Health & Medicine in the 16th century

105 sourced entries, 1500 CE to 1599 CE, oldest first. Also see Health & Medicine across every century or everything else in the 16th century.

• 1500Europe's population is estimated at 56.7 million people. The world's population is estimated to be between 425 million and 540 million.source
• 1500Vijayanagara in the Vijayanagara Empire had about 500,000 inhabitants (supporting 0.1% of the global population during 1440–1540), making it the second largest city in the world after Beijing and almost three times the size of Paris.Indiasource
• 1501September 12 – Maximilian I, Archduke of Austria, issues a decree making firearms safety tests mandatory.source
• 1503October 30 – Queen Isabella I of Spain issues an edict prohibiting violence against indigenous peoples in the New World.source
• 1504March – Private liveried retainers banned as part of a clampdown on the feudal traditionEnglandsource
• 1504April 1 – Guilds in England become subject to state control.source
• 1505Judah Abravanel becomes personal physician to the viceroy of Naples.source
• 1506July 12 – Philip the Handsome, Duke of Burgundy, becomes the ruler of the Spanish Kingdom of Castile with his insane wife Joanna, but reigns for only two months before dying of typhoid.source
• 1507April 27 – In Germany, the Imperial Diet of the Holy Roman Empire convenes at Konstanz and begins a series of reforms.source
• 1510July – The Holy League, formed to defend the Italian States, attacks French-occupied Genoa. The 1510 influenza pandemic reaches Sicily, where it is nicknamed coccolucio, before spreading to the Italian states and the rest of Europe.source
• 1510August 16 – All French subjects were forbidden from visiting the court of Rome, by edict from king Louis XII.Francesource
• 1513January 20 – Spanish conquistador Vasco Núñez de Balboa writes a letter to King Ferdinand II of Aragon advocating genocide against the native peoples of the Caribbean islands, and begins the killing of hundreds of residents of Caribbean villages.source
• 1515September 8– Lopo Soares de Albergaria becomes the new Viceroy of Portuguese India as Afonso de Albuquerque resigns because of health problems.source
• 1516March 29 – The Venetian Ghetto is instituted in the Republic of Venice.source
• 1516April 23 – The Reinheitsgebot is instituted in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, regulating the purity of beer permissible for sale.source
• 1517A third outbreak of the sweating sickness in England hits Oxford and Cambridge. It is said that in Oxford that upwards of 400 students died in less than a week.source
• 1518July 14 – Dancing plague of 1518: A case of dancing mania breaks out in Strasbourg as a woman identified as "Frau Troffea" begins constant dancing that lasts for six days, after which fellow residents begin to join in. According to some historians, several people die from constant dancing.source
• 1518A swarm of stinging ants devastates crops on Hispaniola.source
• 1519Central Mexico Amerindians' population reaches 25.3 million.source
• 1519A large pandemic spreads from the Greater Antilles into Central America, and perhaps as far as Peru in South America. This widespread epidemic kills off much of the indigenous populations in these areas (the first widely documented epidemic in the New World).source
• 1520November 25 – Cuauhtémoc becomes the last Aztec Emperor after the death from smallpox of the Emperor Cuitláhuac, who reigned for only 80 days.source
• 1521January 22 – Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, opens the Diet of Worms in Worms, Germany.source
• 1521April 7 – Martin Luther preaches an inflammatory sermon to students at Erfurt, while on his way to Worms.source
• 1521May 25 – The Diet of Worms ends when Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor issues the Edict of Worms, declaring Martin Luther an outlaw and banning his literature.source
• 1521December 27 – The Zwickau prophets arrive in Wittenberg, disturbing the peace and spreading the idea of rejecting infant baptism.source
• 1522March 9 – In Zurich in Switzerland, the Affair of the Sausages begins as Pastor Huldrych Zwingli of Grossmünster publicly speaks out against the food restrictions during the Roman Catholic period of fasting during Lent, and advocating that followers of Martin Luther eat sausage, one of the prohibited foods. Zwingli defends his action in the sermon Von Erkiesen und Freiheit der Speisen ("Regarding the freedom of Choice of Foods"), in that the Bible does not prohibit the eating of meat during Lent. The public declaration sparks the Reformation in Zürich.source
• 1523April 24 – The Diet of Hungary, parliament for the Kingdom of Hungary under King Lajos II, passes a decree ordering the confiscation of property and execution of all followers of Martin Luther within the Kingdom.source
• 1525European-brought diseases sweep through the Andes, killing thousands, including the Inca.source
• 1525The Bubonic plague spreads in southern France.source
• 1526March 7 – In Switzerland, the Canton of Zurich enacts a law directed against the Anabaptist movement, specifically outlawing a second baptism of an adult who was previously baptized as an infant, and makes the crime punishable by drowning. The penalty is enforced for the first time on January 5, 1527, when Felix Manz is executed.source
• 1527Members of the University of Wittenberg flee to Jena in fear of the bubonic plague.source
• 1528April - August – Siege of Naples is carried out by French tropes led by Odet de Foix, the siege ended when a plague of Cholera swept through the French army, killing Odet de Foix and reducing the army by two-thirds .Francesource
• 1528June 5 – The fourth major outbreak of the sweating sickness is noted for the first time, with a reference in a letter to Bishop Tunstall of London from someone who has fled his home because a servant at his house has become infected with the disease, with sweating soon followed by death.source
• 1528Bubonic plague breaks out in England.source
• 1529July 30 – The only continental outbreak of English sweating sickness reaches Lübeck, spreading from there into Schleswig-Holstein in the next few months.source
• 1530September – John Óge Kirwan (a.k.a. Jhonock Kirwan) becomes Mayor of Galway.Irelandsource
• 1534February – Gerald FitzGerald, 9th Earl of Kildare, is summoned to London, and appoints Thomas FitzGerald, 10th Earl of Kildare deputy governor of Ireland in his absence.Irelandsource
• 1535November 14 – Voters in the Republic of Geneva approve the merger of the city's seven charitable establishments into a single entity, the Hôpital généralsource
• 1536St John's Priory Hospital, Waterford (granted to William Wise, November).Irelandsource
• 1536Hospital of St John the Evangelist, Cork.Irelandsource
• 1537October 15 – Following the baptism of her son, the future Edward VI of England, Jane Seymour begins suffering from puerperal fever. The Queen consort dies nine days later.source
• 1537A royal edict bans the public of Småland from hunting, gathering wood, and settling in the woods.Swedensource
• 1539In Henan province, China, a severe drought with swarms of locusts is made worse, by a major epidemic outbreak of the plague.source
• 1539Priory Hospital of St. John the Baptist, Drogheda (26 July).Irelandsource
• 1539Dundalk Priory Hospital (23 November).Irelandsource
• 1539Priory Hospital of St. John the Baptist, Newtown Trim.Irelandsource
• 1539Ardee Priory Hospital (6 December) and White Friars Priory.Irelandsource
• 1540approximate date – The musket is introduced into Japan from Europe.source
• 1540Drogheda Dominican and Franciscan Friaries and Priory Hospitals of St Laurence and St Mary de UrsoIrelandsource
• 1541July 7 – (Tenbun 10, 14th day of the 6th month) Takeda Shingen becomes head of Japan's powerful Takeda clan of samurais that rules the Kai Province, overthrowing and banishing his father, Takeda Nobutora. Nobutora is exiled to Suruga Province for the next 32 years.source
• 1544After being asked by Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, botanist Luca Ghini comes to the University of Pisa as the chair of botany, where he had the year prior established the Orto botanico di Pisa.source
• 1545In the territory of New Spain in modern-day Mexico, the Cocoliztli Epidemic of 1545–1548 begins.source
• 1546March 8 – King John III of Portugal issues an order for Portuguese India (at Goa) to forbid Hinduism, destroy Hindu temples, prohibit the public celebration of Hindu feasts, expel Hindu priests and severely punish those who created any Hindu images in Portuguese possessions in India.source
• 1546October 17 – Irish noble James Butler, 9th Earl of Ormond, the chief opponent of the policies of Sir Anthony St Leger, England's Lord Deputy of Ireland up until April 1, is fatally poisoned after being invited to the Ely Palace near London. Ormond dies 11 days later, and no investigation is carried out by the Crown as to whether St Leger is involved. St Leger becomes the Lord Deputy again less than three weeks after Ormond's death.source
• 1551July 7 – The fifth, and final outbreak of sweating sickness in England reaches London, as documented by Henry Machyn in his diary, and continues until July 19. Machyn notes that "ther ded from the vii day of July unto the xix ded of the swett in London of all dyssesus viij/c, iij/xx and xij and no more in alle, and so the chanseller is sertefiyd." ("There died from the 7th day of July unto the 19th dead of the sweat in London of all diseases 8 hundred, 3 score and 12 [i.e., 872], and no more in all, and so the Chancellor is certified.") John Caius of Shrewsbury writes the first full contemporary account of the symptoms of the disease.source
• 1553June 26 – Two new schools, Christ's Hospital and King Edward's School, Witley, are created by royal charter in accordance with the will of King Edward VI of England; St Thomas' Hospital, London, in existence since the 12th century, is named in the same charter.source
• 1553Hussein Shah I begins his rule of the Ahmednagar SultanateIndiasource
• 1555February 2 – The Diet of Augsburg begins.source
• 1556February – Royal edict against women who conceal their pregnancy.Francesource
• 1557By June – The 1557 influenza pandemic, probably originating in China, spreads to Europe.source
• 1559Jean Nicot, French ambassador to Portugal, introduces tobacco to the French court in the form of snuff, and describes its medicinal properties. The active ingredient in tobacco is later named "nicotine" in his honor.source
• 1561January 31 – The Ordinance of Orléans suspends the persecution of the Protestant Huguenots in Kingdom of France.source
• 1562April – James Hamilton, 3rd Earl of Arran, talks of conspiracy theories and is confined as insane.Scotlandsource
• 1565Possible date of introduction of the potato to Ireland by John Hawkins (after September).Irelandsource
• 1566Ordonnance of Moulins prohibits writing, printing or selling of defamatory books and requires all books published to carry a seal of state approval.Francesource
• 1567August 22 – The Duke of Alba is sent to the Netherlands with a strong Spanish force, to suppress unrest there. He replaces Margaret of Parma as Governor of the Netherlands. Prince William of Orange is outlawed, and Lamoral, Count of Egmont imprisoned.source
• 1567October - The regency council, which rules during the illness of the King, releases Prince John.Swedensource
• 1568May - Eric XIV recuperates from his mental illness and resume government.Swedensource
• 1568Edinburgh merchant George Bannatyne begins compiling the Bannatyne Manuscript while confined to his home due to plague.Scotlandsource
• 1570The Andean population of the Viceroyalty of Peru reaches 1.3 million.source
• 1572February 13 – Elizabeth I of England issues a proclamation which revokes all commissions, on account of the frauds which they had fostered.source
• 15731 January – William Kirkcaldy of Grange bombards Edinburgh's markets from the Castle, blowing fish into the air.Scotlandsource
• 1573November 29 – The Duke of Alva resigns as the Spanish Governor-General of the Netherlands, and is succeeded by Luis de Requesens, who attempts to pursue a more conciliatory policy.source
• 1573December 11 – The Governor of Portuguese India issues an edict depriving Hindu followers of most rights, including the right to receive Jonoa, the share of the village community income.source
• 1574May 30 – On the death of King Charles IX of France of a tubercular condition at the Château de Vincennes, he is succeeded by his brother King Henry of Poland, who becomes King Henry III of France. His mother, Catherine de' Medici, acts as Regent, until Henry arrives from Poland.source
• 1574The King's brother Magnus, Duke of Östergötland, is formally declared incapacitated because of his mental problems, and the administration of his Duchy is taken over by the monarch.Swedensource
• 1575August–September – Plague in Leinster.Irelandsource
• 1575September 22 – Paulo Dias de Novais becomes the first Portuguese Governor of Angola.source
• 1575The bubonic plague decimates Venice.source
• 1575The Dutch pharmacist Anthonius Busenius is authorized to take part in Slottet Tre Kronor's medicine supply and move it outside the city to be able to sell medicine to the public. This counts as the first royal pharmacy privilege in Sweden, and the first pharmacy was founded at Stortorget in Stockholm.Swedensource
• 1576The 1576 Cocoliztli epidemic causes millions of deaths in the territory of New Spain, in modern-day Mexico.source
• 1577June 29 – Mehmed II Giray becomes the new Khan of Crimea for the Ottoman Empire, after the death of his father, Devlet I Giray, from a plague.source
• 1577July 9 – Ludvig Munk is appointed Governor-General of Norway.source
• 1578The last outbreak of sweating sickness occurs in England.source
• 1578Barnabe Rich publishes Alarme to England.Irelandsource
• 1579First of the Scottish Poor Laws passed.Scotlandsource
• 1580The 1580 influenza pandemic sweeps the world, starting in Asia and moving rapidly through Africa, Europe, and eventually the Americas. More than 10% of the population of Rome dies, and whole towns in Spain are depopulated.source
• 1580The so-called Spanish plague reaps victims in Sweden, mainly in Uppland. Uppsala University is temporarily closed.Swedensource
• 1581June 14 – The representatives of the States General of the Netherlands vote to declare that the throne of the Union of Utrecht is vacant because of the erratic behavior of King Philip II.source
• 1583June 18 – In England, the first known life insurance policy is issued. The Royal Exchange of London accepts a premium from William Gibbons, agreeing to pay a group of 30 beneficiaries a total of £383, 6s. 8d if he dies on or before June 17, 1584. Gibbons dies on May 29, 1584, and the Royal Exchange refuses to pay until a court rejects the insurer's argument that a month is actually four weeks or 28 days.source
• 158530 April – First death in Edinburgh from plague.Scotlandsource
• 1591October 8 – The Separation Edict, a law imposing an immobile social class structure in Japan, is promulgated by Toyotomi Hideyoshi.source
• 1592May 7 – The Malta plague epidemic begins when galleys from the Grand Duchy of Tuscany arrive on the island with 100 prisoners of war from Egypt, and 20 ill crewmembers; over the next 18 months, 3,000 people on Malta die of the bubonic plague.source
• 1592August – 1592–1593 London plague breaks out in England.source
• 1592December 21 – The city of London begins publishing the Bill of Mortality, the first regular data of deaths from an epidemic, as the government reports its weekly survey of the number of burials in the 113 parishes of London of deaths from bubonic plague. The death statistics continue to be published until December 18, 1595.source
• 1592William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, chief adviser of Queen Elizabeth I of England, is taken seriously ill.source
• 1592The Population Census Edict is promulgated in Japan by Toyotomi Hidetsugu.source
• 15944 February – City of Antwerp prohibits pigs foraging in the streetsBelgiumsource
• 1594May 14 – After almost two years of being closed because of bubonic plague, theaters in England are allowed to reopen, as the Admiral's Men stage a performance of The Jew of Malta.source
• 159423 August – City of Antwerp prohibits the keeping of brothels outside the LepelstraatBelgiumsource
• 1596January 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
• 1596February 14 – Archbishop John Whitgift begins building his hospital at Croydon.source
• 1596The Black Death hits parts of Europe.source
• 1598June 30 – England's forces capture the Castillo San Felipe del Morro, the Spanish fortress defending San Juan, after a 15-day battle. When an epidemic begins taking its toll on the English forces, the Earl of Cumberland decides to withdraw and departs in August.source
• 159929 November – Royal Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow granted its charter by King James VI.Scotlandsource