February 24 – In one of the first gun assassinations in Japanese (if not world) history, Mimura Iechika, the daimyō (warlord) of the Bitchū Province, is shot dead by two brothers (Endo Matajiro and Yoshijiro), sent by his rival Ukita Naoie.
Charles IX, King of France, completes his grand tour of his kingdom, returning to Paris a little more than 27 months and 2,500 miles (4,000 km) after his departure on January 24, 1564.
May 25 – King Philip II of Spain issues laws against the remaining Spanish Muslims, including a ban against use of the Arabic language, wearing of traditional Arab or Muslim clothing, a requirement that doors in their homes and buildings be kept open every Friday and on Muslim feast days (in order to verify that Muslim rituals are not observed), and forces the tearing down of public and private bathhouses (to prevent purification rites).
May 30 – The Augsburg Imperial Coin Edict issues from the Holy Roman Empire, authorizing a new coin, the thaler. The new unit of money, the Reichsthaler, follows standards providing that the weight should be based on one-ninth of a Cologne mark of silver (the "9 Thaler standard") with each minted coin to weigh 29.23 grams and to contain 25.96 grams of silver. The word thaler, an abbreviation for the "Joachimsthaler" minted from the silver mines at Joachimsthal (modern-day Jáchymov in the Czech Republic), is anglicized to dollar, the name of currencies in many nations.
July 22 – Pope Pius V issues an edict to expel most prostitutes from Rome, and the Papal States. The edict is soon reversed because of the loss of revenue from the taxation of houses of prostitution.
July 25 – Feodor Stefanovich Kolychov is consecrated as the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church as Philip II, Metropolitan of Moscow with the approval of the Tsar Ivan the Terrible, but soon defies the Tsar. Philip will be deposed in 16 months later and put to death on December 23, 1568.
August 10 – The Beeldenstorm, also called the "Iconoclastic Fury", begins as Protestant Calvinists engage in widespread destruction of religious art in the what are now the Netherlands and Belgium.
September 8 – The siege of Szigetvár ends in a fierce battle with the annihilation of 2,300 Hungarian and Croatian defenders, including their general, Nikola Šubić Zrinski, annihilated by an army of 90,000 soldiers of the Ottoman Empire, under Sokollu Mehmed Pasha. Before charging out with his remaining 600 troops, General Zrinski orders the gates to the fortress to be opened and fires a large cannon, loaded with broken iron, killing hundreds of Ottoman attackers as they enter. As a final measure, according to one source, Zrinski orders a long fuse to be lit to the fortress gunpowder magazine and the powder explodes while thousands of Ottomans are inside.
October 8 – Catherine of the Austrian Habsburgs, Queen of consort of Poland since 1553 as wife of Sigismund II Augustus, leaves Poland to return to Austria after the failure of her marriage. She never comes back to Poland, though she remains the official queen consort until her death in 1572.
October 28 – In Kneiphof, a city in the Duchy of Prussia (modern-day Ostrov Immanuinga Kanta in Russia), Albert, Duke of Prussia has three of the town's five councilors beheaded on charges of causing political and religious disputes with the other Prussian states. Johann Funck, Matthias Horst, and Hans Schnell are executed in the town's marketplace, while Paul Skalich and Johann Steinbach are able to flee the country.
November 5 – Queen Elizabeth I of England addresses the English Parliament and champions English nationalism, asking "Was I not born in this realm? Were my parents born in any foreign country? Is there any cause I should alienate myself from being careful over this country? Is not my kingdom here?"
November 23 – By decree of King Philip II of Spain, the content of gold in the Spanish gold escudo, is raised from 350 maravedis (equivalent to 338 centigrams) of gold to 400 (386 cg) and equivalent to 16 silver reales.
