1642

Years:
1639 1640 1641 - 1642 - 1643 1644 1645

Decades:
1610s 1620s 1630s - 1640s - 1650s 1660s 1670s

Centuries:
16th century - 17th century - 18th century

1642 by topic:
Science - State leaders - Literature - Music

Events

January 4 - Charles I attempts to arrest five leading members of the Long Parliament, but they escape. Beginning of English Civil War.
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 for the Irish Confederates.
May 17 - Sieur de Maisonneuve founds the Ville Marie de Montréal.
July - Charles I besieges Hull in an attempt to gain control of its arsenal.
August 7 - Lord Forbes relieves Forthill and besieges Galway.
September 7 - Lord Forbes raises his unsuccessful siege of Galway.
September 8 - Thomas Granger executed by hanging at Plymouth, Massachusetts for confessing to numerous acts of bestiality.
October - Battle of Edgehill.
November 24 - Abel Tasman becomes the first European to discover the island Van Diemen's Land (later renamed Tasmania).
The Dutch drive Spain from Taiwan.
Abel Tasman achieves the first recorded European sighting of New Zealand.
Blaise Pascal produces a mechanical adding machine (the "Pascaline").
Claudio Monteverdi's opera l'Incoronazione di Poppeia is first performed.
First Battle of Lostwithiel
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier brings Hope diamond to Europe
Puritans close all theaters in England
Peter Stuyvesant becomes the governor of Curaçao