1558

• Queen Elizabeth I takes the throne of England, succeeding her half-sister Mary I and inaugurating the Elizabethan Era of English history.
• French troops led by Francis, Duke of Guise capture Calais, the last continental possession of the Kingdom of England.
• Scottish religious reformer John Knox publishes his polemic The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, arguing that female monarchs are contrary to God's will.

These people were born in 1558:

• National hero of Romania Prince Michael the Brave.
• Future Archduke of Austria Maximilian III.
• English playwright Thomas Kyd.
• English playwright Robert Greene.
• Dutch painter Hendrik Goltzius.
• Olivier van Noort, the first Dutchman to circumnavigate the world.
• Japanese warlord Bessho Nagaharu, future daimyo of the Bessho clan.

These people died in 1558:

• Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.
• English queen Mary I, succeeded by her half-sister Elizabeth I.
• French classical scholar Julius Caesar Scaliger.

1557 - 1558 - 1559

17th century

This is a collaboratively edited writeup. You are encouraged to assimilate and supersede it.