December 17

497BC Saturnalia was an ancient Roman winter celebration. It began as a farmers' festival to mark the end of autumn planting, in honor of Saturn, who was the god of agriculture. The first Saturnalia festival was celebrated in ancient Rome on December 17, 497 BC when the city's Temple of Saturn was dedicated. Starting as a one-day feast, the Saturnalia festivities expanded to three days, then a whole week, from December 17 to 23.

Saturnalia by Antoine Callet

546 The Sack of Rome occurred during the Gothic War (535-554) between the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantines) and the Ostrogoths under their king, Totila. After a long and grueling siege, the Ostrogoths managed to bribe some of the Byzantine garrison to open the Asinarian Gate to them on December 17, 546. 

1538 In 1534 Henry VIII proclaimed himself Head of the Church in England, transferring ecclesiastical jurisdiction and revenues from the pope to himself and creating the Church of England with The Act of Supremacy. Pope Paul III responded by decreeing slavery for all Englishmen who supported Henry, but despite this the king's countrymen were behind their monarch. He finally excommunicated King Henry VIII on December 17, 1538.

1600 Henry IV of France married his second wife Marie de Médici (1573-1642) on December 17, 1600. Henry had four children, two sons and two daughters by Marie de Médici, including Henrietta who married Charles I of England. After Henry IV was assassinated in 1610, Marie de' Medici, served as regent for their nine-year-old son, Louis XIII, until 1617.

Henri IV, Marie de' Medici and family

1676 Hamburger Feuerkasse was established in Hamburg, Germany on December 17, 1676. The first officially established fire insurance company in the world, it is the oldest existing insurance enterprise available to the public.

1706 The philosopher Émilie Du Châtelet was born on December 17, 1706. When she was twenty-seven, married, and the mother of three children she began a sixteen-year liaison with the Enlightenment writer Voltaire. "I found, in 1733, a young woman who thought as I did," Voltaire wrote in his memoirs of the Divine Emilie, "and who decided to spend several years in the country, cultivating her mind."

1734 William Floyd, one of the men of the First Continental Congress and signer of the Constitution of the United States of America, was born in Brookhaven on Long Island on December 17, 1734. The William Floyd Parkway is named after him.

William Floyd

1778 Chemist and inventor Sir Humphry Davy was born in Penzance, Cornwall on December 17, 1778. His Cornish father was a comfortably well off wood carver and small farmer who died when Humphry was 16. A keen naturalist as a boy he was encouraged to take up science by Davies Goddy, a figure of local importance who gave the boy the run of his lab.

1790 The Sun Stone, or Aztec calendar stone, was carved some time early in the sixteenth century. Shortly after the Spanish conquest, the monolithic sculpture was buried in the main square of Mexico City. It was rediscovered on December 17, 1790 during repairs on the Mexico City Cathedral.

Aztec Sun Stone, at National Anthropology Museum in Mexico City, Mexico. By Juan Carlos Fonseca Mata

1793 In September 1793, a young Napoleon assumed command of an artillery brigade at the siege of Toulon, where royalist leaders had welcomed a British fleet and enemy troops. The British were driven out of the French port in December 17, 1793 when Napoleon dragged his cannon to high ground to pound the city more effectively. He was rewarded with promotion to brigadier general .

1819 Venezuelan military and political leader Simón Bolivar freed much of South America from Spanish occupation. On December 17, 1819, he proclaimed the republic of Gran Colombia, comprising the territories of present-day Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Panama, northern Peru, western Guyana and northwest Brazil.

The departments of Gran Colombia in 1820

1830 Despite freeing much of South America from Spanish occupation Simón Bolivar died a disillusioned man on December 17, 1830, at a friend’s estate in Columbia after a painful battle with tuberculosis.

1837 A fire in the Winter Palace at St Petersburg broke out on December 17, 1837, partially damaging the palace and killing thirty guardsmen. Tsar Nicholas I made many changes to the interior of the building, and was responsible for its complete rebuilding following the blaze.

1849 The first bowler hat was sold on December 17, 1849. It was designed by hatmakers Thomas and William Bowler for Lock and Co of St James, London, and was ordered by the British soldier and politician Edward Coke for hunting. According to legend, when Coke arrived to pick up his hat he placed it on the floor and stood on it to test its strength. Satisfied, he paid his 12 shillings (60p).

Bowler hat By Peloponnesian Folklore Foundation 

1889 The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) was founded on December 17, 1889, by Emily Williamson, a social reformer, and Eliza Phillips, a bird enthusiast, in Manchester, England. The RSPB is the UK's largest wildlife conservation charity, with over 1.2 million members and supporters.

1892 The first issue of Vogue magazine was published on December 17 1892, with a cover price of 10 cents. From its inception, the magazine targeted the new New York aristocracy, establishing social norms in a country that did not value class and ceremony as much as England or France.

1896 The Schenley Park Casino, Pittsburgh’s first multi-purpose arena opened in May 1895. The arena was the first place in Pittsburgh where organized ice hockey was played. On December 17, 1896 an ammonia pipe in the ice making department for the ice rink began leaking. Firefighters believed the gas mixed with grease and created an explosion resulting in a fire that destroyed the building.

1896 The French magician Alexander Herrmann, also known as Herrmann the Great. died on December 17, 1896. He was the model for the look of a 'typical' magician—a man with wavy hair, a top hat, a goatee, and a tailcoat.

1903 Orville and Wilbur Wright designed and built the first controlled, powered, heavier-than-air airplane in Dayton, Ohio. The brothers took to the air for the first time making two flights each from level ground into a freezing headwind gusting to 27 miles per hour (43 km/h) at Kitty Hawk Heights, North Carolina on December 17, 1903.

1907 Ugyen Wangchuck was crowned the first Druk Gyalpo (King of Bhutan) on December 17, 1907. During his reign between 1907–1926 Ugyen Wangchuck made great efforts to unite the country and gain the trust of the people.

1925 Balto was a Siberian husky and sled dog who led his team on the final leg of the 1925 serum run to Nome, Alaska in which diphtheria antitoxin was transported to combat an outbreak of the disease. Balto was present for the unveiling of his own statue in Central Park on December 17, 1925.

1936 Pope Francis was born Jorge Mario Bergoglio on December 17, 1936 in Flores, a barrio of Buenos Aires in Argentina. He was born to Italian immigrant parents - railway worker Mario Bergoglio  and his wife, Regina. He earned a master’s degree in Chemistry from the University of Buenos Aires before deciding to follow his religious vocation, In  March 1958 Bergoglio entered the Society of Jesus in Cordoba as a novice.

1938 German chemist Otto Hahn discovered the nuclear fission of the heavy element uranium, the scientific and technological basis of nuclear energy on December 17 1938. The decisive experiment was named "radium-barium-mesothorium-fractionation."

Nuclear fission experimental setup By J Brew - originally posted to Flickr 

1940 42-year-old Mrs Dorothy Pamela O'Grady was the first woman spy to be condemned to death in Britain during World War II. O'Grady of Sandown, Isle of Wight was sentenced on seven charges — of making plans and cutting a military telephone — at Hampshire Assizes on December 17, 1940.
On appeal, O'Grady's sentence was cut to 14 years in prison.

1944 From May 1944 to March 1945, Ernest Hemingway was in London and Europe as a war correspondent. On December 17, 1944, a feverish and ill Hemingway had himself driven to Luxembourg to cover what would later be called The Battle of the Bulge. As soon as he arrived, however, he was handed to the doctors, who hospitalized him with pneumonia; by the time he recovered a week later, most of the fighting in this battle was over.

Hemingway with Col. Charles 'Buck' Lanham in Germany, 1944

1967 Harold Holt, the 17th Prime Minister of Australia, went swimming during a period of high waves and strong currents. at Cheviot Beach, near Portsea, Victoria, on December 17, 1967. Tragically, he was swept away by the currents and never seen again.

1983 On December 17, 1983, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) carried out a terrorist attack by detonating a car bomb outside Harrods Department Store in the Knightsbridge area of London. The explosion resulted in six fatalities, including three police officers and three civilians, and injured around 90 people. The attack occurred just before Christmas, a busy shopping period.

1986 Mrs Davina Thompson created medical history on December 17, 1986 when she was given a new heart, lungs and liver. She underwent surgery for seven hours at Papworth Hospital, Cambridge, UK, for seven hours by a team of 15 headed by chest surgeon Mr John Wallwork and Professor Sir Roy Calne. Mrs Thompson died at the age of 47 on 13 August 1998.

1989 The Simpsons started life as short gags on The Tracy Ullman Show beginning in April 1987.
In 1989, a team of production companies adapted The Simpsons into a half-hour prime time entertainment series. The show made its debut on the Fox television network with Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire on December 17, 1989.

2002 The Second Congo War, beginning in August 1998, devastated the country. Despite the signing of a peace accord on December 17, 2002, hostilities have continued since in the ongoing Lord's Resistance Army insurgency, and the Kivu and Ituri conflicts.

2010 On December 17, 2010 Tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in protest to police harassment, triggering the Tunisian Revolution. Since the "Jasmine Revolution" of 2011, Tunisia has been the most democratic state in the Arab world.

2011 North Korea dictator Kim Jong-il died of a suspected heart attack on December 17, 2011 at 8:30 a.m. while traveling by train to an area outside Pyongyang. In North Korea, people don't celebrate birthdays on July 8 and December 17, since those are the dates that Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il died.