21 June on the globe: what happened in the world on this day, and who was born

A Carthaginian force under Hannibal ambushes and defeats a Roman army commanded by Gaius Flaminius in the battle of lake Trasimene during the Second Punic War.

A Byzantine expeditionary fleet under Belisarios sails from Constantinople to attack the Vandals in Africa, via Greece and Sicily.

Caliph al-Muhtadi is killed by rebellious troops and is succeeded by his cousin Al-Mu'tamid.

William Clito defeated Thierry of Alsace in a battle over the succession to the title of Count of Flanders.

Külüg Khan is enthroned as Khagan of the Mongols and Wuzong of the Yuan.

French forces are driven out of northern Italy by Spain at the Battle of Landriano during the War of the League of Cognac.

French Wars of Religion: Catholic forces defeated an armed group of Huguenots attempting to capture Besançon, from which they had previously been expelled.

Sengoku period: Oda Nobunaga, the most powerful of the Japanese daimyōs, is forced to commit suicide by his own general Akechi Mitsuhide.

Execution of 27 Czech noblemen on the Old Town Square in Prague as a consequence of the Battle of White Mountain.

In Montreal, New France, a slave known by the French name of Marie-Joseph Angélique is put to death, having been convicted of setting the fire that destroyed much of the city.

Halifax, Nova Scotia, is founded.

James Otis Jr. offends the King and Parliament in a speech to the Massachusetts General Court.

New Hampshire becomes the ninth state to ratify the Constitution of the United States.

King Louis XVI and his immediate family begin the Flight to Varennes during the French Revolution.

Irish Rebellion of 1798: The British Army defeats Irish rebels at the Battle of Vinegar Hill.

Peninsular War: Wellington defeats Joseph Bonaparte at the Battle of Vitoria.

Greek War of Independence: Egyptian forces capture Psara in the Aegean Sea.

Maniots defeat Egyptians under Ibrahim Pasha in the Battle of Vergas.

In the Wallachian Revolution, Ion Heliade Rădulescu and Christian Tell issue the Proclamation of Islaz and create a new republican government.

American Civil War: The Battle of Jerusalem Plank Road begins.

New Zealand Wars: A British victory against the Māori King Movement brought the Tauranga campaign to an end.

Rudyard Kipling's poem Mandalay was published.

The United States captures Guam from Spain. The few warning shots fired by the U.S. naval vessels are misinterpreted as salutes by the Spanish garrison, which was unaware that the two nations were at war.

Boxer Rebellion: China formally declares war on the United States, Britain, Germany, France and Japan, as an edict issued from the Empress Dowager Cixi.

The U.S. Supreme Court hands down its decision in Guinn v. United States 238 US 347 1915, striking down Oklahoma grandfather clause legislation which had the effect of denying the right to vote to African-Americans.

Admiral Ludwig von Reuter scuttles the German fleet at Scapa Flow, Orkney. The nine sailors killed are the last casualties of World War I.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police fire a volley into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two, during the Winnipeg general strike.

The Irish village of Knockcroghery is burned by British forces.

An agreement brokered by U.S. Ambassador Dwight Whitney Morrow ends the Cristero War in Mexico.

One-year conscription comes into force in France.

World War II: Italy begins an unsuccessful invasion of France.

Having defeated forces of Vichy France, Allied forces capture Damascus.

World War II: A Japanese submarine surfaces near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by Japan against the United States mainland.

World War II: Tobruk falls to Italian and German forces; 33,000 Allied troops are taken prisoner.

World War II: The Battle of Okinawa ends when the organized resistance of Imperial Japanese Army forces collapses in the Mabuni area on the southern tip of the main island.

The Manchester Baby, the world's first stored-program computer, ran its first program.

The Philippine School of Commerce, through a republic act, is converted to Philippine College of Commerce, later to be the Polytechnic University of the Philippines.

Ellen Fairclough is sworn in as Canada's first female Cabinet Minister.

Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini is elected as Pope Paul VI.

Three civil rights workers, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Michael Schwerner, are murdered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, United States, by members of the Ku Klux Klan.

Penn Central declares Section 77 bankruptcy in what was the largest U.S. corporate bankruptcy to date.

In its decision in Miller v. California, 413 U.S. 15, the Supreme Court of the United States establishes the Miller test for determining whether something is obscene and not protected speech under the U.S. constitution.

The Primer Congreso del Hombre Andino is inaugurated in Arica, Chile.

The original production of Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical, Evita, based on the life of Eva Perón, opens at the Prince Edward Theatre, London.

John Hinckley is found not guilty by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

Braathens SAFE Flight 139 is hijacked on approach to Oslo Airport, Fornebu. Special forces arrest the hijacker and there are no fatalities.

The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397, that American flag-burning is a form of political protest protected by the First Amendment.

Space Shuttle Endeavour is launched on STS-57 to retrieve the European Retrievable Carrier (EURECA) satellite. It is also the first shuttle mission to carry the Spacehab module.

President Bill Clinton awarded the Medal of Honor to 22 Asian Americans, mostly from the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, for actions during World War II.

Section 28 (of the Local Government Act 1988), outlawing the 'promotion' of homosexuality in the United Kingdom, is repealed in Scotland with a 99 to 17 vote.

A federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia, indicts 13 Saudis and a Lebanese in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 American servicemen.

SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight.

Edgar Ray Killen, who had previously been unsuccessfully tried for the murders of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Mickey Schwerner, is convicted of manslaughter 41 years afterwards (the case had been reopened in 2004).

A Yeti Airlines de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter crashes at Jumla Airport in Nepal, killing nine people.

Pluto's newly discovered moons are officially named Nix and Hydra.

Greenland assumes self-rule.

A boat carrying more than 200 migrants capsizes in the Indian Ocean between the Indonesian island of Java and Christmas Island, killing 17 people and leaving 70 others missing.

An Indonesian Air Force Fokker F27 Friendship crashes near Halim Perdanakusuma International Airport, killing 11.

A hot air balloon catches fire mid-flight and crashes in Praia Grande, Santa Catarina, Brazil, killing 8 of the 21 on board.

Jean-Paul Sartre, French philosopher and author (died 1980)

Lana Del Rey, American singer-songwriter

Benazir Bhutto, Pakistani politician, Prime Minister of Pakistan (died 2007)

Chris Pratt, American actor

Joko Widodo, Indonesian businessman and politician, 7th President of Indonesia

Edward Snowden, American activist and academic

Shirin Ebadi, Iranian lawyer, judge, and activist, Nobel Prize laureate

William, Prince of Wales, heir apparent to the British throne

Michel Platini, French footballer and manager

Françoise Sagan, French author and playwright (died 2004)

Viktor Tsoi, Russian singer-songwriter and guitarist (died 1990)

Yingluck Shinawatra, Thai businesswoman and politician, 28th Prime Minister of Thailand

Pope Leo IX (died 1054)

Siméon Denis Poisson, French mathematician and physicist (died 1840)

Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, Brazilian author, poet, and playwright (died 1908)

Andrzej Sapkowski, Polish author and translator

Ian McEwan, British novelist and screenwriter

Jane Russell, American actress and singer (died 2011)

Juliette Lewis, American actress and singer-songwriter

Daniel D. Tompkins, American lawyer and politician, 6th Vice President of the United States (died 1825)

Judy Holliday, American actress and singer (died 1965)

Max Wolf, German astronomer and academic (died 1932)

William Vickrey, Canadian-American economist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1996)

Maureen Stapleton, American actress (died 2006)

Tony Scott, English-American director and producer (died 2012)

Luis Antonio Tagle, Filipino cardinal

Yang Liwei, Chinese general, pilot, and astronaut

Lluís Companys, Spanish lawyer and politician, 123rd President of Catalonia (died 1940)

Joe Flaherty, American-Canadian actor, producer, and screenwriter (died 2024)

Rebecca Black, American singer-songwriter

(O.S.) Natalia Goncharova, Russian painter, costume designer, and illustrator (died 1962)

Manu Chao, French singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer

Reinhold Niebuhr, American theologian and academic (died 1971)

Giovanni Spadolini, Italian journalist and politician, 45th Prime Minister of Italy (died 1994)

Kostas Katsouranis, Greek footballer

Clara Immerwahr, Jewish-German chemist and academic (died 1915)

Adam Zagajewski, Polish author and poet (died 2021)

Gaël Kakuta, French footballer

Sebastian Prödl, Austrian footballer

Claude Auchinleck, English field marshal (died 1981)

Maria of Austria, Holy Roman Empress (died 1603)

Lalo Schifrin, Argentinian pianist, composer, and conductor (died 2025)

Doug Savant, American actor

Johann Christoph Friedrich Bach, German pianist and composer (died 1791)

Aleksandr Tvardovsky, Russian poet and author (died 1971)

Mary McCarthy, American novelist and critic (died 1989)

Heinrich Wölfflin, Swiss historian and critic (died 1945)

Brandon Flowers, American singer-songwriter

Pier Luigi Nervi, Italian architect and engineer, co-designed the Pirelli Tower and Cathedral of Saint Mary of the Assumption (died 1979)

Gennady Padalka, Russian colonel, pilot, and astronaut

Jean Chacornac, French astronomer (died 1873)

Fernando Savater, Spanish philosopher and author

Anne Carson, Canadian poet and academic

Håvard Nordtveit, Norwegian footballer

Pierre Omidyar, French-American businessman, founded eBay

Kris Allen, American musician, singer and songwriter

Ferdinand Christian Baur, German theologian and scholar (died 1860)

Carrie Preston, American actress, director, and producer

Pablo Barrera, Mexican footballer

Motoori Norinaga, Japanese poet and scholar (died 1801)