ON THIS day

2013

217 Caracalla (Marcus Aurelius Antonius), a Roman emperor noted for his brutality, is assassinated as he launches a second campaign against the Parthians.

1817 Sydney merchants open Australia’s first bank, the Bank of NSW (now Westpac), in a house at Macquarie Place rented from businesswoman Mary Reibey.

1904 Britain and France sign the Entente Cordiale, settling colonial disputes and preparing the way for co-operation against German aggression.

1930 The Sydney to Mudgee night mail train is robbed by two armed, masked men who board at Emu Plains. They hold up guards and jump off the train near Glenbrook tunnel with £4600.

1933 West Australians vote by 138,653 to 70,706 to form a separate nation that can keep its earnings from goldmining. The British government declares it constitutionally unacceptable.

1073 Pablo Picasso, perhaps the most influential artist of the 20th century, dies at age 91.

1984 Fiona Coote, 14, (pictured) becomes Australia’s youngest, and first female, heart transplant patient when Dr Victor Chang’s team operates on her at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney. She had poor health because of a virus associated with tonsillitis. Her body rejects the heart but she has a second transplant in 1986.

1990 The first episode of Twin Peaks airs on television, and wins critical acclaim and a cult following with its unconventional narrative, surreal tone and eerie characters.

1994 Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating attends the opening of Australian-built Friendship Bridge across the Mekong River between Laos and Thailand.

2013 British politician Margaret Thatcher, who was Britain (and Europe’s) first female prime minister, dies at age 87. She had been PM for 11 years and 209 days.