1596 CE

Archbishop John Whitgift begins building his hospital at Croydon. During Spain's Brittany Campaign during the Anglo-Spanish War, a Spanish ship carrying 25 soldiers invades England after arriving at Cawsand Bay in Cornwall. After starting a fire, the Spanish retreat. Diego de Montemayor founds the city of Monterrey, Mexico.

In the 1590s, the 16th century.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • December 31 – King Henry IV of France (who was originally King Henry III of the Kingdom of Navarre) declares Navarre to be permanently separate of France.source
  • Tract of alliance between England, France and the United NetherlandsFrancesource

Conflict & Security

  • January 6 – Drake's Assault on Panama: Sir Francis Drake, General Thomas Baskerville and an English force of 15 ships land at the Atlantic Ocean port of Nombre de Dios in an attempt to capture the Isthmus of Panama.source
  • March 11 – The Battle of Pinos is fought between the English Navy (with 14 warships) and the Spanish Navy (with 13 galleons) off of the coast Cuba's Isla de Pinos, with 325 English Navy men killed or captured, while Spain drives Baskerville's ships to retreat and sustains 80 dead or wounded.source
  • March 15 – During Spain's Brittany Campaign during the Anglo-Spanish War, a Spanish ship carrying 25 soldiers invades England after arriving at Cawsand Bay in Cornwall. After starting a fire, the Spanish retreat.source
  • April 9 – Siege of Calais: Spanish troops capture Calais.source
  • July 18 – Queen Elizabeth I of England issues "an open warrant to the Lord Mayor of London and the aldermen and his brethren, and to all other vice-admirals, mayors, and other public officers whatsoever to whom it may appertain" directing that Africans in the realm will be deported. Citing a request from Casper van Senden "to have licence to take up so many blackamoors here in this realm and to transport them into Spain and Portugal," the Queen notes that "Her majesty... considering the reasonableness of his request to transport so many blackamoors from hence, doth think it a very good exchange and that those kind of people may be well spared in this realm being so populous and numbers of able persons the subjects of the land and Christian people that perish for want of service, whereby through their labor they might be maintained."source
  • August 18 – The siege of the Dutch city of Hulst is completed after a month as Spanish forces under the command of Albert, son of the late Holy Roman Emperor Maxmimilan II, force the surrender of the city.source
  • October 26 – Battle of Keresztes: The Ottoman Empire Turks defeat a combined Habsburg–Transylvanian army, after two days of fighting: .source
  • November 25 – The Cudgel War begins in Finland (at the time part of Sweden), when poor peasants rise up against the troops, nobles and cavalry who have taxed them.source
  • 25 November - A peasant uprising in the province of Finland results in the Cudgel War.Swedensource
  • The Serb Uprising of 1596–97 begins.source
  • An envoy of King Philip II of Spain arrives to make inquiries of survivors of the Spanish Armada in Ireland but is successful in only eight cases.Irelandsource

Exploration & Expansion

  • May 18 – Willem Barents leaves Vlie, on his third and final Arctic voyage.source
  • June 10 – Willem Barents and Jacob van Heemskerk discover Bear Island.source
  • June 17 – Willem Barents discovers Spitsbergen.source
  • June 24 – Cornelis de Houtman arrives in Banten, the first Dutch sailor to reach Indonesia.source
  • June – Sir John Norreys and Sir Geoffrey Fenton travel from England to Connacht to parley with the local lords.Irelandsource
  • July 5 – Capture of Cádiz: An English fleet, commanded by Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, and Lord Howard of Effingham, sacks Cádiz.source
  • September 20 – Diego de Montemayor founds the city of Monterrey, Mexico.source

Religion & Belief

  • June 5 – Pope Clement VIII appoints 16 new Cardinals.source
  • August 29 – The coronation of Christian IV as King of Denmark and King of Norway takes place at the Vor Frue Kirke cathedral in Copenhagen. The Bishop of Zealand, Peder Virstrup, places the crown upon the head of King Christian IV, who had become the monarch in 1588 at the age of 11.source
  • October 10 – The Union of Brest: The Ukrainian Church west of the Dnieper becomes known as the Ukrainian Rite of Catholicism, whereas the East officially renounces the authority of the Pope.source
  • October 19 – The Spanish galleon San Felipe founders in Japan, leading to 26 Christians being martyred the next year.source
  • December 5 – Damat Ibrahim Pasha is appointed the Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire by Sultan Mehmed III for the second time in less than a year, replacing Cigalazade Yusuf Sinan Pasha, who succeeded him on October 27.source
  • The Church of Our Lady of Salvation, or the Portuguese Church is established in Dadar, MumbaiIndiasource

Technology & Infrastructure

  • The first water closet, by Sir John Harington, is installed in a manor near Kelston in England.source

Science & Discovery

  • August – David Fabricius discovers the variable nature of the star Mira.source

Health & Medicine

  • January 27 – With an epidemic of dysentery spreading through the English forces of Drake and Baskerville, Drake orders survivors to retreat to the English ships, anchored off of the island of Escudo de Veraguas. Drake dies of dystentery two days later on his flagship, Defiance.source
  • February 14 – Archbishop John Whitgift begins building his hospital at Croydon.source
  • The Black Death hits parts of Europe.source

Disasters & Accidents

  • January 20 – Francis Drake, unable to receive a ransom for the town of Nombre de Dios, orders the town and all Spanish ships in harbor to be burned. At the same time, General Baskerville leads 750 men on a mission to clear the Isthmus of Spanish parties.source
  • October 18 – The Second Armada, a Spanish fleet sent to attack England in revenge for the raid on Cadiz, is wrecked in storms off Cape Finisterre; nearly 5,000 men and 44 ships are lost including five galleonssource
  • December 8 – In Japan, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, Chancellor of the Realm, orders the arrest of the 26 Roman Catholic Christians who had the misfortune of being shipwrecked in Kyoto on October 19; each of the ones arrested has a part of the left ear cut off, then sent on a forced march to Nagasaki on January 4, then has them killed on February 5.source

Climate & Environment

  • The fourth of a five year run of poor harvests, largely caused by the weather, a pattern typical of the last third of the century. This causes famine throughout Europe, which leads to food riots in Britain.source

Culture & Society

  • February 11 – Albert of Austria arrives in Brussels to begin his administration as Governor General of the Habsburg Netherlands.source
  • Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, is founded.source
  • King Sigismund III Vasa moves the capital of Poland from Kraków to Warsaw.source

Births

  • 1 January - Elizabeth Ribbing, morganatic consort of prince Carl Philip (died 1662)Swedensource
  • March 31 – René Descartes, French philosopher and mathematician (died 1650)source
  • 31 March – René Descartes, French philosopher (died 1650 in Sweden)Francesource
  • June 27 – Maximilian, Prince of Dietrichstein, German prince (died 1655)source
  • June 29 – Emperor Go-Mizunoo of Japan (died 1680)source
  • July 12 – Michael I of Russia, Russian Tsar (died 1645)source
  • August 19 – Elizabeth Stuart, later Queen of Bohemia (died 1662)source
  • 19 August – Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia (died 1662 in England)Scotlandsource
  • August 26 – Frederick V of the Palatinate (died 1632)source
  • September 3 – Nicola Amati, Italian luthier from Cremona (died 1684)source
  • September 4 – Constantijn Huygens, Dutch Golden Age poet and composer (died 1687)source
  • October 18 – Edward Winslow, American Pilgrim leader (died 1655)source
  • October 26 – Robert Coe, American colonial (died 1689)source
  • November 1 – Pietro da Cortona, Italian painter (died 1669)source
  • December 21 – Thomas Francis, Prince of Carignano (died 1656)source
  • December 21 – Peter Mohyla, Moldavian Orthodox Metropolitan of Kiev and Galicia (died 1646)source
  • Pocahontas, Algonquian (Native American) princess (died 1617)source
  • Sunderdas, poet and social reformerIndiasource

Deaths

  • January 28 – Sir Francis Drake, English explorer, sea captain, privateer, navigator, slaver, pirate and politician (born c. 1540)source
  • 13 February - Charles II, the tenth overall and fourth York monarchSwedensource
  • February 19 – Blaise de Vigenère, French cryptographer, diplomat, scientist, and author (born 1523)source
  • 19 February – Blaise de Vigenère, diplomat, cryptographer, translator and alchemist (born 1523)Francesource
  • 22 February – David Wemyss of That IlkScotlandsource
  • May 5 – Catherine de Montpensier, politically active French duchess (born 1552)source
  • May 6 – Giaches de Wert, Flemish composer (born 1535)source
  • May 31 – John Lesley, Scottish bishop (born 1527)source
  • May – Janet Fockart, Scottish merchant and moneylendersource
  • June 29 – Emperor Go-Mizunoo, 108th Emperor of Japan (died 1680)source
  • July 14 – King Dominicus Corea (Edirille Bandara) is beheaded by the Portuguese in Colombo, Ceylon.source
  • July 23 – Henry Carey, 1st Baron Hunsdon (born 1526)source
  • August 11 – Hamnet Shakespeare, son of William Shakespeare (born 1585)source
  • September 9 – Anna Jagiellon, queen of Poland (born 1523)source
  • September 15 – Leonhard Rauwolf, German physician and botanist (born 1535)source
  • November 10 – Peter Wentworth, English Puritan politician (born 1530)source
  • Jean Bodin, French jurist (born 1530)source
  • Madhavdev, author and poet dies in Bhela Sattra (born 1489)Indiasource