April 23– On Saint Christopher Island more commonly called St Kitts, a Caribbean Sea island divided between colonies of England and France, a battle near Sandy Point Town over control of the territory ends with a victory by the French over a numerically-superior English force two days after English Deputy Governor William Watts of Anguilla had sent an expedition to capture the neighbouring island of Saint Martin. Governor Watts and the French Governor of Saint-Christophe, Charles de Sales, are both killed in the battle.[3]
May 12– In India, General Shivaji Bhonsale of the Maratha Empire arrives at the Agra Fort for a meeting with Emperor Aurangzeb of the Mughal Empire, as part of the terms of peace under the 1665 Treaty of Purandar. After taking offence at the disrespect shown to him, he gets angry and attempts to leave; he and his son Sambhaji are immediately placed under arrest and imprisoned at the fort.[4]
May 13– French theologian Louis-Isaac Lemaistre de Sacy is imprisoned in the Bastille after his conviction for heresy in connection with the Jansenist movement. Sacy uses his two and one-half years of incarceration (which lasts until November 14, 1668), to create the Bible du Port-Royal, a first French language rendition of the Bible, finishing a translation of the Old Testament from the Vulgate, written in Latin, that had been started by his brother Antoine, and then beginning work on the New Testament.
June 14 (June 4 Julian calendar) – The Four Days' Battle between the Dutch Republic fleet (84 ships under the command of Admiral Michiel de Ruyter) and the English Royal Navy (79 ships led by the Duke of Albemarle) in the North Sea, one of the longest naval engagements in history, ends with a retreat by the English after having started on June 11.[6] A part of the Second Anglo-Dutch War, the battle ends with a Dutch victory, but heavy losses are sustained on both sides: the English lose 1,000 men and 10 ships are sunk, while the Dutch lose four ships and 1,550 men. Damaged, but not destroyed, the English fleet sets about repairs and refitting, and meets the Dutch fleet again on July 25 in the St. James's Day Battle.
July 31– The Agreement of Legonice is signed, with Poland restoring the titles of Jerzy Sebastian Lubomirski and Lubomirski's officers, granting amnesty to all the rebels, and King Jan II Kazimierz abandoning further reform plans.
August 2 (July 23Julian calendar) – A hurricane sweeps through the Caribbean Sea near Guadeloupe five days after Barbados colonial Governor Francis Willoughby led a force of two Royal Navy frigates, 12 commandeered vessels and over 1,000 men in a battle against French colonies during the Second Anglo-Dutch War. Willoughby and most of his crew die in the sinking of his flagship, HMS Hope
September 2– The Great Fire of London begins as a blaze in a bakery owned by Thomas Farriner on Pudding Lane, near London Bridge. Over a period of four days, the fire destroys more than 13,000 buildings (including Old St Paul's Cathedral), but only six people are known to have died,[7] while at least 80,000[8] are left destitute and homeless. The events are recorded by Samuel Pepys in his diary. The resurveying of property is credited with advancing both cartography and the practices of surveying, as well as resulting in the modern definition by John Ogilby of the statute mile, as 1,760 yards.[9]
October 17– In North America, a French Army regiment led by Alexandre de Prouville de Tracy erects crosses in the Mohawk lands of the eastern Iroquois Confederacy territory along the Mohawk River as part of an invasion that started on September 29.[11] During the expedition, Prouville's forces find four abandoned Mohawk villages in the area, located in the modern U.S. state of New York near the village of Schenectady but never confront any Mohawk defenders, and the French never attempt to enforce their claim.
October 23– The most intense tornado on record in English history, an F4 storm on the Fujita scale or T8 on the TORRO scale, strikes the county of Lincolnshire with a path of destruction through the villages of Welbourn, Wellingore, Navenby and Boothby Graffoe, with winds of more than 213 miles per hour (343km/h).[12]
October 26–Abbas II, the Shah of Iran, dies at the age of 34 after a reign of 24 years, without designating a successor.[13] His 18-year old son Sam Mirza is crowned as the new Safavid dynasty emperor six days later.[14]
October 27–Robert Hubert, a Frenchman who has made a false confession to having started the Great Fire of London (despite not arriving in England until two days after the blaze started), is executed based on his statements.
Mughal forces of Emperor Aurangzeb, in alliance with the Portuguese, under Shaista Khan and his son Buzurg Umed Khan, expel the Arakans from the Bengal port city of Chittagong, renaming the city as Islamabad.
Isaac Newton uses a prism to split sunlight, as referenced in his alchemical works as Lux Dei, into the component colours of the optical spectrum, assisting the understanding of the scientific nature of light. He also develops differential calculus simultaneously with Leibniz. His discoveries this year lead to it being referred to as his Annus mirabilis or Newton's "Year of the Morning Star".
The first completed printed Bible translation into Armenian, Astuacašunč hnoc' ew noroc' ktakaranac (Oskanean Bible), is published in Amsterdam, edited by Bishop Oskan Yerevantsi.[17]
W. Earle Lockerby, "Le serment d'allégeance, le service militaire, les déportations et les Acadiens: opinions de France et de Québec aux 17e et 18e siècles", Acadiensis (March 2008)
Gregory Mole, Privileging Commerce: The Compagnie des Indes and the politics of trade in old Regime France (doctoral dissertation, Carolina Digital Repository, 2016) p. 35
Clericuzio, Antonio (2000). Elements, principles, and corpuscles: a study of atomism and chemistry in the seventeenth century. Dordrecht; Boston: Kluwer Academic. p.179. ISBN9780792367826.
Krämer, Gode (1991). Mythos und bürgerliche Welt: Gemälde und Zeichnungen der Haberstock-Stiftung (in German). München: Klinkhardt & Biermann. p.82. ISBN9783781403161.
Guercino, FirstName (1991). Drawings by Guercino from British collections: with an appendix describing the drawings by Guercino, his school and his followers in the British Museum. London, Rome: British Museum Press in association with Leonardo-De Luca Editori. p.14. ISBN9788878133440.