Seventeenth Century

Millennium:	2nd millennium
Centuries:	16th century 17th century 18th century
Decades:	1600s 1610s 1620s 1630s 1640s 1650s 1660s 1670s 1680s 1690s
Categories:	Births – Deaths Establishments – Disestablishments

The 17th century was the century that lasted from January 1, 1601, to December 31, 1700, in the Gregorian calendar. It falls into the Early Modern period of Europe and in that continent (whose impact on the world was increasing) was characterized by the Baroque cultural movement, the Dutch Golden Age, the French Grand Siècle () dominated by Louis XIV, the Scientific Revolution, and according to some historians, the General Crisis. The greatest military conflicts were the Thirty Years' War, the Great Turkish War, and the Dutch-Portuguese War. It was during this period also that European colonization of the Americas began in earnest, including the exploitation of the silver deposits, which resulted in bouts of inflation as wealth was drawn into Europe.

In the Islamic world, the Ottoman, Safavid Persian and Mughal empires grew in strength. In Japan, Tokugawa Ieyasu established the Edo period at the beginning of the century, starting the isolationist Sakoku policy that was to last until the 19th century. In China, the collapsing Ming Dynasty was challenged by a series of conquests led by the Manchu warlord Nurhaci, which were consolidated by his son Hong Taiji and finally consummated by his grandson, the Shunzi Emperor, founder of the Qing Dynasty.