11 May 763
A Saturday in history
Weekday
Saturday
Season
Spring (N. Hemisphere)
Century
8th century
Records
210

2022Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was shot and killed while reporting on an Israel Defense Forces raid on the Jenin refugee camp.
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2013Two car bombs by unknown perpetrators exploded in Reyhanlı, Turkey, resulting in 52 killed and 140 injured.
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2011An earthquake registering Mw 5.1, the worst to hit the region for more than 50 years, struck near Lorca, Spain.
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2010David Cameron took office as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom as the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats formed the country's first coalition government since the Second World War.
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2010Gordon Brown resigned as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party after failing to strike a coalition agreement with the Liberal Democrats.
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1998India began the Pokhran-II nuclear-weapons test, its first since the Smiling Buddha test 24 years earlier.
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1997Deep Blue defeated Garry Kasparov in six games to become the first chess computer to win a match against a world champion.
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- 1963
African Americans rioted in Birmingham, Alabama, in response to two bombings, perceiving local police to be complicit with the perpetrators.
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1928After a week-long standoff punctuated by military clashes, Japanese forces captured the city of Jinan, Shandong in China.
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1894In response to a 28-percent wage cut, 4,000 Pullman Palace Car Company workers went on strike in Illinois, bringing rail traffic west of Chicago to a halt.
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1889Bandits attacked a U.S. Army paymaster's escort in the Arizona Territory, stealing more than $28,000.
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1880A land dispute between the Southern Pacific Railroad and settlers in Hanford, California, turned deadly when a gun battle broke out, leaving seven dead.
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1858Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted as the 32nd U.S. state.
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1820HMS Beagle (pictured), the ship that would take Charles Darwin on his voyage, was launched.
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1813William Lawson, Gregory Blaxland and William Wentworth departed westward from Sydney on an expedition to become the first confirmed Europeans to cross the Blue Mountains.
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1812Spencer Perceval was shot in the lobby of the House of Commons, becoming the only British prime minister to be assassinated.
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1745War of the Austrian Succession: French forces defeated those of the Pragmatic Allies at the Battle of Fontenoy in the Austrian Netherlands in present-day Belgium.
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868A copy of the Diamond Sutra was printed in Tang-dynasty China, making it the world's oldest dated printed book.
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Photo archive
24 historic images from this day — tap to open the gallery.
What was life like?
Prices, jobs, food, music and everyday routine — the world as it felt to live in.
Sources & fact check
Every claim is traced to primary sources, archives, universities and the press — with an explicit confidence rating. Dossiers are generated once and cached permanently.