May 21Birthdays & History

On this day: May 21 in history

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

1. 293Roman Emperors Diocletian and Maximian appoint Galerius as Caesar to Diocletian, beginning the period of four rulers known as the Tetrarchy.Europe
2. 878Syracuse, Sicily, is captured by the Muslim Aghlabids after a nine-month siege.Europe
3. 879Pope John VIII gives blessings to Branimir of Croatia and to the Croatian people, considered to be international recognition of the Croatian state.Europe
4. 996Sixteen-year-old Otto III is crowned Holy Roman Emperor.Europe
5. 1294Coronation of Michael IX Palaiologos as Byzantine Emperor.Europe
6. 1347Coronation of John VI Kantakouzenos as Byzantine Emperor by patriarch Isidore I of Constantinople at the Church of St. Mary of Blachernae.EuropeMiddle East
7. 1349Dušan's Code, the constitution of the Serbian Empire, is enacted by Dušan the Mighty.Europe
8. 1403Henry III of Castile sends Ruy González de Clavijo as ambassador to Timur to discuss the possibility of an alliance between Timur and Castile against the Ottoman Empire.EuropeMiddle East
9. 1424Coronation of James I of Scotland at Scone.Europe
10. 1554Queen Mary I grants a royal charter to Derby School, as a grammar school for boys in Derby, England.Europe
11. 1659In the Concert of The Hague, the Dutch Republic, the Commonwealth of England and the Kingdom of France set out their views on how the Second Northern War should end.Europe
12. 1660The Battle of Long Sault concludes after five days in which French colonial militia, with their Huron and Algonquin allies, are defeated by the Haudenosaunee Confederacy.EuropeNorth America
13. 1674The nobility elect John Sobieski King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania.Europe
14. 1703Daniel Defoe is imprisoned on charges of seditious libel.Europe
15. 1725The Order of St. Alexander Nevsky is instituted in Russia by Empress Catherine I. It would later be discontinued and then reinstated by the Soviet government in 1942 as the Order of Alexander Nevsky.Europe
16. 1758Ten-year-old Mary Campbell is abducted in Pennsylvania by Lenape during the French and Indian War. She is returned six and a half years later.North AmericaEurope
17. 1792A lava dome collapses on Mount Unzen, near the city of Shimbara on the Japanese island of Kyūshū, creating a deadly tsunami that killed nearly 15,000 people.Asia
18. 1799The end of the Siege of Acre (1799): Napoleon Bonaparte abandons his siege of the Ottoman city of Acre after two months. This was the turning point of Bonaparte's Egyptian campaign and one of the first major defeats he suffered in his military career.EuropeMiddle East
19. 1809The first day of the Battle of Aspern-Essling between the Austrian army led by Archduke Charles and the French army led by Napoleon I of France sees the French attack across the Danube held.Europe
20. 1851Slavery in Colombia is abolished.Latin America
21. 1856Lawrence, Kansas is captured and burned by pro-slavery forces.North America
22. 1863American Civil War: The Union Army succeeds in closing off the last escape route from Port Hudson, Louisiana, in preparation for the coming siege.North America
23. 1864Russia declares an end to the Russo-Circassian War and many Circassians are forced into exile. The day is designated the Circassian Day of Mourning.Europe
24. 1864The Ionian Islands reunite with Greece.Europe
25. 1864American Civil War: The Battle of Spotsylvania Court House ends.North America
26. 1871Opening of the first rack railway in Europe, the Rigi Bahnen on Mount Rigi.Europe
27. 1871French troops invade the Paris Commune and engage its residents in street fighting. By the close of "Bloody Week", some 20,000 communards have been killed and 38,000 arrested.Europe
28. 1879War of the Pacific: Two Chilean ships blocking the harbor of Iquique (then belonging to Peru) battle two Peruvian vessels in the Battle of Iquique.Latin America
29. 1881The American Red Cross is established by Clara Barton in Dansville, New York.North America
30. 1894The Manchester Ship Canal in the United Kingdom is officially opened by Queen Victoria, who later knights its designer Sir Edward Leader Williams.Europe
31. 1904The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) is founded in Paris.Europe
32. 1911President of Mexico Porfirio Díaz and the revolutionary Francisco Madero sign the Treaty of Ciudad Juárez to put an end to the fighting between the forces of both men, concluding the initial phase of the Mexican Revolution.Latin America
33. 1917The Great Atlanta fire of 1917 causes $5.5 million in damages, destroying some 300 acres including 2,000 homes, businesses and churches, displacing about 10,000 people but leading to only one fatality (due to heart attack).North America
34. 1917The Imperial War Graves Commission is established through royal charter to mark, record, and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of the British Empire's military forces.Europe
35. 1924University of Chicago students Richard Loeb and Nathan Leopold, Jr. murder 14-year-old Bobby Franks in a "thrill killing".North AmericaEurope
36. 1925The opera Doktor Faust, unfinished when composer Ferruccio Busoni died, is premiered in Dresden.Europe
37. 1927Charles Lindbergh touches down at Le Bourget Field in Paris, completing the world's first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean.Europe
38. 1932Bad weather forces Amelia Earhart to land in a pasture in Derry, Northern Ireland, and she thereby becomes the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.Europe
39. 1934Oskaloosa, Iowa, becomes the first municipality in the United States to fingerprint all of its citizens.North America
40. 1936Sada Abe is arrested after wandering the streets of Tokyo for days with her dead lover's severed genitals in her handbag. Her story soon becomes one of Japan's most notorious scandals.Asia
41. 1937A Soviet station, North Pole-1, becomes the first scientific research settlement to operate on the drift ice of the Arctic Ocean.Europe
42. 1939The Canadian National War Memorial is unveiled by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.North America
43. 1946Physicist Louis Slotin is fatally irradiated in a criticality incident during an experiment with the demon core at Los Alamos National Laboratory.North America
44. 1951The opening of the Ninth Street Show, otherwise known as the 9th Street Art Exhibition: A gathering of a number of notable artists, and the stepping-out of the post war New York avant-garde, collectively known as the New York School.North America
45. 1961American civil rights movement: Alabama Governor John Malcolm Patterson declares martial law in an attempt to restore order after race riots break out.North America
46. 1966The Ulster Volunteer Force declares war on the Irish Republican Army in Northern Ireland.Europe
47. 1969Civil unrest in Rosario, Argentina, known as Rosariazo, following the death of a 15-year-old student.Latin America
48. 1972Michelangelo's Pietà in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome is damaged by a vandal, the mentally disturbed Hungarian geologist Laszlo Toth.Europe
49. 1976Twenty-nine people are killed in the Yuba City bus disaster in Martinez, California.North America
50. 1979White Night riots in San Francisco following the manslaughter conviction of Dan White for the assassinations of George Moscone and Harvey Milk.North America
51. 1981The Italian government releases the membership list of Propaganda Due, an illegal pseudo-Masonic lodge that was implicated in numerous Italian crimes and mysteries.Europe
52. 1981Transamerica Corporation agrees to sell United Artists to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for $380 million after the box office failure of the 1980 film Heaven's Gate.North America
53. 1982Falklands War: A British amphibious assault during Operation Sutton leads to the Battle of San Carlos.Latin AmericaEurope
54. 1988Margaret Thatcher holds her controversial Sermon on the Mound before the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.Europe
55. 1991Mengistu Haile Mariam, president of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, flees Ethiopia, effectively bringing the Ethiopian Civil War to an end.Africa
56. 1991Former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi is assassinated by a female suicide bomber near Madras.Asia
57. 1992After 30 seasons Johnny Carson hosts his penultimate episode and last featuring guests (Robin Williams and Bette Midler) of The Tonight Show.North America
58. 1994The Democratic Republic of Yemen unsuccessfully attempts to secede from the Republic of Yemen; a war breaks out.Middle East
59. 1996The ferry MV Bukoba sinks in Tanzanian waters on Lake Victoria, killing nearly 1,000.Africa
60. 1996The seven Trappist monks of Tibhirine who were abducted on March 27 are killed under uncertain circumstances.Africa
61. 1998In Miami, five abortion clinics are attacked by a butyric acid attacker.North America
62. 1998President Suharto of Indonesia resigns following the killing of students from Trisakti University earlier that week by security forces and growing mass protests in Jakarta against his ongoing corrupt rule.Asia
63. 2000Nineteen people are killed in a plane crash in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.North America
64. 2001French Taubira law is enacted, officially recognizing the Atlantic slave trade and slavery as crimes against humanity.Europe
65. 2003The 6.8 Mw Boumerdès earthquake shakes northern Algeria with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). More than 2,200 people were killed and a moderate tsunami sank boats at the Balearic Islands.Africa
66. 2005The tallest roller coaster in the world, Kingda Ka opens at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson Township, New Jersey.North America
67. 2006The Republic of Montenegro holds a referendum proposing independence from the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro; 55% of Montenegrins vote for independence.Europe
68. 2010JAXA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, launches the solar-sail spacecraft IKAROS aboard an H-IIA rocket. The vessel would make a Venus flyby late in the year.Asia
69. 2011Radio broadcaster Harold Camping predicted that the world would end on this date.North America
70. 2012A bus accident near Himara, Albania kills 13 people and injures 21 others.Europe
71. 2012A suicide bombing kills more than 120 people in Sanaa, Yemen.Middle East
72. 2014Random killings occur on the Bannan Line of the Taipei MRT, killing four and injuring 24.Asia
73. 2017Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus perform their final show at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum.North America
74. 2024The Greenfield tornado kills five and injures 35 across rural Iowa, United States. Wind speeds in excess of 480 kilometres per hour (300 mph) are estimated from measurements for the third time in history.North America
75. 2024A stabbing spree on the Green line of the Taichung MRT injures four people, including the perpetrator.Asia

Source: Wikipedia "May 21" / CC BY-SA 4.0