1620s
* 1620: Emperor Ferdinand II defeats the Bohemian rebels in the Battle of White Mountain.
* 1620: The Puritan Pilgrims arrive in the Mayflower at Cape Cod
* 1620–1621: Polish-Ottoman War over Moldavia.
* 1620: Bethlen Gabor allies with the Ottomans and an invasion of Moldavia takes place. The Polish suffer a disaster at Cecora on the River Prut.
* 1621: The Battle of Chocim: Poles and Cossacks under Jan Karol Chodkiewicz defeat the Ottomans.
* 1622: Jamestown massacre: Algonquian natives kill 347 English settlers outside Jamestown, Virginia (1/3 of the colony's population) and burn the Henricus settlement.
* 1624–1642: As chief minister, Cardinal Richelieu centralises power in France.
* 1625: New Amsterdam founded by the Dutch West India Company in North America.
* 1626: St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican completed.
* 1627: Cardinal Richelieu lays siege to Protestant La Rochelle which eventually capitulates.
* 1629: Cardinal Richelieu allies with Swedish Protestant forces in the Thirty Years' War to counter Ferdinand II's expansion.