Template:On this day - May 5

Alfonso V of León

• 985 – The Andalusi leader Almanzor sets out from the Caliphate of Córdoba with a large army with the aim of laying waste to the County of Barcelona (present-day Spain).
• 1028 – Death of Alfonso V, King of León and King of Galicia (b. c. 994).
• 1282 – Birth of Don Juan Manuel, Spanish nobleman and writer in the Castilian language, and one of the main representatives of medieval fiction in prose (d. 1348).
• 1487 – In the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada (present-day Spain), Boabdil is carried in triumph to the palace of the Alhambra and restored to the throne of Granada, while El Zagal withdraws to Almuñécar.
• 1494 – In the Caribbean Sea, Christopher Columbus reaches the present-day island of Jamaica.
• 1518 – On the coast of the Gulf of New Spain (present-day Mexico), Juan de Grijalva sails along the coast of Yucatán, which his pilot Antón de Alaminos took for an island.
• 1545 – In Spain, Charles I of Spain creates the General Archive of Simancas.
• 1641 – Birth of Cipriano Barace, Spanish Jesuit missionary (d. 1702).
• 1679 – The Treaties of Nijmegen are signed, ending the war between the France of Louis XIV and the allied powers of Spain, the Netherlands and the German Empire.
• 1721 – The Cortazar Municipality is founded in the present-day State of Guanajuato, in Mexico.
• 1773 – Death of Enrique Flórez, Spanish religious and historian (b. 1702).
• 1789 – Two English merchant ships are seized by vessels of the Spanish Navy in retaliation for the English occupation of Nootka Island (present-day Canada).
• 1804 – Death of Antonio José de Cavanilles, Spanish botanist and scientist.
• 1808 – The Abdications of Bayonne take place, by which Ferdinand VII of Spain is forced to return to his father Charles IV of Spain the crown obtained after the Mutiny of Aranjuez, followed by the forced renunciation of these rights to the Spanish throne in favor of Napoleon Bonaparte.
• 1846 – Birth of Federico Chueca, Spanish composer, one of the leading representatives of the género chico (d. 1908).
• 1849 – Death of Vicente Salvá, Spanish grammarian, bibliographer and publisher (b. 1786).
• 1862 – The Mexican Army, under the command of General Ignacio Zaragoza, defeats the interventionist French troops at the Battle of Puebla, an event that gives rise to the Cinco de Mayo celebrations.
• 1887 – The Peruvian Academy of the Language is created in Lima (Peru).
• 1890 – In Spain the Universal suffrage Law is enacted.
• 1902 – In New York denunciations are published of the Philippine genocide perpetrated since 4 February 1899 by United States troops. By around 1913 the United States military will have massacred millions of Filipino civilians (more than 10% of the population).
• 1912 – Death of Rafael Pombo, Colombian poet, fabulist, translator, intellectual and diplomat (b. 1833).
• 1930 – In Madrid (Spain), the Central University is closed after continuous student demonstrations against the monarchy.
• 1935 – In Spain, Alejandro Lerroux forms his fifth Government. The CEDA obtains five ministries and Gil-Robles is appointed Minister of War.
• 1939 – In Alicante the university professor Eliseo Gómez Serrano is executed by firing squad (b. 1889).
• 1958 – The Vice President of the United States, Richard Nixon, visits Bolivia.
• 1959 – Death of Carlos Saavedra Lamas, Argentine politician and jurist, Nobel Peace Prize laureate in 1936 (b. 1878).
• 1971 – The OAS grants the Spanish cellist Pau Casals the title of Honorary Citizen of the Americas.
• 1994 – In Cuba, Fidel Castro announces the confiscation of «illegitimate assets» and restricts self-employment.
• 2002 – Death of Hugo Banzer, Bolivian military officer and politician, twice president of Bolivia: in 1971-1978 and 1997-2001 (b. 1926).
• 2003 – In Colombia, the governor of the department of Antioquia, Guillermo Gaviria Correa, the former defense minister Gilberto Echeverri Mejía, and eight soldiers, all held by the FARC, are murdered while an army operation intended to rescue the hostages is under way.
• 2006 – The Civil Guard dismantles an international network devoted to plundering underwater archaeological remains in Spain.