Cicero is killed after being declared an outlaw (43 BC), and Pakistan forms coalition government under Nurul Amin (1971). Born on this day: Noam Chomsky, Gian Lorenzo Bernini and Nicholas Hoult. Died: Saint Eutychian, Innocent IV and Élie Ducommun.
31 events, 63 births and 61 deaths on this date.
The Roman orator and statesman was murdered by agents of Mark Antony, who had put him on a list of men to be executed. Cicero had attacked Antony in speeches against him, and his death silenced one of the Republic's most forceful defenders.
José Luiz · CC BY-SA 4.0Military ruler Yahya Khan named Nurul Amin as prime minister of a coalition, with Zulfikar Ali Bhutto as his deputy. It was an attempt to share power between rival political figures at a tense moment for the country.
A small team of Royal Marines paddled canoes into the German-held port of Bordeaux and fixed limpet mines to ships moored there. Six vessels were damaged, a raid that showed Britain could strike deep behind enemy lines by sea.
Charles Brooks Jr. became the first person in the United States put to death by lethal injection, carried out in Texas. The method went on to be adopted by many other states as a way of carrying out executions.
The United States entered the First World War against Austria-Hungary, joining the Allies a few months after it had declared war on Germany. The move came as American troops were arriving in Europe, and it made the Habsburg empire one more enemy of a growing American-led alliance.
Karzai, who had led Pashtun tribes against the Taliban in late 2001, was declared the winner of the presidential election that made him the first leader of the Islamic Republic. He stayed in office until 2014, handing over to Ashraf Ghani.
Pete Souza · Public domain
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Noam Chomsky is an American linguist and political critic whose ideas reshaped how scientists study language. His 1957 book Syntactic Structures and his theory of generative grammar remade the field, and he is also a longtime critic of US foreign policy.
Augusto Starita / Ministerio de Cultura de la Nación · CC BY-SA 2.0
Bernini was an Italian sculptor, architect and painter who led sculpture in his age and is credited with shaping the Baroque style. He also wrote and staged plays and designed fountains, churches and public squares across Rome.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini · Public domain
English actor who began as a child performer in films and television, then became known for Skins and the X-Men series, playing Hank McCoy, also known as Beast. He has since earned awards nominations for The Great and The Favourite.
Fred Trauerts · CC0
Eutychian was bishop of Rome, remembered in tradition for blessing grapes and beans and for burying 324 martyrs himself. Little else is firmly known, and even the length of his reign is disputed.
Artaud de Montor (1772–1849) · Public domain
Sinibaldo Fieschi, a canon lawyer from Genoa, reigned as pope from 1243 and fought a long struggle with the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II. He is also remembered for the 1252 bull Ad extirpanda, which allowed torture of heretics.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Élie Ducommun was a Geneva-born journalist and economist who ran the International Peace Bureau in Bern for years without pay. He shared the 1902 Nobel Peace Prize with Charles Albert Gobat for his work on that organisation.
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
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