/year

March 15 in history

236 sourced entries recorded on March 15, from 44 BCE to 2025 CE. Every line is quoted from the revision it came from.

Events

  • 351Emperor Constantius II elevates his 25-year-old cousin Constantius Gallus to Caesar at Sirmium (Pannonia). He arranges a marriage with his sister Constantina, and puts him in charge of the Eastern portion of the Roman Empire.source
  • 493Odoacer is invited to a banquet organised in order to celebrate the peace treaty. During the festivities, Odoacer is killed by Theodoric the Great. His body is skillfully sliced in half in full view of his guests. A massacre of Odoacer's soldiers and supporters follows.source
  • 856Emperor Michael III overthrows the regency of his mother Theodora. He appoints his uncle Bardas as the de facto regent and co-ruler of the Byzantine Empire.source
  • 897Al-Hadi ila'l-Haqq Yahya enters Sa'dah and founds the Zaydi Imamate of Yemen.source
  • 933Battle of Merseburg: King Henry I ("the Fowler") defeats the Magyars near Merseburg after his refusal to pay the annual tribute. During Henry's lifetime they never raid the East Frankish Kingdom again.source
  • 1311The Battle of Halmyros is fought in Greece as the mercenaries of the Catalan Company defeat the Latin forces (some 15,000 men), and their allies under Walter V at Halmyros (southern Thessaly). After the battle, they take control of the Duchy of Athens. Later, Catalan forces peacefully occupy all of Attica and Boeotia, which they rule as part of Greece (until the 1380s).source
  • 1317Pope John XXII admonishes King Frederick III of Sicily to take severe measures against the Fraticelli, the Spiritual Franciscans who have broken with the Roman Catholic Church doctrine.source
  • 1345The Miracle of the Host occurs (as commemorated in Amsterdam).source
  • 1398Trần Thuận Tông is forced to abdicate as ruler of the Trần dynasty in modern-day Vietnam, in favour of his three-year-old son Trần Thiếu Đế.source
  • 1412Treaty of Lubowla: After the Peace of Thorn (1411), Grand Master of the Teutonic Order Heinrich von Plauen asks Sigismund of Hungary for economic aid. Sigismund agrees to mediate reduction to the third installment, demarcation of the Samogitian border, and other matters, with a grand tournament. Hunts and lavish feasts are also organized. Sigismund invites, among others, Polish king Wladyslaw Jagiello, Heinrich von Plauen and Bosnian king Tvrtko II. There are people from 17 countries and languages - 40,000 nobles and 2000 knights are present from all over Europe, including England.source
  • 1420Sigismund, the Holy Roman Emperor, orders the execution of the Hussite Jan Krása, who had led an uprising against the Empire at Wroclaw.source
  • 1435Stjepan Vukčić Kosača becomes the new Grand Duke of Bosnia upon the death of his uncle, Sandalj Hranić.source
  • 1450English commander Thomas Kyriell and 2,500 soldiers land at Cherbourg in English-occupied France, where they join another 1,800 English troops recruited by the Duke of Somerset from the garrisons at Bayeux, Caen and Vire.source
  • 1453Sayf al-Din Inal deposes Sultan Al-Mansur and puts him in prison. Sayf al-Din becomes the new Mamluk Sultan of Egypt and Syria.source
  • 1471With the help of a group of mercenaries lent to him by Charles the Bold of Burgundy, the Yorkist King Edward IV returns to England to reclaim his throne, landing near Hull, after having departed from Holland on March 11.source
  • 1481The first of a series of earthquakes to affect the island of Rhodes occurs, leading up to the deadly earthquake in May.source
  • 1493Christopher Columbus and Martín Alonso Pinzón return to Palos de la Frontera, the original port in Spain from where they started the first voyage of discovery.source
  • 1503Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama and sailors of his Portuguese India Armada become the first Europeans to sight the Seychelles islands as Thomé Lopes notes the discovery of what will later be called Silhouette Island.source
  • 1513In the Taino Rebellion on the island of Puerto Rico, Spanish conquistador Diego Guilarte de Salazar attacks the Taino towns of Yauco and Coxiguex.source
  • 1543James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran, is elected by the Scottish Parliament as the Regent for the infant Mary Queen of Scots.source
  • 1562English merchant Anthony Jenkinson has an audience with Ivan the Terrible in Moscow, before departing the city on April 27 and continuing his second expedition through the Grand Duchy of Moscow to Qazvin, capital of the Safavid dynasty in Persia.source
  • 1587English sailor Sir Francis Drake accepts a privateering commission from Queen Elizabeth to disrupt shipping routes in order to slow supplies from Italy and Andalucia to Lisbon, to trouble enemy fleets in their home ports, to capture Spanish treasure ships and to attack the Spanish Armada if it were to sail for England. On 12 April, his fleet sails from Plymouth.source
  • 1596During 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
  • 1603French explorer Samuel de Champlain departs from the Channel port of Honfleur in the Calvados département in the Kingdom of France for his first voyage to the settlement of New France in what is now Canada.source
  • 1604More than seven months after their July 25, 1603 coronation, King James I and Anne, Queen consort make the traditional Royal Entry to London. The ceremonies have been postponed from 1603 because of the ongoing plague.source
  • 1606The king leaves Paris to besiege Sedan and end the revolt of the Duke of Bouillon, who submits on April 2. On April 6 the king enters the town and on April 28 returns to Paris.source
  • 1614Construction begins on the Takada Castle in Japan.source
  • 1626Portugal declares war on Queen Nzinga of the Kingdom of Ndongo, located in what is now Angola.source
  • 1646Start of the Battles of La Naval de Manila, a series of five naval battles fought between the Dutch Republic and Spain in the waters of the Philippines.source
  • 1649The city of Lappeenranta (Villmanstrand) is founded by Queen Christina of Sweden.source
  • 1651Prince Aisin Gioro Fulin attains the age of 13 and becomes the Shunzhi Emperor of China, which had been governed by a regency since the death of his father Hong Taiji in 1643.source
  • 1656Battle of Jaroslaw: Almost a month after their defeat by Sweden at the Battle of Golab, Polish and Lithuanian troops commanded by Stefan Czarniecki defeat King Karl X Gustav's Swedish Army.source
  • 1670The first English settlers arrive at the modern-day U.S. state of South Carolina, at this time the Province of Clarendon carved out of the Province of Carolina, and construct a settlement at Albemarle Point on the Ashley River.source
  • 1671A tornado kills more than 600 people in the city of Cádiz in Spain.source
  • 1672Charles II of England issues the Royal Declaration of Indulgence, suspending execution of Penal Laws against Protestant nonconformists and Roman Catholics in his realms; this will be withdrawn the following year under pressure from the Parliament of England.source
  • 1672King Charles II issues the Royal Declaration of Indulgence, suspending execution of Penal Laws against Protestant nonconformists and Roman Catholics in his realms.source
  • 1672King Charles II of England issues a Royal Declaration of Indulgence, suspending execution of Penal Laws against Roman Catholics in his realms; this is withdrawn the following year under pressure from the Parliament of England.source
  • 1684highwayman John Nevison hanged in York for murder.source
  • 1703The landmark English court case of Rose v Royal College of Physicians is decided by the Court of Queen's Bench, beginning the end of the monopoly that the Royal College of Physicians has over the practice of medicine.source
  • 1703the landmark case of Rose v Royal College of Physicians is decided in the Court of Queen's Bench, beginning the end of the monopoly that the Royal College of Physicians has over the practice of medicine.source
  • 1712HMS Dragon, a 38-gun fourth rate frigate of the British Royal Navy, is wrecked on Les Casquets rocks to the west of Alderney.source
  • 1712HMS Dragon, a 38-gun fourth rate frigate of the Royal Navy, is wrecked on Les Casquets rocks to the west of Alderney.source
  • 1742Denmark-Norway concludes a treaty of friendship with France, a day after the expiration of its 1739 treaty with Great Britain.source
  • 1742The Verendrye brothers take possession of South Dakota in the name of the King of France.source
  • 1744France declares war on Great Britain.source
  • 1764The day after his return to Paris from a nine-year mission, French explorer and scholar Anquetil Du Perron presents a complete copy of the Zoroastrian sacred text, the Zend Avesta, to the Bibliothèque Royale in Paris, along with several other traditional texts. In 1771, he publishes the first European translation of the Zend Avesta.source
  • 1764The day after his return to Paris from a nine-year mission, French explorer and scholar Anquetil Du Perron presents a complete copy of the Zoroastrian sacred text, the Zend Avesta, to the Bibliothèque Royale.source
  • 1766Nicholas Sheehy, the Roman Catholic priest of Clogheen, County Tipperary, and an open opponent of the Penal Laws against Catholics, having been tried on dubious evidence as an accessory to murder, is hanged, drawn and quartered at Clonmel.source
  • 1771The Smeatonian Society of Civil Engineers first meets in London, the world's oldest engineering society.source
  • 1771Society of Civil Engineers first meets (in London), the world's oldest engineering society.source
  • 1773March 9–19 – Second voyage of James Cook: Tobias Furneaux in HMS Adventure explores the coast of Van Diemen's Land.source
  • 1773The popular (and enduring) comedy She Stoops to Conquer, by Irish playwright Oliver Goldsmith, is performed for the first time, premiering at London's Covent Garden Theatre.source
  • 1773first performance of Oliver Goldsmith's comedy She Stoops to Conquer at the Covent Garden Theatre in London.source
  • 1781American Revolutionary War – Battle of Guilford Court House: American General Nathanael Greene loses to the British.source
  • 1781American Revolution – Battle of Guilford Court House: American General Nathanael Greene loses to the British.source
  • 1783Newburgh Conspiracy: A potential uprising in the Continental Army stationed at Newburgh, New York, is defused, when George Washington asks the officers to support the supremacy of the United States Congress.source
  • 1787Lofthusreisingen ends with the arrest of Christian Jensen Lofthuus.source
  • 1790The Sick and Indigent Roomkeepers' Society is established in Dublin; by the 21st century this will be the city's oldest surviving charity.source
  • 1812Luddites attack the wool-processing factory of Frank Vickerman in West Yorkshire.source
  • 1812Luddites attack the wool processing factory of Frank Vickerman in West Yorkshire.source
  • 1815Joachim Murat, King of Naples, declares war on Austria in an attempt to save his throne, starting the Neapolitan War.source
  • 1818First Seminole War: General Andrew Jackson and his American army invade Florida.source
  • 1818Battle of Quechereguassource
  • 1820Maine is admitted as the 23rd U.S. state.source
  • 1820Maine is admitted as the 23rd U.S. state (see History of Maine).source
  • 1823Sailor Benjamin Morrell erroneously reports the existence of the island of New South Greenland near Antarctica.source
  • 1827The University of Toronto is established by royal charter as King's College at York. It is the first institution of higher education in Upper Canada.source
  • 1827The University of Toronto is charteredsource
  • 1831March 13-15: Night of the Bottle Fight – A street fight between the Portuguese and the Brazilians.source
  • 1836Annual general meeting of the Banque de Belgique, founded the previous year.source
  • 1843Victoria, British Columbia, is founded by the Hudson's Bay Company as a trading post and fort.source
  • 1844opening of Gößnitz stationsource
  • 1848Hungarian Revolution of 1848: The Hungarian young revolutionary intellectuals, led by Sándor Petőfi, Mór Jókai and others, called the Márciusi Ifjak (Young men of March) organize peaceful mass demonstrations in Pest, forcing the city's Habsburg authorities to accept the 12 Points: the Hungarian claim for freedom and self-determination within the Habsburg Empire. On the same day, Lajos Kossuth and representatives of the Diet of Hungary go to Vienna, and force the emperor and Hungarian king Ferdinand I of Austria to accept Hungarian claims for self-determination within the empire.source
  • 1851Explosion at Victoria Pit colliery, Nitshill kills 61 men and boys.source
  • 1857President Comonfort signs the law adopting the metric systemsource
  • 1862riots in Stalybridge resulting from the Lancashire Cotton Famine.source
  • 1867'Conference of Trades' first meets; later forming the nucleus of the Trades Union Congress.source
  • 1871Australia's first synagogue opens in Adelaide, South Australia.source
  • 1873The Phi Sigma Kappa student fraternity is founded at the Massachusetts Agricultural College.source
  • 1874France and Viet Nam sign the Second Treaty of Saigon, further recognizing the full sovereignty of France over Cochinchina.source
  • 1875Roman Catholic Archbishop of New York John McCloskey is named the first cardinal in the United States.source
  • 1875Roman Catholic Archbishop of New York John McCloskey is named the first cardinal in the U.S.source
  • 187715 March to 4 April – 1877 Australia v England series is playedsource
  • 1877English cricket team in Australia and New Zealand in 1876–77: The first Test cricket match is held between England and Australia.source
  • 1878restoration of the Scottish hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church, carried out on the instructions of the newly appointed Pope Leo XIII.source
  • 1883Fenian dynamite campaign: An explosion at the Local Government Board, Charles Street, Mayfair (Westminster) causes over £4,000 worth of damage and some minor injuries to people nearby. A second bomb at The Times newspaper offices in Queen Victoria Street, London does not explode.source
  • 1888The Sikkim Expedition, a British military expedition to expel the Tibetans from northern Sikkim, begins.source
  • 1889Samoan crisis: German and American warships keep each other at bay in a standoff in Apia Harbor, ending when a cyclone blows in and sinks them all.source
  • 1892Jesse W. Reno patents the first escalator, installed at Coney Island as a pleasure ride.source
  • 1892Jesse W. Reno patents the first working escalator, used at Old Iron Pier, Coney Island, New York City.source
  • 1892The Liverpool Football Club is founded in England by John Houlding, the owner of Anfield; Houlding decides to form his own team after Everton leaves Anfield, in an argument over rent.source
  • 1895Heian Shrine is completed in Kyoto, Japan.source
  • 1895Dreyfus is landed on Devil's Island off French Guiana.source
  • 1898After two months of production, Ang Kalayaan gets published, bearing a false masthead stating that the printing was done in Yokohama when it was in fact done in Lavezares Street, Binondo, Manila. Marcelo H. del Pilar was stated as the editor, but it was Emilio Jacinto who made the final changes before printing, writing under a penname. Dimas-Ilaw, Aguedo del Rosario, and Apolinario de la Cruz subsidised types free of charge but the publisher, Pio Valenzuela, had to secure more, paying a peso for each type sold by four workforces of the Diario de Manila who stole them from the paper's production press.source
  • 1898March 1898 Japanese general electionsource
  • 1899The cabinet of Spain's Prime Minister Silvestri approves the ratification of the treaty to end the Spanish–American War. The Queen Regent of Spain signs the treaty two days later.source
  • 1900The Brazilian government sends troops to arrest rebel leader Luis Gálvez Rodríguez de Arias and restore the Republic of Acre to Bolivia.source
  • 1900The Gold Standard Act is ratified, placing United States currency on the gold standard.source
  • 1902The Pattani Sultanate is abolished by the Siamese authority after the last sultan of Pattani refused new administrative reforms by the Siamese.source
  • 1905March 14 – 23 of the 26 crew of the British barque Kyber die when the ship is wrecked off England's Land's End.source
  • 1907March 15–16 – Elections to the new Parliament of Finland are the first in the world for a national assembly with woman candidates, as well as the first elections in Europe where universal suffrage is applied; 19 women are elected.source
  • 1916United States President Woodrow Wilson sends 12,000 United States troops over the U.S.–Mexico border to pursue Pancho Villa; the 13th Cavalry regiment enters Mexican territory.source
  • 1918Finnish Civil War: The Battle of Tampere begins, continuing until 6 April.source
  • 1919Election rally of János Vass is crashed by József Migray's bandsource
  • 1920March 13–17 – Wolfgang Kapp and Walther von Lüttwitz's Kapp Putsch (an attempted coup in Germany) briefly ousts the Weimar Republic government from Berlin, but fails due to public resistance and a general strike.source
  • 1920March 15–16 – Constantinople is occupied by British Empire forces, acting for the Allied Powers against the Turkish National Movement. Retrospectively, the Grand National Assembly of Turkey regards this as the dissolution of the Ottoman regime in Istanbul.source
  • 1922With Egypt having gained self-government from the United Kingdom, Fuad I becomes King of Egypt.source
  • 1924Horacio Vásquez wins the Dominican Republic general election, becoming president, coinciding with the end of United States military occupation.source
  • 1925The Phi Lambda Chi fraternity (original name "The Aztecs") is founded on the campus of Arkansas State Teachers' College in Conway, Arkansas (the modern-day University of Central Arkansas).source
  • 1928Chinese warlord Shi Yousan sets fire to the Shaolin Monastery in Henan, destroying some of its ancient structures and artifacts.source
  • 1928March 15 incident: The Japanese government cracks down on socialists and communists, arresting over 1,000 people.source
  • 1928March 15 – March 15 incident: Alarmed by gains made by socialists and communists in the 1928 general election, the conservative government of Prime Minister Giichi Tanaka ordered the mass arrest of known communists and socialists and suspected communist and socialist sympathizers. The arrests occurred throughout Japan, and a total of 1652 people were apprehended.source
  • 1933Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss keeps members of the National Council from convening, starting the Austrofascist dictatorship.source
  • 1933The Dow Jones Industrial Average rises from 53.84 to 62.10. The day's gain of 15.34%, achieved during the depths of the Great Depression, remains the largest 1-day percentage gain for the index.source
  • 1938The Soviet Union announces officially that Nikolai Bukharin has been executed.source
  • 1939German troops occupy the remaining part of Bohemia and Moravia; Czechoslovakia ceases to exist. The Ruthenian region of Czechoslovakia declares independence as Carpatho-Ukraine.source
  • 1939March 10–21 — 18th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)source
  • 1941Berlin-based American journalist Richard C. Hottelet is arrested by the Gestapo on "suspicion of espionage", but eventually released in July as part of a prisoner exchange with the U.S.source
  • 1943Cardinal van Roey issues a pastoral letter condemning the seizure of church bells.source
  • 1943Italian submarine Leonardo da Vinci sinks Canadian Pacific liner RMS Empress of Canada off Sierra Leone. Nearly half of the 392 fatalities are Italian prisoners of war.source
  • 1944The Soviet Union introduces a new anthem, replacing The Internationale.source
  • 1944Soviet Union introduces new anthem, replacing The Internationale.source
  • 1944WWII: Battle of Monte Cassino: Allied aircraft bomb the monastery, and an assault is staged.source
  • 1944WWII: The National Council of the French Resistance approves the Resistance programme.source
  • 1944The National Council of the French Resistance approves the Resistance programme.source
  • 1944New Zealand General Freyberg orders the destruction of the monastery at Cassino using 775 aircraft, 1250 tons of bombs, and 200,000 shells. At the end of the battle, New Zealand has lost 1050 men, one of the worst days in its history.source
  • 1945The 17th Academy Awards ceremony is held, broadcast via radio in the United States for the first time. Best Picture goes to Going My Way.source
  • 1947Hindus and Muslims clash in Punjab.source
  • 1952March 15–16 – 73 inches (1,870 mm) of rain falls in Cilaos, Réunion, the most rainfall in one day up to that time.source
  • 1956Nanyang University is officiated with a flag-raising ceremony, with classes beginning on 30 March.source
  • 1961The Union of Peoples of Angola, led by Holden Roberto, attacks strategic locations in the north of Angola. These events result in the beginning of the colonial war with Portugal.source
  • 1962Katangan Prime Minister Moise Tshombe begins negotiations to rejoin the Congo.source
  • 1966The decennial census is held in Romania, and counted the population of Romania on that date.source
  • 1970The Expo '70 World's Fair opens in Suita, Osaka, Japan.source
  • 1970September 13 – Expo '70 in Osaka.source
  • 19701969–70 Albanian Cup: Partizani vs Villaznia, Villaznia wins 1-0source
  • 1973Mark Dvorzhetski (born 1908), Russian (Lithuania)-born Israeli physician and historian.source
  • 1975Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith and senior Ministers visit South Africa for talks.source
  • 1975In Brazil, Guanabara State merges into the state of Rio de Janeiro. The state's capital moves from the city of Niterói to the city of Rio de Janeiro.source
  • 1978Somalia and Ethiopia sign a truce to end the Ethio-Somali War.source
  • 1981Three hijackers holding hostages aboard a Pakistani jetliner surrendered to Syrian authorities, ending a 13-day ordeal.source
  • 1983Reform rabbis in the U.S. vote to affirm both patrilineal and matrilineal descent for determining Jewish identity. While Jewish tradition defines a Jew as someone with a Jewish mother, this decision by the Central Conference of American Rabbis amends this principle to mean one Jewish "parent."source
  • 1985Vice-president José Sarney, upon becoming vice president, assumes the duties of president of Brazil, as the new president Tancredo Neves had become severely ill the day before. Sarney would later become Brazil's first civilian president in 21 years, upon Neves' death on April 21.source
  • 1986Hotel New World collapses, killing 33 people and leaving 17 injured.source
  • 1989Israel hands over Taba to Egypt, ending a seven-year territorial dispute.source
  • 1990Fernando Collor de Mello takes office as President of Brazil, Brazil's first democratically elected president since Jânio Quadros in 1961. The next day, he announces a currency freeze and freezes large bank accounts for 18 months.source
  • 1990Iraq hangs Iranian journalist Farzad Bazoft for spying. Daphne Parish, a British nurse, is sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment as an accomplice.source
  • 1991Germany formally regains complete independence after the four post-World War II occupying powers (France, the U.K., the U.S. and the U.S.S.R.) relinquish all remaining rights to the country.source
  • 1993March 13–15 – The 1993 Storm of the Century strikes the eastern U.S., bringing record snowfall and other severe weather all the way from Cuba to Quebec; it reportedly kills 184 people.source
  • 1996Fokker, a major manufacturer of small size aircraft, goes bankrupt in Netherlands.source
  • 1999The Santer Commission of the EU resigns over allegations of corruption.source
  • 1999The Santer Commission, under the leadership of Luxembourger Jacques Santer, resigns in the face of corruption allegations.source
  • 1999President Rawlings attends a state dinner held in his honour by U.S. President Bill Clinton.source
  • 2000March 12–26 – Pope John Paul II visits Israel, and thus becomes the second pope to visit Israel. During his stay, the Pope visits Yad Vashem (the Israeli national Holocaust memorial) and the Western Wall placing a letter inside it in which he prayed for forgiveness for the actions against Jews in the past.source
  • 2001United Nations Security Council resolution 1344 was adopted unanimously and extended the mandate of the United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) until 15 September 2001.source
  • 2002United Nations Security Council resolution 1398 was adopted unanimously and extended the mandate of the United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea (UNMEE) until 15 September 2002.source
  • 2002Romanian film Filantropica is released.source
  • 2003Former General François Bozizé seizes power through a military coup in the Central African Republic.source
  • 2006The United Nations General Assembly votes overwhelmingly to establish the United Nations Human Rights Council.source
  • 2007Russia, Greece and Bulgaria sign a deal to build a pipeline to transport Russian oil to the Greek port of Alexandroupolis.source
  • 2009Luis León Sánchez wins the Paris–Nice.source
  • 2011Egypt’s Ministry of Interior dissolves the widely feared and hated State Security Investigations Service accused of human rights abuses and announced the establishment of the new National Security Agency will replace it and take over its internal security duties.source
  • 2011Protests breakout across Syria demanding democratic reforms, resignation of President Bashar al-Assad, and release of those imprisoned for the March 6 Daraa protest. The government responds by killing hundreds of protesters and laying siege to various cities, beginning the Syrian Civil War, which lasts until Assad’s overthrow in 2024.source
  • 2011Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, King of Bahrain, declares a three-month state of emergency as troops from the Gulf Co-operation Council are sent to quell the civil unrest.source
  • 2012Communist party chief of Chongqing Bo Xilai, well known for his neo-Maoist leanings and policies, is removed from his post after a large scandal involving the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood and an incident involving the Chongqing police chief Wang Lijun.source
  • 2014the first round of the Slovak presidential election is held. Prime Minister Robert Fico and businessman-turned philanthropist Andrej Kiska advance to the second round.source
  • 2016the 2016 Ecuadorian Army Arava crash (22 fatalities)source
  • 2018A summit of Central Asian leaders takes place in Astana.source
  • 2018March 9-18: Belarus takes part in the 2018 Winter Paralympics in PyeongChang, South Korea.source
  • 2018March 9–18 – The 2018 Winter Paralympics are held in Pyeongchang, South Korea.source
  • 2019Cyclone Idai makes landfall on Mozambique, causing at least 1,073 fatalities, as well as mass flooding and power outages in southern Africa.source
  • 2022Puerto Rican government-debt crisis: Puerto Rico exits out of bankruptcy after completing the largest public debt restructuring in U.S. history.source
  • 2023March 8–21 – The 2023 World Baseball Classic is held in, and won by, Japan.source
  • 2024March 15–17 – 2024 Russian presidential election: Incumbent Vladimir Putin is reelected for a fifth term.source
  • 2025March 8–17 – The 2025 Special Olympics World Winter Games are held in Turin, Italy.source

Births

  • 270Saint Nicholas (Santa Claus) (died 343)source
  • 1097Fujiwara no Tadamichi, Japanese nobleman (died 1164)source
  • 1407Jacob, Margrave of Baden-Baden (1431-1453) (died 1453)source
  • 1444Francesco Gonzaga, Catholic cardinal (died 1483)source
  • 1455Pietro Accolti, Italian Catholic cardinal (died 1532)source
  • 1493Anne de Montmorency, 1st Duke of Montmorency, Constable of France (died 1567)source
  • 1513Hedwig Jagiellon, Electress of Brandenburg (died 1573)source
  • 1516Alqas Mirza, Safavid prince (died 1550)source
  • 1582Daniel Featley, English theologian and controversialist (died 1645)source
  • 1582Deodat del Monte, Flemish painter, architect (died 1644)source
  • 1584Philip, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (died 1663)source
  • 1591March 15 or 1593 – Alexandre de Rhodes, French Jesuit missionary (died 1660)source
  • 1591Alexandre de Rhodes, Jesuit missionary (d.1660)source
  • 1611Jan Fyt, Flemish Baroque painter (died 1661)source
  • 1635Sulaiman Shikoh, Mughal Empire emperor (died 1662)source
  • 1638Shunzhi Emperor of China (died 1661)source
  • 164215 March (bapt.) – Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester (died 1711)source
  • 1660Olof Rudbeck the Younger, explorer, scientist (died 1740)source
  • 1666George Bähr, German architect (died 1738)source
  • 1767Andrew Jackson, seventh President of the United States (died 1845)source
  • 1779William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (died 1848)source
  • 1801George Perkins Marsh, American diplomat, philologist and pioneer environmentalist (died 1882)source
  • 1813John Snow, English doctor, pioneer of epidemiology (died 1858)source
  • 1878Reza Shah, Shah of Iran from 1925 to 1941 and founder of the Pahlavi Dynasty.source
  • 1880Montagu Love, English actor (died 1943)source
  • 1933Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (died 2020)source

Deaths

  • 44 BCEMarch 15 (the Ides of March) – Julius Caesar, dictator of Rome, is assassinated by a group of senators, amongst them Gaius Cassius Longinus, Marcus Junius Brutus, and Caesar's Massilian naval commander, Decimus Brutus.source
  • 44 BCEJulius Caesar, Roman politician and general (assassinated in the Theatre of Pompey) (born 100 BC)source
  • 220Cao Cao, Imperial Chancellor and ruler of the Kingdom of Wei, dies.source
  • 220Cao Cao, Chinese warlord of the Eastern Han dynasty (born 155)source
  • 493Odoacer, first "barbarian" king of Italy (born 433)source
  • 752Zachary, pope of the Catholic Churchsource
  • 963Romanos II, Byzantine emperor (born 938)source
  • 963Emperor Romanos II dies at age 39, probably of poison administered by his wife, Empress Theophano. He is succeeded by his infant son Basil II. Theophano becomes regent and de facto ruler, naming her other son Constantine VIII (only 3 years old) as co-emperor of the Byzantine Empire.source
  • 990Siegfried I (the Older), German noblemansource
  • 1086Richilde, countess and regent of Flanderssource
  • 1124Ernulf, Bishop of Rochester (born c. 1040)source
  • 1190Isabella of Hainault, wife of Philip II (Augustus) (born 1170)source
  • 1206Sultan Muhammad of Ghor is murdered and succeeded by Qutb al-Din Aibak, his deputy in India, who founds the Mamluk Dynasty, the first dynasty of the Delhi Sultanate.source
  • 1236Mu'in al-Din Chishti, Persian preacher (born 1143)source
  • 1311Thomas III d'Autremencourt, Lord of Salona, Marshal of Achaeasource
  • 1311Walter V, French nobleman (House of Brienne) (born 1275)source
  • 1311George I Ghisi, Triarch of Euboea, Baron of Chalandritsa, Lord of Tinos, Mykonos, Serifos and Keossource
  • 1327Albert of Schwarzburg, German grand preceptor of the Knights Hospitallersource
  • 1377Al-Ashraf Sha'ban, the Sultan of Egypt since 1363, is assassinated in Cairo and his 9-year-old son, Al-Mansur Ali II is installed as the new Sultan by the rebel leader Emir Aynabak al-Yalbughawi, who serves as the sultanate's actual leader.source
  • 1645Johan Skytte, politician (born 1577)source
  • 1660Louise de Marillac, French co-founder of the Daughters of Charity (born 1591)source
  • 1671Axel Urup, military engineer and commander (born 1601)source
  • 1673Salvator Rosa, Italian painter and poet (born 1615)source
  • 1674Edward Digges, English barrister and colonist, Colonial Governor of Virginia (born 1620)source
  • 1700Hugh Owen, independent ministersource
  • 1711Eusebio Kino, Italian Catholic missionary (born 1645)source
  • 1724Regent Marie Jeanne Baptiste of Savoy-Nemours (born 1644)source
  • 1842Luigi Cherubini, Italian composer (born 1760)source
  • 1895Bridget Cleary is killed and her body burned in County Tipperary, Ireland, by her husband, Michael; he is subsequently convicted and imprisoned for manslaughter, his defence being a belief that he had killed a changeling left in his wife's place after she had been abducted by fairies.source
  • 1921Talaat Pasha, Ottoman Turkish ruler, initiator of the Armenian Genocide (born 1874) (assassinated)source
  • 1937H. P. Lovecraft, American writer (born 1890)source
  • 1938Nikolai Bukharin, Soviet politician (executed) (born 1888)source
  • 1938Nikolai Bukharin, Alexei Rykov, Nikolay Krestinsky, Genrikh Yagoda, Arkady Rosengolts, Vladimir Ivanov, Mikhail Alexandrovich Chernov, Hryhoriy Hrynko, Fayzulla Khodzhayev and Vasily Sharangovichsource
  • 1942The Holocaust: Dünamünde Action – 1,900 central European Jews are shot dead north east of Riga, 1,840 are killed on the 26th.source
  • 201951 people are killed and 50 others injured in terrorist attacks on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. It is the deadliest mass shooting and terrorist attack in New Zealand's history.source