Of those few fools who with ill stars are cursed,
Sure scribbling fools, called poets, fare the worst:
For they're a sort of fools which Fortune makes,
And after she has made 'em fools, forsakes.
- William Congreve, The Way of the World
Born in 1700:
Died in 1700:
Events of 1700:
-
A magnitude 9 "megathrust" earthquake occurs along the Cascadia
subduction zone off the west coast of North America. The resulting
tsunamis destroy Native American villages and wreak havoc in Japan.
-
Many Protestant German states adopt the Gregorian Calendar.
1700 is the first century year that is not counted a leap year under
the 1582 Gregorian reform.
-
William Congreve's play The Way of the World premieres.
It is not received as well as Congreve would have liked, and Congreve never
writes another play.
-
Yale College is founded in New Haven, Connecticut.
-
Massachusetts and (later) New York pass laws forbidding Roman Catholic
priests upon pain of death.
-
Hopi warriors destroy the Pueblo village of Awatovi killing all
of the male inhabitants, because they had allowed the Spanish to establish
a mision there.
-
Tsar Peter the Great wants Russia to have a port on the Baltic
Sea. However, Sweden controls all of the Baltic Sea territory
bordering Russia. Other people are eyeing trans-Baltic territory
-- Augustus, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, and King Frederik
of Denmark and Norway. Peter gets them all together, and thus
begins The Great Northern War:
-
Charles II's wretched life comes to what might be called a merciful end,
if not for the mess he had leaves behind.
-
Deformed and feeble-minded due to his ancestors' inbreeding (and perhaps
his father's syphilis), he is bald and prematurely senile before dying
at age 38.
-
There are two principal candidates:
-
a Hapsburg, 16-year-old Archduke Charles of Austria, son
of Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I.
-
A Bourbon, 17-year-old Philip, Duke of Anjou, grandson of French King
Louis XIV. Louis, naturally sees an opportunity to expand his domain,
and has his diplomats put constant pressure on his brother monarch.
-
(March) The Netherlands signs on to a treaty of the previous year
between England and France giving Spain the Spanish Netherlands to Charles,
but Naples. Sicily, Milan, and to Philip. Charles II is opposed to any
partition however. Not only that, Leopold rejects the treaty,
demanding that the Hapsburgs get the entire inheritance.
-
(October 2) Charles issues a will naming Philip heir to the entire Spanish
Empire.
-
(November 1) Charles II dies.
-
(November 24) Louis proclaims Philip king Philip V of Spain, and invades
the Spanish Netherlands.
-
The College of Cardinals is mired in months of political wrangling between
factions supporting the various Catholic powers. It is not until
after Charles II dies, and the awful consequences of that death are inevitable,
that they elect Gian Francesco Albani as Innocent XII's successor, Pope
Clement XI. Please note that Cardinal Albani had advised
Innocent to approve the will of Charles II.
-
War drums sound and troops deploy all
over Europe.
1699 - 1700 - 1701
How they Were Made - 18th Century |
