1690s

Events

1690

January–March

• January 2 – The Ottoman Empire defeats Serbian rebels and Austrian troops in battle at Kaçanik Gorge, prompting more than 30,000 Serb refugees to flee northward from Kosovo, Macedonia and Sandžak to the Austrian Empire.
• January 6 – At the age of 11 years old, Prince Joseph, son of Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor, is named as "King of the Romans", the next in line to become the Emperor.
• January 7 – The first recorded full peal is rung, at St Sepulchre-without-Newgate in the City of London, marking a new era in change ringing.
• January 13 – Captain Thomas Pound, after being captured with his crew the previous month, is tried in Boston and found guilty of piracy although he is later reprieved.
• January 27
  • The crew of the ship HMS Welfare, commanded by John Strong, become the first European people to land at the Falkland Islands.
  • William Coward is hanged for acts of piracy, following his capture after seizing the ketch Elenor anchored in Boston Harbor the previous year.
  • The Convention Parliament is dissolved in England.
• February 6 – King William III of England calls for new elections for the 512-member House of Commons
• February 8 – The Schenectady massacre takes place in the village of Schenectady in the colony of New York, when 200 Frenchmen, Mohawk and Algonquin warriors kill or capture most of the inhabitants in retaliation for the Lachine massacre.
• February 21 – The opera Orphée by Louis Lully receives its first performance at the Académie Royale de Musique (the Paris Opera).
• March 10 – An annular solar eclipse is visible across the south of the Pacific Ocean.
• March 20 – The 2nd Parliament of William III and Mary II is assembled in London, split almost equally with 243 Whigs, 241 Tories, and 28 independent members.

April–June

• April 6 – Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor issues a document inviting Serbians to resettle in Hungary, at this time a part of the Empire.
• April 16 – An estimated 8.0 magnitude earthquake strikes in the Caribbean Sea less than 10 miles (16 km) from Barbuda and also affects St. Kitts and Nevis, as well as Antigua.
• April 25 – The Parliament of Scotland passes an Act to abolish episcopy in the presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Anglican Episcopal Church in Scotland continues as a separate denomination, retaining bishops.
• April 27 – Sultan Toloko ibn-Sibori becomes the new Sultan of Ternate, located on the Maluku Islands in the Dutch East Indies after the death of his father, Sultan Sibori Amsterdam.
• May 16 – The Battle of Port Royal takes place in Nova Scotia after an invasion by a militia of 446 soldiers and 226 sailors from the Massachusetts Bay Colony on seven warships. With only 90 French colonial soldiers to defend Port-Royal, Acadian Governor Louis-Alexandre des Friches de Menneval surrenders before the end of the day.
• May 20 – England passes the Act of Grace, forgiving followers of the deposed James II.
• June 8 – Siddi general Yadi Sakat razes the Mazagon Fort in Mumbai.
• June 14 – King William III of England (William of Orange) lands in Ireland to confront James II.
• June – An earthquake in Brazil of estimated magnitude 7, with epicenter on the left bank of the Amazon River about 45 km downstream from Manaus, spreads seismic waves through the forest and is felt up to 1000 km away.

July–September

• July 10 (June 30 O.S.) – Battle of Beachy Head: the Anglo-Dutch navy is defeated by the French, giving rise to fears of a Jacobite invasion of England.
• July 11 (July 1 O.S.) – Battle of the Boyne in Ireland: King William III of England (William of Orange) defeats the deposed James II, who returns to exile in France. The rebellion in Ireland continues for a further year until the Orange army gains full control.
• July 26 – A French landing party raids and burns Teignmouth in Devon, England. However, with the loss of James II's position in Ireland, any plans for a real invasion are soon shelved, and Teignmouth is the last French attack on England.
• August 24 – In India, the fort and trading settlement of Sutanuti is founded on the Hooghly River by the English East India Company, following the signing of an Anglo-Mughal treaty.
• September 25 – The only issue of Publick Occurrences is published in Boston, Massachusetts, before being suppressed by the colonial authorities.

October–December

• October 6
  • Massachusetts Puritans, led by Sir William Phips, besiege the city of Quebec; the siege ends in failure after six days.
  • An earthquake with strength 5.2 occurs in Caernarfon, Wales, causing tremors that can be felt as far away as London and Dublin.
• October 8 – Great Turkish War: The Ottomans recapture Belgrade.
• October 16 – Lawrence Justinian (1381–1456) and John of Sahagún (c. 1430–79) are canonized by Pope Alexander VIII.
• October 21 – The play Amphitryon by John Dryden, based on Molière's 1668 play of the same name, receives its first performance at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London.
• November 7 – The opera Énée et Lavinie (Aeneas and Lavinia) by the French composer Pascal Collasse receives its first performance at the Académie Royale de Musique (the Paris Opera).
• November 9 – Near South Mimms, England, several highwaymen stop a convoy carrying taxes from the Midlands to London and take £15,000.
• November 17 – Barclays, which will continue to be active into the 21st century as a multinational bank and lending institution, is founded in London by John Freame and Thomas Gould as Freame & Gould. The bank changes its name in 1736 when James Barclay becomes a partner.
• December 4 – A destructive earthquake in the Eastern Alps causes 24 casualties and results in damage in the Villach, Carinthia area.
• December 10 –Playwright Henry Nevil Payne is tortured for his role in the Montgomery Plot to restore James II to the throne — the last time a political prisoner is legally subjected to torture in Britain.
• December 13 – The planet Uranus is first sighted and recorded, by England's first Astronomer Royal, John Flamsteed, who mistakenly catalogs it as a star 34 Tauri.
• December 20 (December 10, 1690 O.S.) — The General Court of the Province of Massachusetts Bay creates the first authorized paper money issued by any government in the Western World as a substitute for coins. The first money is printed on February 13, 1691 (N.S.) and is dated "Feb. 3, 1690" based on the British old style calendar in use at the time.
• December 29 – An earthquake hits Ancona, in the Papal States of Italy and causes 10 deaths.

Date unknown

• Serbian Patriarch Arsenije III Carnojevic leads the first of the two Great Serbian Migrations into the Habsburg Empire, following Ottoman atrocities in Kosovo.
• The Hearth Tax is abolished in Scotland, one year after its abolition in England and Wales.
• French physicist Denis Papin, while in Leipzig and having observed the mechanical power of atmospheric pressure on his 'digester', builds a working model of a reciprocating steam engine for pumping water, the first of its kind, though not efficient.
• Dutch polymath Christiaan Huygens publishes his book Treatise on Light. The book is considered a pioneering work of theoretical and mathematical physics.
• Giovanni Domenico Cassini observes differential rotation within Jupiter's atmosphere.
• The construction of Fort Longueuil, a stone fort in Longueuil, in Quebec, Canada, is completed. It is one of the only buildings in Canada that could ever be considered a castle (fortified residence for a noble), and out of those buildings it most resembles the castles of Europe.
• The Barrage Vauban, a defensive work in the city of Strasbourg (in modern-day France), is completed.
• The French dictionary and encyclopaedia Dictionnaire universel, contenant generalement tous les mots françois, compiled by Antoine Furetière, is published posthumously.
• Possible year of the disappearance of the western part of the island of Buise, in St. Peter's Flood.

1691

January–March

• January 6 – King William III of England, who rules Scotland and Ireland as well as being the Stadtholder of the Dutch Republic, departs from Margate to tend to the affairs of the Netherlands.
• January 14 – A fleet of ships carrying 827 Spanish Navy sailors and marines arrives at Manzanillo Bay on the island of Hispaniola in what is now the Dominican Republic and joins 700 Spanish cavalry, then proceeds westward to invade the French side of the island in what is now Haiti.
• January 15 – King Louis XIV of France issues an order specifically prohibiting play of games of chance, specifically naming basset and similar games, on penalty of 1,000 livres for the first offence.
• January 23 – Spanish colonial administrator Domingo Terán de los Ríos, most recently the governor of Sonora y Sinaloa on the east side of the Gulf of California, is assigned by the Viceroy of New Spain to administer a new province that governs lands on both sides of the Río Bravo del Norte, "Coahuila y Tejas", and effectively becomes the first Governor of Texas.
• February 13 – The Massachusetts Bay Colony issues the first paper money in North America, in lieu of coins, two months after a December 20 law authorizing the printing. The oldest known specimen, for 20 Massachusetts shillings bears the date "Feb. 3, 1690" based on the British old style calendar in use at the time.
• February 28 – An annular solar eclipse is visible across the Philippines, North Borneo and eastern Sumatra.
• March 5 – Nine Years' War: French troops under Marshal Louis-Francois de Boufflers besiege the Spanish-held town of Mons.
• March 14 – The Public Security Police Force of Macau is founded.
• March 17 – The Athenian Mercury begins twice-weekly publication by The Athenian Society in London.
• March 20 – Leisler's Rebellion: A new governor arrives in New York – Jacob Leisler surrenders, after a standoff of several hours.
• March 29 – The Siege of Mons ends in the city's surrender.

April–June

• April 9 – A fire at the Palace of Whitehall in London destroys its Stone Gallery.
• May 6
  • The Spanish Inquisition condemns and forcibly baptizes 219 Xuetas in Palma, Majorca. When 37 try to escape the island, they are burned alive at the stake.
  • The Province of New York establishes the New York Supreme Court as the Supreme Court of Judicature. It is the oldest Supreme Court with general original jurisdiction.
• May 16 – Jacob Leisler is hanged for treason.
• June – The first performance takes place of the semi-opera King Arthur with a libretto by John Dryden and music by Henry Purcell.
• June 23 – Ahmed II (1691–1695) succeeds Suleiman II (1687–1691), as Ottoman Emperor.

July–September

• July 12
  • Pope Innocent XII becomes the 242nd pope, succeeding Pope Alexander VIII.
  • Williamite War in Ireland – Battle of Aughrim: Protestant Williamite forces, led by Godert de Ginkell, decisively defeat Jacobites under the Marquis de St Ruth (who is killed).
• August 11 – The Battle of La Prairie in Canada: an English and Iroquois force come north from Albany, New York to attack Montreal, but are repulsed with significant casualties by the French and their First Nations allies.
• August 12 – The Battle of Slankamen takes place between the Ottoman Empire and the Holy Roman Empire and allies at Syrmia (now the Serbian province of Vojvodina), and 25,000 Ottomans are killed, including Köprülüzade Fazıl Mustafa Pasha, the Grand Vizier.
• August 23 – A total solar eclipse is visible across South America, Central America and Mexico.
• August 27 – In Scotland, King William offers the Highland clans a pardon for their part in the Jacobite rising of 1689 if they agree to pledge allegiance to him before New Year's Day.
• September 3 – HMS Coronation and HMS Harwich are lost in a storm while making for shelter in Plymouth Sound with 900 killed.
• September 18 – War of the Grand Alliance: English and Dutch forces are defeated by the French in the Battle of Leuze.

October–December

• October 3 – The Treaty of Limerick, ending the Williamite War in Ireland and guaranteeing civil rights to Roman Catholics, is signed. The Flight of the Wild Geese follows.
• October 17 (October 7 O.S.) – In New England, the two separate colonies of Massachusetts Bay Colony and Plymouth Colony are united into a single entity by an act of the King and Queen of England.
• November 26 – In Limerick, "A Form of Prayer and Thanksgiving to the Almighty God for the Preservation of Their Majesties, the Success of Their Forces in the reducing of Ireland, and for His Majesties Safe Return" is celebrated in all Anglican churches in Britain and Ireland by order of Archbishop Tillotson.
• December 6 – During the Morean War, Captain Luca Dalla Rocca of Naples betrays Venice by surrendering the fortress of Gramvousa, on the island of Crete to the Ottoman Turks, in return for a large amount of money and sanctuary in Istanbul.
• December 22 – Patrick Sarsfield and 19,000 troops of the Irish Army who had been supporters of the Jacobite Rebellion leave the country and relocate to France.

Date unknown

• HMNB Devonport, currently one of three operating bases in the United Kingdom for the Royal Navy and the largest naval base in Western Europe, opens.
• Michel Rolle invents Rolle's theorem, which states that any real-valued differentiable function that attains equal values at two distinct points must have at least one stationary point somewhere between them.
• The Khalkha submit to the Manchu invaders, bringing most of modern-day Mongolia under the rule of the Qing Dynasty.
• Nimavar school in Isfahan, Iran is built and opens in this era of Suleiman I.
• The textile factory Barnängens manufaktur is founded in Stockholm, Sweden.
• The Society for the Reformation of Manners is founded in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets with the aim of suppressing profanity, immorality, and other lewd activities in general, and of brothels and prostitution in particular.

1692

January–March

• January 24 – At least 75 residents of what is now York, Maine are killed in the Candlemas Massacre, carried out by French soldiers led by missionary Louis-Pierre Thury, along with a larger force of Abenaki and Penobscot Indians under the command of Penobscot Chief Madockawando during King William's War, between the French colonists and their indigenous allies, against the English colonists.
• January 30 – English Army General John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, a close adviser to King William III of England, is fired from all of his jobs by the English Secretary of State, the Earl of Nottingham, on orders of Mary II of England.
• February 13 – Massacre of Glencoe: The forces of Robert Campbell slaughter around 40 members of the Clan MacDonald of Glencoe in Scotland (from whom they have previously accepted hospitality), for delaying to sign an oath of allegiance to King William III of England.
• February 17 – An annular solar eclipse is visible across Russia, western Mongolia, Xinjiang, Iran, Afghanistan and Iran.
• March 1 – The Salem witch trials begin in Salem Village, Massachusetts Bay Colony, with the charging of 3 women with witchcraft. Tituba, a slave owned by Samuel Parris, is the first to be arrested, and she implicates Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne, who are arrested later in the day.
• March 22 – The Kangxi Emperor of the Qing dynasty issues the Edict of Toleration, recognizing all the members of the Roman Catholic Church, not just the Jesuits, and legalizing missions and their conversion of Chinese people to the Christian Faith.

April–June

• April 18 – Giles Corey, Mary Warren, Abigail Hobbs and Bridget Bishop, all residents of Salem, Massachusetts, are arrested and charged with the practice of witchcraft.
• May 2 – The first performance of the semi-opera The Fairy-Queen by Henry Purcell, based on William Shakespeare's comedy A Midsummer Night's Dream, takes place at the Queen's Theatre, Dorset Garden in London.
• May 29 (May 19 O.S.) – Nine Years' War: Battle of Barfleur – The Anglo-Dutch fleet breaks the French line off the Cotentin Peninsula, foiling the French plan to invade England.
• June 13–14 (June 3–4 O.S.) – Nine Years' War: Battle of La Hogue – The action begun at Barfleur ends with further destruction of the French fleet.
• June 7 – Jamaica earthquake: An earthquake and related tsunami destroy Port Royal, capital of Jamaica, and submerge a major part of it; an estimated 2,000 are immediately killed, 2,300 injured, and a probable additional 2,000 die from the diseases which ravage the island in the following months.
• June 8 – During a famine in Mexico City, an angry mob torches the Viceroy's palace and ignites the archives; most of the documents and some paintings are saved by royal geographer Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora.
• June 10 – The Salem witch trials' first victim, Bridget Bishop, is hanged for witchcraft.

July–September

• July 1 – The siege of the Belgian city of Namur in the Spanish Netherlands ends as Dutch General Menno van Coehoorn capitulates to King Louis XIV of France after five weeks. The siege, a battle in the ongoing Nine Years War, had begun on May 24.
• July 5 – Wine shop owner Antoine Savetier and his wife are murdered by thieves in the French city of Lyon, and a peasant named Jacques Aymar-Vernay is called in as a detective to solve the case. Aymar finds one of the perpetrators, Joseph Arnoul, who confesses to the crime and implicates two accomplices who manage to escape. Arnoul is executed by being "broken on the wheel" on August 30.
• August 12
  • The city of Ponce is founded in Puerto Rico.
  • A total solar eclipse is visible in the South Atlantic Ocean.
• September 8 – An earthquake in Brabant of scale 5.8 is felt across the Low Countries, Germany and England.
• September 14 – Diego de Vargas leads Spanish colonists in retaking the city of Santa Fe, after a 12-year exile, following the Pueblo Revolt of 1680.
• September 19 – Giles Corey is pressed to death in an attempt to coerce a confession from him of witchcraft during the Salem witch trials.
• September 22 – The last of those convicted of witchcraft in the Salem witch trials are hanged. By the end of September, 14 women and 5 men have been executed by hanging. The remainder of those convicted are all eventually released.
• September 27 – The trial for sorcery of Anne Palles of Denmark begins, and she gives a long confession of giving her body and soul to Satan. The court finds her guilty on November 2 and sentences her to death.

October–December

• October 21 – In Barbados, a slave revolt is crushed.
• October 30 – The King of Spain donates the lands that become the municipalities of San Francisco and Mapulaca in Honduras.
• November 5 – Mohamed bin Hajj Ali Thukkala becomes the new Sultan of the Maldives as Muhammad Ali IV.
• November 8 – William Mountfort's play Henry The Second, King Of England; With The Death Of Rosamond is given its first performance, premiering at the Drury Lane Theatre.
• December 5 – John Goldsborough arrives in Madras as the new administrator of the British East India Company.
• December 14 – Maratha Empire General Santaji Ghorpade defeats Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb's General Alimardan Khan, captures him and brings him back to fort Jinjee near Madras.
• December 23 – Nahum Tate is named as the new Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom and serves for 22 years until his death.
• December 24 – The French ship Soleil Royal, a three-decker First Rank ship with 104 guns, is launched at Brest Dockyard.

1693

January–March

• January 11 – The Mount Etna volcano erupts in Italy, causing a devastating earthquake that kills 60,000 people in Sicily and Malta.
• January 22 – A total lunar eclipse is visible across North and South America.
• February 8 – The College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia is granted a Royal charter.
• February 27 – The publication of the first women's magazine, titled The Ladies' Mercury, takes place in London. It is published by the Athenian Society.
• March 27 – Bozoklu Mustafa Pasha becomes the new Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire, after Sultan Ahmed II appoints him as the successor of Çalık Ali Pasha.

April–June

• April 4 – Anne Palles becomes the last accused witch to be executed for witchcraft in Denmark, after having been convicted of using powers of sorcery. King Christian V accepts her plea not to be burned alive, and she is beheaded before her body is set afire.
• April 5 – The Order of Saint Louis, the first medal to be awarded in France to military personnel who are not members of nobility, is created by order of King Louis XIV, and named after his ancestor, King Louis IX.
• April 28 – The 90-gun English Royal Navy warship HMS Windsor Castle is wrecked beyond repair on the Goodwin Sands.
• April – Tituba, a slave who had been convicted at the Salem witch trials of practicing witchcraft after making a confession, is released from jail in Boston after 13 months when an unknown purchaser pays her jail fees.
• May 18 – Forces of Louis XIV of France attack Heidelberg, capital of the Electorate of the Palatinate.
• May 22 – Heidelberg is taken by the invading French forces; on May 23 Heidelberg Castle is surrendered, after which the French blow up its towers using mines.
• June 5 – The first performance of the opera Didon by French composer Henri Desmarets takes place at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal in Paris.
• June 27 – Nine Years' War – Battle of Lagos off Portugal: The French fleet defeats the joint Dutch and English fleet.

July–September

• July 17 – A total lunar eclipse is visible in New Zealand and across the Pacific Ocean.
• July 29 – Nine Years' War – Battle of Landen: William III of England is defeated by the French (with Irish Jacobite mercenaries).
• August 21 – The Indian Ocean port of Pondicherry, capital of French India is captured by a 17-ship fleet from the Netherlands and 1,600 men under the command of Laurens Pit the Younger.
• September 9 – Francesco Invrea, King of Corsica, begins a two-year term as the Doge of the Republic of Genoa in Italy, succeeding Giovanni Battista Cattaneo Della Volta.
• September 10 – France begins the siege of the Spanish Netherlands (now Belgium) fort of Charleroi.
• September 14 – King Louis XIV of France sends a letter to Pope Innocent XII announcing the rescission of the Declaration of the Clergy of France issued in 1682.
• September 23 – Manuel Afonso Nzinga a Nlenke, ruling as King Manuel I of the Kingdom of Kongo (in present-day northern Angola) is executed on orders of the new king, Álvaro X.

October–December

• October – William Congreve's comedy The Double-Dealer is first performed in London.
• October 4 – Battle of Marsaglia near Turin in the Duchy of Savoy: A French force under the command of General Nicolas Catinat defeats the Savoyard forces, leaving 10,000 dead or wounded, while sustaining only 1,000 casualties.
• October 11 – Charleroi falls to French forces.
• October 29 – The Great Storm changes the course of rivers and alters the coastline from Virginia to Long Island in America.
• November 7 – King Charles II of Spain issues a royal edict providing sanctuary in Spanish Florida for escaped slaves from the English colony of South Carolina.
• November 14 – General Santaji Ghorpade of the Maratha Empire in India is defeated by General Himmat Khan of the Mughal Empire near Vikramhalli, and retreats. A week later, after regrouping his troops, Santaji defeats Himmat at their next encounter.
• November 21 – The 46-gun Royal Navy frigate HMS Mordaunt founders off of the coast of Cuba.
• November 29 – A fleet of 30 English and Dutch ships captures the French port of Saint-Malo
• December 16 – Diego de Vargas, Spanish colonial governor of Santa Fe de Nuevo México (now the area around the capital of the U.S. state of New Mexico, returns to the walled city of Santa Fe and requests the Pueblo people to accept the authority of the colonial government. Negotiations fail and a siege begins on December 29. The Pueblo defenders surrender the next day and the 70 rebels are executed soon after. The 400 civilian women and children are made slaves and distributed to the Spanish colonists.
• December 27 – The new 80-gun English Navy warship HMS Sussex departs Portsmouth on its maiden voyage, escorting a fleet of 48 warships and 166 merchant ships to the Mediterranean Sea. The fleet runs into a storm on February 27, 1694, and on March 1, Sussex and 12 other warships sink, along with a cargo of gold.

Date unknown

• China concentrates all its foreign trade on Canton; European ships are forbidden to land anywhere else.
• A religious schism takes place in Switzerland, within a group of Swiss and Alsatian Anabaptists led by Jakob Ammann. Those who follow Ammann become the Mennonite Amish sect.
• The Knights of the Apocalypse are formed in Italy.
• The Academia Operosorum Labacensium is established in Ljubljana, Slovenia.
• Financier Richard Hoare relocates Hoare's Bank (founded 1672) from Cheapside to Fleet Street in London.
• Italian barber Giovanni Paolo Feminis creates a perfume water called Aqua Admirabilis, earliest known form of eau de Cologne.
• John Locke publishes his influential book Some Thoughts Concerning Education.
• William Penn publishes his proposal for European federation, Essay on the Present and Future Peace of Europe.
• English astronomer Edmond Halley studies records of births and deaths in Breslau (Poland), producing a life table consolidating year of birth and age at death. He uses this to work out the price of life annuities.
• Dimitrie Cantemir presents his Kitâbu 'İlmi'l-Mûsiki alâ Vechi'l-Hurûfât (The Book of the Science of Music through Letters) to Sultan Ahmed II, which deals with melodic and rhythmic structure and practice of Ottoman music, and contains the scores for around 350 works composed during and before his own time, in an alphabetical notation system he invented.

1694

January–March

• January 16 – Francesco Morosini, the Doge of Venice since 1688, dies after ruling the Republic for more than five years and a few months after an unsuccessful attempt to capture the island of Negropont from the Ottoman Empire during the Morean War.
• January 18 – Sir James Montgomery of Scotland, who had been arrested on January 11 for conspiracy to restore King James to the throne, escapes and flees to France.
• January 21 (January 11 O.S.) – The Kiev Academy, now the national university of Ukraine, receives official recognition by Tsar Ivan V of Russia.
• January 28 – Pirro e Demetrio, an opera by Alessandro Scarlatti, is given its first performance, debuting at the Teatro San Bartolomeo in Naples. The opera is adapted in 1708 in London as Pyrrhus and Demetrius and becomes the second most popular opera in 18th century London.
• January 29 – French missionary Jean-Baptiste Labat arrives in the "New World", landing at the Caribbean island of Martinique.
• February 5 – The ship Ridderschap van Holland is lost at sea, having departed the Cape of Good Hope with a crew of 300, with a destination of Batavia (now Jakarta in Indonesia), normally a voyage of two months. It never arrives and is never seen again.
• February 6 – The colony of Quilombo dos Palmares, created by rebel African slaves in Brazil, is destroyed by the bandeirantes, colonial troops under the command of Domingos Jorge Velho. After a successful attack on its capital, Cerca do Macaco, the last King of Dos Palmares, Zumbi, flees after a reign of more than 13 years, but is later captured and executed.
• February 26 – Silvestro Valier is elected as the new Doge of Venice to replace the late Francesco Morosini
• March 1 – The HMS Sussex treasure fleet of thirteen ships is wrecked in the Mediterranean off Gibraltar, with the loss of approximately 1,200 lives.
• March 8 – The Casa da Moeda do Brasil is formed by Peter II of Portugal.

April–June

• April 2 – Sheikh Yusuf, exiled by the administrators of the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), arrives at the Dutch Cape Colony on the ship De Voetboog, at what is now Cape Town, South Africa, along with two wives, two concubines and 12 children. Resettled by the colonial government at a farm in Zandvliet, the Sheikh introduces Islam to South Africa.
• April 7 – The English Navy's 40-gun warship, HMS Ruby, captures the French privateer Entreprenant in battle. The confiscated ship is renamed HMS Ruby Prize.
• April 12 – The French ship Diligente, commanded by René Duguay-Trouin, covers the escape of a convoy of ships that he is escorting, but then is surrounded and attacked by six Royal Navy ships led by David Mitchell. Most of the Diligente crew is lost in the battle, and Duguay-Trouin is captured.
• April 13 – The largest volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius since 1631 takes place, with lava flows towards both San Giorgio a Cremano and Torre del Greco, after explosions in the crater that began April 5. Around April 20, ash falls are experienced as far away as Calabria.
• April 27 – Frederick Augustus of Wettin, later known as "Augustus the Strong" and the future King of Poland, becomes the new Elector of Saxony upon the death of his 25-year-old older brother, John George IV
• May 27 – Taking advantage of a fog, the French Army, with 24,000 troops, fights the Battle of Torroella against an equally large Spanish Army force on the banks of the Ter in Spain, near the city of Girona during the Nine Years' War. The Spaniards suffer 3,000 casualties, while the French sustain 500.
• June 22 – An annular solar eclipse is visible across North America and the Atlantic Ocean.
• June 24 – The Tunisian–Algerian War begins as Algerian troops cross into Tunisia.
• June 29 – The Battle of Texel is fought near the Dutch island of Texel, one of the West Frisian Islands. The French Navy force of 8 ships, commanded by Jean Bart, locates and rescues three French ships that had been captured by the Dutch Republic in late May. Bart fights a larger force commanded by Hidde Sjoerds de Vries, who dies of his wounds after being captured.

July–September

• July 27 – The Bank of England is founded through Royal charter by the Whig-dominated Parliament of England, following a proposal by Scottish merchant William Paterson to raise capital, by offering safe and steady returns of interest guaranteed by future taxes. A total of £1.2 million is raised for the war effort against Louis XIV of France by the end of the year, to establish the first-ever government debt.
• August 6 – The coronation of Sultan Husayn of the Safavid dynasty as the Shah of Persia takes place in Isfahan, eight days after the death of his father Suleiman I.
• August 24 – The Dictionnaire de l'Académie française, the first official dictionary of the French language, is presented by Jacques de Tourreil and Academy members on behalf of the Académie française to King Louis XIV.
• September 5 – The Great Fire of Warwick breaks out in England and destroys half the town. Donors raise £110,000 toward disaster relief, with Queen Anne contributing £1,000.
• September 8 – The 1694 Irpinia–Basilicata earthquake causes widespread severe damage and over 6,000 deaths in the Kingdom of Naples.
• September 27 – A hurricane hits Carlisle Bay, Barbados, sinking 27 British ships and resulting in 3,000 casualties.

October–December

• October 19 – A major windstorm begins and continues for several days, spreading the Culbin Sands over a large area of farmland in the Scottish Highlands in the County of Moray and burying the now-abandoned village of Culbin.
• October 23 – British/American colonial forces, led by Sir William Phips, fail to seize Quebec from the French.
• October 25 – Queen Mary II of England founds the Royal Hospital for Seamen at Greenwich.
• November 12 – The Army of Algeria captures Tunis, the capital of Tunisia, after a siege of three months, bringing an end to the Tunisian–Algerian War. Mohamed Bey El Mouradi, the Bey of Tunis, flees southward while Prince Muhammad ben Cheker of Tunisia becomes the new Dey on behalf of the Dey of Algiers, Hadj Ahmed.
• December 3 – The Parliament of England passes the Triennial Act, requiring general elections every three years.
• December 6 – Thomas Tenison is appointed Archbishop of Canterbury.
• December 16 – A total solar eclipse is visible across South America.

Date unknown

• The Lao empire of Lan Xang unofficially ends.
• The notorious voyage of the English slave ship Hannibal (part of the Atlantic slave trade out of Benin) ends with the death of nearly half of the 692 slaves aboard.
• Rascians establish the settlement which will become Novi Sad on the Danube.
• The Parker Tavern is built in Reading, Massachusetts.

1695

January–March

• January 7 (December 28, 1694 O.S.) – The United Kingdom's last joint monarchy, the reign of husband-and-wife King William III and Queen Mary II comes to an end with the death of Queen Mary, at the age of 32. Princess Mary had been installed as the monarch along with her husband and cousin, Willem Hendrik von Oranje, Stadtholder of the Dutch Republic, in 1689 after King James II was deposed by Willem during the "Glorious Revolution".
• January 14 (January 4 O.S.) – The Royal Navy warship HMS Nonsuch is captured near England's Isles of Scilly by the 48-gun French privateer Le Francois. Nonsuch is then sold to the French Navy and renamed Le Sans Pareil.
• January 24 – Milan's Court Theater is destroyed in a fire.
• January 27 – A flotilla of six Royal Navy warships under the command of Commodore James Killegrew aboard HMS Plymouth captures two French warships, the Content and the Trident, the day after the French ships had mistaken the English fleet to be a group of merchant ships to attack.
• February 6 – Mustafa II (1664 – 1703) succeeds his uncle, Ahmed II as Sultan of the Ottoman Empire.
• March 5 – The funeral of Queen Mary II of England takes place, accompanied by music written for the occasion by Henry Purcell.
• March 10 – Almost all French Army soldiers in a column of 1,300 troops, commanded by Brigadier General Urbain Le Clerc de Juigné, are killed or captured in the Battle of Sant Esteve d'en Bas against a smaller Spanish Empire force led by Ramon de Sala i Saçala during the War of the Grand Alliance.
• March 7 – John Trevor, Speaker of the English House of Commons, is expelled from the House by vote of the members, after being found guilty of accepting a bribe of 1000 pounds sterling from the City of London Corporation.
• March 14 – Paul Foley is elected as the new Speaker of the House after the expulsion of John Trevor.
• March 26 – John Hungerford is expelled from the English House of Commons when members vote to find him guilty of accepting a bribe in return for using his committee chairmanship to promote the pending Orphans Bill.

April–June

• April 17 – The House of Commons of England decides not to renew the Licensing Order of 1643, and states its reasoning, beginning with "Because it revives, and re-enacts, a Law which in no-wise answered the End for which it was made". The lifting of censorship creates a more open society, and an explosion of print results. Within 30 years, the number of printing houses in England increases from 20 to 103.
• April 22 – Sürmeli Ali Pasha is fired from his position as Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire, after coming into a disagreement with the new Sultan, Mustafa II. Sürmeli is initially sent into exile, but executed on the Sultan's orders on May 29.
• April 27 – Russo-Turkish War (1686–1700): Russia begins the Azov campaigns (1695–96) against the Ottoman Empire, with 31,000 troops departing to the Ottoman fortress at Azov on the Don River.
• May 18 – The 7.8 magnitude Linfen earthquake in Shanxi Province, Qing Dynasty kills over 50,000 people.
• June 11 – An annular eclipse of the sun is visible across South America.
• June 24 – The Commission of Enquiry into the Massacre of Glencoe in Scotland in 1692 reports to the Parliament of England, blaming Sir John Dalrymple, Secretary of State over Scotland, and declares that a soldier should refuse to obey a "command against the law of nature".

July–September

• July 12 – The Siege of Namur begins in the Spanish Netherlands (now Belgium).
• July 15 – The siege of the Ottoman fortress at Azaq by the Russian Army begins, but is unsuccessful and is discontinued after October 2 (September 22 O.S.).
• July 17 – The Bank of Scotland is founded.
• August 8 – The Wren Building is started in Williamsburg, Virginia (completed in 1700).
• August 13–15 – Nine Years' War: Brussels is bombarded by French troops.
• September 1 – Nine Years' War: France surrenders Namur, Spanish Netherlands to forces of the Grand Alliance, led by King William III of England, Stadtholder of the Dutch Republic, following the 2-month Siege of Namur.
• September 7 – English pirate Henry Every perpetrates one of the most profitable raids in history, with the capture of the Grand Mughal ship Ganj-i-Sawai. In response, Emperor Aurangzeb threatens to put an end to all English trading in India.
• September 24 – All but eight of the remaining 305 crew of the Royal Navy ship HMS Winchester (1693) are killed when the ship founders in the Florida Keys. According to the ship's logbook, an epidemic of yellow fever began on August 1 and had killed 45 people before the hurricane struck, and left all but seven crew members too ill to walk.

October–December

• October 11 – King William III of England dissolves Parliament in the wake of a scandal involving former Speaker of the House of Commons John Trevor and other Tory MPs.
• October 25 – The 48-gun English Navy ship HMS Berkeley Castle is captured by the French Navy.
• November 22 – The new Parliament, with 513 members of the House of Commons is opened by King William III. Commons is composed of 257 Whigs (who hold a majority of one), 203 Tories and 53 members of other parties or independents.
• December 6 – A total eclipse of the sun is visible across the Middle East and western Asia.
• December 31 – A window tax is imposed in England. Some windows are bricked up to avoid it.

Date unknown

• English manufacturers call for an embargo on Indian cloth, and silk weavers picket the House of Commons of England.
• A £2 fine is imposed for swearing in England.
• After 23 years of construction, Spain completes Castillo de San Marcos to protect St. Augustine, Florida, from foreign threats.
• After many years of construction, the Potala Palace in Lhasa is completed.
• Gold is discovered in Brazil.
• Johanne Nielsdatter is executed for witchcraft, the last such confirmed execution in Norway.
• In Amsterdam, the bank Wed. Jean Deutz & Sn. floats the first sovereign bonds on the local market. The scheme is designed to fund a 1.5 million guilder loan to the Holy Roman Emperor. From this date on, European leaders commonly take advantage of the low interest rates available in the Dutch Republic, and borrow several hundred millions on the Dutch capital market.
• A large unidentified tropical volcanic eruption causes colder temperatures, crop failure, food shortage and mortality in north-western Europe.
• The Great Famine of 1695–1697 begins as the Great Famine of Estonia (1695–97) in Swedish Estonia and spreads across Finland, Latvia, Norway and Sweden, while the "seven ill years" of famine in Scotland are ongoing.

1696

January–March

• January 21 – The Recoinage Act, passed by the Parliament of England to pull counterfeit silver coins out of circulation, becomes law.
• January 27 – In England, the ship HMS Royal Sovereign (formerly HMS Sovereign of the Seas, 1638) catches fire and burns at Chatham, after 57 years of service.
• January 31 – In the Netherlands, undertakers revolt after funeral reforms in Amsterdam.
• January – Colley Cibber's play Love's Last Shift is first performed in London.
• February 8 (January 29 old style) – Peter the Great who had jointly reigned since 1682 with his mentally-ill older half-brother, Tsar Ivan V, becomes the sole Tsar of Russia when Ivan dies at the age of 29.
• February 15 – A plot to ambush and assassinate King William III of England in order to restore King James and the House of Stuart to the throne is foiled when the King cancels his usual plan to return from a hunting trip by way of the road between Turnham Green and Brentford. The King's guard is alerted by the Earl of Portland, William Bentinck, who had been approached on February 13 by Sir Thomas Prendergast.
• February 23 – A royal proclamation is issued to arrest suspected Jacobite conspirators who had plotted the assassination of King William III, including gunman Robert Charnock and organizers George Barclay, and Sir John Fenwick. Barclay eludes capture, but Charnock and Fenwick are executed.
• March 7 – King William III of England departs from the Netherlands.
• March 9 – Spanish missionaries in the province of Santa Fe de Nuevo México in North America first learn of plans for a revolt among the Pueblo Indians and send warnings to the Governor, asking for Spanish troops. The uprising begins on June 4.
• March 16 – The Dutch bombard Givet during the Nine Years' War.
• March 18 – Robert Charnock, who had been arrested for the Jacobite plot to kill King William is hanged at the Tower of London.

April–June

• April 23 – Russo-Turkish War (1686–1700): Russia begins the second of the Azov campaigns (1695–96).
• April – A fire destroys the Gra Bet (Left Quarter) of Gondar, the capital of Ethiopia. The fire starts "in the house of a prostitute" and destroys many buildings, including the churches of St. George, Takla Haymanot and Iyasu.
• May 1 – A partial solar eclipse is visible in western Canada and Greenland.
• May 16 – A total lunar eclipse is visible in western Europe and Africa.
• May 31 – John Salomonsz is elected chief of Sint Eustatius in the Caribbean Netherlands.
• June 4 – A second Pueblo Revolt occurs in Santa Fe de Nuevo México. The Tiwas of Taos and Picuris, the Tewas of San Ildefonso and Nambe, the Tanos of Jemez and San Cristobal, and the Keres of Santo Domingo and Cochiti attack during the full moon and kill 21 Spanish civilians and five priests.
• June 12 – China's Kangxi Emperor leads troops in the Battle of Jao Modo (about 37 miles (60 km) from the modern Mongolian capital, Ulan Bator, and defeats 5,000 Mongolian troops of the Dzungar Khanate, under the command of Galdan Boshugtu Khan.
• June 17
  • The throne of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth becomes vacant with the death of Jan Sobieski, prompting a competition between Friedrich Augustus, Elector of Saxony and Prince François Louis of France to compete under the Commonwealth's "Golden Liberty" system for an elective monarchy of the new King by the nobility. Jerzy Albrecht Denhoff, the Grand Chancellor, remains the head of the Polish-Lithuanian government during the vacancy of the ceremonial throne.
  • The Battle of Dogger Bank in which seven French ships attack five Dutch ships escorting a Dutch convoy of 112 merchant ships.

July–September

• July 18 – Azov campaign: The Russian fleet occupies Azov at the mouth of the river Don.
• August 13 – The Dutch state of Drenthe makes William III of Orange its Stadtholder.
• August 22 – Forces of the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire clash near Andros.
• August 29 – King Louis XIV of France and Victor Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, sign the Treaty of Turin, ending Savoy's involvement in the Nine Years' War.
• September 8 – The Parliament of Scotland passes the Education Act 1696, providing for locally funded, Church-supervised schools to be established in every parish in Scotland.
• September 11 – England's Royal Navy scuttles and deliberately sinks its 32-gun battleship HMS Sapphire in Bay Bulls Harbour in Newfoundland, rather than let it be captured by the French Navy following a disastrous battle.
• September 17 – On Canada's Hudson Bay, the English Navy recaptures the York Factory from France, three years after the French had captured it, and renamed the site "Fort Bourbon".

October–December

• October 7 – The Convention of Vigevano is signed, bringing a general ceasefire in Italy and an end to the Nine Years' War between France and the remaining members of the Grand Alliance.
• October 20 – The Imperial Russian Navy is founded on the recommendation of Tsar Peter the Great and approval by the Russian Duma.
• November 9 – A total lunar eclipse is visible in North and South America.
• November 12 – Hand in Hand Fire & Life Insurance Society, as predecessor to Aviva, is founded in England.
• November 21 – John Vanbrugh's play The Relapse is first performed in London.
• November 25 – In England, the House of Commons approves the bill of attainder to convict Sir John Fenwick of high treason for plotting to lead the assassination of and coup d'état against King William III, on its third and final reading, voting 187 to 161 in favor of conviction. The measure then moves to the House of Lords.
• November 30 – Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville captures and destroys St. John's, Newfoundland after a three-day siege.
• December 7 – Connecticut Route 108, one of Connecticut's oldest highways is laid-out to Trumbull.
• December 19 – Jean-François Regnard's verse comedy Le Joueur ("The Gamester") premieres in Paris.
• December 23 – By a vote of 66 to 60, the English House of Lords approves the bill of attainder for the conviction of Sir John Fenwick for high treason. Fenwick is beheaded on January 28, 1697.
• December 24 – The Inquisition in Portugal carries out the sentence of burning at the stake against several Marrano Jews in Évora.

Date unknown

• The Great Famine of 1695–1697 wipes out almost a third of the population of Finland, while the Great Famine of Estonia (1695–97) takes out a fifth of the population of Estonia; and the "seven ill years" of famine in Scotland are ongoing.
• Polish replaces Ruthenian as an official language of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
• Abington, Pennsylvania, is settled.
• William Penn offers an elaborate plan for intercolonial cooperation largely in trade, defense, and criminal matters.
• Edward Lloyd (coffeehouse owner) probably begins publication of Lloyd's News, a predecessor of Lloyd's List, in London.
• Window tax was introduced in England and Wales and remained in force until 1851.
• A New Theory of the Earth, a book by William Whiston, is published and is well received by intellectuals of the day.
• The Bank of Scotland becomes the first bank in Europe to successfully issue paper currency.

1697

January–March

• January 8 – Thomas Aikenhead is hanged outside Edinburgh, becoming the last person in Great Britain to be executed for blasphemy.
• January 11 – French writer Charles Perrault releases the book Histoires ou contes du temps passé (literally "Tales of Past Times", known in England as "Mother Goose tales") in Paris, a collection of popular fairy tales, including Cinderella, Puss in Boots, Red Riding Hood, The Sleeping Beauty and Bluebeard.
• February 22 – Gerrit de Heere becomes the new Governor of Dutch Ceylon, succeeding Thomas van Rhee and administering the colony for almost six years until his death.
• February 26 – Conquistador Martín de Ursúa y Arizmendi and 114 soldiers arrive at Lake Petén Itzá in what is now Guatemala and begin the Spanish conquest of Guatemala with an attack on the capital of the Itza people there before moving northward to the Yucatan peninsula.
• March 9 – Grand Embassy of Peter the Great: Tsar Peter the Great of Russia sets out to travel in Europe incognito, as Artilleryman Pjotr Mikhailov.
• March 13 – The Spanish conquest of Petén, and of Yucatán, is completed with the fall of Nojpetén, capital of the Itza Maya Kingdom, the last independent Maya state.
• March 22 – Charles II of Spain issues a Royal Cedula extending to the indigenous nobles of the Spanish Crown colonies, as well as to their descendants, the preeminence and honors customarily attributed to the Hidalgos of Castile.
• March 26 – Safavid occupation of Basra: Safavid government troops take control of Basra.

April–June

• April 5 – Charles XII becomes king of Sweden at age 14 on the death of his father, Charles XI, from stomach cancer.
• April 23 – As Chinese troops from the Manchu Dynasty (ruled by the Kangxi Emperor) complete their conquest of Mongolia, Galdan Boshugtu Khan, ruler of the last part of Mongolia to be conquered, the Dzungar Khanate, poisons himself, ending the resistance to conquest.
• May 6 – General Bernard Desjean, Baron de Pointis of France carries out an attack and pillaging of the Spanish South American fort of Cartagena de Indias (now in Colombia) with 1,200 soldiers and 650 pirate mercenaries. The French attackers overwhelm the city for the next 18 days. The Baron reneges on a contract to share the wealth with the pirates, who will come back to Cartagena a second time and makes a more violent attack.
• May 17 (May 7 Old Style) – The 13th century royal Tre Kronor ("Three Crowns") castle in Stockholm burns to the ground, and a large portion of the royal library is destroyed.
• June 2 – Augustus, Elector of Saxony converts to Roman Catholicism in order to be eligible to rule Poland.
• June 10 – The last mass execution for witchcraft in western Europe when the five Paisley witches are hanged and then burned in Scotland.
• June 27 – After becoming a Roman Catholic, Augustus the Strong is elected King Augustus II of Poland.
• June 30 – The earliest reported first-class cricket match takes place in Sussex in England.

July–September

• July 4 – A Byzantine icon, the "Weeping Madonna of Pócs", arrives in Vienna after a five-month journey following its forced removal from the Hungarian village of Pócs by order of the Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I. It has been housed for more than 320 years in St. Stephen's Cathedral.
• July 6 – A major naval battle takes place between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire with each side having 25 battleships, supplemented by smaller vessels. The Venetian Navy, under the command of Admiral Bartolomeo Contarini, suffers 71 deaths and 163 injuries, and even worse casualties in a second engagement on September 20.
• July 27 – Mahmud Shah II, the Sultan of Johor and Pahang (now part of Malaysia) takes on full power upon the death of the regent, the Bendahara Paduka Raja. Mahmud II was only 10 years old when he became the Sultan upon the assassination of his father, Ibrahim Shah in 1685.
• July 28 – The opera Vénus et Adonis, composed by Henri Desmarets with libretto by Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, receives its first performance, premiering at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal in Paris.
• August 10 – The Siege of Barcelona ends in Spain after 52 days as Louis Joseph, Duke of Vendôme of France obtains the surrender of Barcelona from the Austrian General, Prince George of Hesse-Darmstadt.
• September 5 (August 25 O.S.) – During the Nine Years' War, the Battle of Hudson's Bay is fought between English and French ships in Hudson Bay near what is now the Canadian province of Manitoba; The French warship Pélican captures York Factory, a trading post of the English Hudson's Bay Company.
• September 11 – Battle of Zenta: Prince Eugene of Savoy crushes the Ottoman army of Mustafa II, and effectively ends Turkish hopes of recovering lost ground in Hungary.
• September 17 – Amcazade Köprülü Hüseyin Pasha becomes the new Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire in the wake of the disastrous Ottoman defeat at Zenta, replacing Grand Vizier Elmas Mehmed Pasha, who was killed in the battle by his own troops.
• September 20 – The Treaty of Ryswick is signed by France and the Grand Alliance, to end both the Nine Years' War and King William's War. Louis XIV of France recognises William III as King of England & Scotland, and both sides return territories they have taken in battle. In North America, the treaty returns Port-Royal (Acadia) to France.

October–December

• October 7 – The opera Issé, composed by André Cardinal Destouches with libretto by Antoine Houdar de la Motte, premieres at the Palace of Fontainebleau in France.
• October 16 – The Norwegian Code, promulgated by King Christian V of Denmark-Norway in 1687, is amended to provide for torture of condemned criminals in certain capital offenses in Norway, with permission for burning with hot irons, or cutting off the prisoner's right hand while the prisoner is being transported for decapitation.
• October 19 – Misión Loreto, the first Roman Catholic mission on Mexico's Baja California Peninsula, is founded by Spanish missionary Juan María de Salvatierra.
• October 24 – The first opéra-ballet, combining elements of both mediums of entertainment, is performed as L'Europe galante makes its debut at the Salle du Palais-Royal in Paris. Composed by André Campra, with libretto by Antoine Houdar de la Motte, the opera and ballet is conducted by Marin Marais.
• October 30 – The Nine Years' War, between France and the Grand Alliance comes to an end with the signing of the last pacts of the Peace of Ryswick in the Dutch city of Rijswijk as Leopold I of Austria accedes two days before a deadline that had been set by the other members of the Grand Alliance. The areas of the Duchy of Lorraine (Lotharingen), Freiburg im Breisgau, and Vieux-Brisach (Breisach) are returned by France to Leopold's control.
• November 24 – The elaborate burial of the late King Charles XI of Sweden takes place more than seven months after his April 5 death, with interment at the Riddarholmen Church on the island of Riddarholmen near Stockholm.
• November 30 – Prince Eugene of Savoy, a field marshal within the Holy Roman Empire, purchases a large tract of land in Vienna for construction of the Belvedere Palace.
• December 2 – The first service is held in St Paul's Cathedral since rebuilding work after the Great Fire of London began.
• December 7 – Louis, Duke of Burgundy, and Marie Adélaïde of Savoy marry in the royal chapel at the Palace of Versailles in France.
• December 8 – Tsangyang Gyatso is installed in Tibet as the 6th Dalai Lama in a ceremony at Lhasa, filling a vacancy that had existed since 1682.
• December 11 – A ball in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles is held to celebrate the Duke of Burgundy and Marie Adélaïde's wedding.
• December 14 – The coronation ceremony takes place for King Charles XII of Sweden.

Date unknown

• The Manchus of the Qing dynasty conquer Outer Mongolia.
• The Parliament of England passes the Trade with Africa Act 1697 (An Act to settle the Trade to Africa), which end the Royal African Company's monopoly on all English trade with Africa.
• William Dampier's A New Voyage Round the World is published in England.
• Christopher Polhem starts Sweden's first technical school.
• Heinrich Escher, Mayor of Zürich, introduces chocolate to Switzerland from Brussels.
• The use of "litters" (wheelless transports that carried by four servants) increases in Europe.

1698

January–March

• January 1 – The Abenaki tribe and Massachusetts colonists sign a treaty, ending the conflict in New England.
• January 4 – The Palace of Whitehall in London, England is destroyed by fire.
• January 23 – George Louis becomes Elector of Hanover upon the death of his father, Ernest Augustus. Because the widow of Ernest Augustus, George's mother Sophia, was heiress presumptive as the cousin of Anne, Queen of Great Britain, and Anne's closest eligible heir, George will become King of Great Britain.
• January 30 – William Kidd, who initially seized foreign ships under authority as a privateer for the British Empire before becoming a pirate, becomes an outlaw and uses his ship, the Adventure Galley, to capture an Indian ship, the valuable Quedagh Merchant, near India.
• February 17 – The Maratha Empire fort at Gingee falls after a siege of almost nine years by the Mughal Empire as King Rajaram escapes to safety. General Swarup Singh Bundela, who led the scaling of the fortress walls and Gingee's capture, is rewarded by Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb with command of the area.
• March 8 – The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, the oldest Anglican mission organization in the world, is founded by English clergyman Thomas Bray and four other people at Lincoln's Inn in London, along with Sir Humphrey Mackworth, Maynard Colchester, Lord Guilford and John Hooke.
• March
  • English Bishop Jeremy Collier publishes his pamphlet A Short View of the Immorality and Profaneness of the English Stage, accusing several contemporary playwrights of undermining public morality in their popular comedies by using profanity, blasphemy and indecency.
  • Samuel Cranston becomes the governor of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.

April–June

• April 1 – Scottish pirate William Kidd and his crew arrive at Île Sainte-Marie off of the coast of Madagascar in Kidd's Adventure Galley bringing with them the cargo of the captured ships Quedagh Merchant and Rouparelle. Upon arrival, all but 13 of Kidd's crew desert to work for another pirate, Robert Culliford. The Adventure Galley, which is leaking and falling apart, sinks and the Rouparelle is sunk by the deserters. Kidd and his 13 henchmen depart on Quedah Merchant.
• April 10 – A total solar eclipse is visible in central America.
• May 1 – The Banishment Act of 1697 goes into effect for Roman Catholic church officials in Ireland, having been the deadline for all "popish archbishops, bishops, vicars general, deans, jesuits, monks, friars, and other regular popish clergy" to have reported to Irish ports for deportation. Re-entry to Ireland after May 4, 1698, is a criminal offense with a penalty of 12 months imprisonment and expulsion, while a second re-entry is punishable by death as treason.
• May 4 – At the imperial capital at Inwa, Sanay Min of the Toungoo dynasty becomes the new King of Burma upon the death of his father, Minye Kyawhtin.
• May 17 – The British Royal Navy ship HMS Hastings, a 32-gun fifth rate, is launched.
• June 20 – An earthquake of magnitude 7.2–7.9 damages an extended region around Ambato, Ecuador, including the Tungurahua, Cotopaxi and Chimborazo provinces. Ambato and Latacunga are completely destroyed and several thousand casualties are reported.
• June 21 – John Churchill, Earl of Marlborough is reinstated in the English Army, with readmission to the Privy Council by King William III. On July 26, he is selected as one of the Lords Justice.
• June 22 – The executions of 57 leaders of the Streltsy uprising begin and continue until June 28.
• June 24 – The Trade with Africa Act 1697 goes into effect in English overseas possessions, ending the monopoly of the Royal African Company (RAC) on the triangular trade by opening it to any English merchants who pay a 10 percent fee to the RAC.

July–September

• July 7 – The English House of Commons is dissolved and new elections are held between July 19 and August 10 for a parliament to be summoned on August 24.
• July 14 – Darien scheme: The first Scottish settlers leave for an ill-fated colony in Panama.
• July 25 – English engineer Thomas Savery obtains a patent for a steam pump.
• August 24 – King William III opens the newly elected House of Commons at Westminster.
• August 25 – Peter the Great arrives back in Moscow; General Patrick Gordon has already crushed the Streltsy Uprising, with 341 rebels sentenced to be decapitated.
• September 5
  • In an effort to move his people away from Asiatic customs, Tsar Peter I of Russia imposes a beard tax.
  • A charter is granted by King William III of England to the new East India Company of England, called "the New Company" or "the English Company" to break the monopoly that has existed in India since 1689 with the existing British East India Company.
• September 8 – The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth defeats the Tatars in the Battle of Podhajce, the last battle between the Ottoman Empire and the Polish and Lithuanians.

October–December

• October 11 – The Treaty of the Hague is signed between the Dutch Republic, England and France.
• October 24 – Iberville and Bienville sail from Brest to the Gulf of Mexico, to defend the southern borders of New France.
• November 2 – The Darien scheme Scottish settlers land in Panama and establish their ill-fated colony; 80% of them would die within the first year.
• November 14
  • The first Eddystone Lighthouse, built off Plymouth, England, is illuminated.
  • The Spanish king Carlos names his grandson Jozef Ferdinand as his heir.
• November 16 – A congress begins in Sremski Karlovci to discuss a treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Holy League.
• November – Tani Jinzan, astronomer and calendar scholar, observes a fire destroy Tosa (now Kōchi) in Japan at the same time as a Leonid meteor shower, taking it as evidence to reinforce belief in the "Theory of Areas".
• December 8 – King William III of England issues a proclamation of "our most gracious pardon unto all such pirates in the East Indies, viz., all eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, who shall surrender themselves for piracies or robberies committed by them upon sea or land" before April 30, 1699 to Captain Thomas Warren, but specifically "excepting Henry Every, alias Bridgman, and William Kidd.
• December 9 – Francis Nicholson becomes the new British colonial governor of Virginia, succeeding Sir Edmund Andros.
• December 12 – Mombasa (referred to at the time as Fort Jesus, and now part of Kenya) falls under control of the Emirate of Oman, with Imam Sa'if ibn Sultan as the first Omani Governor.

Date unknown

• Bucharest becomes the capital of Wallachia (part of modern-day Romania).
• In Africa, Zanzibar is captured by Oman.
• The Whigs sponsor Captain Kidd of New York as a privateer against French shipping.
• Humphrey Hody is appointed regius professor of Greek at Oxford.
• Shepherd Neame Brewery founded.
• Ukraine suffers a great famine.

1699

January–March

• January 5 – A violent earthquake damages the city of Batavia on the Indonesian island of Java, killing at least 28 people.
• January 20 – The Parliament of England (under Tory dominance) limits the size of the country's standing army to 7,000 'native born' men; hence, King William III's Dutch Blue Guards cannot serve in the line. By an Act of February 1, it also requires disbandment of foreign troops in Ireland.
• January 26 – The Republic of Venice, Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Holy Roman Empire sign the Treaty of Karlowitz with the Ottoman Empire, marking an end to the major phase of the Ottoman–Habsburg wars. The treaty marks a major geopolitical shift, as the Ottoman Empire subsequently abandons its expansionism and adopts a defensive posture while the Habsburg monarchy expands its influence.
• February 4 – A group of 350 rebels in the Streltsy Uprising are executed in Moscow.
• March 2 – The Edinburgh Gazette is first published in Scotland.
• March 4 – Jews are expelled from Lübeck, Germany.
• March 26 – The first performance of Amadis de Grèce, an opera by French composer André Cardinal Destouches, takes place at the Académie Royale de Musique, Paris.
• March 31 – A total solar eclipse is visible across the southern Indian Ocean.

April–June

• April 13 – The 10th Sikh guru, Guru Gobind Singh, creates the Khalsa at Anandpur Sahib.
• May 1 – Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville founds the first European settlement in the Mississippi River Valley, at Fort Maurepas (Ocean Springs, Mississippi).
• May 10 – Billingsgate Fish Market in London is sanctioned as a permanent institution by an Act of Parliament, with the provision "that after the tenth of May, 1699, Billingsgate Market should be, every day in the week except Sunday, a free and open market for all sorts of fish, and that it should be lawful for any person to buy or sell any sort of fish without disturbance."
• June 11 – England, France and the Dutch Republic agree on the terms of the Treaty of London (1700) (Second Partition Treaty) for Spain.
• June 14 – Thomas Savery demonstrates his first steam pump to the Royal Society of London.

July–September

• July 6 – Pirate Captain William Kidd is arrested and imprisoned in Boston, Province of Massachusetts Bay, after being tricked by New York Governor Richard Coote, 1st Earl of Bellomont
• July 26 – William Dampier's expedition to New Holland (Australia), in HMS Roebuck, reaches Dirk Hartog Island, at the mouth of what he calls Shark Bay in Western Australia, and he begins producing the first known detailed record of Australian flora and fauna.
• August 25 – Christian V, King of Denmark–Norway since 1670, dies and is succeeded by his son, Frederick IV (to 1730).
• September 23 – A total solar eclipse is visible in the northern hemisphere across Europe, the Middle East and north India.

October–December

• October 3 – The Liverpool Merchant, the first slave ship to depart from the Port of Liverpool, sets sail for West Africa where it embarks hundreds of African slaves and sails for Barbados, arriving there on September 18, 1700 with 220 slaves onboard.
• October 11 – The opera Marthésie, première reine des Amazones (Marthesia, First Queen of the Amazons), composed by André Cardinal Destouches, is performed for the first time, premiering at Fontainebleau near Paris.
• October – An edict by King Louis XIV establishes an office of police magistrate in almost every village in France, with the title of lieutenant general de police created.
• November 22 – The Treaty of Preobrazhenskoye, negotiated by Johann Patkul, is signed at a palace of the Tsar of Russia Peter the Great, and representatives of Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony, King of Poland and Elector of Saxony to provide for the partition of Swedish Empire between Saxony, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Kingdoms of Denmark-Norway and the Russian Empire. The attack on Sweden, which takes place on February 22, starts the Great Northern War.
• December 3 – Baron Jacob Hop is appointed as the treasurer-general of The Hague.
• December 10 – A major ice storm shuts down the city of Boston for a week and freezing rain brings down many tree branches and causes severe damage to orchards.
• December 20 – Peter the Great orders the Russian New Year changed, from September 1 (the start of the Byzantine year) to January 1.