665
Year 665 was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 665 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
Events
By place
Europe
- Kubrat, ruler of Great Bulgaria, dies after a 33-year reign. He is succeeded by his son Batbayan, who rules from Poltava, the lands north of the Black Sea, and the Sea of Azov.
Britain
- Conflict erupts between King Sighere of Essex and his brother Sæbbi, as they struggle for overlordship between Mercia and Wessex.
Arabian Empire
- Muslim Conquest: An Arab army advances through the desert, and captures the Byzantine city of Barca.
Asia
- The city of Seongnam is renamed Hansanju.
- Wu Zetian, the wife of the Chinese emperor, unofficially becomes an absolute ruler by eliminating her political rivals.
By topic
Religion
- Wilfrid, Anglo-Saxon abbot, refuses to be consecrated in Northumbria as bishop, and travels to Compiègne to be consecrated by Agilbert, archbishop of Paris.
- Jaruman, bishop of Mercia, is dispatched with Christian missionaries to reconvert Saxon tribes, which have returned to paganism.
- According to the Annales Cambriae, the Anglo-Saxons convert to Christianity after the Second Battle of Badon.
- Sighere encourages his subjects to reject Christianity and return to their indigenous religion.
Science
- Brahmagupta writes his Khandakhadyaka.
Births
- Ōtomo no Tabito, Japanese poet
Deaths
- April 16 - Fructuosus of Braga, French archbishop
- Féchín of Fore, Irish monk and saint
- Hafsa bint Umar, wife of Muhammad
- Kubrat, ruler of Great Bulgaria
- Li Zhong, prince of the Tang dynasty
- Yu Zhining, chancellor of the Tang dynasty