Directory

1166 CE

King William I ("the Wicked") of Sicily dies at Palermo after a 12-year reign. He is succeeded by his 12-year-old son William II ("the Good"), whose mother, Margaret of Navarre, will be regent until he comes of age. The town of Bad Kleinkirchheim (in modern Austria) is first mentioned, in an ecclesiastical document, in which Archbishop Conrad II of Salzburg confirms the donation of a chapel, nearby Millstatt Abbey. Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony, has the Brunswick Lion created at Dankwarderode Castle in Braunschweig (modern Germany). (Mentioned by Albert of Stade, a German abbot and chronicler, as the year of origin.).

Geopolitics & Diplomacy

  • Henry II enacts the Assize of Clarendon, reforming English law, influential in the development of jury trial in common law countries worldwide.source

Conflict & Security

  • Summer – Henry II of England invades and conquers Brittany to punish the local Breton barons. He grants the territory to his 7-year-old son Geoffrey.source
  • Byzantine Emperor Manuel I Komnenos asks Venice to help pay the costs of defending Sicily, whose Norman rulers have had good relations with Venice. Doge Vitale II Michiel refuses to pay the requested subsidy. Manuel begins to cultivate relationships with the main commercial rivals of Venice: Genoa and Pisa. He grants them their own trade quarters in Constantinople, very near the Venetian settlements.source
  • Mieszko III the Old proclaims a Prussian crusade against the pagans and pressures the collaboration of Frederick I. He leaves Greater Poland in the hands of his younger brother Casimir II the Just.source

Religion & Belief

  • July 5 – The town of Bad Kleinkirchheim (in modern Austria) is first mentioned, in an ecclesiastical document, in which Archbishop Conrad II of Salzburg confirms the donation of a chapel, nearby Millstatt Abbey.source
  • Autumn – Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa begins his fourth Italian campaign, hoping to secure the claim of Antipope Paschal III in Rome and the coronation of his wife Beatrice I, Countess of Burgundy, as Holy Roman Empress.source
  • Cartae Baronum ("Charters of the Barons"), a survey commissioned by the English Treasury requiring each baron to declare how many knights he had enfeoffed.source

Culture & Society

  • Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony, has the Brunswick Lion created at Dankwarderode Castle in Braunschweig (modern Germany). (Mentioned by Albert of Stade, a German abbot and chronicler, as the year of origin.)source
  • Anglo-Norman soldier William Marshal is knighted while on campaign in Normandy; he will be described as "the greatest knight that ever lived".source

Births

  • February 24 – Al-Mansur Abdallah, Zaidi imam (d. 1217)source
  • July 29 – Henry II, Count of Champagne (Henry I, King of Jerusalem) (d. 1197)source
  • December 24 – John, king of England (d. 1216)source
  • Arnold of Altena, German nobleman (d. 1209)source
  • Wansong Xingxiu, Chinese Buddhist monk (d. 1246)source
  • Shunten (Shunten-Ō), Ryukyu ruler of Okinawa (d. 1237)source
  • Philip d'Aubigny, Anglo-Norman knight and courtier (d. 1236)source
  • Ch'oe U, Korean general and dictator (d. 1249)source
  • Alan IV ("the Young"), viscount of Rohan, Morbihan (d. 1205)source
  • Odo III (or Eudes), duke of Burgundy (d. 1218)source
  • William de Warenne, 5th Earl of Surrey, English nobleman (d. 1240)source
  • Judah ben Isaac Messer Leon, French rabbi (b. 1224)source
  • Abu al-Abbas al-Nabati, Andalusian Moorish pharmacist (d. 1239)source

Deaths

  • February 21 – Abdul Qadir Gilani, Persian preacher (b. 1078)source
  • April 9 – Waleran de Beaumont, English nobleman (b. 1104)source
  • May 7 – William I ("the wicked"), king of Sicily (b. 1120)source
  • May 7 – King William I ("the Wicked") of Sicily dies at Palermo after a 12-year reign. He is succeeded by his 12-year-old son William II ("the Good"), whose mother, Margaret of Navarre, will be regent until he comes of age.source
  • May 12 – Gunhilda of Dunbar, Scottish Noblewoman (b. 1120)source
  • August 23 – Konoe Motozane, Japanese nobleman (b. 1143)source
  • October 12 – Henry I, duke of Wiślicasource
  • Gillamaire Ua Conallta, Irish poet and Chief Ollamsource
  • Fujiwara no Motozane, Japanese waka poet (b. 1143)source
  • Muirchertach Mac Lochlainn, High King of Irelandsource
  • Grigor III Pahlavuni, Armenian catholicos of Cilicia (b. 1093)source
  • Ahmad Yasawi, Turkic Sufi religious leader (b. 1093)source
  • Rosalia, Norman-Sicilian noblewoman, hermit and saint (b. 1130)source
  • Athanasius VII bar Qatra, Syrian patriarch of Antiochsource