| 4 October 1636 | Sweden, Holy Roman Empire, Saxony, Germany [Thirty Years War (1618–48)] | Swedish forces, under Marshal Johan Banér, defeat a combined imperial and Saxon force at the Battle of Wittstock. His success shatters the military power of the Saxons and marks a revival of Swedish power in the Thirty Years' War. |
| 4 October 1669 | United Netherlands [births and deaths] | Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn, Dutch painter, often regarded as one of the greatest in history, dies in Amsterdam, United Netherlands (63). |
| 4 October 1883 | France, Bulgaria, Turkey [railways] | The luxury train the Orient Express leaves on its first trip. Europe's first transcontinental express train, it runs 2,740 km/1,700 mi from Paris, France, to Varna, Bulgaria, where passengers disembark to be ferried to Constantinople (Istanbul), Turkey. |
| 4 October 1895 | USA [golf] | English-born US golfer Horace Rawlins receives $150 as the winner of the inaugural US Open golf championship, which is played on a nine-hole course at Newport, Rhode Island. |
| 4 October 1938 | France [political events] | The Popular Front government falls in France when the socialists and communists abstain from a vote of confidence because they are opposed to government economic policy (particularly the devaluation of the franc). |
| 4 October 1947 | Germany [births and deaths] | Max Planck, German theoretical physicist who was the originator of quantum theory, dies in Göttingen, Germany (89). |
| 4 October 1957 | USSR [space exploration] | The USSR launches the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, to study the cosmosphere. It weighs 84 kg/184 lb and circles the Earth in 95 minutes, inaugurating the space age. |
| 4 October 1978 | Lebanon [political events] | An estimated 500 people are killed or wounded in heavy battles in the civil war in Beirut, Lebanon. |
| 4 October 1983 | UK, USA [speed records] | British driver Richard Noble breaks the world one-mile land speed record in the Black Rock Desert, Nevada, in his Thrust 2 jet car, averaging a speed of 1,019.44 kph/633.468 mph over the required two runs. |
| 4 October 1993 | Russia [political events] | Rebels holding out in the Moscow parliament building surrender after attacks by pro-Yeltsin forces; a state of emergency remains in force in Russia until 18 October. |
| 4 October 2000 | UK [motor vehicles] | The classic Mini, the car that symbolised the swinging 1960s, rolls off the Rover production line at Longbridge, Birmingham, for the last time (bringing to an end 41 years of continuous production). |
