January–March •
January 4 • A naval
battle takes place in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of
Goa in South India, as a Netherlands fleet commanded by Admiral Adam Westerwolt decimates the Portuguese fleet. • A fleet of 80 Spanish ships led by Governor-General
Sebastián Hurtado de Corcuera attacks the Sultanate of Sulu in the Philippines by beginning an invasion of
Jolo island, but
Sultan Muwallil Wasit I puts up a stiff resistance. •
January 8 –
Shimabara Rebellion: The
siege of Shimabara Castle ends after 27 days in
Japan's
Tokugawa shogunate (part of modern-day Nagasaki prefecture) as the rebel peasants flee reinforcements sent by the shogun
Tokugawa Iemitsu. •
January 22 – The Shimabara and Amakusa rebels, having joined up after fleeing the shogun's troops, begin the
defense of Hara Castle in modern-day
Minamishimabara in the
Nagasaki prefecture. The siege lasts more than 11 weeks before the peasants are massacred. •
February 28 – The Scottish
National Covenant is signed in
Edinburgh,
Scotland, in opposition to changes to the
Church of Scotland proposed by
King Charles I. •
March 3 –
Thirty Years' War:
Battle of Rheinfelden – A mercenary army under
Bernard of Saxe-Weimar, fighting for France, defeats forces of the Holy Roman Empire. •
March 5 –
Thirty Years' War: The
Treaty of Hamburg is signed by
France and
Sweden, providing the latter with funds. •
March 22 •
Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan and his sons capture the city of
Kandahar from the
Safavids. •
Anne Hutchinson is banished from the
Massachusetts Bay Colony for
heresy and goes to
Rhode Island. •
March 28 – Dutch merchant
Willem Kieft is appointed
Director of New Netherland by the
Dutch East India Company to succeed Wouter van Twiller. •
March 29 – Settlers from Sweden arrive on the ships
Kalmar Nyckel and
Fogel Grip to establish the settlement of
New Sweden in
Delaware, beginning the
Swedish colonization of the Americas.
April–June •
April 3 – Preacher
John Wheelwright is banished from
Boston and founds
Exeter, New Hampshire. •
April 14 – The Netherlands colonizes
Mauritius, with colonists from the ship
Dragon going ashore after sighting it the day before, an event chronicled by British traveler
Peter Mundy. •
April 15 –
Shogunate forces defeat the last remnants of the
Shimabara Rebellion, in the fortress of Hara. In the aftermath, suppression of Christianity is strictly enforced, Portuguese traders are expelled and Japan enters more than two centuries of isolationism. •
April 25 – Settlement of what will become
New Haven, Connecticut begins. •
May 13 – Construction begins on the
Red Fort in
Delhi (India) for
Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan who is transferring his capital there from
Agra. •
May 23 – The Kandyan Treaty is signed between
Singhala King
Rajasimha II and the Dutch, to rid
Ceylon of the Portuguese. •
June 20 –
Eighty Years' War:
Battle of Kallo – Spanish troops under
Ferdinand of Austria defeat a much larger Dutch force, near
Antwerp. •
June 27 –
Patriarch Cyril of Constantinople is deposed for
high treason, strangled and thrown into the sea by
Janissaries, on
Ottoman Sultan Murad IV's command.
July–September •
July 16 –
Thirty Years' War: The
siege of Saint-Omer ends after almost two months as the French-held Flemish city falls after being besieged by Spanish and German troops. •
July 20 – Scottish
Covenanters meet at
Muchalls Castle to compose a response to the 14 demands of the
Bishops of Aberdeen. •
July 28 –
Thirty Years' War: Swedish Army Field Marshal
Johan Banér begins a destructive campaign against the
Duchy of Pomerania, held by the Holy Roman Empire. •
August 15 – The Portuguese expedition led by
Pedro Teixeira completes the first ascent of the
Amazon River, crossing the Quijos River and arriving at
Quito in
Ecuador soon after (the same trip had been made in the opposite direction, in
1541). •
August 22 –
Franco-Spanish War (1635–59): The
Battle of Getaria is fought between the navies of France and Spain, with the French sinking all 17 Spanish Navy ships and killing 2,000 Spanish sailors and officers. •
August 27 –
Tayyar Mehmed Pasha becomes the new
Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire after
Bayram Pasha dies while fighting in
Baghdad. •
September 6 – The Finnish
mail service, predecessor of
Posti Group, is established. •
September 21 – The
Treaty of Hartford is signed, ending the
Pequot War between British American colonists and the Pequot. •
September – John Spofford arrives in
Boston Harbor, on the ship
John of London, and is one of the first people to establish Rowely,
Essex County, Massachusetts.
October–December •
October 21 –
The Great Thunderstorm in
Widecombe-in-the-Moor, England: probable
ball lightning strikes the parish church, killing 4 and injuring about 60. •
November 21 – The General Assembly of the
Church of Scotland is summoned to Glasgow, by
King Charles I. •
November 24 –
New Haven, the first planned city in America, is founded when local Indians make a deed of Quinnipiac to Theophilus Eaton and other English settlers. •
December 18 –
Cardinal Mazarin becomes the first adviser to French potentate
Richelieu, on the death of
Leclerc du Tremblay. •
December 21 – The full moon is in total eclipse from 1:12 to 2:47 UT, and the solstice occurs later in the day, at 16:05 UT. •
December 25 –
Capture of Baghdad by the Ottomans under
Sultan Murad IV.
Date unknown • Shipwrecked English
buccaneer Peter Wallace, called
Balis by the Spanish, settles near and perhaps gives his name to the
Belize River, the
first known European settlement in
Belize. • The
Peking Gazette makes an official switch in its production process of newspapers, from
woodblock printing to
movable type printing (private newspapers in
Ming dynasty China were first mentioned in
1582). == Births ==