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HISTORY & TIMELINE
8 November

A journey through
8 November in history

From the opening of Oxford’s Bodleian Library in 1602 to Liberia’s election of Africa’s first woman president in 2005, 8 November has seen battles, discoveries and turning points across four centuries. This timeline follows the date.

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JUMP THROUGH TIME
III
A CHANGING WORLD

Early Modern Era

Exploration, political change, scientific development and expanding global connections.

1519
The meeting of Cortés and Moctezuma, in a painting by unknown artists.The meeting of Cortés and Moctezuma, in a painting by unknown artists.Image: Unknown artists · Public domain
world · Americas

Cortés meets Moctezuma at Tenochtitlan

On 8 November 1519 (Julian calendar) the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and his small force, with about a thousand allies from Tlaxcala, reached Tenochtitlan, the island capital of the Aztec (Mexica) empire. Moctezuma II came out to meet him on the causeway and, following the diplomatic custom of the country, received him with great honour and lodged the Spaniards in a palace. Within days Cortés took Moctezuma prisoner, hoping to rule the empire through him. Moctezuma died in 1520, and in 1521, after a long siege, the Spanish and their Indigenous allies captured and destroyed the city, on whose ruins Mexico City was built.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: The Spanish conquest of the Aztecs, 1519-21 ↗
1602
The Old Schools Quadrangle of the Bodleian Library, Oxford.The Old Schools Quadrangle of the Bodleian Library, Oxford.Image: Honcques Laus · CC0
culture · Europe

The Bodleian Library opens in Oxford

Oxford University’s old library had been stripped of its books in the 16th century. The scholar and diplomat Sir Thomas Bodley offered to restore it at his own expense, and after refitting the room and gathering about 2,500 books, some of them his own, the library opened on 8 November 1602 (Julian calendar), with Thomas James as its first librarian. In 1610 Bodley agreed with the Stationers’ Company of London that the library would receive a copy of every book registered by its members, the forerunner of today’s legal deposit. The Bodleian is now one of the largest libraries in Britain.

Source: Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford: History of the Bodleian ↗
1620
The Battle of White Mountain, painted by Peter Snayers.The Battle of White Mountain, painted by Peter Snayers.Image: Peter Snayers · Public domain
world · Europe

The Battle of White Mountain

On 8 November 1620, on a low plateau called White Mountain (Bílá hora) a few miles west of Prague, the Catholic armies of the Habsburg emperor Ferdinand II and the Catholic League routed the army of the Protestant Bohemian estates in about an hour. It was the first major battle of the Thirty Years’ War. Prague fell at once. Ferdinand had the rebel leaders tried and executed, seized the lands of their supporters and abolished the Bohemian constitution. The Czech lands stayed under Habsburg rule for three centuries, until 1918.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica: Battle of White Mountain ↗
IV
THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

The 1800s

Industry, empire, invention, reform and a century of enormous transformation.

1889
The Helena Independent reports the proclamation of statehood, 9 November 1889.The Helena Independent reports the proclamation of statehood, 9 November 1889.Image: The Helena Independent (newspaper) · Public domain
politics · Americas

Montana becomes the 41st state

On 8 November 1889 President Benjamin Harrison signed the proclamation admitting Montana to the Union as the 41st state. Congress had passed the Enabling Act in February, and that autumn Montana’s voters ratified the state constitution needed for admission. Joseph K. Toole was sworn in as the first governor in Helena.

Source: State of Montana: A brief history of Montana ↗
1895
An X-ray of Anna Bertha Röntgen's hand and wedding ring, taken by her husband on 22 December 1895.An X-ray of Anna Bertha Röntgen’s hand and wedding ring, taken by her husband on 22 December 1895.Image: Wilhelm Röntgen · Public domain
science · Europe

Röntgen discovers X-rays

On the evening of 8 November 1895, in his laboratory at the University of Würzburg, the physicist Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen was experimenting with a cathode-ray tube wrapped in black cardboard when he noticed that a fluorescent screen some distance away had begun to glow. Invisible rays from the tube were passing through the cardboard. Röntgen called them X-rays, for an unknown kind of radiation. Within weeks he had made an image of the bones of his wife’s hand, and his paper ‘On a new kind of rays’ appeared at the end of December. Doctors began using X-rays almost at once, and in 1901 he received the first Nobel Prize in Physics.

Source: American Physical Society: November 8, 1895, Roentgen’s discovery of X-rays ↗
V
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

The 1900s

War and peace, technological leaps, social change, politics, sport and popular culture.

1923
Armed putschists and onlookers on the Marienplatz in Munich during the putsch, November 1923.Armed putschists and onlookers on the Marienplatz in Munich during the putsch, November 1923.Image: UnknownUnknown · CC BY-SA 3.0 de
politics · Europe

Hitler’s Beer Hall Putsch fails

On the evening of 8 November 1923 Adolf Hitler and his armed Nazi stormtroopers, with the wartime general Erich Ludendorff, burst into a political meeting at the Bürgerbräukeller, a beer hall in Munich. Hitler announced a ‘national revolution’ and forced the leaders of the Bavarian government present to promise their support, planning to march on Berlin. The next day the police opened fire on the marchers in the centre of Munich, killing more than a dozen of Hitler’s followers, and the putsch collapsed. Hitler was convicted of high treason and sentenced to five years in prison, but served less than one. He decided afterwards to seek power through elections.

Source: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia: Beer Hall Putsch ↗
1939
Georg Elser.Georg Elser.Image: Weißkunig · Public domain
world · Europe

Georg Elser’s bomb misses Hitler

Working alone, the carpenter Georg Elser spent weeks hollowing out a pillar in Munich’s Bürgerbräukeller, where Hitler spoke every 8 November to mark the anniversary of his putsch, and hid a time bomb in it. On 8 November 1939 Hitler cut his speech short and left the hall minutes before the bomb exploded at about 9.20 p.m. Eight people were killed and more than sixty injured. Elser was arrested that evening near the Swiss border and was murdered in Dachau concentration camp in April 1945.

Source: German Resistance Memorial Center: Georg Elser and the assassination attempt of November 8, 1939 ↗
1942
Map of the Allied landings in Morocco and Algeria, 8 November 1942.Map of the Allied landings in Morocco and Algeria, 8 November 1942.Image: Unknown · Public domain
world · Africa

Operation Torch: the Allies land in North Africa

In the early hours of 8 November 1942 American and British troops landed on the Atlantic coast of Morocco and the Mediterranean coast of Algeria, both then held by Vichy France. Some 350 warships and 500 transports had carried about 107,000 troops from the United States and Britain for the invasion. French forces resisted at first, but by 10 November the landings had reached their objectives and a ceasefire soon followed. The Allies now threatened the German and Italian armies in North Africa from the west, and the campaign ended with the Axis surrender in Tunisia in May 1943.

Source: Naval History and Heritage Command: Operation Torch, invasion of North Africa ↗
1960
John F. Kennedy, photographed by Cecil Stoughton.John F. Kennedy, photographed by Cecil Stoughton.Image: Cecil W. Stoughton · Public domain
politics · Americas

John F. Kennedy is elected president

On 8 November 1960 the Democrat John F. Kennedy narrowly defeated the Republican vice-president, Richard Nixon, in one of the closest elections in American history: out of nearly 69 million votes cast, his margin was about 118,000. He won 303 electoral votes to Nixon’s 219, and became the youngest person and the first Roman Catholic elected president.

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum: Campaign of 1960 ↗
1998
The Jean-Marie Tjibaou Cultural Centre, a centre for Kanak culture near Nouméa, filmed in 2013.The Jean-Marie Tjibaou Cultural Centre, a centre for Kanak culture near Nouméa, filmed in 2013.Image: gérard from Nouméa, (Nouvelle-Calédonie) · CC BY-SA 2.0
politics · Oceania

New Caledonia approves the Nouméa Accord

On 8 November 1998 the voters of New Caledonia, the French territory in the south-west Pacific, approved the Nouméa Accord by a large majority of about 72 per cent. Signed in May by the French government and the territory’s pro-independence and loyalist parties, the accord gave New Caledonia a large measure of self-government and recognised Kanak identity, and provided for later votes on full independence.

Source: Légifrance: Decision of 9 November 1998 proclaiming the results of the consultation of 8 November 1998 ↗
VI
2000 TO TODAY

Modern Day

The events of recent decades that have already become part of the historical record.

2005
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, photographed in 2022.Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, photographed in 2022.Image: PMO Barbados · Public domain
politics · Africa

Liberia elects Ellen Johnson Sirleaf

On 8 November 2005, two years after the end of Liberia’s civil war, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf won the presidential run-off against the former footballer George Weah, with about 59 per cent of the vote. Inaugurated in January 2006, she was the first woman elected head of state in Africa, and in 2011 she shared the Nobel Peace Prize.

Source: NobelPrize.org: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, biographical ↗
RESEARCH

Sources & Further Reading

Selected authoritative references supporting the events on this page.

WHY THESE MOMENTS?

Significance before volume

This page is not the longest possible list of events. It is a chronological journey through 8 November, where each entry is chosen for historical significance, human interest and reliability.

Facts are checked against authoritative museums, archives, universities and reference works. Where sources disagree, the page says so.

EXPLORED THE DEEPER STORY?

Return to the highlights of 8 November

Discover the lighter side of the date with famous birthdays, culture, firsts and lives remembered.

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