1701

Events

January 18 – The electorate of Brandenburg-Prussia becomes the Kingdom of Prussia, as Elector Frederick III is proclaimed King Frederick I. Prussia remains part of the Holy Roman Empire. It consists of Brandenburg, Pomerania and East Prussia. Berlin is the capital.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
January 28 – Battle of Dartsedo: The Chinese storm the Tibetan border town of Dartsedo.
February 17 (February 6, 1700 O.S.) – The 5th Parliament of William III in England assembles. Future British Prime Minister Robert Walpole enters the House of Commons for the first time and soon makes his name as a spokesman for Whig policy.
April 20th – Mecklenburg-Strelitz is created as a north German duchy.
June 9 – Safavid troops retreat from Basra, ending a three year occupation.<ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref>

April 21 – In Japan, the young daimyō Asano Naganori is ordered to commit seppuku (ritual suicide). A group of 47 samurai of his service begin planning to avenge his death.
May 23 – Scottish-born Captain William Kidd, having been imprisoned in Boston Gaol (Massachusetts) and Newgate Prison (London) and convicted by the High Court of Admiralty of piracy and the murder of one of his crew, is hanged at Execution Dock in Wapping (London).<ref name="Pocket On This Day">Template:Cite book</ref> His body suffers gibbeting over the River Thames at Tilbury Point; ballads are already spreading the legend that he has left buried treasure in the Americas.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
June 24 – The Act of Settlement 1701 is passed by the Parliament of England, to exclude the Catholic Stuarts from the British monarchy. Under its terms, King William III, childless, will be succeeded by Queen Mary II's sister Princess Anne and her descendants. If Anne should have no descendants, she will be succeeded by Sophia of Hanover and her descendants (hence the Hanoverian Succession in 1714).

July 9 – The Battle of Carpi, the first skirmish in the War of the Spanish Succession, takes place in Italy when French troops under the command of Nicolas Catinat are attacked by Austrian forces led by Prince Eugene of Savoy.<ref>Dennis Showalter, Early Modern Wars 1500–1775 (Amber Books Ltd., 2013)</ref>
July 19 – Crossing of the Düna: Following his victories over Denmark-Norway and Russia in 1700, Charles XII of Sweden escalates the conflict in the Great Northern War by an invasion of Poland. The Swedish defeat the army of Saxony (then in personal union with Poland) at the River Dvina.

July 24 – A French emporium named Fort Ponchartrain is founded along the west side of the Detroit River in North America, and later becomes the site of the city of Detroit.
August 4 – The Great Peace of Montreal is signed, ending 100 years of war between the Iroquois Confederacy and New France, and its Huron and Algonquian allies. Formerly allied with the English, the treaty assures the Iroquois will be neutral, if France and England ever resume hostilities.
September 16 – Deposed King James II of England (James VII of Scotland) dies in exile, at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye in France. His supporters, the Jacobites, turn to his son James Francis Edward Stuart (later called "The Old Pretender"), whom they recognise as James VIII and III. Louis XIV of France, the Papal States and Spain also recognise him as the rightful heir.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

October 9 – The Collegiate School of Connecticut (later renamed Yale University) is chartered in Old Saybrook, Connecticut.
November 2 – King Philip V of Spain marries for the first time, to 13-year-old Maria Luisa Gabriella of Savoy, who serves as Queen Consort until her death from tuberculosis at the age of 25.
November 11 (O.S., November 22 N.S.) – The House of Commons of England is dissolved by King William III and new elections are called for all 531 seats.<ref name=Ridgway>A.M. Sullivan, ed., Ridgway's Parliamentary Manual for the Year 1884 (William Ridgway, 1884) p. 100</ref>
December 29 (O.S., January 9, 1702 N.S.) – The Battle of Erastfer takes place near what becomes Erastvere in Estonia, as a large Russian force commanded by Boris Sheremetev invades Swedish Livonia and overwhelms a smaller force led by Wolmar Anton von Schlippenbach in the first significant Russian victory in the Great Northern War.

English agriculturalist Jethro Tull invents a drill for planting seeds in rows.
The Philharmonic Society (Academia Philharmonicorum) is established in Ljubljana, Slovenia.