Year 1659 (MDCLIX) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Saturday of the 10-day slower Julian calendar).

Events of 1659

January - June

• January 14 - Battle of Elvas: The Portuguese beat the Spanish.
• January 24 - Pierre Corneille's Oedipe premieres in Paris.
• February 11 - The assault on Copenhagen by Swedish forces is beaten back with heavy losses.
• February 16 - The first known cheque (400 pounds) is written (on display at Westminster Abbey).
• April 22 - Lord Protector Richard Cromwell disbands the English Parliament.
• May 22 - France, England, and Netherlands sign the Hedges Concerto treaty.
• May 25 - Richard Cromwell resigns as English Lord Protector.
• May 31 - The Netherlands, England, and France sign the Treaty of The Hague.

July - December

• July 16 - Princess Henriette C. of Orange-Nassau weds monarch Johan George II.
• September 30 - Peter Stuyvesant of New Netherland forbids tennis playing during religious services (first mention of tennis in what will be the U.S.).
• October 12 - The English Rump Parliament fires John Lambert and other generals.
• October 13 - General-major John Lambert drives out the English Rump-government.
• November 7 - Treaty of Pyrenees: French King Louis XIV and King Philip IV of Spain agree to French acquisition of Roussillon and most of Artois, and formally end their 24-year war.
• November 25 - Dutch forces under Michiel de Ruyter free the Danish city of Nyborg from Swedish conquest (earlier in the year).
• December 16 - General Monck demands free parliamentary election in Scotland.
• December 26 - The Long Parliament reforms occur in Westminster.

Undated

• The Spanish Infanta Maria Theresa brings cocoa to Paris.
• Diego Velázquez's portrait of Infanta Maria Theresa is first exhibited.
• Thomas Hobbes publishes De Homine.
• Parisian police raid a monastery, sending monks to prison for eating meat and drinking wine during Lent.
• Drought occurs in India.

Science

• Christiaan Huygens writes Systema Saturnium.

Births

• March 8 - Isaac de Beausobre, French Protestant pastor (d. 1738)
• June 3 - David Gregory, Scottish astronomer (d. 1708)
• June 12 - Yamamoto Tsunetomo, Japanese samurai (d. 1719
• July 20 - Hyacinthe Rigaud, French painter (d. 1743)
• July 28 - Charles Ancillon, French Protestant pastor (d. 1715)
• December 12 - Francesco Galli Bibiena, Italian architect/designer (d. 1739)

See also Category:1659 births.

Deaths

• January 16 - Charles Annibal Fabrot, French lawyer (b. 1580)
• February - Willem Drost, Dutch painter and printmaker (b. 1633)
• February 17 - Abel Servien, French diplomat (b. 1593)
• February 27 - Henry Dunster, first President of Harvard College (b. 1609)
• April 15 - Simon Dach, German poet (b. 1605)
• June 3 - Morgan Llwyd, Welsh Puritan preacher and writer (b. 1619)
• October 8 - Jean de Quen, French Jesuit missionary and historian (b. c. 1603)
• October 10 - Abel Tasman, Dutch explorer (b. 1603)
• October 31 - John Bradshaw, English judge (b. 1602)

See also Category:1659 deaths.

Fictional 1659

• September 30 - Robinson Crusoe is shipwrecked (according to Daniel Defoe).

• The book 'The Witch Child' is set in this year. The papers were found in a quilt and have been modernised into a book written by Celia Rees.