istoryworld
Events relating to europe
On the death of her brother-in-law, William III, Anne becomes queen of England and Scotland
Peter the Great falls for a Lithuanian serf, Catherine, who becomes his life-long companion
Peter the Great founds the port and city of St Petersburg, giving Russia access to the Baltic
The Act of Union merges England and Scotland as 'one kingdom by the name of Great Britain', a century after the union of the crowns
The Swedish king Charles XII suffers his first major defeat in a brilliant career, when he faces the Russians at Poltava
The Tatler launches a new style of journalism in Britain's coffee houses, followed two years later by the Spectator
Abraham Darby at Coalbrookdale discovers the use of coke in the smelting of pig iron
In a friendly keyboard contest in Rome between Handel and Domenico Scarlatti, the result is a draw – Handel being the winner on the organ and Scarlatti on the harpsichord
Thomas Newcomen creates a piston steam engine, with the steam condensed in the cylinder by a jet of cold water
Christopher Wren's new domed St Paul's cathedral is completed in London
Machines are thrown out of the window of a Spitalfields factory, in an early protest against industrialization
The Byerley Turk, Darley Arabian and Godolphin Arabian, ancestors of all thoroughbred racehorses, are imported into England
25-year-old George Berkeley attacks Locke in his Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge
Handel's success in London with his opera Rinaldo prompts him to settle in Britain
Alexander Pope's Rape of the Lock introduces a delicate vein of mock-heroic in English poetry
The tsar formally marries Catherine, his mistress for nearly ten years (though they may have married secretly five years earlier)
The violinist Archangelo Corelli composes his Christmas Concerto, the best known of his influential group of twelve Concerti Grossi
The treaties signed in Utrecht bring to an end the War of the Spanish Succession
In the aftermath of the War of the Spanish Succession, the Spanish Netherlands are transferred to Austria
Strasbourg and Alsace are ceded to Louis XIV and become part of France
On the death of Queen Anne, the Act of Settlement delivers the British crown to the elector of Hanover, as George I
The British government offers a massive £20,000 prize for a chronometer capable of keeping accurate time at sea
Louis XIV dies after seventy-two years on the throne
A Jacobite uprising in Scotland on behalf of the Old Pretender ends in fiasco
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, observing the Turkish practice of inoculation against smallpox, submits her infant son to the treatment
