Empire, is damaged in an earthquake.
 * Joseph Haydn writes his Symphony No. 13.
 * The Russo-Circassian War begins, when the Russian Empire attempts to annex Circassia.

Births

 * January 8 – Edmond-Charles Genêt, French ambassador to the United States during the French Revolution (d. 1834)
 * January 8 – Jean-Baptiste Drouet, French revolutionary politician
 * January 24 – Louis Alexandre Andrault de Langeron, Russian general (d. 1831)
 * January 26 – Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, Marshal of France, King Charles XIV John of Sweden and Charles III John of Norway (d. 1844)
 * February 14 – Jean Victor Marie Moreau, French general (d. 1813)
 * February 20 – Adalbert Gyrowetz, Bohemian composer (d. 1850)
 * March 9 – William Cobbett, English journalist, author (d. 1835)
 * March 13 – Guillaume-Marie-Anne Brune, Marshal of France (d. 1815)
 * March 20 – Charles Sturt, English politician (d. 1812)
 * March 21 – Jean Paul, German writer (d. 1825)
 * May 7 – Józef Antoni Poniatowski, Polish prince, Marshal of France (d. 1813)
 * June 20 – Theobald Wolfe Tone, Irish patriot (d. 1798)
 * June 23 – Empress Joséphine, born Marie Josèphe Rose Tascher de La Pagerie, Martinique-born French empress consort (d. 1814)
 * July 17 – John Jacob Astor, German-born American entrepreneur (d. 1848)
 * August 5 – Bill Richmond, American-born British boxer (d. 1829)
 * August 13 – Christoph Johann von Medem, German courtier (d. 1838)
 * August 16 – Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany, second son of George III of Great Britain
 * August 17 – Dmitry Senyavin, Russian admiral (d. 1831)
 * September 2 – Caroline Schelling, German scholar, intellectual (d. 1809)
 * December 25 – Claude Chappe, French telecommunication pioneer (d. 1805)
 * December 28 – John Molson, Canadian entrepreneur (d. 1836)
 * December 31 – Pierre-Charles Villeneuve, French admiral (d. 1806)
 * Date unknown – Huang Pilie, Chinese bibliophile (d. 1825)

Deaths

 * January 2 – John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville, English statesman (b. 1690)
 * January 11 – Caspar Abel, German theologian, historian, and poet (b. 1676)
 * January 29 – Louis Racine, French poet (b. 1692)
 * February 11 – William Shenstone, English poet (b. 1714)
 * February 12 – Pierre de Marivaux, French writer (b. 1688)
 * February 26 – Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth (b. 1711)
 * March 2 – Antoine Walsh, Irish-French slave trader and Jacobite (b. 1703)
 * March 4 – Johan Hörner, Danish artist (b. 1711)
 * March 24 – Catherine Charlotte De la Gardie, Swedish countess (b. 1723)
 * March 31 – Abraham Darby II, English ironmaster (b. 1711)
 * April 8
 * Koca Ragıp Pasha, Ottoman (Turkish) Grand Vizier (b. 1698)
 * Ann Beddingfield, English murderer (b. 1742)
 * April 13 – James Waldegrave, 2nd Earl Waldegrave of Great Britain (b. 1715)
 * April 22 – Jared Eliot, Connecticut farmer, writer on horticulture (b. 1685)
 * May 3 – George Psalmanazar, French-born impostor and English writer (b. c. 1679)
 * June 29 – Hedvig Charlotta Nordenflycht, Swedish writer (b. 1718)
 * August 14 – Giovanni Battista Somis, Italian violinist and composer (b. 1686)
 * August 21 – Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont, British statesman (b. 1710)
 * September 20 – Gabriela Silang, Filipino rebel leader, heroine (b. 1731)
 * September 26 – John Byrom, English poet (b. 1692)
 * October – Anna Maria Garthwaite, British designer (b. 1688)
 * October 5 – Augustus, Elector of Saxony, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania (b. 1696)
 * October 28 – Heinrich von Brühl, German statesman (b. 1700)
 * November 10 – Joseph Dupleix – French governor general at Pondichéry (b. 1697)
 * November 23 – Friedrich Heinrich von Seckendorff, German soldier (b. 1673)
 * November 28 – Naungdawgyi, Burmese king (b. 1734)
 * December 3 – Carl August Thielo, Danish composer (b. 1702)
 * December 17 – Frederick Christian, Elector of Saxony (b. 1722)
 * December 23 – Antoine François Prévost, French writer (b. 1697)

title: 1763


text:
1761

January–March

 * January 14 – Third Battle of Panipat: In India, the armies of the Durrani Empire from Afghanistan, led by Ahmad Shah Durrani and his coalition decisively defeat the Maratha Confederacy, killing over 100,000 Maratha soldiers and civilians in battle and in a subsequent massacre, regaining territory lost by the Mughal Empire and restoring the Mughal Emperor, Shah Alam II, to the throne in Delhi as the nominal ruler.
 * January 16 – In India, the Siege of Pondicherry ends as the British Empire captures Pondichéry from the French colonial empire.
 * February 8 – An earthquake in London breaks chimneys in Limehouse and Poplar.
 * March 8 – A second earthquake occurs in North London, Hampstead and Highgate.
 * March 31 – An 8.5 magnitude earthquake strikes Lisbon in the Kingdom of Portugal, but few deaths are reported because of censorship by the Portuguese government. with effects felt as far north as Scotland.

April–June

 * April 1 – The Austrian Empire and the Russian Empire sign a new treaty of alliance.
 * April 4 – A severe epidemic of influenza breaks out in London and "practically the entire population of the city" is afflicted; particularly contagious to pregnant women, the disease causes an unusual number of miscarriages and premature births.
 * April 14 – Thomas Boone is transferred south to become the Royal Governor of South Carolina after proving to be unable to work with the local assembly as the Royal Governor of New Jersey.
 * May 4 – The first multiple death tornado in the 13 American colonies strikes Charleston, South Carolina, killing eight people and sinking five ships in harbor.
 * June 6 – (May 26 old style); A transit of Venus occurs, and is observed from 120 locations around the Earth. In his observations by telescope at St. Petersburg, Mikhail Lomonosov notes a ring of light around the planet's silhouette as it begins the transit, and becomes the first astronomer to discover that the planet Venus has an atmosphere.

July–September

 * July 17 – The first section of the Bridgewater Canal is opened, for the transportation of coal from local mines to Manchester.
 * August 6 – The Parlement of Paris votes to close all colleges, associations and seminaries associated with the Jesuit Order, following a long campaign by Louis-Adrien Le Paige.
 * August 11 – Two years after his marriage to Martha Custis and his move to Mount Vernon, American military officer and politician George Washington advertises a reward in the Maryland Gazette for the capture of four fugitive slaves who ran away from him: Cupid, Peros, Jack and Neptune, claiming in the gazette that they had escaped "without the least suspicion, provocation, or difference with anybody".
 * August 15 – The Third Family Compact is executed by King Charles III of Spain and King Louis XV of France, as well as representatives of members of the House of Bourbon, King Ferdinand IV of Naples and Philip, Duke of Parma.
 * August 29 – Cherokee chief Attakullakulla and British Army officer Major James Grant meet at Fort Prince George in the Province of South Carolina and begin negotiations to end the Anglo-Cherokee War.
 * September 8 – George III marries Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.
 * September 19 – Slavery in Portugal is abolished.
 * September 22 – George III and Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz are crowned.

October–December

 * October 1 – Austrian field marshal Ernst Gideon von Laudon captures the Prussian town of Schweidnitz (now Świdnica in Poland) during the Seven Years' War.
 * October 5 – William Pitt is dismissed from his position as Secretary of State for the Southern Department after having been a powerful part of a coalition government with the Prime Minister, the Duke of Newcastle.
 * October 30 – Colonel Henry Bouquet issues the first proclamation against Anglo-American settlement on Indian lands in America.
 * November 7 – The New London Harbor Light is first lit to guide ships into the Connecticut harbor; the lighthouse, only the fourth to be built has been in continuous operation for more than 250 years.
 * November 11 – The Earl of Egremont, serving as Secretary of State for the Southern Department, initiated a policy which forbids the issuing of any land grants to white settlers in territory occupied by the American Indian tribes.
 * November 19 – A separate peace treaty is signed between the Cherokee Indians and the Colony of Virginia, bringing the Anglo-Cherokee War to a close.
 * November 26 – A 500-man force from the Army of Spain brings the revolt of Mexico's Maya population to an end, capturing the Yucatan village of Cisteil, killing about 500 of the 2,500 Mayan defenders and losing 40 of their own. The Spaniards arrest 254 people, including Jacinto Canek, who had proclaimed himself as King Canek Montezuma of the Mayas. Canek and eight other rebellion leaders are executed less than three weeks later.
 * December 16 – Seven Years' War: After four months of siege, the Russians under Pyotr Rumyantsev take the Prussian fortress of Kolberg.

Date unknown

 * The Halifax Treaties are concluded between the various bands of the Miꞌkmaq, other First Nations people and the British in Halifax, Nova Scotia, notably in the Burying the Hatchet ceremony on June 25.
 * In Dutch Guyana, a "state" formed by escaped slaves signs a treaty with the local governor.
 * Marine chronometer invented as a means to accurately determine longitude.
 * Matthew Boulton's Soho Manufactory opens in the midlands of England.
 * The music for "Ah! vous dirai-je, maman" ("Ah, would I tell you Mom?") is first published in France by a Monsieur Bouin in his book Les Amusements d'une Heure et Demy; in 1806, English poet Jane Taylor publishes her poem, The Star, whose words fit the rhythm of the tune and become the children's song Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.
 * Faber-Castell Company is founded by Kasper Faber in Nuremberg, Germany.
 * Johann Heinrich Lambert finds a proof that π is irrational.
 * l'Ordre des Chevaliers Maçons Élus Coëns de l'Univers is founded.

Births

 * January 17 – James Hall, Scottish geologist (d. 1832)
 * February 1 – Christian Hendrik Persoon, South African mycologist (d. 1836)
 * February 3 – Dorothea von Medem, Latvian diplomat, duchess of Courland (d. 1821)
 * February 16 – Charles Pichegru, French general (d. 1804)
 * February 22 – Erik Tulindberg, Finnish composer (d. 1814)
 * March 6 – Antoine-Francois Andreossy, French general (d. 1828)
 * May 3 – August von Kotzebue, German dramatist (d. 1819)
 * June 3 – Henry Shrapnel, British Army officer and inventor (d. 1842)
 * June 7 – John Rennie the Elder, Scottish-born civil engineer (d. 1821)
 * October 21 – Louis Albert Guislain Bacler d'Albe, French painter and cartographer (d. 1824)
 * October 27 – Matthew Baillie, Scottish physician and pathologist (d. 1823)
 * November 4 – Bertrand Andrieu, French engraver of medals (d. 1822)
 * November 13 – John Moore, British general (d. 1809)
 * November 20 – Pope Pius VIII (d. 1830)
 * December 1 – Marie Tussaud, French wax modeller (d. 1850)
 * December 24 – Jean-Louis Pons, French astronomer (d. 1831)
 * December 27 – Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly, Russian military commander (d. 1818)
 * Date unknown – Dido Elizabeth Belle, British slave heiress (d. 1804)

Deaths

 * January 4 – Stephen Hales, English physiologist, chemist, and inventor (b. 1677)
 * January 7 – Darkey Kelly, Irish madam and serial murderer, executed by burning
 * January 10 – Edward Boscawen, British admiral (b. 1711)
 * January 26 – Charles Louis Auguste Fouquet, duc de Belle-Isle, French general and statesman (b. 1684)
 * February 1 – Pierre François Xavier de Charlevoix, French historian (b. 1682)
 * February 6 – Clemens August of Bavaria, Archbishop-Elector of Cologne (b. 1700)
 * April 2 – William Sawyer, English cricketer (b. 1712)
 * April 4 – Theodore Gardelle, Swiss painter, enameler (b. 1722)
 * April 9 – William Law, English minister (b. 1686)
 * April 15
 * Archibald Campbell, 3rd Duke of Argyll, Scottish politician (b. 1682)
 * William Oldys, English antiquarian and bibliographer (b. 1696)
 * April 17 – Thomas Bayes, English mathematician (b. c. 1702)
 * May 1 – August Friedrich Müller, German legal scholar, logician (b. 1684)
 * May 10
 * James Colebrooke, British baronet (b. 1722)
 * Richard Edgcumbe, 2nd Baron Edgcumbe, British baron, politician (b. 1716)
 * May 14 – Thomas Simpson, English mathematician (b. 1710)
 * June 2 – Jonas Alströmer, Swedish industrialist (b. 1685)
 * June 29 – Princess Elisabeth Albertine of Saxe-Hildburghausen, Duchess consort of Mecklenburg-Strelitz (b. 1713)
 * July 4 – Samuel Richardson, English writer (b. 1689)
 * July 9 – Carl Gotthelf Gerlach, German organist (b. 1704)
 * July 13 – Tokugawa Ieshige, Japanese shōgun (b. 1712)
 * July 16 – Jacob Fortling, Danish sculptor (b. 1711)
 * August 3 – Johann Matthias Gesner, German classical scholar (b. 1691)
 * September 8 – Bernard Forest de Bélidor, French engineer (b. 1698)
 * October 22 – Louis George, Margrave of Baden-Baden (b. 1702)
 * October 25 – Gioacchino Conti, Italian opera singer (b. 1714)
 * November 21 – Charles Holmes, British Royal Navy admiral (b. 1711)
 * November 30 – John Dollond, English optician (b. 1706)
 * December 9 – Tarabai, Indian queen regent of the Maratha Empire (b. 1675)
 * December 15 – John Willes (judge), English lawyer (b. 1685)
 * December 23 – Alestair Ruadh MacDonnell, Scottish Jacobite spy (b. c. 1725)
 * December 25 – Princess Dorothea of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Beck, German noble (b. 1685)
 * date unknown – Aldegonde Jeanne Pauli, banker in the Austrian Netherlands (b. 1685)

title: 1761


text:
1760

January–March

 * January 9 – Battle of Barari Ghat: Afghan forces defeat the Marathas.
 * January 22 – Seven Years' War – Battle of Wandiwash, India: British general Sir Eyre Coote is victorious over the French under the Marquis de Bussy-Castelnau.
 * January 28 – Benning Wentworth creates the New Hampshire Grant of Pownal, Vermont.
 * February 15 – The British Royal Navy ship HMS Royal Katherine runs aground off Bolt Head in England, with the loss of 699 lives.
 * February 21–26 – Seven Years' War: Battle of Carrickfergus in the north of Ireland – A force of French troops, under the command of privateer François Thurot, captures and holds the town and castle of Carrickfergus before retiring; the force is defeated (and Thurot killed) in a naval action in the Irish Sea, on February 28.
 * February 27 – Seven Years' War: French and Indian War & Anglo-Cherokee War – Cherokee natives attack a North Carolina militia stationed at Fort Dobbs, in the western part of the province. The attack is repelled by the militia, under the command of General Hugh Waddell.
 * March 20 – The Great Fire of Boston, Massachusetts, destroys 349 buildings and marks the biggest conflagration in the American colonies up to this time.

April–June

 * April 3 – Great Britain and Prussia agree to begin peace negotiations to end the Seven Years' War.
 * April 7 – 'Tacky's War', a slave rebellion, begins in Jamaica and lasts for 18 months. During the uprising, 60 white residents are killed and more than 400 black rebels die in the suppression of the revolt. Another 500 are deported to British Honduras.
 * April 10 – France's Minister of the Navy Nicolas René Berryer finally receives permission to send ships to assist French forces at Quebec, and a fleet of six ships under the command of Captain François Chenard de la Giraudais of the FRENCH FRIGATE Machault departs Bordeaux, albeit too late to prevent the loss of New France to the British.
 * April 11 – The Burmese Army, under the command of King Alaungpaya, reaches the outskirts of Siam's capital, Ayutthaya, but then retreats rather than laying siege to the city.
 * April 12 – Two of six French ships run into a British blockade led by Britain's Admiral Edward Boscawen. Of the remaining four, one sinks before it can reach North America.
 * April 20 – France's Marshal François Gaston de Lévis departs from Montreal up the St. Lawrence River with 7,000 troops on a plan to retake Quebec City from the British.
 * April 22 – Belgian entertainer Joseph Mervin is said to have given the first demonstration of roller skates, in a performance at the Carlisle House in London, but the stunt ends in disaster.
 * April 26 – Marshal Lévis and his troops land at Saint-Augustin-de-Desmaures, adjacent to Quebec City, and prepares to lay siege to the British occupying force.
 * April 27 – British Army Brigadier General James Murray marches a force of 3,500 men toward Saint-Augustin to confront Marshal Lévis and the French Army.
 * April 28 – British defenders and the French Army clash at the Battle of Sainte-Foy to determine the future control of Quebec. General Murray is forced to retreat after the British suffer 259 deaths and 845 wounded, while the French under Marshal Lévis suffer 193 deaths and 640 wounded.
 * April 29 – Representatives of the remaining Penobscot Indian tribes in Maine and New Brunswick make peace with the British at Fort Pownal in Newfoundland.
 * April 30 – Swiss mathematician Daniel Bernoulli presents a paper at the French Academy of Sciences in Paris in which "a mathematical model was used for the first time to study the population dynamics of infectious disease."
 * May 11 – King Alaungpaya of Burma dies during a retreat from Ayutthaya after stopping at the village of Kinywa while en route to Martaban. His son Naungdawgyi becomes the new King of Burma.
 * May 16 – Three British Royal Navy ships under the command of Commodore Robert Swanton on HMS Vanguard (1748) arrive to break the siege of Quebec before Marshal Lévis can recapture the city from the British.
 * May 17 – Captain Giraudais's French fleet reaches the Gaspé Peninsula of northeast Quebec and captures seven British merchant ships, but Giraudais learns that the British have already preceded him up the St. Lawrence River and diverts to Chaleur Bay at Newfoundland.
 * June 4 – Expulsion of the Acadians: New England planters arrive to claim land in Nova Scotia taken from the Acadians.
 * June 11 – Robert Rogers and his Rangers launch a strike from Lake Champlain against French military posts along the Richelieu River – they strike at Fort Sainte Thérèse and destroy the settlement.
 * June 19 – The British create Cumberland County and Lincoln County in Maine.
 * June 22 – Britain's Captain John Byron, commanding HMS Fame, locates France's Captain Giraudais but runs aground on June 25 before it can attack.

July–September

 * July 3 – A lightning strike causes a major fire at Portsmouth Royal Dockyard in England.
 * July 8 – Seven Years' War: French and Indian War – Battle of Restigouche: The British defeat French forces, in the last naval battle in New France.
 * July 19 – A formal request is made to the Spanish government, to allow the founding of the later city of Mayagüez, Puerto Rico.
 * July 31 – Seven Years' War: Battle of Warburg – The Anglo-Hanoverian army of Ferdinand of Brunswick storms Warburg, with a heroic role being played by the English commander Lord Granby.
 * August 21 – The church (later cathedral) of Our Lady of Candlemas of Mayagüez (Puerto Rico) is founded, establishing the basis for the founding of the city in the following month.
 * August 30 – Seven Years' War: Battle of Legnica – By a series of brilliant maneuvers, Frederick the Great manages to defeat the Austrian army of Marshal Laudon before it can unite with that of Marshal Daun.
 * September 8 – Seven Years' War: Jeffery Amherst and his British troops capture Montreal from the French, effectively bringing Canada completely under British control.
 * September 18 – The town (later city) of Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, is founded.

October–December

 * October 5 – The wedding of Princess Isabella of Parma and Prince Joseph of Austria takes place at Hofburg Palace's Redoute Hall (Redoutensaele), at the former imperial palace in Vienna.
 * October 9 – Seven Years' War: Russian troops enter Berlin.
 * October 16 – Seven Years' War: Battle of Kloster-Kamp – Ferdinand of Brunswick is beaten back from the Rhine by a French army.
 * October 25 – George II of Great Britain dies; his 22-year-old grandson George, Prince of Wales, succeeds to the throne as King George III and reigns for 59 years until his death on January 29, 1820.
 * November 3 – Seven Years' War: Battle of Torgau – In another extremely hard battle, Frederick defeats Daun's Austrians, who withdraw across the Elbe.
 * November 29 – French Army Colonel François-Marie Picoté de Belestre formally surrenders Detroit to British Army Major Robert Rogers, and the British Union Jack is raised over Fort Detroit.
 * December 4 – For the first time since the surrender of Fort Detroit by France, British authorities meet nearby at a Native American council house with delegates from various Indian tribes that had fought as allies of the French Army, such as the Wyandot and Ottawa Indians, and with tribes that had formerly been allies of the British. The European and Native American representatives open the peace conference with the presentation by the Indians to the British of a wampum belt, and the pronouncement from the principal chief that "The ancient friendship is now renewed, and I wash the blood off the earth that had been shed during the present war, that you may bury the war hatchet in the bottomless pit."
 * December 6 – The siege of Pondicherry, a stronghold of France in India, is begun by British Army Lieutenant General Eyre Coote. The French commander, General Thomas Lally, is finally forced to surrender Pondicherry to the British on January 15, 1761.
 * December 18 – In the wake of Tacky's War by African-born rebels, the Assembly of the British colony of Jamaica outlaws the African religious practice of obeah, with penalties ranging from banishment from the colony to execution. The legislation specifically bans use of contraband associated with obeah, including "animal blood, feathers, parrots' beaks, dogs' teeth, alligators' teeth, broken bottles, grave dirt, rum, and eggshells".

Date unknown

 * Abbé Charles-Michel de l'Épée opens a school for deaf education in Paris which becomes the Institut National de Jeunes Sourds de Paris, the world's first free school for the deaf; Thomas Braidwood establishes Braidwood's Academy for the Deaf and Dumb in Edinburgh, the first school for the deaf in Britain.
 * Western countries pay 3,000,000 ounces of silver for Chinese goods.
 * approximate date – Abu Dhabi is founded.

Births

 * January 11
 * Zofia Potocka, Greek slave courtesan, agent for Russia and Polish noble (d. 1822)
 * February 3 – John Storm, American Revolutionary soldier (d. 1835)
 * March 1 – François Nicolas Leonard Buzot, French Revolutionary leader (suicide 1794)
 * March 10 – Leandro Fernández de Moratín, Spanish dramatist, translator and neoclassical poet (d. 1828)
 * March 28 – Thomas Clarkson, English abolitionist (d. 1846)
 * April 16 – Sigismund Friedrich Hermbstädt, German pharmacist, chemist (d. 1833)
 * April 30 – Joseph Souham, French general (d. 1837)
 * May 10 – Johann Peter Hebel, German poet (d. 1826)
 * May 28 – Alexandre, Vicomte de Beauharnais, French politician, general (d. 1794)
 * May 29 – Charlotte Slottsberg, Swedish ballerina (d. 1800)
 * June 12 – Jean-Baptiste Louvet de Couvrai, French novelist, playwright, journalist, politician and diplomat (d. 1797)
 * June 16 – Louise Contat, French actress (d. 1813)
 * July 13 – István Pauli (Pável), Hungarian Slovene priest, writer (d. 1829)
 * August 3 – Jacques Réattu, French artist 9d. (1833)
 * August 22 – Pope Leo XII, (b. Annibale Francesco Clemente Melchiore Girolamo Nicola Sermattei della Genga), Italian priest (d. 1829)
 * September 14 – Luigi Cherubini, Italian composer (d. 1842)
 * September 21 – Olof Swartz, Swedish botanist (d. 1818)
 * September 30 – Michele Cachia, Maltese architect and military engineer (d. 1839)
 * October 7 (bapt.) – Fredrica Löf, Swedish actress (d. 1813)
 * October 17 – Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon, French economist, political theorist (d. 1825)
 * October 27 – August von Gneisenau, Prussian field marshal (d. 1831)
 * October 31? – Hokusai, born Katsushika Tokitarō, Japanese Edo period artist, ukiyo-e painter and printmaker (died 1849)
 * November 13 – Jiaqing Emperor of China (d. 1820)
 * November 21 – Joseph Plumb Martin, American Revolutionary soldier and narrative author (d. 1850)
 * November 28 – Maria Teresa Poniatowska, Polish noblewoman (d. 1834)
 * December 17 – Deborah Sampson, first American female soldier (d. 1827)
 * date unknown
 * Adam Gillies, Lord Gillies, Scottish judge (d. 1842)
 * Emma Jane Greenland, English painter, writer, singer (d. 1843)
 * Clelia Durazzo Grimaldi, Italian botanist (d. 1830)
 * Moscho Tzavela, Greek-Souliote heroine (d. 1803)
 * probable date – Lemuel Francis Abbott, English portrait painter (d. 1802)

Deaths

 * February 22 – Anna Magdalena Bach, accomplished German singer, second wife of Johann Sebastian Bach (b. 1701)
 * April 3 – John Rous, Royal Navy officer during King George's War and the Seven Years' War (b. 1702)
 * April 6 – Charlotte Charke, British actor and writer (b. 1713)
 * April 10 – Jean Lebeuf, French historian (b. 1687)
 * April 11 – Prince Moritz of Anhalt-Dessau, German general (b. 1712)
 * April 18 – Mary Alexander, influential colonial-era merchant in New York City (b. 1693)
 * May 5 – Laurence Shirley, 4th Earl Ferrers, English murderer (hanged) (b. 1720)
 * May 9 – Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf, German religious and social reformer (b. 1700)
 * May 10 – Christoph Graupner, German composer (b. 1683)
 * May 15 – King Alaungpaya of Burma (b. 1711)
 * May 22 – Israel ben Eliezer aka Baal Shem Tov, Polish-born mystical rabbi, founder of Hasidic Judaism (b. 1698)
 * May 30 – Joanna Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp, German duchess (b. 1712)
 * June 13 – Antoine Court, French Huguenot minister (b. 1696)
 * July 13 – Conrad Weiser, Pennsylvania's ambassador to the Iroquois Confederacy (b. 1696)
 * August 27 – Smart Lethieullier, English antiquary (b. 1701)
 * September 11 – Louis Godin, French astronomer (b. 1704)
 * September 17 – George Bowes, English coal proprietor, Member of Parliament (b. 1701)
 * October 15 – Nicolas d'Assas, captain of the French regiment of Auvergne (b. 1733)
 * October 25 – King George II of Great Britain (b. 1683)
 * November 30 – Friederike Caroline Neuber, German actress (b. 1697)

title: 1760


text:
2008

2008 was designated as:
 * International Year of Languages
 * International Year of Planet Earth
 * International Year of the Potato
 * International Year of Sanitation

The Great Recession, a worldwide recession which began in 2007, continued through the entirety of 2008. Èy63dm61230

January–February

 * January 1 – Cyprus and Malta adopt the euro currency.
 * January 14 – At 19:04:39 UTC, the uncrewed MESSENGER space probe is at its closest approach during its first flyby of the planet Mercury.
 * January 21
 * Stock markets around the world plunge amid growing fears of a U.S. Great Recession, fueled by the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis.
 * Online activist group Anonymous initiates Project Chanology, after a leaked interview of Tom Cruise by the Church of Scientology is published on YouTube, and the Church of Scientology issued a "copyright infringement" claim. In response, Anonymous sympathizers took to the streets to protest outside the church (after February 10), while the church's websites and centres were getting DoS attacks, phone line nukes, and black faxes.

 * January 24 – A peace deal is signed in Goma, Democratic Republic of the Congo, ending the Kivu conflict.
 * February 4 – Civic mobilizations in Colombia against FARC, under the name One million voices against FARC.
 * February 17 – Kosovo formally declares independence from Serbia, to a mixed response from the international community.
 * February 18 – WikiLeaks releases allegations of illegal activities carried out by the Cayman Islands branch of Swiss banking corporation Julius Baer; a subsequent lawsuit against WikiLeaks prompts a temporary suspension of the website, but uproar about violations of freedom of speech causes WikiLeaks to be brought back online.

March–April

 * March 2 – Venezuela and Ecuador move troops to the Colombian border, following a Colombian raid against FARC guerrillas inside Ecuadorian territory, in which senior commander Raúl Reyes is killed.
 * March 8 – Barisan Nasional loses two-thirds majority, for the first time since 1969, to opposition during the 2008 Malaysian general election but still retains control of government. The coalition also loses majority control of five states to the opposition.
 * March 9 – The first European Space Agency Automated Transfer Vehicle, a cargo spacecraft for the International Space Station, launches from Guiana Space Centre in French Guiana.
 * March 19 – An Energy release of a Gamma-ray burst called the GRB 080319B is the brightest event ever recorded in the Universe.
 * March 24 – Bhutan holds its first-ever general elections following the adoption of a new Constitution which changed the country from an absolute monarchy to a multiparty democracy.
 * March 25 – African Union and Comoros forces invade the rebel-held island of Anjouan, returning the island to Comorian control.
 * April 29 – Grand Theft Auto IV is released worldwide, selling over 3.6 million units and earning $310 million during the first day, becoming not only the highest grossing video game release of all-time, but also the highest grossing entertainment product release ever.

May–June

 * May 2 – Iron Man is released in theaters, starting the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
 * May 3 – Cyclone Nargis passes through Myanmar, killing more than 138,000 people.
 * May 12 – An earthquake measuring 7.9 on the moment magnitude scale strikes Sichuan, China, killing an estimated 87,000 people.
 * May 20–24 – The Eurovision Song Contest 2008 takes place in Belgrade, Serbia, and is won by Russian entrant Dima Bilan with the song "Believe".
 * May 21
 * Manchester United wins their third European Cup and second Champions League after they beat Chelsea in the first all-English final in the history of the competition. Manchester United won the match 6–5 on penalties, following a 1–1 draw after extra time.
 * The Union of South American Nations, an intergovernmental organization between states in South America, is founded.
 * The International Court of Justice awards Middle Rocks to Malaysia and Pedra Branca to Singapore, ending a 29-year territorial dispute between the two countries.
 * May 25 – NASA's uncrewed Phoenix spacecraft becomes the first to land on the northern polar region of Mars.
 * May 28 – The Legislature Parliament of Nepal votes overwhelmingly in favor of abolishing the country's 240-year-old monarchy, turning the country into a republic.
 * May 30 – International Convention on Cluster Munitions is adopted in Dublin.
 * June 7–29 – Austria and Switzerland jointly host the UEFA Euro 2008 football tournament, which is won by Spain.
 * June 11
 * The Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope is launched.
 * Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper formally apologizes, on behalf of the Canadian government, to the country's First Nations for the Canadian Indian residential school system.
 * June 14 – Expo 2008 opens in Zaragoza, Spain, lasting to September 14, with the topic "Water and sustainable development".
 * June 14 – A 6.9 magnitude earthquake in Iwate Prefecture, Japan, kills 12 and injures more than 400.

July–August

 * July 2 – Íngrid Betancourt and 14 other hostages are rescued from FARC rebels by Colombian security forces.
 * July 11 – South Korea suspends all trips to North Korea's Mount Kumgang after a 53-year-old South Korean tourist is shot and killed by a North Korean sentry.
 * July 21 – Radovan Karadžić, the first president of the Republika Srpska, is arrested in Belgrade, Serbia, on allegations of war crimes, following a 12-year-long manhunt.
 * August 1
 * India and United States sign the historic Civil Nuclear deal.
 * Eleven mountaineers from international expeditions die on K2, the second-highest mountain on Earth, in the worst single accident in the history of K2 mountaineering.
 * August 6 – President Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi of Mauritania is deposed in a military coup d'état.
 * August 7 – Georgia intervenes against Russian-backed separatists in its South-Ossetia and Abkhazia regions, causing Russia to invade Georgia and spark the Russo-Georgian war, the first major European land war of the 21st century.
 * August 8–24 – The 2008 Summer Olympics take place in Beijing, China.
 * August 20 – Spanair Flight 5022 crashes at Madrid–Barajas Airport, killing 154 people on board.

September–October

 * September 5 – Quentin Bryce becomes the first female Governor-General of Australia.
 * September 10 – The proton beam is circulated for the first time in the Large Hadron Collider, the world's largest and highest-energy particle accelerator, located at CERN, near Geneva, under the Franco-Swiss border.
 * September 13 – Hurricane Ike makes landfall as a category 2 hurricane in Texas, killing 113 and causing over $30 billion in damages.
 * September 15 – Stocks fall sharply Monday on a triptych of Wall Street woe: Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy filing, Merrill Lynch's acquisition by Bank of America, and AIG's unprecedented request for short-term financing from the Federal Reserve.
 * September 20 – A suicide truck bomb explosion destroys the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, Pakistan, killing at least 54 and injuring 266.
 * September 28 – SpaceX Falcon 1 becomes the world's first privately developed space launch vehicle to successfully make orbit.
 * October 3 – Global financial crisis: U.S. President George W. Bush signs the revised Emergency Economic Stabilization Act into law, creating a 700 billion dollar Treasury fund to purchase failing bank assets.
 * October 6 – A controversial Peruvian tape regarding a Norwegian oil company causes the 2008 Peru oil scandal, sparking protests which cause Jorge de Castillo to resign from office.
 * October 21 – The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is officially inaugurated at Geneva.
 * October 22 – The Indian Space Research Organisation successfully launches the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft on a lunar exploration mission.
 * October 30 – Floods affected in Northern Vietnam and Central Vietnam and lasted 5 days causing flooding in many provinces and cities.
 * October
 * The Easyswap on-line local exchange trading system (LETS) website is officially launched in Switzerland.

November–December

 * November 1 – Satoshi Nakamoto publishes "Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System".
 * November 2 – In a race won by Brazilian driver Felipe Massa, British driver Lewis Hamilton ends in 5th place in 2008 Brazilian Grand Prix and becomes the first black driver to win the Formula One World Championship, and the second youngest driver to achieve the feat at the age of 23.
 * November 4 – 2008 United States presidential election: Democratic U.S. Senator Barack Obama defeats Republican candidate John McCain and is elected the 44th President of the United States, making him the first African-American to be elected to the office.
 * November 19 – Claudia Castillo of Spain becomes the first person to have a successful trachea transplant using a tissue-engineered organ.
 * November 20 – The Buzzard Coulee meteorite falls in Saskatchewan. Reported to be 5 times brighter than the full moon and is seen in Alberta, Manitoba, and even North Dakota.
 * November 26–29 – Members of Lashkar-e-Taiba carry out four days of coordinated bombing and shooting attacks across Mumbai, killing 164 people.
 * November 27 – XL Airways Germany Flight 888T. An Airbus A320 due to be redelivered to Air New Zealand stalls and crashes over Mediterranean Sea resulting the deaths of 7
 * December 10 – The Channel Island of Sark, a British Crown dependency, holds its first fully democratic elections under a new constitutional arrangement, becoming the last European territory to abolish feudalism.
 * December 11 – Bernard Madoff is arrested for securities fraud after he was turned in by his sons for operating the largest Ponzi scheme in history, later known as the Madoff investment scandal.
 * December 18 – The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda finds Théoneste Bagosora and two other senior Rwandan army officers guilty of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes and sentences them to life imprisonment for their role in the Rwandan genocide.
 * December 22 – An ash dike ruptured at a solid waste containment area for a Tennessee Valley Authority coal-fired power plant in Roane County, Tennessee, releasing 1.1 e9USgal of coal fly ash slurry in the largest industrial spill in U.S. history.
 * December 23 – A military coup d'état deposes the government of Guinea shortly after the death of longtime President Lansana Conté.
 * December 27 – Israel invades the Gaza Strip, in response to rockets being fired into Israeli territory by Hamas, and due to weapons being smuggled into the area.
 * December 31 – An extra leap second (23:59:60) is added to end the year. The last time this occurred was in 2005.

Date unknown

 * European Certification and Qualification Association is founded.
 * National Disaster Recovery Fund, a disaster management fund is established by the Government of Jamaica.

Nobel Prizes

 * Chemistry – Martin Chalfie, Osamu Shimomura, and Roger Y. Tsien
 * Economics – Paul Krugman
 * Literature – J. M. G. Le Clézio
 * Peace – Martti Ahtisaari
 * Physics – Makoto Kobayashi, Toshihide Maskawa, and Yoichiro Nambu
 * Physiology or Medicine – Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, Harald zur Hausen, and Luc Montagnier

New English words
• @

• adorbs

• anti-vaxxer

• Bitcoin

• burner phone

• cytokine storm syndrome

• exome

• fatberg

• fat-shamer

• ghost pepper

• hate-watch

• infinity scarf

• mansplain

• Me Too

• photobomb

• stick and poke

• TERF

• unfollow

title: 2008


text:
1759

In Great Britain, this year was known as the Annus Mirabilis, because of British victories in the Seven Years' War.

January–March

 * January 6 – George Washington marries Martha Dandridge Custis.
 * January 11 – In Philadelphia, the first American life insurance company is incorporated.
 * January 13 – Távora affair: The Távora family is executed, following accusations of the attempted regicide of Joseph I of Portugal.
 * January 15
 * The British Museum opens at Montagu House in London after six years of development.
 * Voltaire's satire Candide is published simultaneously in five countries.
 * January 27 – Battle of Río Bueno: Spanish forces, led by Juan Antonio Garretón, defeat indigenous Huilliches of southern Chile.
 * February 12 – Ali II ibn Hussein becomes the new Ruler of Tunisia upon the death of his brother, Muhammad I ar-Rashid. Ali reigns for 23 years until his death in 1782.
 * February 16 – The Comte de Lally (Thomas Lally) ends the French Army's two-month siege of the British Indian fort at Madras and retreats.
 * February 17 – "The greatest fleet that had ever put out for America" departs from Portsmouth with 250 ships (including 49 Royal Navy warships under the command of Vice Admiral Charles Saunders, on a mission to capture French-controlled Quebec. The ships bring 14,000 sailors, marines and British Army troops under the command of Major General James Wolfe, along with another 7,000 men in merchant service.
 * March 4–November 20 – Étienne de Silhouette serves as Controller-General of France and attempts major financial reforms.

April–June

 * April 13 – Seven Years' War – Battle of Bergen: A French army defeats Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick in Hesse.
 * May 1 – Josiah Wedgwood founds the Wedgwood pottery in England.
 * May 10 – The Macedonian Hussar Regiment is formed and starts to assist the Russian Empire in the Seven Years' War.
 * June 4 – After arriving at Canada, the Royal Navy fleet sails out of British-controlled Halifax toward the St. Lawrence River to prepare the invasion of French Quebec.
 * June 15 – The first vascular surgery in history is performed by a Dr. Hallowell (whose first name has been lost) at Newcastle upon Tyne in England, who uses suture repair rather than a tying off with a ligature to repair an aneurysm on a patient's brachial artery. The case is reported in 1761 by Dr. Richard Lambert in the paper "A new technique of treating an aneurysm", published in the journal Medical Observations and Inquiries. The new procedure of reconstructing a damaged artery replaces the practice of ligation that had risked the amputation of a limb or organ failure.
 * June 26 – After their fleet finishes navigation of the St. Lawrence and arriving at the Île d'Orléans, British troops go ashore on France's North American territory and begin the siege of Quebec City.

July–September

 * July 19 – The Great Stockholm Fire 1759 breaks out at Södermalm in Stockholm, Sweden.
 * July 25 – Seven Years' War (French and Indian War): In Canada, British forces capture Fort Niagara from the French, who subsequently abandon Fort Rouillé.
 * July 26–27 – Seven Years' War (French and Indian War) – Battle of Ticonderoga: At the southern end of Lake Champlain, French forces withdraw from Fort Carillon, which is taken by the British under General Amherst, and renamed Fort Ticonderoga.
 * August 1 – Battle of Minden: Anglo–Hanoverian forces under Ferdinand of Brunswick defeat the French army of the Duc de Broglie, but due to the disobedience of the English cavalry commander Lord George Sackville, the French are able to withdraw unmolested.
 * August 10 – Ferdinand VI of Spain dies, and is succeeded by his half-brother Charles III. Charles resigns the thrones of Naples and Sicily to his third son, Ferdinand IV.
 * August 12 – Battle of Kunersdorf: Frederick the Great is rebuffed in bloody assaults, by the combined Austro–Russian army of Pyotr Saltykov and Ernst von Laudon. This is one of Frederick's greatest defeats.
 * August 18 – Battle of Lagos: The British fleet of Edward Boscawen defeats a French force under Commodore Jean-François de La Clue-Sabran off the Portuguese coast.
 * September 10 – Battle of Pondicherry: An inconclusive naval battle is fought off the coast of India, between the French Admiral d'Aché and the British under George Pocock. The French forces are badly damaged and sail home, never to return.
 * September 13 – Seven Years' War (French and Indian War) – Battle of the Plains of Abraham: Quebec falls to British forces, following General Wolfe's victory just outside the city. Both the French Commander (the Marquis de Montcalm) and the British General James Wolfe are fatally wounded.
 * September 14 – Carrington Bowles publishes A Journey Through Europe, a board game designed by John Jefferys, the earliest board game whose designer's name is known.

October–December

 * October 16 – Smeaton's Tower, John Smeaton’s Eddystone Lighthouse off the coast of South West England, is first illuminated.
 * October 18 – A fire destroys the Macedonian city of Salonika, reducing 4,000 houses to ashes.
 * October 30 – Near East earthquakes of 1759:  The first event in an earthquake doublet occurs to the north of the Sea of Galilee, with a surface wave magnitude of 6.6 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII–IX (Severe–Violent). About 2,000 are killed in Safed.
 * November 20 – Battle of Quiberon Bay: The British fleet of Sir Edward Hawke defeats a French fleet under Marshal de Conflans, near the coast of Brittany. This is the decisive naval engagement of the Seven Years' War – after this, the French are no longer able to field a significant fleet.
 * November 21 – Battle of Maxen: The Austrian army of Marshal von Daun cuts off and forces the surrender of a Prussian force, under Friedrich von Finck.
 * November 25 – Near East earthquakes of 1759:   The second and stronger event in an earthquake doublet occurs to the east of Beirut, with a surface wave magnitude of 7.4 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), destroying all the villages in the Beqaa Valley.
 * November 29 – Alamgir II, the Mughal Emperor of India, is assassinated in a conspiracy orchestrated by his Prime Minister, Imad-ul-Mulk. The Shah Alam II, a grandson of the 17th century Emperor Aurangzeb, is made the new Mughal Emperor.
 * December 6 – The Germantown Union School (later called Germantown Academy), America's oldest nonsectarian day school, is founded.
 * December 10 – Shah Jahan III is installed as the puppet ruler of India's Mughal Empire eleven days after the death of Alamgir II, but is removed after a reign of only ten months.
 * December 31 – The Guinness Brewery is leased by Arthur Guinness in St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland, for the brewing of Guinness.

Date unknown

 * Adam Smith publishes his Theory of Moral Sentiments, embodying some of his Glasgow lectures.
 * The town of Egedesminde (modern Aasiaat) is founded in Greenland.
 * English clockmaker John Harrison produces his "No. 1 sea watch" (H4), the first successful marine chronometer.
 * The Kew Gardens are established in England by Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, the mother of George III.
 * Churton Town, the Orange County, North Carolina county seat laid out in 1754, is renamed Childsburgh, in honor of North Carolina attorney general Thomas Child. It is later renamed Hillsborough in 1766.
 * Fire destroys 250 houses in Stockholm.
 * Madame du Coudray publishes Abrégé de l'art des accouchements (The Art of Obstetrics), and the French government authorizes her to carry her instruction "throughout the realm" and promises financial support.

Births

 * January 25 – Robert Burns, Scottish poet (d. 1796)
 * January 29 – Louis Augustin Guillaume Bosc, French botanist (d. 1828)
 * February 15 – Friedrich August Wolf, German philologist, archaeologist (d. 1824)
 * February 22 – Claude Lecourbe, French general (d. 1815)
 * April 19 – August Wilhelm Iffland, German actor (d. 1814)
 * April 22 – James Freeman, first clergyman in America to call himself a Unitarian (d. 1835)
 * April 27 – Mary Wollstonecraft, English feminist author (d. 1797)
 * May 15 – Maria Theresia von Paradis, Austrian musician, composer (d. 1824)
 * May 20 – William Thornton, American architect (d. 1828)
 * May 21 – Joseph Fouché, French statesman (d. 1820)
 * May 28 – William Pitt the Younger, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1806)
 * June 21 – Alexander J. Dallas, American statesman and financier (d. 1817)
 * June 25 – William Plumer, American lawyer, Baptist lay preacher, and politician (d. 1850)
 * July 2 – Nathan Read, American engineer and politician (d. 1849)
 * July 31 – Ignaz Anton von Indermauer, Austrian nobleman and government official (d. 1796)
 * August 24 – William Wilberforce, British abolitionist (d. 1833)
 * September 10 – Lemuel Cook, American Revolutionary War veteran, centenarian (d. 1866)
 * September 19 – William Kirby, English entomologist (d. 1850)
 * October 25
 * Sophie Marie Dorothea of Württemberg, empress of Paul I of Russia (d. 1828)
 * William Grenville, 1st Baron Grenville, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (d. 1834)
 * October 26 – Georges Danton, French Revolutionary leader (d. 1794)
 * November 10 – Friedrich Schiller, German writer (d. 1805)
 * November 27 – Franz Krommer, Czech composer (d. 1831)
 * November 23 – Felipe Enrique Neri, legislator and colonizer of Texas (d. 1820)
 * December 2 – James Edward Smith, English botanist (d. 1828)
 * Date unknown – Maria Petraccini, Italian anatomist, physician (d. 1791)
 * Salomea Deszner, Polish actress, singer and theater director (d. 1806)
 * Alice Flowerdew, British teacher, religious poet, hymnwriter (d. 1830)

Deaths

 * January 12 – Anne, Princess Royal and Princess of Orange, regent of Friesland (b. 1709)
 * February 9 – Louise Henriette of Bourbon, Duchess of Orléans, mother of Philippe Égalité (b. 1726)
 * February 20 – Georg Anton Urlaub, German painter (b. 1713)
 * February 27 – Jacob Theodor Klein, German scholar (b. 1685)
 * March 11 – John Forbes, British general (b. 1707)
 * April 6 – Johann Gottfried Zinn, German anatomist, botanist (b. 1727)
 * April 14 – George Frideric Handel, German composer (b. 1685)
 * May 12 – Lambert-Sigisbert Adam, French sculptor (b. 1700)
 * May 23 – Landgravine Eleonore of Hesse-Rotenburg, Countess (b. 1712)
 * June 3 – Didier Diderot, French craftsman (b. 1685)
 * June 20 – Margareta Capsia, Finnish artist (b. 1682)
 * June 27 – Jacques Claude Marie Vincent de Gournay, French economist (b. 1712)
 * July 6 – William Pepperrell, English colonial soldier (b. 1696)
 * July 27 – Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis, French mathematician (b. 1698)
 * August 8 – Carl Heinrich Graun, German composer (b. 1704)
 * August 10 – King Ferdinand VI of Spain (b. 1713)
 * August 16 – Eugene Aram, English philologist and murderer, hanged (b. 1704)
 * August 24 – Ewald Christian von Kleist, German poet (b. 1715)
 * September 10 – Ferdinand Konščak, Croatian explorer (b. 1703)
 * September 13 – James Wolfe, British general (b. 1727)
 * September 14 – Louis-Joseph de Montcalm, French general (b. 1712)
 * September 16 – Nicolas Antoine Boulanger, French philosopher (b. 1722)
 * October 10 – Granville Elliott, Army General, British military expert, working for Britain and Palatine forces (b. 1713)
 * October 27 – Konstancja Czartoryska, Polish noblewoman politician (b. 1700)
 * November 14 – Grégoire Orlyk, Ukrainian-born French Lieutenant General (b. 1702)
 * November 29 – Nicolaus I Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician (b. 1687)
 * December 6 – Princess Louise-Élisabeth of France, daughter of King Louis XV of France (b. 1727)
 * date unknown
 * Alberto Pullicino, Maltese painter (b. 1719)
 * King Thipchang of the Realm of Lampang (b. c. 1675)

title: 1759