Baruch Spinoza's Ethics, dealing with God, the mind and the emotions, is published shortly after his death

The Popish Plot, an invented Jesuit conspiracy to kill Charles II, results in the execution of about thirty-five Roman Catholics

Part I of The Pilgrim's Progress, written during John Bunyan's two spells in Bedford Gaol, is published and is immediately popular

Christiaan Huygens expounds the theory that light consists of a vibration forming a ripple of waves

The rival political parties in Britain find abusive names for each other - Whigs and Tories

The English clockmaker Thomas Tompion is the first to make successful use of the hairspring in pocket watches

Feudal labour laws demanding corvée (compulsory unpaid labour) are imposed by the Habsburgs on the Czech peasants of Bohemia

Louis XIV persecutes the Huguenots by means of dragonnades - the billetting of unruly dragoons in the homes of villagers

John Bunyan publishes The Life and Death of Mr Badman, an allegory of a misspent life that is akin to a novel

Ireland becomes the first European region in which the potato is an important food crop

A comet intrigues Edmund Halley, who works out that it has been around before

The Canal du Midi is completed in France, including at one point a 160-metre tunnel through high ground

A professional ballet company in Paris introduces female dancers and the world's first prima ballerina, Mlle de Lafontaine

The emperor, Leopold I, and his court abandon Vienna on the approach of a Turkish army

The Turks are driven from the walls of Vienna by the Polish king John Sobieski, in what proves a historic turning point

James II succeeds to the throne in Britain and immediately introduces pro-Catholic policies

Denis Papin, a French scientist working in England, demonstrates a pressure cooker fitted with a safety valve

400,000 Huguenots leave France after Louis XIV deprives them of their rights by revoking the Edict of Nantes

English naturalist John Ray begins publication of his Historia Plantarum, classifying some 18,600 plants in 'mutual fertility' species

Newton publishes Principia Mathematica, proving gravity to be a constant in all physical systems

The Hungarian diet grants the Habsburg dynasty in Austria a hereditary right to the crown of St Stephen

A son (the future 'Old Pretender') is born to James II, giving Britain a Catholic heir to the throne

Aphra Behn's novel Oroonoko makes an early protest against the inhumanity of the African slave trade

Sébastien de Vauban's socket bayonet is introduced in the French army

English grandees invite William III of Orange and his wife Mary, daughter of James II, to claim the British throne