1276Magnus Ladulås is crowned King of Sweden in Uppsala Cathedral.
1487The ten-year-old Lambert Simnel is crowned in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, Ireland, with the name of Edward VI in a bid to threaten King Henry VII's reign.
1567Erik XIV of Sweden and his guards murder five incarcerated Swedish nobles.
1595Nomenclator of Leiden University Library appears, the first printed catalog of an institutional library.
1667The French Royal Army crosses the border into the Spanish Netherlands, starting the War of Devolution opposing France to the Spanish Empire and the Triple Alliance.
1683The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England, opens as the world's first university museum.
1738John Wesley is converted, essentially launching the Methodist movement; the day is celebrated annually by Methodists as Aldersgate Day and a church service is generally held on the preceding Sunday.
1813South American independence leader Simón Bolívar enters Mérida, leading the invasion of Venezuela, and is proclaimed El Libertador ("The Liberator").
1822Battle of Pichincha: Antonio José de Sucre secures the independence of the Presidency of Quito.
1844Samuel Morse sends the message "What hath God wrought" (a biblical quotation, Numbers 23:23) from a committee room in the United States Capitol to his assistant, Alfred Vail, in Baltimore, Maryland, to inaugurate a commercial telegraph line between Baltimore and Washington D.C.
1856John Brown and his men kill five slavery supporters at Pottawatomie Creek, Kansas.
1861American Civil War: Union troops occupy Alexandria, Virginia, with Colonel Elmer E. Ellsworth becoming the first Union officer to be killed during the war.
1873Patrick Francis Healy becomes the first black president of a predominantly white university in the United States.
1930Amy Johnson lands in Darwin, Northern Territory, becoming the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia (she left on May 5 for the 11,000 mile flight).
1935The first night game in Major League Baseball history is played in Cincinnati, Ohio, with the Cincinnati Reds beating the Philadelphia Phillies 2–1 at Crosley Field.
1940Igor Sikorsky performs the first successful single-rotor helicopter flight.
1940Acting on the orders of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, NKVD agent Iosif Grigulevich orchestrates an unsuccessful assassination attempt on exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky in Coyoacán, Mexico.
1941World War II: Battle of the Atlantic: In the Battle of the Denmark Strait, the German battleship Bismarck sinks the pride of the Royal Navy, , killing all but three crewmen.
1944Börse Berlin building burns down after being hit in an air raid during World War II.
1944Congress of Përmet occurs which establishes a provisional government in Albania in areas under partisan control, the first independent Albanian government since 1939. In honor of this the national emblem of Albania inscribed this date from 1946 until 1992.
1948Arab–Israeli War: Egypt captures the Israeli kibbutz of Yad Mordechai, but the five-day effort gives Israeli forces time to prepare enough to stop the Egyptian advance a week later.
1956The first Eurovision Song Contest is held in Lugano, Switzerland.
1958United Press International is formed through a merger of the United Press and the International News Service.
1960Following the 1960 Valdivia earthquake, the largest ever recorded earthquake, Cordón Caulle begins to erupt.
1961American civil rights movement: Freedom Riders are arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, for "disturbing the peace" after disembarking from their bus.
1962Project Mercury: American astronaut Scott Carpenter orbits the Earth three times in the Aurora 7 space capsule.
1967Belle de Jour, directed by Luis Buñuel, is released.
1976The Judgment of Paris takes place in France, launching California as a worldwide force in the production of quality wine.
1981Ecuadorian president Jaime Roldós Aguilera, his wife, and his presidential committee die in an aircraft accident while travelling from Quito to Zapotillo minutes after the president gave a famous speech regarding the 24 de mayo anniversary of the Battle of Pichincha.
1982Liberation of Khorramshahr: Iranians recapture the port city of Khorramshahr from the Iraqis during the Iran–Iraq War.
1988Section 28 of the United Kingdom's Local Government Act 1988, a controversial amendment stating that a local authority cannot intentionally promote homosexuality, is enacted.
1991Israel conducts Operation Solomon, evacuating Ethiopian Jews to Israel.
1992The last Thai dictator, General Suchinda Kraprayoon, resigns following pro-democracy protests.
1992The ethnic cleansing in Kozarac, Bosnia and Herzegovina begins when Serbian militia and police forces enter the town.
1993Roman Catholic Cardinal Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo and five other people are assassinated in a shootout at Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla Guadalajara International Airport in Mexico.
1994Four men are convicted of bombing the World Trade Center in New York in 1993; each one is sentenced to 240 years in prison.
1995While attempting to return to Leeds Bradford Airport in the United Kingdom, Knight Air Flight 816 crashes in Dunkeswick, North Yorkshire, killing all 12 people on board.
2000Israeli troops withdraw from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.
2002Russia and the United States sign the Moscow Treaty.
2014A 6.4 magnitude earthquake occurs in the Aegean Sea between Greece and Turkey, injuring 324 people.
2014At least three people are killed in a shooting at Brussels' Jewish Museum of Belgium.
2019Twenty-two students die in a fire in Surat (India).
2019Under pressure over her handling of Brexit, British Prime Minister Theresa May announces her resignation as Leader of the Conservative Party, effective as of June 7.
2022A mass shooting occurs at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, United States, resulting in the deaths of 21 people, including 19 children.
2026A suicide bombing targeting a shuttle train in Quetta, Balochistan, killed at least 48 people and injured 98 others.
Nacimientos (194)
15 a. C.Germanicus, Roman general (died 19)
1335Margaret of Bohemia, Queen of Hungary (died 1349)
1494Pontormo, Italian painter (died 1557)
1522John Jewel, English bishop (died 1571)
1544William Gilbert, English physician, physicist, and astronomer (died 1603)
1576Elizabeth Carey, Lady Berkeley, English courtier (died 1635)
1616John Maitland, 1st Duke of Lauderdale, Scottish politician, Secretary of State, Scotland (died 1682)
1628Marek Sobieski, Polish noble (died 1652)
1669Emerentia von Düben, Swedish royal favorite (died 1743)
1671Gian Gastone de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (died 1737)
1686Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit, Polish-German physicist and engineer, developed the Fahrenheit scale (died 1736)