1748

• English philosopher and jurist Jeremy Bentham.
• Martha Wayles Skelton, future wife of Thomas Jefferson.
• French revolutionary figure Olympe de Gouges.
• French chemist Claude Berthollet, best known for being wrong.
• Patriotic French painter Jacques-Louis David.
• Scottish poet John Logan.
• The future King Carlos IV of Spain.
• German composer Christian Gottlob Neefe, teacher of Beethoven.
• Scottish mathematician and geologist John Playfair.
• English sculptor Anne Seymour Damer.
• Dutch painter Dirk Langendijk, fond of military scenes.

Died in 1748:

• Swiss mathematician Johann Bernoulli.
• English poet James Thomson (writer of "Rule Britannia").
• English Hymn writer Isaac Watts.
• German composer David Kellner.
• English military engineer David Wade, who built the road system that defeated the Jacobites.
• Mughal emperor Mohammed Shah.

• The Treaty of Aix-la-Chappelle ends the War of the Austrian Succession, known in America as King George's War, or The War of Jenkins' Ear:
• King Frederick of Prussia, whose invasion of Silesia started the war, gets to keep it.
• Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, whose accesion was the pretext for the invasion, gets to keep her throne.
• King George of Great Britain doesn't keep Cape Breton Island, instead returning it to France in exchange for Madras. The British South Sea Company gets the trade rights with Spanish America it instigated the war for, especially the right to transport slaves there.
• Spain gets the Italian duchies of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla.
• Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu publishes his major work The Spirit of the Laws.
• David Hume publishes An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding.
• Izumo Takeda writes his puppet play Kanadehon Chushingura, aka The Forty-Seven Ronin.
• An Italian peasant finds traces of ancient buildings beneath his vineyard. These turn out to be the Roman city of Pompeii, buried in 79 AD.

1747 - 1748 - 1749

How They Were Made - 18th Century