Repugnare ut detur vacuum sive in quo nulla plane sit res.

-Rene Descartes, 1644.

Born in 1644:

• Quaker leader and later founder of Pennsylvania, William Penn.
• Dutch (and later English) admiral Godert de Ginkel.
• Danish astronomer Ole Christensen Römer.
• Italian composer Alessandro Stradella.
• Italian composer Bartolomeo Girolamo Laurenti.
• English-born American poet Edward Taylor.
• French painter Jean-Baptiste Jouvenet.
• Dutch painter Simon Verelst.
• Spanish composer Juan Bautista José Cabanilles.
• German musician, composer and lothario Johann Wolfgang Franck.
• English painter John Greenhill.
• English merchant and impresario Thomas Britton.
• Louise de Françoise de la Baume le Blanc, future Duchesse de La Vallière and mistress of Louis XIV.
• English princess Henrietta Anne, later Duchesse d'Orleans.
• (approx). Italian violin maker Antonio Stradivari.
• Japanese haiku poet Matsuo Munefusa.

• English poet and chronicler Francis Quarles.
• Italian painter Giovanni Baglione.
• Italian painter Agostino Tassi.
• English mathematician Richard Delamain.
• Spanish painter and writer Francisco Pacheco.
• Flemish alchemist Jan Baptist van Helmont, discoverer of carbon dioxide.
• Dutch painter Jan van der Beeck, better known as Torrentius Johannes,
• Genoese painter Bernardo Strozzi.
• English adventurer and scholar George Sandys.
• Scottish painter George Jamesone.
• Welsh grammarian John Davies.
• Pope Urban VIII.  After a lot of wrangling between the Spanish and French cardinals, Giambattista Pamfili is elected as his successor, Innocent X.
• (April 25) Ming Sizong, Chongzhen (and also the last) Ming Dynasty emperor of China, suicide.
• Chinese rebel leader Li Zicheng, self-styled Chuang Wang ("Dashing King"), also Emperor for a day.

• John Milton's Areopagitica appears.
• Pietro Francesco Cavalli and Giovanni Faustini's opera Ormindo appears.
• Jean-Baptiste Poquelin helps set up and acting company, L'Illustre Théâtre. He adopts Molière as his nom de plume.
• Sakaida Kakiemon introduces an eponymous style of glazed porcelain to Japan.
• A white-on-blue cameo glass funerary urn appears in Italy.  This will later make its way to England and become known as the Portland Vase.
• Evangelista Toricelli builds the first barometer.
• Abel Tasman explores the Timor Sea and is the first European to enter the Gulf of Carpentaria. He also shows that the land behind the Great Barrier Reef is a continent.
• Marin Mersenne makes claims regarding prime numbers arising from a particular formula.
• Dutch forces under Antonie van Diemen capture part of Ceylon.
• Rene Descartes' mammoth work Principia Philosophia appears.
• Charles de Batz-Castlemore (later Comte d'Artagnan) is admitted to the King's Musketeers).
• London's Globe Theatre is demolished and will not be rebuilt for 350 years.
• Christina Vasa turns 18 and becomes Queen of Sweden.  She immediately begins clashing with chancellor Axel Oxenstierna.
• Polish king Wladyslaw IV Vasa has the Kolumna Zygmunta erected to his father's memory in Warsaw.
• Islam Giray III ousts Muhammad Giray IV as Khan of the Crimea.
• Shah Jahan begins construction of a Delhi mosque that is named after him today.
• English Civil War
• (January 25) Royalist general George Monck is captured at the Battle of Nantwich.
• (March 21) Prince Rupert leads a force from Shrewsbury and breaks the siege of Newark.
• (April 20) A Scottish Covenanter army under the Earl of Leven joins forces with Sir Thomas Fairfax's army
• (June 11) Prince Rupert takes Liverpool and control of Lancashire.
• (July 5) Prince Rupert nearly defeats the Parliamentary army at Marston Moor but pursues fleeing cavalry too far.  This gives Roundhead cavalry commander Oliver Cromwell the chance to turn the tide of battle, and the Cavaliers are crushed.  Charles loses control of the entire north of England, and the war is probably lost at this point.  Prince Rupert gives Cromwell the nickname 'Ironside', which is later applied to his cavalry regiment.
• (September 1) An Irish-Scotch Royalist force under the Marquis of Montrose begins its campaign in Scotland by routing a Covenanter force at Tippermuir, and Perth surrenders soon afterward.
• (September 2) Charles personally leads the army that surrounds Lord Essex's infantry at Lostwithiel in Cornwall. Essex and hius cavalry escape to ships, abandoning hte army, which surrenders.  Charles's position in the West Country is strenghtened to the point where he can consider an attack on London.
• (September 13) The garrison commander of Aberdeen kills the Marquis of Montrose's drummer boy.  After a pitched battle, including a (successful!) charge of Highlanders armed with dirks and claymores against Covenanter riflemen, Montrose enters and sacks the town.
• (October 27) Three Roundhead armies fail to capture a lightly-guarded Charles near Newbury.  Parliament is so dismayed at this that they decide to reorganize their forces into a New Model Army.
• Queen Henrietta Maria flees to France.
• Thirty Years' War:
• Bavarian duke Maximillian takes Freiburg after a bloody battle.  Henri Turenne asks for help and receives it in the form of Louis, duc d'Enghien. Together they drive the Bavarians out of the Rhine Valley and take control of the Lower Palatinate.
• Stephen Rákóczy, voivod of Transylvania, concludes an alliance with Sweden and the Hungarians revolt against the Austrians.
• Ambassadors to the Congress of Westphalia trickle into Munster throughout the year. Everybody moves into their rooms; actual ultimatums do not begin to circulate until December; negotiation is a long way off.
• Fall of the Ming Dynasty. .China has been in chaos since 1628; a rebel army led by Li Zicheng has taken control of most of the Empire.  In April, Li Zicheng captures Beijing; the Emperor commits suicide.  Li Zicheng orders the remaining military commanders to join him, but in the meantime steals the concubine of one Wu Sangui.   This is not smart, since Wu Sangui commands the force in Shanhai Pass, with the Manchu state of Jin on the other side.  Jin is ruled by four-year-old Tong Zhi, with his uncle Dorgon as regent.  And so, rather than capitulate, Wu Sangui sends for help to Shenyang, opening the pass to Dorgon's armies.   Dorgon is happy to 'assist'.  The combined Chinese-Manchu army defeats Li Zicheng at Tongguan Pass;  Li runs back to Beijing and has himself declared Emperor, but has to flee again the next day.  Dorgon takes Beijing and puts Tong Zhi on the throne, with himself as regent.

1643 - 1644 - 1645

How They Were Made - 17th Century