Moses

Pharaoh · 1303 BC – 1213 BC

Ramesses II was the most powerful pharaoh of Egypt's New Kingdom, whose 66-year reign brought military campaigns, colossal building projects and a prosperity that earned him the title Ramesses the Great.

• Battle of Kadesh
• Abu Simbel temples

Why The pharaoh traditionally identified with the Exodus — Moses's antagonist and the ruler from whom he led the Hebrews.

Prophet · 570 – 632

Muhammad was the founder of Islam and regarded by Muslims as the last prophet of God, whose revelations form the Quran and whose life and teachings shaped the religion now followed by 1.8 billion people across the world.

• Founding Islam
• The Quran

Why A later prophet in the Abrahamic tradition who regarded Moses as one of the greatest prophets and whose Quran includes extensive accounts of Moses's life.

Spiritual Leader · 563 BC – 483 BC

Siddhartha Gautama, known as the Buddha, was a spiritual teacher of ancient India whose insights into suffering and liberation founded Buddhism, now one of the world's major religions.

• Founding Buddhism
• The Four Noble Truths

Why A fellow founder of a great spiritual tradition, whose teachings, like Moses's, shaped the lives of hundreds of millions across millennia.

Ruler · 1810 BC – 1750 BC

Hammurabi was the sixth king of Babylon who united Mesopotamia under his rule and issued the Code of Hammurabi, one of the earliest and most complete written law codes in history.

• The Code of Hammurabi
• Uniting Mesopotamia

Why Also a lawgiver · Comparable historical impact

Activist · 1869 – 1948

Mahatma Gandhi was the leader of India's independence movement, who pioneered the philosophy and practice of nonviolent civil disobedience and inspired movements for civil rights across the world.

• Leading Indian independence
• Nonviolent civil disobedience

Why Also a leader · Comparable historical impact

Friar · 1181 – 1226

Francis of Assisi was the Italian friar who founded the Franciscan order, embraced radical poverty, preached to birds and animals, and created a spirituality of joy, simplicity, and care for all creation that became one of the most beloved expressions of Christianity.

• Franciscan order
• Radical poverty

Why Comparable historical impact

Theologian · 1509 – 1564

John Calvin was the French theologian and reformer who developed Calvinism, founded the Reformed tradition of Protestantism, and governed Geneva as a theocracy whose model of disciplined Christian community shaped Puritanism, Presbyterianism, and ultimately the foundations of modern democracy.

• Calvinism
• Predestination

Why Comparable historical impact

Apostle · 5 – 64

Saint Paul was the Jewish-Roman apostle whose missionary journeys spread Christianity across the Roman Empire, whose theological letters form a third of the New Testament, and who shaped Christian doctrine more than any other figure after Jesus of Nazareth.

• Spreading Christianity across the Roman Empire
• The Epistles

Why Comparable historical impact

President · 1809 – 1865

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, who led the nation through its Civil War, preserved the Union, and abolished slavery before his assassination in 1865.

• Leading the Union in the Civil War
• The Emancipation Proclamation

Why Comparable historical impact

Emperor · 1542 – 1605

Akbar was the third Mughal emperor, who expanded the empire across much of the Indian subcontinent and is remembered for his administrative reforms, religious tolerance and patronage of the arts during a long and powerful reign.

• Expansion of the Mughal Empire
• Religious tolerance

Why Comparable historical impact

Economist · 1723 – 1790

Adam Smith was a Scottish Enlightenment philosopher and economist, the father of modern economics, whose work The Wealth of Nations laid the foundations of free-market thought.

• The Wealth of Nations
• The invisible hand

Why Comparable historical impact

Dictator · 1889 – 1945

Adolf Hitler was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945, whose ideology of racial supremacy and aggressive expansionism plunged the world into World War II and caused the Holocaust — the genocide of six million Jews and millions of others.

• Nazi Germany
• World War II

Why Comparable historical impact

Mathematician · 780 – 850

Al-Khwarizmi was a Persian mathematician and scholar of the Islamic Golden Age, the "father of algebra", whose name gave us the word "algorithm".

• Founding algebra
• The word 'algorithm'

Why Comparable historical impact

Mathematician · 1912 – 1954

Alan Turing was an English mathematician and computer scientist who founded theoretical computer science, helped break the German Enigma cipher in World War II, and pioneered the study of artificial intelligence.

• Turing machine
• Breaking the Enigma code

Why Comparable historical impact

Physicist · 1879 – 1955

Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of relativity, one of the two pillars of modern physics, and won the 1921 Nobel Prize.

• Theory of relativity
• E=mc²

Why Comparable historical impact

Bacteriologist · 1881 – 1955

Alexander Fleming was the Scottish bacteriologist who discovered penicillin in 1928 — the world's first antibiotic — by noticing that mold was killing bacteria in a contaminated culture plate, an observation that ultimately saved an estimated 200 million lives.

• Discovery of penicillin
• Nobel Prize in Medicine

Why Comparable historical impact

Statesman · 1755 – 1804

Alexander Hamilton was the American Founding Father who designed the United States financial system, co-wrote the Federalist Papers, founded the first national bank, served as the first Secretary of the Treasury, and was killed in a duel by Vice President Aaron Burr in 1804.

• US financial system
• Federalist Papers

Why Comparable historical impact

Military Leader · 356 BC – 323 BC

Alexander the Great was the king of Macedon who built one of the largest empires in history by his early thirties, spreading Greek culture across three continents.

• Conquest of Persia
• The Hellenistic Age

Why Comparable historical impact

Emperor · 482 – 565

Justinian I was the Byzantine emperor who sought to restore the glory of Rome, reconquering lost western lands, codifying Roman law in the Corpus Juris Civilis, and building the magnificent church of Hagia Sophia.

• Corpus Juris Civilis
• Hagia Sophia

Why Also a lawgiver

Ruler · 69 BC – 30 BC

Cleopatra VII was the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt, a shrewd and learned monarch whose alliances with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony placed her at the center of Roman politics.

• Last pharaoh of Egypt
• Alliance with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Pharaoh · 1380 BC – 1334 BC

Akhenaten was an Egyptian pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty who launched a religious revolution, replacing Egypt's many gods with the worship of a single deity, the sun-disc Aten — one of the earliest experiments with monotheism.

• Worship of the Aten
• City of Amarna

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Pharaoh · 1507 BC – 1458 BC

Hatshepsut was one of the few women to rule ancient Egypt as pharaoh in her own right, a peaceful and prosperous reign marked by ambitious building projects and far-reaching trade.

• Female pharaoh
• Expedition to Punt

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Queen · 1370 BC – 1330 BC

Nefertiti was an Egyptian queen, principal wife of the pharaoh Akhenaten, who wielded unusual power during his religious revolution and whose painted limestone bust is one of the most admired images of the ancient world.

• Berlin bust
• Amarna religious revolution

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Pharaoh · 1341 BC – 1323 BC

Tutankhamun was an Egyptian pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty whose near-intact tomb, discovered in 1922, became the most famous archaeological find in history and made him the best-known of all ancient Egyptians.

• Intact tomb (KV62)
• Golden funerary mask

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization