1642

This article is about the year 1642.

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	16th century – 17th century – 18th century
Decades:	1610s  1620s  1630s  – 1640s –  1650s  1660s  1670s
Years:	1639 1640 1641 – 1642 – 1643 1644 1645

1642 by topic:

Arts and Science

Architecture - Art - Literature - Music - Science

Lists of leaders

Colonial governors - State leaders

Birth and death categories

Births - Deaths

Establishments and disestablishments categories

Establishments - Disestablishments

Works category

Works

1642 in other calendars

Gregorian calendar	1642 MDCXLII
Ab urbe condita	2395
Armenian calendar	1091 ԹՎ ՌՂԱ
Assyrian calendar	6392
Bengali calendar	1049
Berber calendar	2592
English Regnal year	17 Cha. 1 – 18 Cha. 1
Buddhist calendar	2186
Burmese calendar	1004
Byzantine calendar	7150–7151
Chinese calendar	辛巳年 (Metal Snake) 4338 or 4278     — to — 壬午年 (Water Horse) 4339 or 4279
Coptic calendar	1358–1359
Discordian calendar	2808
Ethiopian calendar	1634–1635
Hebrew calendar	5402–5403
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1698–1699
- Shaka Samvat	1564–1565
- Kali Yuga	4743–4744
Holocene calendar	11642
Igbo calendar	642–643
Iranian calendar	1020–1021
Islamic calendar	1051–1052
Japanese calendar	Kan'ei 19 (寛永１９年)
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 10 days
Korean calendar	3975
Minguo calendar	270 before ROC 民前270年
Thai solar calendar	2184–2185

1642 (MDCXLII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (dominical letter E) of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Saturday (dominical letter B) of the Julian calendar, the 1642nd year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 642nd year of the 2nd millennium, the 42nd year of the 17th century, and the 3rd year of the 1640s decade. Note that the Julian day for 1642 is 10 calendar days difference, which continued to be used from 1582 until the complete conversion of the Gregorian calendar was entirely done in 1929.

Events

January–June

• January 4 – First English Civil War: Charles I attempts to arrest 6 leading members of the Long Parliament, but they escape.
• March 1 – Georgeana, Massachusetts (now known as York, Maine) becomes the first incorporated city in America.
• March 19 – The citizens of Galway seize an English naval ship, close the town gates and declare support for Confederate Ireland.
• May 1 honours granted by Charles I from this date onward are retrospectively annulled by Parliament.

July–December

• July – First English Civil War: Charles I besieges Hull in an attempt to gain control of its arsenal.
• August 4 – Lord Forbes relieves Forthill and besieges Galway.
• August 21 – First Battle of Lostwithiel.
• August 22 – King Charles I raises the royal battle standard over Nottingham Castle, so declaring war on his own Parliament.
• September 2 – Parliament orders the theatres of London closed, effectively ending the era of English Renaissance theatre.
• September 7 – Lord Forbes raises his unsuccessful siege of Galway.
• September 8 – Thomas Granger is executed by hanging at Plymouth, Massachusetts for confessing to numerous acts of bestiality.
• October 23 – First English Civil War – Battle of Edgehill: Royalists and Parliamentarians battle to a draw.
• November 13 – First English Civil War – Battle of Turnham Green: The Royalist forces withdraw in face of the Parliamentarian army and fail to take London.
• November 24 – Abel Tasman becomes the first European to discover the island Van Diemen's Land (later renamed Tasmania).

Abel Tasman sights New Zealand.

• December 13 – Abel Tasman is the first recorded European to sight New Zealand.

Date unknown

• The Dutch drive Spain from Taiwan.
• The village of Bro (Broo) in Sweden is granted the city rights for the second time and takes the name Kristinehamn (literally "Christina's port") after the then Swedish monarch, Queen Christina.

The Night Watch

• Rembrandt finishes his painting "The Night Watch".
• The Manchu under their leader Huang Taiji raid the Ming Chinese province of Shandong from their base in Manchuria. Two years later Beijing falls to rebels, the Chongzhen Emperor commits suicide, and the Shunzhi Emperor becomes the first Qing Emperor to rule over China proper.
• Kaifeng flood of 1642: Some 300,000 people die when the Ming dynasty army in China intentionally breaks the dams and dykes of the Yellow River to break the siege by the large rebel force of Li Zicheng.
• Isaac Aboab da Fonseca is appointed rabbi in Pernambuco, Brazil, thus becoming the first rabbi of the Americas.

Births

Mehmed IV

• January 2 – Johannes van Haensbergen, Dutch Golden Age painter (d. 1705)
• January 2 – Mehmed IV, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1648 to 1687 (d. 1693)
• January 3 – Diego Morcillo Rubio de Auñón, Catholic bishop (d. 1730)
• January 3 – Mehmed IV, Ottoman Sultan (d. 1693)
• January 4 – Philippe Pierson, Jesuit missionary (d. 1688)
• January 5 – Philipp Jeningen, German clergy (d. 1704)
• January 6 – Julien Garnier, French Jesuit missionary to Canada (d. 1730)
• January 6 – Gisbert Steenwick, Dutch musician (d. 1679)
• January 11 – Mary Carleton, impostor (d. 1673)
• January 11 – Johann Friedrich Alberti, German composer and organist (d. 1710)
• January 26 – Evert Collier, Dutch Golden Age painter (d. 1708)
• February 3 – Philip Aranda, Spanish Jesuit theologian (d. 1695)
• February 18 – Marie Champmeslé, French actress (d. 1698)
• March 2 – Claudio Coello, Spanish artist (d. 1693)
• March 4 – Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski, Polish noble (d. 1702)
• March 15 (bapt.) – Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester, English statesman (d. 1711)
• March 25 – Anna Talbot, Countess of Shrewsbury, English countess (d. 1702)
• March 28 – Henry Wolrad, Count of Waldeck, Count of Waldeck-Eisenberg (1645-1664) (d. 1664)
• March 29 – Emich Christian of Leiningen-Dagsburg, Count of Leiningen-Dagsburg and Lord of Broich, Oberstein and Bürgel (d. 1702)
• April 15 – Suleiman II, Ottoman Sultan (d. 1691)
• April 21 – Simon de la Loubère, French diplomat (d. 1729)
• April 27 – Francisque Millet, painter (d. 1679)
• April 30 – Christian Weise, Writer, dramatist, poet, pedagogue and librarian (d. 1708)
• June 8 – Frescheville Holles, Members of the Parliament of England (d. 1672)
• June 12 – Alexander Seton, 3rd Earl of Dunfermline, Earl in the Peerage of Scotland (d. 1677)
• June 18 – Paul Tallement the Younger, French writer (d. 1712)
• June 20 – George Hickes, English minister and scholar (d. 1715)
• June 28 – Jacob de Graeff, member of the De Graeff-family from the Dutch Golden Age (d. 1690)
• July 3 – Joseph-François Hertel de la Fresnière, military officer of New France (d. 1722)
• July 7 – Gregorio II Boncompagni, Italian nobleman and the 5th Duke of Sora (d. 1707)
• July 25 – Louis I, Prince of Monaco, Monegasque prince (d. 1701)
• August 3 – Robert Austen (1642–1696), English politician (d. 1696)
• August 11 – Mary Carleton, Englishwoman who used false identities (d. 1673)
• August 14 – Cosimo III de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (d. 1723)
• September 1 – Angelo Paoli, Italian Carmelite (d. 1720)
• September 23 – Giovanni Maria Bononcini, Italian composer (d. 1678)
• October 12 – Abraham van Calraet, Dutch painter (d. 1722)
• November 4 – Zheng Jing, Chinese pirate (d. 1681)
• November 5 – Nils Gyldenstolpe (1642–1709), Swedish count, official and diplomat (d. 1709)
• November 9 – Sir John Lowther, 2nd Baronet, of Whitehaven (d. 1706)
• November 11 – André Charles Boulle, French cabinet-maker (d. 1732)
• November 16 – Cornelis Evertsen the Youngest, Dutch admiral (d. 1706)
• November 24 – Anne Hilarion de Tourville, French admiral (d. 1701)
• November 30 – Andrea Pozzo, Jesuit Brother, architect and painter (d. 1709)
• December 6 – Johann Christoph Bach, German composer and organist (d. 1703)
• December 6 – Gerard Callenburgh, Dutch admiral (d. 1722)
• December 8 – Nicolas Roland, French priest and founder (d. 1678)
• December 17 – Francisco Castillo Fajardo, Marquis of Villadarias, Spanish general (d. 1716)
• December 17 – Francis de Geronimo (d. 1716)
• December 23 – John Holt (Lord Chief Justice), English politician (d. 1710)

Isaac Newton

• December 25 – Isaac Newton, English scientist (d. 1727)
• December 30 – François Roger de Gaignières (d. 1715)
• December 30 – Vincenzo da Filicaja, Italian poet (d. 1707)
• date unknown
  • John Archdale, British colonial governor (d. 1717)
  • Abdul-Qādir Bīdel, Persian Sufi poet (d. 1720)
  • Bonaventure Giffard, English Catholic priest (d. 1734)
  • Josep Romaguera, Catalan author (d. 1723)
  • Albert Janse Ryckman, Mayor of Albany, Prominent Brewermaster (d. 1737)
  • Edward Taylor, American poet (d. 1729)

Deaths

Galileo Galilei

• January 8 – Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer and physicist (b. 1564)
• February 7 – William Bedell, English clergyman (b. 1571)
• April 30 – Dmitry Pozharsky, Russian prince (b. 1578)
• July 3 – Marie de' Medici, queen of Henry IV of France (b. 1573)
• August 18 – Guido Reni, Italian painter (b. 1575)
• September 3 – Elisabeth of Nassau, regent of Sedan (b. 1577)
• September 12 – Henri Coiffier de Ruzé, Marquis of Cinq-Mars, French conspirator (b. 1620)
• September 29 – René Goupil, the first of the Canadian Martyrs (b. 1608)
• October 24 – Robert Bertie, 1st Earl of Lindsey Fen drainage adventurer and soldier (b. 1583)
• November 1 – Jean Nicolet, French explorer (b. 1598)
• November 7 – Henry Montagu, 1st Earl of Manchester, English politician (b. c. 1563)
• December 4 – Armand Jean du Plessis, Cardinal Richelieu, French statesman (b. 1585)
  • date unknown
  • Eudemus I of Georgia, Catholicos Patriarch of Georgia
  • Franz von Hatzfeld, Prince-Bishop of Würzburg (b. 1596)
  • Walatta Petros, saint in the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (b. 1592)