In the year AD 1598...

• Russia's disastrous Time of Troubles begins when insane Tsar of Russia Fyodor I dies, and his villainous brother-in-law Boris Godunov seizes the throne.
• Toyotomi Hideyoshi's second invasion of Korea comes to an end when Hideyoshi dies, issuing deathbed orders to recall his forces back to Japan. The orders take a while to get to Korea however, leaving the Korean navy a chance to deal one final devastating defeat to the Japanese at the Battle of Noryang Point, although at great cost when renowned Korean admiral Yi Sun-sin is killed by a bullet during the final battle.
• French King Henry IV issues the Edict of Nantes, granting the protestant Huguenots equal rights as Catholics, and makes peace with Spain by signing the Treaty of Vervins, bringing a final end to the long and bloody French Wars of Religion.
• The Nine Years War continues in Ireland, and the Irish under Hugh O'Neill deal a crushing defeat to the English at the Battle of the Yellow Ford, killing over 2000 English troops.
• Sigismund III Vasa, King of Sweden and Poland, is defeated in his attempt to regain control of Sweden from his Uncle, Charles Albert, at the Battle of Stångebro.
• Spanish soldier Juan de Oñate conquers New Mexico, brutally supressing the native Pueblo Indians.
• The Mapuche people in what is now southern Argentina and Chile revolt against Spanish rule and inflict a devastating defeat on Spainish forces in the Battle of Curalaba. Eventually, all Spanish settlements south of Biobio river will fall to the Mapuche, who will not be reconquered until the 1870s.
• English forces under Sir George Clifford, third Earl of Cumberland capture San Juan, Puerto Rico and hold it for several months, while ransacking the town. But in the face of stiff local resistance and with 400 Englishmen dead of dysentery, the survivors burn down San Juan in disgust and sail for home.
• William Shakespeare writes his play Much Ado About Anothing.
• Chinese dramatist Tang Xianzu pens his most famous opera, The Peony Pavilion.
• English playwright Ben Jonson has an eventful year. First he kills actor Gabriel Spenser in a duel, and pleads guilty to manslaughter, but then escapes execution by means of the legal ploy of "benefit of clergy," although he is still forced to surrender his "goods and chattels" and be branded on his thumb. Jonson then goes on to stage his first great success, the play Every Man in His Humour, which stars his friend William Shakespeare.

These people were born in 1598:

• Italian sculptor and architect Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the leading figure of the Italian Baroque.
• Chinese painter Wang Jian, renowned as one of the Four Wangs - four great painters of the early Qing period all named Wang.
• Venetian architect Baldassarre Longhena, designer of the Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute.
• Italian mathematician Bonaventura Cavalieri, whose work was an important step toward integral calculus.
• Swedish linguist, poet, and civil servant Georg Stiernhielm.
• Spanish painter Francisco de Zurbarán.
• Icelandic woman Guðríður Símonardóttir, who would famously be abducted frome her home by Barbary Pirates in 1627 and sold as a sex slave in Algeria, only to be rescued ten years later.

These people died in 1598:

• Spanish king Philip II, succeeded by his son, Philip III.
• Japanese hegemon Toyotomi Hideyoshi, succeeded by a regency of his five top generals on behalf of his infant son Hideyori.
• Legendary naval admiral and Korean national hero Yi Sun-sin, felled by a bullet while fighting the Japanese at the Battle of Noryang Point.
• Russian tsar Fyodor I, marking the beginning of the Time of Troubles.
• Abdulla Khan, ruler of the Uzbeks.
• Italian virtuoso singer Anna Guarini, axe-murdered in her bed by her jealous husband Count Ercole Trotti.
• English statesman William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, chief advisor and close friend of Queen Elizabeth I for most of her reign.
• Dutch writer and statesman Philips of Marnix, lord of Saint-Aldegonde, probable author of the Dutch national anthem.
• Renowned Chinese general Li Rusong, captured and tortured to death by Tatars.
• Flemish cartographer Abraham Ortelius, widely recognized as the creator of the first modern atlas.
• Italian philosopher Jacopo Mazzoni.
• Welsh-born Roman Catholic priest John Jones, executed for allegedly performing forbidden private masses, thereby becoming one of the 40 Martyrs of England and Wales.

1597 - 1598 - 1599

16th century

How they were made