1722
Death of the Kangxi Emperor
After sixty-one years on the throne, the longest reign in Chinese history, the Kangxi Emperor died in Beijing. He had doubled the empire, suppressed revolts, sponsored scholars, dabbled in Jesuit mathematics, and fathered fifty-six children. His successor Yongzheng would inherit an empire at a peak most rulers only dream of.
Fall of Isfahan to the Ghilzai Afghans
After a six-month siege that starved the Safavid capital to cannibalism, Mahmud Hotak's Afghans entered Isfahan. Shah Sultan Husayn surrendered his turban. The gardens of the Four Heavens burned. Two centuries of Safavid rule over Persia ended in a matter of weeks. The Persian throne itself would wander for a generation.
Roggeveen Sights Easter Island
The Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, hunting the mythic Southern Continent, made landfall on Easter Sunday at an island ringed by gigantic stone heads. The islanders wore little and offered reed boats. Roggeveen stayed a day and sailed on, mystified. The moai, already ancient, gazed inward from their collapsing platforms. The mystery of who carved them and how they were moved would captivate scholars for centuries.
Defoe's Moll Flanders
The creator of Crusoe published another pseudo-autobiography: the confessions of a Newgate-born pickpocket who had been whore, thief, wife, and American planter, and now found religion. Readers devoured it. The English novel had added a second species: the picaresque testimony from the lower depths, told in the voice of a woman who survived.
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Frequently asked
What happened in the year 1722?
Saeculum lists 4 curated events from 1722. The most significant is Death of the Kangxi Emperor: After sixty-one years on the throne, the longest reign in Chinese history, the Kangxi Emperor died in Beijing.
What era was 1722 part of?
1722 falls within the Enlightenment (1651-1800). Reason, revolution, and the first global wars.
Which regions saw notable events in 1722?
The curated events from 1722 span East Asia, Middle East, Oceania and Europe.