1539

Year 1539 (MDXXXIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.

Events

January–June

• Burma
  : The Toungoos decisively defeat the Hanthawaddys.
• Henry VIII of England's split with Rome and Pope Paul III
  .
• January 14 – Spain annexes Cuba.
• February 9 – The first horse race is held at Chester Racecourse, the oldest in use in England.^[1]
• March – Canterbury Cathedral surrenders, and reverts to its previous status of 'a college of secular canons'.
• Hernando de Soto lands at Tampa Bay, Florida with 600 soldiers, with the goal of finding gold. He also introduces pigs into North America
  .
• Henry VIII's Church of England.^[2]
• June 26 – Battle of Chausa in modern-day Buxar, India: Sher Shah Suri defeats the Mughal emperor, Humayun (Sher Shah goes on to form the Sur Empire, and take control of nearly all Mughal territory).

July–December

• August 15 – King Francis I of France issues the Ordinance of Villers-Cotterêt, that places the whole of France under the jurisdiction of the royal law courts, and makes French the language of those courts, and the official language of legal discourse.
• Guru Angad Dev becomes the second Guru of the Sikhs
  .
• Henry VIII contracts to marry Anne of Cleves.^[3]
• Joachim II Hector
  introduces Lutheranism in the Margraviate of Brandenburg, becoming the second Prince-Elector after the Prince-Elector of Saxony to turn Protestant.
• November 26 – Abbot Marmaduke Bradley and 31 monks sign the deed surrendering Fountains Abbey to the English Crown. ^[4]

Undated

• Protestant Reformation
  • Lutheranism is forcibly introduced into Iceland, despite the opposition of Bishop Jón Arason.
  • Dissolution of the Monasteries
    in England.
  • The first edition of the
    Genevan Psalter
    is published.
• In Henan province, China, a severe drought with swarms of locusts is made worse, by a major epidemic outbreak of the plague.
• The first printing press in North America is set up in Mexico City.^[5]
• Teseo Ambrogio's Introductio in Chaldaicam lingua, Syriaca atq Armenica, & dece alias linguas, published in Pavia, introduces several Middle Eastern languages to western Europe for the first time.

Births

• January 28 – Nicolò Donato, Doge of Venice (d. 1618)
• February 13 – Elisabeth of Hesse, Electress Palatine by marriage (1576-1582) (d. 1582)
• February 23
  • Henry XI of Legnica, thrice Duke of Legnica (d. 1588)
  • Salima Sultan Begum, Empress of the Mughal Empire as a wife of Emperor Akbar (d. 1613)
• February 27 – Franciscus Raphelengius, Dutch printer (d. 1597)
• March 5 – Christoph Pezel, German theologian (d. 1604)
• March 18 – Maria of Nassau, Countess of Nassau (d. 1599)
• April 5 – George Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach (d. 1603)
• April 6 – Amalia of Neuenahr, German noble (d. 1602)
• April 7
  • Tobias Stimmer, Swiss artist (d. 1584)
  • Strange Jørgenssøn, Norwegian businessman (d. 1610)
• April 30 – Archduchess Barbara of Austria, Austrian archduchess (d. 1572)
• May 22 – Edward Seymour, 1st Earl of Hertford (d. 1621)
• May 29 – Thomas Pounde, English Jesuit lay brother (d. 1613)
• Catherine Vasa, Regent of East Frisia (1599-1610) (d. 1610
  )
• June 13 – Jost Amman, Swiss printmaker (d. 1591)
• June 23 – William Darrell of Littlecote, English politician (d. 1589)
• July 4 – Louis VI, Elector Palatine (d. 1583)
• Louis Gonzaga, Duke of Nevers, Italian-French dignitary and diplomat (d. 1595
  )
• Peter Vok, Czech noble (d. 1611
  )
• November 1 – Pierre Pithou, French lawyer and scholar (d. 1596)
• Fausto Paolo Sozzini, Italian theologian (d. 1604
  )
• December 20 – Paulus Melissus, German composer (d. 1602)
• December 31 – John Radcliffe, English politician (d. 1568)
• date unknown
  • José Luis Carvajal y de la Cueva, Portuguese explorer (d. 1590
    )
  • Hasegawa Tōhaku, Japanese painter (d. 1610)
  • Laurence Tomson, English Calvinist (d. 1608)
  • Humphrey Gilbert, English adventurer, explorer, member of Parliament and soldier (d. 1583)

Deaths

• January 24 – Anneke Esaiasdochter, Dutch Anabaptist writer (b. 1509)
• February – Narapati of Prome, king of Prome in Burma.
• February 6 – John III, Duke of Cleves (b. 1491)
• February 13 – Isabella d'Este, Marquise of Mantua (b. 1474)^[6]
• March 5 – Nuno da Cunha, Portuguese governor in India (b. 1487)
• March 12 – Thomas Boleyn, 1st Earl of Wiltshire, English diplomat and politician (b.1477)
• March 19 – Lord Edmund Howard, English nobleman (b. c. 1478))
• April 17 – George, Duke of Saxony (b. 1471)
• April 19 – Katarzyna Weiglowa, Jewish martyr (b. 1460)
• April 30 – John Bourchier, 1st Earl of Bath, English noble (b. 1470)
• May 1 – Isabella of Portugal, Holy Roman Empress (b. 1503)^[7]
• May 7 – Ottaviano Petrucci, Italian printer (b. 1466)
• May 7 or September 22 – Guru Nanak, founder of Sikhism (b. 1469)
• June 20 – Philip III, Count of Waldeck-Eisenberg (1524–1539) (b. 1486)
• St Anthony Maria Zaccaria, Italian saint (b. 1502
  )
• July 9 – Adrian Fortescue, English Roman Catholic martyr (b. 1476)
• August – Vannoccio Biringuccio, Italian metallurgist (b. 1480)
• September 8 – John Stokesley, English prelate (b. 1475)^[8]
• Hugh Cook Faringdon
  , English Abbot of Reading
• December 12 – Bartolomeo degli Organi, Italian musician (b. 1474)
• December 20 – Johannes Lupi, Flemish composer (b. c. 1506)
• date unknown
  • James Beaton, Scottish church leader (b. 1473)
  • Cura Ocllo, Inca queen

References