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Contents: political eventsexploration, colonization commerce religion education communications, media literature art theater, film population |
The czar of Muscovy Boris Godunov dies at Moscow April 13 at age 52. He is succeeded for a few months by his only son, but the new czar Fyodor II is murdered by enemies of the Godunovs. The only legal heir of Fedor I was killed in exile at Uglich in 1591, but an imposter claiming to be that son gains support from boyars, Cossacks, and Polish volunteers. The "false Demetrius" enters Moscow June 19 and begins a reign of 11 months.
Poland has a political crisis as the Sejm (legislature) adjourns without imposing new taxes to fund the nation's military. Sweden's new king Karl (Charles) IX senses an opportunity and mobilizes an army of about 12,000 that includes German, Dutch, and Scottish mercenaries and even some Hungarians and Poles. The Polish general Jan Karol Chodkiewicz, 44, manages by early summer to collect a 5,000-man army, of whom 1,500 are needed to garrison a few major forts. A Swedish force of about 3,000 men, composed mostly of German mercenaries and under the command of Joachim Mansfeld, lands at Dynemunt August 12 with two large cannon to blockade Riga. About 4,000 Dutch and Finnish mercenaries arrive a few days later. Karl (Charles) himself arrives August 30 with about 4,000 Swedes and Scots, but although Chodkiewicz is outnumbered four to one he defeats the invaders in September on the Dvina River at Kircholm (Salaspils); Sweden's king escapes alive, but only barely.
Siam's king Phra Naret (Naresuan) dies April 25 at age 49 while campaigning on the Salween River. He has gained independence from Burma and defeated three invading Burmese armies in his 15-year reign, given his country an outlet to the sea by seizing the Burmese peninsular provinces of Tavoy and Tennasarim, and made Cambodia a vassal state (see 1796). Phra Naret is succeeded by his brother Ekathotsarot.
India's Mughal emperor Akbar dies October 17 at age 62 after a 49-year reign that has established the dynasty that will rule until 1858. Possibly the victim of poisoning, Akbar is succeeded by his son, 36, who has been called Prince Selim. He will reign until 1627 as Jahangir ("Conqueror of the World") but is a drunk and will add little territory to the empire. When he marries in 1611, his empress, Nur Jahan ("Light of the World"), will control the realm.
Japan's shōgun Ieyasu Tokugawa, now 62, makes his son Hidetada, 26, co-shōgun in a move to ease the succession. Hidetada is Ieyasu's third son but is more even-tempered than his older brothers.
English explorer George Waymouth lands on an island off the North American coast, finds it populated by Wampanoag tribespeople, and calls it Nanticut (see 1658).
French colonists in Acadia (later Nova Scotia) found Port Royal.
Navigator John Davis is killed by Japanese pirates off Bintan Island on the night of December 29 at age 55 (approximate).
English pilot William Adams, now 39, obtains an invitation to establish a Dutch trading post in Japan. Forced to remain since his shipwreck in 1600, Adams has become foreign adviser to the Tokugawa shōgun, adopted the Japanese name Anjin Miura, and taken a Japanese wife (see 1609; 1613).
Dye wood costs English dyers six times what it cost in 1550 (see 1589; 1593; 1615).
English ships of the East India Company reach Bantam and load up with pepper (see 1607; Lancaster, 1603).
Pope Clement VIII dies at Rome March 5 at age 70 after a 13-year reign in which he has brought peace between France and Spain (1598) and between France and Savoy, made efforts to improve the lot of English Catholics, established the Scottish College at Rome, and supported the English colleges elsewhere on the Continent. Clement is succeeded April 1 by the Florentine Alessandro Ottaviano Cardinal de' Medici, 69, who begins a reign as Leo XI but dies April 27 and is succeeded by Camillo Cardinal Borghese, 52, who wins election May 16 and will reign until 1621 as Paul V, improving the lot of Italian peasants.
Calvinist theologian and translator Théodore de Bèze dies at Geneva October 13 at age 86.
The Gunpowder Plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament in revenge against harsh penal laws enacted against Roman Catholics comes to light when English Catholic Guy Fawkes, 35, is arrested the night of November 4 while entering the gunpowder-filled cellar under Parliament. A convert to Catholicism who has served with the Spanish in Flanders, Fawkes has conspired with Robert Catesby, 32, who has schemed with other Catholic zealots since 1603. Under torture, Fawkes reveals the names of his co-conspirators, who also include Thomas Percy, 45, and Thomas Winter, 33. Catesby is killed while resisting arrest at Holbeche House in Staffordshire November 8; Percy is mortally wounded while fleeing arrest; Winter and his brother Robert will be hanged next year along with Fawkes.
Sikhs in the Punjab complete the Golden Temple in the middle of the sacred pool at the 28-year-old city of Amritsar, now the center of Sikh worship; the temple's copper dome is covered in gold leaf.
Catherine de Vivonne de Savelli, 17, marquise de Rambouillet, finds herself annoyed by the coarseness of Parisian society under Henri IV, packs her husband off to the country, and makes her home a center for refined and witty conversation—the first great Paris salon.
The world's first newspaper begins publication at Antwerp under the direction of local printer Abraham Verkoeven, a notorious drunkard (see Wolfenbuttel, Strasbourg, 1609).
Nonfiction: A Relation of the State of Religion by English parliamentary leader Sir Edwin Sandys, 43, who while traveling on the Continent from 1593 to 1599 wrote the tolerant analysis of contemporary religious faiths. Sandys antagonizes James I by rejecting the doctrine of the divine right of kings and espousing, instead, the principle of a constitutional monarchy.
Chronicler John Stow dies in poverty at London in April at age 79 (approximate).
Poetry: Poems Lyric and Pastoral by Michael Drayton, whose "Ballad of Agincourt" begins, "Fair stood the wind for France."
Painting: The Crucifixion, The Adoration of the Shepherds, The Resurrection, Pentecost, St. Peter, and St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist by El Greco; frescoes for Rome's Farnese Palace by Annibale Caracci.
Theater: Volpone, or The Fox by Ben Jonson; The Honest Whore, Part II, by Thomas Dekker and Thomas Middleton.
New Spain has a native population of 1,075,000, down from 6 million in 1547 and 11 million in 1518 as a result of disease and exploitation imposed by the conquistadors.
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