January 1 – The uninhabited island of Annobón, off of the coast of West Africa, is claimed by Portuguese explorers who name it in honor of the New Year.[1] A year later, it becomes the home of enslaved Africans who either marry or work of Portuguese citizens, or sold.
March 6 – The original University of Trier is founded in the Electorate of the Paletine in what is now Germany, 18 years after the Pope had granted the Archbishop of Trier, Jakob von Sierck, the papal dispensation to create a university. After 365 years, the university is closed in 1798, but re-established 172 years later in 1970.
May 7 – Pope Sixtus IV appoints eight clerics to the College of Cardinals, the most in his career, the most since December 18, 1439 when 17 were appointed by Pope Eugene IV.
July 10 – James II, King of Cyprus, dies after a reign of nine years. In that his widow, the Queen Consort Catherine, is eight months pregnant with the couple’s son, she becomes Queen Regent and the throne is deemed to remain vacant until the child is born.
August 6 – King James III of Cyprus becomes the de jure monarch of Cyprus from the moment he is born, 27 days after the death of his father, King James II, although the rule of Cyprus is carried out by his mother, Catherine, Queen regent.[3] King James III lives for only one year and 20 days before dying on August 26, 1474.[4]
October 1 – Johannes Hennon publishes the medical treatise Commentarii in Aristotelis libros Physicorum.
October 7 – At Trier, Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, hosts an elaborate banquet for the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II and various prince-electors of the electorates within the Empire, ostensibly to work towards a common union of nations to begin a new crusade against the Ottomans, but offends most of his guests because of his arrogant ambition.
October 31 – The Trier Conference breaks up after Charles the Bold fails to persuade the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick to help Charles become King of the Romans or to enter into an alliance against King Loouis XI of France. Frederick II instead proposes an alliance between the Empire, Burgundy, and France. Charles threatens to leave unless he can secure an alliance by a treaty marriage.[9]
November 4 – The negotiators for Burgundy and the Holy Roman Empire tentatively agree on creating a Kingdom of Burgundy, ruled by Charles the Bold, that would become a member of the Empire and that would include Burgundy, Holland, Luxembourg, Savoy, Lorraine and other parts of what are now the Netherlands, Belgium and France.[10] A coronation ceremony for Charles as King of Burgundy is tentatively scheduled to take place on November 25.
November 23 – Prince Stephen of Moldavia begins the siege of Dâmbovița Fortress, where Wallachia’s Prince Radu has taken refuge in a war between the two monarchs. Prince Radu escapes during the night, leaving behind his wife, his daughter and his treasury, and the fortress surrenders the next day.[11]
November 25 – On the day set for the scheduled coronation at Trier of Charles the Bold as King of Burgundy, Charles learns that the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick had changed his mind and left overnight, and that the ceremony will never take place.[9]
Stephen the Great of Moldavia refuses to pay tribute to the Ottomans. This will attract an Ottoman invasion in 1475, resulting in the greatest defeat of the Ottomans so far.
Axayacatl, Aztec ruler of Tenochtitlan, invades the territory of the neighboring Aztec city of Tlatelolco. The ruler of Tlatelolco is killed and replaced by a military governor; Tlatelolco loses its independence.
^Šandera, Martin (2016). Jindřich starší z Minsterberka : syn husitského krále : velký hráč s nízkými kartami [Jindřich the Elder of Münsterberg: Son of the Hussite King: A Great Low-Card Player]. Prague: Vyšehrad. pp. 73–84. ISBN 978-80-7429-687-1.
^De Girolami Cheney, Liana (2013). “Caterina Cornaro, Queen of Cyprus”. In Barrett-Graves, Debra (ed.). The Emblematic Queen Extra-Literary Representations of Early Modern Queenship. Palgrave Macmillan.
^Fileti, Felice (2009). I Lusignan di Cipro (in Italian). Florence: Atheneum. p. 41.
^“Die Tomburg bei Rheinbach”, by Dietmar Pertz, in Rheinische Kunststätten, Issue 504, Cologne, 2008, ISBN 978-3-86526-026-0
^Ross, James (2011). John de Vere, Thirteenth Earl of Oxford (1442-1513), ‘The Foremost Man of the Kingdom’. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press. ISBN 978-1-84383-614-8.
^Émile Toutey, ”Charles le Téméraire et la ligue de Constance (Charles the Bold and the League of Constance) (Paris: Hachette, 1902) pp. 49-51
^ abÉmile Toutey, ”Charles le Téméraire et la ligue de Constance (Charles the Bold and the League of Constance) (Paris: Hachette, 1902) pp. 58-59
^Gabrielle Claerr-Stamm, Pierre de Hagenbach. Le destin tragique d’un chevalier sundgauvien au service de Charles le Téméraire (Pierre de Hagenbach: The tragic destiny of a Sundgauvian knight in the service of Charles the Bold) (Altkirch: Sundgau History Society, 2004) pp. 135-137
^E. B. Pryde; D. E. Greenway; S. Porter; I. Roy (23 February 1996). Handbook of British Chronology. Cambridge University Press. p. 482. ISBN 978-0-521-56350-5.