1600s (decade)
1600s: events by year
Contents: 1600 1601 1602 1603 1604 1605 1606 1607 1608 1609
January–June
July–December
Date unknown
January–June
July–December
Date unknown
January–June
- January 3 – Battle of Kinsale: The battle happened on Thursday, 3 January 1602 according to the Gregorian Calendar used by the Irish and Spanish forces in the battle, although, for the English who were still using the old Julian Calendar, the date of the battle was Thursday, 24 December 1601.
- February 2 (Candlemas night) – First known production of William Shakespeare's comedy Twelfth Night, in London.[3]
- March 20 – The United East India Company is established by the United Provinces States-General in Amsterdam, with the stated intention of capturing the spice trade from the Portuguese.
- May 15 – Bartolomew Gosnold becomes the first European at Cape Cod.
- June – James Lancaster's East India Company fleet arrives at Achin (now Aceh), Sumatra to deal with the local ruler. Having defeated Portugal's ally, the ruler is happy to do business, and Lancaster seizes a large Portuguese galleon and loots it.
July–December
Ongoing events
Date unknown
January–June
July–December
Ongoing events
Date unknown
January–June
July–December
Date unknown
- The Sikh Holy Scripture Guru Granth Sahib is compiled and edited by Guru Arjan.
- France begins settling Acadia, first successful French North American colony.
- France begins settling French Guiana.
- England concludes the Treaty of London with Spain, ending its involvement in the Eighty Years' War.
- Za Dengel is deposed as Emperor of Ethiopia by Za Sellase, who restores his cousin Yaqob.
- The Table Alphabeticall, the first known English dictionary to be organized by alphabetical ordering, is published.
- Before 1 October, Huntingdon Beaumont completes the Wollaton Wagonway, built to transport coal from the mines at Strelley to Wollaton just west of Nottingham, England. This is currently the world's oldest wagonway with provenance. The exact date is unknown, but a surviving account book for the year ended 30 September 1604 proves it was built within the preceding 12 months.
- The A-text of Christopher Marlowe's The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus is officially published.
- Lancelot de Casteau's L'Ouverture de cuisine published in Liège, including the first printed recipe for choux pastry.
January–June
July–December
Date unknown
- Francis Bacon publicizes Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Humane.
- The first half of Miguel de Cervantes's landmark novel Don Quixote ("El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha" or "The Ingenious Hidalgo Don Quixote of La Mancha") — one of the earliest novels in the western literary tradition, is published and becomes Cervantes's first literary success.
- Polish troops occupy Moscow.
- Tokugawa Ieyasu abdicates as shogun of Japan, becoming Ogosho. His son Tokugawa Hidetada succeeds him to the office.
- Crew of the Olive become the first British visitors to Barbados.
- French Huguenot refugees settle in Dublin and Waterford.
- The Priory of St. Gregory's is founded at Douai, Flanders, at this time in the Spanish Netherlands, by its first prior, Saint John Roberts, and other exiles, thus becoming the first English Benedictine house to renew conventual life after the Reformation. More than two centuries later the community will establish Downside Abbey back in England.
- De Nieuwe Tijdinghen, a Dutch proto-newspaper, is published.
- Central Mexico's Amerindian population reaches one million.
January–June
July–December
Date unknown
January–June
- January 13 – The Bank of Genoa fails after the announcement of national bankruptcy in Spain.
- January 19 – San Agustin Church in Manila is officially completed; it is currently the oldest church in the Philippines
- January 20 – A massive wave sweeps along the Bristol Channel, possibly a tsunami, killing 2,000 people.
- March 10 – Susenyos defeats the combined armies of Yaqob and Abuna Petros II at the Battle of Gol in Gojjam, which makes him Emperor of Ethiopia.
- April 25 – Battle of Gibraltar: A Dutch fleet destroys a Spanish fleet anchored in the Bay of Gibraltar (Battle of Gibraltar).
- April 26 – English colonists make landfall at Cape Henry, Virginia, later moving up the James River to found Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in what is now the United States.
- May 14 – Jamestown, Virginia, is settled as what would become the first permanent English colony in North America.
- May 15 – Jamestown: Christopher Newport, George Percy, Gabriel Archer, and others travel 6 days exploring along the James River up to the falls and Powhatan's village.
- May 26
- Jamestown: The president directs the fort to be strengthened and armed against the many attacks of the natives: "Hereupon the President was contented the Fort should be pallisadoed, the ordinance mounted, his men armed and exercised, for many were the assaults and Ambuscadoes of the Savages ..." [John Smith, Proceedings (Barbour 1964)]
- 200 armed Indians attack the Jamestown settlement, killing 2 and wounding 10.
- May 28 – Jamestown: The Fort is pallisadoed: "we laboured, pallozadoing our fort" [Gabriel Archer (Arber)].
- June 5 – John Hall marries Susanna, daughter of William Shakespeare.
- June 8 – Newton rebellion: The Tresham landowners family kills 40–50 peasants during protests against the enclosure of common land in Newton, Northamptonshire, UK, at the culmination of the Midland Revolt.
- June 10 – Jamestown: John Smith is released from arrest and sworn in as a member of the colony Council.
- June 15 – Jamestown: The triangular fort is completed and armed: "The fifteenth of June we had built and finished our Fort, which was triangle wise, having three Bulwarkes, at every corner, like a halfe Moone, and foure or five pieces of Artillerie mounted in them. We had made our selves sufficiently strong for these Savages. We had also sowne most of our Corne on two Mountaines." [George Percy (Tyler 1952:19)]
- June 22 – Christopher Newport sails back to England.
- June 27 – Jamestown: The colony bears extreme toil in strengthening the fort [from John Smith, Proceedings (Barbour 1964:210)].
July–December
- August 13 – The ship Gift of God of the Plymouth Company arrives at the mouth of the modern-day Kennebec River in Maine. English colonists establish a Fort St. George, also known as the Popham Colony. The settlement lasts little more than a year, before residents return to England in the first ocean going ship built in the New World, a 30-ton pinnace called The Virginia.
- September 14 – Flight of the Earls: Hugh O'Neill, 2nd Earl of Tyrone, and Rory O'Donnell, 1st Earl of Tyrconnell, leave Ireland with 90 followers, never to return.
- September 10: Jamestown: President Wingfield is deposed, and then Ratcliffe is elected.
- December – Jamestown: In early December, John Smith is captured by Opechancanough.
Date unknown
January–June
July–December
- July 3 – Quebec City is founded by Samuel de Champlain.
- July – The English ship Mary and Margaret, captained by Christopher Newport, leaves England bound for Jamestown, Virginia.[8]
- August 24 – The first official English representative to India lands at Surat.
- September 10 – John Smith is elected council president of Jamestown, and begins expanding the fort.
- September 21 – The University of Oviedo, Spain is founded.
- October 1 – At Jamestown, a second supply ship, the Mary and Margaret, arrives with Christopher Newport, including 70 settlers, bringing the population back up to 120; the passengers include 8 glassmen.
- October 2 – Dutch lens maker Hans Lippershey demonstrates the first telescope in the Dutch parliament.
- December – Jamestown: Christopher Newport returns to England carrying cargo with "tryals of Pitch, Tarre, Glasse, Frankincense, Sope Ashes ..."
Date unknown
.
January–June
July–December
- July 6 – Bohemia is granted freedom of religion (Letter of Majesty).
- July 23 – Jamestown: A hurricane at sea separates the 9 ships (600 more settlers) en route, one ship sinks, and the ship Sea Venture wrecks at Bermuda.
- July 28 – Bermuda is first settled by survivors of the English Sea Venture, en route to Virginia.
- July 30 – At what is now Crown Point, New York, Samuel de Champlain participates in a battle between the Huron and Iroquois, shooting and killing two Iroquois chiefs; this helps set the tone for French–Iroquois relations for the next 100 years.
- August 25 – Galileo Galilei demonstrates his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers.
- August 28 – Henry Hudson is the first European to see Delaware Bay.
- August – Jamestown: Seven ships arrive at the colony, with 200–300 men, women, and children, reporting that the Sea Venture wrecked near Bermuda.
- September 2 – Henry Hudson enters New York Bay aboard the Halve Maen.
- September 10 – Jamestown: Capt. George Percy replaces Captain John Smith as president of the Council, and Smith returns to England.
- September 11 – Valencia expels all the Moriscos (see April 4).
- September 12 – Henry Hudson discovers the Hudson River aboard the Halve Maen.
- October 12 – "Three Blind Mice" is published by London teenage songwriter Thomas Ravenscroft.
Date unknown
Significant people
Births
Deaths
References
- ^ a b Palmer, Alan; Veronica (1992). The Chronology of British History. London: Century Ltd. pp. 166–168. ISBN 0-7126-5616-2.
- ^ Edwards, Phillip, ed (1985). Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. New Cambridge Shakespeare. Cambridge University Press. p. 8. ISBN 0-521-29366-9. "Any dating of Hamlet must be tentative." Scholars date its writing as between 1599 and 1601.
- ^ Shakespeare, William (2001). Smith, Bruce R.. ed. Twelfth Night: Texts and Contexts. Boston, Mass: Bedford/St Martin's. p. 2. ISBN 0312202199.
- ^ http://homepage.ntu.edu.tw/~borao/2Profesores/massacre.pdf
- ^ http://seds.org/~spider/spider/Vars/sn1604.html
- ^ http://www.nasaimages.org/luna/servlet/detail/nasaNAS~4~4~12406~114566:Three-Great-Eyes-on-Kepler-s-Supern
- ^ a b Scholars date completion as between 1603 and 1606. Boyce, Charles (1990). Encyclopaedia of Shakespeare. New York: Roundtable Press.
- ^ "First Germans at Jamestown 1" (history), Davitt Publications, 2000, webpage: GHfirst.