Jan III Sobieski was one of the most notable monarchs of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania from 1674 until his death. Sobieski's 22-year-reign was marked by a period of the Commonwealth's sta...

John Dryden was an English poet, dramatist, and critic. He first came to public notice in 1659 with his Heroic Stanzas, commemorating the death of Oliver Cromwell. The following year, however, he celebrated the restoration of Charles II wit...

Robert Hooke, natural philosopher, inventor, architect, chemist, mathematician, physicist, engineer. Robert Hooke is one of the most neglected natural philosophers of all time. The inventor of, amongst other things, the iris diaphragm in ca...

Pope Clement XI, was Pope from 1700 until his death. Born in Urbino, into a noble family that had established itself there from northern Albania in the 15th century and were originally soldiers of Scanderbeg against the Ottoman Empire. Duri...

Johann Bernoulli was a Swiss mathematician and was one of the many prominent mathematicians in the Bernoulli family. He is known for his contributions to infinitesimal calculus and educated Leonhard Euler in his youth. Throughout Johann Ber...

Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor, King of Bohemia, King of Hungary, King of the Romans was the elder son of Emperor Leopold I and his third wife, Eleonore-Magdalena of Pfalz-Neuburg, who was the daughter of Philipp Wilhelm, Elector Palatine. Bo...

Vitus Bering was a Danish explorer. Explored the Siberian Far East and Alaska and claimed it for Russia. The value of Bering's work was not fully recognized for many years, but Captain Cook was able to prove Bering's accuracy as an observer...

Frederick William I was the King in Prussia and Elector of Brandenburg (as Frederick William II) from 1713 until his death. He was in personal union the sovereign prince of the Principality of Neuchâtel. The King acquired a reputation fo...

Francis Hutcheson was a philosopher born in Ireland to a family of Scottish Presbyterians who became one of the founding fathers of the Scottish Enlightenment. Hutcheson was an important influence on the works of several significant Enlight...

Charles VII was the prince-elector of Bavaria from 1726 and Holy Roman Emperor from 24 January 1742 until his death in 1745. A member of the House of Wittelsbach, Charles was the first person not born of the House of Habsburg to become empe...

Jeremiah Dixon was an English surveyor and astronomer who is best known for his work with Charles Mason, from 1763 to 1767, in determining what was later called the Mason–Dixon line. Dixon was born in Cockfield, near Bishop Auckland, Cou...

Jean-Baptiste de la Marck, often just known as "Lamarck", was a French soldier, naturalist, academic and an early proponent of the idea that evolution occurred and proceeded in accordance with natural laws. In the modern era, Lamarck is re...

Antonio Salieri is still better known today for the renowned composers with whom he was associated than for his own many and varied compositions. While he cannot be ranked among the great masters himself, he has nevertheless come into view...

Nicolas-Jacques Conté was a French painter, balloonist, army officer, and inventor of the modern pencil. He distinguished himself for his mechanical genius which was of great avail to the French army in Egypt. Napoleon called him “a univ...

Thomas Telford was a Scottish civil engineer, architect and stonemason, and a noted road, bridge and canal builder. Apprenticeship as a stonemason laid the basis for Telford's move via Edinburgh to London, where he worked on Somerset House...