17th century

As a means of recording the passage of time, the 17th century was that century which lasted from 1601-1700 in the Gregorian calendar.

Shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu is the founder of Japan's last shogunate, which lasted well into the 19th century.

Events

1600s

• 1601: Battle of Kinsale, one of the most important battles in Irish history, fought.
• 1602: Dutch East India Company founded. Its success contributes to the Dutch Golden Age.
• 1603: Elizabeth I of England dies and is succeeded by her cousin King James VI of Scotland, uniting the crowns of Scotland and England.
• 1603: Tokugawa Ieyasu seizes control of Japan and establishes the Tokugawa Shogunate which rules the country until 1868.
• 1603-23: After modernizing his army, Abbas I expands Persia by capturing territory from the Ottomans and the Portuguese.
• 1605: Gunpowder Plot failed in England.
• 1607: The London Company establishes the Jamestown Settlement in North America precipitating the British colonization of the Americas.
• 1608: Quebec City founded by Samuel de Champlain in New France (present-day Canada).

1610s

• 1611: The King James Version of the Bible is completed.
• 1613: The Time of Troubles in Russia ends with the establishment of the House of Romanov which rules until 1917.
• 1615: The Mughal Empire grants extensive trading rights to the British East India Company.
• 1618-48: The Thirty Years' War devastates Central Europe.

1620s

Apollo and Daphne (1622-1625), by Gian Lorenzo Bernini is considered one the masterpieces of the century.

• 1624-42: As chief minister, Cardinal Richelieu centralizes power in France.
• 1625: New Amsterdam founded by the Dutch West India Company in North America.

1630s

• 1637: The Dutch tulip mania bubble bursts.
• 1637: The Pequot War, the first of the American Indian Wars
• 1639-51: Wars of the Three Kingdoms, civil wars throughout Scotland, Ireland, and England.

1640s

• 1640: Portugal regains its independence from Spain bringing an end to the Iberian Union.
• 1640: Torture is outlawed in England.
• 1641: The Tokugawa Shogunate institutes Sakoku- foreigners are expelled and no one is allowed to enter or leave Japan.
• 1642: Dutch explorer Abel Janszoon Tasman achieves the first recorded European sighting of New Zealand.
• 1644: The Manchu conquer China ending the Ming Dynasty. The subsequent Qing Dynasty rules until 1912.
• 1648: The Peace of Westphalia ends the Thirty Years' War and the Eighty Years' War and marks the ends of Spain and the Holy Roman Empire as major European powers.
• 1648-53: Fronde civil war in France.
• 1648-67: The Deluge wars leave Poland in ruins.
• 1648-69: The Ottoman Empire captures Crete from the Venetians after the Siege of Candia.

1650s

• 1652: Cape Town founded by the Dutch East India Company in South Africa.
• 1652: Anglo-Dutch Wars begin.
• 1655-61: The Northern Wars cement Sweden's rise as a Great Power.
• 1656: Velázquez paints Las Meninas

1660s

• 1660: The Commonwealth of England ends and the monarchy is brought back during the English Restoration.
• 1660: Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge founded.
• 1661: The reign of the Kangxi Emperor of China begins.
• 1662: Koxinga captures Taiwan from the Dutch and founds the Kingdom of Tungning which rules until 1683.
• 1663: France takes full political and military control over its colonial possessions in New France.
• 1664: British troops capture New Amsterdam and rename it New York.
• 1665: Portugal defeats the Kongo Empire.
• 1666: The Great Fire of London.
• 1667-99: The Great Turkish War halts the Ottoman Empire's expansion into Europe.

1670s

• 1670: The Hudson's Bay Company is founded in Canada.
• 1672-78: Franco-Dutch War
• 1674: Maratha Empire founded in India by Shivaji.
• 1676: Russia and the Ottoman Empire commence the Russo-Turkish Wars.

1680s

• 1682: Peter the Great becomes joint ruler of Russia (sole tsar in 1696).
• 1682: La Salle explores the length of the Mississippi River and claims Louisiana for France.
• 1683: China conquers the Kingdom of Tungning and annexes Taiwan.
• 1685: Edict of Fontainebleau outlaws Protestantism in France.
• 1687: Isaac Newton publishes Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica.
• 1688-89: After the Glorious Revolution, England becomes a constitutional monarchy and the Dutch Republic goes into decline.
• 1688-97: The Grand Alliance sought to stop French expansion during the Nine Years War.
• 1689: Nerchinsk Treaty establishes a border between Russia and China.

1690s

• 1692: Salem witch trials in Massachusetts.
• 1700-21: Russia supplants Sweden as the dominant Baltic power after the Great Northern War.

Significant people

• Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden (1594-1632).
• Tokugawa Ieyasu
• Francis Bacon, English philosopher and politician (1561-1626).
• Johann Sebastian Bach, German composer of genius(1685-1750)
• Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez, Spanish painter (1599-1660)
• Pierre Corneille, French dramatist (1606 - 1684)
• William Harvey, medical doctor (1578 – 1657)
• Jean Racine, French dramatist (1639 - 1699)
• Molière, French dramatist, actor, director (1622 - 1673)
• Jean de La Fontaine French poet (1621 - 1695)
• Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux (1636 - 1711) French poet and critic
• Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598 - 1680) Italian artist
• Jean-Baptiste Lully Italian-born French compsoer (1632 - 1687)
• André Le Nôtre French landscape architect (1613 - 1700)
• Gabriel Bethlen, Hungarian prince of Transylvania (1580-1629)
• Sir Thomas Browne, English author, philosopher and scientist (1605-1682).
• Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Spanish author (1574 - 1616)
• Charles I of England (1600 - 1649).
• Charles II of England (1630 - 1685).
• Queen Christina of Sweden, high profile Catholic convert, matron of arts (1626 - 1689)
• Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland (1599 - 1658)
• Richard Cromwell, Lord Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland (1626 - 1712).
• René Descartes, French philosopher and mathematician (1596 - 1650)
• John Donne, English metaphysical poet (1572 - 1631)
• John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester (1647 - 1680) English poet
• Elizabeth I of England (1533 - 1603).
• Galileo Galilei, Italian natural philosopher (1564 - 1642)
• Andreas Gryphius, German poet and dramatist(1616 - 1664)
• Thomas Hobbes, English philosopher and mathematician (1588 - 1679)
• Christiaan Huygens, Dutch mathematician, physicist and astronomer (1629 - 1695)
• Johannes Kepler, German astronomer (1571 - 1630)
• Gottfried Leibniz, German philosopher and mathematician (1646 - 1716)
• John Locke, English philosopher (1632 - 1704)
• James I of England (1566 - 1625).
• James II of England (1633 - 1701).
• Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor (1640 - 1705)
• Louis XIV, King of France, (1638 - 1715)
• Mary II of England (1662 - 1694).
• Dubhaltach MacFhirbhisigh (d.1671), Irish historian and genealogist.
• John Milton, English author and poet (1608 - 1674)
• Miyamoto Musashi, famous warrior in Japan, author of The Book of Five Rings, a treatise on strategy and martial combat. (1584 - 1645)
• Isaac Newton, English physicist and mathematician (1642 - 1727)
• Blaise Pascal, French theologian, mathematician and physicist (1623 - 1662)
• Pierre de Fermat French lawyer and mathematician 1601 – 1665
• John Dryden, English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright (1631 - 1700)
• Samuel Pepys, English civil servant and diarist (1633 - 1703)
• Henry Purcell, English composer (1659 - 1695)
• Samarth Ramdas, Hindu saint (1608 - 1681)
• Sant Tukaram, Hindu saint (1600 - 1650)
• Anne of Austria (1601 - 1666) Queen consort and regent of France
• Cardinal Richelieu, French cardinal, duke, and politician (1585 - 1642)
• Cardinal Mazarin, French cardinal and politician of Italian origin (1602 - 1661)
• Françoise-Athénaïs, marquise de Montespan (1641 - 1707) lover of Louis XIV
• Françoise d'Aubigné, marquise de Maintenon (1635 - 1719 second wife of Louis XIV
• Rembrandt van Rijn, Dutch painter (1606 - 1669)
• William Shakespeare, English author and poet (1564 - 1616)
• Pedro Calderón de la Barca Spanish dramatist (1600 - 1681)
• Shivaji Bhonsle, Hindu king, 1st Maratha ruler, established Hindavi Swaraj. (1630-1680)
• Baruch Spinoza, Dutch philosopher (1632 - 1677)
• Seathrún Céitinn, Irish historian (ca. 1569 - ca. 1644)
• Jan III Sobieski, King of Poland (1629 - 1696)
• Imre Thököly, prince of Transylvania, leader of the anti-Habsburg uprising in Hungary (1657 - 1705)
• Albrecht von Wallenstein, German general in the Thirty Years' War, Catholic (1583 - 1634)
• William III of England (1650 - 1702).
• Abel Janszoon Tasman (1603 - 1659), Dutch seafarer and explorer.
• Michiel de Ruyter (1607 - 1676), Dutch admiral
• Guru Teg Bahadur, (1621 - 1675), 9th Sikh Guru
• Peter the Great, (1672 - 1725), Russian tsar

Inventions, discoveries, introductions

List of 17th century inventions

Major changes in philosophy and science take place, often characterized as the Scientific revolution.

• First measurement of the speed of light, 1676.
• Banknotes were reintroduced in Europe.
• Ice cream
• Tea and coffee become popular in Europe.
• Central Banking in France and modern Finance by Scottish economist John Law.
• 1609: Johann Carolas of Germany published the 'Relation', the first newspaper
• 1610: The Orion Nebula was identified by Nicolas de Peiresc of France
• c. 1612: The first flintlock musket was likely created for Louis XIII of France by gunsmith Marin de Bourgeoys
• 1620: Funded by James I of England, Cornelius Drebbei built the first 'submarine' made of wood and greased leather
• 1623: The first English dictonary, 'English Dictionarie' was published by Henry Cockeram, listing difficult words with definitions
• 1642: Mezzotint engraving introduced grey tones to printed images
• 1643: Evangelista Torricelli of Italy invented the mercury Barometer
• 1645: Giacomo Torelli of Venice, Italy invented the first rotating stage
• 1657: Christiaan Huygens developed the first functional pendulum clock based on the learnings of Galileo Galilei
• 1663: The first reflecting telescope was built by James Gregory based on suggestions of Italian astronomer Niccolo Zucchi
• c. 1670: Monk Dom Perignon discovered Champagne in France
• 1676: Antoni van Leeuwenhoek fist discovered Bacteria
• 1679: Binary system developed by Gottfried Leibnitz, possibly influenced by Shao Yung
• 1684: Calculus independently developed by both Gottfried Leibnitz and Sir Issac Newton and used to formulate classical mechanics.

Decades and years

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