535. The acquisition of Sicily from the Goths. Belisarius entered Syracuse in triumph, a city which once embraced 22 miles.
1384. John Wickliffe died; professor of divinity in the university of Oxford, and father of the reformation of the English church from popery.
1460. Battle of Wakefield, in England; the duke of York and 3000 of his followers slain.
1563. Charles de Cosse died; a French general of great military talents, and employed also as a diplomatist.
1583. Thomas Erastus, a celebrated German physician and divine, died. He wrote several works on philosophy, physic and divinity; but is chiefly memorable for his work on excommunication, in which he denies the power of the church, and affirms its censures to be incapable of extending beyond the present life.
1600. The East India company established by a charter from Elizabeth, granted to the earl of Cumberland and 215 knights, aldermen and merchants. The original capital was £22,000, divided into shares of £50.
1616. James Le Maire died at sea in returning with the Dutch navigator, Schouten. In this voyage, the straits that bear his name were discovered, between Staaten Land and Terra del Fuego.
1620. Era of the first settlement of New England. It being sabbath, they kept the day for the first time in their new house, and in grateful remembrance of the friends they found in the last town they left in their native country, they called it Plymouth.
1674. Battle of Mulhausen, in Alsace, in which the French marshal Turenne defeated the Austrians.
1679. John Adolphus Borelli, a distinguished philosopher and mathematician, of Naples, died; author of thirteen treatises in Italian and Latin.