August 27 in History

The sack of Rome on 24 August 410 AD was undertaken by the Visigoths led by their king, Alaric. At that time, Rome was no longer the administrative capital of the Western Roman Empire, having been replaced first by Mediolanum (now Milan) in 286 and then by Ravenna in 402. Nevertheless, the city of Rome retained a paramount position as "the eternal city" and a spiritual center of the Empire. This was the first time in almost 800 years that Rome had fallen to a foreign enemy, and the sack was a major shock to contemporaries, friends and foes of the Empire alike. The sacking of 410 is seen as a major landmark in the fall of the Western Roman Empire. St. Jerome, living in Bethlehem, wrote: "the city which had taken the whole world was itself taken".

Henry the Young King (28 February 1155 – 11 June 1183) was the eldest son of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine to survive childhood. In 1170, he became titular King of England, Duke of Normandy, Count of Anjou and of Maine. Henry the Young King was the only English king since the Norman Conquest to be crowned during his father's reign, but he was frustrated by his father's refusal to grant him meaningful autonomous power. He died aged 28, six years before his father, during the course of a campaign in Limousin against his father and his brother Richard.

The Battle of Saint-Quentin of 1557 was a decisive engagement of the Italian War of 1551–1559 between the Kingdom of France and the Spanish Empire, at Saint-Quentin in Picardy. A Habsburg Spanish force under Duke Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy defeated a French army under the command of Louis de Gonzague, and Anne de Montmorency, Duke of Montmorency.

The Imjin War was a series of two Japanese invasions of Korea: an initial invasion in 1592 also individually called the "Imjin War", a brief truce in 1596 between the conflicts, followed by a second invasion in 1597 called the Chŏngyu War. The conflict ended in 1598 with the withdrawal of Japanese forces from the Korean Peninsula after a military stalemate in Korea's southern provinces.

Ishida Mitsunari (石田 三成; Japanese pronunciation: [i.ɕi.da (|) mʲi.tsɯꜜ.na.ɾʲi], 1559 – November 6, 1600) was a Japanese samurai and military commander of the late Sengoku period of Japan. He is probably best remembered as the commander of the Western army in the Battle of Sekigahara following the Azuchi–Momoyama period of the 16th century. He is also known by his court title, Jibu-no-shō (治部少輔).

The Treaty of Nerchinsk was a peace treaty signed between the Tsardom of Russia and the Qing dynasty following Russia's defeat at the Siege of Albazin. Signed on 27 August 1689 by Songgotu on behalf of the Kangxi Emperor and Fyodor Golovin for Russian Tsars Peter I and Ivan V, it was the first formal treaty China ever signed with a Western power. To bypass translation issues and avoid misinterpretation, the authoritative version was written in Latin, with secondary translations made into Russian and Manchu. While no official Chinese text existed for another two centuries, physical border markers were inscribed in Chinese, Manchu, Russian, and Latin. The geopolitical terms of the treaty forced the Russians to yield the territory north of the Amur River up to the Stanovoy Range, while allowing them to retain control over the region between the Argun River and Lake Baikal. This established boundary effectively halted Russian expansion in the region for nearly two centuries and opened vital markets for Russian goods in China, granting the Tsardom direct access to Chinese supplies and luxuries. The framework was later reconfirmed and expanded upon by the 1727 Treaty of Kiakhta, which delineated what is now the border of Mongolia west of the Argun River and legally opened up the caravan trade network. This territorial arrangement lasted until the mid-19th century, when a weakened Qing faced the Amur Annexation by an expanding Russian Empire. Through the Treaty of Aigun in 1858, Russia annexed the lands north of the Amur, and subsequently seized the Pacific coast down to Vladivostok via the Convention of Peking in 1860. Unlike the mutual compromises of 1689, these later agreements were unequal treaties dictated by Russia, stripping China of its regional sovereignty while granting total immunity and control to Russia. Today, the modern international border between the two nations runs along the Argun, Amur, and Ussuri rivers.

The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence or simply the American Revolution, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which American Patriot forces organized as the Continental Army and, commanded by George Washington, defeated the British Army. The conflict was fought in North America, the Caribbean, and the Atlantic Ocean. The war's outcome seemed uncertain for most of the war, but Washington and the Continental Army's decisive victory in the Siege of Yorktown in 1781 led King George III and the Kingdom of Great Britain to negotiate an end to the war. In 1783, in the Treaty of Paris, the British monarchy acknowledged the independence of the Thirteen Colonies, leading to the establishment of the United States as an independent and sovereign nation. In 1763, after the British Empire gained dominance in North America following its victory over the French in the Seven Years' War, tensions and disputes began escalating between the British and the Thirteen Colonies, especially following passage of the Stamp and Townshend Acts. The British Army responded by seeking to occupy Boston militarily, leading to the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770. In mid-1774, with tensions escalating even further between the British Army and the colonies, the British Parliament imposed the Intolerable Acts, an attempt to disarm Americans, leading to the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775, the first battles of the Revolutionary War. In June 1775, the Second Continental Congress voted to incorporate colonial-based Patriot militias into a central military, the Continental Army, and unanimously appointed Washington its commander-in-chief. Two months later, in August 1775, George III declared the colonies to be in a state of rebellion. In July 1776, the Second Continental Congress formalized the war, passing the Lee Resolution on July 2, and, two days later, unanimously adopting the Declaration of Independence, on July 4. In March 1776, in an early win for the newly-formed Continental Army under Washington's command, following a successful siege of Boston, the Continental Army successfully drove the British Army out of Boston. British commander in chief William Howe responded by launching the New York and New Jersey campaign, which resulted in Howe's capture of New York City in November. Washington responded by clandestinely crossing the Delaware River and winning small but significant victories at Trenton and Princeton. In the summer of 1777, as Howe was poised to capture Philadelphia, the Continental Congress fled to Baltimore. In October 1777, a separate northern British force under the command of John Burgoyne was forced to surrender at Saratoga in an American victory that proved crucial in convincing France and Spain that an independent United States was a viable possibility. France signed a commercial agreement with the revolutionaries, followed by a Treaty of Alliance in February 1778. In 1779, the Sullivan Expedition undertook a scorched earth campaign against British-allied factions of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy (also Iroquois). Native American raids on the American frontier, however, continued to be a problem. Also, in 1779, Spain allied with France against Great Britain in the Treaty of Aranjuez, though Spain did not formally ally with the Americans. Howe's replacement Henry Clinton intended to take the war against the Americans into the Southern Colonies. Despite some initial success, British General Cornwallis was besieged by a Franco-American army in Yorktown, Virginia, in September and October 1781. The French navy cut off Cornwallis's escape and he was forced to surrender in October. The British wars with France and Spain continued for another two years, but fighting largely ceased in North America. In the Treaty of Paris, signed on September 3, 1783, Great Britain acknowledged the sovereignty and independence of the United States, bringing the American Revolutionary War to an end. The Treaties of Versailles resolved Great Britain's conflicts with France and Spain, and forced Great Britain to cede Tobago, Senegal, and small territories in India to France, and Menorca, West Florida, and East Florida to Spain.

The French Revolution was a period of political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the Coup of 18 Brumaire on 9 November 1799. Many of the revolution's ideas are considered fundamental principles of liberal democracy, and its values remain central to modern French political discourse. It was caused by a combination of social, political, and economic factors which the existing regime proved unable to manage.

The French Revolutionary Wars were a series of sweeping military conflicts resulting from the French Revolution that lasted from 1792 until 1802. They pitted France against Great Britain, Austria, Prussia, Russia, and several other countries. The wars are divided into two periods: the War of the First Coalition (1792–1797) and the War of the Second Coalition (1798–1802). Initially confined to Europe, the fighting gradually assumed a global dimension. After a decade of constant warfare and aggressive diplomacy, France had conquered territories in the Italian peninsula, the Low Countries, and the Rhineland with its very large and powerful military which had been totally mobilized for war against most of Europe with mass conscription of the vast French population. French success in these conflicts ensured military occupation and the spread of revolutionary principles over much of Europe.

Theobald Wolfe Tone (Irish: Bhulbh Teón; 20 June 1763 – 19 November 1798), posthumously known as Wolfe Tone, was a revolutionary exponent of Irish independence and is an iconic figure for Irish republicanism. Convinced that if his fellow Protestants feared to make common cause with the Catholic majority, the British Crown would continue to govern Ireland in the English interest, he helped form the Society of United Irishmen in 1791. Fuelled by the popular grievances of rents, tithes and taxes, driven by martial-law repression, and despairing of reform, the society developed as an insurrectionary movement. When in the early summer of 1798 it broke into open rebellion, Tone was in exile soliciting assistance from the French Republic. In October 1798, on his second attempt to land in Ireland with French troops and supplies, he was taken prisoner. Sentenced to be hanged, he died from a reportedly self-inflicted wound. Since the mid-19th century, his name has been invoked, and his legacy disputed, by different factions of Irish republicanism. These have held annual, but separate, commemorations at his graveside in Bodenstown, County Kildare.

The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a global series of conflicts fought by a fluctuating array of European coalitions against the French First Republic (1803–1804) under the First Consul followed by the First French Empire (1804–1815) under the Emperor of the French, Napoleon. The wars originated in political forces arising from the French Revolution (1789–1799) and French Revolutionary Wars (1792–1802) and produced a period of French domination over continental Europe. The wars are categorised as seven conflicts, five named after the coalitions that fought Napoleon, plus two named for their respective theatres: the War of the Third Coalition, War of the Fourth Coalition, War of the Fifth Coalition, War of the Sixth Coalition, War of the Seventh Coalition, the Peninsular War, and the French invasion of Russia. The first stage of the wars broke out when Britain declared war on France on 18 May 1803. After minor campaigns, Britain allied with Austria, Russia, and minor powers, to form the Third Coalition in April 1805. Napoleon defeated the allied Russo-Austrian armies in the subsequent war which climaxed in French victories at Ulm and at Austerlitz, leading to the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire and Austria being forced to make peace. Britain and Russia remained at war with France. Concerned about increasing French power, Prussia joined Britain and Russia in the Fourth Coalition, which resumed war in October 1806. Napoleon defeated the Prussians at Jena-Auerstedt and the Russians at Friedland, bringing an uneasy peace to the continent by July 1807, and again leaving Britain as France's sole major enemy. Britain was unable to dispute French dominance on the continent but obtained hegemony over the seas after victories including Trafalgar. Russia used the interim peace to resolve wars with the Ottomans, Swedes, and Iranians. Hoping to isolate and weaken Britain economically through his Continental System, Napoleon launched an invasion of Portugal, the only remaining British ally in continental Europe. After occupying Lisbon in November 1807, and with the bulk of French troops present in Spain, Napoleon seized the opportunity to turn against his former ally, depose the reigning Spanish royal family, and declare his brother as Joseph I the King of Spain in 1808, to the disapproval of the Spanish populace. Spain joined Britain and Portugal, with the three powers engaging France in the Peninsular War. The diversion of French armies to the large new Anglo-Spanish front led to Austria reentering the conflict and forming the Fifth Coalition in April 1809, composed of Austria, Spain, and Britain. Austria won the Battle of Aspern-Essling but was defeated at Wagram, forcing the imposition of a harsh peace in October 1809. Britain, Spain, and Portugal remained at war with France. Concurrently Russia, unwilling to bear the economic consequences of reduced trade, violated the Continental System, prompting Napoleon to launch an invasion in June 1812. The resulting campaign was costly for both sides, but ultimately ended in disaster for France and the near-destruction of Napoleon's Grande Armée. French forces retreated from Russia by December 1812 and began reconstituting their lost strength. Encouraged by the defeat, Austria, Prussia, and several minor powers joined Russia, Britain, and Spain in a Sixth Coalition and began a campaign against France. The Sixth Coalition defeated Napoleon at Leipzig in October 1813. The allies then invaded France on two fronts: the Russians, Austrians, and Prussians invaded France from the east, while the British, Spanish, and Portuguese invaded France from the west. Coalition troops captured Paris in March 1814, forced Napoleon to abdicate in April, exiled him to the island of Elba, and restored power to the Bourbons. Napoleon escaped exile in February 1815 and reassumed control of France for around one hundred days, igniting the eponymous conflict. The allies formed the Seventh Coalition, which defeated him at Waterloo in June 1815 and exiled him to Saint Helena, where he died in 1821. The wars had profound consequences on history. New methods of warfare were introduced, including mass conscription and guerrilla warfare. Politically, the wars greatly influenced Europe through the advancements in civil law brought about by the Napoleonic Code, which was largely retained where it was adopted, and the spread of nationalism and liberalism. Independence movements emerged in Spanish America as a direct consequence of the wars, leading to the decline of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires. France's defeat led to the rise of Britain as the world's foremost naval and economic power, a status it would hold for the remainder of the century. After the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the Congress of Vienna redrew Europe's borders and brought a relative peace to the continent, with no major great power conflicts until the Crimean War in 1853.

Napoleon Bonaparte (born Napoleone di Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was Emperor of the French from 18 May 1804 until his first abdication in 1814, with a brief restoration during the Hundred Days in 1815. He rose to prominence as a general during the French Revolution and led a series of military campaigns across Europe and the Middle East during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. As a statesman, he implemented numerous legal and administrative reforms in France and Europe. Born on the island of Corsica to a family of Italian origin, Napoleon moved to mainland France in 1779 and was commissioned as an officer in the French Royal Army in 1785. He supported the French Revolution in 1789 and promoted its cause in Corsica. He rose rapidly through the ranks after winning the siege of Toulon in 1793 and defeating royalist insurgents in Paris on 13 Vendémiaire in 1795. In 1796 he commanded a military campaign against the Austrians and their Italian allies in the War of the First Coalition, scoring decisive victories and becoming a national hero. He led an invasion of Egypt and Syria in 1798, which served as a springboard for his rise to political power. In November 1799 Napoleon engineered the Coup of 18 Brumaire against the French Directory and became First Consul of the Republic. He won the Battle of Marengo in 1800, which secured France's victory in the War of the Second Coalition, and in 1803 he sold the territory of Louisiana to the United States. In December 1804 Napoleon crowned himself Emperor of the French, further consolidating his power. The breakdown of the Treaty of Amiens led to the War of the Third Coalition by 1805. Napoleon shattered the coalition with a decisive victory at the Battle of Austerlitz, which led to the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire. In the War of the Fourth Coalition, Napoleon defeated Prussia at the Battle of Jena–Auerstedt in 1806, marched his Grande Armée into Eastern Europe, and defeated the Russians in 1807 at the Battle of Friedland. Seeking to extend his trade embargo against Britain, Napoleon invaded the Iberian Peninsula and installed his brother Joseph as King of Spain in 1808, provoking the Peninsular War. In 1809 the Austrians again challenged France in the War of the Fifth Coalition, during which Napoleon consolidated his dominance over Europe after winning the Battle of Wagram. In the summer of 1812 he launched an invasion of Russia. After forcing the Russians to abandon Moscow following the Battle of Borodino, Napoleon briefly occupied the city before conducting a catastrophic retreat of his army that winter. In 1813 Prussia and Austria joined Russia in the War of the Sixth Coalition, in which Napoleon was decisively defeated at the Battle of Leipzig. The coalition invaded France and captured Paris, forcing Napoleon to abdicate in April 1814. He was exiled to the Mediterranean island of Elba and the Bourbons were restored to power. Ten months later Napoleon escaped from Elba with around a thousand men and marched on Paris, reclaiming control of the country. His opponents responded by forming a Seventh Coalition, which defeated him at the Battle of Waterloo in June 1815. Napoleon was exiled to the remote island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic, where he died of stomach cancer in 1821, aged 51. Since his death, Napoleon has maintained a prominent place in historical research and popular culture. He is considered one of the greatest military commanders in history, and Napoleonic tactics are still studied at military schools worldwide. His legacy endures through the legal and administrative reforms he enacted in France and Western Europe, most notably the Napoleonic Code. He established a system of public education, abolished the vestiges of feudalism, emancipated Jews and other religious minorities, abolished the Spanish Inquisition, enacted the principle of equality before the law for an emerging middle class, and centralized state power at the expense of religious authorities. His conquests also acted as a catalyst for political change and the development of nation-states. However, he remains controversial because of his role in wars that devastated Europe, his looting of conquered territories, and his mixed record on civil rights. He abolished the free press, ended directly elected representative government, exiled and imprisoned critics of his regime, reinstated slavery in French colonies, banned the entry of black people and mulattos into France, reduced the civil rights of women and children, reintroduced a hereditary monarchy and nobility, and violently repressed popular uprisings against his rule.

Mahkatêwe-meshi-kêhkêhkwa, known in English as Black Hawk (c. 1767 – October 3, 1838), was a Sauk leader and warrior who lived in what is now the Midwestern United States. Although he had inherited an important historic sacred bundle from his father, he was not a hereditary civil chief. Black Hawk earned his status as a war chief or captain by his actions: leading raiding and war parties as a young man and then a band of Sauk warriors during the Black Hawk War of 1832. During the War of 1812, Black Hawk fought on the side of the British against the US in the hope of pushing white American settlers away from Sauk territory. Later, he led a band of Sauk and Meskwaki warriors, known as the British Band, against white settlers in Illinois and present-day Wisconsin during the 1832 Black Hawk War. After the war, he was captured by US forces and taken to the Eastern US, where he and other war leaders were taken on a tour of several cities. Shortly before being released from custody, Black Hawk told his story to an interpreter. Aided also by a newspaper reporter, he published Autobiography of Ma-Ka-Tai-Me-She-Kia-Kiak, or Black Hawk, Embracing the Traditions of his Nation... in 1833. The first Native American autobiography to be published in the US, his book became an immediate bestseller and has gone through several editions. Black Hawk died in 1838, at age 70 or 71, in what became southeastern Iowa. He has been honored by an enduring legacy: his book, many eponyms, and other tributes.

Petroleum, also known as crude oil or simply oil, is a natural resource that appears as a yellowish-black liquid chemical mixture found in geological formations, consisting primarily of hydrocarbons. The term petroleum refers to both naturally occurring unprocessed crude oil, as well as to petroleum products that consist of refined crude oil.

The 1881 Atlantic hurricane season featured a tropical cyclone that remains one of the deadliest in the history of the United States. Seven tropical storms are known to have developed, four of which strengthened into hurricanes, though none of those intensified into a major hurricane. However, in the absence of modern satellite and other remote-sensing technologies, only storms that affected populated land areas or encountered ships at sea were recorded, so the actual total could be higher. In 2004, meteorologist Christopher Landsea concluded that the official hurricane database (HURDAT) excludes zero to six tropical cyclones per year between 1851 and 1885 and zero to four per year between 1886 and 1910.

Between 19 May and 21 October 1883, the volcanic island of Krakatoa (located in the Sunda Strait, then part of the Dutch East Indies—modern-day Indonesia) began erupting, lasting more than five months. On 27 August, the island had its most significant eruption, which destroyed over 70% of the island and its surrounding archipelago, the island collapsing into a caldera. The eruption of 27 August had an estimated volcanic explosivity index of 6, and is one of the deadliest and most destructive volcanic events in recorded history; the third explosion of that day, that occurred at 10:02 a.m., remains the loudest-known sound in history. The explosion was heard 3,110 kilometres (1,930 mi) away in Perth, Western Australia, and Rodrigues near Mauritius, 4,800 kilometres (3,000 mi) away. The acoustic pressure wave circled the globe more than three times. At least 36,417 deaths are attributed to the eruption and the tsunamis it created. Significant additional effects were felt worldwide in the days and weeks after the volcano's eruption. Additional seismic activity was reported until February 1884, but any reports after October 1883 were dismissed by Rogier Verbeek's subsequent investigation into the eruption.

The 1893 Sea Islands hurricane was a catastrophic and deadly Category 3 major hurricane that struck the Sea Islands near Savannah, Georgia on August 27, 1893. It was the 7th deadliest hurricane in United States history, and was one of three deadly hurricanes during the 1893 Atlantic hurricane season; the storm killed an estimated 1,000–2,000 people, mostly from storm surge that inundated the low-lying areas across the Southeastern United States in Georgia and South Carolina. One long-term consequence of the hurricane was the strengthening of Jim Crow laws that enforced racial segregation in the southern United States. United States Life-Saving Service Keeper Dunbar Davis became known nationwide for rescuing four ships in the storm.

The Japanese invasion of Taiwan, also known as Yiwei War in Chinese (Chinese: 乙未戰爭; 29 May－18 November 1895), was a conflict between the Empire of Japan and the armed forces of the short-lived Republic of Formosa following the Qing dynasty's cession of Taiwan to Japan in April 1895 at the end of the First Sino-Japanese War. The Japanese sought to take control of their new possession, while the Republican forces fought to resist Japanese occupation. The Japanese landed near Keelung on the northern coast of Taiwan on 29 May 1895, and in a five-month campaign swept southwards to Tainan. Although their advance was slowed by guerrilla activity, the Japanese defeated the Formosan forces (a mixture of regular Chinese units and local Hakka militias) whenever they attempted to make a stand. The Japanese victory at Baguashan on 27 August, the largest battle ever fought on Taiwanese soil, doomed the Formosan resistance to an early defeat. The fall of Tainan on 21 October ended organised resistance to Japanese occupation, and inaugurated five decades of Japanese rule in Taiwan.

The Anglo-Zanzibar War was a military conflict fought between the United Kingdom and the Sultanate of Zanzibar on 27 August 1896. The conflict lasted between 38 and 45 minutes, marking it as the shortest recorded war in history. The immediate cause of the war was the suspicious death of the pro-British Sultan Hamad bin Thuwaini on 25 August 1896 and the subsequent succession of Sultan Khalid bin Barghash. The British authorities preferred Hamoud bin Mohammed, who was more favourable to British interests, as sultan. The agreement of 14 June 1890, instituting a British protectorate over Zanzibar, specified that a candidate for accession to the sultanate should obtain the permission of the British consul; Khalid had not fulfilled this requirement. The British considered this a casus belli and sent an ultimatum to Khalid demanding that he order his forces to stand down and leave the palace. In response, Khalid called up his palace guard and barricaded himself inside the palace. The ultimatum expired at 09:00 local time on 27 August, by which time the British had gathered two cruisers, three gunboats, 150 marines and sailors, and 900 Zanzibaris in the harbour space, ready to surround the Sultan's palace. The Royal Navy contingent were under the command of Rear-Admiral Harry Rawson and the pro-Anglo Zanzibaris were commanded by Brigadier-General Lloyd Mathews of the Zanzibar army (who was also the First Minister of Zanzibar). Around 2,800 Zanzibaris defended the palace; most were recruited from the civilian population, but they also included the sultan's palace guards and several hundred of his servants and slaves. The defenders had several artillery pieces and machine guns, which were set in front of the palace sighted at the British ships. A bombardment, opened at 09:02, set the palace on fire and disabled the defending artillery. A small naval action took place, with the British sinking the Zanzibari royal yacht HHS Glasgow and two smaller vessels. Some shots were also fired ineffectually at the pro-British Zanzibari troops as they approached the palace. The flag at the palace was shot down and fire ceased at 09:46. The sultan's forces sustained roughly 500 casualties, while only one British sailor was injured. Sultan Khalid received asylum in the German consulate before escaping to German East Africa (in the mainland part of present Tanzania). The British quickly placed Sultan Hamoud in power at the head of a puppet government. The war marked the end of the Sultanate of Zanzibar as a sovereign state and the start of a period of heavy British influence.

The Qing dynasty, officially the Great Qing, also known as the Qing Empire or Qing China, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia which existed from 1636/1644 to 1912. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the Ming dynasty and succeeded by the Republic of China. At the height of its power, the empire stretched from the Sea of Japan in the east to the Pamir Mountains in the west, and from the Mongolian Plateau in the north to the South China Sea in the south. Originally emerging from the Later Jin dynasty founded in 1616 and proclaimed in Shenyang in 1636, the dynasty seized control of the Ming capital Beijing and North China in 1644, traditionally considered the start of the dynasty's rule. The dynasty lasted until the Xinhai Revolution of October 1911 led to the abdication of the last emperor in February 1912. The multi-ethnic Qing dynasty assembled the territorial base for modern China. The Qing controlled the most territory of any dynasty in Chinese history, and in 1790 was the fourth-largest empire in world history to that point. It was also the most populous state at the time, with over 426 million citizens in 1907.

World War I, or the First World War, also known as the Great War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Central Powers. One of the deadliest conflicts in history, World War I resulted in an estimated 15 to 22 million deaths, including those in war crimes and genocides. The war also helped spread the Spanish flu pandemic. The conflict saw important developments in weaponry, including the first large-scale use of machine guns, artillery, aircraft, chemical weapons, and tanks.

The Siege of Tsingtao (German: Belagerung von Tsingtau; Japanese: 青島の戦い; simplified Chinese: 青岛战役; traditional Chinese: 青島戰役) was the attack on the German port of Qingdao (Tsingtao) from Jiaozhou Bay during World War I by Japan and the United Kingdom. The siege was waged against Imperial Germany between 27 August and 7 November 1914. The siege was the first encounter between Japanese and German forces, the first Anglo-Japanese operation of the war, and the only major land battle in the Asian and Pacific theatre during World War I.

Assassination is the willful killing, by a sudden or secret attack, of a person—especially a prominent or important one—typically for political, social, or ideological reasons. Assassinations may be ordered by individuals or organizations, and carried out by themselves or their hired accomplices. Acts of assassination have been performed since ancient times. A person who carries out an assassination is called an assassin.

The Kingdom of Romania was a constitutional monarchy that existed from 25 March [O.S. 13 March] 1881 with the crowning of prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen as King Carol I, until 30 December 1947 with the abdication of King Michael I and the Romanian Parliament proclamation of the Romanian People's Republic.

The Mexican Revolution was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from 20 November 1910 to 1 December 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It saw the destruction of the Federal Army, its replacement by a revolutionary army, and the transformation of Mexican culture and government. The northern Constitutionalist faction prevailed on the battlefield and drafted the present-day Constitution of Mexico, which aimed to create a strong central government. Revolutionary generals held power from 1920 to 1940. The revolutionary conflict was primarily a civil war, but foreign powers, having important economic and strategic interests in Mexico, figured in the outcome of Mexico's power struggles; the U.S. involvement was particularly high. The conflict led to the deaths of around one million people, mostly non-combatants.

The Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922 was fought between Greece and the Turkish National Movement during the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire in the aftermath of World War I, between 15 May 1919 and 14 October 1922. This conflict was a part of the Turkish War of Independence. The causes and aims of the war have been debated and interpreted differently in the historiography. One major stated justification for the Greek military campaign was the protection of Greek populations amid continuing violence against Ottoman Greeks. By contrast, the Turkish National Movement presented the conflict as a defensive struggle to preserve Turkish homelands against foreign occupation. The armed conflict started when the Greek forces landed in Smyrna (now İzmir), on 15 May 1919. In the Greek Summer Offensive of 1920, they advanced inland and took control of the western and northwestern part of Anatolia, including the cities of Manisa, Balıkesir, Aydın, Bursa and Uşak, among others. In 1921, after another Greek victory in the Battle of Kütahya–Eskişehir, the Greek forces almost reached Ankara, but their advance was finally checked by Turkish forces at the Battle of the Sakarya. The Greek front eventually collapsed with the Turkish counter-attack in August 1922, and the war effectively ended with the recapture of Smyrna by Turkish forces and the great fire of Smyrna. As a result, the Greek government accepted the demands of the Turkish National Movement and returned to its pre-war borders, thus leaving Eastern Thrace and Western Anatolia to Turkey. The Allies abandoned the Treaty of Sèvres to negotiate a new treaty at Lausanne with the Turkish National Movement. The Treaty of Lausanne recognized the independence of the Republic of Turkey and its sovereignty over Anatolia, Istanbul, and Eastern Thrace. The Greek and Turkish governments agreed to engage in a population exchange.

The Kellogg–Briand Pact or Pact of Paris is a 1928 international agreement on peace in which signatory states promised not to use war to resolve "disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise among them". The pact was signed by Germany, France, and the United States on 27 August 1928, and by most other states soon after. Sponsored by France and the US, the Pact is named after its authors, United States Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg and French foreign minister Aristide Briand. The pact was concluded outside the League of Nations and remains in effect.

The turbojet is an airbreathing jet engine which is typically used in aircraft. It consists of a gas turbine with a propelling nozzle. The gas turbine has an air inlet which includes inlet guide vanes, a compressor, a combustion chamber, and a turbine. The compressed air from the compressor is heated by burning fuel in the combustion chamber and then allowed to expand through the turbine. The turbine exhaust is then expanded in the propelling nozzle where it is accelerated to high speed to provide thrust. Two engineers, Frank Whittle in the United Kingdom and Hans von Ohain in Germany, developed the concept independently into practical engines during the late 1930s.

The Holocaust, known in Hebrew as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered around six million Jews across German-occupied Europe, approximately two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. The murders were committed primarily through mass shootings across Eastern Europe and poison gas chambers in extermination camps, chiefly Auschwitz-Birkenau, Treblinka, Belzec, Sobibor, Chełmno and Majdanek death camps in occupied Poland. Concurrent Nazi persecutions killed millions of other non-Jewish civilians and prisoners of war (POWs); the term Holocaust is sometimes used to include the murder and persecution of non-Jewish groups, such as the Romani and Soviet POWs.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated, with many engaging in total war on an unprecedented scale. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, causing the deaths of 60 to 75 million people, a majority of whom were civilians. Millions died as a result of massacres, starvation, disease, and genocides including the Holocaust. After the Allied victory, Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea were occupied, and German and Japanese leaders were tried for war crimes.

The Luftwaffe was the aerial-warfare branch of the Wehrmacht before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the Luftstreitkräfte of the Imperial Army and the Marine-Fliegerabteilung of the Imperial Navy, had been disbanded in May 1920 in accordance with the terms of the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, which banned Germany from having any air force.

Guinness World Records, known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as The Guinness Book of Records and in previous United States editions as The Guinness Book of World Records, is a British reference book published annually, listing world records both of human achievements and the extremes of the natural world. Sir Hugh Beaver created the concept in order to settle arguments debated in pubs, and twin brothers Norris and Ross McWhirter co-founded the book in London in late August 1955.

Calder Hall Nuclear Power Station is a former Magnox nuclear power station on the Sellafield site in Cumbria in North West England. Calder Hall was the first full-scale nuclear power station to enter operation in the World, and was the sister plant to the Chapelcross plant in Scotland. Both were commissioned and originally operated by the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority. The primary purpose of both plants was to produce weapons-grade plutonium for the UK's nuclear weapons programme, but they also generated electrical power for the National Grid.

Mariner 2, an American space probe to Venus, was the first robotic space probe to report successfully from a planetary encounter. The first successful spacecraft in the NASA Mariner program, it was a simplified version of the Block I spacecraft of the Ranger program and an exact copy of Mariner 1. The missions of the Mariner 1 and 2 spacecraft are sometimes known as the Mariner R missions. Original plans called for the probes to be launched on the Atlas-Centaur, but serious developmental problems with that vehicle forced a switch to the much smaller Agena B second stage. As such, the design of the Mariner R vehicles was greatly simplified. Far less instrumentation was carried than on the Soviet Venera probes of this period—for example, forgoing a TV camera—as the Atlas-Agena B had only half as much lift capacity as the Soviet 8K78 booster. The Mariner 2 spacecraft was launched from Cape Canaveral on August 27, 1962, and passed as close as 34,773 km (21,607 mi) to Venus on December 14, 1962.

Intrepid Potash, Inc., based in Denver, Colorado, is a fertilizer manufacturer. The company is the largest producer of potassium chloride, also known as muriate of potash, in the United States. It owns three mines, all in the Western U.S., near the cities of Carlsbad, New Mexico, Moab, Utah, and Wendover, Utah.

The Army of the Republic of Vietnam composed the ground forces of the South Vietnamese military from its inception in 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. Its predecessor was the ground forces of the Vietnamese National Army, established on 8 December 1950, representing Vietnam to fight in the First Indochina War against the communist Viet Minh rebels. At the ARVN's peak, an estimated 1 in 9 citizens of South Vietnam were enlisted, composed of Regular Forces and the more voluntary Regional Forces and the Popular Force militias. It is estimated to have suffered 1,394,000 casualties during the Vietnam War.

A coup d'état, or simply a coup, is typically an illegal and overt attempt by a military organization or other government elites to unseat an incumbent person or leadership. A self-coup is said to take place when a leader, having come to power through legal means, tries to stay in power through illegal means.

Portuguese Timor was a Portuguese colony on the territory of present-day Timor-Leste from 1702 until 1975. During most of this period, Portugal shared the island of Timor with the Dutch East Indies.

The Troubles were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is usually deemed to have ended with the Good Friday Agreement of 1998. Although centred in Northern Ireland, violence at times spilled into the Republic of Ireland, England, and mainland Europe. The conflict arose from political and nationalistic disputes with a strong ethnic and sectarian dimension. Unionists and loyalists, mostly Ulster Protestants, wanted Northern Ireland to remain in the United Kingdom, while Irish nationalists and republicans, mostly Irish Catholics, wanted it to join a united Ireland. Despite the division between Protestants and Catholics, it was not a religious war.

A military attaché or defence attaché (DA), sometimes known as a "military diplomat", is an official responsible for military matters within a diplomatic mission, typically an embassy. They are usually high-ranking members of the armed forces who retain their commission while being accorded full diplomatic status and immunity.

Muhammadu Buhari was a Nigerian general and politician who ruled as military dictator of Nigeria from 1983 to 1985, and later served as the democratically elected civilian president of Nigeria from 2015 to 2023.

Space Shuttle Discovery is a retired American Space Shuttle orbiter. The spaceplane was one of the orbiters from NASA's Space Shuttle program and the third of five fully operational orbiters to be built. Its first mission, STS-41-D, flew from August 30 to September 5, 1984. Over 27 years of service it launched and landed 39 times, aggregating more spaceflights than any other spacecraft as of December 2024. The Space Shuttle launch vehicle had three main components: the Space Shuttle orbiter, a single-use central fuel tank, and two reusable solid rocket boosters. Nearly 25,000 heat-resistant tiles cover the orbiter to protect it from high temperatures on re-entry.

The European Economic Community (EEC) was a regional organisation created by the Treaty of Rome of 1957, aiming to foster economic integration among its member states. It was subsequently renamed the European Community (EC) upon becoming integrated into the first pillar of the newly formed European Union (EU) in 1993. In the popular language, the singular European Community was sometimes inaccurately used in the wider sense of the plural European Communities, in spite of the latter designation covering all the three constituent entities of the first pillar. The EEC was also known as the European Common Market (ECM) in the English-speaking countries, and sometimes referred to as the European Community even before it was officially renamed as such in 1993. In 2009, the EC formally ceased to exist and its institutions were directly absorbed by the EU. This made the Union the formal successor institution of the Community.

Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of 33,843 km2 (13,067 sq mi) and a population of 2.38 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The unrecognised breakaway state of Transnistria lies across the Dniester river on the country's eastern border with Ukraine. Moldova is a parliamentary democratic republic with its capital in Chișinău, the country's largest city and main cultural and commercial centre.

Aeroflot Flight 2808 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight from Mineralnye Vody to Ivanovo, both in Russia, with a stopover in Donetsk, Ukraine on 27 August 1992. While attempting to land at Ivanovo airport, the Tupolev Tu-134 crashed into a group of buildings in the village of Lebyazhy Lug. Investigators determined the cause of the accident was errors made by the crew and the air traffic controller. There were no fatalities on the ground, but all 84 people on board the flight died in the crash.

Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", for its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous atmosphere that is primarily carbon dioxide. At the average surface level the atmospheric pressure is a few thousandths of Earth's, atmospheric temperature ranges from −153 to 20 °C, and cosmic radiation is high. Mars retains some water, in the ground as well as thinly in the atmosphere, forming cirrus clouds, fog, frost, larger polar regions of permafrost and ice caps, but no bodies of liquid surface water. Its surface gravity is roughly a third of Earth's or double that of the Moon. Its mean diameter, 6,779 km (4,212 mi), is about half the Earth's, or twice the Moon's, and its surface area is around the size of all the dry land of Earth.

Comair Flight 5191 was a scheduled United States domestic passenger flight from Lexington, Kentucky, to Atlanta, Georgia. On the morning of August 27, 2006, at around 06:07 EDT, the Bombardier CRJ100 crashed while attempting to take off from Blue Grass Airport in Fayette County, Kentucky, four miles west of the central business district of the city of Lexington.

Myanmar has been in armed conflict since 1948, when the country, then known as Burma, gained independence from the United Kingdom. The conflict has largely been ethnic-based, with ethnic armed organisations fighting Myanmar's armed forces, the Tatmadaw, for self-determination. Despite numerous ceasefires and the creation of autonomous self-administered zones in 2008, armed groups continue to call for independence, increased autonomy, democracy, or the federalisation of Myanmar. It is the world's longest ongoing civil war, spanning almost eight decades.

Hurricane Irene was a large and destructive tropical cyclone which affected much of the Caribbean and East Coast of the United States during late August 2011. The ninth named storm, first hurricane, and first major hurricane of the 2011 Atlantic hurricane season, Irene originated from a well-defined Atlantic tropical wave that began showing signs of organization east of the Lesser Antilles. Due to development of atmospheric convection and a closed center of circulation, the system was designated as Tropical Storm Irene on August 20, 2011. After intensifying, Irene made landfall in St. Croix as a strong tropical storm later that day. Early on August 21, the storm made a second landfall in Puerto Rico. While crossing the island, Irene strengthened into a Category 1 hurricane. The storm paralleled offshore of Hispaniola, continuing to slowly intensify in the process. Shortly before making four landfalls in The Bahamas, Irene peaked as a 120 mph (190 km/h) Category 3 hurricane.