1061

Year 1061 (MLXI) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.

Europe

 * Spring – Robert de Grandmesnil, his nephew Berengar, half-sister Judith (future wife of Roger I), and eleven monks of the Abbey of Saint-Evroul, are banished by Duke William II (the Bastard) of Normandy for violence, and travel to Southern Italy.
 * Summer – Norman forces led by Duke Robert Guiscard and his brother Roger I invade Sicily. They land unseen during the night and surprise the Saracen army. Guiscard conquers Messina and marches into central Sicily.
 * June 28 – Count Floris I is ambushed on a retreat from Zaltbommel and killed by German troops at Nederhemert. Most of West Frisia (later part of the County of Holland) is conquered and annexed by the Holy Roman Empire.
 * Sosols (a tribe in Estonia) destroy the Kievan Rus' fortification of Yuryev in Tartu, and carry out a raid on Pskov.

Africa

 * Sultan Yusuf ibn Tashfin succeeds to the throne of Morocco, following the Almoravid conquest.

Religion

 * July 27 – Pope Nicholas II dies after a 2-year pontificate at Florence. He is succeeded by Alexander II as the 156th pope of the Catholic Church in Rome.
 * The Speyer Cathedral is consecrated in Speyer (modern Germany).

Births

 * Al-Maziri, Zirid imam, jurist and scholar (d. 1141)
 * Al-Tughrai, Persian poet and alchemist (d. 1121)
 * Roger Borsa, duke of Apulia and Calabria (or 1060)
 * William II (the German), count of Burgundy (d. 1125)
 * Wuyashu, chieftain of the Wanyan tribe (d. 1113)

Deaths

 * January 28 – Spytihněv II, duke of Bohemia (b. 1031)
 * May 5 – Humbert of Moyenmoutier, French cardinal
 * June 28 – Floris I, count of Friesland (west of the Vlie)
 * July 13 – Beatrice I, German abbess of Quedlinburg (b. 1037)
 * July 27 – Nicholas II, pope of the Catholic Church
 * Abu Sa'id Gardezi, Persian geographer and historian
 * Adelmann, bishop of Brescia (approximate date)
 * Ali ibn Ridwan, Arab physician and astronomer
 * Burgheard, English nobleman
 * Burkhard I (or Burchardus), German nobleman
 * Conrad III (or Konrad III), German nobleman
 * Henry I (or Heinrich I), German count palatine
 * Rajaraja Narendra, Indian ruler (b. 1022)
 * Rúaidhri Ua Flaithbheartaigh, king of Iar Connacht
 * Song Qi, Chinese statesman and historian (b. 998)