Events

Up to 1900 
 69 - Roman Emperor Vitellius is captured and murdered at the Gemonian Stairs in Rome.
 401 - Pope Innocent I is elected.
 856 - An earthquake, near Donghan, Persia, kills an estimated 200,000 people.
 880 - China: Luoyang, eastern capital of the Tang Dynasty, is captured by rebel leader Huang Chao during the reign of Emperor Xizong of Tang.
 1135 - Stephen of Blois becomes King of England.
 1603 – Mehmed III Sultan of the Ottoman Empire dies and is succeeded by his son Ahmed I.
 1622 - The city of Bucaramanga in present-day Colombia is founded.
 1647 - A hurricane strikes the Canary Islands, with Fuerteventura being hit particularly hard.
 1711 - Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor is crowned.
 1769 - The Sino-Burmese War of 1765-1769 ends with an uneasy truce.
 1789 - Revolutionary France is divided into departments.
 1790 - The Turkish fortress of Izmail is stormed and captured by Alexander Suvorov and his Russian armies.
 1807 – The Embargo Act, forbidding trade with all foreign countries, is passed by the United States Congress, at the urging of President Thomas Jefferson.
 1809 – The Non-Intercourse Act, lifting the Embargo Act except for the United Kingdom and France, passes the United States Congress.
 1849 – The execution of Fyodor Dostoevsky is canceled at the last second.
 1851 – The first freight train is operated in Roorkee in India.
 1857 - Mountaineering: The Alpine Club is founded in London.
 1864 – Savannah, Georgia falls to General William Tecumseh Sherman during the American Civil War.
 1885 – Ito Hirobumi, a samurai, becomes the first Prime Minister of Japan.
 1891 - Asteroid 323 Brucia becomes the first asteroid discovered by the use of photography
 1894 – The Dreyfus affair begins, in France, when Alfred Dreyfus is wrongly convicted of treason, on antisemitic grounds.
 1894 - The United States Golf Association is founded.

1901  2000 
 1910 – Chicago Union Stock Yards Fire, 21 firemen were killed.
 1937 – The Lincoln Tunnel opens to traffic in New York City.
 1939 - Worst day in history of German train travel: Two separate accidents kill 287 people in total.
 1942 - World War II: Adolf Hitler orders the development of the V-2 rocket as a weapon.
 1944 – World War II: German troops demand the surrender of United States troops at Bastogne, Belgium. See Battle of the Bulge
 1944 – World War II: Vietnam People's Army is formed to resist Japanese occupation of Vietnam.
 1947 - The Constituent Assembly of Italy approves the country's new constitution.
 1956 - Colo, the first gorilla to be bred in captivity, is born at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium in Ohio.
 1963 – Cruise ship Lakonia burns 180 miles north of Madeira with the loss of 128 lives.
 1964 – Comedian Lenny Bruce is convicted of obscenity.
 1965 – A 65 miles per hour speed limit is introduced on country roads and motorways in the United Kingdom.
 1968 - Cultural Revolution: People's Daily posted the instructions of Mao Zedong that it is "The intellectual youth must go to the country, and will be educated from living in rural poverty."(Down to the Countryside Movement)
 1974 – Grande Comore, Anjouan and Mohéli vote to become the independent nation of Comoros. Mayotte remains under French administration.
 1974 - The house of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Edward Heath is attacked by members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army.
 1979 - Catalonia is given autonomy within Spain.
 1984 – Subway vigilante Bernhard Hugo Goetz shoots four African-American youths on an express train in The Bronx borough of New York City.
 1988 – Chico Mendes, a Brazilian rubber tapper, unionist and environmental activist, is assassinated.
 1988 – Yitzhak Shamir present his 3rd government in front of the Israeli Parliament
 1989 – After a week of bloody demonstrations, Ion Iliescu takes over as president of Romania, ending Nicolae Ceauşescu's Communist dictatorship.
 1989 – Berlin's Brandenburg Gate re-opens after nearly 30 years, effectively ending the division of East and West Germany.
 1989 – Two Tourist coaches collide on the Pacific Highway north of Kempsey NSW (Kempsey Bus Crash).
 1990 – The Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia become independent after the end of their trusteeship.
 1990 – Lech Wałęsa is sworn in as President of Poland.
 1991 - Armed opposition groups launch a military coup against President of Georgia Zviad Gamsakhurdia.
 1992 – An MiG23 and a Boeing 727 of Libyan Arab Airlines collide near Tripoli, killing 157 people.
 1997 – Acteal massacre: Attendees at a prayer meeting of Roman Catholic activists for indigenous causes in the small village of Acteal in the Mexican state of Chiapas were massacred by paramilitary forces.
 1999 – The Spanish Civil Guard finds near Calatayud (Zaragoza) another van loaded by ETA with 750 kg of explosives (see related event on December 21 1999).
 1999 – Tandja Mamadou becomes President of Niger.

From 2001 
 2001 – Burhanuddin Rabbani, political leader of the Afghan Northern Alliance, handed over power in Afghanistan to the interim government headed by Hamid Karzai.
 2001 – Richard Reid attempts to destroy a passenger airliner by igniting explosives hidden in his shoes aboard American Airlines Flight 63.
 2001 – CC the cat, the first cloned pet, is born.
 2002 - Janez Drnovsek becomes President of Slovenia.
 2005 - Astronomers announce the discovery of two more rings around the planet Uranus.
 2008 – President of Guinea Lansana Conté dies. Following his death, Moussa Dadis Camara takes power in a coup.
 2010 – The end of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy regarding Homosexuals in the United States Military is signed into law by Barack Obama.
 2011 – Baghdad is struck by a series of bomb explosions.
 2015 - SpaceX lands a first stage Falcon 9 rocket on ground after reaching low-Earth orbit, for the first time in history.
 2016 - A study finds the VSV-EBOV vaccine against the Ebola virus between 70 and 100% effective, and therefore making it the first proven vaccine against the disease.
 2017 - A typhoon hits the southern Philippines, killing almost 200 people.
 2017 - The United Nations Security Council votes 15-0 in favour of additional sanctions (punishments) against North Korea.

Births

Up to 1900 
 244 – Diocletian, Roman Emperor (d. 311)
 1095 – King Roger II of Sicily (d. 1154)
 1178 – Emperor Antoku of Japan (d. 1185)
 1183 - Chagatai Khan, Mongol ruler (d. 1242)
 1546 - Kuroda Yoshitaka, Japanese daimyo (d. 1604)
 1550 - Cesare Cremonini, Italian philosopher (d. 1631)
 1639 – Jean Racine, French dramatist (d. 1699)
 1666 – Gobind Singh, Sikh guru (d. 1708)
 1694 – Hermann Samuel Reimarus, German writer and philosopher (d. 1768)
 1696 – James Oglethorpe, English general, founder of the State of Georgia (d. 1785)
 1723 – Carl Friedrich Abel, German composer (d. 1787)
 1765 – Johann Friedrich Pfaff, German mathematician (d. 1825)
 1798 - George W. Crawford, American politician, Governor of Georgia (d. 1872)
 1805 - John Obadiah Westwood, English entomologist and archaeologist (d. 1893)
 1807 – Johann Christian Welhaven, Norwegian poet (d. 1873)
 1819 – Franz Abt, German composer (d. 1870)
 1819 – Pierre Ossian Bonnet, French mathematician (d. 1892)
 1848 – Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff, German classical philologist (d. 1931)
 1850 - Victoriano Huerta, President of Mexico (d. 1916)
 1853 - Yevgraf Fyodorov, Russian mathematician (d. 1919)
 1856 – Frank B. Kellogg, American lawyer and diplomat, 45th United States Secretary of State (d. 1937)
 1858 – Giacomo Puccini, Italian composer (d. 1924)
 1862 - Connie Mack, American baseball player, manager and team owner (d. 1956)
 1865 - Charles Sands, American golfer and tennis player (d. 1945)
 1869 - Dmitri Egorov, Russian mathematician (d. 1931)
 1869 - Edwin Arlington Robinson, American poet (d. 1935)
 1876 – Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, Italian poet and editor (d. 1944)
 1883 – Edgard Varèse, French-American composer (d. 1965)
 1887 – Srinivasa Ramanujan, Indian mathematician (d. 1920)
 1888 - J. Arthur Rank, 1st Baron Rank, British movie producer (d. 1972)
 1892 - Lawrence Sperry, American pilot (d. 1923)
 1899 – Gustaf Gründgens, German actor (d. 1963)
 1900 – Marc Allégret, French movie director and screenwriter (d. 1973)
 1900 - John C. Slater, American chemist and physicist (d. 1976)

1901  1950 
 1901 - Andre Kostelanetz, American popular music orchestra leader and arranger (d. 1980)
 1903 – Haldan Keffer Hartline, American physiologist (d. 1983)
 1905 – Pierre Brasseur, French actor (d. 1972)
 1907 – Peggy Ashcroft, British actress (d. 1991)
 1907 - Fred M. Wilcox, American film director (d. 1964)
 1909 - Patricia Hayes, British actress (d. 1998)
 1912 – Lady Bird Johnson, First Lady of the United States (d. 2007)
 1914 - Colin Hannah, Australian air force commander and 19th Governor of Queensland (d. 1978)
 1915 – Barbara Billingsley, American actress (d. 2010)
 1917 - Gene Rayburn, American game show host (d. 1999)
 1922 - Ruth Roman, American actress (d. 1999)
 1922 - Jim Wright, American politician (d. 2015)
 1924 - Lefter Küçükandonyadis, Turkish footballer (d. 2012)
 1926 - Alcides Ghiggia, Uruguayan footballer (d. 2015)
 1928 - Fredrik Barth, Norwegian ethnologist (d. 2016)
 1931 - Gisela Birkemeyer, German athlete
 1933 - Abel Pacheco, former President of Costa Rica
 1935 - Paulo Rocha, Portuguese director and screenwriter (d. 2012)
 1936 – Héctor Elizondo, American actor
 1936 - Wojciech Frykowski, Polish actor (d. 1969)
 1937 – Eduard Uspensky, Russian writer
 1938 - Lucien Bouchard, 27th Premier of Quebec
 1940 – Luis Francisco Cuéllar, Colombian politician (d. 2009)
 1942 - Yasuyuki Kuwahara, Japanese footballer (d. 2017)
 1943 – Paul Wolfowitz, former World Bank President
 1944 - Barry Jenkins, English drummer (The Animals)
 1945 - Diane Sawyer, American journalist and television presenter
 1948 - Rick Nielsen, rock musician
 1948 – Noel Edmonds, British television presenter
 1948 – Lynne Thigpen, American actress (d. 2003)
 1949 – Maurice Gibb, British singer and musician (Bee Gees) (d. 2003)
 1949 – Robin Gibb, British singer and musician (Bee Gees) (d. 2012)

1951  1975 
 1951 - Gerald Grosvenor, 6th Duke of Westminster. British businessman (d. 2016)
 1952 - Sandra Kalniete, Latvian politician
 1955 - Thomas C. Südhof, German-American biochemist, 2013 Nobel Prize winner
 1956 - Colo, American-bred Western gorilla (d. 2017)
 1958 - Frank Gambale, Australian guitarist, songwriter and musician
 1958 - Masaaki Kato, Japanese footballer
 1959 – Bernd Schuster, German footballer
 1960 - Jean-Michel Basquiat, American artist (d. 1988)
 1961 - Yuri Malenchenko, Russian colonel, pilot and astronaut
 1962 
 Andres Cantor, Argentine/American sportscaster
 Ralph Fiennes, English actor
 1963 – Giuseppe Bergomi, Italian footballer
 1963 - Bryan Gunn, British footballer
 1967 – Dan Petrescu, Romanian footballer
 1967 – Richey James Edwards, Welsh musician (Manic Street Preachers) (disappeared in 1995)
 1968 - Luis Hernandez, Mexican footballer
 1968 - Lauralee Bell, American actress, director, producer and screenwriter
 1969 - Myriam Bédard, Canadian biathlete
 1970 - Gary Anderson, Scottish darts player
 1970 - Ted Cruz, American lawyer and politician
 1972 – Vanessa Paradis, French actress and singer
 1972 - Franck Cammas, French sailor
 1972 - Steffi Jones, German footballer
 1973 - Traci Dinwiddie, American actress
 1973 - Heather Donahue, American actress
 1975 – Dmitri Khokhlov, Russian footballer
 1975 – Stanislav Neckar, Czech ice hockey player

From 1976 
 1978 - Joy Ali, Fijian boxer (d. 2015)
 1978 – Emmanuel Olisadebe, Nigerian-Polish footballer
 1978 - Mia Tyler, American model
 1979 - Naotake Hanyu, Japanese footballer
 1979 – Jamie Langfield, Scottish footballer
 1980 - Chris Carmack, American actor, singer and model
 1982 - Teko Modise, South African footballer
 1982 - Agbani Darego, Nigerian model
 1982 - Alinne Moraes, Brazilian actress
 1983 - Jennifer Hawkins, Australian model
 1984 – Basshunter, Swedish DJ and singer
 1985 - Edurne, Spanish singer, actress, model and presenter
 1986 – Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, Nigerian Islamist militant
 1987 - Lisa Andreas, English-Cypriot singer
 1987 - Eder, Portuguese footballer
 1988 – Leigh Halfpenny, Welsh rugby player
 1989 – Jordin Sparks, American singer
 1989 - Logan Huffman, American actor
 1990 – Jean-Baptiste Maunier, French singer and actor
 1990 - Josef Newgarden, American racing driver
 1992 - Anis Amri, Tunisian suspected terrorist (2016 Berlin attack) (d. 2016)
 1993 - Ali Lohan, American actress and singer
 1993 - Meghan Trainor, American singer
 1998 - Genevieve Hannelius, American actress and musician
 2001 - CC, first cloned pet

Deaths

Up to 1950 
 69 – Vitellius, Roman Emperor (b. 15)
 1100 - Bretislaus II, Duke of Bohemia (b. 1060)
 1603 – Mehmed III, Ottoman Sultan (b. 1566)
 1646 - Peter Mogila, Moldovan religious figure (b. 1596)
 1708 - Hedvig Sophia of Sweden (b. 1681)
 1767 - John Newbery, English children's writer (b. 1713)
 1788 – Percival Pott, English physician and surgeon (b. 1714)
 1828 - William Hyde Wollaston, English chemist and physicist (b. 1766)
 1867 – Jean-Victor Poncelet, French mathematician (b. 1788)
 1880 – George Eliot, English writer (b. 1819)
 1899 - Dwight E. Moody, American evangelist and publisher (b. 1837)
 1902 – Richard von Krafft-Ebing, German psychiatrist (b. 1840)
 1917 – St. Francesca Xavier Cabrini, American Catholic saint (b. 1850)
 1918 - Aristeidis Moraitinis, Greek aviator (b. 1891)
 1925 - Amelie Beese, German aviatrix (b. 1886)
 1939 – Ma Rainey, American singer (b. 1886)
 1940 – Nathanael West, American writer (b. 1903)
 1943 – Beatrix Potter, British writer (b. 1866)
 1944 - Harry Langdon, American actor, singer, director and screenwriter (b. 1884)

From 1951 
 1959 – Gilda Gray, Polish-American singer (b. 1901)
 1961 - Elia Dalla Costa, Archbishop of Florence (b. 1872)
 1965 – Richard Dimbleby, British broadcaster (b. 1913)
 1974 - Sterling North, American author (b. 1906)
 1979 – Darryl F. Zanuck, American producer (b. 1902)
 1988 – Chico Mendes, Brazilian activist (b. 1944)
 1989 – Samuel Beckett, Irish playwright (b. 1906)
 1995 – Butterfly McQueen, American actress (b. 1911)
 1995 – James Meade, British economist (b. 1907)
 2002 – Joe Strummer, British musician (b. 1952)
 2002 – Desmond Hoyte, Guyanese politician (b. 1929)
 2007 - Julien Gracq, French writer (b. 1910)
 2008 – Lansana Conté, President of Guinea (b. 1934)
 2009 – Luis Francisco Cuéllar, Colombian politician (b. 1940)
 2012 - Cliff Osmond, American actor (b. 1937)
 2013 - Diomedes Diaz, Colombian singer-songwriter (b. 1956)
 2014 - Joe Cocker, English singer (b. 1944)
 2014 - Abd El Aziz Muhammad Hegazi, former Prime Minister of Egypt (b. 1923)
 2014 - Joseph Sargent, American movie director, producer and actor (b. 1925)
 2014 - Fritz Sdunek, German boxing trainer (b. 1947)
 2014 - Christine Cavanaugh, American actress (b. 1963)
 2015 - George Clayton Johnson, American science fiction writer (b. 1929)
 2015 - Rolf Bossi, German lawyer (b. 1923)
 2015 - Freda Meissner-Blau, Austrian politician (b. 1927)
 2015 - Peter Lundblad, Swedish singer (b. 1950)
 2016 - Yevgeny Dzhugashvili, Russian-Georgian activist and politician (b. 1936)
 2016 - Franca Sozzani, Italian journalist, editor of Vogue Italia (b. 1950)
 2016 - Miruts Yifter, Ethiopian long-distance runner (b. 1944)
 2017 - Jason Lowndes, Australian racing cyclist (b. 1994)
 2017 - Gerald B. Greenberg, American film editor (b. 1936)

Observances
 Winter solstice (Northern Hemisphere), sometimes occurs on December 21
 Summer solstice (Southern Hemisphere), sometimes occurs on December 21
 Mother's Day (Indonesia)
 Unity Day (Zimbabwe)
 Dongzhi Festival (East Asia)
 National Mathematics Day (India)
 Armed Forces Day (Vietnam)

Days of the year