| | 842 - Charles the Bald and Louis the German swear the Oaths of Strasbourg in French and German language. |
| | 1014 - Pope Boniface I recognizes Henry of Bavaria as King of Germany. |
| | 1076 - Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor. |
| | 1556 - Thomas Cranmer is declared a heretic. |
| | 1575 - Henry III of France marries Louise de Lorraine-Vaudémont. |
| | 1743 - Henry Pelham becomes British Prime Minister. |
| | 1779 - James Cook is killed by the natives of the Sandwich Islands. |
| | 1797 - French Revolutionary Wars: Battle of Cape St. Vincent - John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent & Horatio Nelson (later 1st Viscount Nelson) led the British Royal Navy to victory over a Spanish fleet in action near Gibraltar. |
| | 1803 - Chief Justice John Marshall declares that any act of U.S. Congress which conflicts with the Constitution is void. |
| | 1804 - Karadjordje leads the First Serbian Uprising against the Ottoman Empire. |
| | 1831 - Ras Marye of Yejju marches into Tigray and defeats and kills dejjazmatch Sabagadis in the Battle of Debre Abbay. |
| | 1835 - The original Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is formed in Kirtland, Ohio. |
| | 1843 - The event that inspired the song Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite! is held. |
| | 1849 - In New York City, James Knox Polk becomes the first President of the United States to have his photograph taken. |
| | 1854 - Texas linked by telegraph with the rest of the United States, with the completion of a connection between New Orleans and Marshall, Texas. |
| | 1859 - Oregon admitted as the 33rd U.S. state. |
| | 1876 - Alexander Graham Bell applies for a patent for the telephone,as does Elisha Gray. |
| | 1879 - The War of the Pacific breaks out when Chilean armed forces occupy the Bolivian port city of Antofagasta. |
| | 1886 - First trainload of oranges left Los Angeles via the transcontinental railroad. |
| | 1895 - First performance of Oscar Wilde's last play The Importance of Being Earnest at the St James's Theatre in London). |
| | 1899 - Voting machines are approved by the U.S. Congress for use in federal elections. |
| | 1900 - Russia responds to international pressure to free Finland by tightening imperial control over the country. |
| | 1900 - Second Boer War: In South Africa, 20,000 British troops invade the Orange Free State. |
| | 1903 - The United States Department of Commerce and Labor is established (later split into Dept. of Commerce and Dept. of Labor). |
| | 1912 - Arizona admitted as the 48th U.S. state. |
| | 1912 - In Groton, Connecticut, the first diesel-powered submarine is commissioned. |
| | 1918 - Tarzan of the Apes, the first movie featuring Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan character, is released. |
| | 1918 - The Soviet Union adopts the Gregorian calendar (1 February according to the Julian calendar). |
| | 1919 - The Polish-Soviet War begins. |
| | 1920 - The League of Women Voters is founded in Chicago, Illinois. |
| | 1924 - The International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) is founded. |
| | 1929 - St. Valentine's Day Massacre: Seven gangster rivals of Al Capone are murdered in Chicago, Illinois. |
| | 1943 - World War II: Rostov, Russia is liberated. |
| | 1943 - World War II: Battle of the Kasserine Pass - German General Erwin Rommel and the Afrika Korps launch an offensive against Allied defenses in Tunisia. |
| | 1944 - World War II: Anti-Japanese revolt on Java. |
| | 1945 - On the second day of the Bombing of Dresden in World War II the British Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces begin fire-bombing Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony. |
| | 1945 - Bombing of Prague - probably due to a mistake in the orientation of the pilots bombing Dresden. |
| | 1945 - Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru join the United Nations. |
| | 1945 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt meets with King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia aboard the USS Quincy, officially starting the U.S.-Saudi diplomatic relationship. |
| | 1945 - Fascism destroyed in City of Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina(then:Yugoslavia) thanks to partisans(Dalmatinaska birgada, Hercegovacka divizija). |
| | 1946 - The Bank of England is nationalized. |
| | 1946 - ENIAC (for "Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer"), the first general-purpose electronic computer, unveiled at the University of Pennsylvania. |
| | 1949 - The Knesset (Israeli parliament) first convenes. |
| | 1949 - The Asbestos Strike begins in Canada. The strike marks the beginning of the Quiet Revolution in Quebec. |
| | 1952 - Olympic Games: Winter Olympic Games - VI Olympic Winter Games open in Oslo, Norway. |
| | 1956 - The XX Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union starts in Moscow. In the last night of the meeting, in a secret session, Premier Nikita Khruschev condemns Josef Stalin's crimes. |
| | 1961 - Discovery of the chemical elements: Element 103, Lawrencium, is first synthesized at the University of California. |
| | 1962 - First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy takes television viewers on a tour of the White House. |
| | 1966 - Australian currency is decimalised. |
| | 1979 - In Kabul, Muslim extremists kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police. |
| | 1980 - Olympic Games: Winter Olympic Games - XIII Olympic Winter Games open in Lake Placid, New York. |
| | 1980 - Walter Cronkite announces his retirement from the CBS Evening News. |
| | 1981 - Stardust Disaster. A fire in a Dublin nightclub kills 48 people |
| | 1983 - United American Bank of Knoxville, Tennessee collapses. Its president, Jake Butcher is later convicted of fraud. |
| | 1985 - CNN reporter Jeremy Levin is freed from captivity in Lebanon. |
| | 1989 - Union Carbide agrees to pay $470 million to the Indian government for damages it caused in the 1984 Bhopal Disaster. |
| | 1989 - Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini issues a fatwa encouraging Muslims to kill the author of The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie. |
| | 1989 - The first of 24 satellites of the Global Positioning System is placed into orbit. |
| | 1998 - Authorities in the United States announce that Eric Robert Rudolph is a suspect in an Alabama abortion clinic bombing. |
| | 2000 - The spacecraft NEAR Shoemaker enters orbit around asteroid 433 Eros, the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid. |
| | 2002 - The Tullaghmurray Lass sinks off the coast of Kilkeel, County Down, Northern Ireland killing three members of the same family on board. |
| | 2004 - In a suburb of Moscow, Russia, the roof of the Transvaal water park collapses, killing more than 25 people, and wounding more than 100 others. |
| | 2005 - Lebanon's former Prime Minister, Rafik Hariri, is assassinated, prompting the Cedar Revolution (Intifada of Independence). |
| | 2005 - Seven people were killed and 151 wounded in a series of bombings by suspected Al-Qaeda-linked militants that hit the Philippines' Makati financial district in Metro Manila, Davao City, and General Santos City. |
| | 2006 chip and PIN - UK cardholders had to use their PIN to be sure they could pay with their chip and PIN card. This change was made to better protect cardholders against fraudsters. |