On this day: September 9

Events on September 9

• 9 Germanic Wars: An alliance of Germanic tribes led by Arminius engaged Roman forces at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, defeating three legions within a few days. Wikipedia
• 337 After disposing of all relatives who possibly held a claim to the throne, Constantine II, Constantius II and Constans became Roman co-emperors. Wikipedia
• 1141 Yelü Dashi, the Liao general who founded the Qara Khitai, defeated Seljuq and Kara-Khanid forces at the Battle of Qatwan, near Samarkand in present-day Uzbekistan. Wikipedia
• 1320 Byzantine forces defeated Achaean troops at the Battle of Saint George, taking control of the Arcadia region of Greece. Wikipedia
• 1493 Ottoman wars in Europe: A large Croatian army intercepted Ottoman forces returning to the Sanjak of Bosnia, but was defeated. Wikipedia
• 1493 Christopher Columbus, with 17 ships and 1,200 men, sails on second voyage from Cadiz. Wikipedia
• 1499 The citizens of Lisbon celebrate the triumphal return of the explorer Vasco de Gama, completing his two-year journey around the Cape of Good Hope to India. Wikipedia
• 1570 Ottoman–Venetian War: After a 40-day siege, the Cypriot city of Nicosia fell to the Ottomans, leading to a massacre of more than 20,000 citizens. Wikipedia
• 1739 The Stono Rebellion, at the time the largest slave rebellion in the Thirteen Colonies of British America, erupted near Charleston, South Carolina. Wikipedia
• 1791 The commissioners overseeing the construction of the United States' new capital city named it Washington, in honor of the first president. Wikipedia
• 1796 French Revolutionary Wars: A naval engagement between French and British fleets off the coast of Sumatra ended inconclusively. Wikipedia
• 1839 John Herschel takes the first glass plate photograph. Wikipedia
• 1850 California is admitted as the thirty-first U.S. state. Wikipedia
• 1882 A British force repels an Egyptian force led by Ahmed Urabi in the battle of Qassasin during the Anglo-Egyptian War. Wikipedia
• 1892 At the Lick Observatory in California, Edward Emerson Barnard discovered Amalthea, a moon of Jupiter and the last natural satellite to be discovered by visual observation. Wikipedia
• 1939 World War II: About 3,000 Polish Army troops began a nearly month-long defence of the Hel Peninsula during the German invasion of Poland. Wikipedia
• 1945 World War II and Second Sino-Japanese War: The Empire of Japan formally surrenders to China. Wikipedia
• 1954 A magnitude-6.7 earthquake struck near Chlef, killing over 1,200 people and forcing the Algerian government to implement comprehensive reforms in building codes. Wikipedia
• 1957 U.S. president Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Civil Rights Act of 1957, the first civil rights bill since Reconstruction. Wikipedia
• 1962 French president Charles de Gaulle delivered his "speech to the German youth" to 20,000 people in the courtyard of Ludwigsburg Palace. Wikipedia
• 1969 Allegheny Airlines Flight 853 collided in mid-air with a Piper PA-28 Cherokee flown by a student pilot near Fairland, Indiana, killing all 83 occupants of and destroying both aircraft. Wikipedia
• 1971 Imagine, the second solo album by John Lennon, was released. Wikipedia
• 1999 The first banknotes of the Portrait Series of the Singapore dollar were introduced by the Board of Commissioners of Currency. Wikipedia
• 2001 Two al-Qaeda attackers assassinated Ahmad Shah Massoud, a pivotal Afghan resistance leader, two days before the September 11 attacks in the United States. Wikipedia
• 2010 A natural-gas pipeline in San Bruno, California, exploded and "shot a fireball more than 1,000 feet (300 m) in the air", killing eight people. Wikipedia
• 2015 Elizabeth II became the longest-reigning monarch of the United Kingdom, surpassing Queen Victoria. Wikipedia

Born on September 9

• 384 Honorius, Roman emperor (died 423) Wikipedia
• 1585 Cardinal Richelieu, French cardinal and politician (died 1642) Wikipedia
• 1737 Luigi Galvani, Italian physician and physicist (died 1798) Wikipedia
• 1778 Clemens Brentano, German poet and author (died 1842) Wikipedia
• 1828 Leo Tolstoy, Russian author and playwright (died 1910) Wikipedia
• 1908 Cesare Pavese, Italian poet and author (died 1950) Wikipedia
• 1918 Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, Italian lawyer and politician, 9th President of Italy (died 2012) Wikipedia
• 1922 Hans Georg Dehmelt, German-American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2017) Wikipedia
• 1923 Daniel Carleton Gajdusek, American physician and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 2008) Wikipedia
• 1923 Cliff Robertson, American actor (died 2011) Wikipedia
• 1926 Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Egyptian theologian and author (died 2022) Wikipedia
• 1941 Dennis Ritchie, American computer scientist, created the C programming language (died 2011) Wikipedia
• 1941 Otis Redding, American singer-songwriter and producer (died 1967) Wikipedia
• 1949 Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Indonesian general and politician, 6th President of Indonesia Wikipedia
• 1960 Hugh Grant, English actor and producer Wikipedia
• 1966 Adam Sandler, American actor, comedian, producer, and screenwriter Wikipedia
• 1967 Akshay Kumar, Indian actor and producer Wikipedia
• 1972 Goran Višnjić, Croatian-American actor Wikipedia
• 1975 Michael Bublé, Canadian singer-songwriter and actor Wikipedia
• 1980 Michelle Williams, American actress Wikipedia
• 1985 Luka Modrić, Croatian footballer Wikipedia
• 1991 Oscar, Brazilian footballer Wikipedia

Died on September 9

• 1087 William the Conqueror, English king (born c. 1028) Wikipedia
• 1513 Notable Scottish casualties of the Battle of Flodden Wikipedia
• 1569 Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Dutch painter (born 1525) Wikipedia
• 1891 Jules Grévy, French politician, 4th President of the French Republic (born 1813) Wikipedia
• 1898 Stéphane Mallarmé, French poet and critic (born 1842) Wikipedia
• 1901 Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, French painter and illustrator (born 1864) Wikipedia
• 1941 Hans Spemann, German embryologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1869) Wikipedia
• 1976 Mao Zedong, Chinese philosopher, academic, and politician, 1st Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party (born 1893) Wikipedia
• 1981 Jacques Lacan, French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist (born 1901) Wikipedia
• 1985 Paul Flory, American chemist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1910) Wikipedia
• 1997 Burgess Meredith, American actor, director, and producer (born 1907) Wikipedia
• 2001 Ahmad Shah Massoud, Afghan commander and politician, Afghan Minister of Defense (born 1953) Wikipedia
• 2003 Edward Teller, Hungarian-American physicist and academic (born 1908) Wikipedia
• 2024 James Earl Jones, American actor (born 1931) Wikipedia

Holidays and observances

• Christian feast day: Charles Lowder (Church of England) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Ciarán of Clonmacnoise Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Euthymia Üffing Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Francisco Gárate Aranguren Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Constance, Nun, and her Companions (Episcopal Church) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Blessed Maria Torribia Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Our Lady of Arantzazu (Oñati, Spain; Philippines Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Peter Claver Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: Synaxis of Ss. Joachim and Anna, an Afterfeast. (Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Churches) Wikipedia
• Christian feast day: September 9 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) Wikipedia
• Armored Forces Day (Ukraine) Wikipedia
• California Admission Day (California, United States) Wikipedia
• Children's Day (Costa Rica) Wikipedia
• Chrysanthemum Day or Kiku no Sekku (Japan) Wikipedia
• Day of the Victims of Holocaust and of Racial Violence (Slovakia) Wikipedia
• Emergency Services Day (United Kingdom) Wikipedia
• Independence Day or Republic Day, celebrates the proclamation of Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) in 1948. Wikipedia
• Independence Day (Tajikistan), celebrates the independence of Tajikistan from USSR in 1991. Wikipedia
• International Buy-a-Priest-a-Beer Day Wikipedia
• Martyrs' Day (Afghanistan) (date may fall on September 8, follows a non-Gregorian calendar, see List of observances set by the Solar Hijri calendar) Wikipedia
• Remembrance for Herman the Cheruscan (The Troth) Wikipedia

Sources

• Wikipedia — “September 9” — events, births, deaths and observances (text under CC BY-SA 4.0) (checked 2026-10-15)
• Wikipedia — “Selected anniversaries/September 9” — 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 “September 9” 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 September 9 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.