{"id":18456,"date":"2022-10-12T07:06:00","date_gmt":"2022-10-12T05:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historyextra.com\/?p=188505"},"modified":"2022-10-13T12:48:08","modified_gmt":"2022-10-13T10:48:08","slug":"12-october-on-this-day-in-history","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbchistory\/rss_feed\/12-october-on-this-day-in-history\/","title":{"rendered":"12 October: On this day in history"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Elinor Evans\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Wednesday, 12 October 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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12 October 633<\/h3>\n

At Hatfield Chase near Doncaster, the troops of Gwynedd and Mercia smash their Northumbrian adversaries and kill their king, Edwin.<\/p>\n

12 October 539 BC: Babylon falls to Cyrus the Great<\/h3>\n

The great Mesopotamian city comes under Persian control<\/em><\/p>\n

Babylon! For millennia the name had the ring of wealth, splendour and power: the city of Hammurabi, Nebuchadnezzar, the Ishtar Gate and the Hanging Gardens.<\/p>\n

But in the autumn of 539 BC, Babylon was at bay. After years of retreat, the Babylonians had been pushed back by the Persian king Cyrus the Great<\/a>, and at the battle of Opis, on the banks of the Tigris, Cyrus won an overwhelming victory. Now, Babylon lay open before him. What happened next, however, remains mysterious.<\/p>\n

According to the evidence of local inscriptions, Cyrus\u2019s army entered Babylon on 12 October without a fight, let alone a siege, probably because the city\u2019s rulers reckoned the war was lost and it was better to appease their new master. But the Greek historian Herodotus<\/a> tells a much more exciting story. The city, he explained, was guarded by impassable walls, which crossed the river Euphrates. Cyrus ordered his sappers to drain off the river into a nearby lake, so that its level fell \u201cabout to the middle of a man\u2019s thigh\u201d. Then\u00a0he sent his army along the river bed, into\u00a0the heart of the city. As luck would have it,\u00a0Herodotus added, the Babylonians were celebrating a religious festival. So even as the Persians crept towards them, \u201cthey went on dancing and rejoicing during this time until they\u00a0learnt the truth only too well\u201d.<\/p>\n

Either way, the result was the same: Cyrus was the master of Babylon. It belonged to his descendants for the next 200 years. | Written by Dominic Sandbrook<\/strong><\/p>\n

12 October 1216: King John loses his crown jewels<\/h3>\n

Precious jewels, men and horses are engulfed by \u201cwaves and bottomless whirlpools\u201d in East Anglia <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

By the autumn of 1216, England had been at war for over a year. With the barons in open rebellion against King John<\/a>, Prince Louis of France had landed in Kent in May and was then proclaimed king at St Paul\u2019s. John had fought back but by October the war had reached a gruelling stalemate.<\/p>\n

In September, John set out across the country on a long campaign, arriving in King\u2019s Lynn on 9 October before heading north. Three days later, disaster struck. The king had sent his baggage train separately, ordering it to take a short cut from East Anglia across the great estuary of the Wash. It was here, according to the chronicler Roger of Wendover, that \u201cthe treasures, precious vessels and all the other things which he cherished with special care\u201d were swept away in a terrible accident, \u201cfor the ground was opened in the midst of the waves and bottomless whirlpools engulfed everything, together with men and horses, so that not a single foot-soldier got away to bear tidings of the disaster to the king\u201d.<\/p>\n

One of the best known of all medieval anecdotes left John widely remembered as the hapless bungler who lost his treasure\u00a0in the Wash. Yet the story may not be quite what it seems. Accounts differ a lot, and even Roger\u2019s version is muddled. Some historians suspect it never happened, others that only a small quantity of valuables was lost. But John had more important things to worry about. By the time he reputedly lost his treasure, he had contracted dysentery. Six days later he was dead. | Written by Dominic Sandbrook<\/strong><\/p>\n

12 October 1459<\/h3>\n

A Yorkist army fled in disorder from Ludford Bridge near Ludlow after the defection of part of their forces to their Lancastrian enemies. Ludlow, which was known to be Yorkist in sympathies, was then thoroughly looted by the victorious Lancastrians.<\/p>\n

12 October 1537<\/h3>\n

Jane Seymour<\/a> gives birth to the future King Edward VI<\/a>.<\/p>\n

12 October 1808<\/h3>\n

A naval court martial finds Mr Watson Cradock, surgeon on board HMS Vulture, guilty of \u201cvery disorderly language, calculated to generate discontent and excite mutiny amongst the seamen\u201d, and dismisses him from the Navy.<\/p>\n

12 October 1871<\/h3>\n

The British government in India passed the Criminal Tribes Act, which branded the members of a number of population groups as innately criminal, restricted their movements and made elaborate arrangements for their supervision.<\/p>\n

12 October 1812<\/h3>\n

Italian chemist Ascanio Sobrero was born in Piedmont. In 1846 he discovered nitroglycerin when he added glycerol to a mixture of nitric and sulphuric acid. Alarmed by the compound\u2019s explosive nature, he warned vigorously against its use.<\/p>\n

12 October 1960<\/h3>\n

Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev caused uproar at the United Nations General Assembly when he used his shoe to bang on his desk in protest after the Philippine delegate accused the USSR of imperialism in eastern Europe.<\/p>\n

12 October 1971<\/h3>\n

Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi begins festivities \u2013 at a cost of up to $200m \u2013 to celebrate the 2,500th birthday of the Persian empire.<\/p>\n

Browse more\u00a0On this day in history<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n