August 8

• August 8, 70
  Antonia Fortress is destroyed by the Romans during the siege of Jerusalem
• August 8, 117
  Trajan, emperor of Rome, dies
• August 8, 869
  Lothair II, King of Lotharingia, dies
• August 8, 870
  Kingdom of Lotharingia, realm of Lothair II, who died some monthes ago, is devided between his uncles Louis the German of East Francia and Charles the Bald of West Francia by the Treaty of Meerssen
• August 8, 1579
  Cornerstone is laid for Tycho Brahe's Uraniborg observatory, the first custom-built observatory in modern Europe, by order of Frederick II, King of Denmark
• August 8, 1588
  The English Navy destroy the Spanish Armada at the Battle of Gravelines which opens the world for English trade and colonization
• August 8, 1700
  Denmark signs the peace treaty of Travendal with Sweden during the Great Northern War
• August 8, 1709
  In Lisbon, Bartolomeu de Gusmão manages to lift a balloon full of hot air about 4.5 meters in front of King John V and the Portuguese court, which becomes the first documented balloon flight in Europe
• August 8, 1736
  Mahomet Weyonomon, a Mohegan sachem or leader, dies of smallpox while waiting to see King George II to complain directly about British settlers encroaching on tribal lands in the Connecticut colony
• August 8, 1786
  Savoyard mountain guide Jacques Balmat and doctor Michel-Gabriel Paccard become the first men to climb Mont Blanc in France
• August 8, 1788
  King Louis XVI calls the Estates General, which have not met since 1614, because of loosing of power
• August 8, 1815
  Napoleon Bonaparte set sail for Saint Helena, an island in the South Atlantic Ocean, to spend the remainder of his days in exile
• August 8, 1846
  David Wilmot, an American politic, offers to ban slavery in any territory to be acquired from Mexico in the Mexican War in his speech in the United States House of Representatives, the event known as the Wilmot Proviso
• August 8, 1897
  Anarchist Michele Angiolillo assassinates Spanish Prime Minister Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, Spain, and Marcelo Azcárraga Palmero becomes prime minister of Spain
• August 8, 1919
  British recognize Afghanistan's independence with Treaty of Rawalpindi
• August 8, 1945
  USSR establishes a communist government in the northern half of the occupied Korean peninsula, stopping along 38th parallel after invasion of Manchuria, per the agreement with the United States
• August 8, 1949
  Bhutan becomes an independent monarchy after Treaty of Friendship between India and Bhutan
• August 8, 1963
  Great Train Robbery occurs in England, 2.6 million pounds, or US$7.3 million
• August 8, 1988
  Thousands of protesters in Myanmar are killed during anti-government demonstrations, which leads to a bloody military coup
• August 8, 1991
  The Warsaw radio mast, the tallest construction ever built, collapses
• August 8, 2008 08:08
  An estimated one billion people worldwide watch the opening ceremonies of the Games of the XXIX Olympiad on TV

July 21

• July 21, 365
  An earthquake with epicenter in Crete levels the Egyptian Port of Alexandria as well as the Roman outpost of Leptis Magna in Libya, while thousands people dies
• July 21, 1403
  Henry IV defeats the rebel forces of English nobleman Henry Percy in the Battle of Shrewsbury during Glyndŵr Rising
• July 21, 1669
  John Locke's Constitution of English colony Carolina is approved
• July 21, 1711
  Russia and Turkey sign the Treaty of Pruth, which ends the year-long Russo-Turkish War and stipulates the return of Azov to the Ottomans and destruction of Taganrog and several Russian fortresses
• July 21, 1718
  The Turkish threat to Europe is eliminated with the signing of the Treaty of Passarowitz between Austria, Venice and the Ottoman Empire, starting Tulip period of the Ottoman Empire, a relatively peaceful period, during which the Ottoman Empire orients towards Europe
• July 21, 1773
  Pope Clement XIV promulgates Dominus ac Redemptor, a papal brief by which the Society of Jesus is suppressed
• July 21, 1798
  Napoleon Bonaparte defeats Murad Bey and his Mameluke warriors on the outskirts of Cairo at the Battle of the Pyramids ending 700 years of Mamluk rule in Egypt
• July 21, 1822
  Agustín de Iturbide, a Mexican army general and politician, is crowned Agustín I and becomes the first Emperor of Mexico
• July 21, 1831
  The Belgian Revolution in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands leads to the creation of Belgium as independent country with Leopold I, who takes the oath as King of the Belgians
• July 21, 1832
  Treaty of Constantinople grants Greek independence
• July 21, 1861
  In the first major battle of the Civil War, known as First Battle of Bull Run, Confederate forces repel an attempt by the Union Army to turn their flank in Virginia
• July 21, 1873
  At Adair, Iowa, more than seven years after the Liberty holdup, the James-Younger gang makes their first train robbery
• July 21, 1917
  Alexander Kerensky, a moderate socialist party member, becomes Russian Prime Minister
• July 21, 1925
  John Scopes, a Tennessee high school teacher, is indicted for teaching the theory of evolution to students of his science classes in violation of a Tennessee state law, and fined US$100
• July 21, 1954
  At Geneva, Switzerland, France agrees to independence of North and South Vietnam ending the First Indochina War
• July 21, 1969
  American astronaut Neil Armstrong steps off the lunar landing module Eagle during the spaceflight Apollo 11, becoming the first human to walk on the surface of the moon
• July 21, 1973
  USSR launches Mars 4 for fly-by of the red planet

April 16

• April 16, 1457 BC
  Egyptian Pharaoh Thutmose III defeats a large rebellious coalition of Canaanite vassal states led by the king of Kadesh at the Battle of Megiddo
• April 16, 1071
  The Norman Robert Guiscard takes Bari, ending five centuries of Byzantine rule in southern Italy
• April 16, 1705
  Queen Anne of England knights Isaac Newton at Trinity College
• April 16, 1746
  The Battle of Culloden becomes a crushing defeat for Jacobites and ends an attempt of Charles Edward Stuart, known as The Young Pretender, to regain the British throne during Second Jacobite Rebellion
• April 16, 1760
  In England Laurence Shirley, 4th Earl Ferrers, is hanged as a felon in the Tower of London for the murder of his steward
• April 16, 1853
  The first steam locomotive in Asia begin running from Bombay to Tanna, India, pulling 14 cars and 400 people
• April 16, 1856
  Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law, ratified by 55 states, including the United Kingdom, Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Sardinia, and the Ottoman Empire, abolishes privateering
• April 16, 1859
  Alexis de Tocqueville, a French political thinker and historian, dies in Cannes
• April 16, 1866
  Dmitry Karakozov, a Russian revolutionary, makes the first attempt to assassinate Alexander II of Russia
• April 16, 1867
  Constitution of North German Confederation, written by Otto von Bismarck for a federation of 22 independent states of northern Germany, is accepted by Norddeutscher Reichstag
• April 16, 1945
  Battle of Berlin, the final major offensive of the European Theatre of World War II, is begun by the Soviet Union
• April 16, 1948
  Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OECD) forms in Paris, France, to help administer the Marshall Plan and stimulate economic progress
• April 16, 1964
  Nine men sentenced 25-30 years for Britain's 1963 "Great Train Robbery"
• April 16, 1977
  At the West Coast Computer Faire in SanFrancisco, California, Commodore International demonstrates the PET 2001 computer, and Apple Computer introduces the Apple II, marking start of era of mass-produced personal computers
• April 16, 1991
  The Skoda company, an automobile manufacturer based in Czech Republic, is acquired by Volkswagen
• April 16, 2003
  The Treaty of Accession is signed in Athens, Greece, allowing ten new members into the European Union
• April 16, 2006
  Prince Albert II of Monaco reaches the North Pole, becoming the first reigning monarch ever to do so
• April 16, 2009
  Alexander Bortnikov, the head of the Russian Federal Security Service, announces that they "cancelled the decree imposing an anti-terror operation on the territory of, effective from midnight", which ends the Second Chechen War

April 9

• April 9, 1241
  Mongol armies defeat the combined defending forces of the Poles and Germans at the Battle of Legnica perishing almost the entire European army
• April 9, 1388
  Habsburgs tries to reach their goals by military force but are again defeated by Swiss forces at the Battle of Nafels
• April 9, 1454
  The Treaty of Lodi establishes peace and a stable political framework in Italy between Venice, Milan and Florence
• April 9, 1483
  Edward IV, King of England, dies at age 38 and is succeeded by his twelve-year-old son, Edward V
• April 9, 1520
  The first European diplomatic mission to Ethiopia, sent by the Portuguese, arrives at Massawa, followed by their arrival at the imperial encampment of Emperor Dawit II in Shewa on 9 October
• April 9, 1609
  The Netherlands and Spain agree to a Twelve Years' Truce in the Eighty Years' War
• April 9, 1621
  Twelve Years' Truce expires so Dutch and Spanish resume war
• April 9, 1682
  The French explorer Rene Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, reached the Mississippi River claiming Louisiana for France
• April 9, 1691
  After a nine-month siege, Louis XIV’s army storm the city of Mons and occupy it
• April 9, 1747
  Simon Fraser, Scottish Jacobite and Chief of Clan Fraser, becomes the last man to be officially beheaded in England
• April 9, 1770
  Captain James Cook discovers Botany Bay on the Australian continent
• April 9, 1783
  Tippu Sahib, ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore, drives out English from Bednore, India
• April 9, 1860
  Parisian inventor Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville makes the first known audio recording, ten seconds long, of a person singing a folk song
• April 9, 1865
  At Appomattox, Virginia, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders his 28,000 troops to USA General Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the American Civil War
• April 9, 1867
  The Alaska purchase is ratified by the United States Senate
• April 9, 1927
  Italian-born anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti are sentenced to death for murdering two men during the armed robbery of a shoe factory on July 14, 1921 in Massachusetts after controversial trial
• April 9, 1928
  Turkey passes separation of church and state
• April 9, 1940
  German forces invade Denmark and Norway to protect shipments of iron ore from Sweden, forcing to capitulate Denmark after a few hours
• April 9, 1942
  American General Jonathan M. Wainwright's American and Filipino 70,000 troops on Bataan, Philippines, surrender to the Japanese
• April 9, 1949
  United Nations' International Court of Justice holds Albania responsible for incidents in Corfu Channel, an early episode of the Cold War involving Royal Navy ships in the Channel of Corfu, and awards Britain damages
• April 9, 1959
  Frank Lloyd Wright, an American interior designer, who designed more than 1,000 structures, dies
• April 9, 1965
  India and Pakistan engage in border fight, marking start of Second Indo-Pakistani War
• April 9, 1970
  Paul McCartney announces official split of The Beatles
• April 9, 1989
  Georgian demonstrators are massacred and 20 citizens are killed by Red Army soldiers in Tbilisi's central square during a peaceful rally
• April 9, 1991
  Soviet Republic of Georgia declares independence from Soviet Union
• April 9, 2002
  The funeral of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, the wife of King George VI and the mother of Queen Elizabeth II, takes place in Westminster Abbey, London