| 25 May 735 | Northumbria [births and deaths] | St Bede (Baeda or Beda; ‘the Venerable Bede’), Anglo-Saxon theologian, historian, and chronologist, known chiefly for his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum/Ecclesiastical History of the English People (731), dies in Jarrow, England (c. 63). |
| 25 May 1315 | Ireland, Scotland [wars] | Edward Bruce, brother of Robert I the Bruce, King of Scotland, invades Ireland, having been offered the high kingship by Donal O'Neill, King of Tyrone. |
| 25 May 1659 | UK [administration] | Richard Cromwell resigns as Lord Protector of England and the Commonwealth is re-established by the Rump Parliament. |
| 25 May 1703 | England [births and deaths] | Samuel Pepys, English diarist whose diary provides a look at upper class life during the 1660s, dies in London, England (70). |
| 25 May–17 September 1787 | America [legislation] | The Constitutional Convention opens in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with participants including George Washington (president), Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, and Edmund Randolph. The new constitution establishes a bicameral legislature whose power is counterbalanced by an executive officer, an independent judiciary, and the authority of individual states. |
| 25 May 1810 | South America, Spain [political events] | A revolt breaks out in the Spanish viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata, South America, against Joseph Bonaparte's regime. |
| 25 May 1935 | USA [athletics] | In less than an hour at the Big Ten Championships held at Ann Arbor, Michigan, US athlete Jesse Owens, of Ohio State University, breaks the world record in the long jump, the 220 yards, the 220 yards hurdles, and equals the record for the 100 yards. His jump of 8.13 m/26 ft 8 1⁄4in is the first ever over 8 metres and is not bettered until 1960. |
| 25 May 1959 | USA [boxing] | The US Supreme Court rules that a Louisiana state ban on boxing matches between white and black fighters is unconstitutional. |
| 25 May 1978 | UK [law and government] | The British Liberal Party leader David Steel announces the end of the ‘Lib–Lab Pact’ with Labour. |
| 25 May 1986 | USA [social services] | To draw attention to the plight of the homeless, approximately 6 million people form a human chain – Hands Across America – most of the way from New York to California. |
| 25 May 1995 | Bosnia-Herzegovina [Balkan conflicts (c. 1991–2000)] | NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) launches airstrikes against the Serbs following their refusal to surrender artillery; in response, Serbs kill 67 people in attacks on the United Nations (UN) safe haven of Tuzla, Bosnia-Herzegovina. |
| 25 May 1999 | USA [weapons] | An all-party report from the US Congress claims that Chinese spies have infiltrated US weapons intelligence, stealing data on every major US nuclear warhead in recent years. |
| 25 May 2005 | Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey [energy] | The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline, which runs for about 1,800 km from Azerbaijan through Georgia to Turkey's Mediterranean coast, is officially opened. The pipeline was built by a consortium led by BP of the UK at a cost of US$4 billion. |
