Template:On this day - January 31

Guido Fawkes

• 1504 – France cedes the Kingdom of Naples (in present-day Italy) to the Crown of Aragon.
• 1542 – In the Governorate of the Río de la Plata and Paraguay (present-day Argentina), the Spanish conquistador Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and his soldiers are the first Europeans to see the Iguazu Falls.
• 1558 – In the Captaincy General of Chile (present-day Chile), García Hurtado de Mendoza takes possession of the Isla Grande de Chiloé for the Spanish Empire.
• 1578 – At the Battle of Gembloux, during the Eighty Years' War, the Spaniards are victorious, which means the recovery of the south of the Spanish Netherlands. For this reason the date of this decisive victory has been promoted as the Day of the Tercios.
• 1580 – Death of Henry I of Portugal, which provokes a Portuguese succession crisis that will culminate in the crowning of Philip II of Spain as King of Portugal on 12 September of the same year.
• 1606 – Guido Fawkes, condemned for conspiring against King James I of England and VI of Scotland, is executed in London (b. 1570).
• 1676 – By a Royal Decree of Charles II of Spain, the Royal and Pontifical University of San Carlos Borromeo of Guatemala is founded.
• 1736 – Death of Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, Spanish military officer who served as Governor of the Río de la Plata and of Paraguay, considered the founder of the city of Montevideo (Uruguay) (b. 1682).
• 1750 – The Spanish King Ferdinand VI and the Portuguese King Joseph I sign the Treaty of Madrid, which defines the borders of their respective colonies in South America.
• 1813 – In the United Provinces of the Río de la Plata, the Assembly of the Year XIII is inaugurated.
• 1814 – In Argentina, Gervasio Antonio de Posadas becomes "Supreme Director".
• 1824 – In Mexico, the free state of Tabasco is created, becoming the 13th state of the Federal Republic.
• 1866 – At the Battle of Pehuajó Creek (Corrientes Province), at the beginning of the War of the Triple Alliance, the Paraguayans defeat the Argentine forces, and General Bartolomé Mitre, for unknown reasons, fails to support them with his army. 900 Argentine soldiers die.
• 1906 – In Ecuador and Colombia, a violent earthquake of magnitude 8.8 produces a tsunami with waves 5 meters high that reached Japan.
• 1922 – King Alfonso XIII awards the Cross of Alfonso XII to the Barcelona tenor Hipólito Lázaro.
• 1924 – In Spain, a royal order forbids the free sale of lighters and accessories, as well as their circulation and possession.
• 1962 – Cuba is expelled from the Organization of American States (OAS), after being accused by the United States of "turning its back on the Pan-American system" and drawing closer to the Sino-Soviet community.
• 1974 – On the outskirts of Havana (Cuba), the Vladimir Ilyich Lenin Vocational School is inaugurated with the participation of Fidel Castro and Leonid Brezhnev.
• 1980 – In Guatemala City, political dissidents and native peasants take over the embassy of Spain. At noon the Guatemalan police storm the embassy, and 37 people die (Massacre at the Spanish embassy).
• 2010 – In Ciudad Juárez (Mexico), 17 young people are murdered at a party by members of drug-trafficking groups (Villas de Salvárcar massacre).
• 2015 – Death of Tomás Bulat, Argentine economist, journalist and teacher (b. 1964).