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Contents: political eventsexploration, colonization commerce science medicine religion theater, film music crime agriculture food and drink |
The Elector Palatine of the Rhine Friedrich IV, 34, organizes a Protestant Union (see 1609). The Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II is compelled to cede the kingdom of Hungary and the government of Austria and Moravia to his brother Matthias in June. Karl of Liechtenstein is raised to the hereditary rank of prince, becoming the first prince of that small Germanic territory (see 1394; 1699; Battle of the White Mountain, 1620).
Paraguay is founded by Jesuits in South America (see Asuncíon, 1537; de Vaca, 1542; agriculture [Arias de Saavedra], 1603).
Captain John Smith is about to be clubbed to death in January on orders from the Powhatan chief Wahunsonacook when (according to the account that Smith will give in his 1624 General Historie of Virginia), "Pocahontas, the king's dearest daughter, when no entreaty could prevail, got his head in her arms, and laid her own upon his to save him from death. Whereat the emperor was contented he should live to make him hatchets" (see 1607; 1613).
Fire destroys Jamestown's fort January 7, but Captain Christopher Newport soon arrives with 110 new Virginia colony settlers. He finds that disease and malnutrition have reduced the original contingent to a group of 40.
Captain John Smith surveys Chesapeake Bay and the Potomac River through much of the summer, using an open boat to look for a passage to the South Sea. He is elected president of the Jamestown Council September 10 and tries to cope with the disease and famine that have ravaged the colony since late summer.
Captain Newport arrives at Jamestown September 29 with a second supply ship and departs in December with Smith's map of Chesapeake Bay and its rivers. He carries back a cargo of pitch, tar, iron ore, soap ashes, and clapboards in place of the worthless mica he has twice carried home under the impression that it was gold.
Henry Hudson searches the Barents Sea for a Northeast Passage on a second voyage for the Muscovy Company (see 1607). His failure persuades the 51-year-old company to direct its future energies to developing its profitable Spitsbergen fishery (see 1611; Hudson, 1609).
France exports so much grain that "it robbeth all Spain of their silver and gold that is brought thither out of their Indies," says English nobleman George Carew, 53, the baron of Clopton.
England's James I entrusts courtier-poet William Alexander and Alexander's cousin with an assignment to go to Scotland and collect debts owed to the crown in the years from 1547 to 1588, awarding them half of anything they collect (see 1606). He knights Alexander later in the year.
The English East India Company ship Hector arrives at Surat after a 17-month voyage and becomes the first company ship to reach India. William Hawkins disembarks with a letter from James I to the late Mughal emperor Akbar asking for trade (see 1609).
The new Mughal emperor Jahangir grants trading concessions to John Mildenhall (see 1603).
The world's first practical telescope is invented by Dutch optician Hans Lippershey, 21, whose device will further the knowledge of astronomy.
Alchemist, astrologer, and mathematician John Dee dies at Mortlake, Surrey, in December at age 81, having contributed greatly to a revival of English interest in mathematics.
Observations diverses sur la stérilité, perte de fruict, fécondité, accouchements et maladies des femmes et enfants nouveaux naiz (Divers Observations on Sterility, Miscarriage, Fertility, Childbirth and Illnesses of Women and Newborn Infants) by midwife Louyse Bourgeois, now 45, is a treatise on childbirth with illustrations and explanations of the causes of miscarriage and premature birth (she advises bedrest to stop hemorrhaging) (see 1601). Although her patron, the duchesse d'Orléans, has died of puerperal fever, Bourgeois replies to her critics with an attack on male doctors. By next year she will have attended more than 2,000 births; her book will be plagiarized by English writers and translated into German and Dutch (see 1626).
English Separatists escape to Amsterdam following increased sanctions by intolerant Puritan authorities. Led and largely financed by bailiff and postmaster William Brewster, 41, of Scrooby, the Separatists include some who were imprisoned last year after a betrayal attempt. They will settle next year at Leyden, and Brewster will become a printer, publishing religious books outlawed in England (see Pilgrims, 1620).
Theater: Timon of Athens by William Shakespeare, who has based his story on a tale by the late William Painter; Pericles, Prince of Tyre by Shakespeare and collaborators; Philaster by Beaumont and Fletcher; The Revenger's Tragedy by English playwright Cyril Tourneur, 33 (or by John Webster, Thomas Middleton, or John Marston).
Playwright Thomas Sackville dies of a heart attack at a council meeting in Whitehall, London, April 19 at age 71.
Opera: L'Arianna 5/28 at the duke of Mantua's Teatro della Arte, with music by Claudio Monteverdi, who is paid a meager stipend by the city's ruling Gonzaga family. Libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini.
English authorities arrest Vice Admiral Sir Richard Hawkins on charges of condoning piracy. He is fined but not otherwise punished.
The Jamestown colonists find the natives growing peanuts, a legume the Powhatan tribesmen call "groundnuts" because they grow underground, whereas all other nuts grow on trees.
An Englishman reporting on his travels describes having seen Italians eating with forks, "not used in any other country that I saw on my travels, neither doe I thinke that any other nation in Christendome doth use it, but only Italy."
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