title: 1542
text: 
  
  Events 
   December 14 – Accession of Mary, Queen of Scots
  
  Births 
   June 6 – Richard Grenville, Elizabethan sailor (died 1591)
   June 24 – St. John of the Cross, Spanish Carmelite friar and poet (died 1591)
   October 15 – Akbar, Jellaladin Mahommed, ruler of the Mughal Empire (died 1605)
   December 8 – Mary, Queen of Scots (died 1587)
   Robert Bellarmine, Catholic theologian and saint (died 1621)
   Toda Kazuaki, samurai in the service of Tokugawa Ieyasu (died 1604)
   Anthony Shirley, English traveller (died 1635)
   John Speed, historian (died 1629)
   Horio Yoshiharu, Japanese daimyo (died 1611)
   Kuki Yoshitaka, Japanese naval commander
   Jan Zamoyski, Polish nobleman (died 1605)
  
  Deaths 
   February 13 – Katherine Howard, Queen of England
   December 14 – James V, King of Scotland