Today in History: A fire in Thessaloniki, Greece, destroys 32% of the city in 1917

The following is a chronological list of notable events that occurred on August 18 throughout history: 

707 – Princess Abe accedes to the imperial Japanese throne as Empress Genmei.

1487 – The Siege of Málaga ends with the taking of the city by Castilian and Aragonese forces.

1612 – The trials of the Pendle witches and Samlesbury witches, one of England’s most famous witch trials, begin at the Lancaster Assizes.

1826 – Major Gordon Laing becomes the first European to enter Timbuktu.

1877 – American astronomer Asaph Hall discovers Phobos, one of Mars’s moons.

1917 – A Great Fire in Thessaloniki, Greece, destroys 32% of the city leaving 70,000 individuals homeless.

1940 – World War II: The Hardest Day air battle, part of the Battle of Britain, takes place. At that point, it is the largest aerial engagement in history with heavy losses sustained on both sides.

1958 – Vladimir Nabokov’s controversial novel Lolita is published in the United States.

1976 – The Soviet Union’s robotic probe Luna 24 successfully lands on the Moon.

2019 – One hundred activists, officials, and other concerned citizens in Iceland hold a funeral for Okjökull glacier, which has completely melted after having once covered six square miles (15.5 km2).