January 26 – After receiving no support from the Russian nobles, the Tsaritsa Irina Godunova abandons her brief rule as autocrat of Russia, and abdicates in favor of her older brother, Boris Godunov.
January 29 – In what is now South Korea, a force of 50,000 troops of the Korean kingdom of Joseon and Chinese Ming dynasty troops begins the siege of Ulsan, a Japanese-controlled castle located in the southwest port of Ulsan on the Sea of Japan.
March 20 – The Duchy of Brittany in France is conquered by King Henry IV, who forces the surrender of Philippe Louis de Lorraine-Mercœur, Duke of Brittany. Merceur is then exiled to Hungary.
April 30 – In Mexico, on the day of the Feast of the Ascension, Juan de Oñate, dispatched by the Viceroy of New Spain to expand the Spanish colony's territory, assembles his group on the south side of the Rio Grande and formally claims all territory north of the river (near what is now the U.S. city of El Paso, Texas) as a colony of the Spanish Empire. [3]
May 2 – The Peace of Vervins, mediated by Cardinal Alessandro de Medici, ends the war between France and Spain.
June 9 – The Principality of Wallachia becomes a vassal state of the Austrian Habsburgs and the Holy Roman Empire, after Michael the Brave (Mihai Pătrașcu, with a regnal name of Michael II) signs an agreement at Prague with Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor to receive protection from the Ottoman Empire. [4]
June 27 – The ill-fated Dutch expedition of Jacques Mahu begins as his ship Hoop, along with the ships Liefde, Geloof, Trouwe and Blijde Boodschap, departs from Rotterdam.
June 30 – England's forces capture the Castillo San Felipe del Morro, the Spanish fortress defending San Juan, after a 15-day battle. [6] When an epidemic begins taking its toll on the English forces, the Earl of Cumberland decides to withdraw and departs in August.
July 10 – John Barrose, a Burgundian fencer who has challenged all comers and killed several, is hanged for murder. Barrose's story is dramatized by playwright Ben JonsoninEvery Man in His Humour.
July 12 – After fording the Rio Grande near what are now the Mexican city of Juarez and the U.S. city of El Paso, Juan de Oñate proclaims the founding of the colony of Santa Fe de Nuevo Méjico (Santa Fe of New Mexico), with himself as the first Viceroy. Oñate establishes the first capital of the New Mexico viceroyalty at a new village, San Juan de los Caballeros, near the Pueblo Indian city of Ohkay Owingeh, now located in Rio Arriba County, New Mexico.
July 22 – William Shakespeare registers the rights to his new play, The Merchant of Venice, in the Register of the Stationers Company, under the title The Marchaunt of Venyce or otherwise called The Jewe of Venyce. [8]
July 23 – Sigismund III Vasa, King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania, departs from Gdansk with 80 transports, several warships and exiled members of the Swedish parliament to invade Sweden. The troops land at Kalmar on July 31, and secure its surrender. [9]
July – Philosopher Tommaso Campanella moves from Naples to Calabria, where he will be involved in a revolt against the rule of the Spanish viceroy the following year.[10]
August 16 (Keichō 3, 15th day of the 7th month) – The Council of Five Elders, to serve in Japan as regents after the death of General Hideyoshi, is gathered at Fushimi on orders of Hideyoshi, and the members vow their allegiance to Hideyoshi's son, Hideyori. [11]
September 2 – The Mahu expedition from the Dutch Republic arrives at the Cape Verde Islands off of the coast of Africa, and many of the men become fatally ill, including Captain Jacques Mahu, who dies on September 23.
September 5 (Keichō 3, 5th day of the 8th month) – With his own death imminent, General Toyotomi Hideyoshi of Japan issues an order directing the Council of Five Elders to bring their children to the Osaka Castle to join Hideyoshi's designated successor, his son Hideyori. [11]
October 19 – The Siege of Suncheon, an attempt by Korean and Chinese troops to capture the Japanese-occupied Suncheon Castle. [13] An attempt to lure Japanese General Konishi Yukinaga into an ambush fails when a Korean Army cannon is fired too early and gives away the Korean plan.
November 2 – Admiral Yi Sunsin of the Korean Navy attempts to bombard the Suncheon Castle, two days after the joint Chinese and Korean land assault is driven back. Korea and Japan lose 39 ships when a large number of the fleet gets stuck in the shallow waters at low tide and the vessels are attacked by the Japanese. Yi Sunsin calls off the siege the next day. [14]
November 15 – Pope Clement VIII authorizes the marriage between Albert of Austria and Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain. The two will be married on April 18.
December 4 – In what is now part of the U.S. state of New Mexico, a dispute breaks out between the Keres people of the Acoma Pueblo (near what is now Albuquerque, New Mexico between the Keres Chief Zutacapan and the Spanish colonial envoy Juan de Zaldívar. After being refused food and shelter for himself and his 16 men, Zaldivar retaliates by pillaging Acoma, and Zutacapan orders a counterattack in which Zaldivar and 11 other men are killed. [16] Spanish troops from the Santa Fe de New Mexico colony retaliate on January 22 by carrying out the Acoma Massacre of 800 people.
Illustrations of Ottoman Turkish and European riflemen, with detailed illustrations of their firearms, appear in Zhao Shizhen's book Shenqipu in this year, during the Ming Dynasty of China.
^Gaspar Pérez de Villagrá, Historia de la Nueva México, 1610 : a critical and annotated Spanish/English edition (translated by Joseph P. Sánchez, University of New Mexico Press, 1992)
^Constantin C. Giurescu, Istoria Românilor (Editura Al.) p. 191
^R. A. Van Middeldyk, The History of Puerto Rico (Echo Library, 2008) p.114
^George Williamson, George, Third Earl of Cumberland, 1558-1605: His Life and His Voyages (Kessinger Publishing, 2009) p.205
^ abNancy Lyman Roelker, Queen of Navarre: Jeanne d'Albret, 1528-1572 (Harvard University Press, 1968) p. xiv
^Kenneth M. Swope, A Dragon's Head and a Serpent's Tail: Ming China and the First Great East Asian War, 1592–1598 (University of Oklahoma Press, 2009) p.271
^Samuel Hawley, The Imjin War (Royal Asiatic Society, Korea Branch/UC Berkeley Press, 2005) p.531
^Perrie, Maureen (1995). Pretenders and popular monarchism in early modern Russia: the false tsars of the Time of Troubles. Cambridge New York: Cambridge University Press. p. 21. ISBN9780521472746.
^The Catholic Encyclopedia: New Mexico-Philip. Appleton. 1911. p. 510.
^May King; David Leer Ringo; William K. Barnarad (2001). Supplemental research and history (volume XIV). McDowell Publications for the Freeborn Family Association. p. 24.
