185

By place

Nepal Empire

• The statue of King Jayavarma, the first King of Nepal, is erected in the Maligaon palatial grounds of Kathmandu, Nepal.

  Roman Empire

• Nobles of Britain demand that Commodus rescind all power given to Tigidius Perennis, who is eventually executed.
• Publius Helvius Pertinax is made governor of Britain and quells a mutiny of the British Roman legions who wanted him to become emperor. The disgruntled usurpers go on to attempt to assassinate the governor.
• Tigidius Perennis, his family and many others are executed for conspiring against Commodus.
• Emperor Commodus drains Rome's treasury to put on gladiatorial spectacles and confiscates property to support his pleasures. He participates as a gladiator and boasts of victory in 1,000 matches in the Circus Maximus.

  India

• Reign in India of Vasudeva, Kushan emperor.

  China

• Zhi Yao, a Kushan Buddhist monk of Yuezhi ethnicity, translates Buddhist texts into the Chinese language during the Han Dynasty.
• February - The rebels of the Yellow Turban are defeated by the imperial army, but only two months later, the rebellion breaks out again. It spreads to the Taihang Mountains on the western border of Hebei Province.

  By topic

Arts and sciences

• Cleomedes discovers the refraction of light by the Earth's atmosphere.
• A supernova now known as SN 185 is noted by Chinese astronomers in the Astrological Annals of the Houhanshu, making it the earliest recorded supernova.

  Religion

• Irenaeus writes that there are only four Gospels.