23 Azar 1403

Events

• 1642 (384 years ago) Abel Tasman is the first recorded European to sight New Zealand.
• 1938 (88 years ago) The Holocaust: The Neuengamme concentration camp opens in the Bergedorf district of Hamburg, Germany.
• 1939 (87 years ago) The Battle of the River Plate is fought off the coast of Uruguay; the first naval battle of World War II. The Kriegsmarine's Deutschland-class cruiser (pocket battleship) Admiral Graf Spee engages with three Royal Navy cruisers: HMS Ajax, HMNZS Achilles and HMS Exeter.
• 1949 (77 years ago) The Knesset votes to move the capital of Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
• 1960 (66 years ago) While Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia visits Brazil, his Imperial Bodyguard seizes the capital and proclaims him deposed and his son, Crown Prince Asfa Wossen, Emperor.
• 1974 (52 years ago) Malta becomes a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations.
• 1982 (44 years ago) The 6.0 Ms North Yemen earthquake shakes southwestern Yemen with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe), killing 2,800, and injuring 1,500.
• 2002 (24 years ago) European Union enlargement: The EU announces that Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia will become members on May 1, 2004.

Births

• 1521 (505 years ago) Pope Sixtus V,
• 1553 (473 years ago) Henry IV of France,
• 1797 (229 years ago) Heinrich Heine, German journalist, poet, and critic (died 1856)
• 1929 (97 years ago) Christopher Plummer, Canadian actor and producer (died 2021)
• 1953 (73 years ago) Ben Bernanke, American economist
• 1957 (69 years ago) Steve Buscemi, American actor and director
• 1967 (59 years ago) Jamie Foxx, American actor, singer, songwriter, producer, and comedian
• 1989 (37 years ago) Taylor Swift, American singer-songwriter

Deaths

• 1124 (902 years ago) Pope Callixtus II,
• 1204 (822 years ago) Maimonides, Spanish rabbi and philosopher (born 1135)
• 1250 (776 years ago) Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (born 1194)
• 1466 (560 years ago) Donatello, Italian painter and sculptor (born 1386)
• 1784 (242 years ago) Samuel Johnson, English poet and lexicographer (born 1709)
• 1931 (95 years ago) Gustave Le Bon, French psychologist, sociologist, and anthropologist (born 1840)
• 1935 (91 years ago) Victor Grignard, French chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1871)
• 1944 (82 years ago) Wassily Kandinsky, Russian-French painter and theorist (born 1866)

All 264 events, births and deaths of December 13