1633
Italian astronomer Galileo arrives in Rome and is detained by the Roman Catholic Inquisition.
1793
Britain, Prussia, Austria, Holland, Spain and Sardinia form an alliance against France.
1858
Sir Richard Burton and Captain John Speke become the first Europeans to discover Lake Tanganyika in East Africa.
1883
Death of Wilhelm Richard Wagner, German composer. His most famous works include the operatic cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung), Tristan und Isolde and Parsifal.
1895
The Lumiere brothers are granted a patent in France for their projected cinematic film.
1945
Allied forces capture Budapest, Hungary, in World War II.
1968
Ten thousand additional US troops are transported to southern Viet Nam as fighting increases there.
1975
Turkish Cypriots proclaim separate administration in Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus.
1985
The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance meets in Viet Nam for co-ordination of science, technology and agricultural activities. Participants include Viet Nam, Bulgaria, Hungary, the German Democratic Republic, Cuba and the Soviet Union.
1990
Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and the US, plus the two Germanys, announce a two-stage plan for talks leading to German reunification.
1991
US planes destroy a bunker in Baghdad that allies identified as a military site, but apparently contained civilians, with reported death toll of up to 500.
2004
Chechnya's exiled former president Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, wanted by Russia for terrorism and ties to al-Qaeda, is assassinated when a bomb blows apart his car as he leaves a mosque in Doha, Qatar. Yandarbiyev's 13-year-old son is critically wounded.
2007
North Korea agrees with US and four regional powers on nuclear disarmament plan.
2008
One of the world's most wanted and elusive terrorists, Imad Mughniyeh, is killed by a car bomb in Syria nearly 15 years after dropping almost entirely from sight. Iran and the militant group Hezbollah blame Israel, which denies a role. — AP/REUTERS/VNS