211Following the death of the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus at Eboracum (modern York, England) while preparing to lead a campaign against the Caledonians, the empire is left in the control of his two quarrelling sons, Caracalla and Geta, whom he had instructed to make peace.
960Zhao Kuangyin declares himself Emperor Taizu of Song, ending the Later Zhou and beginning the Song dynasty.
1169A strong earthquake strikes the Ionian coast of Sicily, causing tens of thousands of injuries and deaths, especially in Catania.
1454Thirteen Years' War: The Secret Council of the Prussian Confederation sends a formal act of disobedience to the Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, sparking the Thirteen Years' War.
1794The French legislature abolishes slavery throughout all territories of the French First Republic. It would be reestablished in the French West Indies in 1802.
1797The Riobamba earthquake strikes Ecuador, causing up to 40,000 casualties.
1961The Angolan War of Independence and the greater Portuguese Colonial War begin.
1966All Nippon Airways Flight 60 plunges into Tokyo Bay, killing 133.
1967Lunar Orbiter program: Lunar Orbiter 3 lifts off from Cape Canaveral's Launch Complex 13 on its mission to identify possible landing sites for the Surveyor and Apollo spacecraft.
1974The Symbionese Liberation Army kidnaps Patty Hearst in Berkeley, California.
1974M62 coach bombing: The Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) explodes a bomb on a bus carrying off-duty British Armed Forces personnel in Yorkshire, England. Nine soldiers and three civilians are killed.
1975Haicheng earthquake (magnitude 7.3 on the Richter scale) occurs in Haicheng, Liaoning, China.
1977A Chicago Transit Authority elevated train rear-ends another and derails, killing 11 and injuring 180, the worst accident in the agency's history.
1992A coup d'état is led by Hugo Chávez against Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez.
1997En route to Lebanon, two Israeli Sikorsky CH-53 troop-transport helicopters collide in mid-air over northern Galilee, Israel, killing 73.
1997The Bojnurd earthquake measuring 6.5 strikes Iran. With a Mercalli intensity of VIII, it kills at least 88 and damages 173 villages.
1998The 5.9 Afghanistan earthquake shakes the Takhar Province with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VII (Very strong). With 2,323 killed, and 818 injured, damage is considered extreme.
1999Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot 19 times by four plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake-out, inflaming race relations in the city.
2000The World Summit Against Cancer for the New Millennium, Charter of Paris is signed by the President of France, Jacques Chirac and the Director General of UNESCO, Koichiro Matsuura, initiating World Cancer Day which is held on February 4 every year.
2003The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia adopts a new constitution, becoming a loose confederacy between Montenegro and Serbia.
2004Facebook, a mainstream online social networking site, is founded by Mark Zuckerberg and Eduardo Saverin.
2008Civic mobilizations in Colombia against FARC, under the name A million voices against the FARC.
2015TransAsia Airways Flight 235, with 58 people on board, en route from the Taiwanese capital Taipei to Kinmen, crashes into the Keelung River just after takeoff, killing 43 people.
2020The COVID-19 pandemic causes all casinos in Macau to be closed down for 15 days.
2025Ten people are killed in a mass shooting at an adult education centre in Örebro, Sweden.
Nacimientos (160)
1447Lodovico Lazzarelli, Italian poet (died 1500)
1495Francesco II Sforza, Duke of Milan (died 1535)
1495Jean Parisot de Valette, Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller (died 1568) las demás fuentes: 1494
1505Mikołaj Rej, Polish poet and author (died 1580)
1575Pierre de Bérulle, French cardinal and theologian, founded the French school of spirituality (died 1629)
1646Hans Erasmus Aßmann, German poet and politician (died 1699)
1677Johann Ludwig Bach, German violinist and composer (died 1731) juliano y gregoriano
1688Pierre de Marivaux, French author and playwright (died 1763)
1725Dru Drury, English entomologist and author (died 1804)
1740Carl Michael Bellman, Swedish poet and composer (died 1795) juliano y gregoriano
1778Augustin Pyramus de Candolle, Swiss botanist, mycologist, and academic (died 1841)
1799Almeida Garrett, Portuguese journalist and author (died 1854)
1803Antonija Höffern, Slovenian noblewoman (died 1871)
1818Emperor Norton, San Francisco eccentric and visionary (died 1880)
1935Martti Talvela, Finnish opera singer (died 1989)
1935Collin Wilcox, American actress (died 2009)
1936David Brenner, American comedian, actor, and author (died 2014)
1936Gary Conway, American actor
1936Claude Nobs, Swiss businessman, founded the Montreux Jazz Festival (died 2013)
1937Birju Maharaj, Indian dancer, composer, singer and exponent of the Lucknow "Kalka-Bindadin" Gharana of Kathak dance (died 2022) las demás fuentes: 4 feb 1938
1937David Newman, American director and screenwriter (died 2003)
1938Frank J. Dodd, American businessman and politician, president of the New Jersey Senate (died 2010)
1939Stan Lundine, American lawyer and politician, Lieutenant Governor of New York
1940George A. Romero, American director and producer (died 2017)
856Rabanus Maurus, Frankish archbishop and theologian (born 780)
870Ceolnoth, archbishop of Canterbury
1169John of Ajello, Bishop of Catania
1498Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Italian artist (born 1429/1433)
1505Jeanne de Valois, daughter of Louis XI of France (born 1464)
1508Conrad Celtes, German poet and scholar (born 1459)
1555John Rogers, English clergyman and translator (born 1505)
1590Gioseffo Zarlino, Italian composer and theorist (born 1517) juliano y gregoriano
1615Giambattista della Porta, Italian playwright and scholar (born 1535)
1617Lodewijk Elzevir, Dutch publisher, co-founded the House of Elzevir (born 1546)
1713Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury, English philosopher and politician (born 1671) fecha discutida
1774Charles Marie de La Condamine, French mathematician and geographer (born 1701)
1781Josef Mysliveček, Czech composer (born 1737)
1799Étienne-Louis Boullée, French architect and educator (born 1728)
1843Theodoros Kolokotronis, Greek general (born 1770) juliano y gregoriano
1891Pelagio Antonio de Labastida y Dávalos, Roman Catholic archbishop and Mexican politician who served as regent during the Second Mexican Empire (born 1816)
1905Louis-Ernest Barrias, French sculptor and academic (born 1841)
1912Franz Reichelt, French tailor and inventor (born 1878)
1926İskilipli Âtıf Hodja, Turkish author and scholar (born 1875)
1928Hendrik Lorentz, Dutch physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1853)
1933Archibald Sayce, English linguist and educator (born 1846)
1936Wilhelm Gustloff, German-Swiss soldier, founded Swiss NSDAP/AO (born 1895)
1940Nikolai Yezhov, Russian police officer and politician (born 1895)
1943Frank Calder, English-Canadian ice hockey player and journalist (born 1877)
1944Arsen Kotsoyev, Russian author and translator (born 1872)
1956Savielly Tartakower, Russian-French chess player, journalist, and author (born 1887)
1958Henry Kuttner, American author and screenwriter (born 1915)
1959Una O'Connor, Irish-American actress (born 1880)
1968Neal Cassady, American novelist and poet (born 1926)
1970Louise Bogan, American poet and critic (born 1897)
1974Satyendra Nath Bose, Indian physicist, mathematician, and academic (born 1894)
1975Louis Jordan, American singer-songwriter and saxophonist (born 1908)
1982Alex Harvey, Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist (born 1935)
1982Georg Konrad Morgen, German lawyer and judge (born 1909)
1983Karen Carpenter, American singer (born 1950)
1987Liberace, American singer-songwriter and pianist, (born 1919)
1987Meena Keshwar Kamal, Afghan activist, founded the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (born 1956)
1987Carl Rogers, American psychologist and academic (born 1902)
1990Whipper Billy Watson, Canadian-American wrestler and trainer (born 1915)
1992John Dehner, American actor (born 1915)
1995Patricia Highsmith, American novelist and short story writer (born 1921)