648

By place

Byzantine Empire

• Emperor Constans II, to quiet the intense controversy caused by the Monothelete doctrine, issues an imperial edict forbidding the subject to be discussed. This edict, distributed by patriarch Paul II in Constans' name, is known as the Typos.

  Europe

• King Sigebert II of Austrasia is advised by Remaclus to establish a double-monastery at Stavelot and Malmedy. As a missionary bishop he founds an abbey on the River Amblève.

  Britain

• King Cenwalh of Wessex returns from a 3-year exile in East Anglia to reclaim his kingdom. He gives 3,000 hides of land around Ashdown to his nephew Cuthred, possibly sub-king of Berkshire.
• Cenwahl invites bishop Birinus to establish under his direction the Old Minster in Winchester. Together they have a small stone church built.

  Asia

• Tang general Ashina She'er re-establishes Tang control of Karasahr, and leads a military campaign against the Tarim Basin kingdom of Kucha in Xinjiang, a vassal of the Western Turkic Khaganate.

  Americas

• In an early skirmish in the run up to the Second Tikal-Calakmul War, B'alaj Chan K'awiil scores a military victory, apparently over his half-brother, who had galled him by using the same royal emblem as he did.
• Dos Pilas breaks away from Tikal and becomes a vassal state of Calakmul.

  By topic

Literature

• The Book of Jin is compiled in China during the Tang Dynasty. Its chief editor is the chancellor Fang Xuanling, who dies in this year as well.

  Religion

• Pope Theodore I excommunicates Paul II of Constantinople.