February 5Birthdays & History

On this day: February 5 in history

Oldest first. Tap a year to see it on the World Chronicle timeline.

1. 2 BCCaesar Augustus is granted the title pater patriae by the Roman Senate.Europe
2. 62An earthquake with an estimated intensity between IX or X on the Mercalli scale occurs in Pompeii, Italy.Europe
3. 756An Lushan proclaims himself Emperor of China, founding the short-lived state of Yan.Asia
4. 1265Pope Clement IV is elected as the 183rd Bishop of Rome and head of the Catholic Church.Europe
5. 1576Henry of Navarre abjures Catholicism at Tours and rejoins the Protestant forces in the French Wars of Religion.Europe
6. 1597A group of early Japanese Christians are killed by the new government of Japan for being seen as a threat to Japanese society.Asia
7. 1783In Calabria, a sequence of strong earthquakes begins.Europe
8. 1810Peninsular War: Siege of Cádiz begins.Europe
9. 1818Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte ascends to the thrones of Sweden and Norway.Europe
10. 1852The New Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia, one of the largest and oldest museums in the world, opens to the public.Europe
11. 1859Alexandru Ioan Cuza, Prince of Moldavia, is also elected as prince of Wallachia, joining the two principalities as a personal union called the United Principalities, an autonomous region within the Ottoman Empire, which ushered in the birth of the modern Romanian state.Middle EastEurope
12. 1869The largest alluvial gold nugget in history, called the "Welcome Stranger", is found in Moliagul, Victoria, Australia.Oceania
13. 1885King Leopold II of Belgium establishes the Congo as a personal possession.EuropeAfrica
14. 1901J. P. Morgan incorporates U.S. Steel in the state of New Jersey, although the company would not start doing business until February 25 and the assets of Andrew Carnegie's Carnegie Steel Company, Elbert H. Gary's Federal Steel Company, and William Henry Moore's National Steel Company were not acquired until April 1.North America
15. 1905In Mexico, the General Hospital of Mexico is inaugurated, initially with four basic specialties.Latin America
16. 1907Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland announces the creation of Bakelite, the world's first synthetic plastic.Europe
17. 1913Claudio Monteverdi's last opera L'incoronazione di Poppea was performed theatrically for the first time in more than 250 years.Europe
18. 1913Greek military aviators Michael Moutoussis and Aristeidis Moraitinis perform the first naval air mission in history, with a Farman MF.7 hydroplane.Europe
19. 1917The current constitution of Mexico is adopted, establishing a federal republic with powers separated into independent executive, legislative, and judicial branches.Latin America
20. 1917The Congress of the United States passes the Immigration Act of 1917 over President Woodrow Wilson's veto.North America
21. 1918SS Tuscania is torpedoed off the coast of Ireland; it is the first ship carrying American troops to Europe to be torpedoed and sunk.EuropeNorth America
22. 1918Stephen W. Thompson shoots down a German airplane; this is the first aerial victory by the U.S. military.EuropeNorth America
23. 1919Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, and D. W. Griffith launch United Artists.North America
24. 1924The Royal Greenwich Observatory begins broadcasting the hourly time signals known as the Greenwich Time Signal.Europe
25. 1933Mutiny on Royal Netherlands Navy warship HNLMS De Zeven Provinciën off the coast of Sumatra, Dutch East Indies.EuropeAsia
26. 1941World War II: Allied forces begin the Battle of Keren to capture Keren, Eritrea.Africa
27. 1945World War II: General Douglas MacArthur returns to Manila.Asia
28. 1958Gamal Abdel Nasser is nominated to be the first president of the United Arab Republic.Middle East
29. 1958A hydrogen bomb known as the Tybee Bomb is lost by the US Air Force off the coast of Savannah, Georgia, never to be recovered.North America
30. 1962French President Charles de Gaulle calls for Algeria to be granted independence.EuropeAfrica
31. 1963The European Court of Justice's ruling in Van Gend en Loos v Nederlandse Administratie der Belastingen establishes the principle of direct effect, one of the most important, if not the most important, decisions in the development of European Union law.Europe
32. 1967Cultural Revolution: The Shanghai People's Commune is formally proclaimed, with Yao Wenyuan and Zhang Chunqiao being appointed as its leaders.Asia
33. 1971Astronauts land on the Moon in the Apollo 14 mission.North America
34. 1975Riots break out in Lima, Peru after the police forces go on strike the day before. The uprising (locally known as the Limazo) is bloodily suppressed by the military dictatorship.Latin America
35. 1981Operation Soap: The Metropolitan Toronto Police Force raids four gay bathhouses in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, arresting just under 300, triggering mass protest and rallies.North America
36. 1985Ugo Vetere, then the mayor of Rome, and Chedli Klibi, then the mayor of Carthage, meet in Tunis to sign a treaty of friendship officially ending the Third Punic War which lasted 2,131 years.EuropeAfrica
37. 1988Manuel Noriega is indicted on drug smuggling and money laundering charges.North AmericaLatin America
38. 1994Markale massacres, more than 60 people are killed and some 200 wounded as a mortar shell explodes in a downtown marketplace in Sarajevo.Europe
39. 1994Byron De La Beckwith is convicted of the 1963 murder of civil rights leader Medgar Evers.North America
40. 1997The so-called Big Three banks in Switzerland announce the creation of a $71 million fund to aid Holocaust survivors and their families.Europe
41. 2000Russian forces massacre at least 60 civilians in the Novye Aldi suburb of Grozny, Chechnya.Europe
42. 2004Rebels from the Revolutionary Artibonite Resistance Front capture the city of Gonaïves, starting the 2004 Haiti rebellion.Latin America
43. 2008A major tornado outbreak across the Southern United States kills 57.North America
44. 2016Cybercriminals initiate the Bangladesh Bank robbery, using the SWIFT network to fraudulently transfer $101 million from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York account of Bangladesh Bank.AsiaNorth America
45. 2016New Zealand politician Steven Joyce is hit by a flung rubber dildo in a Waitangi Day protest.Oceania
46. 2019Pope Francis becomes the first Pope in history to visit and perform papal mass in the Arabian Peninsula during his visit to Abu Dhabi.EuropeMiddle East
47. 2020Pegasus Airlines Flight 2193 overshoots the runway at Sabiha Gökçen International Airport and crashes, killing three people and injuring 179.Middle East
48. 2020United States President Donald Trump is acquitted by the United States Senate in his first impeachment trial.North America

Source: Wikipedia "February 5" / CC BY-SA 4.0