Baruch Laibov and Alexander Voznitzin are burned alive in St. Petersburg, Russia. Vonitzin had converted to Judaism with Laibov's help, with the consent of Empress Anna Ivanovna.

Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. With an area of 1,439 sq km, Saint Petersburg is the smallest administrative division of Russia by area. The city had a population of 5,601,911 residents as of 2021, with more than 6.4 million people living in the metropolitan area. Saint Petersburg is the fourth-most populous city in Europe, the most populous city on the Baltic Sea, and the world's northernmost city of more than 1 million residents. As the former capital of the Russian Empire, and a historically strategic port, it is governed as a federal city.

The emperor and autocrat of all Russia, also translated as emperor and autocrat of all the Russias, was the official title of the Russian monarch from 1721 to 1917.

Anna Ioannovna, also russified as Anna Ivanovna and sometimes anglicized as Anne, served as regent of the Duchy of Courland and Semigallia from 1711 until 1730 and then ruled as Empress of Russia from 1730 to 1740. Much of her administration was defined or heavily influenced by actions set in motion by her uncle, Peter the Great, such as the lavish building projects in St. Petersburg, funding the Russian Academy of Science, and measures which generally favored the nobility, such as the repeal of a primogeniture law in 1730. In the West, Anna's reign was traditionally viewed as a continuation of the transition from the old Muscovy ways to the European court envisioned by Peter the Great. Within Russia, Anna's reign is often referred to as a "dark era".

July 15 is the 196th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; 169 days remain until the end of the year.