On this day: February 22

Events on February 22

• 1076 Having received a letter during the Lenten synod of 14–20 February demanding that he abdicate, Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor. Wikipedia
• 1288 The Franciscan Girolamo Maschi is elected pope, choosing the name Nicholas IV. Wikipedia
• 1316 The Catalan forces of Ferdinand of Majorca defeated troops loyal to Princess Matilda of Hainaut at the Battle of Picotin on the Peloponnese peninsula in modern-day Greece. Wikipedia
• 1371 Robert II became King of Scots as the first monarch of the House of Stewart. Wikipedia
• 1495 King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne. Wikipedia
• 1744 War of the Austrian Succession: British ships began attacking the rear of a combined Franco-Spanish fleet in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Toulon, France. Wikipedia
• 1819 By the Adams–Onís Treaty, Spain sells Florida to the United States for five million U.S. dollars. Wikipedia
• 1848 The French Revolution of 1848, which would lead to the establishment of the French Second Republic, begins. Wikipedia
• 1856 The United States Republican Party opens its first national convention in Pittsburgh. Wikipedia
• 1909 The sixteen United States Navy battleships of the Great White Fleet, led by Connecticut, completed a circumnavigation of the globe. Wikipedia
• 1944 World War II: The Soviet Red Army recaptures Krivoi Rog. Wikipedia
• 1957 Ngô Đình Diệm of South Vietnam survives a communist shooting assassination attempt in Buôn Ma Thuột. Wikipedia
• 1959 Lee Petty won the first edition of the Daytona 500, a NASCAR auto race at the Daytona International Speedway in Florida. Wikipedia
• 1974 Samuel Byck attempted to hijack an aircraft at Baltimore/Washington International Airport with the intention of crashing it into the White House to assassinate U.S. president Richard Nixon, but he was stopped by police. Wikipedia
• 1974 The Organisation of the Islamic Conference summit begins in Lahore, Pakistan. Thirty-seven countries attend and twenty-two heads of state and government participate. It also recognizes Bangladesh. Wikipedia
• 1980 At the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York, the United States ice hockey team defeated the Soviet team in an unlikely victory that became known as the Miracle on Ice. Wikipedia
• 1983 The play Moose Murders opened and closed on the same night at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre, becoming the standard of "awfulness" against which all Broadway failures are judged. Wikipedia
• 1986 Start of the People Power Revolution in the Philippines. Wikipedia
• 1997 Scientists at the Roslin Institute in Scotland announced the existence of Dolly, a female sheep who was the first mammal to have successfully been cloned from an adult cell. Wikipedia
• 1998 The cherry-throated tanager, a critically endangered bird which had not been definitively sighted in over a century, was rediscovered in Conceição do Castelo, Brazil. Wikipedia
• 2006 Seven men staged the largest cash robbery in Britain at a Securitas depot in Tonbridge, Kent, United Kingdom. Wikipedia
• 2011 An earthquake registering 6.3 ML struck Christchurch, New Zealand, killing 185 people and causing around NZ$40 billion in damage. Wikipedia
• 2011 Bahraini uprising: Tens of thousands of people marched in protest in Manama against the deaths of seven people killed by police and army forces during previous protests. Wikipedia
• 2012 A train failed to apply its brakes and crashed through a buffer stop at Once railway station in Buenos Aires, resulting in 51 deaths and more than 700 injuries. Wikipedia
• 2014 President Viktor Yanukovych of Ukraine is impeached by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine by a vote of 328–0, fulfilling a major goal of the Euromaidan rebellion. Wikipedia
• 2019 A group broke into the North Korean embassy in Madrid, Spain, and stole several mobile telephones and digital storage devices. Wikipedia

Born on February 22

• 1403 Charles VII of France (died 1461) Wikipedia
• 1514 Tahmasp I, Iranian shah (died 1576) Wikipedia
• 1732 George Washington, American general and politician, 1st President of the United States (died 1799) Wikipedia
• 1788 Arthur Schopenhauer, German philosopher and author (died 1860) Wikipedia
• 1840 August Bebel, German theorist and politician (died 1913) Wikipedia
• 1857 Heinrich Hertz, German physicist, philosopher, and academic (died 1894) Wikipedia
• 1857 Robert Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell, English general, co-founded The Scout Association (died 1941) Wikipedia
• 1864 Jules Renard, French author and playwright (died 1910) Wikipedia
• 1892 Edna St. Vincent Millay, American poet and playwright (died 1950) Wikipedia
• 1900 Luis Buñuel, Spanish-Mexican director and producer (died 1983) Wikipedia
• 1914 Renato Dulbecco, Italian-American virologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2012) Wikipedia
• 1921 Jean-Bédel Bokassa, Central African general and politician, 2nd President of the Central African Republic (died 1996) Wikipedia
• 1932 Ted Kennedy, American soldier, lawyer, and politician (died 2009) Wikipedia
• 1943 Horst Köhler, Polish-German economist and politician, 9th President of Germany (died 2025) Wikipedia
• 1944 Jonathan Demme, American director, producer, and screenwriter (died 2017) Wikipedia
• 1949 Niki Lauda, Austrian racing driver (died 2019) Wikipedia
• 1959 Kyle MacLachlan, American actor Wikipedia
• 1962 Steve Irwin, Australian zoologist and television host (died 2006) Wikipedia
• 1974 James Blunt, English singer-songwriter and guitarist Wikipedia
• 1975 Drew Barrymore, American actress, director, producer, and screenwriter Wikipedia
• 1984 Branislav Ivanović, Serbian footballer Wikipedia
• 1987 Sergio Romero, Argentine footballer Wikipedia

Died on February 22

• 606 Sabinian, Pope of the Catholic Church Wikipedia
• 1371 David II, King of Scotland (born 1324) Wikipedia
• 1512 Amerigo Vespucci, Italian cartographer and explorer (born 1454) Wikipedia
• 1875 Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, French painter and illustrator (born 1796) Wikipedia
• 1875 Charles Lyell, Scottish geologist (born 1797) Wikipedia
• 1913 Ferdinand de Saussure, Swiss linguist and author (born 1857) Wikipedia
• 1913 Francisco I. Madero, Mexican president and author (born 1873) Wikipedia
• 1939 Antonio Machado, Spanish-French poet and author (born 1875) Wikipedia
• 1942 Stefan Zweig, Austrian journalist, author, and playwright (born 1881) Wikipedia
• 1943 Sophie Scholl, German activist (born 1921) Wikipedia
• 1958 Abul Kalam Azad, Indian scholar and politician, Indian Minister of Education (born 1888) Wikipedia
• 1980 Oskar Kokoschka, Austrian painter, poet and playwright (born 1886) Wikipedia
• 1987 Andy Warhol, American painter and photographer (born 1928) Wikipedia
• 2002 Jonas Savimbi, Angolan general, founded UNITA (born 1934) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Birthday of Scouting and Guiding founder Robert Baden-Powell and Olave Baden-Powell, and its related observance: Founder's Day or "B.-P. day" (World Organization of the Scout Movement) Wikipedia
• Birthday of Scouting and Guiding founder Robert Baden-Powell and Olave Baden-Powell, and its related observance: World Thinking Day (World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Baradates Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Émilie d'Oultremont Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Eric Liddell (Episcopal Church (USA)) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Feast of the Chair of Saint Peter (Roman Catholic Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Margaret of Cortona Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Papias of Hierapolis Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: February 22 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• Crime Victims Day (Europe) Wikipedia
• Independence Day, celebrates the independence of Saint Lucia from the United Kingdom in 1979. Wikipedia
• Founding Day (Saudi Arabia) Wikipedia
• Washington's Birthday, federal holiday in the United States. A holiday on February 22 as well as the third Monday in February. Wikipedia
• National Cat Day (Japan) Wikipedia

Sources

• Wikipedia — “February 22” — events, births, deaths and observances (text under CC BY-SA 4.0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikipedia — “Selected anniversaries/February 22” — 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 “February 22” 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 February 22 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.