Deaths on January 3

Mathieu Molé, French politician (b. 1584)

Mathieu Molé (1584 – 3 January 1656) was a French statesman.

23 Jan

Lettres provinciales
Blaise Pascal publishes the first of his Lettres provinciales.
30 Jul

Battle of Warsaw (1656)
Swedish forces under the command of King Charles X Gustav defeat the forces of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth at the Battle of Warsaw.
14 Oct

Puritanism
Massachusetts enacts the first punitive legislation against the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). The marriage of church-and-state in Puritanism makes them regard the Quakers as spiritually apostate and politically subversive.