Charles Martel also known as Charles the Hammer, was a Frankish military and political leader, who served as Mayor of the Palace under the Merovingian kings and ruled de facto during an interregnum (737–43) at the end of his life, using the...

Isaac of Nineveh also remembered as Isaac the Syrian and Isaac Cyrus was a Seventh century bishop and theologian best remembered for his written work. He is also regarded as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church, which the feast day of Jan...

Li Bai or Li Po was a Chinese poet who lived during the Tang Dynasty. Called the Poet Immortal, Li Bai is often regarded, along with Du Fu, as one of the two greatest poets in China's literary history. Approximately 1,100 of his poems remai...

Du Fu or Tu Fu was a prominent Chinese poet during the Tang Dynasty. Along with Li Po (Li Bai), he is frequently called the greatest of the Chinese poets. His own greatest ambition was to help his country by becoming a successful civil serv...

Pepin the Short (or Pepin the Younger or Pepin III), was the King of the Franks from 751 to 768 and is best known for being the father of Charlemagne, or Charles the Great. He was born in 714 in Jupille, close to the city of Liège, in what...

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...

Empress Koken, also known as Empress Shotoku, was the 46th (with Empress Koken name) and the 48th monarch of Japan (with Empress Shotoku name), according to the traditional order of succession. Empress Koken first reigned from 749 to 758, t...

Alcuin of York was an English scholar, ecclesiastic, poet and teacher from York, Northumbria. He was born around 735 and became the student of Archbishop Ecgbert at York. At the invitation of Charlemagne, he became a leading scholar and tea...

Abd al-Rahman I was the founder of a Muslim dynasty that ruled the greater part of Iberia for nearly three centuries (including the succeeding Caliphate of Córdoba). The Muslims called the regions of Iberia under their dominion al-Andalus....

Charlemagne, meaning Charles the Great, was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans (Imperator Romanorum) from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Cent...

Padmasambhava, The Lotus Born, was a sage guru from Oddiyana na who is said to have transmitted Vajrayana Buddhism to Bhutan and Tibet and neighbouring countries in the 8th century. In those lands he is better known as Guru Rinpoche ("Preci...

Offa (son of Thingfrith, son of Eanulf), King of Mercia, was one of the leading figures of Saxon history. He obtained the throne of Mercia in 757, after the murder of his cousin, King Aethelbald, by Beornraed. After spending fourteen years...

Jayavarman II, a 9th century king of Cambodia, is widely recognized as the founder of the Khmer Empire, which ruled much of the Southeast Asian mainland for more than six hundred years. Historians formerly dated his reign as running from 80...

Bai Juyi or Po Chü-i was a Chinese poet of the Tang dynasty. He wrote over 2,800 poems, which he had copied and distributed to ensure their survival. He is most notable for the accessibility of his work. It is said that he rewrote any part...

Liu Zongyuan was a Chinese writer and poet who lived in Chang'an in the Tang dynasty. Along with Han Yu, he was a founder of the Classical Prose Movement. He was traditionally classed as one of the Eight Great Prose Masters of the Tang and...