1261

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	12th century 13th century 14th century
Decades:	1240s 1250s 1260s 1270s 1280s
Years:	1258 1259 1260 1261 1262 1263 1264

1261 in various calendars

Gregorian calendar	1261 MCCLXI
Ab urbe condita	2014
Armenian calendar	710 ԹՎ ՉԺ
Assyrian calendar	6011
Balinese saka calendar	1182–1183
Bengali calendar	668
Berber calendar	2211
English Regnal year	45 Hen. 3 – 46 Hen. 3
Buddhist calendar	1805
Burmese calendar	623
Byzantine calendar	6769–6770
Chinese calendar	庚申年 (Metal Monkey) 3958 or 3751     — to — 辛酉年 (Metal Rooster) 3959 or 3752
Coptic calendar	977–978
Discordian calendar	2427
Ethiopian calendar	1253–1254
Hebrew calendar	5021–5022
Hindu calendars
- Vikram Samvat	1317–1318
- Shaka Samvat	1182–1183
- Kali Yuga	4361–4362
Holocene calendar	11261
Igbo calendar	261–262
Iranian calendar	639–640
Islamic calendar	659–660
Japanese calendar	Bun'ō 2 / Kōchō 1 (弘長元年)
Javanese calendar	1170–1171
Julian calendar	1261 MCCLXI
Korean calendar	3594
Minguo calendar	651 before ROC 民前651年
Nanakshahi calendar	−207
Thai solar calendar	1803–1804
Tibetan calendar	阳金猴年 (male Iron-Monkey) 1387 or 1006 or 234     — to — 阴金鸡年 (female Iron-Rooster) 1388 or 1007 or 235

Hagia Sofia in Constantinople. The city is captured by the Empire of Nicaea on July 25, thus re-establishing the Byzantine Empire.

Year 1261 (MCCLXI) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.

Events

• January – Pope Alexander IV prohibits the Flagellants.
• March 13 – The Treaty of Nymphaeum, directed against the Latin Empire of Constantinople, is signed between the Republic of Genoa and the Nicaean emperor Michael VIII Palaiologos.
• June 12 – King Henry III of England obtains a papal bull releasing him from his oath to maintain the Provisions of Oxford, setting the stage for the Second Barons' War (1263–1267).
• July 4 – Baybars becomes the new Mamluk Sultan of Egypt.
• July 23 – Battle of Callann: The Normans, under John FitzGerald, 1st Baron Desmond, are defeated by the Gaelic forces of Fínghin Mac Carthaigh, King of Desmond.
• July 25 – The city of Constantinople is recaptured by Nicaean forces under the command of Alexios Strategopoulos, thus ending the Latin Empire and re-establishing the Byzantine Empire.
• August 15 – The Nicaean ruler Michael VIII Palaiologos is crowned Byzantine Emperor in Constantinople.
• August 29 – Pope Urban IV succeeds Pope Alexander IV as the 182nd pope, the last man to do so without being a cardinal first.
• December 25 – The 11-year-old John IV Laskaris is blinded by order of his cousin and nominal co-ruler of the Byzantine Empire, Michael VIII Palaiologos, in Nicaea to render him ineligible for the throne, and he is exiled.
• The population of Greenland accepts the overlordship of the King of Norway.
• Livonian Crusade: The Estonian rebellion on Saaremaa Island is forced down by the Livonian Order.
• The Japanese Bun'ō era ends, and the Kōchō era begins.
• The Convent of Wurmsbach is established in Switzerland.
• Baibars establishes a puppet caliphate in Cairo.
• Béla IV of Hungary repels a Tatar invasion.
• Kublai Khan, who became a Khagan claimant in the previous year, releases 75 Song Dynasty Chinese merchants from captivity, after they had been captured along the border of his Empire, and the Southern Song Dynasty of China. This is an act to increase his reputation amongst the Chinese, shore up his legitimacy as a just ruler, and to gain more defectors from the Southern Song Dynasty.
• The earliest extant Chinese illustration of Pascal's Triangle is from Yang Hui's book Xiangjie Jiuzhang Suanfa, published in this year, although knowledge of Pascal's Triangle existed in China by at least 1100.

Births

• February 1 – Walter de Stapledon, English bishop (d. 1326)
• February 11 – Otto III, Duke of Bavaria (d. 1312)
• February 28 – Margaret of Scotland, Queen of Norway (d. 1283)
• March 1 – Hugh le Despenser, 1st Earl of Winchester (d. 1326)
• July 25 – Arthur II, Duke of Brittany (d. 1312)
• October 9 – King Denis of Portugal (d. 1325)
• date unknown
  • Bohemond VII, Count of Tripoli, prince of Antioch (d. 1287)
  • Prince Daniel of Moscow, son of Alexander Nevsky (d. 1303)
  • Konoe Iemoto, Japanese kugyō (d. 1296)
  • Albertino Mussato, Italian statesman and writer (d. 1329)
  • Władysław I the Elbow-high, King of Poland (d. 1333)
  • Constantine Palaiologos, Byzantine prince and general (d. 1306)

Deaths

Bettisia Gozzadini, lithograph from Carolina Bonafede, Cenni biografici … , 1845

• February 28 – Henry III, Duke of Brabant
• May 25 – Pope Alexander IV
• July 8 – Adolf IV of Holstein, Count of Schauenburg
• September – Plaisance of Antioch, queen of Cyprus
• September 18 – Konrad von Hochstaden, Archbishop of Cologne
• November 9 – Sanchia of Provence, queen consort of Germany
• date unknown
  • An-Nasir Dawud, Ayyubid sultan of Damascus and Emir of Kerak
  • Bettisia Gozzadini, Italian scholar (b. 1209)
  • Qin Jiushao, Chinese mathematician of the Song Dynasty (b. 1202)
  • Patriarch Nicephorus II of Constantinople