1721

• British general Thomas Gage.
• William Augustus of Hanover, the future "Bloody" Duke of Cumberland, commander at the 1745 Battle of Culloden.
• British general James Murray.
• Marquise Antoinette Poisson de Pompadour, future mistress of King Louis XV.
• French chemist and politician Anne-Robert-Jacque Turgot.
• Scottish mathematician John Keill.
• Scottish epic poet William Wilkie.
• Colonial Massachusetts politician and signer of the Declaration of Independence Roger Sherman.
• Maryland politician John Hanson, first President of the United States under the Articles of Confederation.
• Future Mughal/Afghan ruler Haider Ali.

• English poet Matthew Prior.
• Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk, whose experiences inspired Daniel Defoe to write Robinson Crusoe.
• German librettist Christian Friedrich Hunold, aka 'Menantes'.
• Pope Clement XI.
• British comic actor Thomas Doggett.
• French painter Jean-Antoine Watteau.
• German botanist Rudolph Jakob Camerarius.
• Maratha Emperor Balaji Vishwanath.  His son Bajirao succeeds him.

• Russia and Sweden sign the Treay of Nystad ending the Great Northern War, whose last real engagements had been fought in 1715.  Sweden officially cedes large portions of Finland to Russia, including the area upon which Tsar Peter I had already built his new capital, St. Petersburg.
• Michelangelo Dei Conti is elected Pope Innocent XIII.
• Bishop George Berkeley writes De motu rejecting Newtonian physics.
• John Hadley produces the first useful reflecting telescope.
• There is a smallpox epidemic in Boston.
• The Ottoman sultan sends an ambassador to Paris. The account of his travels will begin the Westernization of Turkey..
• Taiwan revolts against the Qing Emperor's rule.  This "Zhu Yigui Rebellion" is soon crushed.
• Johann Sebastian Bach publishes his six Brandenburg Concertos.
• British King George I creates a new colony in North America, South Carolina.
• The first national census of Japan counts 31 million people, with approximately 1 million in Edo alone.

1720 - 1721 - 1722

How they Were Made - 18th Century