| c. 12 July 100 BC | Roman Empire [births and deaths] | (Gaius) Julius Caesar, Roman general, dictator, and statesman, conqueror of Transalpine Gaul, born (–44 BC). |
| 12 July 1153 | Papal States, Italy [administration] | Anastasius IV is elected pope following the death of Eugenius III. |
| 12 July 1174 | England [Catholicism] | King Henry II of England does penance at Canterbury for Archbishop Thomas à Becket's murder in 1170. |
| 12 July 1191 | England, Palestine, Kingdom of Jerusalem [Crusades (1095–1272)] | Four days after the arrival of King Richard I the Lionheart of England, the crusaders take the Muslim-held port of Acre (present-day Akko, Israel); it becomes the capital of the kingdom of Jerusalem. |
| 12 July 1346 | France, England [Hundred Years War (1337–1453)] | King Edward III of England, seeking to exploit Norman disaffection with King Philip VI of France, lands in northern Normandy at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue. |
| 12 July 1536 | Swiss Confederation, Netherlands [births and deaths] | Desiderius Erasmus, Dutch humanist, considered the greatest scholar of the northern European Renaissance, dies in Basel, Swiss Confederation (66). |
| 12 July 1543 | England [political events] | King Henry VIII of England marries Catherine Parr, widow of Lord Latimer; she is his sixth wife. |
| 12 July–27 August 1549 | England [political events] | Robert Kett, an English Protestant tanner, leads an insurgent army of East Anglian peasants, who have been in tumult against the enclosure of common land for some months, to Norwich, England, where they establish a ‘commonwealth’, a great camp, 12,000 strong, on Mousehold Heath. |
| 12 July 1645 | Russia [political events] | On the death of his father Michael I Romanov, Alexis I becomes the second Romanov tsar of Russia. |
| 12 July 1691 | Papal States, Italy [Catholicism] | Pope Innocent XII is elected following the death of Pope Alexander VIII. |
| 12 July 1790 | France [Christianity] | The Civil Constitution of the Clergy is established by the French National Constituent Assembly, reorganizing the church on national lines. It is to be state funded and its priests democratically elected. Jews in France are admitted to civil liberties. |
| 12 July 1854 | USA [births and deaths] | George Eastman, US inventor, manufacturer, and philanthropist who introduces the Kodak camera, born in Waterville, New York (–1932). |
| 12 July 1856 | Natal, UK [colonies and mandate] | Natal, formerly part of the British Cape Colony in southern Africa, is established as a separate British crown colony with an elected assembly. |
| 12 July 1946 | Italy [television] | Pius XII becomes the first pope to appear on television when the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) broadcasts a papal address from the Vatican. |
| 12 July 1975 | São Tomé e Príncipe, Portugal [decolonization] | São Tomé e Príncipe gains its independence from Portugal. |
| 12 July 1977 | USA [medicine] | US medical researcher Raymond Damadian produces the first images of human tissues using an NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) scanner; used to detect cancer and other diseases without the need for X-rays, the scanner is based on the fact that electromagnetic fields cause some atomic nuclei to align themselves. The scanners become commercially available in the USA in 1984. |
