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The duke of Argyll's Scottish Royalists disperse Jacobite troops in January. The pretender James Edward Stuart flees to France February 5, and Jacobite leaders captured at Preston last year are executed (see 1715). Sir James Radcliffe, 27, 3rd earl of Derwentwater, and William Gordon, 6th Viscount Kenmure, are both beheaded. The countess of Mar, whose husband has fled to France, continues to live in her house in the Privy Gardens of London's Whitehall Palace, and although overzealous patriots sometimes attack her, she is protected by the fact that her family is solidly Whig, and her husband insists that she had no part in his political activities.
Simon Fraser, baron Lovat, receives a pardon and liferent on the Lovat estates as a reward for having brought in his clan on the side of the Hanoverian king George I, an action he took to obtain his cousin's estates (see 1745). The Pretender, now 27, will get married in 1719 to Maria Clementina Sobieska, a granddaughter of the late Polish king Jan III Sobieski.
Eugene of Savoy defeats Ottoman forces August 5 at Peterwardein, and the Holy Roman Emperor Karl VI enters the war against the Turks.
Russia's Peter the Great receives a letter from his son Alexius Petrovich requesting permission to become a monk (see 1712). Peter writes to Alexius from abroad August 26, urging him to come home and rejoin the army without delay if he wishes to remain czarevich. But Alexius flees to Vienna, places himself under the protection of his brother-in-law the emperor Karl VI, and is sent first to the Tyrolean fortress of Ahrenberg, then to the castle of San Elmo at Naples in company with his Finnish mistress Afrosina (see 1718).
Admiral François-Louis Rousselet, marquis de Château-Renault, dies at Paris November 15 at age 79.
Japan's Tokugawa shōgun Ietsugu dies at age 7 after 4 years in power and in the absence of any brothers is succeeded by his strong-willed cousin Yoshimune, 31, who has headed the Kii feudal fief and will rule until 1745. Ietsugu's chief adviser has been scholar Hakuseki Arai, now 59, who was also the late Ienobu's chief adviser but is now forced to retire. Yoshimune will allow the Dutch at Deshima to bring Western books into Japan, help merchants establish a trading system, and build extensive irrigation projects to aid agriculture.
A company of Virginia colonists crosses the Blue Ridge Mountains into the valley of the Shenandoah River under the leadership of Alexander Spotswood (see 1714; Iroquois treaty, 1722).
"Wealth depends on commerce, and commerce depends on circulation [of money]," says Scottish monetary reformer John Law, now 45, and he persuades the French regent Philippe d'Orléans to issue a royal decree May 5 allowing him to open a private bank under the name Law & Cie, investing his entire fortune in the enterprise and promising to give 500,000 livres to charity should his venture fail (see Law Boisguilbert, 1705). Tall, attractive, elegantly attired, and intelligent, Law has gained a place in Paris society even while fleecing Parisians at their high-stakes games of basset and faro. "My secret is to make gold out of paper," he says, and since commerce is based entirely on gold, which has perennially been in short supply, his ideas find a ready reception. Some Parisians are so rich that the mistress of a nobleman eats a 500,000-franc note in a frivolous whim to outdo the legendary Roman general Lucullus, who swallowed a diamond worth the equivalent of 100,000 francs. But France's treasury has been exhausted by the wars of the late Louis XIV, who borrowed gold from his subjects and gave them worthless paper in exchange, spending 2 billion livres more in his final 14 years than he collected in taxes. The nation is heavily in debt, its coinage has been debased, coins fluctuate wildly in value, and trade is virtually at a standstill, with agriculture in distress and tens of thousands of workers unemployed. But the duc de Villars has become Philippe's financial adviser and strongly opposes Law's measures, causing him to lose favor briefly at the court. Like many other mercantilists, Law believes that an increase in the quantity of money will stimulate growth of the national product and increase national power, but unlike the others he believes in a central bank that can issue paper money in the form of bank notes that can be redeemed on demand for coin "of the weight and standard of the day of issue" and can circulate in place of scarce gold and silver (see 1717).
The East India Company receives exemption from Indian customs duties and gains other concessions in return for gifts and medical services.
The East India Company receives permission to bring a ship of 650 tons with trading goods into Portobello for the annual Spanish American trade fair (see 1713; Vernon, 1739).
Russia's Peter the Great enforces tax collection with extreme measures: a landowner suspected of cheating on his taxes risks being stretched out and broken on a wheel, and men with beards are taxed because Peter considers beards uncultured and unnecessary; the tax is graduated, with a peasant required to pay only a few kopecks per year. Peter's administrator Aleksandr M. Menshikov, now 42, comes under attack for greed and corruption.
Mathematician-philosopher Gottfried W. Leibniz dies at Hanover November 14 at age 70, having been confined to bed with gout since meeting with Peter the Great in June.
New York City's Common Council passes an ordinance requiring midwives to take out licenses and swear a version of the traditional midwives' oath.
China outlaws Christian religious teaching, following the lead of Japanese shōguns (see 1713).
Diario di Roma begins publication. It is the first Italian newspaper.
Military officer and author Louis-Armand de Lom d'Arce, Baron Lahontan, dies at Hanover April 21 at age 49.
Painting: La Leçon d'amour by Antoine Watteau; Fruit, Flowers, and Insects by Rachel Ruysch, now 52, who returns from Düsseldorf to Amsterdam following the death of the Elector Palatine. Japanese painter Korin Ogata dies at age 58. He has gained fame for his Tale of Ise and screens painted with iris and red and white plum trees.
Playwright William Wycherley dies at London January 1 at age 75.
Opera: Italian soprano Faustina Bordoni, 16, makes her debut at Venice singing in the C. F. Pollarolo opera Ariodante. She is engaged by the Elector Palatine to perform at his court.
Oratorio: Judithea by Venetian violinist-composer Antonio (Lucio) Vivaldi, 41, who was ordained a priest at age 28, has taught violin since 1704 at the Conservatorio dell' Ospedale della Pietà, and is required to supply two concerti per month to the Conservatory.
Lucca-born composer-violinist Francesco Geminiani, 28, publishes his Opus I sonatas for violin and continuo, having established a reputation for his performances in England.
Paris café proprietor Procope (Francesco Procopio dei Coltelli) dies, and his son Alexandre takes over Café Procope, hiring Italian musicians to entertain patrons of the establishment, which remains strictly for men (see 1670). Some ladies have their coachmen stop in front of the place and bring them coffee, which they sip without alighting from their carriages.
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