February 4

The Roman emperor Septimius Severus died at Eboracum (York) while campaigning in Britain, leaving the empire to his sons Caracalla and Geta.

Georges Dossin, the Belgian Assyriologist who read thousands of cuneiform tablets from the royal archives of Mari, was born near Liège.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German Lutheran pastor and theologian whose prison writings became widely read, was born in Breslau.

The foundation stone of Banaras Hindu University, envisioned by Madan Mohan Malaviya to join Vedic learning with modern science, was laid at Varanasi.

Robert Koldewey, the German archaeologist whose long excavation of Babylon uncovered the Ishtar Gate and the Processional Way, died in Berlin.

Archibald Henry Sayce, a pioneering British Assyriologist and Oxford's first Professor of Assyriology, died at Bath.

Robert Boyle, the Irish natural philosopher remembered for Boyle's law of gases and for championing careful experiment, was born at Lismore Castle in County Waterford.

Hendrik Lorentz, the Dutch physicist whose transformations of space and time underpinned Einstein's special relativity, died at Haarlem; his funeral drew leading scientists from across Europe.