A Daily Dose of History: Events on this Day in History

A Daily Dose of History (08 May 2025) Today's historical events: Emperor Honorius signs an edict providing tax relief for the Italian provinces Tuscia, Campania, Picenum, Samnium, Apulia, Lucania and Calabria, which were plundered by the Visigoths. Reccared I opens the Third Council of Toledo, marking the entry of Visigothic Spain into the Catholic Church. Treaty of Brétigny drafted between King E...

A Daily Dose of History (07 May 2025) Today's historical events: The Jewish revolt against Constantius Gallus breaks out after his arrival at Antioch. In Constantinople, the dome of the Hagia Sophia collapses, twenty years after its construction. Justinian I immediately orders that the dome be rebuilt. In France, the Second Council of Lyon opens to regulate the election of the Pope. The Siege of M...

A Daily Dose of History (06 May 2025) Today's historical events: Spanish and German troops sack Rome; many scholars consider this the end of the Renaissance. The Siege of Cuzco commences, in which Incan forces attempt to retake the city of Cuzco from the Spanish. Francis Xavier reaches Old Goa, the capital of Portuguese India at the time. The Dutch city of Coevorden held by the Spanish, falls to a...

A Daily Dose of History (05 May 2025) Today's historical events: The Second Council of Constantinople begins. Rebel barons renounce their allegiance to King John of England — part of a chain of events leading to the signing of the Magna Carta. On his second voyage to the New World, Christopher Columbus sights Jamaica, landing at Discovery Bay and declares Jamaica the property of the Spanish crown....

A Daily Dose of History (04 May 2025) Today's historical events: The Augustinian monastic order is constituted at the Lecceto Monastery when Pope Alexander IV issues a papal bull Licet ecclesiae catholicae. Religious reformers John Wycliffe and Jan Hus are condemned as heretics at the Council of Constance. Assassination of the Swedish rebel (later national hero) Engelbrekt Engelbrektsson Wars of t...

A Daily Dose of History (03 May 2025) Today's historical events: Mayan king Bird Jaguar IV of Yaxchilan in modern-day Chiapas, Mexico, assumes the throne. The largest of three earthquakes strikes the island of Rhodes and causes an estimated 30,000 casualties. Kongo monarch Nkuwu Nzinga is baptised by Portuguese missionaries, adopting the baptismal name of João I. Angered by the brutal onslaught of...

A Daily Dose of History (02 May 2025) Today's historical events: King Richard I of England gives Portsmouth its first Royal Charter. William de Braose is hanged by Prince Llywelyn the Great. Anne Boleyn, Queen of England, is arrested and imprisoned on charges of adultery, incest, treason and witchcraft. John Knox returns from exile to Scotland to become the leader of the nascent Scottish Reformati...

A Daily Dose of History (01 May 2025) Today's historical events: The Nea Ekklesia is inaugurated in Constantinople, setting the model for all later cross-in-square Orthodox churches. Norman mercenaries land at Bannow Bay in Leinster, marking the beginning of the Norman invasion of Ireland. Wars of Scottish Independence end: By the Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton, England recognises Scotland as an...

A Daily Dose of History (30 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The Diocletianic Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire ends. Enguerrand de Marigny is hanged at the instigation of Charles, Count of Valois. Spain gives Christopher Columbus his commission of exploration. He is named admiral of the ocean sea, viceroy and governor of any territory he discovers. Edmund de la Pole, Yorkist prete...

A Daily Dose of History (29 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Battle of Levounion: The Pechenegs are defeated by Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos.[citation needed] Battle of the Vikhra River: The Principality of Smolensk is defeated by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and becomes its vassal. Joan of Arc arrives to relieve the Siege of Orléans. Gran Canaria, the main island of the Canary Islands...

A Daily Dose of History (28 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The Battle of Hormozdgan is fought. Ardashir I defeats and kills Artabanus V effectively ending the Parthian Empire. Emperor Constantius II enters Rome for the first time to celebrate his victory over Magnus Magnentius. Assassination of Conrad of Montferrat (Conrad I), King of Jerusalem, in Tyre, two days after his title to the thron...

A Daily Dose of History (27 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Philip the Arab marks the millennium of Rome with a celebration of the ludi seaculares. Emperor Arcadius marries Aelia Eudoxia, daughter of the Frankish general Flavius Bauto. She becomes one of the more powerful Roman empresses of Late Antiquity. Islamic conquest of Hispania: Moorish troops led by Tariq ibn Ziyad land at Gibraltar t...

A Daily Dose of History (26 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Czech king Karel IV founds the Charles University in Prague, which was later named after him and was the first university in Central Europe. Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch) ascends Mont Ventoux. The Pazzi family attack on Lorenzo de' Medici kills his brother Giuliano during High Mass in Florence Cathedral. Playwright William Shakespear...

A Daily Dose of History (25 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The Battle of Bagrevand puts an end to an Armenian rebellion against the Abbasid Caliphate. Muslim control over the South Caucasus is solidified and its Islamization begins, while several major Armenian nakharar families lose power and their remnants flee to the Byzantine Empire. After mistreatment and disfigurement by the citizens o...

A Daily Dose of History (24 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Battle of Mühlberg. Duke of Alba, commanding Spanish-Imperial forces of Charles I of Spain, defeats the troops of Schmalkaldic League. Mary, Queen of Scots, marries the Dauphin of France, François, at Notre Dame de Paris. The first regular newspaper in British Colonial America, The Boston News-Letter, is published. French revolutiona...

A Daily Dose of History (23 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Maya king Uneh Chan of Calakmul attacks rival city-state Palenque in southern Mexico, defeating queen Yohl Ik'nal and sacking the city. Dagobert III succeeds his father King Childebert III as King of the Franks. Battle of Clontarf: High King of Ireland Brian Boru defeats Viking invaders, but is killed in battle. Edmund Ironside succe...

A Daily Dose of History (22 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Year of the Six Emperors: The Roman Senate outlaws emperor Maximinus Thrax for his bloodthirsty proscriptions in Rome and nominates two of its members, Pupienus and Balbinus, to the throne. Portuguese navigator Pedro Álvares Cabral lands in Brazil. Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés establishes a settlement at Veracruz, Mexico. Treat...

A Daily Dose of History (21 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The Diocese of Pisa is elevated to the rank of metropolitan archdiocese by Pope Urban II The three-day Lisbon Massacre comes to an end with the slaughter of over 1,900 suspected Jews by Portuguese Catholics. Henry VIII ascends the throne of England on the death of his father, Henry VII. The last ruler of the Lodi dynasty, Ibrahim Lod...

A Daily Dose of History (20 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The Sapienza University of Rome is instituted by a bull of Pope Boniface VIII. Three Genoese galleys and a Byzantine blockade runner fight their way through an Ottoman blockading fleet a few weeks before the fall of Constantinople. Jacques Cartier begins his first voyage to what is today the east coast of Canada, Newfoundland and Lab...

A Daily Dose of History (19 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The freedman Milichus betrays Piso's plot to kill the Emperor Nero and all the conspirators are arrested. Battle of Callinicum: A Byzantine army under Belisarius is defeated by the Persians at Raqqa (northern Syria). Empress Irene organizes a conspiracy against her son, the Byzantine emperor Constantine VI. He is deposed and blinded....

A Daily Dose of History (18 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: King Æthelred I of Northumbria is murdered in Corbridge by a group led by his ealdormen, Ealdred and Wada. The patrician Osbald is crowned, but abdicates within 27 days. The cornerstone of the current St. Peter's Basilica is laid. Bona Sforza is crowned as queen consort of Poland. Trial of Martin Luther begins its second day during t...

A Daily Dose of History (17 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Harald III of Denmark dies and is succeeded by Canute IV, who would later be the first Dane to be canonized. The rule of the Bavand dynasty in Mazandaran is brought to an end by the murder of Hasan II. Kaunas Castle falls to the Teutonic Order after a month-long siege. Spain and Christopher Columbus sign the Capitulations of Santa Fe...

A Daily Dose of History (16 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Defeated by Vitellius' troops at Bedriacum, Otho commits suicide. Masada, a Jewish fortress, falls to the Romans after several months of siege, ending the First Jewish-Roman War. Stefan Dušan, "the Mighty", is crowned Emperor of the Serbs at Skopje, his empire occupying much of the Balkans. The Revolt of the Comuneros begins in Spain...

A Daily Dose of History (15 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: The Lateran Council condemns the Council of Hieria and anathematizes its iconoclastic rulings. Bari, the last Byzantine possession in southern Italy, is surrendered to Robert Guiscard. Timur defeats Tokhtamysh of the Golden Horde at the Battle of the Terek River. The Golden Horde capital city, Sarai, is razed to the ground and Timur...

A Daily Dose of History (14 Apr 2025) Today's historical events: Vitellius, commander of the Rhine armies, defeats Emperor Otho in the Battle of Bedriacum to take power over Rome. After his marriage to the Christian Doubravka of Bohemia, the pagan ruler of the Polans, Mieszko I, converts to Christianity, an event considered to be the founding of the Polish state. Co-Emperor Otto II, a son of Otto...