1698
| Millennium: | 2nd millennium |
|---|---|
| Centuries: | 16th century – 17th century – 18th century |
| Decades: | 1660s 1670s 1680s – 1690s – 1700s 1710s 1720s |
| Years: | 1695 1696 1697 – 1698 – 1699 1700 1701 |
Events
- January 4 – Palace of Whitehall in London is destroyed by fire.
- June 19 – Volcano of Carguarazon erupts in the Andes and causes a rain of fish
- August 25 – Peter the Great arrives back to Moscow – general Patrick Gordon has already crushed the streltsy rebellion – 341 rebels sentenced to be decapitated. Tradition holds that tsar Peter decapitated some of them himself
- September 5 – In an effort to move his people away from Asiatic customs, Tsar Peter I of Russia imposes a tax on beards; All men except priests and peasants, are required to pay a tax of one hundred rubles a year and the commoners had to pay one kopek each
- Whigs sponsor Captain Kidd of New York as a privateer against French shipping
- Darien Scheme – First Scottish settlers leave for an ill-fated colony in Panama
- Isaac Newton calculates the speed of sound
- Tani Jinzan, astronomer and calendar scholar, observes a fire destroy Tosa (now Kochi) in Japan at the same time as a Leonid Meteor storm, taking it as evidence to reinforce belief in the "Theory of Areas".
- Thomas Savery patents an early steam engine.
- A congress begins in Sremski Karlovci to discuss a treaty between the Ottoman Empire and the Holy League.
- Humphrey Hody is appointed regius professor of Greek at Oxford.
- Bucharest becomes capital of Wallachia (now part of Romania).
- Mombasa and Zanzibar are captured by Oman.
- George Louis (who would in 1714 become King George I of Great Britain) becomes Elector of Hanover.