Year 1601 (MDCI) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Thursday () of the 10-day slower Julian calendar).

Events of 1601

January–June

• January 1 – The first day of the seventeenth century.

• February 8 – Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, longtime favorite of Queen Elizabeth I, rebels against the queen; his revolt is quickly crushed.

• February 25 – Robert Devereux is beheaded.

July–December

• 24 December (Julian Calendar) – The Battle of Kinsale ends the siege of Kinsale, Ireland, a siege that started in the autumn of 1601. According to the Gregorian Calendar used by the Irish and Spanish forces in the battle, its date was 3 January 1602.

Undated

• The Jesuit Matteo Ricci becomes the first European to enter the Forbidden City in Beijing, China, during the Ming Dynasty.

• A bad harvest occurs in Russia due to a rainy summer.

• Dutch troops drive the Portuguese from Málaga.

• A famine (-1603) kills about half the Estonian population.

Births

• January 8 – Baltasar Gracián y Morales, Spanish prose writer (d. 1658)

• May – Spencer Compton, 2nd Earl of Northampton (d. 1643)

• May 2 – Athanasius Kircher, German Jesuit scholar (d. 1680)

• August 17 – Pierre de Fermat, French mathematician (d. 1665)

• August 22 – Georges de Scudéry, French novelist, dramatist and poet (d. 1667)

• September 13 – Jan Brueghel the Younger, Flemish painter (d. 1678)

• September 22 – Anna of Austria, queen of Louis XIII of France and regent (d. 1666)

• September 27 – King Louis XIII of France (d. 1643)

• date unknown

• *William Coddington, first governor of Rhode Island (d. 1678)

• *Jacques Gaffarel, French librarian and astrologer (d. 1681)

• probable

• *Adrian Scrope, English regicide (d. 1660)

• *François Tristan l'Hermite, French dramatist (d. 1655)

• *Edward Somerset, 2nd Marquess of Worcester (d. 1667)

Deaths

• January 19 – Henry Herbert, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, English statesman (b. 1534)

• February 25 – Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, English politician (b. 1566)

• February 27 – Anne Line, English saint (birthdate unknown)

• April 10 – Mark Alexander Boyd, Scottish poet and soldier of fortune (b. 1562)

• May 19 – Costanzo Porta, Italian composer (b. 1528)

• August 9 – Mihai Viteazul, Prince of Wallachia (b. 1558)

• October 24 – Tycho Brahe, Danish astronomer (b. 1546)

• date unknown

• *Scipione Ammirato, Italian historian (b. 1531)

• *Girolamo Dalla Casa, Italian composer

• *Ogawa Suketada, Japanese daimyo (b. 1549)

• probable

• *Thomas North, English translator of Plutarch (b. 1535)

• *John Shakespeare, English glover and farmer, father of William Shakespeare (b. 1529)