Ardashir I or Ardeshir I, also known as Ardashir the Unifier, was the founder of the Sasanian Empire. He was the ruler of Estakhr since 206, subsequently Pars Province since 222, and finally "King of Kings of Sasanian Empire" in 224 with th...

Plotinus was a major philosopher in the ancient world and is widely considered the father of Neoplatonism. Much of our biographical information about him comes from Porphyry's preface to his edition of Plotinus' Enneads. His metaphysical wr...

Mani was the prophet and the founder of Manichaeism, a gnostic religion of Late Antiquity which was once widespread but is now extinct. Mani was born in or near Seleucia-Ctesiphon in Parthian Babylonia, at the time still part of the Parthia...

Eusebius of Caesarea was a historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christian polemicist. He became the bishop of Caesarea Maritima about 314 AD. Together with Pamphilus, he was a scholar of the Biblical canon and is regarded as one of the m...

Constantine, The Great was the 57th Emperor of the Roman Empire from 306, and the sole holder of that office from 324 until his death in 337. Best known for being the first Christian Roman emperor, Constantine reversed the persecutions of h...

Attila the Hun was the Emperor of the Huns from 434 until his death in 453. He was leader of the Hunnic Empire which stretched from Germany to the Ural River and from the River Danube to the Baltic Sea. During his rule, he was one of the mo...

Clovis or Chlodowech was the first King of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler, changing the leadership from a group of royal chieftains, to rule by kings, ensuring that the kingship was held by his heirs. He was als...

Dionysius Exiguus has left his mark conspicuously, for it was he who introduced the use of the Christian Era according to which dates are reckoned from the Incarnation, which he assigned to 25 March, in the year 754 from the foundation of R...

Aryabhata is the first of the great astronomers of the classical age of India. He was born in 476 AD in Ashmaka but later lived in Kusumapura, which his commentator Bhaskara I (629 AD) identifies with Patilputra (modern Patna). Aryabhata...

Saint Benedict of Nursia is a Christian saint, honored by the Roman Catholic Church as the patron saint of Europe and students. Benedict founded twelve communities for monks at Subiaco, about 40 miles (64 km) to the east of Rome, before mov...

Emperor Wen of Sui (581-604), personal name Yang Jian, was the founder and first emperor of China's Sui Dynasty. He was a hard-working administrator and a micromanager. As a Buddhist, he encouraged the spread of Buddhism through the state;...

Emperor Gaozu of Tang China, born Li Yuan, was the founder of the Tang Dynasty of China, and the first emperor of this dynasty from 618 to 626. Under the shortlived Sui dynasty, Li Yuan was the governor in the area of modern-day Shanxi prov...

Muhammad was the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet and God's messenger, sent to present and confirm the monotheistic teachings preached previously by Adam, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and other prophets. He is vie...

Bede, also referred to as Saint Bede or the Venerable Bede, was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, England, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow (see Wea...

Al-Mansur was the second Abbasid Caliph from 136 AH to 158 AH (754 AD – 775 AD). He is generally regarded as the real founder of the Abbasid Caliphate. In 762 he founded as new imperial residence and palace city Madinat as-Salam (the cit...