January 2 – King Amangkurat IIofMataram (located on the island of Java, part of modern-day Indonesia), invites Trunajaya, who had led a failed rebellion against him until his surrender on December 26, for a ceremonial visit to the royal palace. After Trunajaya arrives, King Amangkurat stabs his guest to death.
January 24 – William Harris, one of the four English Puritans who established the Plymouth Colony and then the Providence PlantationsatRhode Island in 1636, is captured by Algerian pirates, when his ship is boarded while he is making a voyage back to England. After being sold into slavery on February 23, he remains a slave until ransom is paid. He dies in 1681, three days after his return to England.
February 12 – The Marquis de Croissy, Charles Colbert, becomes France's Minister of Foreign Affairs and serves for 16 years until his death, when he is succeeded as Foreign Minister by his son Jean-Baptiste Colbert.
February 22 – Catherine Deshayes Monvoisin, a fortune teller in France who organized a ring of killers in what became known as the "Affair of the Poisons" that killed at least 1,000 people, is burned at the stake after being convicted of witchcraft. In all, 36 people are executed for their role in the poisoning.
March 25 – Troops sent by the Sultan of Morocco, Ismail Ibn Sharif, begin a blockade of the port of Tangier, occupied by the English and located on the North African coast. Palmes Fairborne is dispatched to defend Tangier as the colonial governor and commander-in-chief of English forces.
April 21 – Prince Rajaram Bhosle, the 10-year-old son of the Shivaji, the Chhatrapati (Emperor) of the Maratha Empire in India, is installed on the throne as the new Emperor, less than three weeks after the death of his father. Sambhaji Bhosle, the eldest son of Shivaji, learns the news while imprisoned at Panhala and makes plans to escape prison and take over the throne.
April 27 – Prince Sambhaji and fellow prisoners kill the commander of the Panhala prison and take control of the fort, as he makes plans to become ruler of the Maratha Empire.
April 30 – The first FrenchHuguenots in the New World arrive at Charleston, South Carolina, as 45 of the religious exiles arrive at Oyster Point on the ship Richmond, after being sent there by King Charles II of England.[2]
June 10 – England and Spain sign a mutual defense treaty.[3]
June 11 – Elizabeth Cellier, an English Catholic midwife, is tried and acquitted of treason for pamphleting against the government.
June 16 – Sambhaji Bhosle and his troops capture Raigad, the capital of the Maratha Empire and Sambhaji becomes the new Chhatrapati or Emperor. Sambhaji deposes his younger brother Rajaram I and places Rajaram and Rajaram's mother under house arrest.
August 10 – A Pueblo medicine man named Popé begins an attack by the Puebloans and their Apache allies on Spanish outposts throughout what is the modern-day U.S. state of New Mexico, choosing the campaign to begin before a supply caravan can reach the Spaniards.[4]
A four month truce between England and Morocco expires and the Alcaid Omar, Viceroy of Morocco, begins a bombardment of the English fort at Tangier.[6]
Atreaty is concluded between the Dutch Republic and the Ottoman Empire for Ottoman Sultan Mehmed IV and his subjects to apply Dutch law to Dutch visitors to Ottoman territory.[7]
September 21 – Spanish troops make a counterattack on Santa Fe in the modern-day U.S. state of New Mexico, allowing the remaining Spanish troops in the besieged city to flee to El Paso (now in Texas).[4]
December 17 (December 7 O.S.) – The trial for treason of William Howard, 1st Viscount Stafford before his fellow members of the House of Lords having concluded after seven days, the Lords vote on whether to convict him of the articles of impeachment. The Lords vote, 55 to 31 to convict him and to impose the death sentence [13] and Lord Stafford is beheaded on 29 December (8 January 1681 N.S.)
^James Peller Malcolm, Londinium Redivivum, or, An Ancient History and Modern Description of London (J. Nichols, 1807) p. 433
^Edward G. Lilly, ed., Historic Churches of Charleston, South Carolina (Legerton Publishing, 1966) p. 29
^"William III, Brandenburg, and the anti-French coalition", by Wouter Troost, in The Anglo-Dutch Moment: Essays on the Glorious Revolution and Its World Impact, ed. by Jonathan I. Israel (Cambridge University Press, 2003) p. 315
^ ab"Pueblo Revolt", by Amy Meschke, in Encyclopedia of Leadership (Sage Publications, 2004) p. 1277
^John Childs, General Percy Kirke and the Later Stuart Army (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014) p. 35
^"The peace treaties of the Ottoman Empire with European Christian powers", by Karl-Heinz Ziegler, in Peace Treaties and International Law in European History: From the Late Middle Ages to World War One, ed. by Randall Lesaffer (Cambridge University Press, 2004) p. 349
^N.C. Datta, The Story of Chemistry (Universities Press, 2005) p. 74
