This Day In European History
18th February
Events1678: John Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress' is published.
1856: The Reform Edict brings widespread freedoms to the Ottoman Empire.
Births
1516: Queen Mary I of England, 'Bloody Mary'.
1559: Isaac Casaubon, French scholar and theologian.
1609: Edward Hyde, English historian.
1734: Jean Marie Roland, French scientist and Girondist leader.
1745: Alessandro Volta, Italian physicist.
1838: Ernst Mach, Austrian physicist.
1857: Max Klinger, German artist.
1899: Arthur Bryant, British historian.
Deaths
999: Pope Gregory V, the first German pope.
1478: George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence and brother of King Edward IV of England, legendarily by being drowned in a wine butt.
1546: Martin Luther, German theologian and trigger of the Protestant Reformation.
1564: Michelangelo, Italian artist.
1612: Robert di Ridolfi, Florentine banker and plotter.
1712: Louis, Duke of Burgundy and heir to the French throne after the previous Dauphin's death less than a year before, of smallpox.
1851: Carl Jacobi, German mathematician.
