1512

January–June

• Middle of January - After Regent of Sweden Svante Nilsson dies on January 2, Eric Trolle is elected new Regent of Sweden. He is, however, ousted after only six months.
• February 18 - War of the League of Cambrai: The French carry out the Sack of Brescia.
• April 11 - War of the League of Cambrai - Battle of Ravenna: French forces under Gaston of Foix, Duke of Nemours defeat the Spanish under Raymond of Cardona, but Gaston is killed in the pursuit.
• May 3 - The Fifth Council of the Lateran begins.
• May 12 - Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, leads an English expedition into France and burns the port city of Brest.
• May 26 - Selim I succeeds Bayezid II, as Sultan of the Ottoman Empire.

  July–December

• July 23 - Sten Sture the Younger is elected new Regent of Sweden, thus deposing Eric Trolle from the post.
• August 10 - War of the League of Cambrai - Battle of Saint-Mathieu: The English navy defeats the French-Breton fleet. Both navies use ships firing cannon through ports, and each loses its principal ship — Regent and Marie-la-Cordelière — through a large explosion aboard the latter.
• Summer - War of the League of Cambrai: Ferdinand II of Aragon sends Don Fadrique de Toledo, to complete the Spanish conquest of Iberian Navarre.
• October 19 - Martin Luther becomes a doctor of theology.
• October 21 - Martin Luther joins the theological faculty of the University of Wittenberg.
• November 1 - The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, painted by Michelangelo Buonarroti, is exhibited to the public for the first time.
• December 27 - The Spanish Crown issues the Laws of Burgos, governing the conduct of settlers with regard to native Indians in the New World.

  Date unknown

• António de Abreu discovers Timor Island, and reaches the Banda Islands, Ambon Island and Seram.
• Francisco Serrão reaches the Moluccas.
• Francisco Serrao and other shipwreck sailors with permission from the Ternate Sultanate build Fort Tolukko. It is one of the earliest, if not the first European style fortress in southeast Asia.
• Juan Ponce de León discovers the Turks and Caicos Islands.
• Pedro Mascarenhas discovers Diego Garcia, and reaches Mauritius in the Mascarene Islands.
• Moldavia becomes a vassal of the Ottoman Empire, on the same conditions as Wallachia: the voivode will be designated by the Turks, but will be Eastern Orthodox Christians. Also, the Turks are not allowed to build mosques, to be buried, to own land or to settle in the country.
• The Florentine Republic is dismantled, and the Medici Family comes back into power.
• The word masque is first used to denote a poetic drama.
• Wolverhampton Grammar School is founded by Sir Stephen Jenyns, in England.
• Paracelsus moves to Ferrara.
• Possible date - Nicolaus Copernicus begins to write Commentariolus, an abstract of what will eventually become his heliocentric astronomy De revolutionibus orbium coelestium; he sends it to other scientists interested in the matter by 1514.