General
Population: 644 Million*
- Entertainment: Writers include George Farquhar (comedy), Edward Busshe (poetry), Daniel Defoe, Cotton Mather (ecclesiastical history)
Music includes Handel at Hamburg
- Deaths: William III of Orange of England, Organist NA de Le Beuge
, , Rebellion of Protestant Peasants of "Camisards" in Cevennes, Jesuit College founded in Breslau
Africa
- General: Asiento Guinea Company founded for slave trade between Africa and America
Asia
- Japan: Painter Ogota Korin unites two imperial schools of Japanese painting – Kano and Tamato
Edo earthquake and fire (see next year)
Europe
- General: Because of war for Spanish crown England renews war against France against Louis XIV
War of Spanish Succession begins as Britain takes Spanish possessions abroad – also called Queen Anne's War
- Denmark: Serfdom abolished in Denmark
- England: Death of William in England – chest infection from horseriding accident – James Stuart proposed but sister-in-law Princess Anne daughter of James II rules England – last Stuart
First British daily newspaper published
Anne addresses Parliament re-establishing England over Dutch interests
John Churchill Duke of marlborough leads army (and wife Sarah friends with Anne)
Duke of Marlborough takes Benlo Ruremonde and Liege
Earliest form of English pantomime given in London
Daily Courant becomes first daily newspaper issued in London
Earl of Clarendon writes first-hand account of wars in England
Queen Anne of England gives royal approval to horseracing and originates sweepstakes idea – racing for cash
- France: Jean Antoine Watteay arrives in Paris
- German States: Fisher von Erlach finishes Church of the Holy Trinity in Salzburg
Many German towns lit by oil
- Italian States: Armenian priest Mekhitar of Sebaste founds order of the Mekhitarists – Roman Catholic Armenian monks in Rome
- Poland: Charles XII takes Warsaw and Krakow
- Russia: Moscow Gazette published