January–March •
January 4 –
Charles the Bold,
Duke of Burgundy agrees to help
Edward IV regain the English throne from
King Henry VI. •
January 17 – Portuguese navigators
João de Santarém and
Pedro Escobar discover the uninhabited island of
Príncipe (now part of the nation of
São Tomé and Príncipe). They initially call it "Ilha de Santo Antão" because they land it on the feast day of
Saint Anthony. •
January 22 – At age 15,
Prince João of Aviz, the eldest son of
King Afonso V, marries his 12-year-old first cousin,
Leonor de Avis. Both are grandchildren of
King Duarte I of Portugal. •
January – Portuguese navigators
João de Santarém and
Pedro Escobar reach the gold-trading centre of
Elmina on the
Gold Coast of west Africa, and explore Cape St. Catherine, two degrees south of the equator, so that they begin to be guided by the
Southern Cross constellation. They also visit
Sassandra on the
Ivory Coast. •
February 10 –
Albrecht III Achilles becomes the new
Elector of Brandenburg upon the abdication of his older brother,
Friedrich II, who had guided the electorate since 1440. •
February 24 – In what is now south
Vietnam, the
Champa–Dai Viet War begins when the
Dai Viet Emperor
Lê Thánh Tông sends 500 warships to block the Champa Kingdom's Bay of Sa Ky, while another 30,000 troops block all entrances to the capital city of
Vijaya at what is now the
Quảng Ngãi Province. The Me Can citadel in Quang Na falls two days later and the Vietnamese advance. •
March 22 – The Empire of Dai Viet in north Vietnam triumphs over the
Champa Kingdom of south Vietnam after Dai Viet Emperor Le Thanh Tong ignores the offer of Champa King Tra Toan to surrender Vijaya. After the city walls are breached, King Tra Toan, his family and 30,000 other Chams are captured as prisoners, while over 60,000 other Chams are killed. Another 40,000 residents who did not die in the fighting are executed. •
March 15 – With the help of a group of mercenaries lent to him by Charles the Bold of Burgundy, the
Yorkist King
Edward IV returns to England to reclaim his throne, landing near Hull, after having departed from Holland on March 11.
April–June •
April 14 – At the
Battle of Barnet, Edward defeats the
Lancastrian army under
Warwick, who is killed. •
May 4 – At the
Battle of Tewkesbury, King Edward defeats a Lancastrian army led by
Queen Margaret and her son,
Edward of Westminster, Prince of Wales. Edward is killed in the battle. •
May 12 – The
siege of London is attempted by hundreds of supporters of England's
House of Lancaster, who are attempting to free the former King Henry VI from imprisonment in the
Tower of London. Led by
Thomas Neville, the Lancastrians set cannons up on the south bank of the
Thames and attempt to bombard London, but is unable to break the defense put up by Londoners led by
Edward Woodville, Lord Scales, and the attack fails after three days. •
May 21 – King Edward IV celebrates his victories with a triumphal parade on his return to London. The captured Queen Margaret is paraded through the streets. On the same day
Henry VI of England is murdered in the
Tower of London, eliminating all Lancastrian opposition to the
House of York. •
May 27 – Two months after the death of King
George of Poděbrady, the Diet of Bohemian nobles meets at
Kutná Hora and elects
Vladislaus Jagiello as the new
King of Bohemia. The papal legate,
Lorenzo Roverella, Bishop of Ferrara, declares the election void with the approval of Pope Paul II, and endorses
Matthias Corvinus, King of Hungary, to be the new King of Bohemia, which the
Imperial Diet of the
Holy Roman Empire refuses to approve. •
June 26 –
Edward of York, the 7-month-old son of King
Edward IV of England, is created
Prince of Wales, two months after his father has regained the throne.
July–September •
July 14 – At the
Battle of Shelon, the forces of
Muscovy defeat the
Republic of Novgorod. •
July 26 –
Pope Paul II dies of a heart attack. at age 54 after a reign of almost seven years, leaving the Roman Catholic Church papacy vacant. •
August 6 – Eleven days after the death of Pope Paul II, the
papal conclave begins in Rome with 18 of the 25 cardinals present. On the initial vote, with 12 needed to win,
Basilios Bessarion of Greece gets six, and
Guillaume d'Estouteville of France and
Niccolò Fortiguerra of Italy receive three each. •
August 22 – • King
Afonso V of Portugal conquers the Moroccan town of
Arzila. •
Vladislav Jagellion is crowned as King of Bohemia at Prague. •
September 22 – After being tracked down by King Edward IV and taken prisoner at
Southampton, the rebel
Thomas Neville is beheaded at
Middleham Castle in his native
Yorkshire.
October–December •
October 2 – Eleven days after Hungary's King Matthias is supported to be King of Bohemia,
Prince Casimir of Poland, a younger son of
King Casimir IV (who is later
canonised as a Roman Catholic saint) leads an army on an invasion of Bohemia and begins a war against Hungary. •
October 10 –
Battle of Brunkeberg in
Stockholm,
Sweden: The forces of
Regent of
Sweden Sten Sture the Elder, with the help of
farmers and
miners, repel an attack by
Christian I,
King of Denmark. •
November 12 –
Shah Suwar, the ruler of the independent Ottoman Governor of the semi-independent Anatolian Turk
Beylik of Dulkadir is defeated by the army of the Egyptian Mamluk General
Yashbak min Mahdi in a battle at
Kars, sustaining more than 300 soldiers lost and losing most of his lands in what is now southeastern Turkey. After fleeing to the castle of Zamantu for refuge, Suwar is cornered again by Yashbak and surrenders on June 4, 1472, and executed two months later. •
November 25 –
Nicolò Tron is elected as the new
Doge of the Republic of Venice, 15 days after the death of the Doge
Cristoforo Moro, who had governed the Republic since 1461.. •
December 25 – The
Great Comet of 1472 is first observed from Earth passing in front of the constellation of
Virgo. The comet is recorded by astronomers in
Korea and by the German astronomers
Regiomontanus and
Bernhard Walther, and will come within 6.5 million miles of Earth, the closest in recorded history that a
great comet approaches. The comet is visible for 59 days, disappearing after March 1.
Date unknown •
Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui of the
Inca Empire dies, and is succeeded by his son
Topa Inca Yupanqui. •
Moorish exiles from Spain, led by Moulay Ali Ben Moussa Ben Rached El Alami, found the city of
Chefchaouen in the north of Morocco. •
Marsilio Ficino's translation of the
Corpus Hermeticum into
Latin,
De potestate et sapientia Dei, is published. • World population reaches 500 million. == Births ==