On this day: August 30

Events on August 30

• 70 First Jewish–Roman War: Roman forces led by Titus set fire to the Second Temple during the siege of Jerusalem. Wikipedia
• 1464 Paul II succeeds Pius II as pope of the Catholic Church. Wikipedia
• 1574 Guru Ram Das became the fourth of the Sikh gurus, the spiritual masters of Sikhism. Wikipedia
• 1594 King James VI of Scotland held a masque at the baptism of Prince Henry, his first child. Wikipedia
• 1721 The Great Northern War between Sweden and Russia ends in the Treaty of Nystad. Wikipedia
• 1800 Gabriel Prosser planned to hold a slave rebellion in Virginia, U.S., but it was postponed due to rain; he was captured before he could reschedule it. Wikipedia
• 1813 First Battle of Kulm: French forces are defeated by an Austrian-Prussian-Russian alliance. Wikipedia
• 1896 Philippine Revolution: In the Battle of San Juan del Monte, the first real battle of the war, a Katipunan force temporarily captured a powder magazine before being beaten back by a Spanish garrison. Wikipedia
• 1914 World War I: The Battle of Tannenberg resulted in the almost complete destruction of the Russian 2nd Army by the German 8th Army. Wikipedia
• 1918 Fanni Kaplan shoots and seriously injures Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin, which, along with the assassination of Bolshevik senior official Moisei Uritsky days earlier, prompts the decree for Red Terror. Wikipedia
• 1940 The Second Vienna Award reassigns the territory of Northern Transylvania from Romania to Hungary. Wikipedia
• 1942 Second World War: German field marshal Erwin Rommel launched the last major Axis offensive of the Western Desert campaign, attacking British positions near El Alamein, Egypt. Wikipedia
• 1942 British and Australian prisoners of war in Singapore revolted against their Japanese captors, who required them to pledge not to escape. Wikipedia
• 1959 South Vietnamese opposition figure Phan Quang Đán was elected to the National Assembly, despite soldiers being bussed in to vote multiple times for President Ngô Đình Diệm's candidate. Wikipedia
• 1959 Writer and politician Abdul Muis became the first person to be awarded the posthumous title of National Hero of Indonesia. Wikipedia
• 1967 Thurgood Marshall was confirmed as the first African-American Supreme Court justice. Wikipedia
• 1974 An express train carrying foreign workers from Yugoslavia to West Germany derailed in Zagreb, killing 153 people. Wikipedia
• 1974 A bomb exploded at the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries headquarters in Marunouchi, Tokyo, killing eight people. Wikipedia
• 1981 Iranian president Mohammad-Ali Rajai and prime minister Mohammad-Javad Bahonar were assassinated in a bombing committed by the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran. Wikipedia
• 1984 Discovery, the third orbiter of NASA's Space Shuttle program, lifted off on its maiden voyage from Kennedy Space Center, Florida. Wikipedia
• 1990 Gulf War: US General Norman Schwarzkopf Jr. issued General Order No. 1 prohibiting US troops from consuming alcohol or possessing pornographic material. Wikipedia
• 1991 Dissolution of the Soviet Union: Azerbaijan declares independence from Soviet Union. Wikipedia
• 1995 Bosnian War: NATO launches Operation Deliberate Force against Bosnian Serb forces. Wikipedia
• 2007 A heavy bomber that had been unintentionally loaded with nuclear missiles flew them from North Dakota to Louisiana before they were recognized. Wikipedia
• 2023 Gabonese coup d'état: After Ali Bongo Ondimba's reelection, a military coup ousts him, ending 56 years of Bongo family rule in Gabon. Wikipedia
• 2025 Ukrainian politician Andriy Parubiy was assassinated in Lviv, Ukraine. Wikipedia

Born on August 30

• 1748 Jacques-Louis David, French painter and illustrator (died 1825) Wikipedia
• 1797 Mary Shelley, English novelist and playwright (died 1851) Wikipedia
• 1852 Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff, Dutch chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1911) Wikipedia
• 1860 Isaac Levitan, Russian painter and illustrator (died 1900) Wikipedia
• 1871 Ernest Rutherford, New Zealand-English physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1937) Wikipedia
• 1883 Theo van Doesburg, Dutch artist (died 1931) Wikipedia
• 1884 Theodor Svedberg, Swedish chemist and physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1971) Wikipedia
• 1898 Shirley Booth, American actress and singer (died 1992) Wikipedia
• 1912 Edward Mills Purcell, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1997) Wikipedia
• 1913 Richard Stone, English economist and statistician, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1991) Wikipedia
• 1930 Warren Buffett, American businessman and philanthropist Wikipedia
• 1931 Jack Swigert, American pilot and astronaut (died 1982) Wikipedia
• 1935 Sylvia Earle, American marine biologist Wikipedia
• 1943 Jean-Claude Killy, French skier Wikipedia
• 1951 Gediminas Kirkilas, Lithuanian politician, 11th Prime Minister of Lithuania (died 2024) Wikipedia
• 1954 Alexander Lukashenko, Belarusian marshal and politician, 1st President of Belarus Wikipedia
• 1958 Anna Politkovskaya, Russian journalist and activist (died 2006) Wikipedia
• 1972 Cameron Diaz, American model, actress, and producer Wikipedia
• 1972 Pavel Nedvěd, Czech footballer Wikipedia
• 1982 Andy Roddick, American tennis player Wikipedia
• 1983 Simone Pepe, Italian footballer Wikipedia
• 1989 Bebe Rexha, American singer-songwriter Wikipedia

Died on August 30

• 526 Theodoric the Great, Italian ruler (born 454) Wikipedia
• 1181 Pope Alexander III (born c. 1100–1105) Wikipedia
• 1483 Louis XI, King of France (born 1423) Wikipedia
• 1928 Wilhelm Wien, German physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1864) Wikipedia
• 1935 Henri Barbusse, French journalist and author (born 1873) Wikipedia
• 1940 J. J. Thomson, English physicist and mathematician, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1856) Wikipedia
• 1981 Mohammad-Ali Rajai, Iranian politician, 2nd President of Iran (born 1933) Wikipedia
• 2003 Charles Bronson, American actor and soldier (born 1921) Wikipedia
• 2006 Naguib Mahfouz, Egyptian journalist and author, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1911) Wikipedia
• 2006 Glenn Ford, Canadian-American actor and producer (born 1916) Wikipedia
• 2013 Seamus Heaney, Irish poet and playwright, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1939) Wikipedia
• 2015 Wes Craven, American director, producer, screenwriter, and actor (born 1939) Wikipedia
• 2015 Oliver Sacks, English-American neurologist, author, and academic (born 1933) Wikipedia
• 2022 Mikhail Gorbachev, 8th and final leader of the Soviet Union (born 1931) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Christian feast day: Alexander of Constantinople (Eastern Orthodoxy) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Alfredo Ildefonso Schuster Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Eustáquio van Lieshout Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Stephen Nehmé (Maronite Church / Catholic Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Charles Chapman Grafton (Episcopal Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Fantinus Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Felix and Adauctus Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Fiacre Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed María Rafols Bruna Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Mary Ward Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Narcisa de Jesús Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Pammachius Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Theodosius of Oria Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: August 30 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• Constitution Day (Kazakhstan) Wikipedia
• Constitution Day (Turks and Caicos Islands) Wikipedia
• Independence Day (Tatarstan, Russia not formally recognized) Wikipedia
• International Day of the Disappeared Wikipedia
• International Whale Shark Day
• Popular Consultation Day (East Timor) Wikipedia
• Saint Rose of Lima's Day (Peru) Wikipedia
• Victory Day (Turkey) Wikipedia

Sources

• Wikipedia — “August 30” — events, births, deaths and observances (text under CC BY-SA 4.0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikipedia — “Selected anniversaries/August 30” — the anniversaries editors chose for the date and the article each one is about (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikidata — in how many language editions each entry's own article exists, used to fill the lists (CC0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• vacanza/holidays (open-source holiday rules, MIT licence) — holiday rules used to build the lists (checked 2026-10-15)

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “August 30” and the articles it links to (authors and history), retrieved 2026-10-15 through the Wikimedia “On this day” feed. They are licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this selection is shared under the same licence. Every anniversary that Wikipedia's editors selected for August 30 stays on the list; the remaining places, up to 26 events, 22 births and 14 deaths, go to the entries whose own article — about the event itself, or else the person or thing it is about — appears in the most language editions (counted from Wikidata); an article about a person or thing, which covers far more than one day, counts half. An entry with no article of its own counts, also at half, by the least covered article it links, and one that links only places counts for nothing. Each list runs by year, and the wording is unchanged apart from removing references to pictures, audio and video.