Charles XI, King of Sweden

Events of 1668back to top

Current affairs

An illicit affair between George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham and beauty, Anna Maria, Countess of Shrewsbury, leads to a notorious duel during which Villiers mortally wounds Shrewsbury's husband, Francis Talbot.
William Penn, Quaker and founder of Pennsylvania, is imprisoned after producing pamphlets advocating Quakerism.

Art and science

Writer, Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle republishes her science fiction work, The Description of a New World, called the Blazing-World, as a separate edition, originally published as an appendix to her Observations upon Experimental Philosophy, (1666).
Poet John Dryden is appointed poet laureate.

International

Diplomat and writer, Sir William Temple, negotiates the Triple Alliance between England, Holland and Sweden to protect the Spanish Netherlands from French expansion during the War of Devolution. The union ultimately forces Louis XIV to sign the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle and retreat from the Habsburg-controlled Netherlands.

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