1617 CE

On Shrove Tuesday, angry rioters burn down London's Cockpit Theatre because of its increase in the price of admission to its plays. Three rioters are killed when the actors at the theater defend themselves. Pocahontas (Rebecka Rolfe), daughter of the Chief of the Powhatan Algonquian tribe in the English colony of Virginia and the wife of English colonist John Rolfe, dies of smallpox after an illness of three days contracted as the couple and their son were preparing to return to America. She is buried at Gravesend. Sir Walter Ralegh's last expedition sets out from County Cork to cross to South America.

In the 1610s, the 17th century.

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • February 27 – The Treaty of Stolbovo ends the Ingrian War between Sweden and Russia. Sweden gains Ingria and Kexholm.source
  • June 5 – Ferdinand II, Archduke of Inner Austria, is elected King of Bohemia. Ferdinand's forceful Catholic counter-reformation causes great unrest, amongst the Protestants and moderates in Bohemia.source
  • July 29 – The secret Oñate treaty is signed in Vienna between representatives of King Philip III of Spain reached an agreement with the junior Habsburg branch of Archduke Ferdinand II of Austria, the heads of two different branches of the House of Habsburg. Spain's Ambassador to Austria, Íñigo Vélez de Guevara, 7th Count of Oñate signs on behalf of King Philip.source
  • August 4 – The Sharp Resolution is passed in the States of Holland and West Friesland, authorizing city governments to create their own mercenary armies, the waardgelders, to maintain public order.source
  • September 23 – The Peace of Busza is signed, between the Ottoman Empire and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.source
  • October 9 – The Treaty of Pavia is signed between Spain and Savoy, under which Savoy returns Monferrato to Mantua.source
  • November 22 – Mustafa I succeeds Ahmed I, as Sultan of the Ottoman Empire.source

Conflict & Security

  • April 14 – Second Battle of Playa Honda: The Spanish navy defeats a Dutch fleet in the Philippines.source
  • April 24 – Encouraged by Charles d'Albert, fifteen-year-old Louis XIII, king of France, forces his mother Marie de Medici, who has held de facto power, into retirement and has her favourite, Concino Concini, assassinated.source
  • April 24 – Encouraged by Charles d'Albert, the seventeen-year-old Louis XIII, king of France, forces his mother Marie de Medici, who has held de facto power, into retirement and has her favourite, Concino Concini, assassinated.Francesource
  • November 17 – A naval battle between the Sicilians and Venetians ends inconclusively.source

Exploration & Expansion

  • May 24 – King James VI of Scotland authorizes the Scottish East India Company, led by Lord Glencairn to trade to the East Indies, the Levant, Greenland, Muscovy and all other islands in the north, north-west and north-eastern seas. James VI is advised that the authorization is not in conflict with charters granted by him in his capacity as King James I of England to England's East India Company, the Levant Company, and the Muscovy Company.source
  • July 1 – Willem Schouten and the crew of the Dutch ship Eendracht return to the Netherlands after sailing around the world in two years and 17 days, in what is only the fourth circumnavigation of the globe, and the first since 1588. The expedition had departed from Texel on June 14, 1615 under the command of Jacob Le Maire, who died on December 22, 1616, slightly more than six months before the return to the Netherlands.source
  • August 19 – Sir Walter Ralegh's last expedition sets out from County Cork to cross to South America.Irelandsource
  • Glückstadt is founded by Christian IV in the Duchy of Holstein.Denmarksource

Religion & Belief

  • March 7 – Francis Bacon is appointed as Lord Keeper of the Great Seal of England and is designated by King James I to serve as regent during the time that the King of England is away from Westminster to travel to Scotland.source
  • May 26 – Eliya VIII becomes the new Patriarch of the Church of the East and leader of the Christians of Mesopotamia.source
  • May 27 – In Germany, the Prince-Bishops of Bamberg, Eichstädt and Würzburg, and the Prince-Provost of Ellwangen, withdraw their states from the Catholic League.source
  • June – Contention of the bards: Teige MacDaire in a letter to Lughaidh Ó Cléirigh and the northern poets proposes a decisive face-to-face poetic disputation.Irelandsource
  • September 1 – The weighing ceremony of Jahangir is described by the first English ambassador to the Mughal court, Sir Thomas Roe.source
  • October 17 – proclamation ordering banishment of Roman Catholic priests educated abroad.Irelandsource
  • Trinity Church begins construction in Kristianstad, then a part of the Kingdom of Denmark.Denmarksource
  • Barnabe Rich publishes The Irish Hubbub, or the English Hue and Crie.Irelandsource

Crime & Justice

  • 12 October – The Witchcraft Act of 1617 (Danish: Trolddomsforordningen af 1617) is signed into law by Christian IV, leading to a surge in witch trials in Denmark from 1617 to 1625 referred to as The Great Witch Hunt.Denmarksource
  • December 30 – Lord Clifton is imprisoned at the Tower of London for threatening Francis Bacon, Lord Chancellor. Clifton is prosecuted by the Star Chamber on March 17 and eventually commits suicide in Fleet Prison.source

Disasters & Accidents

  • March 4 – On Shrove Tuesday, angry rioters burn down London's Cockpit Theatre because of its increase in the price of admission to its plays. Three rioters are killed when the actors at the theater defend themselves.source
  • December 24 – An unexpected storm strikes off the coast of Finnmark in Norway, sinking 10 ships and drowning at least 40 people. A little more than three years later, Mari Jørgensdatter tells interrogators that she and several other witches caused the storm, prompting the Vardø witch trials.source
  • 24 December - Eastern Finnmark suffered a terrible storm. A great majority of the male population was out at sea at that time and were surprised by the storm, ten boats sank and forty men drowned.Norwaysource
  • At least seven women are sentenced to death by burning for witchcraft, at the Finspång witch trial in Sweden.source

Culture & Society

  • January 5 – Pocahontas and Tomocomo of the Powhatan Algonquian tribe, in the Virginia colony of America, meet King James I of England as his guests, at the Banqueting House at Whitehall.source
  • January 5 – The Mad Lover, a play by John Fletcher, is given its first performance.source
  • April 19 – The town of Uusikaupunki (Nystad, lit. "New Town") was founded by King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden.source
  • May 8 – title of Baron Hamilton of Strabane in the County of Tyrone created in the Peerage of Ireland for the 13-year-old James Hamilton, Master of Abercorn.Irelandsource
  • May 13 – King James I of England is escorted by the Earl of Home across the border to return to Scotland (where he reigns as King James VI) for the first time since the Union of the Crowns 14 years earlier in 1603. He is given lodging at Home's Dunglass Castle, East Lothian.source
  • August 8 – King James of England and Scotland returns to England after having spent three months in Scotland, arriving at Wharton, Cumbria.source
  • August 24 – The "Fruitbearing Society" (Die Fruchtbringende Gesellschaft) of German scholars is founded in Weimar.source
  • October 12 – The coronation ceremony of King Gustav Adolf of Sweden takes place in Stockholm, almost six years after he succeeded to the throne.source
  • November 14 – L’Union de la Boîte was founded.Francesource
  • December 15 – Sir Thomas Roe, a representative of England's East India Company, arrives in Ahmedabad at India's Mughal Empire, and seeks an audience with the Emperor, Shah Jahan. The Emperor receives Roe in an audience three weeks later, on January 6.source
  • The Book of Swindles, a collection of short stories on fraud in the late Ming dynasty, is published.source
  • Giambattista Andreini's play The Penitent Magdalene is published in Mantua.source
  • The De Barry family moves from Barryscourt Castle near Carrigtwohill to Barrymore Castle in Castlelyons.Irelandsource

Births

  • 6 January – Christoffer Gabel, statesman (died 1673)Denmarksource
  • January 19 – Lucas Faydherbe, Belgian sculptor and architect (died 1697)source
  • January 30 – William Sancroft, 79th Archbishop of Canterbury (died 1693)source
  • February 5 – Jan Thomas van Ieperen, Flemish engraver, painter (died 1673)source
  • March 8 – Tito Livio Burattini, Italian inventor, Egyptologist, instrument-maker (died 1681)source
  • May 23 – Elias Ashmole, English antiquarian (died 1692)source
  • June 2 – Maeda Toshitsugu, Japanese daimyō of the early Edo period (died 1674)source
  • June 13 – Sir Vincent Corbet, 1st Baronet, English politician (died 1656)source
  • August 10 – Richard Ingoldsby, English politician (died 1685)source
  • September 3 – Roshanara Begum, Mughal princess (died 1671)source
  • 6 October – Vitus Bering, poet and historian (died 1675)Denmarksource
  • November 6 – Leopoldo de' Medici, Italian Catholic cardinal (died 1675)source
  • December 9 – Richard Lovelace, English poet (died 1657)source
  • December 22 – Charles I Louis, Elector Palatine (died 1680)source
  • December – Gerard ter Borch, Dutch painter (died 1681)source
  • Lozang Gyatso, 5th Dalai Lama (died 1682)source
  • Roger Boyle, Church of Ireland bishop (died 1687)Irelandsource
  • Hezekiah Holland ('Anglo-Hibernus'), Anglican clergyman (died after 1660)Irelandsource

Deaths

  • January 1 – Hendrik Goltzius, Dutch painter (born 1558)source
  • January 17 – Faust Vrančić, Croatian inventor (born 1551)source
  • January 29 – William Butler, alchemist (born c.1534)Irelandsource
  • February 3 – Prospero Alpini, Italian physician and botanist from the Republic of Venice (born 1553)source
  • February 11 – Giovanni Antonio Magini, Italian mathematician, cartographer and astronomer (born 1555)source
  • March 21 – Pocahontas, Algonquian (Native American) princess (born c. 1596)source
  • March 21 – Pocahontas (Rebecka Rolfe), daughter of the Chief of the Powhatan Algonquian tribe in the English colony of Virginia and the wife of English colonist John Rolfe, dies of smallpox after an illness of three days contracted as the couple and their son were preparing to return to America. She is buried at Gravesend.source
  • April 4 – John Napier, Scottish mathematician (born 1550)source
  • May 22 – Portuguese Christian Missionary João Baptista Machado de Távora is killed, becoming the first of the 205 Martyrs of Japan.source
  • August 24 – Rose of Lima, Peruvian saint (born 1586)source
  • September 25 – Emperor Go-Yōzei of Japan (born 1571)source
  • September 25 – Francisco Suárez, Spanish Jesuit priest (born 1548)source
  • September 27 – John Ernest of Nassau-Siegen, German general (born 1582)source
  • November 10 – Barnabe Rich, English soldier and writer (born c.1540)Irelandsource
  • November 12 – Nicolas de Neufville, seigneur de Villeroy, secretary of state under four kings of France (born 1543)source
  • November 22 – Ahmed I, Ottoman Emperor (born 1590)source
  • Niels Claussøn Senning, bishop (born c. 1580).Norwaysource
  • Johannes Stephani Bellinus, a Swedish prelate and vicar in Enköping, SwedenSwedensource