• Scottish philosopher and economist Adam Smith.
• English architect William Chambers.
• German-born French radical thinker Baron Paul Henri Thiry d'Holbach.
• German amateur astronomer Johann Palitzsch.
• German astronomer Johann Tobias Meyer.
• German composer Princess Anna Amalia of Prussia, to the great surprise of her mother.
• Maryland statesman Barrister Charles Carroll.
• Mohegan author Samson Occom.
• The future King Frederik V of Denmark and Norway.
• German composer Karl Friedrich Abel.
• English painter Joshua Reynolds.
• English jurist Sir William Blackstone.
• Spanish missionary and early California historian Padre Francisco Palou.
• English marine painter Charles Brooking.
• The future Ahmad Shah of Persia

• Dutch optician and microscope innovator Antonie van Leeuwenhoek.
• Safavid Shah Soltan Hoseyn of Persia, put to death by the Afghan conqueror Mahmud.
• Austrian architect Johann Fischer von Erlach.
• Philippe II duc d'Orléans, regent of France.
• English architect Sir Christopher Wren.
• English composer William Babell.
• German-born English painter Sir Godfrey Kneller.
• Chinese Emperor Qing Sheng Zu; the Kang Xi Era ends.
• English judge Sir James Montagu.

• With the death of the duc d'Orleans, 13-year-old Louis XV theoretically rules France in his own right.  However, power is really in the hands of the duc d'Bourbon.
• Persia cedes Azerbaijan to Russia.
• Qing Shi Zhong becomes emperor of China, beginning the Yongzheng Era.
• Shu li jing yun publishes his Collected Basic Principles of Mathematics
• An Afghan soldier, Dost Mohammad, founds the Princely State of Bhopal, and builds a capital city of the same name.

1722 - 1723 - 1724

How they Were Made - 18th Century