[CaptainCrunch]

Jan 16

27 BC – Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus is granted the title Augustus by the Roman Senate, marking the beginning of the Roman Empire.

550 – Gothic War: The Ostrogoths, under King Totila, conquer Rome after a long siege, by bribing the Isaurian garrison.

1120 – The Council of Nablus is held, establishing the earliest surviving written laws of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem.

1492 – The first grammar of the Spanish language (Gramática de la lengua castellana) is presented to Queen Isabella I.

1547 – Grand Duke Ivan IV of Muscovy becomes the first Tsar of Russia, replacing the 264-year-old Grand Duchy of Moscow with the Tsardom of Russia.

1572 – Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk is tried for treason for his part in the Ridolfi plot to restore Catholicism in England.

1707 – The Scottish Parliament ratifies the Act of Union, paving the way for the creation of Great Britain.

1780 – American Revolutionary War: Battle of Cape St. Vincent.

1786 – Virginia enacts the Statute for Religious Freedom authored by Thomas Jefferson.

1883 – The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, establishing the United States Civil Service, is passed.

1909 – Ernest Shackleton's expedition finds the magnetic South Pole.

1919 – Temperance movement: The United States ratifies the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, requiring Prohibition in the United States one year after ratification.




1920 – The League of Nations holds its first council meeting in Paris, France.

1945 – Adolf Hitler moves into his underground bunker, the so-called Führerbunker.

1964 – Hello, Dolly! opened on Broadway, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.

1969 – Czech student Jan Palach commits suicide by self-immolation in Prague, Czechoslovakia, in protest against the Soviets' crushing of the Prague Spring the year before.

1969 – Soviet spacecraft Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 perform the first-ever docking of manned spacecraft in orbit, the first-ever transfer of crew from one space vehicle to another, and the only time such a transfer was accomplished with a space walk.



1979 – The last Iranian Shah flees Iran with his family for good and relocates to Egypt.

1991 – Coalition Forces go to war with Iraq, beginning the Gulf War.

2002 – The UN Security Council unanimously establishes an arms embargo and the freezing of assets of Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and the remaining members of the Taliban.

2003 – The Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission STS-107 which would be its final one. Columbia disintegrated 16 days later on re-entry.