1703

This article is about the year 1703.

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	17th century – 18th century – 19th century
Decades:	1670s  1680s  1690s  – 1700s –  1710s  1720s  1730s
Years:	1700 1701 1702 – 1703 – 1704 1705 1706

1703 by topic:

Arts and Sciences

Archaeology – Architecture – Art – Literature (Poetry) – Music – Science

Countries

Canada – England – Scotland –

Lists of leaders

Colonial governors – State leaders

Birth and death categories

Births – Deaths

Establishments and disestablishments categories

Establishments – Disestablishments

Works category

Works

1703 in other calendars

Gregorian calendar	1703 MDCCIII
Ab urbe condita	2456
Armenian calendar	1152 ԹՎ ՌՃԾԲ
Assyrian calendar	6453
Bahá'í calendar	-141 – -140
Bengali calendar	1110
Berber calendar	2653
English Regnal year	1 Ann. 1 – 2 Ann. 1
Buddhist calendar	2247
Burmese calendar	1065
Byzantine calendar	7211–7212
Chinese calendar	壬午年 (Water Horse) 4399 or 4339     — to — 癸未年 (Water Goat) 4400 or 4340
Coptic calendar	1419–1420
Ethiopian calendar	1695–1696
Hebrew calendar	5463–5464
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1759–1760
- Shaka Samvat	1625–1626
- Kali Yuga	4804–4805
Holocene calendar	11703
Igbo calendar	703–704
Iranian calendar	1081–1082
Islamic calendar	1114–1115
Japanese calendar	Genroku 16 (元禄１６年)
Juche calendar	N/A
Julian calendar	Gregorian minus 11 days
Korean calendar	4036
Minguo calendar	209 before ROC 民前209年
Thai solar calendar	2246

Year 1703 (MDCCIII) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Friday of the 11-day slower Julian calendar. In the Swedish calendar it was a common year starting on Thursday, one day ahead of the Julian and ten days behind the Gregorian calendar.

Events

January–June

• January 14 – An earthquake hits Norcia, Italy.
• January 30 (December 14 of previous year in the Chinese calendar) – In Japan, the revenge of the Forty-seven Ronin occurs, assassinating Daimyo Kira Yoshinaka, the enemy of their former lord Asano Naganori, at his own mansion as a vengeance. All 47 samurais commit seppuku, a ritual suicide on March 20 (February 4 in the Chinese calendar).
• February – Soldiers at Fort Louis de la Mobile celebrate Mardi Gras in Mobile, starting the tradition for Mobile, Alabama.
• February 2 – An earthquake hits the town of L'Aquila, Italy.
• April 21 – The Company of Quenching of Fire (i.e., a fire brigade) is founded in Edinburgh, Scotland.
• May 27 – The city of Saint Petersburg is founded in Russia.
• May 26 – Portugal joins the Grand Alliance.
• June 15 – Hungarians rebel under Prince Francis II Rákóczi.
• June – The completed Icelandic census of 1703 is presented in the Althing, the first complete census of any country.

July–December

July 29: Daniel Defoe

November 24: Great Storm of 1703

• July 29–July 31 – Daniel Defoe is placed in a pillory, then imprisoned for four months for the crime of seditious libel, after publishing his politically satirical pamphlet The Shortest Way with the Dissenters (1702) (his release is granted in mid-November).
• August 23 – Edirne event: Sultan Mustafa II of the Ottoman Empire is dethroned.
• September 12 – War of the Spanish Succession – Habsburg Archduke Charles is proclaimed King of Spain but never exercises full rule.
• October – A whirlwind blows down the tower of the Gan Takal in Gondar, capital of Ethiopia, killing 30.
• November 19 – The Man in the Iron Mask dies in the Bastille.
• November 24–December 2 – The Great Storm of 1703, an Atlantic hurricane, ravages southern England and the English Channel, killing nearly 8,000, mostly at sea.
• November 30 – Isaac Newton is elected president of the Royal Society in London, a position he will hold until his death in 1727.
• December 27 – Portugal and England sign the Methuen Treaty, which gives preference to Portuguese wines imported into England.
• December 28 – Ahmed III succeeds the deposed Mustafa II as Ottoman Emperor.

Date unknown

• French-born imposter George Psalmanazar arrives in London.

Births

• February 5 – Gilbert Tennent, Irish-born religious leader (d. 1764)
• March 5 (N. S.) – Vasily Trediakovsky, Russian poet (d. 1768)
• May 14 – David Brearly, delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention (d. 1785)
• June 26 – Thomas Clap, first president of Yale University (d. 1767)
• June 28 – John Wesley, English founder of Methodism and anti slavery activist (d. 1791)
• August 2 – Lorenzo Ricci, Italian Jesuit leader (d. 1775)
• September 29 – François Boucher, French painter (d. 1770)
• October 5 – Jonathan Edwards, American preacher (d. 1758)
• October 28 – Antoine Deparcieux, French mathematician (d. 1768)
• November 25 – Jean-François Séguier, French astronomer and botanist (d. 1784)
• November 26 – Theophilus Cibber, English actor and writer (d. 1758)
• December 2 – Ferdinand Konščak, Croatian explorer (d. 1759)
• date unknown – Jack Broughton, English bare-knuckle fighter who produced the earliest known rules of boxing (d. 1789)

Deaths

• January 11 – Johann Georg Graevius, German classical scholar and critic (b. 1632)
• March 3 – Robert Hooke, English scientist (b. 1635)
• March 31 – Johann Christoph Bach, German composer (b. 1642)
• April 20 – Lancelot Addison, English royal chaplain (b. 1632)
• May 16 – Charles Perrault, French author (b. 1628)
• May 26 – Samuel Pepys, English civil servant and diarist (b. 1633)
• June 14 – Jean Herauld Gourville, French adventurer (b. 1625)
• July 17 – Roemer Vlacq I, Dutch naval captain (b. 1637)
• September 22 – Vincenzo Viviani, Italian mathematician and scientist (b. 1622)
• September 25 – Archibald Campbell, 1st Duke of Argyll, Scottish privy councillor (b. 1658)
• September 29 – Charles de Saint-Évremond, French soldier (b. 1610)
• October 28 – John Wallis, English mathematician (b. 1616)
• November 19 – The Man in the Iron Mask
• November 30 – Nicolas de Grigny, French organist and composer (b. 1672)
• December 28 – Mustafa II, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1664)
• date unknown – Phetracha, king of Ayutthaya (b. 1632)