January–March •
January 16 –
Mehmed III succeeds
Murad III, as
Sultan of the Ottoman Empire and begins a reign of almost nine years. Upon ascending the throne, Mehmed orders that all 19 of the other sons of Murad III are to be strangled to death. •
January 17 – During the
French Wars of Religion, King
Henry IV of France declares war on Spain, ordering
Henry, Duke of Bouillon to lead armies
through Luxembourg for an attack on the
Spanish Netherlands (now Belgium). •
January 24 –
Matthias of Habsburg is appointed by his brother
Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor, to become the Archduke of
die Vorlande, the possessions of the Austrian Habsburgs in Southern Germany outside of
Austria, also called Further Austria (
Vorderösterreich). The appointment follows the death of their uncle,
Ferdinand II. Matthias will later become Archduke of Austria (in 1608) and the Emperor in 1612. •
January 28 – The
Principality of Transylvania (now encompassing most of Romania) joins the
Holy League alliance with the Holy Roman Empire in a war against the Ottoman Empire, as
Stephen Bocskai signs a treaty at
Prague on behalf of Prince
Sigismund Báthory. •
February 6 • Sir
Walter Raleigh of England departs from
Plymouth to begin
an expedition to South America • Despite a string of military victories over the Serbian rebels,
Koca Sinan Pasha is dismissed as
Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire by Sultan Mehmed III, and banished to
Malkara. He is replaced by
Serdar Ferhad Pasha, whom he replaces on July 7. •
February 16 – In northern Ireland,
Art MacBaron O'Neill successfully conducts the
assault on the Blackwater Fort, an English military outpost located in
County Armagh and captures it. •
February 20 –
Archduke Ernest of Austria, Governor-General of the
Habsburg Netherlands (now Belgium), dies at the age of 41 and is temporarily replaced by his Spanish assistant,
Pedro Henriquez de Acevedo, Count of Fuentes. •
February 25 – The Goa state archives are established at the city of
Panaji in
Portuguese India (now India's
Goa state) by historian
Diogo do Couto. •
March 20 – After a siege of 13 days, the French town of
Huy (now in Belgium) is captured by the army of the Spanish Netherlands, as the General Charles de Héraugière surrenders to the Baron de la Motte. •
March 26 –
Thado Dhamma Yaza III, who has served since 1589 for the Kingdom of Pegu as the Burmese Viceroy of
Prome (now in the
Bago Region of Myanmar), declares himself to be the King of Prome during the
invasion by the Kingdom of Siam and breaks relations with his father King
Nanda Bayin of Pegu.
April–June •
April 8 (March 29
O.S.) – Combined
Taungoo–
Lan Na armies break the rebel
Thado Dhamma Yaza's siege of
Taungoo, in modern-day
Myanmar. •
April 15 – Sir
Walter Raleigh travels up the
Orinoco River,
in search of the fabled city of
El Dorado. •
May 24 – The
Nomenclator of
Leiden University Library appears, the first printed catalog of an institutional library. •
May 29 –
George Somers and
Amyas Preston travel to aid Raleigh's El Dorado expedition but failing to meet him instead
raid the Spanish
Province of Venezuela •
June 9 –
Battle of Fontaine-Française:
Henry IV of France defeats the
Spanish, but is nearly killed due to his rashness.
July–September •
July 21 – A Spanish expedition of four ships, led by
navigator and
explorer Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira, makes the first
European landing in
Polynesia, on the
Marquesas Islands. Despite an initially good reception with the natives, fighting begins and the Mendaña ships leave after two weeks. One of the ships, the
Santa Ysabel, disappears during the voyage toward the Solomon Islands. •
July 23 – The Spanish raid
Cornwall,
England. •
August 23 –
Battle of Calugareni: The Wallachians, led by
Michael the Brave, accomplish a great tactical victory against a vast army of Turks, led by
Sinan Pasha. •
August 28 – Sir
Francis Drake and Sir
John Hawkins depart from England, on their final voyage to the
Spanish Main, which ends in both of their deaths. •
September 2 –
Battle of the Lippe (
Eighty Years' War): Spanish cavalry, led by
Cristóbal de Mondragón (aged over 80), defeat combined forces of the
Dutch Republic and England led by
Philip of Nassau (who dies of wounds received), on the banks of the
river Lippe in Germany. •
September 8 – The first European colony in the
South Seas is established as Spanish explorer
Álvaro de Mendaña claims
Nendö Island (one of the
Solomon Islands) and claims it for Spain as the colony of Santa Cruz. Malaria, a mutiny of some of the Spanish soldiers, and a fight with the indigenous people kills 47 of the settlers, including Mendaña on October 18.
October–December •
October 26 –
Battle of Giurgiu:
Michael the Brave, led by Transylvanian Prince
Sigismund Báthory, again defeats the Turkish army led by
Sinan Pasha, pushing them on the east side of the Danube. •
October 30 – The surviving members of Spain's Mendaña expedition to Santa Cruz, including Mendaña's widow
Isabel Barreto, decide to abandon the Santa Cruz colony in the South Pacific. •
November 7 – Portuguese explorer
Sebastião Rodrigues Soromenho, who had departed from the Philippines on the ship
San Agustin on July 5 with cargo of Asian silk, porcelain, and almost 100 passengers and crew, drops anchor at
Drakes Bay in what is now the U.S. state of
California. He and some of his crew come ashore, where they are greeted by Native Americans. A gale in a few weeks later sinks the
San Agustin, killing at least 7 people and ruining the ship's cargo. The crew salvages a
launch that they had brought with them. •
November 8 – The
Battle of Guadalupe Island is fought between nine English Navy warships (led by Sir
Francis Drake) and eight Spanish frigates off in the North Atlantic Ocean. The Spanish force wins the battle, capturing one ship and killing 45 English sailors. Both sets of ships proceed toward
Puerto Rico. •
November 9 – In India, Prince
Man Singh I,
Maharaja of Amber within the
Mughal Empire, becomes the Mughal Governor (
subahdar) of
Bengal in what is now Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal. He lays the foundations of a new capital of Bengal,
Akbarnagar (now
Rajmahal,
Jharkhand state). •
November 17 – In the remodeling of the Church of Saint Sylvester in
Rome, the ashes of
Pope Anterus are discovered almost 1,360 years after his death. Anterus had served as Pope for six weeks before dying on January 3,
236. •
November 18 – The settlers of the first attempt to create a European colony in the South Pacific depart from Santa Cruz Island on three surviving ships, the
San Geronimo, the
San Felipe and the
Santa Catalina (which disappears during the attempt to return home). Despite the lack of navigation charts, navigator Pedro Fernandes de Queirós brings the
San Geronimo and the
San Felipe back to Manila Bay, arriving on February 11 after 12 weeks and the deaths of 50 passengers. •
November 22 – The
Battle of San Juan is fought off of the island of
Puerto Rico as an English fleet of 27 ships and 2,500 men, led by
Francis Drake, attempts to invade the Spanish colony. In a three-day battle, the English lose at least eight ships and 400 men, including
Admiral John Hawkins. Drake's fleet withdraws and attempts to conquer Panama. •
December 8 – A group of 80 people from the sunken ship
San Agustin, are able to leave California on the launch which they had brought along, which they name the
San Buenaventura. The group sails past
San Francisco Bay and arrives at Chacala in Mexico on January 17. == Births ==