1666

Events

• September 2 - Great Fire of London: A large fire breaks out in London in the house of Charles II's baker on Pudding Lane near London Bridge. The fire burns for three days destroying 10,000 buildings including St. Paul's Cathedral, but only 16 people are known to have died.
• Sir Isaac Newton uses a prism to split sunlight into its component colours, which helped us understand the nature of light more comprehensively. (See optical spectrum).
• Lund University founded in Lund, Sweden
• Newark, New Jersey founded
• Jean Talon completes a census of New France, the first census in North America
• Louis XIV founds the French Academy of Sciences.

Births

• Arthur Chichester, 3rd Earl of Donegall
• Thomas Parker, 1st Earl of Macclesfield
• February 9 - George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney
• March 15 - George Bähr, German architect
• August 13 - William Wotton, English scholar
• September 6 - Tsar Ivan V of Russia
• December 22 - Guru Gobind Singh (d. 1708)

Deaths

• Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, Italian painter (b. 1591)
• Sir William Clarke, British politician
• Sir Richard Fanshawe, British diplomat and translator (b. 1608)
• Philip Fruytiers, Flemish painter (b. 1627)
• James Howell, British writer
• January 20 - Anne of Austria, Queen Consort of France and Regent for her son, Louis XIV of France (b. 1601)
• January 22 - Shah Jahan, Mogul Emperor of India (b. 1592)
• July 10 - John Fell, British churchman
• August 26 - Frans Hals, Dutch painter
• October 29 - James Shirley, English dramatist