What happened today in history
May
What happened on May 20
On May 20 history recorded 64 notable events. 160 people who left a mark were born on this day, and 104 died. Here is the full almanac.
- 64events
- 160births
- 104deaths
- 21observances
Highlights
Highlights
325The First Council of Nicaea, the first ecumenical council of the Christian Church, was formally opened by Constantine the Great.
The First Council of Nicaea was a council of Christian bishops convened in the Bithynian city of Nicaea by the Roman Emperor Constantine I, also known as the First Ecumenical Council. It met from May until the end of July 325.
685The Picts defeated the Northumbrians at the Battle of Dun Nechtain, severely weakening the latter's power in northern Great Britain.
The Picts were a group of peoples in what is now Scotland north of the Firth of Forth, in the Early Middle Ages. Where they lived and details of their culture can be gleaned from early medieval texts and Pictish stones. The name Picti appears in written record
794According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, King Æthelberht II of East Anglia was beheaded on the orders of Offa of Mercia.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is the term used by historians to describe a set of annals in Old English, chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons.
May 20
On this day
IV century
- 325
325The First Council of Nicaea is formally opened, starting the first ecumenical council of the Christian Church.
V century
VII century
VIII century
X century
XIII century
- 1202
1202A major earthquake hits Syria, widely felt between Sicily and Iraq. - 1217
1217The Second Battle of Lincoln is fought near Lincoln, England, resulting in the defeat of Prince Louis of France by William Marshal, 1st Earl of Pembroke. - 1293
1293King Sancho IV of Castile creates the Estudio de Escuelas de Generales in Alcalá de Henares.
XV century
- 1426
1426King Mohnyin Thado formally ascends to the throne of Ava. - 1449
1449The Battle of Alfarrobeira is fought, establishing the House of Braganza as a principal royal family of Portugal. - 1497
1497John Cabot sets sail from Bristol, England, on his ship Matthew looking for a route to the west (other documents give a May 2 date). - 1498
1498Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama discovers the sea route to India when he arrives at Kozhikode (previously known as Calicut), India.
XVI century
XVII century
- 1609
1609Shakespeare's sonnets are first published in London, perhaps illicitly, by the publisher Thomas Thorpe. - 1631
1631The city of Magdeburg in Germany is seized by forces of the Holy Roman Empire and most of its inhabitants massacred, in one of the bloodiest incidents of the Thirty Years' War. - 1645
1645Yangzhou massacre: The ten day massacre of the residents of the city of Yangzhou, part of the Transition from Ming to Qing.
XVIII century
- 1714
1714Johann Sebastian Bach leads the first performance of his cantata for Pentecost, Erschallet, ihr Lieder, BWV 172, at the chapel of Schloss Weimar. - 1741
1741The Battle of Cartagena de Indias ends in a Spanish victory and the British begin withdrawal towards Jamaica with substantial losses. - 1775
1775The Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence is allegedly signed in Charlotte, North Carolina.
XIX century
- 1802
1802By the Law of 20 May 1802, Napoleon Bonaparte reinstates slavery in the French colonies, revoking its abolition in the French Revolution. - 1813
1813Napoleon Bonaparte leads his French troops into the Battle of Bautzen in Saxony, Germany, against the combined armies of Russia and Prussia. The battle ends the next day with a French victory. - 1861
1861American Civil War: The state of Kentucky proclaims its neutrality, which will last until September 3 when Confederate forces enter the state. - 1861
1861American Civil War: The State of North Carolina secedes from the Union. - 1862
1862U.S. President Abraham Lincoln signs the Homestead Act into law, opening eighty-four million acres (340,000 km2) of public land to settlers. - 1864
1864American Civil War: Battle of Ware Bottom Church: In the Virginia Bermuda Hundred campaign, 10,000 troops fight in this Confederate victory. - 1873
1873Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis receive a U.S. patent for blue jeans with copper rivets. - 1875
1875Signing of the Metre Convention by 17 nations leading to the establishment of the International System of Units. - 1882
1882The Triple Alliance between the German Empire, Austria-Hungary and the Kingdom of Italy is formed. - 1883
1883Krakatoa begins to erupt; the volcano explodes three months later, killing more than 36,000 people. - 1891
1891History of cinema: The first public display of Thomas Edison's prototype kinetoscope.
XX century
- 1902
1902Cuba gains independence from the United States. Tomás Estrada Palma becomes the country's first President. - 1927
1927Treaty of Jeddah: The United Kingdom recognizes the sovereignty of King Ibn Saud in the Kingdoms of Hejaz and Nejd, which later merge to become the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. - 1927
1927Charles Lindbergh takes off for Paris from Roosevelt Field in Long Island, N.Y., aboard the Spirit of St. Louis on the first nonstop solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean, landing 33+1⁄2 hours later. - 1932
1932Amelia Earhart takes off from Newfoundland to begin the world's first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean by a female pilot, landing in Ireland the next day. - 1940
1940The Holocaust: The first prisoners arrive at a new concentration camp at Auschwitz. - 1941
1941World War II: Battle of Crete: German paratroops invade Crete. - 1943
1943The Luttra Woman, a bog body from the Early Neolithic period (radiocarbon-dated c. 3928–3651 BC), is discovered near Luttra, Sweden. - 1948
1948Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek wins the 1948 Republic of China presidential election and is sworn in as the first President of the Republic of China at Nanjing. - 1949
1949In the United States, the Armed Forces Security Agency, the predecessor to the National Security Agency, is established. - 1956
1956In Operation Redwing, the first United States airborne hydrogen bomb is dropped over Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean. - 1958
1958Capital Airlines Flight 300 collides in mid-air with a United States Air Force Lockheed T-33 over Brunswick, Maryland, killing 12. - 1964
1964Discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation by Robert Woodrow Wilson and Arno Penzias. - 1965
1965One hundred twenty-one people are killed when Pakistan International Airlines Flight 705 crashes at Cairo International Airport. - 1967
1967The Popular Movement of the Revolution political party is established in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. - 1969
1969The Battle of Hamburger Hill in Vietnam ends. - 1971
1971In the Chuknagar massacre, Pakistani forces massacre thousands, mostly Bengali Hindus. - 1980
1980In a referendum in Quebec, the population rejects, with 60% of the vote, a government proposal to move towards independence from Canada. - 1983
1983First publications of the discovery of the HIV virus that causes AIDS in the journal Science by a team of French scientists including Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, Jean-Claude Chermann, and Luc Montagnier. - 1983
1983Church Street bombing: A car bomb planted by UMkhonto we Sizwe explodes on Church Street in South Africa's capital, Pretoria, killing 19 people and injuring 217 others. - 1985
1985Radio Martí, part of the Voice of America service, begins broadcasting to Cuba. - 1989
1989The Chinese authorities declare martial law in the face of pro-democracy demonstrations, setting the scene for the Tiananmen Square massacre. - 1990
1990The first post-Communist presidential and parliamentary elections are held in Romania. - 1996
1996Civil rights: The Supreme Court of the United States rules in Romer v. Evans against a law that would have prevented any city, town or county in the state of Colorado from taking any legislative, executive, or judicial action to protect the rights of gays and lesbians.
XXI century
- 2002
2002The independence of East Timor is recognized by Portugal, formally ending 23 years of Indonesian rule and three years of provisional UN administration (Portugal itself is the former colonizer of East Timor until 1976). - 2009
2009An Indonesian Air Force Lockheed L-100 Hercules crashes in Magetan Regency, killing 99. - 2011
2011Mamata Banerjee is sworn in as the Chief Minister of West Bengal, the first woman to hold this post. - 2012
2012At least 27 people are killed and 50 others injured when a 6.0-magnitude earthquake strikes northern Italy. - 2013
2013An EF5 tornado strikes the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore, killing 24 people and injuring 377 others. - 2016
2016The government of Singapore authorises the controversial execution of convicted murderer Kho Jabing for the murder of a Chinese construction worker despite international pleas for clemency, notably from Amnesty International and the United Nations. - 2019
2019The International System of Units (SI): The base units are redefined, making the international prototype of the kilogram obsolete. - 2022
2022Russo-Ukrainian war: Russia claims full control of the Ukrainian city of Mariupol after a nearly three-month siege.
Best known
Born on May 20
Best known
Died on May 20
794Æthelberht II of East Anglia
8th-century king and saint
965Gero
German nobleman (c. 900 – 965)
1062Bao Zheng
11th-century Chinese politician and cultural personification of justice
1277Pope John XXI
Head of the Catholic Church from 1276 to 1277
1291Jalaluddin Surkh-Posh Bukhari
South Asian Sufi saint
1366Maria of Calabria
Countess of Alba
Holidays and observances
- Christian feast day: Abercius and Helena
- Christian feast day: Alcuin of York
- Christian feast day: Aurea of Ostia
- Christian feast day: Austregisilus
- Christian feast day: Baudilus
- Christian feast day: Bernardino of Siena
- Christian feast day: Columba of Rieti
- Christian feast day: Lydia of Thyatira
- Christian feast day: Lucifer of Cagliari
- Christian feast day: Sanctan
- Christian feast day: May 20 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
- Day of Remembrance (Cambodia)
- Emancipation Day (Florida)
- European Maritime Day (European Council)
Frequently asked questions
What happened on May 20?
64 documented historical events happened on May 20, from antiquity to the present day. The best known is this: The First Council of Nicaea, the first ecumenical council of the Christian Church, was formally opened by Constantine the Great. On the same day, in another year: The Picts defeated the Northumbrians at the Battle of Dun Nechtain, severely weakening the latter's power in northern Great Britain. On Almanaccolo every event is listed in chronological order, grouped by century, and links to the Wikipedia article it comes from, so you can always read further or check the source. Alongside the events you find who was born and who died on this date, and which observances are celebrated around the world.
Who was born on May 20?
160 people with a Wikipedia article were born on May 20, including Teodoro Fernández, Bill Hewlett, Moshe Dayan. The list spans every era and every field — art, science, politics, sport, entertainment — ordered by year of birth, from the earliest to the most recent. The six featured people are those most has been written about: the ordering uses the length of their Wikipedia article as an indicator of prominence. For each one you find their occupation, year of birth and a link to the full biography.
Who died on May 20?
104 people with a Wikipedia article died on May 20, including Æthelberht II of East Anglia, Gero, Bao Zheng. The list is in chronological order by year of death and spans all of documented history, from antiquity to the present day. For each person you find their occupation, the year and a link to the Wikipedia biography, where the full story and its sources can be read.
What is celebrated on May 20?
21 observances are celebrated on May 20 around the world: Christian feast day: Abercius and Helena, Christian feast day: Alcuin of York, Christian feast day: Aurea of Ostia, Christian feast day: Austregisilus, Christian feast day: Baudilus, Christian feast day: Bernardino of Siena. The list gathers national holidays, international days and religious or civil observances falling on this date in different countries, as recorded on Wikipedia. Some are fixed and recur on the same day every year; others depend on the local calendar. Each links to the article explaining its origin and meaning.
Keep exploring
Free app
Every day’s history, in your pocket
Almanaccolo greets you each morning with the almanac of the day, sunrise and sunset times and your saved events.
- Today’s almanac, every morning
- Save the events that strike you
- Sunrise, sunset and weather for your city
- Free, no account required
Source: Wikipedia · Calendar