October 16

456 – Ricimer defeats Avitus at Piacenza and becomes master of the Western Roman Empire. 690 – Empress Wu Zetian ascends to the throne of the Tang dynasty and proclaims herself ruler of the Chinese Empire. 912 – Abd ar-Rahman III becomes the eighth Emir of Córdoba. 955 – King Otto I defeats a Slavic revolt in what is now Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. 1311 – The Council of Vienne convenes for the first time. 1384 – Jadwiga is crowned King of Poland, although she is a woman. 1590 – Prince Gesualdo of Venosa murders his wife and her lover. 1736 – Mathematician William Whiston's predicted comet fails to strike the Earth. 1780 – American Revolutionary War: The British-led Royalton raid is the last Native American raid on New England. 1780 – The Great Hurricane of 1780 finishes after its sixth day, killing between 20,000 and 24,000 residents of the Lesser Antilles. 1793 – French Revolution: Queen Marie Antoinette is executed. 1793 – War of the First Coalition: French victory at the Battle of Wattignies forces Austria to raise the siege of Maubeuge. 1805 – War of the Third Coalition: Napoleon surrounds the Austrian army at Ulm. 1813 – The Sixth Coalition attacks Napoleon in the three-day Battle of Leipzig. 1817 – Simón Bolívar sentences Manuel Piar to death for challenging the racial-caste in Venezuela. 1834 – Much of the ancient structure of the Palace of Westminster in London burns to the ground. 1836 – Great Trek: Afrikaner voortrekkers repulse a Matabele attack, but lose their livestock. 1841 – Queen's University is founded in the Province of Canada. 1843 – William Rowan Hamilton invents quaternions, a three-dimensional system of complex numbers. 1846 – William T. G. Morton administers ether anesthesia during a surgical operation. 1847 – The novel Jane Eyre is published in London. 1859 – John Brown leads a raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia. 1869 – The Cardiff Giant, one of the most famous American hoaxes, is "discovered". 1869 – Girton College, Cambridge is founded, becoming England's first residential college for women.