January 21– The English Parliament, summoned in the name of King Henry VI on October 29, assembles at Westminster. The House of Commons elects the ailing John Tyrrell as its Speaker.
February 13– In France, English troops led by the Earl of Shrewsbury capture the town of Pontoise, less than 18 miles (29 km) from Paris, and threaten the royal capital before being forced to abandon their position.[3]
February 21– King James I of Scotland is assassinated in an attempted coup d’état led by his uncle and former ally, Walter Stewart, Earl of Atholl. The night before, the King and his wife, Catherine Douglas had stopped at Blackfriars monastery in Perth. Queen Catherine is injured while barring the door with her arm in order to allow the King to escape, and King James is found in the early hours of the morning and stabbed to death while trying to escape.[4]
March 11– The nova Scorpii AD 1437 is first observed, and is seen by Korean astronomers at Seoul. It remains visible until March 25.[5][6]
March 26 – In Scotland, Walter Stewart, Earl of Atholl, at one time the heir presumptive to the Scottish throne until the birth of James II, is brutally executed for the assassination of King James I. A red hot iron crown placed upon his head, after which he is cut into pieces while still alive and his heart was taken out, after which his body is thrown into a fire.[8]
March 27 – The regents for King Henry VI give royal assent to the legislation passed by the English Parliament, including the Marshalsea Act; the Exportation of Corn Act (excusing licensing fees of small amounts of grain, at less than 6 shillings, 8 pence for wheat or 3 shillings for barley); and the Guilds and Fraternities Act.[9]
April–June
April 2 – A bubonic plague epidemic strikes the independent city of Ragusa (modern-day Dubrovnik in Croatia), capital of the Republic of Ragusa, and a group of 10 patricians reject the chance to flee, staying to govern the city. Within 15 days, nine of the ten are dead, and only Marin Simunov Rastic survives. The progress of the plague, which lasts for more than two months, is chronicled by an Italian-born resident, Opis Diversis.[10]
April 23 – Pope Eugene IV issues the papal bull Dominatur Dominus, further to safeguard the rights of the Guanches, the natives of the Portuguese-controlled Canary Islands.[11]
May 18 (Full moon of Nayon799 M.E.) – In Burma, King Mohnyin Thado of Ava announces that, effective March 30, 1438, the year will be recalibrated after 799 M.E. to will become 2 M.E., as part of the recommendations of his astrologers.[13]
May 21 – During a visit by Phillip III of Burgundy, who still controls parts of France while his war against King Charles VI continues, rebels in the city of Bruges take over and lynch his representative, Marshal Jean de Villiers de L’Isle-Adam, while Philip himself narrowly escapes capture.[14]
June 6 – A peasant army gathers at Babolna during the Transylvanian peasant revolt against King Sigismund of Hungary and defeat the Hungarian Governor, Ladislaus Csaki.[15]
June 24 – On the feast day of St. John the Baptist, the plague in Ragusa is declared at an end.[10]
July–September
July 6– The Transylvanian peasant revolt comes to an end with a formal treaty signed at the monastery of Cluj-Manastur, reducing the tithe to be paid to their employers, and abolishing the tax requiring surrendering one-ninth of each individual’s production of wine and grain, and confirming the right of peasants to move freely within Transylvania.[16]
August 22– Portugal’s disastrous Tangier expedition to attack Morocco begins as Prince Henry the Navigator and more than 6,000 troops (3,000 knights, 2,000 infantry, 1,000 archers) sail from the port of Belém toward Africa and the Portuguese colony of Ceuta. They arrive at Ceuta five days later.[17]
Led by Prince Henry the Navigator, a poorly-prepared Portuguese attempt to conquer the city of Tangier in the Marinid Sultanate in Morocco begins. Although the Portuguese have more than 6,000 troops, they reach the walled city and find that their scaling ladders are too short to reach the top, and their artillery is too weak to damage the walls.[17]
September 30– A Moroccan relief force of at least 10,000 cavalry and 90,000 foot soldiers arrives at Tangier to halt Portugal’s assault on Tangier.[17]
October–December
October 5 – The Portuguese, reinforced with better equipment and having routed the Moroccans two days earlier, make a second assault on Tangier and fail.[17]
October 9 – A counterattack on the Portuguese troops’ camp, with additional troops led by the Moroccan grand vizier, Abu Zakariya Yahya al-Wattasi, forces the Portuguese to flee to their ships but King Henry’s son, Prince Ferdinand, is taken as a prisoner of war.[17]
October 15 – Prince Henry the Navigator (Henrique, o Navegador), brother of King Duarte of Portugal, agrees on behalf Portugal to cede its North African colony of Ceuta back to Morocco in return for being allowed to withdraw all of his troops, including those taken prisoner.
October 19 – After negotiating a surrender and exchanging prisoners of war with the Moroccans, the Portuguese troops leave Tangier and sail away from Morocco.[17]
^Stieber, Joachim W. (1978). Pope Eugenius IV, the Council of Basel and the Secular and Ecclesiastical Authorities in the Empire: The Conflict Over Supreme Authority and Power in the Church. BRILL. p. 163. ISBN 90-04-05240-2.
^Harrison, Dick, Karl Knutsson – en biografi (Lund: Historiska media, 2002) ISBN 91-89442-58-X
^Shara, M. M.; Iłkiewicz, K.; Mikołajewska, J.; Pagnotta, A.; Bode, M. F.; Crause, L. A.; Drozd, K.; Faherty, J.; Fuentes-Morales, I.; et al. (Grindlay, J. E.; Moffat, A. F. J.; Pretorius, M. L.; Schmidtobreick, L.; Stephenson, F. R.; Tappert, C.; Zurek, D.) (August 31, 2017). Proper-motion age dating of the progeny of Nova Scorpii AD 1437 (Report). Nature (journal). Archived from the original on June 2, 2025. Retrieved November 26, 2025. Here we report the recovery of the binary star underlying the classical nova eruption of 11 March AD 1437
^“James II of Scotland”, in Historical Dictionary of the British Monarchy, by Kenneth J. Panton (Rowman and Littlefield, 2023) p.582
^ abZlata Blazina Tomic and Vesna Blazina, Expelling the Plague: The Health Office and the Implementation of Quarantine in Dubrovnik, 1377-1533 (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2015) pp.120-121 ISBN 9780773597129
^Ze starých letopisů českých (“From the Old Czech Chronicles”) (Svoboda Press, 1980) p.125
^Kala, U (2006) [1724]. Maha Yazawin (in Burmese). Vol. 1–3 (4th printing ed.). Yangon: Ya-Pyei Publishing. p. 70.
^Bonenfant, Paul et A.-M. (1996). Philippe le Bon: sa politique, son action (Philip the Good: his policy, his action) (in French). De Boeck Université. p. 476.
^“Transylvanian peasant revolt”, in Dictionary of Battles and Sieges: A Guide to 8,500 Battles from Antiquity Through the Twenty-first Century, ed. by Tony Jacques (Greenwood Press, 2006) p.90
^Pal Engel, The Realm of St Stephen: A History of Medieval Hungary, 895-1526 (I. B. Tauris, 2001) ISBN 9780857731739
^ abcdefIgnacio da Costa Quintella, Annaes da Marinha Portugueza, 2 vols (Lisbon: Academia Real das Sciencias, 1840) pp.87-95
