• English poet William Broome.
• English writer and socialite Mary Pierrepont.
• English novelist Samuel Richardson.
• French explorer Etienne Veniard, later Sieur de Bourgmont.
• English painter Peter Monamy.
• Lithuanian peasant Marta Skavronska, later mistress of Peter the Great and, still later, Empress Catherine I of Russia.
• French painter Philip Mercier.
• French composer Jacques Aubert.
• French composer Joseph Bodin de Boismortier.
• Charles Louis de Secondat, later Baron de Montesquieu.

• Former Swedish Queen Kristina Vasa, in exile in Rome.
• English physician Thomas Sydenham.
• English playwright Aphra Behn.
• English physician and playwright William Chamberlayne.
• John Graham Dundee, 1st Viscount of Claverhouse, at Killiecrankie, see below.
• Dutch scholar Isaac Vossius, canon of Windsor Cathedral.
• George Jeffreys, 1st Baron of Wem, beheaded in the Tower of London.
• Countess Maria Anna Josepha of The Palatinate; Louis XIV claims it.
• Pope Innocent XI.  Pietro Ottoboni is elected Pope Alexander VIII.

• Nahum Tate's play Dido and Aeneas premeires.
• Dean Aldrich publishes a poem enumerating Reasons for Drinking.
• Jean Racine's play Esther premieres.
• Matsuo Basho sets off on a journey into Northen Japan that will result in his work Oku no Hosomichi (The Narrow Road to the Deep North).
• Table Talk, a posthumous collection of John Selden's witticisms, is published.
• James II is out of power in the wake of the Glorious Revolution:
• On January 3, James, under arrest in Rochester, manages to escape to France. His son-in-law William of Orange, the stadtholder of The Netherlands, has Dutch guards stationed in Westminster.
• The English Parliament:
• passes a "Declaration of right" which:
• Enumerates the many sins of James II, who has abdicated,
• limits the power of the monarchy, specifically stating that
• Parliament is the only body allowed to enact, enforce, and revoke laws,
• All citizens have the right to petition the King for a redress of grievances.
• declares James's Protestant daughter Mary Queen of England, and her husband, William, King,
• expresses the intent for further legislation to prohibit Roman Catholics from the throne.
• passes an Act of Toleration granting religious freedom for Protestants, except that Dissenters could not hold public office, and Catholics could neither vote nor hold office..
• passes a Mutiny Act, punishing mutiny and desertion, effectively creating a standing army.
• The Scottish Parliament passes a "Claim of Right" which declares James VII deposed, and lays out rights similar to those in England.
• Dundee leads a Jacobite rebellion in Scotland.  His forces are victorious at Killiecrankie Pass but he is mortally wounded.
• In May, James lands in Ireland, his last base of support, and gathers an army. James himself leads the siege of Derry, but is forced to withdraw when a relieving force arrives.
• On hearing of James's overthrow, Massachusetts colonists imprison Governor Edward Andros.  While Increase Mather in in London negotiating a new charter for Massachusets, his son Cotton Mather publishes a manifesto juistifying the overthrow.
• New York prepares for war; in New Amsterdam, the militia seizes the local fort.  Commander Jacob Leisler eventually gets himself elected governor of New York.  Pro-Leisler (mostly Dutch) and anti-Leisler (mostly English) factions form.
• In Maryland, Anglican ministers use the pulpit to accuse Papist priests of stirring up the local Indians to pillage settements. John Coode, an Anglican member of the General Assembly, stages a popular uprising to unseat Charles Calvert, current Lord Baltimore.
• Louis XIV declares war on England, in support of James.  England and Holland join up with the League of Augsburg as "The Grand Alliance"; this sets off the War of the League of Augsburg, also known as the Nine Years' War or King William's War.
• Louis's forces invade The Palatinate and the Spanish Netherlands. General Melac lays waste to the Palatinate, and the cities of
• Baden-Baden,
• Yburg,
• Mannheim,
• Speyer, where the tombs of Holy Roman Emperors are looted,
• Heidelberg,
• Ettingen,
• Rastatt.
This triggers a wave of emigration from Germany to Pensylvania, Maryland, and Virginia.
• Russian regent Sophia negotiates the Treaty of Nerchinsk with Qing Emperor Kang Xi, delineating the boundary between Russia and China for the first time.
• In Moscow, the faction surrounding regent Sofia attempts to assasinate her brother, seventeen-year-old Tsar Peter.  This plot fails, and the streltsy faction surrounding Peter squashes the other faction, forcing Sophia to retire. Although Peter's feeble-minded brother Ivan V is technically co-tsar, it is Peter (and his mother, now regent) who holds all the power now.
• The Baptists assemble in London and issue a statement of their doctrines.
• A "Chinese quarter" is set up in Nagasaki.

1688 - 1689 - 1690

How They Were Made - 17th Century