1735
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The War of the Polish Succession ends October 5 in the Treaty of Vienna that will be ratified in 1738. The treaty legitimizes the elector of Saxony as king of Poland, and he will reign until 1763 as Frederick Augustus II. Austria cedes Naples and Sicily to the Spanish Borbóns (Bourbons) on condition that they never be united with Spain under one crown (see 1734), and the son of Spain's Felipe V assumes the throne of Naples and Sicily as Carlos VII after giving up Parma and Piacenza to Austria. He will reign as king of Naples until 1759 (see 1738).
Russia gives up the late Peter the Great's last Persian acquisitions and joins in an alliance against the Ottoman Turks with help from Persia's Afshar chief Nadir Kuli, who wins a great victory over the Turks at Baghavand and takes Tiflis.
China's third Qing emperor Yin Zhen dies at his native Beijing (Peking) October 8 at age 66 after a 13-year reign, possibly having been murdered by the daughter of a man whom he has had executed. He has had some of his own brothers executed and some imprisoned, removed the imperial princes from control of the major military units (the Eight Banners), required all princes to attend a special palace school, used an extensive system of espionage to have the actions of every minister reported to him, reined in corruption, and reorganized the state's finances to produce more revenue. On the eve of his death he has named his son Hung-Li, 24, as his heir in accordance with the wishes of his own father, and Hung-Li will reign until he abdicates in 1796 as the emperor Qianlong (Chienlung).
Trustees of the Georgia colony prohibit slavery and the importation of rum.
Vincennes, Indiana, has its beginnings in a French settlement on the Wabash River.
Augusta, Georgia, is founded on the Savannah River by settlers in the new Georgia colony.
French naturalist-mathematician Charles-Marie de La Condamine, 34, joins a geographic expedition sent to Peru to measure an arc of the meridian near the equator (see 1743). Also in the party is botanist Joseph de Jussieu, 30, a brother of Antoine and Bernard, who will remain in South America for 35 years. La Condamine next year will send home samples of rubber (see Columbus, 1503), using the term caoutchouc for the condensed juice of the Hevea tree (caoutchouc is a French spelling of the native term for weeping wood) (see solvent, 1762).
Scarlet fever strikes New England in a devastating epidemic (see 1736).
Ergotism breaks out in Württemberg in a severe epidemic (see 1722; 1777).
The Renewed Moravian Church consecrates its first bishop in the person of one David Nitschmann, restoring its own ministry separate from that of Nikolaus, graf von Zinzendorf (see 1734). Zinzendorf sends missionaries to Britain's Georgia colony, where they will have little or no success (see Bethlehem, 1740).
John Wesley and his brother Charles lose their father April 25 and embark in October for the Georgia colony with two other Methodists, a party of German Moravians sent by Nikolaus, graf von Zinzendorf, and George E. Oglethorpe, who returned to England in 1734 and will not remain long at Savannah (see 1733; Wesley, 1729). The Simmonds encounters storms en route, and John Wesley finds his fears greater than his faith. He will provoke criticism at Savannah but will begin the first Methodist society, and although his brother Charles soon returns to England, John will remain for nearly 2 years (see 1738).
John Peter Zenger, 38, gains a landmark victory for freedom of the press. New York governor William Cosby has brought libel charges against the German-born printer for reporting that Cosby attempted to rig a 1733 election held at St. Paul's Church village green in the town of Eastchester. Philadelphia lawyer Andrew Hamilton admits that his client printed the report in his New York Weekly Journal as charged, but he persuades the jury that Zenger printed only the truth and wins acquittal.
Nonfiction: A Defence of Free-Thinking in Mathematics by George Berkeley.
Fiction: Gil Blas (L'Histoire de Gil Blas de Santillana) by Alain-René Le Sage, now 67, whose four-volume pioneer picaresque novel appeared in its first volume 20 years ago and is based in part on the 1618 novel by the late Vicente Espinel; Les Memoires de Comte Comminges by French courtesan and novelist Claudine-Alexandrine Guerin de Tencin, 54, who came to Paris in 1714 at age 33 after having lived a religious life. She attracted a string of lovers with her wit and beauty and used her influence to further the fortunes of her now deceased older brother Cardinal Pierre Guérin de Tencin, who died 9 years later. Imprisoned briefly in the Bastille after one of her lovers shot himself in her house in 1726, she went on to maintain one of the most glittering salons in Paris.
Mathematician-physician-wit John Arbuthnot dies at London February 27 at age 67.
Poetry: Liberty by James Thomson, whose political poem traces the history of civil and religious freedom; The Chace by Staffordshire-born poet and country gentleman William Somerville, 59, whose verses trace the history of hunting up to the time of the Norman Conquest in 1066, providing information on breeding and training dogs, kennel design, and hunting hare, otter, and stag.
Painting: The Pleasure Party by Nicolas Lancret; A Rake's Progress by William Hogarth, who began his eight scenes in 1732 and this year also completes The Good Samaritan and The Distressed Poet.
Parliament passes a Copyright Act (Hogarth Act) to protect artists against pirating of their work in cheap copies. William Hogarth has withheld his eight-part Rake's Progress pending enactment of the new legislation.
Opera: Olimpiade 1/8 at Rome's Theatre Tordinona, with music by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi; Ariodante 1/9 at London's Covent Garden, with Anna Maria Strata del Po singing the role of Genebra, Marie Sallé dancing, music by George Frideric Handel; Alcina 4/17 at Covent Garden, with Sallé appearing dressed as a man (the audience shows its disapproval of her attire), music by Handel; Les Indes galantes 8/23 at the Paris Opéra, with music by Jean Philippe Rameau.
Architect-city planner John Wood lays out Bath's Queen Square and begins work on Prior Park, which will be completed in 1748 as the residence of Wood's patron Ralph Allen (see 1728; hospital, 1738).
Pellagra is described for the first time by Don Gasper Casal, personal physician to Spain's Felipe V (see Italy, 1749).
Botulism makes its first recorded appearance in one of the German states. An outbreak of the deadly food poisoning is traced to some sausage (see 1895).
A March 9 edict of France's Louis XV specifies the size and shape of the classic champagne bottle (see 1728; Moët and Chandon, 1743).
English distillers produce gin at a rate of 5.4 million gallons per year, nearly a gallon for every man, woman, and child (see 1736).
Governors of the Georgia colony enact a law forbidding import of rum and other spirituous liquors, but rum will continue to come in and the law will be repealed in 1742.
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