Herodotus

Historian · 460 BC – 400 BC

Thucydides was an Athenian historian and general whose History of the Peloponnesian War set the standard for rigorous, evidence-based history and remains a foundational text of political and military analysis.

• History of the Peloponnesian War
• Scientific history

Why The younger historian who followed and sharpened the discipline Herodotus founded.

Ruler · 600 BC – 530 BC

Cyrus the Great was the founder of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, the largest empire the ancient world had yet seen, remembered for his military genius and his tolerance toward conquered peoples.

• Founding the Persian Empire
• The Cyrus Cylinder

Why A central figure in the Histories' account of the rise of the Persian Empire.

Biographer · 46 – 120

Plutarch was a Greek philosopher and biographer of the Roman era whose Parallel Lives paired famous Greeks and Romans and became one of the most read and influential works of biography in history.

• Parallel Lives
• Moralia

Why A later Greek writer who, like Herodotus, narrated the lives and deeds of the past.

Statesman · 1874 – 1965

Winston Churchill was the British statesman who led the United Kingdom to victory in World War II — and a prolific historian and writer whose books and speeches won him the Nobel Prize in Literature, a rare honour for a man of action.

• Leadership in World War II
• Historic wartime speeches

Why Also a writer & historian · Comparable historical impact

Philosopher · 1770 – 1831

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher and the leading figure of German idealism, whose dialectical method and grand vision of history as the self-development of Spirit profoundly shaped modern philosophy.

• German idealism
• The dialectic

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Historian · 1332 – 1406

Ibn Khaldun was a North African scholar of the 14th century widely regarded as a founder of historiography, sociology and economics, whose Muqaddimah pioneered the analytical study of how societies rise and fall.

• The Muqaddimah
• Theory of asabiyyah

Why Also a historian · Comparable historical impact

Novelist · 1890 – 1976

Agatha Christie was an English writer, the best-selling novelist of all time, whose ingenious detective stories featuring Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple made her the undisputed "Queen of Crime".

• Hercule Poirot
• Miss Marple

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Writer · 1894 – 1963

Aldous Huxley was an English writer and philosopher whose dystopian novel Brave New World became one of the most influential warnings of the 20th century, imagining a future enslaved not by terror but by pleasure and conditioning.

• Brave New World
• The Doors of Perception

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Naturalist · 1769 – 1859

Alexander von Humboldt was a Prussian naturalist and explorer whose pioneering expeditions and best-selling books — including the vast Cosmos — founded modern geography and ecology and made him one of the most famous scientists and authors of his age.

• Cosmos
• Scientific exploration of the Americas

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Novelist · 1802 – 1870

Alexandre Dumas was a French writer whose swashbuckling historical novels — The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo — became some of the most popular and widely adapted stories in the world.

• The Three Musketeers
• The Count of Monte Cristo

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Diarist · 1929 – 1945

Anne Frank was a German-Dutch Jewish girl whose diary, written while hiding from the Nazis in occupied Amsterdam, became one of the most widely read accounts of the Holocaust and a lasting testament to humanity amid persecution.

• The Diary of a Young Girl
• Voice of the Holocaust

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Writer · 1860 – 1904

Anton Chekhov was a Russian playwright and short-story writer — and a practising physician — widely regarded as among the greatest masters of both the short story and modern drama, whose plays like The Cherry Orchard transformed the theatre.

• The Cherry Orchard
• The Seagull

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Writer · 1859 – 1930

Arthur Conan Doyle was a British writer and physician who created Sherlock Holmes, the most famous detective in fiction, whose stories of brilliant deduction defined the detective genre and remain among the best-loved in the world.

• Sherlock Holmes
• The Hound of the Baskervilles

Why Also a writer · Comparable historical impact

Playwright · 480 BC – 406 BC

Euripides was one of the three great tragedians of classical Athens, whose psychologically searching, often unsettling plays such as Medea and The Bacchae made him the most modern-feeling dramatist of the ancient world.

• Medea
• The Bacchae

Why Also a writer · Active in the same era

Poet · 630 BC – 570 BC

Sappho was an ancient Greek lyric poet from the island of Lesbos, celebrated in antiquity as one of the greatest of all poets and revered for her intimate, intensely personal verse on love and longing.

• Lyric love poetry
• The 'Tenth Muse'

Why Also a writer · Active in the same era

Playwright · 497 BC – 406 BC

Sophocles was one of the three great tragedians of classical Athens, author of Oedipus Rex and Antigone, whose dramas shaped Western theatre and gave us some of its most enduring stories.

• Oedipus Rex
• Antigone

Why Also a writer · Active in the same era

Poet · b. 800 BC

Homer was the legendary ancient Greek poet to whom the great epics the Iliad and the Odyssey are attributed, foundational works of Western literature.

• The Iliad
• The Odyssey

Why Also a writer · Active in the same era

Mathematician · 325 BC – 265 BC

Euclid was an ancient Greek mathematician, the "father of geometry", whose treatise the Elements is the most influential mathematics textbook ever written.

• The Elements
• Euclidean geometry

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Physician · 460 BC – 370 BC

Hippocrates was an ancient Greek physician regarded as the father of Western medicine, who established medicine as a rational discipline distinct from superstition and inspired the Hippocratic Oath.

• Father of medicine
• The Hippocratic Oath

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Mathematician · 570 BC – 495 BC

Pythagoras was an ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher who founded the Pythagorean school and is remembered for the Pythagorean theorem and the idea that number underlies the cosmos.

• Pythagorean theorem
• Pythagoreanism

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Philosopher · 334 BC – 262 BC

Zeno of Citium was an ancient Greek philosopher who founded Stoicism, teaching that virtue and reason are the path to a good life, in lectures given at the Painted Porch (Stoa) in Athens.

• Founding Stoicism
• Teaching at the Stoa

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

King · 540 BC – 480 BC

Leonidas I was a king of Sparta who led a small Greek force in a legendary last stand against the vast Persian army at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC, becoming an enduring symbol of courage and sacrifice.

• Battle of Thermopylae
• The stand of the 300

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Statesman · 495 BC – 429 BC

Pericles was an Athenian statesman who led the city during its golden age, strengthening its democracy, building the Parthenon and championing the arts, in an era so brilliant it is often called the Age of Pericles.

• The Age of Pericles
• Building the Parthenon

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Statesman · 524 BC – 459 BC

Themistocles was an Athenian statesman and general whose foresight built the navy that saved Greece, and whose brilliant strategy at the Battle of Salamis destroyed the Persian fleet and turned back Xerxes's invasion.

• Battle of Salamis
• Building the Athenian navy

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization