Template:On this day - December 11

Averroes

• 1198 – Death of Averroes, philosopher, physician, mathematician and astronomer of Al-Andalus (present-day Spain) (b. 1126).
• 1474 – Death of Henry IV, Castilian-Leonese king (b. 1425).
• 1576 – Fray Luis de León is acquitted by the Inquisition after almost five years of imprisonment for translating the Song of Songs into the vernacular without license.
• 1582 – Death of Fernando Álvarez de Toledo y Pimentel, third Duke of Alba (b. 1507).
• 1634 – Death of Fadrique Álvarez de Toledo y Mendoza, Spanish soldier and politician (b. 1580).
• 1813 – Napoleon Bonaparte restores the crown of Spain to Ferdinand VII.
• 1824 – Birth of Víctor Balaguer, Spanish writer, journalist and politician (d. 1901).
• 1831 – On the beaches of San Andrés, in Málaga, Spain, General José María de Torrijos y Uriarte is executed by firing squad together with the 48 men who had accompanied him in his pronunciamiento to overthrow the absolutism of Ferdinand VII (b. 1791).
• 1868 – In the course of the War of the Triple Alliance, the Brazilian army defeats the Paraguayan army at the Battle of Abaí.
• 1899 – Birth of Julio de Caro, Argentine tango violinist, conductor and composer.
• 1944 – Costa Rica declares war on Germany and Italy under its international policy of complete solidarity and cooperation with American countries whenever they were threatened by a non-American power.
• 1981 – In El Salvador (in the course of «Operation Rescue» against the FMLN), the second day of the El Mozote massacre takes place, during which troops of the Armed Forces of El Salvador torture and execute 900 unarmed peasant civilians (men, women and children). It is considered the worst massacre in the Western Hemisphere in modern times.
• 1987 – UNESCO declares the Historic Center of Puebla (Mexico) a World Heritage Site.
• 2006 – The Mexican president Felipe Calderón begins the War against drug trafficking in Mexico after ordering a police-military operation in Michoacán.
• 2007 – In Lima (Peru), former president Alberto Fujimori is sentenced at first instance to 6 years in prison plus 2 additional years for the crime of usurpation of functions and abuse of authority during his term.
• 2014 – Spain passes a law obliging publishers to charge web search engines for showing their publications on their results pages, which leads to the indefinite closure of Google News.