Major Events
- Jan 31 Battle of Gembloux (Gembloers); Spanish forces win decisive victor over coalition rebel forces
- Feb 13 Tycho Brahe first sketches "Tychonic system" of solar system
- Mar 10 Queen Elizabeth I of England gives Johan Casimir £20,000 to aid Dutch rebellion
- Apr 27 Duel of the Mignons claims the lives of two favorites of Henry III of France and two favorites of Henry I, Duke of Guise.
- May 31 Martin Frobisher sails from Harwich, England, to Frobisher Bay, Canada. Eventually mines fools gold, famously used to pave the streets of London.
- Jun 11 England grants Sir Humphrey Gilbert a patent to explore and colonize North America
- Jul 2 English explorer Martin Frobisher sights Baffin Island
- Aug 2 Battle of Rijmenam: Spanish Habsburg forces defeated by Dutch troops (Eighty Years' War)
- Aug 4 Battle of The Three Kings [Battle of Alcazar quivir): Moroccans defeat a Moroccan-Portuguese alliance in northern Morocco with 10,000 killed
- Aug 13 Duke Frans of Anjou recognized as protector of Netherlands
- More 1578 Events
Philip III
Ferdinand IIMore People Born in 1578
Who Died in 1578
- Feb 5 Giovanni B Moroni, Italian portrait painter, dies
- Mar 7 Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lennox, niece of Henry VIII and whose son married Mary Queen of Scots, dies at 62
- Mar 29 Arthur Champernowne, English admiral (b. 1524)
- Mar 29 Louis I, Cardinal of Guise, French cardinal (b. 1527)
- Mar 31 Juan de Escobedo, sec of Spanish land guardian Don Juan, murdered
More 1578 Deaths
Elizabeth I
Philip II of Spain