NOW & THEN
2 JULY
1266: By the Treaty of Perth, Norway renounced its claim on the Hebrides.
1644: Scottish forces under David Leslie helped the victory of the Parliamentary forces over Royalists at the Battle of Marston Moor near York. The victory was the turning point in the Civil War.
1645: The Marquis of Montrose defeated Lieutenant-general Baillie at the Battle of Alford, in which Lord Gordon was killed.
1687: King James II disbanded parliament.
1865: Former Methodist minister William Booth and his wife Catherine founded the Salvation Army, initially known as the East London Christian Mission.
1881: James Garfield, 20th United States president, was shot by Charles Guiteau in Washington DC. He died on 19 September.
1900: Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin flew his first airship from a field on the outskirts of Berlin.
1901: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid robbed a train of $40,000 at Wagner, Wyoming.
1928: By the Representation of the People Act, the British parliament reduced the age at which women could vote to 21.
1937: Aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan disappeared over the Pacific Ocean during an attempted circumnavigation of the globe.
1940: Adolf Hitler ordered the invasion of Britain (Operation Sealion).
1940: The Vichy government was formed after the collapse of France, with Henri Pétain as head of state.
1940: More than 440 interned Italians, many from families settled in Scotland, drowned when a German submarine sank British prison ship Arandora Star on her way to Canada.
1948: Henry Cotton won the Open Championship at Muirfield with a score of 284.
1971: The Erskine Bridge over the River Clyde was opened.
1976: North and South Vietnam were formally reunified.
1985: The European Space Agency launched Giotto, a robotic spacecraft which flew by and observed Halley’s Comet.
1990: Failure of a ventilation system in the pedestrian tunnel linking the holy city of Mecca and tent city caused a stampede in which 1,400 pilgrims died.
2001: Barry George was jailed for life at the Old Bailey for the murder of the television presenter Jill Dando in 1999. His conviction was judged unsafe by the Court of Appeal and was quashed in 2007. After a retrial, on 1 August, 2008, he was found not guilty and freed.
2003: Silvio Berlusconi, the prime minister of Italy, assumed the EU council presidency and immediately caused outrage when he insulted German MEP Martin Schulz, by saying he would be ideal for a film role as a Nazi concentration camp leader.
2012: Monsoon rain in east India killed 79 people and left 2.2 million homeless.
2013: Sixteen people were killed and 200 injured during protest clashes at Cairo University against Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi.
2014: Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy was charged with corruption by French prosecutors.