• French composer François Couperin.
• French novelist Alain-René Lesage.
• Italian philosopher Giambattista Vico.
• Austrian architect Johann Lukas von Hildebrandt.
• English architect Thomas Archer.
• Italian physician Giorgio Baglivi.
• English composer John Eccles.
• Japanese woodblock artist Ume Shushiki.

• German poet Jacobus Balde.
• French Prince Armand de Conti, former patron of Molière.
• English playwright Sir William Davenant.
• Dutch painter Jan Miense Molenaer.
• Dutch painter Philips Wouwerman.
• 50,000 people from the earthquake in China.

• Francesco Redi proposes that maggots hatch from eggs laid by flies, upsetting the commonly-held view that they arose by spontaneous generation.
• Isaac Newton builds the first reflecting telescope.
• A canal between the Elbe and Oder rivers is built in Brandenburg.
• Edward Lloyd opens a coffeehouse in London.
• John Dryden's play The Maiden Queen appears.  English King Charles II grants him the title 'poet laureate'.
• Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, aka Molière, writes three plays: Amphitryon, George Dandin, and The Miser.
• Sir George Etheredge's bawdy play She Wou'd If She Cou'd appears. He also becomes Charles II's minister to Turkey.
• Louis XIV, having invaded the Spanish Netherlands after claiming that they automatically devolved upon him when he married his Hapsburg wife Maria Theresa, has to deal with the war
• (Jan) The United Provinces of the Netherlands, afraid that they're next, conclude an alliance with England and Sweden.
• (Feb) French troops occupy Franche-Comté
• (May) Louis signs a treaty in Aix-la-Chappelle, gets to keeps bits of Flanders, but has to give back Franche-Comté.
• João IV Bragança takes the throne of Portugal and Brazil as Charles II of Spain recognizes its independence; once the most powerful nation in Europe, Spain is now the most feeble.
• Charles II of England marries Katherine of Portugal, getting Bombay (now Mumbai) as dowry.
• Father Jacques Marquette builds a mission at Sault du Gastogne, a New France trading post on Lake Huron, naming it Sault Ste Marie.
• William Penn the Younger is thrown into the Tower of London for his Quaker writings.
• Ottoman grand vizier Mohammed Koprulu captures Crete for sultan Mehmet IV.
• Jan II Kazimierz Wazy abidcates the throne of Poland.  Jan Sobieski attacks the Tatar/Ottoman army at Podhajce (in Ruthenia, now extreme wwestern Ukraine) and forces it to withdraw.
• Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb grants the Maratta leader Shivaji the title of raja.
• A magnitude 8.5 earthquake strikes North China and Korea; parts of Shandong are levelled.  A magnitude 7.6 earthquake strikes Sind, 30,000 houses in Samaji sink into the ground.

1667 - 1668 - 1669

How They Were Made - 17th Century