1696
Events
January–March
- January 21 - The Recoinage Act, passed by the Parliament of England to pull counterfeit silver coins out of circulation, becomes law.
- January 27 - In England, the ship catches fire and burns at Chatham, after 57 years of service.
- January 31 - In the Netherlands, undertakers revolt after funeral reforms in Amsterdam.
- January - Colley Cibber's play Love's Last Shift is first performed in London.
- February 8 - Peter the Great, who had jointly reigned since 1682 with his mentally ill older half-brother Tsar Ivan V, becomes the sole Tsar of Russia when Ivan dies at the age of 29.
- February 15 - A plot to ambush and assassinate King William III of England in order to restore King James and the House of Stuart to the throne is foiled when the king cancels his usual plan to return from a hunting trip by way of the road between Turnham Green and Brentford. The king's guard is alerted by the Earl of Portland, William Bentinck, who had been approached on February 13 by Sir Thomas Prendergast.
- February 23 - A royal proclamation is issued to arrest suspected Jacobite conspirators who had plotted the assassination of King William III, including gunman Robert Charnock and organizers George Barclay, and Sir John Fenwick. Barclay eludes capture, but Charnock and Fenwick are executed.
- March 7 - King William III of England departs from the Netherlands.
- March 9 - Spanish missionaries in the province of Santa Fe de Nuevo México in North America first learn of plans for a revolt among the Pueblo Indians and send warnings to the governor, asking for Spanish troops. The uprising begins on June 4.
- March 16 - The Dutch bombard Givet during the Nine Years' War.
- March 18 - Robert Charnock, who had been arrested for the Jacobite plot to kill King William is hanged at the Tower of London.
April–June
- April 23 - Russo-Turkish War : Russia begins the second of the Azov campaigns.
- April - A fire destroys the Gra Bet of Gondar, the capital of Ethiopia. The fire starts "in the house of a prostitute" and destroys many buildings, including the churches of St. George, Takla Haymanot and Iyasu.
- May 1 - A partial solar eclipse is visible in western Canada and Greenland.
- May 16 - A total lunar eclipse is visible in western Europe and Africa.
- May 31 - John Salomonsz is elected chief of Sint Eustatius in the Caribbean Netherlands.
- June 4 - A second Pueblo Revolt occurs in Santa Fe de Nuevo México. The Tiwas of Taos and Picuris, the Tewas of San Ildefonso and Nambe, the Tanos of Jemez and San Cristobal, and the Keres of Santo Domingo and Cochiti attack during the full moon and kill 21 Spanish civilians and five priests.
- June 12 - China's Kangxi Emperor leads troops in the Battle of Jao Modo, about from the modern Mongolian capital, Ulan Bator, and defeats 5,000 Mongolian troops of the Dzungar Khanate under the command of Galdan Boshugtu Khan.
- June 17
- * The throne of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth becomes vacant with the death of Jan Sobieski, prompting a competition between Friedrich Augustus, Elector of Saxony and Prince François Louis of France to compete under the commonwealth's "Golden Liberty" system for an elective monarchy of the new king by the nobility. Jerzy Albrecht Denhoff, the Grand Chancellor, remains the head of the Polish-Lithuanian government during the vacancy of the ceremonial throne.
- * Seven French ships attack five Dutch ships escorting a convoy of 112 merchant ships in the Battle of Dogger Bank.
July–September
- July 18 - Azov campaign: The Russian fleet occupies Azov at the mouth of the river Don.
- August 13 - The Dutch state of Drenthe makes William III of Orange its Stadtholder.
- August 22 - Forces of the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire clash near Andros.
- August 29 - King Louis XIV of France and Victor Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, sign the Treaty of Turin, ending Savoy's involvement in the Nine Years' War.
- September 8 - The Parliament of Scotland passes the Education Act 1696, providing for locally funded, Church-supervised schools to be established in every parish in Scotland.
- September 11 - England's Royal Navy scuttles and deliberately sinks its 32-gun battleship HMS Sapphire in Bay Bulls Harbour in Newfoundland, rather than let it be captured by the French Navy following a disastrous battle.
- September 17 - On Canada's Hudson Bay, the English Navy recaptures the York Factory from France, three years after the French had captured it, and renamed the site "Fort Bourbon".
October–December
- October 7 - The Convention of Vigevano is signed, bringing a general ceasefire in Italy and an end to the Nine Years' War between France and the remaining members of the Grand Alliance.
- October 20 - The Imperial Russian Navy is founded on the recommendation of Tsar Peter the Great and approval by the Russian Duma.
- November 9 - A total lunar eclipse is visible in North and South America.
- November 12 - Hand in Hand Fire & Life Insurance Society, as predecessor to Aviva, is founded in England.
- November 21 - John Vanbrugh's play The Relapse is first performed in London.
- November 25 - In England, the House of Commons approves the bill of attainder to convict Sir John Fenwick of high treason for plotting to lead the assassination of and coup d'état against King William III, on its third and final reading, voting 187 to 161 in favor of conviction. The measure then moves to the House of Lords.
- November 30 - Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville captures and destroys St. John's, Newfoundland after a three-day siege.
- December 7 - Connecticut Route 108, one of Connecticut's oldest highways is laid-out to Trumbull.
- December 19 - Jean-François Regnard's verse comedy Le Joueur premieres in Paris.
- December 23 - By a vote of 66 to 60, the English House of Lords approves the bill of attainder for the conviction of Sir John Fenwick for high treason. Fenwick is beheaded on January 28, 1697.
- December 24 - The Inquisition in Portugal carries out the sentence of burning at the stake against several Marrano Jews in Évora.
Date unknown
- The Great Famine of 1695–1697 wipes out almost a third of the population of Finland, while the Great Famine of Estonia takes out a fifth of the population of Estonia; and the "seven ill years" of famine in Scotland are ongoing.
- Polish replaces Ruthenian as an official language of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
- Abington, Pennsylvania, is settled.
- William Penn offers an elaborate plan for intercolonial cooperation largely in trade, defense, and criminal matters.
- Edward Lloyd probably begins publication of Lloyd's News, a predecessor of Lloyd's List, in London.
- Window tax was introduced in England and Wales and remained in force until 1851.
- A New Theory of the Earth, a book by William Whiston, is published and is well received by intellectuals of the day.
- The Bank of Scotland becomes the first bank in Europe to successfully issue paper currency.
Births
January–March
- January 5 - Giuseppe Galli Bibiena, Italian artist
- January 8 - Étienne Parrocel, French painter
- January 11 - Frederick William, Prince of Solms-Braunfels
- January 14
- * Troiano Acquaviva d'Aragona, Italian cardinal
- * John Hippisley, English actor and theatre manager
- January 17
- * Jean de Beaurain, French geographer
- * Laurent Delvaux, Flemish sculptor
- * Ambrose Madison, American planter and politician
- January 18
- * Ludovico Calini, Italian cardinal
- * Sebastian Klotz, German violin maker
- January 22 - Johann Jakob Brucker, German historian of philosophy
- January 31 - John Wigan, British physician and author
- February 2 - Juan José Eguiara y Eguren, Mexican bishop
- February 3 - Caspar Wistar, American glassmaker
- February 4 - Marco Foscarini, 117th Doge of Venice
- February 10 - Johann Melchior Molter, German composer
- February 17 - Ernst Gottlieb Baron, German composer
- February 22 - Henrietta Polyxena of Vasaborg, Swedish countess
- February 25 - Jean-Philippe-René de La Bléterie, French historian and translator
- February 29 - Esprit Antoine Blanchard, French baroque composer
- March 5 - Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Italian painter
- March 6 - Joseph Anton Feuchtmayer, German sculptor
- March 10 - John Campbell, 3rd Earl of Breadalbane and Holland, Scottish nobleman, diplomat and politician
- March 13 - Armand de Vignerot du Plessis, French diplomat
- March 15 - François-Arnoul Poisson de Roinville, French actor
- March 17 - Lajos Batthyány, Hungarian palatine
- March 18 - Domenico Maria Fratta, Italian painter and draughtsman
- March 21 - Pierre Février, French composer, organist, and harpsichordist
- March 23 - Johann Erhard Kapp, German author and historian
- March 27
- * Antoine Court, French Huguenot minister
- * Charles Ingram, British army officer
- March 30
- * Ayşe Sultan, daughter of Ottoman Sultan Mustafa II
- * John Worsley, scholar
April–June
- April 2 - Francesca Cuzzoni, Italian operatic soprano
- April 3 - Diego Bernardo de Peredo y Navarrete, Mexican Roman Catholic clergyman, bishop of Yucatán
- April 6
- * Charles Beauclerk, 2nd Duke of St Albans, British politician
- * Richard Grey, priest
- April 8 - Wichmann Lastrop, Hamburg merchant and grand burgher
- April 10 - Esther Wheelwright, Ursuline nun
- April 12 - Joseph Atwell, English cleric
- April 14 - Princess Antoinette of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, German duchess
- April 15 - François Morellon la Cave, French engraver
- April 19 - Burchard Mauchart, German anatomist and surgeon
- April 20 - Curtis Barnett, Royal Navy officer
- April 21 - Francesco de Mura, Italian painter
- April 26 - Michał Fryderyk Czartoryski, Polish noble
- April 27 - John Lyon, 5th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne, Scottish Earl
- May 2 - Thomas Chester, British Member of Parliament
- May 4 - Louis de Cormontaigne, French engineer
- May 7 - Eleonore Wilhelmine of Anhalt-Köthen, German noblewoman
- May 11 - George Crowle, British Whig MP
- May 16 - Countess Palatine Franziska Christine of Sulzbach, Abess of Thorn and Abbess of Essen
- May 22 - William Rathbone II, British businessman
- May 23 - Johann Caspar Vogler, German composer
- May 28 - Giovanni Lorenzo Berti, Italian theologian
- June 5 - Peregrine Hopson, British Army general
- June 6 - Peter Spaak, Swedish Protestant reformer
- June 9 - Shivaji II, Ruler of Maratha Empire
- June 11 - James Francis Edward Keith, Scottish soldier and Prussian field marshal
- June 14 - Al-Mansur al-Husayn II, imam
- June 18 - Friedrich August von Harrach-Rohrau, plenipotentiary minister of the Austrian Netherlands
- June 21 - John Gibbes, English military officer in the province of Carolina
- June 27 - William Pepperrell, English colonial soldier