July 25Birthdays & History

On this day: July 25 in history

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

1. 306Constantine I is proclaimed Roman emperor by his troops.Europe
2. 315The Arch of Constantine is completed near the Colosseum in Rome to commemorate Constantine I's victory over Maxentius at the Milvian Bridge.Europe
3. 677Climax of the Siege of Thessalonica by the Slavs in a three-day assault on the city walls.Europe
4. 864The Edict of Pistres of Charles the Bald orders defensive measures against the Vikings.Europe
5. 918Wang Geon becomes King of Goryeo after overthrowing Gung Ye in a coup the previous day.Asia
6. 1137Eleanor of Aquitaine marries Prince Louis, later King Louis VII of France, at the Cathedral of Saint-André in Bordeaux.Europe
7. 1139Pope Innocent II confirms in the treaty of Mignano the investiture of the sons of Roger II of Sicily to their fiefs and abandons support for the barons opposed to Roger.Europe
8. 1139Battle of Ourique: The Almoravids, led by Ali ibn Yusuf, are defeated by Prince Afonso Henriques who is proclaimed King of Portugal.Europe
9. 1261The city of Constantinople is recaptured by Nicaean forces under the command of Alexios Strategopoulos, re-establishing the Byzantine Empire.Middle EastEurope
10. 1278The naval Battle of Algeciras takes place in the context of the Spanish Reconquista resulting in a victory for the Emirate of Granada and the Maranid Dynasty over the Kingdom of Castile.Europe
11. 1441King Henry VI of England lays the foundation stone of King's College Chapel, Cambridge.Europe
12. 1467The Battle of Molinella: The first battle in Italy in which firearms are used extensively.Europe
13. 1536Sebastián de Belalcázar, on his search for El Dorado, founds the city of Santiago de Cali.Latin America
14. 1538The city of Guayaquil is founded by the Spanish Conquistador Francisco de Orellana and given the name Muy Noble y Muy Leal Ciudad de Santiago de Guayaquil.EuropeLatin America
15. 1547Henry II of France is crowned.Europe
16. 1554The royal wedding of Mary I and Philip II of Spain is celebrated at Winchester Cathedral.Europe
17. 1567Don Diego de Losada founds the city of Santiago de Leon de Caracas, modern-day Caracas, the capital city of Venezuela.Latin America
18. 1591The Duke of Parma is defeated near the Dutch city of Nijmegen by an Anglo-Dutch force led by Maurice of Orange.Europe
19. 1593Henry IV of France publicly converts from Protestantism to Roman Catholicism.Europe
20. 1603James VI and I and Anne of Denmark are crowned in Westminster Abbey.Europe
21. 1609The English ship Sea Venture, en route to Virginia, is deliberately driven ashore during a storm at Bermuda to prevent its sinking; the survivors go on to found a new colony there.EuropeNorth America
22. 1668A magnitude 8.5 earthquake strikes eastern China, killing over 43,000 people.Asia
23. 1693Ignacio de Maya founds the Real Santiago de las Sabinas, now known as Sabinas Hidalgo, Nuevo León, Mexico.Latin America
24. 1718At the behest of Tsar Peter the Great, the construction of Kadriorg Palace, dedicated to his wife Catherine, begins in Tallinn.Europe
25. 1722Dummer's War begins along the Maine-Massachusetts border.North America
26. 1755British governor Charles Lawrence and the Nova Scotia Council order the deportation of the Acadians.EuropeNorth America
27. 1759French and Indian War: In Western New York, British forces capture Fort Niagara from the French, who subsequently abandon Fort Rouillé.EuropeNorth America
28. 1783American Revolutionary War: The war's last action, the Siege of Cuddalore, is ended by a preliminary peace agreement.North America
29. 1788Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completes his Symphony No. 40 in G minor (K550).Europe
30. 1792The Brunswick Manifesto is issued to the population of Paris promising vengeance if the French royal family is harmed.Europe
31. 1797Horatio Nelson loses more than 300 men and his right arm during the failed conquest attempt of Tenerife (Spain).Europe
32. 1799Napoleon Bonaparte defeats a numerically superior Ottoman army under Mustafa Pasha at the Battle of Abukir.EuropeMiddle East
33. 1814War of 1812: An American attack on Canada is repulsed.North America
34. 1824Costa Rica annexes Guanacaste from Nicaragua.Latin America
35. 1835James Bowman Lindsay demonstrates a constant electric light at a public meeting in Dundee, Scotland.Europe
36. 1837The first commercial use of an electrical telegraph is successfully demonstrated in London by William Cooke and Charles Wheatstone.Europe
37. 1853Joaquin Murrieta, the famous Californio bandit known as the "Robin Hood of El Dorado", is killed.North America
38. 1861American Civil War: The United States Congress passes the Crittenden–Johnson Resolution, stating that the war is being fought to preserve the Union and not to end slavery, in the wake of the defeat at the First Battle of Bull Run.North America
39. 1866The United States Congress passes legislation authorizing the rank of General of the Army. Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant becomes the first to be promoted to this rank.North America
40. 1868The Wyoming Territory is established.North America
41. 1869The Japanese daimyōs begin returning their land holdings to the emperor as part of the Meiji Restoration reforms. (Traditional Japanese Date: June 17, 1869).Asia
42. 1894The First Sino-Japanese War begins when the Japanese fire upon a Chinese warship.AsiaAsia
43. 1897American author Jack London embarks on a sailing trip to take part in the Klondike's gold rush, from which he wrote his first successful stories.North AmericaEurope
44. 1898Spanish–American War: The American invasion of Spanish-held Puerto Rico begins, as United States Army troops under General Nelson A. Miles land and secure the port at Guánica.EuropeNorth AmericaLatin America
45. 1908Ajinomoto is founded. Kikunae Ikeda of the Tokyo Imperial University discovers that a key ingredient in kombu soup stock is monosodium glutamate (MSG), and patents a process for manufacturing it.Asia
46. 1909Begin of the Tragic Week in Barcelona in response to troop mobilisations for the Rif War.Europe
47. 1909Louis Blériot makes the first flight across the English Channel in a heavier-than-air machine from Calais to Dover, England, United Kingdom in 37 minutes.Europe
48. 1915RFC Captain Lanoe Hawker becomes the first British pursuit aviator to earn the Victoria Cross.Europe
49. 1915The British capture Nasiriyah from the Ottomans during the Mesopotamian campaign.Europe
50. 1917Sir Robert Borden introduces the first income tax in Canada as a "temporary" measure (lowest bracket is 4% and highest is 25%).North America
51. 1925Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union (TASS) is established.Europe
52. 1934The Nazis assassinate Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss in a failed coup attempt.Europe
53. 1940General Henri Guisan orders the Swiss Army to resist German invasion and makes surrender illegal.Europe
54. 1942The Norwegian Manifesto calls for nonviolent resistance to the German occupation.Europe
55. 1943World War II: 136 Greek civilians are murdered by soldiers of the German 1st Mountain Division in the village of Mousiotitsa, Greece.Europe
56. 1943World War II: Benito Mussolini is forced out of office by the King (encouraged by the Grand Council of Fascism) and is replaced by Pietro Badoglio.Europe
57. 1944World War II: Operation Spring near Caen is one of the bloodiest days for the First Canadian Army during the war.North America
58. 1946The Crossroads Baker device is the first underwater nuclear weapon test.Oceania
59. 1956Forty-five miles south of Nantucket Island, the Italian ocean liner SS Andrea Doria collides with the MS Stockholm in heavy fog and sinks the next day, killing 51.Europe
60. 1957The Tunisian King Muhammad VIII al-Amin is replaced by President Habib Bourguiba.Africa
61. 1958The African Regroupment Party holds its first congress in Cotonou.Africa
62. 1961Cold War: In a speech John F. Kennedy emphasizes that any attack on Berlin is an attack on NATO.Europe
63. 1965Bob Dylan goes electric at the Newport Folk Festival, signaling a major change in folk and rock music.North America
64. 1969Vietnam War: U.S. President Richard Nixon declares the Nixon Doctrine, stating that the United States now expects its Asian allies to take care of their own military defense. This is the start of the "Vietnamization" of the war.AsiaNorth America
65. 1971The Sohagpur massacre is perpetrated by the Pakistan Army.Asia
66. 1973Soviet Mars 5 space probe is launched.Europe
67. 1976Viking program: Viking 1 takes the famous Face on Mars photo.Europe
68. 1978Birth of Louise Joy Brown, the first human to have been born after conception by in vitro fertilisation, or IVF.Europe
69. 1978Puerto Rican police shoot two nationalists in the Cerro Maravilla murders.Latin America
70. 1979In accord with the Egypt–Israel peace treaty, Israel begins its withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula.Middle East
71. 1983Black July: Thirty-seven Tamil political prisoners at the Welikada high security prison in Colombo are massacred by the fellow Sinhalese prisoners.Asia
72. 1984Salyut 7 cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the first woman to perform a space walk.World
73. 1993Israel launches a massive attack against Lebanon in what the Israelis call Operation Accountability, and the Lebanese call the Seven-Day War.Middle East
74. 1993The Saint James Church massacre occurs in Kenilworth, Cape Town, South Africa.Africa
75. 1994Israel and Jordan sign the Washington Declaration, that formally ends the state of war that had existed between the nations since 1948.Middle EastNorth America
76. 1995A gas bottle explodes in Saint Michel station of line B of the RER (Paris regional train network). Eight are killed and 80 wounded.Europe
77. 1996In a military coup in Burundi, Pierre Buyoya deposes Sylvestre Ntibantunganya.Africa
78. 2000Concorde Air France Flight 4590 crashes outside of Paris shortly after taking off at Charles de Gaulle Airport, killing 113 people.Europe
79. 2001Phoolan Devi, a serving Member of Parliament, is assassinated by shooting in New Delhi, India.Asia
80. 2007Pratibha Patil is sworn in as India's first female president.Asia
81. 2010WikiLeaks publishes classified documents about the War in Afghanistan, one of the largest leaks in U.S. military history.AsiaNorth America
82. 2018As-Suwayda attacks: Coordinated attacks occur in Syria.Middle East
83. 2019National extreme heat records set this day in the UK, Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany during the July 2019 European heat wave.Europe

Source: Wikipedia "July 25" / CC BY-SA 4.0