Events

• June 25 - Augsburg confession presented to Charles V of Holy Roman Empire.
• August 12 - Florence is captured by Spanish troops under Prince Philibert of Orange . The Medici are restored in the person of the Pope's nephew Alessandro de Medici.
• Knights of Malta are formed when the Knights Hospitaller are given Malta by Pope Clement VIII.
• Ducal palace of Celle constructed.
• Martin Afonso de Souza 's expedition to patrol the Brazilian coast, banish the French, and create the first colonial towns: São Vicente and São Paulo.
• Austrian forces capture Gran in Hungary, and raid as far as Buda.
• Copernicus presents his sun-based system.

Births

• February 18 - Uesugi Kenshin, Japanese samurai and warlord
• April 27 - Jacopo Sannazaro, Italian poet (b. 1458)
• May 7 - Louis I de Bourbon, Prince de Condé, Huguenot general (d. 1569)
• August 25 - Ivan IV of Russia (Ivan The Terrible), first czar of all Russia.
• November 6 - Josias Simler, Swiss scholar, mostly known as the author of the first book pertaining entirely to the Alps.
• Thomas Jones (later known as Twm Shon Catti), Welsh outlaw, called the Welsh Robin Hood. (approximate date)
• Jan Kochanowski
• Christopher Bathory, a prince of Transylvania
• John Whitgift, English archbishop
• Elias Nikolaus Ammerbach, German composer
• Guillaume Costeley , French composer of Parisian chansons
• Claude Le Jeune, French composer of chansons

Deaths

• December 26 - Babur, founder of India's Mughal Empire
• November 29 - Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, British statesman
• Quentin Matsys a painter in the Flemish tradition, founder of the Antwerp school.
• Fernando Lopes, the first permanent resident of Saint Helena.