| |||||
Centuries: | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Decades: | |||||
See also: | Other events of 1703 |
Events from the year 1703 in England.
Samuel Pepys was an English diarist and naval administrator. He served as administrator of the Royal Navy and Member of Parliament and is most famous for the diary he kept for a decade. Pepys had no maritime experience, but he rose to be the Chief Secretary to the Admiralty under both King Charles II and King James II through patronage, diligence, and his talent for administration. His influence and reforms at the Admiralty were important in the early professionalisation of the Royal Navy.
1703 (MDCCIII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar and a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar, the 1703rd year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 703rd year of the 2nd millennium, the 3rd year of the 18th century, and the 4th year of the 1700s decade. As of the start of 1703, the Gregorian calendar was 11 days ahead of the Julian calendar, which remained in localized use until 1923.
Charles II was King of Scotland from 1649 until 1651 and King of England, Scotland, and Ireland from the 1660 Restoration of the monarchy until his death in 1685.
Robert Hooke FRS. was an English polymath, active as a physicist, astronomer, geologist, meteorologist and architect. He is credited as one of the first scientists to explore living things at microscopic scale, using a compound microscope that he designed. An impoverished scientific inquirer in young adulthood, he became one of the most important scientists of his day. As a surveyor and architect, he found wealth and esteem by performing over half of the property surveys after London's great fire of 1666 and assisting in the city's rapid reconstruction. In recent times, he has been called "England's Leonardo".
Anne Hyde was the first wife of James, Duke of York, who later became King James II and VII.
Events from the year 1703 in literature.
St Olave's Church, Hart Street, is a Church of England church in the City of London, located on the corner of Hart Street and Seething Lane near Fenchurch Street railway station.
The Pepys Library of Magdalene College, Cambridge, is the personal library collected by Samuel Pepys which he bequeathed to the college following his death in 1703.
Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich, 27 July 1625 to 28 May 1672, was an English military officer, politician and diplomat from Barnwell, Northamptonshire. During the First English Civil War, he served with the Parliamentarian army, and was an MP at various times between 1645 and 1660. Under The Protectorate, he was also a member of the English Council of State and General at sea.
Frances Teresa Stewart, Duchess of Richmond and Lennox was a prominent member of the Court of the Restoration and famous for refusing to become a mistress of Charles II of England. For her great beauty she was known as La Belle Stuart and served as the model for an idealised, female Britannia. She is one of the Windsor Beauties painted by Sir Peter Lely.
Sir Robert Holmes was an English Admiral of the Restoration Navy. He participated in the second and third Anglo-Dutch Wars, both of which he is, by some, credited with having started. He was made Governor of the Isle of Wight, where he is buried in Yarmouth Parish Church.
Roderigo Lopes served as a physician-in-chief to Queen Elizabeth I of England from 1581 until his death by execution, having been found guilty of plotting to poison her. A Portuguese converso or New Christian of Jewish ancestry, he is the only royal doctor in English history to have been executed, and may have inspired the character of Shylock in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, which was written within four years of his death.
Events from the year 1660 in England. This is the year of the Stuart Restoration.
Events from the year 1667 in England. Dates are given in Old Style. As of the start of this year, the Gregorian calendar in use by the Dutch Republic and elsewhere on the continent is 10 days ahead of the Julian calendar in use in England.
Events from the year 1665 in England.
Events from the 1630s in England.
Events from the year 1635 in England.
Sir Samuel Tuke, 1st Baronet was an English officer in the Royalist army during the English Civil War and a notable playwright. He is best known for his 1663 play The Adventures of Five Hours, possibly co-authored by George Digby – the play was produced by the Duke's Company and later proved an influence on Richard Brinsley Sheridan's opera The Duenna.
Sir Alexander Fraizer FRS, was a Scottish physician.
Hester Davenport was a leading actress with the Duke's Company under the management of Sir William Davenant. Among the earliest English actresses, she was best known as "that faire & famous Comoedian call'd Roxalana," as diarist John Evelyn put it after seeing her on 9 January 1661/2. Her career ended when she married Aubrey de Vere, 20th Earl of Oxford (1627-1703) in 1662 or 1663. The couple had a son in 1664. Oxford soon deserted Davenport and his son Aubrey, marrying a fellow nobleman's daughter in January 1672. In a 1686 church court case, Oxford admitted the marriage ceremony with Davenport had been a sham.