A shipload of Puritans, among them some of the future Pilgrim Fathers, sail from Boston in Lincolnshire to seek religious freedom in Holland

Johannes Kepler, in Prague, puts forward the radical proposition that the planets move in elliptical rather than circular orbits

Galileo improves on the Dutch telescope (and doubles his salary by presenting one to his employer)

The Blue Mosque, commissioned by Ahmed I, begins to rise in Istanbul like a twin to the nearby Santa Sophia

A law is passed expelling the Moriscos from Spain, with the result that some 300,000 are shipped to north Africa

News sheets published in Augsburg and Strasbourg become the first known newspapers

Shakespeare's sonnets, written ten years previously, are published

A flintlock designed in France (possibly by Marin Le Bourgeoys) becomes the standard firing mechanism for muskets

Galileo, with his new powerful telescope, observes the moons of Jupiter and spots moving on the surface of the sun

Henry IV is assassinated in a Paris street by a Roman Catholic, François Ravaillac

After the assassination of Henry IV, his wife Marie de Médicis becomes regent for the 9-year-old Louis XIII

Shakespeare's last completed play, The Tempest, is performed

Galileo publishes his evidence, from sun spots, proving Copernicus right and Ptolemy wrong on the solar system

Michael Romanov is elected tsar, beginning a new dynasty on the Russian throne

The Globe catches fire during a performance of Shakespeare's last play, Henry VIII

Richelieu begins his public career, becoming a secretary of state to Marie de Médicis

Pocahontas fascinates Londoners when she arrives with her husband to publicize Jamestown

John Smith publishes A Description of New England, an account of his exploration of the region in 1614

The treaty of Stolbova brings into Swedish hands the coast round the Gulf of Finland, ending Russian access to the Baltic

Albrecht von Wallenstein uses his wife's fortune to mobilize a private army in support of the emperor Ferdinand II

Bohemian nobles throw the Habsburg regents out of a window in the castle in Prague, thus triggering the Thirty Years' War

The Teatro Farnese in Parma is the first to have a proscenium arch, framing perspective scenery painted on flat wings

The 19-year-old Flemish painter Anthony van Dyck is employed by Rubens in Antwerp as his chief assistant

The Protestant Frederick V (elector palatine of the Rhine) is elected king by the rebellious Bohemian nobles

The Pilgrims (or Pilgrim Fathers), a group of 102 English settlers, sail in the Mayflower to the new world