1622: Emperor Ferdinand II concludes a peace treaty with the Prince of Transylvania, Gabor Bethlen. As an ally of the Bohemian Protestants, he had advanced to Pressburg and had himself proclaimed King of Hungary in 1620.
1727: World premiere of the drama “Lucio Vero, imperator di Roma” by Attilio Ariosti at the King’s Theater in London.
1807: England imposes a coastal blockade against Napoleonic France and its allies.
1857: World premiere of the Piano Concerto No. 2 in A major by Franz Liszt.
1902: After the Boxer Rebellion was put down in China, the Dowager Empress Cixi (Tzu-hsi), who fled to Sian in 1901, returned with her court to the Forbidden City in Beijing.
1927: The first transatlantic phone call is made from New York City to London.
1932: The US is officially protesting Japanese aggression in China.
1937: Crown Princess Juliana of Holland marries the German Prince Bernhard zur Lippe-Biesterfeld. Prince Bernhard receives the title “Prince of the Netherlands” and the title “Royal Highness”.
1972: The People’s Republic of China is conducting a nuclear weapon test in the Taklamakan desert.
1972: 104 people die in a plane crash in Ibiza.
1977: The civil rights movement Charter 77, founded on January 1st, publishes a resolution of the same name in Prague calling on the government to respect human and civil rights. The officers respond with arrests and threats of identification.
1992: Five EC observers are killed when their helicopter is shot down over Croatian territory.
1997: The hijacking of an AUA machine by a Bosnian is ended bloodlessly in Berlin-Tegel.
2007: Anders Jacobsen wins the Four Hills ski jumping tournament in his first World Cup season. The Norwegian refers the Tyrolean Gregor Schlierenzauer and Simon Ammann from Switzerland to the other places. Schlierenzauer, who is also making his tour debut, wins the tour jumping in Oberstdorf and Bischofshofen.
Birthdays: Pope Gregory XIII (Ugo Boncompagni) (1502-1585); Milovan Glišić, Serbian writer (1847-1908); Josef Scheidl, east Politician (1907-1985); Nicanor Zabaleta, Spanish harpist (1907-1993); Günter Wand, German conductor (1912-2002); Jean-Pierre Rampal, French flautist (1922-2000); Wolfgang Reichmann, German actor (1932-1991); Max Gallo, French Historian, writer and former politician (1932-2017); Sylvia Caduff, Switzerland. Conductor (1937); Franz Josef Czernin, east. Writer (1952); Andreas Staribacher, east. Lawyer and former politician (1957); Ole Kristian Furuseth, Norway. Ex-ski racer (1967).
Days of Death: André Maginot, French politician (1877-1932); Carl Schuricht, German composer (1880-1967); John Berryman, US writer (1914-1972); Fritz Sitte, east. Journalist and adventurer (1924-2007); Mário Soares, Portuguese politician and three-time Prime Minister (1924-2017).
Name days: Valentin, Sigrid, Reinhold, Raimund, Tilman, Isidor, Anno, Virginia, Knud, Artur, Melanie, Julian.