On this day: July 16

Events on July 16

• 622 The Hijrah of Muhammad begins, marking the beginning of the Islamic calendar. Wikipedia
• 997 Battle of Spercheios: Bulgarian forces of Tsar Samuel are defeated by a Byzantine army under general Nikephoros Ouranos at the Spercheios River in Greece. Wikipedia
• 1212 Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa: After Pope Innocent III calls European knights to a crusade, the forces of kings Alfonso VIII of Castile, Sancho VII of Navarre, Peter II of Aragon and Afonso II of Portugal defeat those of the Berber Muslim leader Almohad, thus marking a significant turning point in the Reconquista and in the medieval history of Spain. Wikipedia
• 1251 Celebrated by the Carmelite Order–but doubted by modern historians–as the day when Saint Simon Stock had a vision of the Virgin Mary. Wikipedia
• 1536 Jacques Cartier, navigator and explorer, returns home to St. Malo after claiming Stadacona (Quebec), Hochelaga (Montreal) and the River of Canada (St. Lawrence River) region for France. Wikipedia
• 1683 Manchu Qing dynasty naval forces under commander Shi Lang defeat the Kingdom of Tungning in the Battle of Penghu near the Pescadores Islands. Wikipedia
• 1769 Father Junípero Serra founds California's first mission, Mission San Diego de Alcalá. Over the following decades, it evolves into the city of San Diego, California. Wikipedia
• 1782 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera Die Entführung aus dem Serail premiered in Vienna, after which Emperor Joseph II anecdotally remarked that it had "too many notes". Wikipedia
• 1790 President George Washington signed the Residence Act, selecting a new permanent site along the Potomac River for the capital of the United States, which later became Washington, D.C. Wikipedia
• 1790 The District of Columbia is established as the capital of the United States after signature of the Residence Act. Wikipedia
• 1809 The city of La Paz, in what is today Bolivia, declares its independence from the Spanish Crown during the La Paz revolution and forms the Junta Tuitiva, the first independent government in Spanish America, led by Pedro Domingo Murillo. Wikipedia
• 1849 Antonio María Claret y Clará founds the Congregation of the Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, popularly known as the Claretians in Vic, in the province of Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Wikipedia
• 1861 American Civil War: At the order of President Abraham Lincoln, Union troops begin a 25-mile march into Virginia for what will become the First Battle of Bull Run, the first major land battle of the war. Wikipedia
• 1935 The world's first parking meter is installed in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Wikipedia
• 1942 Holocaust: Vel' d'Hiv Roundup (Rafle du Vel' d'Hiv): The government of Vichy France orders the mass arrest of 13,152 Jews who are held at the Vélodrome d'Hiver in Paris before deportation to Auschwitz. Wikipedia
• 1945 The United States conducted the first detonation of a nuclear weapon during the Trinity test. Wikipedia
• 1945 Manhattan Project: The Atomic Age begins when the United States successfully detonates a plutonium-based test nuclear weapon near Alamogordo, New Mexico. Wikipedia
• 1948 Following token resistance, the city of Nazareth, revered by Christians as the hometown of Jesus, capitulates to Israeli troops during Operation Dekel in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Wikipedia
• 1957 KLM Flight 844 crashes off the Schouten Islands in present day Indonesia (then Netherlands New Guinea), killing 58 people. Wikipedia
• 1979 Iraqi President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr resigns and is replaced by Saddam Hussein. Wikipedia
• 1990 The Luzon earthquake strikes the Philippines with an intensity of 7.7, affecting Benguet, Pangasinan, Nueva Ecija, La Union, Aurora, Bataan, Zambales and Tarlac. Wikipedia
• 1994 Fragments of Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9 began colliding with the planet Jupiter , with the first impact causing a fireball that reached a peak temperature of 24,000 kelvin. Wikipedia
• 1994 The comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 is destroyed in a head-on collision with Jupiter. Wikipedia
• 2004 Millennium Park, a public park in Chicago, Illinois, and one of the world's largest rooftop gardens, opened to the public. Wikipedia
• 2009 Teoh Beng Hock, an aide to a politician in Malaysia is found dead on the rooftop of a building adjacent to the offices of the Anti-Corruption Commission, sparking an inquest that gains nationwide attention. Wikipedia
• 2019 A 100-year-old building in Mumbai, India, collapses, killing at least 10 people and leaving many others trapped. Wikipedia

Born on July 16

• 1194 Clare of Assisi, Italian nun and saint (died 1253) Wikipedia
• 1486 Andrea del Sarto, Italian painter (died 1530) Wikipedia
• 1723 Joshua Reynolds, English painter and academic (died 1792) Wikipedia
• 1796 Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, French painter and etcher (died 1875) Wikipedia
• 1872 Roald Amundsen, Norwegian pilot and explorer (died 1928) Wikipedia
• 1888 Frits Zernike, Dutch physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1966) Wikipedia
• 1896 Trygve Lie, Norwegian trade union leader and politician, 1st Secretary-General of the United Nations (died 1968) Wikipedia
• 1907 Barbara Stanwyck, American actress (died 1990) Wikipedia
• 1911 Ginger Rogers, American actress, singer, and dancer (died 1995) Wikipedia
• 1919 Hermine Braunsteiner, Austrian SS officer and Majdanek concentration camp guard (died 1999) Wikipedia
• 1919 Choi Kyu-hah, South Korean politician, 4th President of South Korea (died 2006) Wikipedia
• 1926 Irwin Rose, American biologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2015) Wikipedia
• 1936 Yasuo Fukuda, Japanese politician, 91st Prime Minister of Japan Wikipedia
• 1942 Margaret Court, Australian tennis player and minister Wikipedia
• 1957 Maurice Kottelat, Swiss ichthyologist specializing in Eurasian freshwater fishes Wikipedia
• 1964 Miguel Induráin, Spanish cyclist Wikipedia
• 1967 Will Ferrell, American actor, comedian, and producer Wikipedia
• 1968 Larry Sanger, American philosopher and businessman, co-founded Wikipedia and Citizendium Wikipedia
• 1969 Sahra Wagenknecht, German politician Wikipedia
• 1983 Katrina Kaif, British Indian actress and model Wikipedia
• 1988 Sergio Busquets, Spanish footballer Wikipedia
• 1989 Gareth Bale, Welsh footballer Wikipedia

Died on July 16

• 1216 Pope Innocent III (born 1160) Wikipedia
• 1557 Anne of Cleves, Queen consort of England (born 1515) Wikipedia
• 1882 Mary Todd Lincoln, First Lady of the United States 1861–1865 (born 1818) Wikipedia
• 1885 Rosalía de Castro, Spanish poet (born 1837) Wikipedia
• 1915 Ellen G. White, American author and co-founder of the Seventh-day Adventist Church(born 1827) Wikipedia
• 1985 Heinrich Böll, German novelist and short story writer, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1917) Wikipedia
• 1989 Herbert von Karajan, Austrian conductor and manager (born 1908) Wikipedia
• 1994 Julian Schwinger, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1918) Wikipedia
• 2003 Celia Cruz, Cuban-American singer and actress (born 1925) Wikipedia
• 2012 Stephen Covey, American businessman and author (born 1932) Wikipedia
• 2017 George A. Romero, American filmmaker (born 1940) Wikipedia
• 2019 John Paul Stevens, American lawyer and jurist, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (born 1920) Wikipedia
• 2023 Jane Birkin, British model, actress, singer, and songwriter (born 1944) Wikipedia
• 2025 Connie Francis, American singer and actress (born 1937) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Christian feast day: André de Soveral Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Gondulphus of Tongeren Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Helier Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Irmgard of Chiemsee Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Marie-Madeleine Postel Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Our Lady of Mount Carmel Fiesta de La Tirana (Tarapacá Region, Chile) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Reineldis Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Sisenandus of Beja Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: July 16 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• Engineer's Day (Honduras) Wikipedia
• Holocaust Memorial Day (France) Wikipedia

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “July 16” and the articles it links to (authors and history), retrieved 2026-10-09 through the Wikimedia “On this day” feed. They are licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this selection is shared under the same licence. We picked the 26 events, 22 births and 14 deaths with the widest coverage across Wikipedia's language editions (counted from Wikidata) and sorted them by year; the wording is unchanged apart from removing references to pictures.