What are the important events that happened on August 23? Here are historical events, facts, and some myths about this day.
August 23: Facts & Myths About This Day
August 23 is the 236th day of the year 2024 in the Gregorian calendar. There are 130 days remaining until the end of this year. The day of the week is Friday.
Under the Julian calendar, this day is August 10, 2024 – a Friday. Both day of the week are the same but did you notice the difference with the Gregorian calendar?
When this day started, 478,992 hours has elapsed since midnight of January 1, 1970 – the Unix epoch.
Strange as it may, if we name this day after a polygon then it will be called ‘dihectatriacontahexagon’ day.
Virgo is the zodiac sign of a person born on this day. Peridot is the modern birthstone for this month. Diamond is the mystical birthstone from Tibetan origin that dates back over a thousand years.
According to the lunisolar Chinese calendar, there are 159 days remaining before the start of the next Chinese New Year.
The ancient Maya civilization believes that the end of the world will happen on December 21, 2012. There are now 4,263 days since this fabled cataclysmic event.
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August 23 Historical Events
- 1514 –Battle of Chaldiran ended with a decisive victory for the Sultan Selim I, Ottoman Empire, over the Shah Ismail I, Safavids founder.
- 1572 –Mob violence against Huguenots in Paris – St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre.
- 1595 –Michael the Brave confronts the Ottoman army in the Battle of Calugareni.
- 1858 –The Round Oak rail accident occurs in Brierley Hill in the Black Country, England. It is 'Arguably the worst disaster ever to occur on British railways'.
- 1873 –Albert Bridge in Chelsea, London opened.
- 1914 –World War I: Japan declares war on Germany and bombs Qingdao, China.
- 1939 –World War II: Germany and the Soviet Union sign a non-aggression treaty, the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. In a secret addition to the pact, the Baltic states, Finland, Romania, and Poland are divided between the two nations.
- 1973 –A bank robbery gone wrong in Stockholm, Sweden, turns into a hostage crisis; over the next five days the hostages begin to sympathise with their captors, leading to the term “Stockholm syndrome”.
- 1990 –West Germany and East Germany announce that they will unite on October 3.
- 2010 –Manila hostage crisis, in which 8 hostages were killed
Who were born on August 23?
- 1524 –François Hotman, French lawyer and writer (d. 1590)
- 1623 –Stanisław Lubieniecki, Polish Socinian theologist (d. 1675)
- 1900 –Malvina Reynolds, American folk singer/songwriter (d. 1978)
- 1912 –Gene Kelly, American dancer and actor (d. 1996)
- 1921 –Sam Cook, England cricketer (d. 1996)
- 1932 –Houari Boumediène, President of Algeria (d. 1978)
- 1932 –Mark Russell, American comedian and political commentator
- 1944 –Antonia Novello, former United States Surgeon General
- 1979 –Ritchie Neville, British musician
- 1983 –Sun Ming Ming, Chinese basketball player
Who died on August 23?
- 1387 –King Olav IV of Norway (b. 1370)
- 1519 –Philibert Berthelier, Swiss patriot (b. 1465)
- 1591 –Luis Ponce de León, Spanish poet and mystic (b. 1527)
- 1806 –Charles Augustin de Coulomb, French physicist (b. 1736)
- 1892 –Deodoro da Fonseca, 1st President of Brazil (b. 1827)
- 1955 –Reginald Tate, British actor (b. 1896)
- 1962 –Walter Anderson, German folklorist (b. 1885)
- 1977 –Naum Gabo, Russian artist (b. 1890)
- 1982 –Stanford Moore, American biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1913)
- 1996 –Margaret Tucker Indigenous Australian activist and autobiographer (b. 1904)
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