142 things happened on 8 January, from AD 307 to 2023. UK stories come first, then the rest of the world.
1735 · 291 years ago
Ariodante, an opera by George Frideric Handel, was performed for the first time at the Covent Garden Theatre in London. Its story was based on part of a long Italian poem called Orlando Furioso. Each act includes dances, written for the dancer Marie Sallé and…
UK history first: stories from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
UK story
At the Battle of Ashdown, a West Saxon army beat a Danish Viking army. It was led by King Æthelred of Wessex and his younger brother Alfred. Nobody knows exactly where Ashdown was, but it may have been in Berkshire. Alfred became king later that year and is remembered as Alfred the Great.
UK story
Ariodante, an opera by George Frideric Handel, was performed for the first time at the Covent Garden Theatre in London. Its story was based on part of a long Italian poem called Orlando Furioso. Each act includes dances, written for the dancer Marie Sallé and her company. Handel was a German-British composer, famous for his operas, oratorios and anthems.
UK story
During the Jacobite rising of 1745, Charles Edward Stuart and his army occupied the town of Stirling in Scotland. Charles, known as Bonnie Prince Charlie, was the grandson of King James VII and II. He led the rising to try to win back the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland for the exiled Stuart family. The rising failed, and it was the last of the Jacobite risings.
UK story
Britain began rationing food, which means limiting how much of it each person could buy. Bacon, butter and sugar were the first foods to be rationed. Everyone had a ration book with coupons, and shopkeepers cancelled the coupons when rationed food was bought. Later, many more foods were rationed, including meat, tea, cheese and eggs, but vegetables and bread were not.
UK story
Queen Elizabeth II christened, or officially named, the ocean liner RMS Queen Mary 2. The ship was named after Queen Mary, the Queen's grandmother. At the time it was the largest ocean liner ever built. Queen Mary 2 sails across the Atlantic between Southampton and New York, and it is the only ocean liner still in service.
UK story
The Dutch Cape Colony in southern Africa becomes the British Cape Colony as a result of the Battle of Blaauwberg.
UK story
War of 1812: Battle of New Orleans: Andrew Jackson leads American forces in victory over the British.
François Grimaldi, a nobleman from Genoa, led his men to capture the fortress on the Rock of Monaco during the night. Grimaldi was disguised as a monk. His family, the House of Grimaldi, has ruled Monaco ever since. Monaco is now the second smallest country in the world, after Vatican City.
American inventor Herman Hollerith received a patent for his tabulating machine. It used electricity to count information stored as holes punched in stiff paper cards. The machine was developed to help process the results of the 1890 United States census. His invention began the era of machine data processing, and punched cards were later used in early computing.
The African National Congress, or ANC, was founded in South Africa, at first under the name South African Native National Congress. It became a liberation movement known for opposing apartheid, a system that kept people apart by race. In 1994, after the first election following apartheid, the ANC's Nelson Mandela became President of South Africa. The ANC has governed the country since then.
The Soviet Union launched Luna 21, a spacecraft with no crew. It landed on the Moon and released Lunokhod 2, the second Soviet Moon rover. The mission's goals included taking pictures of the Moon's surface and studying its soil and magnetic fields. It also measured X-rays coming from the Sun.
Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov set off on Soyuz TM-18 for the Mir space station. He stayed on board until 22 March 1995, spending a record 437 days in space. He still holds the record for the longest single stay in space. During his long flight, he carried out research into space medicine.
Sima Chi becomes emperor of the Jin dynasty in succession to his brother, Sima Zhong, despite a challenge from his other brother, Sima Ying.
Lotario dei Conti was elected as Pope Innocent III; he later worked to restore papal power in Rome.
The papal bull Romanus Pontifex awards the Kingdom of Portugal exclusive trade and colonization rights to all of Africa south of Cape Bojador.
Louis XII of France marries Anne of Brittany in accordance with a law set by his predecessor, Charles VIII.
The first Lithuanian-language book, the Catechism of Martynas Mažvydas, is published in Königsberg.
George Washington delivered the first State of the Union address in New York City, then the provisional capital of the United States.
The Democratic Party of the United States is organized.
US President Andrew Jackson announces a celebratory dinner after having reduced the United States national debt to zero for the only time.
American Civil War: Second Battle of Springfield.
The United States Congress passes the bill to allow African American men the right to vote in Washington, D.C.
Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle against the United States Cavalry at Wolf Mountain, Montana Territory.
President William McKinley places Alaska under military rule.
Blackstone Library (pictured), the first branch of the Chicago Public Library system, was dedicated.
U.S. president Woodrow Wilson announced his Fourteen Points for a moral cause and for post–World War I peace in Europe.
The steel strike of 1919 ends in failure for the Amalgamated Association of Iron, Steel and Tin Workers labor union.
Abdul-Aziz ibn Saud is crowned King of Hejaz.
Crown Prince Nguyễn Phúc Vĩnh Thuỵ is crowned emperor of Vietnam, the country's last monarch.
The Committee for Union Action is established in Guatemala.
Anarchist insurrection of January 1933 breaks out in Barcelona, Spain.
Reza Shah issued the Kashf-e hijab decree, ordering Iranian police to remove hijabs from any women in public.
The New Deal for Aborigines was formally announced by the Australian government, providing for full civil rights for Indigenous Australians in exchange for cultural assimilation.
World War II: Philippine Commonwealth troops under the Philippine Commonwealth Army units enter the province of Ilocos Sur in Northern Luzon and attack invading Japanese Imperial forces.
Charles de Gaulle is proclaimed as the first President of the French Fifth Republic.
In France a referendum supports Charles de Gaulle's policies in Algeria.
President Lyndon B. Johnson declares a "War on Poverty" in the United States.
Following Pakistan's defeat in the Bangladesh Liberation War, President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto released Bangladeshi politician Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (pictured) from prison in response to international pressure.
Ella T. Grasso becomes Governor of Connecticut, the first woman to serve as a governor in the United States other than by succeeding her husband.
In Trans-en-Provence, France, a local farmer reported a UFO sighting claimed to be "perhaps the most completely and carefully documented sighting of all time".
Breakup of the Bell System: In the United States, AT&T agrees to divest itself of twenty-two subdivisions.
President of the United States George W. Bush signs into law the No Child Left Behind Act.
Supporters of former Brazil president Jair Bolsonaro storm the Brazilian Congress.
Every answer is somewhere on this page. Have a go, then check!
In which year did this happen: “Handel's opera Ariodante is first performed in London”?
C: 1735. 1735 — that’s 291 years ago. Find it on the page
In which year was Stephen Hawking born?
A: 1942. 1942 — that’s 84 years ago. Find it on the page
Which of these happened first?
C: Æthelred and Alfred defeat the Vikings at the Battle of Ashdown. 1735: Handel's opera Ariodante is first performed in London · 2004: The Queen names the ocean liner Queen Mary 2 · AD 871: Æthelred and Alfred defeat the Vikings at the Battle of Ashdown Find it on the page
“The Queen names the ocean liner Queen Mary 2” happened in 2004. How many years ago was that?
C: 22 years. 2026 − 2004 = 22. Find it on the page
Famous people whose birthday is 8 January.
UK story
Stephen Hawking was an English scientist who studied black holes and the universe. He was born in Oxford and became a professor at the University of Cambridge. At 21 he was found to have motor neurone disease, which slowly paralysed him, so he spoke using a speech-generating machine. His book A Brief History of Time stayed on the bestseller list for a record 237 weeks.
UK story
Alfred Russel Wallace was a naturalist, explorer and illustrator. He worked out the theory of evolution by natural selection on his own. His paper on it was published in 1858 alongside writings by Charles Darwin. This spurred Darwin to quickly write a shorter version of his big book, which came out in 1859 as On the Origin of Species.
Well-known people who died on 8 January.
Festivals, holidays and saints’ days celebrated on 8 January somewhere in the world.
Content note: these entries mention things like war, violence, deaths, disasters or crime. They are part of history, but they can be upsetting. Grown-ups and teachers: you may want to read them first. They come straight from Wikipedia and have not been rewritten for children.
Stories with a heading have been written for young readers by A Day in the Past, using the linked articles as sources. Other entries show text from Wikipedia’s “January 8” page and its “On this day” feed, written by Wikipedia contributors and shared under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence. Each “Read more” link goes to the article an entry is based on. Photos are credited under each picture. Spotted a mistake? Please tell us.