1664
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Contents: political eventshuman rights, social justice commerce medicine religion communications, media literature art theater, film music food and drink |
Portuguese forces defeat a Spanish army in the Battle of Castelo Rodrigo, building on last year's victory at Ameixal (see 1665).
Austrian field marshal Raimondo Montecuccoli gains a decisive victory over Ottoman forces August 1 at St. Gotthard on the Raab River and is hailed as the savior of Christendom (see 1660). Now 55, he is named generalissimo of all the Hapsburg imperial armies (see 1668).
Nieuw Amsterdam becomes New York August 27 as 300 English soldiers under Colonel Richard Nicolls, 40, take the town from the Dutch under orders from Charles II (see 1626). Nicolls renames the town in honor of the king's brother James, duke of York, who is granted the territory of New Netherland, including eastern Maine and islands to the south and west of Cape Cod, claimed by England on the basis of John Cabot's explorations in the late 1490s. Hudson Valley Dutch patroons become English landlords. The duke of York has granted land between the Hudson and Delaware Rivers June 24 to John Berkeley, first baron Berkeley of Stratton, and Sir George Carteret, 54, formerly governor of the Isle of Jersey and now treasurer of the Royal Navy (see 1665).
French forces occupy the Caribbean island of Montserrat, the English soon drive them off, but the French will seize the island again in 1667 (see Treaties of Breda, 1667).
France's Louis XIV gives the Compagnie des Indes Occidentales authority over the Caribbean island of Martinique (see 1658; 1674).
New France's new governor-general removes four protégés of Bishop François de Montmorency Laval from the colony's sovereign council following a quarrel with the bishop (see 1663; exploration, colonization [Talon], 1665).
English seamen take Africa's Cape Verde Islands from Dutch forces, although no war has been declared.
The Mughal emperor Aurangzeb orders his viceroy in the south to put a stop to the Marathan rebel Shivaji's anti-Muslim uprising (see 1659), but Shivaji stages a midnight raid on the viceroy's camp. The viceroy loses all the fingers of one hand, his son is killed, and he withdraws. Shivaji then sacks the coastal town of Surat and carries off great amounts of plunder as he builds up a large Hindu following among the Mawali hill-dwellers (see 1665).
The Compagnie du Sénégal is founded to provide African slaves for plantations in the French Antilles.
Slavery is introduced into the Caribbean island of Montserrat and will not be abolished until 1834.
Two English women are condemned as witches on professional evidence given by Norwich physician-author Thomas Browne of 1658 "Urne-Buriall" fame.
France's Louis XIV charters the French East India Company (Compagnie des Indes Orientales) as a commercial enterprise to compete with the British and Dutch companies established in 1600 and 1602, respectively. His financial adviser Jean Baptiste Colbert has advised the move (but see 1674).
Traité de l'homme et de la formation du foetus by the late René Descartes states unequivocally that blood in the body is in a state of perpetual circulation (see 1619; Harvey, 1628).
Jan Swammerdam discovers the valves of the lymph vessels (see 1658; 1669; Bartholin, Rudbeck, 1653).
The Black Death kills 24,000 in old Amsterdam while the English are taking Nieuw Amsterdam. The plague spreads to Brussels and throughout much of Flanders, and in December it kills two Frenchmen in London's Drury Lane (see 1663; 1665). Men who put the dead into the deadcarts keep their pipes lit in the belief, now widespread, that tobacco smokers will somehow be spared.
An anti-Christian official at Beijing (Peking) accuses German missionary-astronomer Adam Schall von Bell, now 73, of having plotted against the state and casting a spell that caused the premature death of the late emperor Shunzhi 3 years ago. Envious Chinese astronomers join in the attack. Schall von Bell's newly arrived assistant Ferdinand Verbiest, 41, is not fluent enough in Chinese to defend his superior, and Schall von Bell is sentenced to death by dismemberment, as are some of his Chinese colleagues. An earthquake the next day is perceived as an inauspicious omen, and although five Chinese astronomers are executed Schall von Bell's own sentence is commuted.
The eighth Sikh guru Hari Krishen dies of smallpox at Delhi at age 8, mumbling the words "Baba Bakale," meaning that his successor will be found in the village of Bakala. Having astonished visiting Brahmans with his knowledge of the Hindu scripture Bhagavadgita, he is succeeded by Tegh Bahadur, a son of the late guru Hargobind, who will head the sect until 1675.
Japanese merchants establish express mail service between Edo and Osaka. The three-times-per-month service takes 6 days as compared with 30 for ordinary mail.
Poetry: Hudibras (part II) by Samuel Butler; The Compleat Gamester by English poet Charles Cotten, 34, is more popular than his burlesque of Virgil which is also published (see everyday life [Hoyle], 1742).
Poet-statesman Miklós Zrínyi is killed by a wild boar at Csáktornya November 18 at age 44 after starting an organization to oppose Hungary's Hapsburg ruler.
Painting: The Travellers by Dutch landscape painter Meyndert Hobbema, 25; Young Woman Weighing Gold, The Interior of the Burgomasters' Council Chamber in the Amsterdam Town Hall, and A Couple Walking in the Citizens' Hall of the Amsterdam Town Hall by Pieter de Hooch; The Christening Feast and The Effects of Intemperance by Jan Steen; The Lacemaker by Johannes Vermeer; Apollo and Daphne by Nicolas Poussin. Francisco de Zurbarán dies at Madrid August 27 at age 65.
Theater: The Indian Queen by John Dryden and Sir Robert Howard in January at London's Theatre Royal in Bridges Street; The Forced Marriage (Le mariage forcé by Molière 1/29 at the Palais-Royal, Paris; The Comical Revenge, or Love in a Tub by English playwright George Etherege, 29, in March at the Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, London. The intrigue of Etherege's stylish Sir Frederick Frollick enlivens his comedy of manners, which is written in heroic couplets and blank verse, has a farcical subplot, and gains the playwright entrée to London's haut monde, where he soon becomes a friend of the London wit Sir Charles Smedley, the earl of Dorset, and the earl of Rochester; The Royal Ladies by John Dryden in June at London's Royal Theatre in Bridges Street; The Thebans, or The Enemy Brothers (La Thébaïde, ou les frères ennemis) by French playwright Jean Baptiste Racine, 25, 6/20 at the Palais-Royal, Paris, with Jean Baptiste Molière's company; Othon by Pierre Corneille 7/31 at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, Paris.
Playwright-poet Andreas Gryphius dies at his native Glogau, Silesia, July 16 at age 47.
The French horn becomes an orchestral instrument.
Oratorio: Christmas Oratorio by Heinrich Schütz at Dresden.
Samuel Pepys buys forks for his household, but most Englishmen continue to eat with their fingers and will continue to do so until early in the next century lest they be considered effete or, in the opinion of some clergymen, even sacrilegious. A man going out to dinner has for centuries brought his own spoon and knife, the spoon being folded into the pocket and the knife carried in a scabbard attached to the belt; more men now carry folding forks as well.
The English East India Company purchases two pounds and two ounces of "good thea" for presentation to Charles II lest he feel "wholly neglected by the Company" (see 1615), but few Englishmen have ever tasted tea.
Samuel Pepys makes an entry in his diary for November 24, 1664: "To a Coffee-house, to drink jocolatte, very good." Who picks up the tab he does not say; cocoa costs 10 to 15 shillings per pound, making it prohibitively dear for all but the very rich.
The Kronenbourg Brewery founded in Alsace will continue into the 21st century to produce beer.
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