On this day: September 30

Events on September 30

• 737 Muslim conquest of Transoxiana: Türgesh tribesmen attacked and captured the exposed baggage train of the Umayyad army, sent ahead of the main force. Wikipedia
• 737 The Türgesh drive back an Umayyad invasion of Khuttal, follow them south of the Oxus, and capture their baggage train. Wikipedia
• 1139 A violent earthquake struck the Caucasus near Ganja, killing up to an estimated 300,000 people. Wikipedia
• 1139 A magnitude 7.7 earthquake strikes the Caucasus mountains in the Seljuk Empire, causing mass destruction and killing up to 300,000 people. Wikipedia
• 1342 An Anglo-Breton army defeated a far larger Franco-Breton force in the first land battle of the Hundred Years' War. Wikipedia
• 1342 Battle of Morlaix is fought in the Hundred Years' War. Wikipedia
• 1520 Suleiman the Magnificent becomes sultan of the Ottoman Empire. Wikipedia
• 1687 The Venetians under Girolamo Corner take the city of Herceg Novi from the Ottoman Empire. Wikipedia
• 1791 Mozart conducted the premiere of his last opera, The Magic Flute, in Vienna. Wikipedia
• 1863 Georges Bizet's opera Les pêcheurs de perles, premieres in Paris. Wikipedia
• 1882 Thomas Edison's first commercial hydroelectric power plant, the Vulcan Street Plant, begins operation. Wikipedia
• 1895 Friedrich Nietzsche finished writing The Antichrist, with the 7 propositions Law Against Christianity, marked by him as a Day of Salvation, Day and Year 1 of a new calendar. Wikipedia
• 1915 World War I: Radoje Ljutovac becomes the first soldier in history to shoot down an enemy aircraft with ground-to-air fire. Wikipedia
• 1918 Nestor Makhno and Fedir Shchus led insurgents to successfully ambush the Central Powers that occupied southern Ukraine during World War I. Wikipedia
• 1919 The Elaine massacre in Arkansas commences. Wikipedia
• 1936 American journalists Herbert R. Ekins, reporter for the New York World-Telegram, Dorothy Kilgallen of the New York Journal and Leo Kieran of The New York Times start the race to travel around the world on commercial airline flights. The race takes 18 ½ days. Wikipedia
• 1938 Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Neville Chamberlain, and Édouard Daladier signed the Munich Agreement, stipulating that Czechoslovakia must cede the Sudetenland to Germany. Wikipedia
• 1939 Second World War: General Władysław Sikorski became the first prime minister of the Polish government-in-exile. Wikipedia
• 1939 World War II: General Władysław Sikorski becomes prime minister of the Polish government-in-exile. Wikipedia
• 1947 Pakistan joins the United Nations. Wikipedia
• 1966 Bechuanaland declares its independence, and becomes the Republic of Botswana. Wikipedia
• 1975 Malév Flight 240 crashes into the Mediterranean Sea while on approach to Beirut International Airport in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 60. Wikipedia
• 1998 The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a nonprofit organization that manages the assignment of domain names and IP addresses in the Internet, was incorporated. Wikipedia
• 2000 Twelve-year-old Muhammad al-Durrah was shot dead in the Gaza Strip; the Israel Defense Forces initially accepted responsibility but retracted it five years later. Wikipedia
• 2005 The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published controversial editorial cartoons depicting Muhammad, sparking protests across the Islamic world by many who viewed them as Islamophobic and blasphemous. Wikipedia
• 2009 A 7.6 MW earthquake struck off the southern coast of Sumatra, Indonesia (damage pictured), killing 1,115 and impacting an estimated 1.2 million people. Wikipedia

Born on September 30

• 1207 Rumi, Persian mystic and poet (died 1273) Wikipedia
• 1227 Pope Nicholas IV (died 1292) Wikipedia
• 1714 Étienne Bonnot de Condillac, French epistemologist and philosopher (died 1780) Wikipedia
• 1732 Jacques Necker, Swiss-French politician, Prime Minister of France (died 1804) Wikipedia
• 1870 Jean Baptiste Perrin, French-American physicist and chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1942) Wikipedia
• 1882 Hans Geiger, German physicist and academic (died 1945) Wikipedia
• 1905 Nevill Francis Mott, English physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1996) Wikipedia
• 1921 Deborah Kerr, Scottish-English actress (died 2007) Wikipedia
• 1924 Truman Capote, American novelist, playwright, and screenwriter (died 1984) Wikipedia
• 1925 Arkady Ostashev, Russian engineer and scientist in the former Soviet space program (died 1998) Wikipedia
• 1928 Elie Wiesel, Romanian-American author, academic, and activist, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2016) Wikipedia
• 1934 Udo Jürgens, Austrian-Swiss singer-songwriter and pianist (died 2014) Wikipedia
• 1939 Jean-Marie Lehn, French chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate Wikipedia
• 1943 Johann Deisenhofer, German-American biochemist and biophysicist, Nobel Prize laureate Wikipedia
• 1945 Ehud Olmert, Israeli lawyer and politician, 12th Prime Minister of Israel Wikipedia
• 1951 Barry Marshall, Australian physician and academic, Nobel Prize laureate Wikipedia
• 1955 Andy Bechtolsheim, German engineer, co-founded Sun Microsystems Wikipedia
• 1964 Monica Bellucci, Italian actress and fashion model Wikipedia
• 1975 Marion Cotillard, French actress and singer Wikipedia
• 1980 Martina Hingis, Swiss tennis player Wikipedia
• 1986 Olivier Giroud, French footballer Wikipedia
• 1997 Max Verstappen, Dutch race car driver Wikipedia

Died on September 30

• 420 Jerome, Roman priest, theologian, and saint Wikipedia
• 954 Louis IV of France (born 920) Wikipedia
• 1288 Leszek II the Black, Polish prince, Duke of Łęczyca, Sieradz, Kraków, Sandomierz (born 1241) Wikipedia
• 1626 Nurhaci, Chinese emperor (born 1559) Wikipedia
• 1866 Per Gustaf Svinhufvud af Qvalstad, treasurer of Tavastia province, manor host, and paternal grandfather of President of Finland P. E. Svinhufvud (born 1804) Wikipedia
• 1897 Thérèse of Lisieux, French nun and saint (born 1873) Wikipedia
• 1955 James Dean, American actor (born 1931) Wikipedia
• 1985 Simone Signoret, French actress (born 1921) Wikipedia
• 1985 Charles Francis Richter, American seismologist and physicist (born 1900) Wikipedia
• 1990 Patrick White, Australian novelist, poet, and playwright, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1912) Wikipedia
• 1994 André Michel Lwoff, French microbiologist and virologist, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1902) Wikipedia
• 2011 Ralph M. Steinman, Canadian-American immunologist and biologist, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1943) Wikipedia
• 2014 Martin Lewis Perl, American physicist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1927) Wikipedia
• 2018 Sonia Orbuch, Polish resistance fighter during the Second World War and Holocaust educator. (born 1925) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Agricultural Reform (Nationalization) Day (São Tomé and Príncipe) Wikipedia
• Birth of Morelos (Mexico) Wikipedia
• Boy's Day (Poland) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Federico Albert Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Gregory the Illuminator Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Honorius of Canterbury Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Jerome Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: September 30 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• Independence Day (Botswana) or Botswana Day, celebrates the independence of Botswana from United Kingdom in 1966. Wikipedia
• International Translation Day (International Federation of Translators) Wikipedia
• National Day for Truth and Reconciliation or Orange Shirt Day (Canada) Wikipedia

The events, births, deaths and observances above are from the English Wikipedia article “September 30” 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.