AncientPages.com  – On 25 August 1609, the Italian astronomer and philosopher Galileo Galilei showed Venetian merchants his new invention, a telescope, an important instrument to observe the sky. This invention made him famous much later, but it also brought him

AncientPages.com – On August 23, 1305, great Scottish hero William Wallace was hanged, drawn, and cut into pieces. It was a traitor’s death. On this day, William Wallace was tried in Westminster Hall; a list of his crimes, including murder and

AncientPages.com – On 22 August 1572, “Earl of Northumberland” Thomas Percy was executed because he was Catholic. Thomas Percy was a Catholic and lived when the Protestant Queen Elizabeth I (a member of the Tudor dynasty) ruled England. The English allegedly

AncientPages.com – On August 21, 1680, Pueblo Indians captured Santa Fe from the Spanish.Pueblo Indians were peaceful people who managed to endure much after New Mexico’s colonization in 1598. They succeeded in overthrowing Spanish rule in New Mexico for 12

AncentPages.com – On August 20, 1940, exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky was fatally stabbed by a pick of an ice axe in his skull. The next day Leon Trotsky died. His assassin, Ramon Mercader, was a Spanish communist and a secret

AncientPages.com – On August 19, 1759, the naval Battle of Lagos between the Royal Navy of Britain and France, which began one day earlier, continued. This historical event happened off the coasts of Spain and Portugal and is named after Lagos,

AncientPages.com – On August 18, 1227, Genghis Khan died during the siege of Ningxia. The cause of his death remains unknown and has been attributed to being slain in battle, illness, falling from a horse. His dreams of conquest did not

AncientPages.com – On August 17, 1970, Venera 7, a Soviet spacecraft, was launched from Earth as part of the Venera series of probes to Venus. When it landed on the Venusian surface, it became the first spacecraft to land on

AncientPages.com – On August 16, 1896, while camping near Rabbit Creek near the Klondike River in Canada’s Yukon Territory, George Carmack reportedly spotted nuggets of gold in a creek bed. Panning gold during the Klondike Gold Rush (© Library and

AncientPages.com – On 15 August 1057, Macbeth was killed at the Battle of Lumphanan in 1057 by forces loyal to the future Malcolm III. He was buried on Iona, the traditional resting place of Scottish kings. On this day, Malcolm

AncientPages.com – On August 14, 1720, the Spanish Villasur expedition was wiped out by Pawnee and Otoe warriors near present-day Columbus, Nebraska. In June 1720, a Spanish military force led by Sir Pedro de Villasur left Santa Fe, New Mexico, to

AncientPages.com – On Aug. 13, 1792, the National Tribunal in Paris formally arrested King Louis XVI of France and the royal family, including Queen Mary Antoinette, the king’s son and heir to the throne, the king’s daughter, and the king’s sister

AncientPages.com – On August 12, 1990, the largest and best-preserved Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton to date was discovered and nicknamed “Sue”. The discoverer was the paleontologist Susan “Sue” Hendrickson. In the meantime, the skeleton was sold for 7.6 million dollars, the highest price

AncientPages.com – On August 11, 3114 BC, the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar began. It was in use by several pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilizations, especially the Maya. According to Maya theology, the world was created on a date modern people would write as

AncientPages.com – On August 10, 1675, King Charles II laid the foundation stone of the Royal Greenwich Observatory in London, England. The building was designed by Sir Christopher Wren, who was also a Professor of Astronomy. Dome of the Greenwich

AncientPages.com – On 9 August 48 BC, the Battle of Pharsalus was fought between Julius Caesar and Pompeius Magnus (“Pompey the Great”), who fled to Egypt. In this decisive battle of Caesar’s Civil War, on this day, Gaius Julius Caesar