16 June in history
8 events that happened on 16 June, from 632 to 1976.
632 CE 1,394 years ago
Yazdegerd III, the last Sasanian king, takes the throne
Yazdegerd III came to the throne of the Sasanian Empire at the age of eight. His death in 651, after successive defeats by the Rashidun Caliphate, marked the end of the last pre-Islamic Iranian empire.
1407 CE 619 years ago
Ming forces capture Hồ Quý Ly, ruler of Đại Ngu
Ming forces captured Hồ Quý Ly, founder of the Hồ dynasty, and his son Hồ Hán Thương in present-day Hà Tĩnh Province and brought them as prisoners to the Yongle Emperor in Nanjing. Đại Ngu became the Ming province of Jiaozhi.
1487 CE 539 years ago
Henry VII defeats the Yorkist rebels at Stoke Field
Henry VII crushed a rebel army supporting the pretender Lambert Simnel. It is often counted as the last battle of the Wars of the Roses.
1858 CE 168 years ago
Lincoln delivers his 'House Divided' speech
Accepting the Illinois Republican nomination for the Senate, Abraham Lincoln warned that the nation could not endure 'permanently half slave and half free'. The speech raised his national profile.
1963 CE 63 years ago
Valentina Tereshkova becomes the first woman in space
Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova launched aboard Vostok 6 and orbited Earth 48 times in nearly three days. No other woman flew in space for 19 years.
✦ Anniversary of the day
Born on 16 June 6
Died on 16 June 5
Dates as the sources give them: in the Julian calendar before 1582, and in some countries for longer (Britain until 1752, Russia until 1918). Only people whose day of birth or death the records agree on are listed.