1603

Events

• March 24 - Elizabeth I of England dies and is succeeded by her cousin King James VI of Scotland, uniting the crowns of Scotland and England
• April 28 – Funeral of Elizabeth I of England in Westminster Abbey
• July 17 or July 19 - Sir Walter Raleigh arrested for treason.
• July 25 - Coronation of James I of England. By some criteria this was the start of the modern Great Britain
• November 17 - Sir Walter Raleigh goes on trial for treason in the converted Great hall of Winchester Castle
• December 22 - Mehmed III Sultan of the Ottoman Empire dies and is succeeded by his son Ahmed I.
• Johann Bayer's Uranometria, an atlas of the southern sky, is published.
• Tokugawa Ieyasu granted title of shogun from Emperor Go-Yozei of Japan and establishes the Edo or Tokugawa Shogunate in Edo, Japan. This ends the Azuchi-Momoyama period and begins the Edo period.
• Accademia dei Lincei founded
• Huguenot Pierre de Gua is granted royal permission to settle in North America
• Rebellion in Transylvania
• Plague in England
• English crush Irish rebellion. Hugh O'Neill, 2nd Earl of Tyrone surrenders.

Births

• Denis Gaultier - A French lutenist and composer. (d. 1672)
• March 18 - King John IV of Portugal (d. 1656)
• Abel Janszoon Tasman - Dutch Explorer (d. 1659)

Deaths

• March 24 - Queen Elizabeth I of England, Wales and Ireland (b. 1533)
• December 22 - Mehmed III, Ottoman Emperor (b. 1566)