1710s

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	17th century – 18th century – 19th century
Decades:	1680s 1690s 1700s – 1710s – 1720s 1730s 1740s
Years:	1710 1711 1712 1713 1714 1715 1716 1717 1718 1719
1710s-related categories:	Births – Deaths – By country Establishments – Disestablishments

This is a list of events occurring in the 1710s, ordered by year.

January–June

• February 28 (Swedish calendar) – Battle of Helsingborg: Fourteen thousand Danish invaders under Jørgen Rantzau are decisively defeated by an equally large Swedish army under Magnus Stenbock.
• April 10 – The world's first copyright legislation, Britain's Statute of Anne, becomes effective.
• April 19 – Anne, Queen of Great Britain, meets the Four Mohawk Kings.
• June – Protestant Swiss and German Palatines under the leadership of Christoph von Graffenried travel to Bath County in the Province of Carolina. The settlers displace the native town of Chattoka and found New Bern, named for von Graffenried's hometown of Bern, Switzerland.
• June 8 – The Tuscarora nation sends a petition to the Province of Pennsylvania, protesting the seizure of their lands and enslavement of their people by citizens of the Province of Carolina.

July–December

• August 20 – War of the Spanish Succession: Battle of Saragossa: The Spanish-Bourbon army commanded by the Marquis de Bay is soundly defeated by the forces of the Habsburg Monarchy under Guido Starhemberg and their allies.
• October 13 – Queen Anne's War: The French surrender ending the Siege of Port Royal gives the British permanent possession of Nova Scotia.

Date unknown

• In Sweden, the Royal Society of Sciences in Uppsala is founded as the Collegium curiosorum.
• John Smithwick begins brewing Smithwick's ale at Kilkenny, Ireland (St. Francis Abbey Brewery).
• Beijing becomes the largest city of the world, taking the lead from Istanbul.

January–March

• January – Cary's Rebellion: The Lords Proprietor appoint Edward Hyde to replace Thomas Cary, as the governor of the North Carolina portion of the Province of Carolina. Hyde's policies are deemed hostile to Quaker interests, leading former governor Cary and his Quaker allies to take up arms against the province.
• January 24 – The first performance of Francesco Gasparini's most famous opera Tamerlano takes place at the Teatro San Cassiano in Venice.
• February – French settlers at Fort Louis de la Mobile celebrate Mardi Gras in Mobile (Alabama), by parading a large papier-mache ox head on a cart (the first Mardi Gras parade in America).
• February 3 – A total lunar eclipse occurs, at 12:31 UT.
• February 24
  • Thomas Cary, after declaring himself Governor of North Carolina, sails an armed brigantine up the Chowan River, to attack Governor Hyde's forces fortified at Colonel Thomas Pollock's plantation. The attack fails, and Cary's forces retreat.
  • Rinaldo by George Frideric Handel, the first Italian opera written for the London stage, premieres at the Queen's Theatre, Haymarket.
• March 1 – The Spectator is founded by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele in London.

April–June

• April 3 – Clipperton Island is rediscovered by Frenchmen Martin de Chassiron and Michel Du Bocage, who draws up the first map and claims the island for France. The island had been discovered by Alvaro Saavedra Cedrón in 1528.
• April 5 (Easter Sunday) – The central tower of Elgin Cathedral in northeast Scotland collapses.
• April 13 – The Treaty of the Lutsk, a secret agreement between the Tsardom of Russia and the Ottoman Protectorate of Moldavia is signed in Lutsk, Poland-Lithuania (modern-day Ukraine).
• April 17 – Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor dies, opening the way for the succession of his brother Charles VI. This complicates the ongoing War of the Spanish Succession as Charles is one of the two candidates for the Spanish throne, backed by the Grand Alliance.
• April 29 – A rabid wolf fatally injures two shepherds in Roncà, North Italy; it also attacks livestock.
• May – Alexander Pope publishes the poem An Essay on Criticism in London.
• May 25 – In Denmark, Helsingør is put under military blockade to prevent an outbreak of plague from spreading to Copenhagen; this year about one third of Helsingør's population is killed by the disease.
• June 18 – King Louis XIV becomes the longest-reigning monarch in the world, surpassing the previous record of 68 years set by Kʼinich Janaabʼ Pakal in 683. As of 2022, Louis XIV still holds this record.

July–September

• July 2 – Cary's Rebellion: Lieutenant Governor Alexander Spotswood of Virginia dispatches a company of Royal Marines to assist Governor Hyde. After hearing of this, Cary's troops abandon all of their fortifications along the Pamlico River. Cary and many of his supporters are soon caught and sent to England as prisoners, ending Cary's Rebellion.
• July 11 – The town of São Paulo, Brazil, is elevated to city status.
• July 21 – The Treaty of the Pruth is signed between the Ottoman Empire and Russia, ending the Pruth River Campaign.
• July 29 – Total lunar eclipse at 17:50 UT.
• August 1 – The Dutch East India Company trading ship Zuytdorp leaves the Netherlands on an ill-fated voyage to Indonesia bearing a load of freshly minted silver coins. The wreck site remains unknown until the mid-20th century, on a remote part of the Western Australian coast between Kalbarri and Shark Bay.
• August 7 – Capture of the galleon San Joaquin: Spanish galleon San Joaquin in a treasure fleet sailing from Cartagena de Indias (modern-day Colombia) to Spain surrenders after an engagement with five British ships.
• August 9 – John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough with an army of 30,000 besieges Bouchain in the War of the Spanish Succession. The siege lasts 34 days and results in the last major victory for Churchill.
• August 11 – The first horse race is held at the newly founded Ascot Racecourse, which becomes one of the leading racecourses in England.
• August 13 – Tamachi Raisinhji becomes Jam Sahib (ruling prince) of Nawanagar State in Gujarat, India.
• August 14 – The inauguration of the newly built Cathedral of the Assumption takes place in Gozo, Malta.
• August 22 – The Quebec Expedition, a British attempt to attack Quebec as part of Queen Anne's War, fails when 8 of its ships are wrecked in the Saint Lawrence River and 890 people, mostly soldiers, drown.
• September 8 – The South Sea Company receives a Royal Charter in Britain.
• September 10 (also dated September 12) – John Lawson, Christoph von Graffenried, two African American slaves and two Native Americans leave on an exploration expedition from New Bern, North Carolina, and travel north by canoe up the Neuse River.
• September 14 (approximate date) – Tuscarora natives capture John Lawson, Christoph von Graffenried and their expeditionary party, and bring them to Catechna.
• September 16 (approximate date) – Tuscarora natives kill Lawson. Von Graffenried and one African American slave are known to have been set free.
• September 18 – Bishop Bogusław Gosiewski sells the town of Maladzyechna in the Minsk Region of Belarus to the mighty Ogiński family.
• September 22 – The Tuscarora War begins when Tuscarora natives under the command of Chief Hancock raid settlements along the south bank of the Pamlico River, within the Province of Carolina (modern-day North Carolina), killing around 130 people.

October–December

• October 7 – HMS Feversham is wrecked on Scaterie Island, Nova Scotia with the loss of 102 lives.
• October 11 – Panic kills 241 people in the stampede on the Guillottière bridge in France near Lyon. Revelers returning from a festival on the other side of the Rhône river are blocked by from crossing after a collision between a carriage and a cart. At least 25 fall off the bridge and into the river, while 216 are trampled by people behind them.
• October 14
  • Yostos kills Tewoflos, becoming Emperor of Ethiopia.
  • Woodes Rogers returns to England after a successful round-the-world privateering cruise against Spain, carrying loot worth £150,000.
• October 16 – Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts is established in Brussels.
• November 5 – The southwest spire of Southwell Minster in Nottinghamshire, England is struck by lightning, resulting in a fire that spreads to the nave and tower, destroying roofs, bells, clock and organ.
• November 7 – The Dutch East India Company ship Liefde runs aground and sinks off Out Skerries, Shetland, with the loss of all but one of her 300 crew.
• December 5 – Great Northern War: the Battle of Wismar results in a Danish victory over Swedish forces.
• December 7 – In the Parliament of Great Britain the Earl of Nottingham successfully proposes a "No Peace Without Spain" amendment.
• December 8 – The Immaculate Conception Cathedral, Comayagua in Honduras, one of the oldest cathedrals in Central America, is inaugurated.
• December 12 – A constitution is approved for the Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna, which had been founded in 1690.
• December 13 – Wall Street in New York City becomes the city's first official slave market for the sale and rental of enslaved Africans and Indians.
• December 15 – The Old Pummerin, a massive bell cast from 208 captured cannons, is consecrated by Bishop Franz Ferdinand Freiherr von Rummel in preparation for its installation in St. Stephen's Cathedral, Vienna (the Stephansdom).
• December 25 – The rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral in London to a design by Sir Christopher Wren is declared complete by Parliament; Old St Paul's had been destroyed by the 1666 Great Fire of London.

Date unknown

• John Shore invents the tuning fork.
• Luigi Ferdinando Marsili shows that coral is an animal rather than a plant as previously thought.

January–June

• February 10 – A Huilliche rebellion begins in Chiloé Archipelago.
• February 30 – Sweden temporarily adopts February 30 as a day to adjust the Swedish Calendar back to the Julian calendar.
• May 19 – Peter the Great moves the capital of Russia from Moscow to St. Petersburg.
• May 22 – Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor crowned king of Hungary.

July–December

• July 24
  • Battle of Denain: The French defeat a combined Dutch-Austrian force.
  • Battle of Villmergen: Reformed cantons of Switzerland defeat the Catholic cantons.
• December 9 – Battle of Gadebusch: Sweden defeats Denmark and Saxony.

Date unknown

Newcomen steam engine diagram

• The Treaty of Aargau is signed by Catholics and Protestants, establishing Protestant dominance in Switzerland, while preserving the rights of Catholics.
• The first known working Newcomen steam engine is built by Thomas Newcomen with John Calley to pump water out of mines in the Black Country of England, the first practical device to harness the power of steam to produce mechanical work.
• After many years of settlement, the "Town on Queen Anne's Creek" is established as a courthouse for Chowan County, North Carolina. The town is renamed Edenton in 1720 and incorporated in 1722.
• The VOC Zuytdorp is wrecked off the coast of Western Australia.
• John Arbuthnot creates the character of John Bull to represent Britain.

January–June

• January 17 – Tuscarora War: Colonel James Moore leads the Carolina militia out of Albemarle County, North Carolina in a second offensive against the Tuscarora. Heavy snows force the troops to take refuge in Fort Reading on the Pamlico River.
• February 1 – Skirmish at Bender
• February 4 – Tuscarora War: The Carolina militia under Colonel James Moore leaves Fort Reading to continue the campaign against the Tuscarora.

Frederick William I of Prussia, 1713

• February 25 – Frederick William I of Prussia begins his reign.
• March 1 – Tuscarora War: Colonel James Moore's Carolina militia lays siege to the Tuscaroran stronghold of Fort Neoheroka, located a few miles up Contentnea Creek from Fort Hancock.
• March 20 – Tuscarora War: Colonel James Moore's Carolina militia launches a major offensive against Fort Neoheroka.
• March 23 – Tuscarora War: Fort Neoheroka falls to the Carolina militia, effectively ending the Tuscarora nation's military strength. Two Tuscaroran allies, the Machapunga and Coree tribes, continue offensive actions against North Carolina.

Western Europe Treaty

• March 27 – First Treaty of Utrecht between Great Britain and Spain. Philip V accepted by Britain and Austria as king of Spain; Spain cedes Gibraltar and Minorca to Britain.
• April 11 – Second Treaty of Utrecht between Britain and France ends the War of the Spanish Succession. France cedes Newfoundland, Acadia, Hudson Bay and St Kitts to Britain.
• April 14 – First performance, in London, of Joseph Addison's libertarian play Cato, a Tragedy, which will be influential on both sides of the Atlantic.
• April 19 – With no living male heirs, Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, issues the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713 to ensure one of his daughters will inherit the Habsburg lands.
• June 1 (approx.) – Tuscarora War: Colonel James Moore leads the Carolina militia into the Pamlico Peninsula to defeat the Machapunga and Coree tribes.
• June 23 – French residents of Acadia given one year to declare allegiance to Britain or leave Nova Scotia.

July–December

• July 13 – The Treaty of Portsmouth brings an end to Queen Anne's War.
• September 1 – Tuscarora War: The Carolina militia led by Colonel James Moore returns to South Carolina after mixed success in the campaign against the Machapunga and Coree.

January–June

• March 7 – Treaty of Rastatt signed between Austria and France concluding the War of the Spanish Succession between them. Austria receives from Spain, Spanish territories in Italy – the Kingdom of Naples, Duchy of Milan and Kingdom of Sardinia – as well as the Southern Netherlands; and from France Freiburg and Landau. The Austrian Habsburg Empire reaches its largest territorial extent yet with Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, succeeding Philip V of Spain as ruler in the ceded territories.
• May 19 – Anne, Queen of Great Britain, refuses to allow members of the House of Hanover to settle in Britain during her lifetime.

July–December

August 1: King George I of Great Britain

• July – Longitude prize: The Parliament of Great Britain votes "to offer a reward for such person or persons as shall discover the Longitude." (£10,000 for any method capable of determining a ship's longitude within 1 degree; £15,000, within 40 minutes, and £20,000 within ½ a degree.)
• July 27 – Battle of Gangut: The Imperial Russian Navy gains its first important victory, against the Swedish Navy.
• August 1 – George, elector of Hanover becomes King George I of Great Britain and Ireland on the death of Queen Anne.
• September 11 – War of the Spanish Succession: Barcelona taken after a long siege and Catalonia surrenders to Spanish and French Bourbon armies.
• December 9 – Ottoman–Venetian War (1714–1718): The Ottoman Empire declares war on the Republic of Venice.

Date unknown

• Archbishop Tenison's School, the world's earliest surviving mixed gender school, is established by Thomas Tenison, Archbishop of Canterbury, in Croydon, south of London, England.
• Louis Juchereau de St. Denis establishes Fort St. Jean Baptiste at the site of present day Natchitoches, Louisiana (the first permanent European settlement in the Louisiana Territory, after Biloxi (1699) and Mobile, Alabama (1702) were separated).
• Worcester College, University of Oxford is founded (formerly Gloucester College, closed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries).
• Stockholm County founded.
• Redirection of the river Kander (Switzerland) into Lake Thun.

January–June

• February 11 – Tuscarora War: The Tuscarora and their allies sign a peace treaty with the Province of Carolina and agree to move to a reservation near Lake Mattamuskeet, effectively ending the Tuscarora War. Large numbers of Tuscarora subsequently move to New York.
• March 27 – Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke, flees from Great Britain to France. His part in secret negotiations with France leading to the Treaty of Utrecht has cast suspicion on him in the eyes of the Whig government of Britain. He becomes secretary of state to the Pretender, James Edward Stuart.
• May 3 – A total solar eclipse is seen across southern England, Sweden and Finland (the last total eclipse visible in London for almost 900 years).

July–December

• July 20 – Ottoman–Venetian War (1714–18): The fall of Nauplion, the capital of the Venetian "Kingdom of the Morea", seals the fate of the Peloponnese peninsula, which is soon completely retaken by the Ottomans.
• July 24 – 1715 Treasure Fleet: A Spanish treasure fleet of 10 ships under General Don Juan Ubilla leaves Havana, Cuba for Spain. Seven days later, nine of them sink in a storm off the coast of Florida (some centuries later, treasure salvage is found from these wrecks).
• August 31 – Opening of Old Dock, Liverpool, England, the world's first enclosed commercial wet dock (Thomas Steers, engineer).
• September – The first major Jacobite rising in Scotland against the rule of King George I of Great Britain breaks out. The Earl of Mar raises the standard of James Edward Stuart and marches on Edinburgh. James, the son of the deposed King James VII, arrives from France.
• September 1 – King Louis XIV of France dies after a reign of 72 years, leaving his throne to his great-grandson Louis XV, who will reign for 58 years. Regent for the new, 5-year-old monarch is Philippe d'Orléans, nephew of Louis XIV.
• November 13 – The Battle of Sheriffmuir during the Jacobite rising in Scotland. Although the action is inconclusive, the forces of the Kingdom of Great Britain led by John Campbell, 2nd Duke of Argyll, halt the Jacobite advance.
• November 14 – Battle of Preston: Government forces defeat the Jacobite incursion at the conclusion of a five-day siege and action.
• November 15 – Third Barrier Treaty signed by Britain, the Holy Roman Empire and the Dutch Republic.
• November 28 – Application of Nueva Planta decrees in Majorca and the other Balearic Islands formerly under the Crown of Aragon bringing them under the laws of the Crown of Castile.
• December 22 – James Edward Stuart rejoins Jacobite rebels in Scotland but fails to rouse his army.
• December 24 – Swedish troops occupy Norway.

Date unknown

• Yamasee War: the Province of Carolina goes to war with the Yamasee Native Americans.
• Karlsruhe Palace is built, resulting in the town of Karlsruhe growing up around it.
• The ancient right to evaluate royal decrees publicly before they are given the force of law by the high court of Paris (the Parlement) is restored.

January–June

• January – The town of Crieff, Scotland, is burned to the ground by Jacobites returning from the Battle of Sheriffmuir.
• January 16 – Application of Nueva Planta decrees to Catalonia, making it subject to the laws of the Crown of Castile, concluding the unification of Spain under Philip V.
• January 27 – The Tugaloo Massacre changes the course of the Yamasee War.
• February 10 – James Edward Stuart flees from Scotland to France with a handful of supporters following failure of the Jacobite rising of 1715.
• February 24 – Execution of the Jacobite leaders James Radclyffe, 3rd Earl of Derwentwater and William Gordon, 6th Viscount of Kenmure in London.
• May – John Law founds the Banque Générale.
• May 26 – Two regular companies of field artillery, each 100 men strong, are raised at Woolwich by Royal Warrant of King George I of Great Britain.
• May 28 – John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough, suffers a paralytic stroke.

July–December

• July 5 – Prince Ernest Augustus is created Duke of York and Albany in the peerage of Great Britain.
• July 8 – Battle of Dynekilen: The Swedish fleet is defeated by a Danish–Norwegian fleet.
• August 4 – George Seton, 5th Earl of Winton, under sentence of death for his part in the Jacobite rising of 1715, escapes from the Tower of London and flees into exile on the continent.
• August 5 – Battle of Petrovaradin: 83,300 Austrian troops of Prince Eugene of Savoy defeat 150,000 Ottoman Turks under Silahdar Damat Ali Pasha (who is killed).
• August 24 – Charles VII, Holy Roman Emperor, returns from Italy.
• November 9 – Caroline of Ansbach, Princess of Wales, gives birth to a stillborn son in London.
• December 12 – Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend, is demoted from his office as Secretary of State for the Northern Department in the British government and replaced by James Stanhope, 1st Earl Stanhope.

Date unknown

• The English pirate Edward Teach is given command of a sloop in the Bahamas.
• Natchez, one of the oldest towns on the Mississippi, is founded.
• A fire in Wapping, England, destroys 150 houses.
• Tsar Peter the Great of Russia studies with the physician Herman Boerhaave at Leiden University.
• The Kangxi Dictionary is published, laying the foundation of most references to Han characters studied today.

January–June

• January 1 – Count Carl Gyllenborg, the Swedish ambassador to the Kingdom of Great Britain, is arrested in London over a plot to assist the Pretender to the British throne, James Francis Edward Stuart.
• January 4 (December 24, 1716 Old Style) – Great Britain, France and the Dutch Republic sign the Triple Alliance in an attempt to maintain the Treaty of Utrecht (1713), Britain having signed a preliminary alliance with France on November 28 (November 17) 1716.
• February – Following the treaty between France and Britain, James Stuart leaves France and seeks refuge with Pope Clement XI.
• February 1 – The Silent Sejm, in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, marks the beginning of the Russian Empire's increasing influence and control over the Commonwealth.
• February 26–March 6 – What is now the northeastern United States is paralyzed by a series of blizzards that bury the region.
• March 2 – Dancer John Weaver performs in the first ballet in Britain, shown at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, The Loves of Mars and Venus.
• March 31 – Benjamin Hoadly, Bishop of Bangor, brings the Bangorian Controversy within the Church of England into the open by delivering a sermon to, and supposedly at the request of, King George I of Great Britain on The Nature of the Kingdom of Christ with the text "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36), concluding there is no Biblical justification for church government.
• April 26 – The Whydah Gally, flagship of "Black Sam" Bellamy, is wrecked in a storm off Wellfleet, Massachusetts. The Whydah sinks with a reputed four and a half tons of treasure on board, and all but two of her crew are lost, including Bellamy.
• May 27 – Spain unites its South American colonies as the Viceroyalty of New Granada.
• June 24 – The Premier Grand Lodge of England, the 'Modern' and first Free-Masonic Grand Lodge (which merges with the Ancient Grand Lodge of England in 1813 to form the United Grand Lodge of England), is founded in London.

July–December

• August 17 – The month-long Siege of Belgrade ends with Prince Eugene of Savoy's Austrian troops capturing the city from the Ottoman Empire.
• September – The first known Druid revival ceremony is held by John Toland at Primrose Hill, in London, at the Autumnal Equinox, to found the Mother Grove, what is later to become the Ancient Order of Druids.
• September 29 – Guatemala earthquake: A 7.4 magnitude earthquake strikes Antigua Guatemala, destroying much of the city and making authorities consider moving the capital of Guatemala to a different location.
• November
  • Crews on two ships commanded by Benjamin Hornigold and Edward Teach attack and capture the British-built French Guineaman Concorde in the eastern Caribbean. Hornigold soon accepts a British amnesty for all pirates, but Teach rejects it and subsequently becomes known as Blackbeard.
  • A rift between George I of Great Britain and his son the Prince of Wales leads to the latter being banished from the royal household.
• December – Blackbeard teams up with Stede Bonnet but later takes his ship and demotes Bonnet to guest. The Queen Anne's Revenge and Revenge take several ships as prizes in the Caribbean. Blackbeard eventually adds two more ships to his party and sails north to the North American coast.
• December 24–December 25 – Christmas flood: A disastrous flood hits the North Sea coast between the Netherlands and Denmark; thousands die or lose their houses.

Date unknown

• 1717 Omani invasion of Bahrain.
• François-Marie Arouet is sentenced to imprisonment in the Bastille for eleven months because of a satirical verse against the Régent of France and his infamous daughter Marie Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans who at the time was hiding an illegitimate pregnancy and soon to give birth; Arouet will emerge with the pseudonym Voltaire and the completed text of his first play, Œdipe.
• Tatar invasions in Transylvania, with many towns devastated, including Cavnic, Sighet and Dej.
• Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, wife of the British ambassador to Istanbul, has her son inoculated.
• Casa de Contratación ("House of Trade") is set up in Cádiz.
• Maharaja Pamheiba of Manipur is converted to Hinduism by Shantidas Goswami, and decrees it to be the official religion of his state.
• Most recent rupture of New Zealand's Alpine Fault with an earthquake estimated to have had a magnitude between 7.8 and 8.1.
• Thomas Fairchild, a nurseryman at Hoxton in the East End of London, becomes the first person to produce a successful scientific plant hybrid, Dianthus Caryophyllus barbatus, known as "Fairchild's Mule".

January–June

• January – France declares war on Spain, leading to the 2-year War of the Quadruple Alliance.

December 10: Flag of Stede Bonnet.

• May – English pirate Blackbeard leads 400 sailors in four ships to blockade the port of Charleston, South Carolina. The Queen Anne's Revenge and Adventure are both lost at Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina, a week later. Blackbeard allows Stede Bonnet to command the Revenge (which is renamed the Royal James) once again. Bonnet rescues 25 sailors abandoned by Blackbeard on a sandbar and continues his life of piracy.
• May 7 – New Orleans, is founded.
• June – Blackbeard and Bonnet take refuge in Bath, North Carolina, where Governor Charles Eden pardons them and their crew.

July–December

May 7: New Orleans

• July 21 – The Treaty of Passarowitz is signed.
• August 11 – Battle of Cape Passaro: a Spanish fleet is defeated by the British Royal Navy under Admiral George Byng off Capo Passero, Sicily, a prelude to the War of the Quadruple Alliance.
• September – The Dzungar Khanate destroys a Qing army at the Battle of the Salween River.
• October – Stede Bonnet and his crew are captured near the mouth of the Cape Fear River and taken to Charleston, South Carolina, where they are tried for piracy. All but four are found guilty and sentenced to death.
• October 24 – Stede Bonnet escapes from prison.
• November 8 – 22 of Stede Bonnet's pirate crew are hanged at Charleston.
• November 11 – Lightning strikes the powder magazine at the Old Fortress, Corfu, causing a major catastrophe on the island.
• November 18 – Voltaire's first play, Oedipus, premières at the Comédie-Française in Paris. This is his first use of the pseudonym.
• November 22 – Citing violations of the amnesty agreement with Blackbeard, Virginia Governor Alexander Spotswood sends a Royal Navy contingent to North Carolina, where they battle Blackbeard and his crew in Ocracoke Inlet. Blackbeard is killed in action after receiving five musketball wounds and twenty sword lacerations.

Dec. 6: Ulrika Eleonora, Queen of Sweden

• December 5 – Following the death of Charles XII on November 30, his sister Ulrika Eleonora proclaims herself Queen regnant of Sweden, as the news of her brother's death reaches Stockholm.
• December 10 – Stede Bonnet is hanged at Charleston after being recaptured.
• December 17 – The Holy Roman Empire, Kingdom of Great Britain and Dutch Republic join the Kingdom of France in formally declaring war on Spain, launching the War of the Quadruple Alliance.

Date unknown

• Islamization of Sudan: The Funj warrior aristocracy deposes the reigning mek and places one of their own ranks on the throne of Sennar.
• The white potato reaches New England from England.

January–June

• January 23
  • The Principality of Liechtenstein is created within the Holy Roman Empire.
  • The Riksdag of the Estates recognizes Ulrika Eleonora's claim to the Swedish throne, after she has agreed to sign a new Swedish constitution. Thus, she is recognized as Queen regnant of Sweden.
• February 20 – The first Treaty of Stockholm is signed.
• February 29 – King christian the 6th of Denmark appoints Niels Jakobsen as the leader of the first Danish Curling team.
• April 19 – In Louisiana (New France), Bienville's brother Serigny arrives on a French man-of-war, bringing news that war was declared between France and Spain (from December 1718).
• April 25 – Daniel Defoe publishes Robinson Crusoe.
• April – French army under James FitzJames, 1st Duke of Berwick invades the Basque provinces of Spain.
• May 14 – In Louisiana (New France), at war with Spain, Bienville, from Mobile, captures Pensacola, but Pensacola is later recaptured by the Spanish, and again re-taken by Bienville.
• June 4 – Battle of Ösel Island: A Russian naval force defeats the Swedish fleet.
• June 10 – Battle of Glen Shiel: British forces defeat the Jacobites and their Spanish allies.
• June 20 – Austrians are defeated in the Battle of Francavilla.

July–December

• December 22 – Andrew Bradford publishes the American Weekly Mercury, Pennsylvania's first newspaper.

Date unknown

• Prussia conducts Europe's first systematic census.
• Miners in Falun, Sweden find the apparently petrified body of Fet-Mats Israelsson in an unused part of the copper mine.
• Raine's Foundation School, Bethnal Green, opens in Wapping (opened by Henry Raine).
• Thomas Elfe, born in 1719 was a successful colonial period furniture craftsman in Charleston, South Carolina.