19 July in history
5 events that happened on 19 July, from 711 to 1979.
✦ Anniversary of the day
711 CE 1,315 years ago
Tariq ibn Ziyad defeats King Roderic at Guadalete
Umayyad forces under Tariq ibn Ziyad defeated and killed the Visigothic king Roderic, by the traditional date. Within a few years most of Iberia was under Muslim rule, the beginning of al-Andalus.
1553 CE 473 years ago
Mary Tudor is proclaimed Queen of England in London
As support for Lady Jane Grey collapsed, the Privy Council proclaimed Mary queen to cheering crowds. England's first undisputed queen regnant restored Catholicism and burned some 280 Protestants.
1848 CE 178 years ago
The Seneca Falls Convention opens
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott opened the first women's rights convention in the United States. Its Declaration of Sentiments, stating that 'all men and women are created equal', launched the suffrage movement.
1870 CE 156 years ago
France declares war on Prussia
Provoked by Bismarck's edited Ems Dispatch, Napoleon III's government declared war on Prussia. Within months France was defeated, the Second Empire fell and the German Empire was proclaimed at Versailles.
1979 CE 47 years ago
Sandinista rebels take power in Nicaragua
Two days after Anastasio Somoza Debayle fled, Sandinista forces entered Managua, ending the Somoza family's 43-year rule. The revolution soon drew the US into backing the Contra insurgency.
