Year 98 » Trajan succeeded his adoptive father Nerva as Roman emperor; under his rule the Roman Empire would reach its maximum extent.
Year 661 » The Rashidun Caliphate ends with the death of Ali.
Year 1142 » Song Dynasty General Yue Fei is executed.
Year 1186 » Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor known as Henry VI, the son and heir of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor called Frederick I, marries Constance of Sicily.
Year 1302 » Dante Alighieri, the poet and politician is exiled from Florence, Italy, where he served as one of six priors governing the city.
Year 1343 » Pope Clement VI issues the papal bull 'Unigenitus' to justify the power of the pope and the use of indulgences. Nearly 200 years later, Martin Luther would protest this.
Year 1593 » The Holy See named Vatican opens the seven-year trial of scholar Giordano Bruno.
Year 1606 » Gunpowder Plot: The trial of Guy Fawkes and other conspirators begins, ending with their execution on January 31.
Year 1695 » Mustafa II becomes the Ottoman Ottoman Emperor called sultan in Istanbul on the death of Ahmed II. Mustafa rules until his abdication in 1703.
Year 1785 » The University of Georgia is founded, the first public university in the United States.
Year 1825 » The U.S. Congress approves Indian Territory (in what is present-day Oklahoma), clearing the way for forced relocation of the Five Civilized Tribes called Eastern Indians on the "Trail of Tears".
Year 1868 » Boshin War: The Battle of Toba-Fushimi between forces of the Tokugawa shogunate and pro-Emperor of Japan called Imperial factions begins, which will end in defeat for the shogunate, and is a pivotal point in the Meiji Restoration.
Year 1869 » Boshin War: Tokugawa rebels establish the Ezo Republic in HokkaidÅ.
Year 1870 » The Kappa Alpha Theta fraternity is founded at DePauw University.
Year 1888 » The National Geographic Society is founded in Washington, D.C.
Year 1909 » The Young Left (Norway) known as Young Left is founded in Norway.
Year 1927 » Ibn Saud takes the title of Kingdom of Nejd and Hejaz known as King of Nejd.
Year 1939 » First flight of the Lockheed P-38 Lightning.
Year 1943 » World War II: The VIII Bomber Command dispatched ninety-one B-17s and B-24s to attack the U-Boat construction yards at Wilhelmshaven, Germany. This was the first American bombing attack on Germany of the war.
Year 1944 » World War II: The 900-day Siege of Leningrad is lifted.
Year 1945 » World War II: The Red Army liberates the remained inmates of the Auschwitz concentration camp or Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp built by the Nazi Germans on the territory of Poland.
Year 1951 » Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site begins with a one-kiloton bomb dropped on Frenchman Flat.
Year 1961 » Soviet Union called Soviet submarine 'Soviet submarine S-80 e.g S-80' sinks with all hands lost.
Year 1967 » Astronauts Gus Grissom, Edward Higgins White called Edward White and Roger Chaffee are killed in a fire during a test of their Apollo 1 spacecraft at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida.
Year 1967 » The United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union sign the Outer Space Treaty in Washington, D.C., banning deployment of nuclear weapons in space, and limiting use of the Moon and other astronomical object or celestial bodies to peaceful purposes.
Year 1974 » The Brisbane River breaches its banks causing 1974 Brisbane flood e.g the largest flood to affect the city of Brisbane in the 20th century.
Year 1980 » Through cooperation between the U.S. and Canadian governments, six American diplomats secretly escape Iran hostage crisis named hostilities in Iran in the culmination of the Canadian Caper.
Year 1984 » Pop singer Michael Jackson suffers second degree burns to his scalp during the filming of a Pepsi commercial in the Shrine Auditorium.
Year 1996 » Germany first observes International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Year 2002 » Lagos armoury explosion e.g An explosion at a military storage facility in Lagos, Nigeria, kills at least 1,100 people and displaces over 20,000 others.
Year 2003 » The first selections for the National Recording Registry are announced by the Library of Congress.
Year 2006 » Western Union discontinues its Telegraphy called Telegram and Commercial Messaging services.
Year 2010 » The 2009 Honduran constitutional crisis ends when Porfirio Lobo Sosa becomes the new President of Honduras.
Year 2013 » 242 people die in a Kiss nightclub fire called nightclub fire in the city of Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul or Santa Maria, Brazil.