1684 (MDCLXXXIV) was a leap year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar and a leap year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar, the 1684th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 684th year of the 2nd millennium, the 84th year of the 17th century, and the 5th year of the 1680s decade. As of the start of 1684, the Gregorian calendar was 10 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.

Millennium: 2nd millennium
Centuries: 16th century17th century18th century
Decades: 1650s  1660s  1670s  – 1680s –  1690s  1700s  1710s
Years: 1681 1682 168316841685 1686 1687
1684 in other calendars
Gregorian calendar1684
MDCLXXXIV
Ab urbe condita2437
Armenian calendar1133
ԹՎ ՌՃԼԳ
Assyrian calendar6434
Balinese saka calendar1605–1606
Bengali calendar1091
Berber calendar2634
English Regnal year35 Cha. 2 – 36 Cha. 2
Buddhist calendar2228
Burmese calendar1046
Byzantine calendar7192–7193
Chinese calendar癸亥(Water Pig)
4380 or 4320
    — to —
甲子年 (Wood Rat)
4381 or 4321
Coptic calendar1400–1401
Discordian calendar2850
Ethiopian calendar1676–1677
Hebrew calendar5444–5445
Hindu calendars
 - Vikram Samvat1740–1741
 - Shaka Samvat1605–1606
 - Kali Yuga4784–4785
Holocene calendar11684
Igbo calendar684–685
Iranian calendar1062–1063
Islamic calendar1095–1096
Japanese calendarTenna 4 / Jōkyō 1
(貞享元年)
Javanese calendar1606–1607
Julian calendarGregorian minus 10 days
Korean calendar4017
Minguo calendar228 before ROC
民前228年
Nanakshahi calendar216
Thai solar calendar2226–2227
Tibetan calendar阴水猪年
(female Water-Pig)
1810 or 1429 or 657
    — to —
阳木鼠年
(male Wood-Rat)
1811 or 1430 or 658

Events

change
  • July 24 – René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle sails from France, again, with a large expedition designed to establish a French colony on the Gulf of Mexico, at the mouth of the Mississippi River.
  • October 7Japanese Chief Minister Hotta Masatoshi is assassinated, leaving Shogun Tsunayoshi without any adequate advisors, leading him to issue impractical edicts and create hardships for the Japanese people.
  • December 10Isaac Newton's derivation of Kepler's laws from his theory of gravity, contained in the paper De motu corporum in gyrum, is read to the Royal Society by Edmund Halley.

Undated

change
  • France under Louis XIV makes Truce of Ratisbon separately with the Holy Roman Empire (Habsburg) and Spain.
  • Pope Innocent XI forms a Holy League with the Habsburg Empire, Venice and Poland to liberate Europe from the Ottoman Turkish rule.
  • The Japanese poet Saikaku composes 23,500 verses in 24 hours at the Sumiyoshi Shrine at Osaka; the scribes cannot keep pace with his dictation and just count the verses.
  • The British East India Company receives Chinese permission to build a trading station at Canton. Tea sells in Europe for less than a shilling a pound, but the import duty of 5 shillings makes it too expensive for most English people to afford.
  • Smuggled tea is drunk much more than legally imported tea.
  • England has its coldest winter in living memory; the River Thames and the sea as far as 2 miles out from land freezes over.
  • John Bunyan writes The Pilgrim's Progress Part 2.
  • The Chipperfield's Circus dynasty begins when James Chipperfield introduces performing animals to England at the River Thames frost fairs on the Thames in London.

Births

change
  • January 1 – Arnold Drakenborch, Dutch classical scholar (died 1748)
  • January 14 – Jean-Baptiste van Loo, French painter (died 1745)
  • February 24 – Matthias Braun, Czech sculptor (died 1738)
  • March 15 – Francesco Durante, Italian composer (died 1755)
  • March 19 – Jean Astruc, French physician and scholar (died 1766)
  • April 15 – Catherine I of Russia (died 1727)
  • June 22 – Francesco Manfredini, Italian composer (died 1762)
  • September 18 – Johann Gottfried Walther, German music theorist, organist, and composer (died 1748)
  • October 10 – Antoine Watteau, French painter (died 1721)
  • October 26 – Kurt Christoph Graf von Schwerin, Prussian field marshal (died 1757)
  • December 3 – Ludvig Holberg, Norwegian historian and writer (died 1754)

Deaths

change
  • April 1 – Roger Williams, English theologian and colonist (born 1603)
  • April 5 – Lord William Brouncker, English mathematician (born 1602)
  • May 4 – John Nevison, English highwayman (born 1639)
  • May 12 – Edme Mariotte, French physicist and priest (born c.1620)
  • July 2 – John Rogers, American President of Harvard University (born 1630)
  • July 6 – Peter Gunning, English royalist churchman (born 1614)
  • August 8 – George Booth, 1st Baron Delamer (born 1622)
  • October 1 – Pierre Corneille, French playwright (born 1606)
  • October 11 – James Tuchet, 3rd Earl of Castlehaven (born 1617)