After being expelled from Malaysia, Singapore became independent as the Republic of Singapore on 9 August 1965, with Lee Kuan Yew and Yusof bin Ishak as the first prime minister and president respectively. In 1967, the country co-founded the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Race riots broke out once more in 1969. Lee Kuan Yew's emphasis on rapid economic growth, support for business entrepreneurship, and limitations on internal democracy shaped Singapore's policies for the next half-century. Economic growth continued throughout the 1980s, with the unemployment rate falling to 3% and real GDP growth averaging at about 8% up until 1999. During the 1980s, Singapore began to shift towards high-tech industries, such as the wafer fabrication sector, in order to remain competitive as neighbouring countries began manufacturing with cheaper labour. Singapore Changi Airport was opened in 1981 and Singapore Airlines was formed. The Port of Singapore became one of the world's busiest ports and the service and tourism industries also grew immensely during this period.
The PAP, which has remained in power since independence, is believed to rule in an authoritarian manner by some activists and opposition politicians who see the strict regulation of political and media activities by the government as an infringement on political rights. In response, Singapore has seen several significant political changes, such as the introduction of the Non-Constituency members of parliament in 1984 to allow up to three losing candidates from opposition parties to be appointed as MPs. Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs) were introduced in 1988 to create multi-seat electoral divisions, intended to ensure minority representation in parliament. Nominated members of parliament were introduced in 1990 to allow non-elected non-partisan MPs. The Constitution was amended in 1991 to provide for an Elected President who has veto power in the use of national reserves and appointments to public office.
In 1990, Goh Chok Tong succeeded Lee and became Singapore's second prime minister. During Goh's tenure, the country went through the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the 2003 SARS outbreak. In 2004, Lee Hsien Loong, the eldest son of Lee Kuan Yew, became the country's third prime minister. Lee Hsien Loong's tenure included the 2008 global financial crisis, the resolution of a dispute over land ownership at Tanjong Pagar railway station between Singapore and Malaysia, and the introduction of the 2 integrated resorts (IRs), located at the Marina Bay Sands and Resorts World Sentosa. The People's Action Party (PAP) suffered its worst ever electoral results in 2011, winning just 60% of votes, amidst debate over issues including the influx of foreign workers and the high cost of living. On 23 March 2015, Lee Kuan Yew died, and a one-week period of public mourning was observed nationwide. Subsequently, the PAP regained its dominance in Parliament through the September general election, receiving 69.9% of the popular vote, although this remained lower than the 2001 tally of 75.3% and the 1968 tally of 86.7%. The 2020 election held in July saw the PAP drop to 61% of the vote, while the opposition Workers' Party took 10 of the 93 seats, the highest number ever won by an opposition party.


January 18 – Third voyage of James Cook: Captain James Cook, with ships HMS Resolution and HMS Discovery, first views Oahu then Kauai in the Hawaiian Islands of the Pacific Ocean, which he names the Sandwich Islands.
February 5 –
South Carolina becomes the first state to ratify the Articles of Confederation.
General John Cadwalader shoots and seriously wounds Major General Thomas Conway in a duel after a dispute between the two officers over Conway's continued criticism of General George Washington's leadership of the Continental Army.
February 6 – American Revolutionary War – In Paris, the Treaty of Alliance and the Treaty of Amity and Commerce are signed by the United States and France, signaling official French recognition of the new republic.
February 23 – American Revolutionary War – Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben arrives at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania and begins to train the American troops.
March 6–October 24 – Captain Cook explores and maps the Pacific Northwest coast of North America, from Cape Foulweather (Oregon) to the Bering Strait.
March 10 – American Revolutionary War – George Washington approves the dishonorable discharge of Lieutenant Frederick Gotthold Enslin, for "attempting to commit sodomy, with John Monhort a soldier".


It is generally considered that in Europe World War II started on 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland and the United Kingdom and France's declaration of war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of the war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or the earlier Japanese invasion of Manchuria, on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously, and the two wars became World War II in 1941. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939. Others view the Spanish Civil War as the start or prelude to World War II.
The exact date of the war's end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945 (V-J Day), rather than with the formal surrender of Japan on 2 September 1945, which officially ended the war in Asia. A peace treaty between Japan and the Allies was signed in 1951. A 1990 treaty regarding Germany's future allowed the reunification of East and West Germany to take place and resolved most post-World War II issues. No formal peace treaty between Japan and the Soviet Union was ever signed, although the state of war between the two countries was terminated by the Soviet–Japanese Joint Declaration of 1956, which also restored full diplomatic relations between them.


The Kuomintang (KMT) party in China launched a unification campaign against regional warlords and nominally unified China in the mid-1920s, but was soon embroiled in a civil war against its former Chinese Communist Party allies and new regional warlords. In 1931, an increasingly militaristic Empire of Japan, which had long sought influence in China as the first step of what its government saw as the country's right to rule Asia, staged the Mukden Incident as a pretext to invade Manchuria and establish the puppet state of Manchukuo.
China appealed to the League of Nations to stop the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Japan withdrew from the League of Nations after being condemned for its incursion into Manchuria. The two nations then fought several battles, in Shanghai, Rehe and Hebei, until the Tanggu Truce was signed in 1933. Thereafter, Chinese volunteer forces continued the resistance to Japanese aggression in Manchuria, and Chahar and Suiyuan. After the 1936 Xi'an Incident, the Kuomintang and communist forces agreed on a ceasefire to present a united front to oppose Japan.


When civil war broke out in Spain, Hitler and Mussolini lent military support to the Nationalist rebels, led by General Francisco Franco. Italy supported the Nationalists to a greater extent than the Nazis did: altogether Mussolini sent to Spain more than 70,000 ground troops and 6,000 aviation personnel, as well as about 720 aircraft. The Soviet Union supported the existing government of the Spanish Republic. More than 30,000 foreign volunteers, known as the International Brigades, also fought against the Nationalists. Both Germany and the Soviet Union used this proxy war as an opportunity to test in combat their most advanced weapons and tactics. The Nationalists won the civil war in April 1939; Franco, now dictator, remained officially neutral during World War II but generally favoured the Axis. His greatest collaboration with Germany was the sending of volunteers to fight on the Eastern Front.


In Europe, Germany and Italy were becoming more aggressive. In March 1938, Germany annexed Austria, again provoking little response from other European powers. Encouraged, Hitler began pressing German claims on the Sudetenland, an area of Czechoslovakia with a predominantly ethnic German population. Soon the United Kingdom and France followed the appeasement policy of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and conceded this territory to Germany in the Munich Agreement, which was made against the wishes of the Czechoslovak government, in exchange for a promise of no further territorial demands. Soon afterwards, Germany and Italy forced Czechoslovakia to cede additional territory to Hungary, and Poland annexed Czechoslovakia's Zaolzie region.
Although all of Germany's stated demands had been satisfied by the agreement, privately Hitler was furious that British interference had prevented him from seizing all of Czechoslovakia in one operation. In subsequent speeches Hitler attacked British and Jewish "war-mongers" and in January 1939 secretly ordered a major build-up of the German navy to challenge British naval supremacy. In March 1939, Germany invaded the remainder of Czechoslovakia and subsequently split it into the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and a pro-German client state, the Slovak Republic. Hitler also delivered an ultimatum to Lithuania on 20 March 1939, forcing the concession of the Klaipėda Region, formerly the German Memelland.
Greatly alarmed and with Hitler making further demands on the Free City of Danzig, the United Kingdom and France guaranteed their support for Polish independence; when Italy conquered Albania in April 1939, the same guarantee was extended to the Kingdoms of Romania and Greece. Shortly after the Franco-British pledge to Poland, Germany and Italy formalised their own alliance with the Pact of Steel. Hitler accused the United Kingdom and Poland of trying to "encircle" Germany and renounced the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact.
The situation reached a general crisis in late August as German troops continued to mobilise against the Polish border. On 23 August, when tripartite negotiations about a military alliance between France, the United Kingdom and Soviet Union stalled, the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact with Germany. This pact had a secret protocol that defined German and Soviet "spheres of influence" (western Poland and Lithuania for Germany; eastern Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Bessarabia for the Soviet Union), and raised the question of continuing Polish independence. The pact neutralised the possibility of Soviet opposition to a campaign against Poland and assured that Germany would not have to face the prospect of a two-front war, as it had in World War I. Immediately after that, Hitler ordered the attack to proceed on 26 August, but upon hearing that the United Kingdom had concluded a formal mutual assistance pact with Poland and that Italy would maintain neutrality, he decided to delay it.
In response to British requests for direct negotiations to avoid war, Germany made demands on Poland, which only served as a pretext to worsen relations. On 29 August, Hitler demanded that a Polish plenipotentiary immediately travel to Berlin to negotiate the handover of Danzig, and to allow a plebiscite in the Polish Corridor in which the German minority would vote on secession. The Poles refused to comply with the German demands, and on the night of 30–31 August in a confrontational meeting with the British ambassador Nevile Henderson, Ribbentrop declared that Germany considered its claims rejected.


March 10 – General Fulgencio Batista re-takes power in Cuba in a coup.
March 15 – 16 – 73 inches (1,870 mm) of rain falls in Cilaos, Réunion, the most rainfall in one day up to that time.
March 20 – The United States Senate ratifies a peace treaty with Japan.
March 21
The last two executions in the Netherlands take place.
Dr. Kwame Nkrumah is elected Prime Minister of the Gold Coast.
Tornadoes ravage the lower Mississippi River Valley, leaving 208 dead, through March 22.
March 22 – Wernher von Braun publishes the first in his series of articles titled Man Will Conquer Space Soon!, including ideas for crewed flights to Mars and the Moon.
March 27
Konrad Adenauer survives an assassination attempt.
A legislative Assembly election is held in Coorg.
April 4
In the Hague Tribunal, Israel demands reparations worth $3 billion from Germany.
West Ice accidents: During a severe storm in the West Ice, east of Greenland, 78 seal hunters on 5 Norwegian seal hunting vessels vanish without a trace.
April 7 – The American Research Bureau reports that the I Love Lucy episode "The Marriage License" was the first TV show in history to be seen in around 10,000,000 homes, the evening the episode aired.
April 8 – Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer: The U.S. Supreme Court limits the power of the President to seize private business, after President Harry S. Truman nationalizes all steel mills in the United States, just before the 1952 steel strike begins.
April 9 – Hugo Ballivián's government is overthrown by the Bolivian National Revolution, which starts a period of agrarian reform, universal suffrage and the nationalization of tin mines.
April 11
Battle of Nanri Island: The Republic of China seizes the island from the People's Republic of China.
Bolivian National Revolution: Rebels take over Palacio Quemado.
April 18
Bolivia National Revolution: A universal vote enables indigenous peoples and women to vote, nationalizes mines and enacts agrarian reform.
West Germany and Japan form diplomatic relations.
April 26 – United States Navy aircraft carrier Wasp collides with destroyer Hobson while on exercises in the Atlantic Ocean, killing 175 men.
April 28 – The Treaty of San Francisco goes into effect, formally ending the war between Japan and the Allies, and simultaneously ending the occupation of the four main Japanese islands by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers.


January 26 – Black Saturday in Egypt: Rioters burn Cairo's central business district, targeting British and upper-class Egyptian businesses.
February 6
Princess Elizabeth, Duchess of Edinburgh, becomes monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the British Dominions: Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Pakistan and Ceylon. The princess, who is on a visit to Kenya when she hears of the death of her father, King George VI, aged 56, takes the title Elizabeth II.
In the United States of America, a mechanical heart is used for the first time in a human patient.
February 14 – February 25 –  The Winter Olympics are held in Oslo, Norway.
February 18 – Greece and Turkey join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
February 21 – In Dhaka, East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh) police open fire on a procession of students, killing 4 people and starting a country-wide protest, which leads to the recognition of Bengali as one of the national languages of Pakistan. The day is later declared "International Mother Language Day" by UNESCO.
February 25 – The Parícutin active volcano in Michoacán, west central Mexico, ceases its discontinuous eruption after spewing forth a gigaton of lava, and burying San Juan Parangaricutiro.
February 26 – Vincent Massey is sworn in, becoming the first Canadian-born Governor General of Canada.


May 1 – East Germany threatens to form its own army.
May 3 – U.S. lieutenant colonels Joseph O. Fletcher and William P. Benedict land a plane at the geographic North Pole.
May 6 – Farouk of Egypt has himself announced as a descendant of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad.
May 13 – Pandit Nehru forms his first government in India.
May 15 – Diplomatic relations are established between Israel and Japan at the level of legations.
May 18 – Ann Davison becomes the first woman to single-handedly sail the Atlantic Ocean.
June 1
The Roman Catholic Church bans the books of André Gide.
Navigation opens on the Volga–Don Canal, connecting the Caspian Sea basin with that of the Black Sea.
June 10 - 1952 San Juan earthquake. A magnitude 6.8 earthquake kills 5 people on Argentina's San Juan Province.
June 13 – "Catalina affair": Soviet MiG-15 fighter planes shoot down a Swedish military Douglas C-47 Skytrain, carrying out signals intelligence gathering operations over the Baltic Sea, killing all 8 crew; three days later they shoot down a Catalina flying boat, searching for possible survivors.
June 14 – Myxomatosis is introduced to Europe, on the French estate of Dr. Paul-Félix Armand-Delille.
June 15 – Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl is published in English-language translation.
June 19 – The Special Forces (United States Army) are created.
June 26 – The Pan-Malayan Labour Party is founded in Malaya, as a union of statewide labour parties.
June 27 – Decree 900 in Guatemala orders the redistribution of uncultivated land.
June 28 – The First Miss Universe pageant is held. Armi Kuusela from Finland wins the title of Miss Universe 1952.


1952 (MCMLII) was a leap year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1952nd year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 952nd  year of the 2nd millennium, the 52nd  year of the 20th century, and the  3rd   year of the 1950s decade.


January 5 – Alfonso Ferrero La Marmora, 6th Prime Minister of Italy (b. 1804)
January 8 – Nikolay Nekrasov, Russian poet (b. 1821)
January 9 – King Victor Emmanuel II of Italy (b. 1820)
January 18 – Antoine César Becquerel, French scientist (b. 1788)
February 7 – Pope Pius IX (b. 1792)
February 11 – Gideon Welles, American politician (b. 1802)
February 18 – John Tunstall, American rancher, merchant, first man killed in the Lincoln County War (b. 1853)
February 19 – Charles-François Daubigny, French painter (b. 1817)
February 26 – Angelo Secchi, Italian astronomer (b. 1818)
March 8 – Archduke Franz Karl of Austria (b. 1802)
March 20 – Julius von Mayer, German physician, physicist and one of the founders of thermodynamics (b. 1814)
March 27 – Sir George Gilbert Scott, British architect (b. 1811)
April 4 – Richard M. Brewer, American gunslinger, cowboy (b. 1850)
April 5 – Buckshot Roberts, American buffalo hunter who killed Richard M. Brewer (shot) (b. 1831)
April 8 – Henrietta Treffz, Austrian soprano, first wife of Johann Strauss II (b. 1818)
April 11 – Robert Wentworth Little, British occultist (b. 1840)
April 12 – William M. Tweed, American politician (b. 1823)
April 25 – Anna Sewell, English author (b. 1820)
May 11 – Pierre Philippe Denfert-Rochereau, French military officer and politician (b. 1823)
May 12 – Anselme Payen, French chemist (b. 1795)
May 13 – Joseph Henry, American scientist (b. 1797)
May 14 – Ōkubo Toshimichi, Japanese samurai, later leader of the Meiji restoration (b. 1830)
May 28 – John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1792)
June 5 – Ernst von Bibra, German scientist (b. 1806)
June 6
Achille Baraguey d'Hilliers, Marshal of France (b. 1795)
Robert Stirling, Scottish clergyman, inventor (b. 1790)
June 12
Queen Cheorin, Korean queen consort (b. 1837)
George V of Hanover (b. 1819)
June 15 – Seth Shiv Dayal Singh Ji Maharaj Founder and first SatGuru of Radha Soami Faith (b. 1818)
June 27 – Sidney Breese, U.S. senator from Illinois, father of the Illinois Central Railroad (b. 1800)


The 1990s (shortened to the 90s and referred to as the nineties) was a decade that began 1 January 1990 and ended 31 December 1999. Culturally, it is often defined as the period from the Revolutions of 1989 until the September 11 attacks. The decade, known as the Golden Age of Multiculturalism, saw a rise in the awareness of multiculturalism compared to the 1980s, as well as the advance of alternative media. Music movements like grunge, the rave scene, Eurodance and, in the late 90s, hip hop, became popular with young people worldwide, aided by cable television and the Internet. The 1990s saw advances in technology, with the World Wide Web, the first gene therapy trial, and cloning all emerging and being improved upon throughout the decade.
A combination of factors, including the continued mass mobilization of capital markets through neo-liberalism, the end of the Cold War caused by the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the beginning of the widespread proliferation of new media such as the Internet, and increasing skepticism towards the government, led to a realignment and consolidation of economic and political power across the world. Many countries were economically prosperous during the 1990s. High-income countries experienced steady economic growth for much of the decade during the Great Moderation. In contrast, the GDP of the countries of the former Soviet Union decreased as their economies restructured. International trade increased with the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994 and forming of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995, and the dot-com frenzy resulted in the dot-com bubble of 1997–2000 that brought great wealth to some entrepreneurs before its crash in 2000 and 2001.
New ethnic conflicts emerged in Africa (such as the Rwandan genocide), the Balkans (such as the Bosnian genocide), and the Caucasus (several wars in the Chechen–Russian conflict). Signs of any resolution of tensions between Israel and the Arab world remained elusive, despite the progress of the Oslo Accords. However, there was progress in Northern Ireland: The Troubles came to a standstill in 1998 with the Good Friday Agreement, following 30 years of violence.


The 1990s was an era of spreading capitalism and third way policies. The former countries of the Warsaw Pact moved from single-party socialist states to multi-party states with private sector economies. The same wave of political liberalization occurred in the capitalist and newly industrialized countries (including First and Third World countries), such as Argentina, Brazil, Chile, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, South Africa, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand. Market reforms made incredible changes to the economies of Second World socialist countries such as China and Vietnam.
Ethnic tensions and violence in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s created a greater sense of ethnic identity among nations in newly independent countries and a marked increase in the popularity of nationalism.


Henry IV of England quells the Epiphany Rising and executes the Earls of Kent, Huntingdon and Salisbury, and the Baron le Despencer, for their attempt to have Richard II restored as king.
February – Henry Percy (Hotspur) leads English incursions into Scotland.
February 14 – The deposed Richard II of England dies by means unknown in Pontefract Castle. It is likely that King Henry IV ordered his death by starvation, to prevent further uprisings.
March 23 – Five-year-old Trần Thiếu Đế is forced to abdicate as ruler of Đại Việt (modern-day Vietnam), in favour of his maternal grandfather and court official Hồ Quý Ly, ending the Trần Dynasty after 175 years and starting the Hồ Dynasty. Hồ Quý Ly subsequently changes the country's name to Đại Ngu.
May – Frederick I, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg is declared as a rival to  Wenceslaus, King of the Romans. However, Frederick is murdered shortly after.
August
The English occupy Edinburgh in Scotland, but fail to capture Edinburgh Castle.
The princes of the German states vote to depose Wenceslaus as King of the Romans, due to his weak leadership and mental illnesses.
August 21 – Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine, is elected as King of the Romans.
September 16 – Owain Glyndŵr is proclaimed Prince of Wales by his followers, and begins attacking English strongholds in north-east Wales.
October/November – Sack of Aleppo (1400) during Timur's conquest of Syria.
December – Manuel II Palaiologos becomes the only Byzantine Emperor ever to visit England.


January 13 – Infante John of Portugal, the Constable (d. 1442)
May 19 – John Stourton, 1st Baron Stourton, English baron (d. 1462)
July 26 – Isabel le Despenser, Countess of Worcester, English noble (d. 1439)
December 25 – John Sutton, 1st Baron Dudley, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (d. 1487)
date unknown
James Tuchet, 5th Baron Audley (d. 1459)
Luca della Robbia, Florentine sculptor (d. 1482)
Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine (d. 1453).
Richard Neville, 5th Earl of Salisbury, English politician (d. 1460)
Owen Tudor, Welsh courtier (d. 1461)
Rogier van der Weyden, Dutch painter (or 1399)
Hans Multscher, German painter and sculptor (d. 1467)
Helene Kottanner, Hungarian writer and courtier (d. after 1470)
probable
Marina Nani, Venetian dogaressa (d. 1473)
Giovanna Dandolo, Venetian dogaressa (d. after 1462)
Johannes Gutenberg (d. 1468)


Year 1400 (MCD) was a leap year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. The year 1400 was not a leap year in the Proleptic Gregorian Calendar.


February 1 –
Ranavalona III, who had been the Queen of Madagascar until being deposed on February 28, 1897, is sent into exile by French colonial authorities, along with the rest of the royal family.  She departs on the ship Yang-Tse on a 28-day trip to Marseilles.
The Suntory whisky distiller in Japan is opened by Shinjiro Torii in Osaka as a store selling imported wines.
February 2 – The participants in the Australian Premiers' Conference, held in Melbourne, agree that Australia's capital (Canberra) should be located between Sydney and Melbourne.
February 3 – Kansas University's new college basketball team, coached by the game's inventor, Dr. James Naismith, plays its first game, and is defeated by the YMCA team of Kansas City, Kansas, 16 to 5.
February 4 –
The Philippine–American War begins as hostilities break out in Manila.
Rudyard Kipling's poem "The White Man's Burden" is first published, appearing in The Times of London.  A response to the United States occupation of the Philippine Islands, and exhorting members of the White race to be responsible for benevolent civilizing of the world's "non-white" people, the poem is reprinted in The New York Sun the next day.
February 5 – The first major battle of the Philippine–American War concludes with the capture by the U.S. of the San Juan River Bridge that connects Manila and San Juan.  U.S. Army General Arthur MacArthur Jr. directs troops of the U.S. Army Eighth Corps to victory over Filipino troops commanded by General Antonio Luna.  In the two-day battle, 55 U.S. soldiers and 238 Filipino soldiers are killed.
February 6 – A peace treaty between the United States and Spain is ratified by the United States Senate by a vote of 57 to 27 to end the Spanish–American War.
February 7 – Elections are held in Greece for the 235 seats of the Hellenic Parliament.  Supporters of the late Charilaos Trikoupis win 110 seats, 8 short of a majority, and Trikoupis's successor, Georgios Theotokis forms a government as Prime Minister.
February 8 – Protesting against the government of Russia breaks out at Saint Petersburg University and mounted police violently respond to the group, causing a riot.
February 9 – The Dodge Commission exonerates the U.S. Department of War from responsibility in the United States Army beef scandal, where meatpacking companies supplied low-grade, putrefied beef to American soldiers during the Spanish American War and caused an unquantified number of cases of food poisoning.  While War Secretary Russell Alger is not accused of criminal negligence, the Commission implies that he was incompetent and he is later forced to resign.
February 10 –
U.S. Army troops, supported by bombardment from the warships Charleston and Monandock, defeat Filipino forces in the Battle of Caloocan and get control of the Manila to Dagupan railway. Colonel W. S. Metcalfe is later accused by some of his men of having ordered the shooting of Filipino soldiers taken prisoner.
Future U.S. President Herbert Hoover and his fiancee Lou Henry, both 224, are married at her parents' home in Monterey, California, and depart the next day for a 14-month stay in China, where Hoover works as a mining engineer.
February 11 – The coldest temperature recorded up to that time in the continental United States is set as Fort Logan, Montana records a low of −61 °F (−52 °C).
February 12 – The Great Blizzard of 1899 strikes the east coast of the United States, causing subzero temperatures as far south as southern Florida for two days and destroying the citrus fruit crop that year.
February 13 – In New York, the White Star ocean liner SS Germanic, already laden with ice and snow during its voyage from Liverpool, becomes even more weighed down after disembarking its passengers when the New York City blizzard strikes. With 3,600,000 pounds (1,600,000 kg) of added weight, the ship begins to list sideways and additional weight enters cargo doors that had been opened for refuelling.  Germanic remains on the bottom New York Harbor for more than a week while salvaging goes on, then requires refurbishing for three months, but becomes operational again.
February 14 – Voting machines are approved by the U.S. Congress, for use in federal elections.
February 15 – The February Manifesto is issued by the Emperor of Russia, decreeing that a veto by the Diet of Finland may be overruled in legislative matters concerning the interest of all Russia, including autonomous Finland. The manifesto is viewed as unconstitutional and a coup d'état by many Finns, who have come to consider their country a separate constitutional state in its own right, in union with the Russian Empire. Furthermore, the manifesto also fails to elaborate the criteria that a law has to meet in order to be considered to concern Russian imperial interests, and not an internal affair of Finland (affairs over which the Diet's authority is supposed have remained unaltered), leaving it to be decided by the autocratic Emperor. This results in Finnish fears that the Diet of Finland may be overruled arbitrarily.
February 16 –
Félix Faure, the President of France since 1895, dies of a stroke in his office while engaged in sexual activity with his mistress, Marguerite Steinheil.
Knattspyrnufélag Reykjavíkur, the first Association football club in Iceland, is established in the island's capital, Reykjavík.
February 17 – The research vessel SS Southern Cross, on an Antarctic expedition led by Carsten Borchgrevink, arrives at Cape Adare and begins unloading 90 sledge dogs— the first ever on the continent and two Norwegian Sámi crewmen, Per Savio and Ole Must, who become the first humans to spend the night in Antarctica.  Over the next 12 days, the rest of the 31-man crew brings in supplies builds a temporary settlement.
February 18 – The National Assembly of France elects a new President to fill out the remainder of the late President Faure's term. Senate President Émile Loubet wins the vote, 483 to 278, against Prime Minister Jules Méline.
February 19 – In Venezuela, the former Minister of War, Major General Ramón Guerra, angry with the reforms of President Ignacio Andrade, proclaims the state of Guárico as an independent territory.  President Andrade orders General Augusto Lutowsky to crush the rebellion and Guerra flees to Colombia, but later comes back as Minister of War.
February 20 – Discussions among members of a joint Anglo-American commission, set up by U.S. President William McKinley and Canadian Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier to resolve the Alaska boundary dispute, end abruptly after it is clear that the U.S. will not make any concessions.  In response, Laurier makes clear that there will be no further concessions with the U.S. in trade.
February 21 –
Gdadebo II, the Alake of Egba in what is now southeast Nigeria, signs an agreement with the British Governor of Lagos Colony to lease lands for construction of a new railway from Aro to Abeokuta.
The British freighter SS Jumna, with the capacity to carry more than 500 people, but hauling a load of coal with minimal crew, is last seen passing Rathlin Island at Northern Ireland.  Bound from Scotland to deliver a shipment of coal to Uruguay, it never arrives and is never seen again.
The Vicksburg National Military Park is established in Mississippi to preserve the battlefield of the Battle of Vicksburg that was fought in 1863 during the American Civil War.
February 22 – Convention Hall, which later hosts two national political conventions, opens in Kansas City, Missouri with a concert by the band of John Philip Sousa.  The building burns down less than 14 months later.
February 23 – In France, Paul Déroulède and Jules Guérin of the right-wing Ligue des Patriotes attempt to persuade General Georges-Gabriel de Pellieux to lead a coup d'etat during the funeral of the late president Félix Faure in order to overthrow President Loubet. General Pellieux refuses to participate. Later in the year, Déroulède and Guérin are indicted for conspiracy against the government and banished from France.
February 24 – The works of Catholic priest and theologian Herman Schell, including the recently published Der Katholicismus als Princip des Fortschritts and Die neue Zeit und der alte Glaubeare placed by the Roman Catholic Church on its Index Librorum Prohibitorum, the list of banned books.
February 25 – In an accident at Grove Hill, Harrow, London, England, Edwin Sewell becomes the world's first driver of a petrol-driven vehicle to be killed; his passenger, Maj. James Richer, dies of injuries three days later.
February 26 – Dezső Bánffy resigns as Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Hungary, at the time a partner in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and is succeeded by Kálmán Széll.
February 27 – Japanese immigration to South America, primarily the nation of Peru, begins as the ship Sakura Maru departs from Yokohama with 790 men employed by the Morioka-shokai Sugar Company.  The group arrives in Callao on April 3.
February 28 – U.S. President William McKinley approves a law increasing the pension to American Civil War veterans, both Union and Confederate, to $25.00 per month.


April 1 – The Second Battle of Vailele takes place in Samoa as rebels loyal to King Mata'afa Iosefo force the retreat of  American and British troops who assisting Samoans loyal to Prince Tanumafili.
April 2 – The Hamburg America Line cruise ship SS Graf Waldersee begins its maiden voyage.
April 3 – The ship Sakura Maru brings 790 Japanese immigrants to the Peruvian port of Callao as the first persons from Japan to be accepted to live in South America.
April 4 –
Cuba's General Assembly voted to disband the Cuban army and to dissolve to accept U.S. sovereignty.
The German Imperial Navy warship SMS Jaguar, which will be scuttled after losing the 1914 Siege of Tsingtao, begins service.
April 5 – A team of five European geologists and 30 African laborers sets out from Northern Rhodesia to explore the minerals of central Africa for the British company Tanganyika Concessions, Ltd. (TCL).  Discovering that the most valuable copper deposits are in the Congo Free State, TCL makes an unsuccessful attempt to purchase full rights from King Leopold of Belgium.
April 6 – In an elaborate military ceremony, 336 of the 385 American soldiers killed in the Spanish–American War are interred at the Arlington National Cemetery.
April 7 – The Shootout at Wilson Ranch, the last major gunfight of the Wild West era in the U.S., takes place in Tombstone, Arizona.  Brothers William Halderman and Thomas Halderman, kill two lawmen.  They will later be hanged on November 16, 1900.
April 8 – The Victors, the famous fight song for University of Michigan sports, is premiered at Ann Arbor, Michigan by John Philip Sousa and his band.  A student orchestra had played the music three days earlier for a smaller student audience.
April 9 –
In Uganda, King Chwa II Kabalega of the Bunyoro kingdom, a leader of the fight against British colonial occupation, is taken prisoner after being shot in a battle near Hoima.  Kabalega is exiled to the Seychelles in the South Pacific ocean and remains there until 1923.
The Greek ship Maria sinks after a collision with the British steamer Kingswell in the Mediterranean and 45 people drown.
The Battle of Santa Cruz begins in the Philippines between U.S. Army troops and nationalists of the First Philippine Republic.  After a two day battle, 93 Filipino fighters and one American soldier are dead.
April 10 – Seven people are shot and killed in a gun battle at the Springside Mine at Pana, Illinois, between striking white union coal miners, and African-Americans hired as strikebreakers by the company. Five of the dead are black, including the wife of one of the non-union miners, along with one white miner and a white sheriff's deputy.
April 11 – U.S. President William McKinley declares the Spanish-American War to be at an end as the Treaty of Paris between the U.S. and Spain goes into effect.  Ratifications are exchanged between McKinley and French Ambassador Jules Cambon on behalf of Spain. Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam are ceded to the U.S. and Cuba becomes an American protectorate.
April 12 – Bolivia's President Severo Fernández is overthrown in a military coup d'etat led by General José Manuel Pando.
April 13 – The British freighter City of York departs from the U.S. port of San Francisco with a crew of 27 and a cargo of Oregon timber bound for Fremantle in Australia, but never reaches its destination, wrecking on the reefs at Rottnest Island on July 12.
April 14 – British Army troops in Hong Kong attack the Walled City of Kowloon on orders of colonial Governor Henry Blake, based on intelligence that Chinese Imperial Army troops have been stationed behind the walls to subvert Britain's 1898 lease. By April 19, the British commander discovers that the Chinese troops had already departed and that only 150 civilians remain.
April 15 – Students at the University of California, Berkeley steal the Stanford Axe from Stanford University, yelling at leaders following a baseball game, thus establishing the Axe as a symbol of the rivalry between the schools.
April 16 –
Voting is held in Spain for the 402 seats of the Congreso de los Diputados, and the Conservative Union wins a majority with 233 members. Voting for the Senate of Spain takes place on April 30.
Britain formally claims possession of the "New Territories" as an extension of its lease of Hong Kong to cover the area south of the Sham Chun River and 230 island in Kowloon Bay.
April 17 – The first elections for the 10-member Legislative Council of the British colony of Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), limited to European candidates and voters.
April 18 – The Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898 goes into effect, creating 32 counties of Ireland (six which would become Northern Ireland) and abolishes the counties corporate of Carrickfergus and Drogheda.
April 19 – France adds Kingdom of Laos, a protectorate since 1893, to the existing colony of French Indochina.
April 20 – The controversial ballet Le Cygne, choreographed by Madame Mariquita and written by Catulle Mendès, premieres at the Opéra-Comique in Paris, but is considered by critics to be too sexually explicit.
April 21 – The nova V606 Aquilae is first observed from Earth as seen within the constellation Aquila.  It fades within six months.
April 22 – In aid of the Royal Niger Company, the British Army begins an invasion of Esanland,  in southwestern Nigeria, to halt the resistance of the Esan chiefs still resistant to European rule.  After Benin King Ologbosere is overcome, the British attack the kingdom at Ekpoma.
April 23 – The steamship General Whitney sinks off the coast of St. Augustine, Florida.  While everyone on board escapes in lifeboats, one of the boats capsizes, drowning the captain and 16 other crew.
April 24 – The Scottish ship Loch Sloy is wrecked off the coast of Australia's Kangaroo Island, drowning 32 of the 35 people on board.
April 25 – Voting is held for the 169-seat National Assembly in Bulgaria, and the Radoslava Party wins a majority.
April 26 – Jean Sibelius's First Symphony premieres in Finland at Helsinki.
April 27 – In Australia, the Apostolic Church of Queensland receives formal recognition as a religious denomination.
April 28 – The United Kingdom and the Russian Empire sign the Anglo-Russian Agreement formalizing their spheres of influence in China, essentially agreeing that Britain will not seek railway concessions north of the Great Wall of China, and Russia will avoid doing the same in the Yangtze River valley in southern China.
April 29 – Camille Jenatzy of Belgium becomes the first person to drive faster than 100 kilometers per hour, powering his electric CITA Number 25 racecar, La Jamais Contente at 105.88 kilometres per hour (65.79 mph) at a track at Achères, near Paris.
April 30 – In the Philippines, the U.S. establishes a protectorate over the Republic of Negros, a semi-independent government for Negros Island, separate from the rest of the Philippine Islands.  The Republic exists until its annexation to the rest of the U.S. territory on April 20, 1901.


March 1 – In Afghanistan, Capt. George Roos-Keppel makes a sudden attack on a predatory band of Chamkannis that have been raiding in the Kurram Valley, and captures 100 prisoners with 3,000 head of cattle.
March 2 – Mount Rainier National Park is established, in the U.S. state of Washington.
March 3 –
Guglielmo Marconi conducts radio beacon experiments on Salisbury Plain in England and notices that radio waves are being reflected back to the transmitter by objects they encounter, one of the early steps in the potential for developing radar.
March 4 – Cyclone Mahina strikes Bathurst Bay, Queensland. A 12 meter high wave reaches up to 5 km inland, leaving over 400 dead (the deadliest natural disaster in Australia's history).
March 5 – George B. Selden sells the rights to his patent for an internal combustion engine to the Electric Vehicle Company, and he and the company then claim a royalty on all automobiles using such an engine.
March 6 – German chemist Felix Hoffmann patents aspirin, and Bayer registers its name as a trademark.
March 7 – The Provisional Law on the Judiciary is issued in the Philippines to provide for the selection of a Chief Justice.
March 8 – The Frankfurter Fußball-Club Victoria von 1899 (predecessor of Eintracht Frankfurt Association football club) is founded.
March 9 – Japan promulgates its commercial code, the Shōhō, to take effect on June 16.  The Shōhō, as amended applies to Japanese business today.
March 10 –
The U.S. state of Delaware enacts its general corporation act that makes it the most important jurisdiction in United States corporate law.
At the Battle of Balantang, the U.S. Army sustains 400 casualties in an attack by Philippine troops under the command of Pascual Magbanua.
March 11 –
A wireless distress signal is sent for the first time by a patrol boat to aid the endangered British cruiser Elbe.  The Morse code distress signal is heard by the lighthouse near Ramsgate Lifeboat Station, which sends a lifeboat to the rescue.
Waldemar Jungner files the patent application for the first alkaline battery and receives Swedish patent number 11132.
March 12 – Encinal County, Texas, created on February 1, 1856, near the U.S. city of Laredo on the condition that it would create a county seat, is discontinued and annexed into neighboring Webb County. The largest town in the area, Bruni, has less than 400 people.
March 13 – Chelan County, Washington is created from Okanogan and Kittitas counties for the area around Wenatchee.
March 14 –
After a civil war breaks out in Samoa between Malietoa Tanumafili I (recognized by Germany, the UK and the U.S.) and rebels who recognize Mata'afa Iosefo as the island's king, the USS Philadelphia takes control of the capital at Apia.
Germany's Kaiser Wilhelm II takes direct command of the Imperial Navy.
March 15 – Santa Cruz County is established in the southeast corner of Pima County around the city of Nogales (built across from the border of the larger Mexican city of Nogales, Sonora) in the U.S. territory of Arizona.
March 16 – Memorial ceremonies are held for the burial of the late German hero Otto von Bismarck and his wife, Johanna von Puttkamer with their re-interment at the Bismarck Mausoleum, now a tourist attraction at Friedrichsruh in Aumühle.  Bismarck, who had died on July 30, had been buried along with his wife at the estate of his home in Varzin, now the city of Warcino in Poland.
March 17 – A fire kills 86 people at the Windsor Hotel in New York City.
March 18 – Phoebe, the ninth-known moon of the planet Saturn is discovered by U.S. astronomer William Pickering from analysis of photographic plates made by a Peruvian observatory seven months earlier, the first discovery of a satellite photographically.
March 19 –
One of the first labor unions for government employees is formed with the organization in Denmark of the Copenhagen Municipal Workers' Union
The Battle of Taguig takes place in the Philippines as the USS Laguna de Bay bombards the Katipunan stronghold.
March 20 – At Sing Sing prison in Ossining, New York, Martha M. Place becomes the first woman to be executed in an electric chair.
March 21 – The Eden Theatre in La Ciotat, a small city in France near Marseilles, lays a claim to being the first cinema by as brothers Auguste Lumière and Louis Lumière present their short film, L'Arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat ("The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat") to 250 spectators surprised.  The action film shows a steam train pulling into La Ciotat station, passengers coming out of the cars, and departing passengers climbing on.
March 22 – The coronation of Malietoa Tanumafili I as King of Samoa takes place.  He had become the Malieota of the South Pacific island when his father died on August 22.
March 23 – The U.S. cruiser USS Philadelphia and the Royal Navy cruisers HMS Porpoise and HMS Royalist bombard rebel-held villages in Samoa after an attack on Apia.
March 24 –
The U.S. Ambassador to Argentina, acting as arbitrator of a boundary dispute between Argentina and Chile, awards the disputed territory to Chile.
George Dewey is made Admiral of the U.S. Navy.
March 25 – The rowing team of Cambridge University wins the annual boat race against Oxford University for the first time in a decade, finishing ahead of Oxford by 3 1⁄4 lengths on the Thames. Oxford had won the race nine times in a row from 1890 to 1898.
March 26 – In the first major action in the Malolos Campaign in the Philippine–American War, 90 Filipino soldiers are killed in the Battle of the Meycauayan bridge
March 27
Guglielmo Marconi successfully transmits a radio signal across the English Channel.
In the Battle of Marilao River, Filipino forces under the personal command of Emilio Aguinaldo, President of the Philippines, fail to prevent troops of the United States Army crossing the river.
March 28 – Alfred Martineau becomes the new French colonial governor of French Somaliland in northeast Africa, now the Republic of Djibouti
March 29 – The First Philippine Republic relocates its capital from Malolos to San Isidro, Nueva Ecija as the government flees an invasion of U.S. forces.
March 30 – The British steamer Stella sinks in the English Channel with the loss of 80 people after wrecking against Les Casquets, a group of rocks near the Channel Islands.
March 31 –
The United Kingdom announces that it has completed the purchase of rights to occupy the Kingdom of Tonga.
In the Philippine–American War, Malolos, capital of the First Philippine Republic, is captured by American forces.


May 1 – U.S. Navy Admiral George Dewey reports that 10 officers and crew of the ship USS Yorktown have been taken prisoner by the Phillipine republic.
May 2 – The Kingdom of Siam (now Thailand) cedes its province of Luang Prabang (now Laos) to France.
May 3 –
Francisco Silvela becomes the new Prime Minister of Spain after the resignation on March 7 of Práxedes Sagasta in the wake of Spain's loss of its overseas territories during the Spanish-American War.
The Ferencvárosi TC Association football club is founded in Budapest.
May 4 –
The thoroughbred horse Manuel, ridden by Fred Taral, wins the 25th running of the Kentucky Derby.
Inventor John Matthias Stroh applies for the patent for his new invention, the "Stroh violin", a stringed musical instrument with an amplifying horn attached.  British Patent No. GB9418 is granted on March 24, 1900.
May 5 – The village of Stirling, Alberta is founded in Canada as a Mormon colony of 30 American settlers from Richfield, Utah, led by Theodore Brandley
May 6 – The first democratic elections in Philippine history are held in for a municipal government for Baliuag in the province of Bulacan.
May 7 – The capital of the First Philippine Republic is moved by President Emilio Aguinaldo from Manolos to Angeles City
May 8 – In the French West African colony of Niger, French Army Captain Paul Voulet carries out the massacre of the Hausa inhabitants of the village of Birni-N'Konni in retaliation for the continued resistance of Queen Sarraounia.
May 9 – The first KNVB Cup of the Royal Dutch Football Association is won by RAP Amsterdam in extra time, 1 to 0, over HVV Den Haag.
May 10 – Finnish farmworker Karl Emil Malmelin kills seven people with an axe at the Simola croft in the village of Klaukkala.
May 11 – Alberto Santos-Dumont attempts the first test flight of his Airship No. 2, but rain cools the hydrogen during the ship's inflation and a gust of wind blows it into nearby trees, where it is destroyed.
May 12 – The first trade union for railway employees in Sweden, the Svenska Järnvägsmannaförbundet (Sweden Railworkers' League) is founded.  It lasts until 1970, when it merges into a labor union of Swedish government employees.
May 13 –
A train wreck near Reading, Pennsylvania kills 28 people and injures 50.
The Esporte Clube Vitória Association football club is founded in Salvador, Brazil.
May 14 – The three time world champion Club Nacional de Football is founded in Montevideo, Uruguay.
May 15 – A clue to the fate of the British freighter Pelican, which disappeared in October 1897 along with 40 crew, is found in a message in a bottle that washes ashore at Portage Bay, Alaska.
May 16 –
British troops in the leased Chinese territory of Hong Kong take control of the city of Kowloon.
The last Spaniards remaining in the Philippine Islands, after the cession to the U.S., depart from the island of Basilan.
May 17 – In the Philippines, U.S. Army troops capture the city of San Isidro, Nueva Ecija, where Philippine Republic president Aguinaldo had moved his capital, but find that the insurgents had already left.
May 18 – The First Hague Peace Conference is opened in The Hague by Willem de Beaufort, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands.
May 19 – The U.S. Army captures Tawi-Tawi, the southernmost island in the Philippines.
May 20 –
Jacob German, a New York City cab driver, becomes the first motor vehicle operator in the U.S. to be arrested for speeding when he is caught driving his electric taxi 12 miles per hour (19 km/h), more than twice the speed limit on Lexington Avenue.
The American Physical Society is founded at a meeting at Columbia University in New York by 36 physicists, with a mission ""to advance and diffuse the knowledge of physics."
May 21 –
The crew of the Royal Navy ship HMS Narcissus sights a large sea creature estimated to be 150 feet (46 m) long in the Mediterranean Sea near Algeria and reports that it propels itself by means of "an immense number of fins", as well as being able to spout water from several points on its body.  The creature is not seen again after the lone encounter.
The town of Porosow in Poland (now Porazava in Belarus) is destroyed by fire.
May 22 – The unrecognized República Selvática— the "Jungle Republic" is proclaimed by Peruvian Army Colonel Emilio Vizcarra in three provinces in Northern Peru located within the Amazon rainforest, Loreto, San Martín and Ucayali. The "republic" is reincorporated into Peru after Vizcarra's death on February 27, 1900.
May 23 – Major General Henry W. Lawton and his troops arrive in Manolos, capital of the First Philippine Republic, after a 120-mile march in 20 days that had captured 28 towns with a loss of only six men.
May 24 –
Jules Massenet's Cendrillon, the first opera based on the fairy tale of Cinderella, premieres in Paris at the theater of the Opéra-Comique.
The 80th birthday of Queen Victoria is celebrated throughout the British Empire.
May 25 –
Pope Leo XIII issues the encyclical Annum sacrum, declaring 1900 to be a Holy Year and directing Roman Catholic churches worldwide to carry out the consecration of all human beings to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
A fire in the Candian city of Saint John, New Brunswick, destroys 150 buildings and renders over 1,000 people homeless.
May 26 – The guns of the British warship HMS Scylla, commanded by Captain Percy Scott, hit their targets 56 out of 70 times after Percy and his crew solve the problem of aiming a ship cannon on rolling seas.
May 27 –
Rangers F.C., commonly called the Glasgow Rangers and one of the most successful soccer football teams in the Scottish Football League, is incorporated.
Maurice Ravel's Shéhérazade Overture, is given its first public performance,
May 28 – General Vicente Álvarez forms the short-lived Republic of Zamboanga in the Philippines on a peninusla on the island of Mindanao.  The nation exists until 1903 when it is consolidated by the U.S. to the rest of the Philippine territory.
May 29 – The Spanish system of courts in the Philippines, closed since the American occupation began, is revived under U.S. sovereignty and regulation.
May 30 – Female outlaw Pearl Hart robs a stage coach 30 miles (48 km) southeast of Globe, Arizona.
May 31 – The Harriman Alaska Expedition is launched.


July 1 – The International Council of Nurses is founded in London, at a meeting of the Matron's Council of Great Britain and Ireland.
July 2 – Pope Leo XIII venerates four missionaries who were executed in Asia as martyrs of the Roman Catholic Church.  Jean-Charles Cornay will be canonized as a saint in 1988, while Paul Liu Hanzuo, Peter Lieou and Louis Gabriel Taurin Dufresse will be canonized 100 years after their veneration by Pope John Paul II on October 1, 2000.
July 3 – Swiss-born American boxer Frank Erne wins the world lightweight championship by defeating champion George "Kid" Lavigne in a decision after 20 rounds in Buffalo, New York.
July 4 – The most famous skeleton of a dinosaur ever found intact, a Diplodicus, is discovered at the Sheep Creek Quarry in the western United States near Medicine Bow, Wyoming.  The expedition team, financed by Andrew Carnegie for the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh and led by William Harlow Reed, bestows the name "Dippy" on the Diplodicus carnegii, which becomes well known after Carnegie has plaster cast replicas made for donation to museums all over the world.  The diplodicus dinosaurs are estimated to have roamed in North America more than 152,000,000 years ago.
July 5 –
In Chicago, the first juvenile court in the United States, the Cook County Circuit Court Juvenile Justice Division, hears its first cases with R. S. Tuthill as its judge.
The 1895 Trade and Navigation agreement between the Japanese and Russian empires goes into effect, with each country was given "a full freedom of ship and cargo entrance to all places, ports, and rivers on the other country's territory."
July 6 – An assassin attempts to kill Milan Obrenović, who had been King of Serbia before abdicating in 1889, and had more recently been appointed by his son, King Alexander, as Commander-in-chief of the Serbian Army.  General Obrenović is uninjured, but begins a campaign to seek out and arrest the radicals in Serbia.
July 7 – The Great Lakes Towing Company (GLT), now part of The Great Lakes Group, is incorporated by John D. Rockefeller and William G. Mather to acquire more than 150 tugboats to control shipping in four of the North American Great Lakes (Lake Huron, Lake Michigan, Lake Erie and Lake Superior) and quickly builds a monopoly on Great Lakes traffic.
July 8 – In the U.S., the Lorelei Fountain, sculpted by Ernst Herter from white marble, is unveiled in the Bronx in New York City across from the Bronx County Courthouse.
July 9 – The Latin American Plenary Council, called by Pope Leo XIII on December 25 for the Roman Catholic bishops of lands in Central America and South America to address the question of "how to guard the interests of the Latin race", closes in Rome after six weeks.  The bishops agree that Catholics should not "to celebrate with heretics" (specifically, non-Catholics) in religious ceremonies or to attend heretic church services, on pain of excommunication; that every republic in Latin America should have "a truly Catholic University" for education in the "sciences, literature and the good arts"; that missionary work to the Indian populations is "the grave duty of the ecclesiastical as well as civil authority to carry civilization to the tribes that remain faithless"; and that priests should be encouraged to study at the Pius Latin American Seminary in Rome.
July 10 –
British colonial authorities in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan give control of the Red Sea port of Suakin to Sudan, after having agreed on January 19 that Egypt would the right to administer commerce there.
The Allegan meteorite, a 50 pounds (23 kg) H chondrite crashes to Earth and lands in southwestern Michigan's Allegan County in the U.S.
July 11 – In Turin in Italy, Giovanni Agnelli and eight investors form the Italian automobile manufacturer F.I.A.T. (Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino, the Italian Automobile Manufacturers of Turin), producers of the Fiat motor vehicles.
July 12 – The British freight ship City of York sinks after striking reefs at Rottnest Island, off the coast of Western Australia, due to a misunderstanding of signal flare fired from the island's lighthouse.  The ship, which was nearing the end of a 90-day voyage from the U.S. (San Francisco) to Fremantle, Western Australia, evacuates its 26 crew in two lifeboats, but one of the boats overturns and 11 men, including Captain Phillip Jones, drown.
July 13 – A tornado kills 13 people in the U.S. village of Herman, Nebraska.
July 14 – The first Republic of Acre is declared by former Spanish journalist Luis Gálvez Rodríguez de Arias in the Amazon jungle in South America, and lasts for nine months.
July 15 –
Japan's first comprhensive copyright law takes effect and, on the same day, Japan agrees to join the Berne Convention on respect of copyright laws of other nations.
General Emilio Aguinaldo, who has commanded the Filipino resistance against the Spanish government, informs the U.S. Army General Thomas M. Anderson that he intends to assume authority for the Philippine Islands in areas conquered by the Filipinos from the Spaniards.
July 16 – The first soccer football game in El Salvador between two organized teams takes place at the Campo Marte field in Santa Ana, where a local team hosts a team of players from San Salvador.  The Santa Ana team wins, 2 to 0.
July 17
NEC Corporation is organized as the first Japanese joint venture with foreign capital.
In the Battle of Togbao, the French Bretonnet–Braun mission is destroyed, in the North African kingdom of Chad, by the warlord Rabih az-Zubayr.
The Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Commerce and Navigation takes effect, ending extraterritoriality and the unequal status of Japan in foreign commerce.
July 18 – The patent for the first sofa bed (a foldable bed frame that can be stored under the cushions of a couch) is taken out by African-American inventor Leonard C. Bailey.  He receives U.S. Patent No. 629,286 on June 2, 1900.
July 19 – U.S. Secretary of War Russell A. Alger submits his resignation at the request of U.S. President McKinley, following public outrage over the United States Army beef scandal, in which the War Department purchased tainted beef for soldiers during the Spanish-American War.
July 20 – A white lynch mob in Tallulah, Louisiana carries out the killing of five white Italian shopkeepers from Sicily who had opened stores in the town to sell produce and meat, after accusations that the Sicilians were driving the American stores out of business.  None of the suspects in the lynching are prosecuted.
July 21 – The Newsboys' strike takes place, when the Newsies of New York go on strike (until August 2).
July 22 – The torture and lynching of Frank Embree takes place in the town of Fayette, Missouri, after Embree, a black 19-year-old man, is accused by a mob of raping a white 14-year-old girl.  Shortly after Embree has received 100 lashes from a whip, a photographer takes Embree's photo, followed by another one after Embree's hanging.
July 23 – The city of Washington DC retires its short-lived cable car system, the day after Columbia Railway Company converts exclusively to electric powered cars
July 24 – In the first trade treaty signed by the U.S. after the passage of the Dingley Act, which authorizes the U.S. President to negotiate reductions of tariffs up to 20% if the other side does the same, France and the United States sign an agreement for a 20% reduction of France's existing tariffs on 635 of 654 specific items, in return for the U.S. reduction between 5% and 20% of duty fees on 126 items.
July 25 – France's Minister of War levies out punishments against officers who participated in the Dreyfus affair, removing General Georges-Gabriel de Pellieux from his duties as Military Governor of Paris, and removing General Oscar de Négrier from the War Council.
July 26 – The President of the Dominican Republic, dictator Ulises Heureaux, is assassinated during a visit to the city of Moca.  Vice President Wenceslao Figuereo succeeds to the office.
July 27 – Gold is discovered in Nome, Alaska, leading to the Nome Gold Rush.
July 28 – The All Cubans, a team of professional baseball players from Cuba, begins a barnstorming tour of games against white and black teams, starting with a 12-4 win over a local team at Weehawken, New Jersey
July 29 – The first international Peace Conference ends, with the signing of the First Hague Convention.
July 30 – The Harriman Alaska Expedition ends successfully.
July 31 – Duke of York Island, outside Antarctica, is discovered by explorer Carsten Borchgrevink and the British Southern Cross Expedition.


January 1
Spanish rule ends in Cuba, concluding 400 years of the Spanish Empire in the Americas.
Queens and Staten Island become administratively part of New York City.
January 2 –
Bolivia sets up a customs office in Puerto Alonso, leading to the Brazilian settlers there to declare the Republic of Acre in a revolt against Bolivian authorities.
The first part of the Jakarta Kota–Anyer Kidul railway on the island of Java is opened between Batavia Zuid (Jakarta Kota) and Tangerang.
January 3 – Hungarian Prime Minister Dezső Bánffy fights an inconclusive duel with his bitter enemy in parliament, Horánszky Nándor.
January 4 –
U.S. President William McKinley's declaration of December 21, 1898, proclaiming a policy of benevolent assimilation of the Philippines as a United States territory, is announced in Manila by the U.S. commander, General Elwell Otis, and angers independence activists who had fought against Spanish rule.
The American Society of Landscape Architects, still in existence 123 years later, is founded.
January 5 – A fierce battle is fought between American troops and Filipino defenders at the town of Pililla on the island of Luzon. The Filipinos retreat to the mountains at Tanay.
January 6 – Lord Curzon becomes Viceroy of India.
January 7 – The Lucky Star, and an English comic opera composed by Ivan Caryll and produced by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company premieres at the Savoy Theatre in London for the first of 143 performances.
January 8 – The Association football club SK Rapid Wien is founded in Vienna.
January 9 –
After a successful revolt against the Ottoman Empire by the inhabitants of the island of Crete, the area, which joins Greece, gets its first constitution, with provisions for a provincial legislature with 138 Christian deputies and 50 Muslim deputies.
George F. Hoar, a U.S. Senator for Massachusetts, speaks out in the Senate against American expansion into the Philippines.  The text of Hoar's is sent by cable to Hong Kong at a cost of $4,000, and is later cited by Ambassador John Barrett on January 13, 1900, as an incitement to Filipino attacks on U.S. troops.
January 10 – The Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity is founded, at Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington, Illinois.
January 11 – The Steel Plate Transferrers' Association, the first labor union for workers skilled in siderography (the engraving and mass reproduction of steel plates for newspaper printing) is established  After changing its name to the International Association of Siderographers, it has 80 members at its peak. It dissolves in 1991, with only eight members left. Stewart, Estelle May (1936). Handbook of American trade-unions: 1936 edition. United States Bureau of Labor Statistics. United States Government Printing Office.
January 12 – A massive rescue by the Lynmouth Lifeboat Station, using 100 men and requiring the transport of the lifeboat Louisa over land and then out to sea, succeeds in saving all 18 men aboard.  The event is later made famous in the children's book The Overland Launch.
January 13 – The Canadian Northern Railway is established, on January 13, 1899
January 14 –
The White Star Line ship RMS Oceanic, at the time the largest British ocean liner up to that time, is launched from the Irish port of  Belfast in front of over 50,000 people. It will begin its maiden voyage on September 6.
The British four-masted sailing ship Andelana capsizes during a storm in Commencement Bay off the coast of the U.S. Washington, with the loss of all 17 of her crew.
January 15 – The name of Puerto Rico is changed by the new U.S. military government to "Porto Rico". It will not be changed back until May 17, 1932.
January 16 – Eduardo Calceta is appointed as Chief of the Army (Jefe General) of the rebel Phillipine Republic army by Emilio Aguinaldo.
January 17 – The United States takes possession of Wake Island in the Pacific Ocean.
January 18 – The General Assembly of the U.S. state of Pennsylvania begins the task of filling the U.S. Senate seat of Matthew Quay, who had recently resigned after being indicted on criminal charges.  After 79 ballots and three months, no candidate has a majority, and the General Assembly refuses to approve the governor's appointment of a successor, and the seat remains vacant for more than two years. The Pennsylvania experience later leads to the 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to provide for U.S. Senators to be directly elected by popular vote, rather than by the state legislatures.
January 19 –
The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan is formed (it is disbanded in 1956).
Future film producer Samuel Goldwyn, born in Poland and later a resident of Germany and England, arrives in the United States at the age of sixteen as Szmuel Gelbfisz.
January 20 – The Schurman Commission is created by U.S. President William McKinley to study the issue of the American approach to he sovereignty of the Philippines, ceded to the U.S. on December 10 by Spain.  The five-man group, chaired by Cornell University President Jacob Schurman, later concludes that the Philippines will need to become financially independent before a republic can be created.
January 21
Opel Motors opens for business in Germany.
The Malolos Constitution is ratified in the Province of Bulacan by the Revolutionary Government of the Philippines.
January 22 – The leaders of six Australian colonies meet in Melbourne, to discuss the confederation of Australia as a whole.
January 23
Emilio Aguinaldo is sworn in, as President of the First Philippine Republic.
Mubarak Al-Sabah, the emir of Kuwait, signs the Anglo-Kuwaiti Agreement of 1899 a secret treaty with the British Empire to accept protectorate status for the Middle Eastern sheikdom in return for British protection of Kuwaiti territory.
The British Southern Cross Expedition crosses the Antarctic Circle.
January 24 – The Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, one of the oldest medical schools in the United States, is founded.
January 25 – The city of Ponce, Puerto Rico is saved from disaster by seven firemen and one volunteer civilian who disobey orders and stop "El Polverin", a fire near the U.S. Army's store of explosive artillery. A "Monument to the Heroes of El Poverin is later erected in their honor.
January 26 –
U.S. Representative George Henry White of North Carolina, the only African-American in Congress at the time, delivers his first major speech, speaking out against disenfranchisement of black voters and proposing that the number of representatives from a U.S. state should be based on the number of persons of voting age who actually cast ballots, rather than population. "
German inventor Karl Ferdinand Braun, who will later share the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics with Guglielmo Marconi, receives British Patent No. 1899-1862 for his wireless radio invention "Telegraphy without directly connected wire".
January 27 – Camille Jenatzy of France becomes the first man to drive an automobile more than 80 kilometers per hour, almost breaking the 50 mph barrier when he reaches an unprecedented speed of 80.35 kilometres per hour (49.93 mph) in his CGA Dogcart racecar.  Jenatzy's speed is more than 20% faster than the January 17 mark of 66.65 kilometres per hour (41.41 mph) set by Gaston de Chasseloup-Laubat.
January 28
At a time when U.S. Senators are elected by the state legislature rather than by ballot, wealthy businessman William A. Clark is elected U.S. Senator after offering bribes to most of the members. The U.S. Senate refuses to seat him after evidence of the bribery is revealed.
The League of Peja, organized by Haxhi Zeka to lobby for a Kosovar Albanian state within the Ottoman Empire, attracts 450 delegates to its first convention, held at the city of Peja, now in the Republic of Kosovo.
January 29 – A lawyer for the estate of John W. Keely, and inventor who had persuaded investors in his Keely Motor Company that an automobile could be created that would operate from Keely's "induction resonance motion motor" that had achieved perpetual motion, reveals that the late Mr. Keely's motor had been a fraud, and that the widow knew nothing of it.
January 30 – Dimitar Grekov is appointed as Prime Minister of Bulgaria by King Ferdinand I, but removed from office less than 10 months later on October 13.
January 31 – Cherokee Nation voters in the Indian Territory (later the U.S. state of Oklahoma) approve a proposition to allot Cherokee lands and to dissolve the Cherokee government, but the U.S. Congress never ratifies the results.


The 1940s (pronounced "nineteen-forties" and commonly abbreviated as "the 40s" or "the Forties") was a decade that began on January 1, 1940, and ended on December 31, 1949.
Most of World War II took place in the first half of the decade, which had a profound effect on most countries and people in Europe, Asia, and elsewhere. The consequences of the war lingered well into the second half of the decade, with a war-weary Europe divided between the jostling spheres of influence of the Western world and the Soviet Union, leading to the beginning of the Cold War. To some degree internal and external tensions in the post-war era were managed by new institutions, including the United Nations, the welfare state, and the Bretton Woods system, facilitating the post–World War II economic expansion, which lasted well into the 1970s. The conditions of the post-war world encouraged decolonization and the emergence of new states and governments, with India, Pakistan, Israel, Vietnam, and others declaring independence, although rarely without bloodshed. The decade also witnessed the early beginnings of new technologies (such as computers, nuclear power, and jet propulsion), often first developed in tandem with the war effort, and later adapted and improved upon in the post-war era.


Prominent assassinations, targeted killings, and assassination attempts include:
August 20, 1940 – Leon Trotsky, a Russian revolutionary and Soviet politician is attacked by Ramón Mercader using an ice axe. Trotsky died the next day from exsanguination and shock.
May 27, 1942 – Reinhard Heydrich, a high-ranking Nazi official who played a key role in the Holocaust, helping to develop the Final Solution, is assassinated with a converted anti-tank mine in an attack by two British-trained and equipped Czech paratroopers in Prague, dying of his wounds on June 4.
December 24, 1942 – François Darlan, French Admiral and political figure is assassinated by Fernand Bonnier de La Chapelle in Algiers, French Algeria.
April 18, 1943 – In a targeted killing, Japanese admiral Isoruku Yamamoto, who oversaw the operation against Pearl Harbor, is killed when the bomber transporting him is shot down by P-38 fighters over Bougainville.
July 20, 1944 – Adolf Hitler, German fascist dictator is attacked with a bomb by anti-Nazi Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg and others of the German resistance in the 20th July plot. Hitler survives with minor wounds and the suspects are either arrested or executed.
January 30, 1948 – Mahatma Gandhi, Indian activist and leader of the Indian independence movement is assassinated by Nathuram Godse using a pistol.


Although the Saint Lawrence Seaway and Great Lakes Waterway make the Great Lakes accessible to ocean-going vessels, shifts in shipping to wider ocean-going container ships—which do not fit through the locks on these routes—have limited container shipping on the lakes. Most Great Lakes trade is of bulk material, and bulk freighters of Seawaymax-size or less can move throughout the entire lakes and out to the Atlantic. Larger ships are confined to working within the lakes. Only barges can access the Illinois Waterway system providing access to the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River. Despite their vast size, large sections of the Great Lakes freeze over in winter, interrupting most shipping from January to March. Some icebreakers ply the lakes, keeping the shipping lanes open through other periods of ice on the lakes.
The Great Lakes are connected by the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal to the Gulf of Mexico via the Illinois River (from the Chicago River) and the Mississippi River. An alternate track is via the Illinois River (from Chicago), to the Mississippi, up the Ohio, and then through the Tennessee–Tombigbee Waterway (a combination of a series of rivers and lakes and canals), to Mobile Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. Commercial tug-and-barge traffic on these waterways is heavy.
Pleasure boats can enter or exit the Great Lakes by way of the Erie Canal and Hudson River in New York. The Erie Canal connects to the Great Lakes at the east end of Lake Erie (at Buffalo, New York) and at the south side of Lake Ontario (at Oswego, New York).


October 10
Daniel Boone leads the first attempt by British colonists to establish a settlement in Kentucky, but is turned back in an attack by Native Americans, in which his son is killed.
Paul Revere marries Rachel Walker, his second wife.
October 12 – America's first insane asylum opens, for Persons of Insane and Disordered Minds, in Williamsburg, Virginia.
October 13 – French astronomer Charles Messier discovers the Whirlpool Galaxy, an interacting, grand design spiral galaxy located at a distance of approximately 23 million light-years, in the constellation Canes Venatici.
October 14 – The Komisja Edukacji Narodowej (Polish for Commission for the Education of the People), formed in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, is considered to be the world's first ministry of education.
November 10 – Four ships— the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, the Beaver and the William— depart Britain for America, carrying the first Indian tea to be subject to the newly enacted taxes.  The William is lost in a storm; the Dartmouth is the first ship to reach Boston, docking on November 28.
December 16 – Boston Tea Party: A group of American colonists, dressed as Mohawk Indians, steal aboard ships of the East India Company and dump their cargo of tea into Boston Harbor, in protest against British tax policies.


Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774: Russian forces fail to take Silistria.
Emelian Pugachev starts Pugachev's Rebellion in Russia, attacking and occupying Samara.
John Harrison wins the Longitude prize, for his invention of the marine chronometer.
Hilaire Rouelle discovers urea.
Istanbul Technical University is established (under the name of Royal School of Naval Engineering) as the world's first comprehensive institution of higher learning dedicated to engineering education.
Marsala wine first shipped to England.
In China, written work begins on the Siku Quanshu, the largest literary compilation of books in China's history (surpassing the Yongle Encyclopedia of the 15th Century). Upon completion in 1782, the books are bound in 36,381 volumes (册) with more than 79,000 chapters (卷), comprising about 2.3 million pages, and approximately 800 million Chinese characters.
Scottish judge James Burnett, Lord Monboddo, begins publication of Of the Origin and Progress of Language, a contribution to evolutionary ideas of the Enlightenment.
Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock publishes the last five cantos of his epic poem Der Messias in Hamburg.


January 1 – Sir Richard Glyn, 1st Baronet, of Ewell, Lord Mayor of London (b. 1711)
January 21 – Alexis Piron, French writer (b. 1689)
January 23
Manuel Pinto da Fonseca, 68th Grandmaster of the Knights Hospitaller (b. 1681)
Pieter van Reede van Oudtshoorn, Dutch administrator of the Cape Colony (b. 1714)
February 20 – King Charles Emmanuel III of Sardinia (b. 1701)
March 1 – Luigi Vanvitelli, Italian architect (b. 1700)
March 24
Stephen Leake, English numismatist, officer of arms at the College of Arms in London (b. 1702)
Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, English statesman and man of letters (b. 1694)
March 20 – Gottlieb Heinrich Totleben, German noble (b. 1715)
May 8 – Ali Bey Al-Kabir, Mamluk Sultan of Egypt (b. 1728)
May 15 – Alban Butler, English Catholic priest, writer (b. 1710)
May 28 – John Wayles, American lawyer and planter (b. 1715)
June 21 – Jorge Juan y Santacilia, Spanish geodesist (b. 1713)
June 27 – Mentewab, dowager Empress of Ethiopia (b. c. 1706)
July 5 – Francisco José Freire, Portuguese historian, philologist (b. 1719)
July 12 – Johann Joachim Quantz, German flutist, composer (b. 1697)
July 23 – George Edwards, English naturalist (b. 1693)
July 25 – Axel Löwen, Swedish duke (b. 1686)
August 3 – Stanisław Konarski, Polish writer (b. 1700)
August 19
Burkat Shudi, English harpsichord maker (b. 1702)
Francesco Zahra, Maltese painter (b. 1710)
August 20 – Enrique Florez, Spanish historian (b. 1701)
September 23 – Johan Ernst Gunnerus, Norwegian bishop and botanist (b. 1718)
October 14 – Septimanie d'Egmont, French salonist (b. 1740)
October 30 – Philippe de La Guêpière, French architect (b. 1725)
November 2 – John Glas, Scottish minister (b. 1695)
November 7 – Princess Anne Charlotte of Lorraine, French royal (b. 1714)
November 8 – Friedrich Wilhelm von Seydlitz, Prussian general (b. 1721)
November 16 – John Hawkesworth, English writer
November 19 – James FitzGerald, 1st Duke of Leinster, Irish politician (b. 1722)


July 14 – The first annual conference of American Methodists is convened at Philadelphia in St. George's Church.
July 21 – Under pressure from the Bourbon courts, Pope Clement XIV suppresses the Society of Jesus (brief Dominus ac Redemptor). Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor, expels the order from his territories.
July 29 (Feast of St Martha) – Guatemala earthquake: The Santa Marta earthquake hits, with an estimated epicentral magnitude of 7.5 Mᵢ, strikes Guatemala; numerous aftershocks last until December. The city of Antigua Guatemala is virtually destroyed, leading to the decision to move the country's capital to La Nueva Guatemala de la Asunción.
August 11 – Second voyage of James Cook in the Tuamotus: Captain Cook discovers Tekokota, which he names Doubtful Island.
August 12 – Second voyage of James Cook in the Tuamotus: Captain Cook discovers Marutea Nord, which he names Furneaux Island.
September 11 – The Public Advertiser publishes a satirical essay titled Rules By Which A Great Empire May Be Reduced To A Small One, written by Benjamin Franklin.


1773 (MDCCLXXIII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar, the 1773rd year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 773rd  year of the 2nd millennium, the 73rd  year of the 18th century, and the  4th   year of the 1770s decade. As of the start of 1773, the Gregorian calendar was 11 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.


January 8 – An unsuccessful slave revolt is led by Charles Deslondes, in St. Charles and St. James Parishes, Louisiana.
January 17 – Mexican War of Independence – Battle of Calderón Bridge: A heavily outnumbered Spanish force of 6,000 troops defeats nearly 100,000 Mexican revolutionaries.
January 22 – The Casas Revolt begins in San Antonio, Spanish Texas.
February 5 – British Regency: George, Prince of Wales becomes Prince Regent, because of the perceived insanity of his father, King George III of the United Kingdom.
February 19 – Peninsular War – Battle of the Gebora: An outnumbered French force under Édouard Mortier routs and nearly destroys the Spanish, near Badajoz, Spain.
March 1 – Citadel Massacre in Cairo: Egyptian ruler Muhammad Ali kills the last Mamluk leaders.
March 5 – Peninsular War – Battle of Barrosa: A French attack fails, on a larger Anglo-Portuguese-Spanish force attempting to lift the Siege of Cádiz in Spain.
March 13 – Battle of Lissa: The British fleet defeats the French.
March 22 – The Commissioners' Plan for Manhattan is presented.
March 25 – The Great Comet of 1811 is discovered by Honoré Flaugergues.
March 27 – Battle of Anholt: The British Navy defeats Denmark.
March 28 – Henri Christophe is proclaimed King Henri I, turning the northern State of Haiti into the Kingdom of Haiti.


The Normans attacked Malta in 1091, as part of their conquest of Sicily. The Norman leader, Roger I of Sicily, was welcomed by Christian captives. The notion that Count Roger I reportedly tore off a portion of his checkered red-and-white banner and presented it to the Maltese in gratitude for having fought on his behalf, forming the basis of the modern flag of Malta, is founded in myth.
Malta became part of the newly formed Kingdom of Sicily, which also covered the island of Sicily and the southern half of the Italian Peninsula. The Catholic Church was reinstated as the state religion, with Malta under the See of Palermo, and some Norman architecture sprang up around Malta, especially in its ancient capital Mdina. King Tancred made Malta a fief of the kingdom and installed a count of Malta in 1192. As the islands were much desired due to their strategic importance, it was during this time that the men of Malta were militarised to fend off attempted conquest; early Counts were skilled Genoese privateers.
The kingdom passed on to the Hohenstaufen dynasty from 1194 until 1266. During this period, when Emperor Frederick II began to reorganise his Sicilian kingdom, Western culture and religion began to exert their influence more intensely. Malta was declared a county and a marquisate, but its trade was totally ruined. For a long time it remained solely a fortified garrison.
A mass expulsion of Arabs occurred in 1224, and the entire Christian male population of Celano in Abruzzo was deported to Malta in the same year. In 1249 Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, decreed that all remaining Muslims be expelled from Malta or compelled to convert.
For a brief period, the kingdom passed to the Capetian House of Anjou, but high taxes made the dynasty unpopular in Malta, due in part to Charles of Anjou's war against the Republic of Genoa, and the island of Gozo was sacked in 1275.


Malta has been inhabited from around 5900 BC, since the arrival of settlers originating from European Neolithic agriculturalists. A significant prehistoric Neolithic culture marked by Megalithic structures, which date back to c. 3600 BC, existed on the islands, as evidenced by the temples of Bugibba, Mnajdra, Ggantija and others. The Phoenicians colonised Malta between 800 and 700 BC, bringing their Semitic language and culture. They used the islands as an outpost from which they expanded sea explorations and trade in the Mediterranean until their successors, the Carthaginians, were ousted by the Romans in 216 BC with the help of the Maltese inhabitants, under whom Malta became a municipium.
After a probable sack by the Vandals, Malta fell under Byzantine rule (4th to 9th century) and the islands were then invaded by the Aghlabids in AD 870. The fate of the population after the Arab invasion is unclear but it seems the islands may have been repopulated at the beginning of the second millennium by settlers from Arab-ruled Sicily who spoke Siculo-Arabic.
The Muslim rule was ended by the Normans who conquered the island in 1091. The islands were completely re-Christianised by 1249. The islands were part of the Kingdom of Sicily until 1530 and were briefly controlled by the Capetian House of Anjou. In 1530 Charles V of Spain gave the Maltese islands to the Order of Knights of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem in perpetual lease.
The French under Napoleon took hold of the Maltese islands in 1798, although with the aid of the British the Maltese were able to oust French control two years later. The inhabitants subsequently asked Britain to assume sovereignty over the islands under the conditions laid out in a Declaration of Rights, stating that "his Majesty has no right to cede these Islands to any power...if he chooses to withdraw his protection, and abandon his sovereignty, the right of electing another sovereign, or of the governing of these Islands, belongs to us, the inhabitants and aborigines alone, and without control." As part of the Treaty of Paris in 1814, Malta became a British colony. It ultimately rejected an attempted integration with the United Kingdom in 1956 after the British proved reluctant to integrate.
Malta became independent on 21 September 1964 (Independence Day). Under its 1964 constitution, Malta initially retained Elizabeth II as queen, with a governor-general exercising authority on her behalf. On 13 December 1974 (Republic Day) it became a republic within the Commonwealth, with the President as head of state. On 31 March 1979, Malta saw the withdrawal of the last British troops and the Royal Navy from Malta. This day is known as Freedom Day and Malta declared itself as a neutral and non-aligned state. Malta joined the European Union on 1 May 2004 and joined the Eurozone on 1 January 2008.


The origin of the name Malta is uncertain, and the modern-day variation is derived from the Maltese language. The most common etymology is that the word Malta is derived from the Greek word μέλι, meli, "honey". The ancient Greeks called the island Μελίτη (Melitē) meaning "honey-sweet", possibly for Malta's unique production of honey; an endemic subspecies of bees live on the island. The Romans called the island Melita, which can be considered either a Latinisation of the Greek Μελίτη or the adaptation of the Doric Greek pronunciation of the same word Μελίτα. In 1525 William Tyndale used the transliteration "Melite" in Acts 28:1 for Καὶ διασωθέντες τότε ἐπέγνωμεν ὅτι Μελίτη ἡ νῆσος καλεῖται ("After we were brought safely through, we then learned that the island was called Melita") as found in his translation of The New Testament that relied on Greek texts instead of Latin. "Melita" is the spelling used in the Authorized (King James) Version of 1611 and the American Standard Version of 1901. "Malta" is widely used in more recent versions, such as The Revised Standard Version of 1946 and The New International Version of 1973.
Another conjecture suggests that the word Malta comes from the Phoenician word Maleth, "a haven", or 'port' in reference to Malta's many bays and coves. Few other etymological mentions appear in classical literature, with the term Malta appearing in its present form in the Antonine Itinerary (Itin. Marit. p. 518; Sil. Ital. xiv. 251).


Phoenician traders colonised the islands sometime after 1000 BC as a stop on their trade routes from the eastern Mediterranean to Cornwall, joining the natives on the island. The Phoenicians inhabited the area now known as Mdina, and its surrounding town of Rabat, which they called Maleth. The Romans, who also much later inhabited Mdina, referred to it (and the island) as Melita.
After the fall of Phoenicia in 332 BC, the area came under the control of Carthage, a former Phoenician colony. During this time the people on Malta mainly cultivated olives and carob and produced textiles.
During the First Punic War, the island was conquered after harsh fighting by Marcus Atilius Regulus. After the failure of his expedition, the island fell back in the hands of Carthage, only to be conquered again in 218 BC, during the Second Punic War, by Roman Consul Tiberius Sempronius Longus. After that, Malta became Foederata Civitas, a designation that meant it was exempt from paying tribute or the rule of Roman law, and fell within the jurisdiction of the province of Sicily. Punic influence, however, remained vibrant on the islands with the famous Cippi of Melqart, pivotal in deciphering the Punic language, dedicated in the 2nd century BC. Also the local Roman coinage, which ceased in the 1st century BC, indicates the slow pace of the island's Romanization, since the last locally minted coins still bear inscriptions in Ancient Greek on the obverse (like "ΜΕΛΙΤΑΙΩ", meaning "of the Maltese") and Punic motifs, showing the resistance of the Greek and Punic cultures.
In the 1st century BC, Roman Senator and orator Cicero commented on the importance of the Temple of Juno, and on the extravagant behaviour of the Roman governor of Sicily, Verres. During the 1st century BC the island was mentioned by Pliny the Elder and Diodorus Siculus: the latter praised its harbours, the wealth of its inhabitants, its lavishly decorated houses and the quality of its textile products. In the 2nd century, Emperor Hadrian (r. 117–38) upgraded the status of Malta to municipium or free town: the island local affairs were administered by four quattuorviri iuri dicundo and a municipal senate, while a Roman procurator, living in Mdina, represented the proconsul of Sicily. In 58 AD, Paul the Apostle was washed up on the islands together with Luke the Evangelist after their ship was wrecked on the islands. Paul the Apostle remained on the islands for three months, preaching the Christian faith. The island is mentioned at the Acts of the Apostles as Melitene (Greek: Μελιτήνη).
In 395, when the Roman Empire was divided for the last time at the death of Theodosius I, Malta, following Sicily, fell under the control of the Western Roman Empire. During the Migration Period as the Western Roman Empire declined, Malta came under attack and was conquered or occupied a number of times. From 454 to 464 the islands were subdued by the Vandals, and after 464 by the Ostrogoths. In 533 Belisarius, on his way to conquer the Vandal Kingdom in North Africa, reunited the islands under Imperial (Eastern) rule. Little is known about the Byzantine rule in Malta: the island depended on the theme of Sicily and had Greek Governors and a small Greek garrison. While the bulk of population continued to be constituted by the old, Latinized dwellers, during this period its religious allegiance oscillated between the Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople. The Byzantine rule introduced Greek families to the Maltese collective. Malta remained under the Byzantine Empire until 870, when it fell to the Arabs.


Fishing tackle is the equipment used by fishers when fishing. Almost any equipment or gear used for fishing can be called fishing tackle. Some examples are hooks, lines, sinkers, floats, rods, reels, baits, lures, spears, nets, gaffs, traps, waders and tackle boxes.
Tackle that is attached to the end of a fishing line is called terminal tackle. This includes hooks, sinkers, floats, leaders, swivels, split rings and wire, snaps, beads, spoons, blades, spinners and clevises to attach spinner blades to fishing lures. People also tend to use dead or live fish as another form of bait.
Fishing tackle refers to the physical equipment that is used when fishing, whereas fishing techniques refers to the ways the tackle is used when fishing.


The English word Alps comes from the Latin Alpes.
The Latin word Alpes could possibly come from the adjective albus ("white"), or could possibly come from the Greek goddess Alphito, whose name is related to alphita, the "white flour"; alphos, a dull white leprosy; and finally the Proto-Indo-European word *albʰós. Similarly, the river god Alpheus is also supposed to derive from the Greek alphos and means whitish.
In his commentary on the Aeneid of Vergil, the late fourth-century grammarian Maurus Servius Honoratus says that all high mountains are called Alpes by Celts.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the Latin Alpes might derive from a pre-Indo-European word *alb "hill"; "Albania" is a related derivation. Albania, a name not native to the region known as the country of Albania, has been used as a name for several mountainous areas across Europe.
In Roman times, "Albania" was a name for the eastern Caucasus, while in the English languages "Albania" (or "Albany") was occasionally used as a name for Scotland, although it is more likely derived from the Latin word albus, the color white.
In modern languages the term alp, alm, albe or alpe refers to a grazing pastures in the alpine regions below the glaciers, not the peaks.
An alp refers to a high mountain pasture, typically near or above the tree line, where cows and other livestock are taken to be grazed during the summer months and where huts and hay barns can be found, sometimes constituting tiny hamlets. Therefore, the term "the Alps", as a reference to the mountains, is a misnomer. The term for the mountain peaks varies by nation and language: words such as Horn, Kogel, Kopf, Gipfel, Spitze, Stock, and Berg are used in German-speaking regions; Mont, Pic, Tête, Pointe, Dent, Roche, and Aiguille in French-speaking regions; and Monte, Picco, Corno, Punta, Pizzo, or Cima in Italian-speaking regions.


The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth was created in 1569 by the Union of Lublin. As a member of the Commonwealth, Lithuania retained its institutions, including a separate army, currency, and statutory laws – the Statute of Lithuania. Eventually Polonization affected all aspects of Lithuanian life: politics, language, culture, and national identity. From the mid-16th to the mid-17th centuries, culture, arts, and education flourished, fueled by the Renaissance and the Protestant Reformation. From 1573, the Kings of Poland and Grand Dukes of Lithuania were elected by the nobility, who were granted ever-increasing Golden Liberties. These liberties, especially the liberum veto, led to anarchy and the eventual dissolution of the state.
The Commonwealth reached its Golden Age in the early 17th century. Its powerful parliament was dominated by nobles who were reluctant to get involved in the Thirty Years' War; this neutrality spared the country from the ravages of a political-religious conflict that devastated most of contemporary Europe. The Commonwealth held its own against Sweden, the Tsardom of Russia, and vassals of the Ottoman Empire, and even launched successful expansionist offensives against its neighbours. In several invasions during the Time of Troubles, Commonwealth troops entered Russia and managed to take Moscow and hold it from 27 September 1610 to 4 November 1612, when they were driven out after a siege.
In 1655, after the extinguishing battle, for the first time in history the Lithuanian capital Vilnius was taken by a foreign army. The Russian army looted the city, splendid churches, and manors. Between 8,000 and 10,000 citizens were killed; the city burned for 17 days. Those who returned after the catastrophe could not recognise the city. The Russian occupation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania lasted up to 1661. Many artefacts and cultural heritage were either lost or looted, significant parts of the state archive – Lithuanian Metrica, collected since the 13th century, were lost and the rest was moved out of the country. During the Northern Wars (1655–1661), the Lithuanian territory and economy were devastated by the Swedish army. Almost all territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was occupied by Swedish and Russian armies. This period is known as Tvanas (The Deluge).
Before it could fully recover, Lithuania was ravaged during the Great Northern War (1700–1721). The war, a plague, and a famine caused the deaths of approximately 40% of the country's population. Foreign powers, especially Russia, became dominant in the domestic politics of the Commonwealth. Numerous fractions among the nobility used the Golden Liberties to prevent any reforms.
The Constitution of 3 May 1791 was adopted by the Great Sejm (parliament) of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth trying to save the state. The legislation was designed to redress the Commonwealth's political defects due to the system of Golden Liberties, also known as the "Nobles' Democracy," which had conferred disproportionate rights on the nobility (Szlachta) and over time had corrupted politics. The constitution sought to supplant the prevailing anarchy fostered by some of the country's magnates with a more democratic constitutional monarchy. It introduced elements of political equality between townspeople and nobility, and placed the peasants under the protection of the government, thus mitigating the worst abuses of serfdom. It banned parliamentary institutions such as the liberum veto, which had put the Sejm at the mercy of any deputy who could revoke all the legislation that had been passed by that Sejm. It was drafted in relation to a copy of the United States Constitution. It is regarded as the world's second-oldest codified national governmental constitution after the 1787 U.S. Constitution.