What happened like today in Greece and the world.
399 BC: The philosopher Socrates is condemned to drink the hemlock, because he “introduced new demons” into the Athenian state.
360: The first church of Hagia Sophia is inaugurated by the Byzantine emperor Constantius. Ioannis Chrysostomos and Grigorios Nazianzenos speak at the ceremony.
706: The Byzantine emperor Justinian II publicly executes his predecessors, Leontius and Tiberius III, in the Hippodrome of Constantinople.
1493: Christopher Columbus writes an open letter (which was widely distributed upon his return to Portugal) in which he describes his discoveries and what he unexpectedly encountered in the New World.
1564: Galileo Galilei, known in Greece as Galileo, was born, an Italian astronomer and physicist who supported the heliocentric theory, which he was forced by the Inquisition to renounce.
1857: The occupation of Athens and Piraeus by the Anglo-French ends. It had been imposed due to the insistence of King Otho to undertake a campaign for the liberation of Thessaly.
1898: The Spanish-American War begins with the blowing up of the battleship “Maine” in the port of Havana, in Spanish-occupied Cuba.
1902: In Germany, the Berlin subway is inaugurated.
1936: The creation of the “people’s car” is announced. It is the most popular Volkswagen “scarab” to date.
1941: Duke Ellington records his smash hit ‘Take The A Train’.
1942: The fall of Singapore takes place. After an attack by Japanese forces, the British surrender. About 80,000 Indian, British and Australian soldiers become prisoners of war.
[1945: The bombing of Dresden continues for the third day.
1946: ENIAC, the first general purpose electronic computer, is officially launched at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
1951: The MP of the People’s Party and former Deputy Minister of Transport, Panos Hatzipanos, is sentenced by the Special Court (Ministerial Court) to two months in prison with a three-year suspension for disloyalty against the State, regarding a fuel transport scandal.
1961: Sabena Flight 548 crashes in Belgium, killing 75 people, including the entire US figure skating team along with several coaches and family members.
1965: A red and white maple leaf becomes the symbol of the Canadian flag, replacing the Red Banner.
1972: The United States of America grants federal copyright protection to sound recordings for the first time.
1974: Oil extraction from the first layer of Thassos deposits reaches 10,000 barrels per day.
1989: The Soviet Union announces that its last soldier has left Afghanistan.
1991: The leaders of Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Poland sign the Visegrad Agreement, establishing cooperation to move toward free market systems.
1995: PASOK accepts the proposal of the president of Political Spring, Antonis Samaras, that Konstantinos Stephanopoulos be a candidate for the presidency of the Republic.
1999: Kurdish PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan flees the Greek embassy in Kenya, but is arrested by Kenyan police and handed over to his Turkish pursuers.
2003: In more than 600 cities around the world, thousands of demonstrators are opposing the possible war in Iraq. It is estimated that around 30 million people participated. In the end they did not convince the Bush administration.
2005: Popular video sharing website YouTube launches.
2020: The first death from the new coronavirus in Europe occurs in France. The victim is an 80-year-old Chinese tourist who had arrived in Paris showing symptoms of the disease on January 16.
2021: World Health Organization announces approval of Oxford–AstraZeneca vaccine.
Births
1368 – Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor
1557 – Alfonso Fontanelli, Italian composer
1564 – Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer and physicist
1571 – Michael Pretorius, German composer
1710 – Louis XI, King of France
1739 – Charles Henri Sanson, French executioner
1748 – Jeremy Bentham, English jurist and philosopher
1806 – Solomon Andrews, American inventor
1835 – Dimitrios Vikelas, Greek writer
1840 – Titos Majorescu, Romanian politician
1857 – Federico Halber, Italian archaeologist
1858 – John Joseph Montgomery, American inventor and engineer
1861 – Charles Édouard Guillaume, Swiss physicist
1873 – Hans von Euler-Chelpin, German chemist
1874 – Ernest Shackleton, Irish explorer
1890 – Robert Leigh, German Nazi official
1892 – James Forrestal, American politician
1899 – Gale Sodergaard, American actress
1910 – Irena Sendler, Polish social worker
1940 – Ismail Cem, Turkish politician
1941 – Babis Tsetinis, Greek singer
1947 – Yiannis Floriniotis, Greek singer
1952 – Tomislav Nikolic, Serbian politician
1954 – Matt Groening, American cartoonist
1970 – Megan Dodds, American actress
1974 – Alexander Wurtz, Austrian racing driver
1976 – George Karagoutis, Greek basketball player
1980 – Pyotr Gelfimov, Belarusian singer
1983 – Antonis Aresti, Cypriot athlete
1984 – Doda (née Dorota Rabczewska), Polish singer
1991 – Panagiotis Takhtsidis, Greek football player
Deaths
670 – Oswy, King of Northumbria
706 – Leontius, Byzantine emperor
706 – Tiberius III, Byzantine emperor
1145 – Pope Lucius II
1152 – Conrad III, king of Germany
1621 – Michael Pretorius, German composer
1637 – Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor
1731 – Maria de Leon Beyo y Delgado, Spanish nun
1781 – Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, German writer and philosopher
1857 – Mikhail Glinka, Russian composer
1887 – Joachim IV, Patriarch of Constantinople
1900 – Achilleas Gerokostopoulos, Greek politician
1905 – Lew Wallace, American soldier and politician
1939 – Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin, Russian painter
1946 – Malik Busati, Albanian politician
1959 – Owen Willans Richardson, English physicist
1965 – Nat King Cole, American singer
1970 – Dimitrios Loundras, Greek gymnast
1970 – Hugh Dowding, English soldier
1982 – Kalliopi Liga, Greek heroine
1988 – Phoebus Delphis, Greek poet
1988 – Richard Phillips Feynman, American physicist
1998 – Georgios Mylonas, Greek politician
2003 – Babis Markakis, Greek singer
2003 – Francisque Ravoni, Prime Minister of Madagascar
2007 – Robert Adler, Austrian inventor
2007 – Ray Evans, American songwriter
2008 – Dolly Goulandris, Greek businesswoman
2009 – Savvas Agouridis, Greek theologian
2011 – Yannis Karabesinis, Greek composer.
Source: News Beast
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