ABSTRACT

Each volume of the Dictionary of World Biography contains 250 entries on the lives of the individuals who shaped their times and left their mark on world history. This is not a who's who. Instead, each entry provides an in-depth essay on the life and career of the individual concerned. Essays commence with a quick reference section that provides basic facts on the individual's life and achievements. The extended biography places the life and works of the individual within an historical context, and the summary at the end of each essay provides a synopsis of the individual's place in history. All entries conclude with a fully annotated bibliography.

chapter |3 pages

Abahai

chapter |3 pages

‘Abbās the Great

chapter |5 pages

Robert Adam and James Adam

chapter |4 pages

Abigail Adams

chapter |5 pages

John Adams

chapter |5 pages

Samuel Adams

chapter |4 pages

Joseph Addison

chapter |4 pages

Jean Le Rond d'Alembert

chapter |3 pages

Ethan Allen

chapter |5 pages

Lord Amherst

chapter |4 pages

John André

chapter |4 pages

Lancelot Andrewes

chapter |5 pages

Queen Anne

chapter |4 pages

Lord Anson

chapter |5 pages

Richard Arkwright

chapter |5 pages

Benedict Arnold

chapter |4 pages

Aurangzeb

Muhī-ud-Dīn Muhammad

chapter |3 pages

Ba'al Shem Tov

Israel ben Eliezer

chapter |4 pages

Johann Sebastian Bach

chapter |3 pages

Nathaniel Bacon

chapter |5 pages

Sir Joseph Banks

chapter |4 pages

Benjamin Banneker

chapter |3 pages

Johann Bernhard Basedow

chapter |3 pages

John Baskerville

chapter |5 pages

Richard Baxter

chapter |4 pages

Pierre Bayle

chapter |4 pages

Jeremy Bentham

chapter |3 pages

Vitus Jonassen Bering

chapter |4 pages

George Berkeley

chapter |4 pages

Gian Lorenzo Bernini

chapter |4 pages

The Bernoulli Family

chapter |3 pages

John Biddle

chapter |3 pages

William Blackstone

chapter |5 pages

Robert Blake

chapter |6 pages

William Blake

chapter |4 pages

William Bligh

chapter |4 pages

Luigi Boccherini

chapter |3 pages

Germain Boffrand

chapter |3 pages

Jakob Böhme

chapter |6 pages

First Viscount Bolingbroke

Henry St. John

chapter |4 pages

Daniel Boone

chapter |3 pages

Francesco Borromini

Francesco Castelli

chapter |4 pages

Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet

chapter |5 pages

James Boswell

chapter |3 pages

Matthew Boulton

chapter |4 pages

Robert Boyle

chapter |4 pages

William Bradford

chapter |3 pages

Anne Bradstreet

chapter |5 pages

Joseph Brant

Thayendanegea

chapter |4 pages

Lancelot Brown

chapter |3 pages

James Bruce

chapter |4 pages

First Duke of Buckingham

George Villiers

chapter |3 pages

Comte De Buffon

Georges-Louis Leclerc

chapter |4 pages

John Bunyan

chapter |4 pages

Edmund Burke

chapter |3 pages

Charles Burney

chapter |6 pages

Robert Burns

chapter |4 pages

Pedro Calderön De La Barca

chapter |3 pages

Richard Cameron

chapter |4 pages

Canaletto

Giovanni Antonio Canal

chapter |4 pages

Guy Carleton

Lord Dorchester

chapter |4 pages

Charles Carroll

chapter |3 pages

Giovanni Giacomo Casanova

chapter |4 pages

Catherine the Great

chapter |4 pages

Henry Cavendish

chapter |6 pages

Miguel de Cervantes

chapter |4 pages

Samuel de Champlain

chapter |4 pages

Jean Siméon Chardin

chapter |4 pages

Charles I

chapter |4 pages

Charles II

chapter |3 pages

Charles III

chapter |3 pages

Charles XII

chapter |4 pages

Samuel Chase

chapter |3 pages

Cheng Ch'Eng-Kung

chapter |4 pages

Ch'ien-Lung

Hung-li

chapter |4 pages

Christina

chapter |4 pages

First Earl of Clarendon

Edward Hyde

chapter |5 pages

George Rogers Clark

chapter |4 pages

Claude Lorrain

chapter |4 pages

Sir Henry Clinton

chapter |4 pages

Robert Clive

chapter |7 pages

Sir Edward Coke

chapter |5 pages

Jean-Baptiste Colbert

chapter |3 pages

The Great Condé

Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé

chapter |3 pages

Marquis de Condorcet

chapter |5 pages

Captain James Cook

chapter |4 pages

John Singleton Copley

chapter |3 pages

Arcangelo Corelli

chapter |4 pages

Pierre Corneille

chapter |4 pages

First Marquess Cornwallis

chapter |3 pages

John Cotton

chapter |4 pages

François Couperin

chapter |4 pages

Oliver Cromwell

chapter |3 pages

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz

Juana Inés de Asbaje y Ramírez de Santillana

chapter |4 pages

Cyrano de Bergerac

chapter |4 pages

William Dampier

chapter |3 pages

Georges Danton

chapter |3 pages

Abraham Darby

chapter |4 pages

Daniel Defoe

chapter |5 pages

René Descartes

chapter |4 pages

John Dickinson

chapter |4 pages

Denis Diderot

chapter |5 pages

John Donne

chapter |3 pages

Dorgon

chapter |4 pages

John Dryden

chapter |4 pages

Jonathan Edwards

chapter |3 pages

Elijah Ben Solomon

chapter |4 pages

John Eliot

chapter |4 pages

First Baron Erskine

chapter |3 pages

Leonhard Euler

chapter |4 pages

Third Baron Fairfax

chapter |4 pages

Ferdinand II

chapter |4 pages

Adam Ferguson

chapter |4 pages

Pierre de Fermat

chapter |3 pages

Nicholas Ferrar

chapter |4 pages

Johann Gottlieb Fichte

chapter |4 pages

Henry Fielding

chapter |3 pages

John Fitch

chapter |5 pages

Charles James Fox

chapter |4 pages

George Fox

chapter |4 pages

Jean-Honoré Fragonard

chapter |5 pages

Benjamin Franklin

chapter |3 pages

Frederick I

chapter |4 pages

Frederick Henry

chapter |4 pages

Frederick the Great

chapter |4 pages

Thomas Gage

chapter |4 pages

Thomas Gainsborough

chapter |4 pages

Galileo

chapter |4 pages

Luigi Galvani

chapter |4 pages

David Garrick

chapter |4 pages

George I

chapter |4 pages

George II

chapter |6 pages

George III

chapter |4 pages

Edward Gibbon

chapter |3 pages

Christoph Gluck

chapter |3 pages

First Earl of Godolphin

chapter |5 pages

William Godwin

chapter |4 pages

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

chapter |5 pages

Oliver Goldsmith

chapter |5 pages

Francisco De Goya

chapter |5 pages

Nathanael Greene

chapter |4 pages

Hugo Grotius

chapter |3 pages

Guarino Guarini

chapter |3 pages

Otto Von Guericke

chapter |4 pages

Gustavus II Adolphus

chapter |3 pages

Samuel Hahnemann

chapter |4 pages

Matthew Hale

chapter |4 pages

Edmond Halley

chapter |4 pages

Frans Hals

chapter |5 pages

Alexander Hamilton

chapter |6 pages

John Hancock

chapter |4 pages

George Frideric Handel

chapter |3 pages

James Hargreaves

chapter |5 pages

William Harvey

chapter |4 pages

Warren Hastings

chapter |4 pages

Nicholas Hawksmoor

chapter |5 pages

Franz Joseph Haydn

chapter |3 pages

Piet Hein

chapter |4 pages

Patrick Henry

chapter |3 pages

Johann Gottfried Herder

chapter |3 pages

James Jerome Hill

chapter |6 pages

Thomas Hobbes

chapter |4 pages

William Hogarth

chapter |4 pages

Admiral Richard Howe

chapter |4 pages

General William Howe

chapter |3 pages

Henry Hudson

chapter |4 pages

David Hume

chapter |4 pages

Anne Hutchinson

chapter |4 pages

Thomas Hutchinson

chapter |4 pages

Christiaan Huygens

chapter |4 pages

James I

chapter |4 pages

James II

chapter |4 pages

Cornelius Otto Jansen

chapter |5 pages

John Jay

chapter |5 pages

Thomas Jefferson

chapter |4 pages

Edward Jenner

chapter |3 pages

John III Sobieski

chapter |4 pages

Samuel Johnson

chapter |3 pages

Louis Jolliet

chapter |3 pages

Inigo Jones

chapter |6 pages

John Paul Jones

chapter |6 pages

Ben Jonson

chapter |4 pages

Joseph II

chapter |3 pages

Engelbert Kämpfer

chapter |4 pages

K'ang-hsi

chapter |4 pages

Immanuel Kant

chapter |4 pages

Angelica Kauffmann

chapter |3 pages

John Kay

chapter |5 pages

Johannes Kepler

chapter |4 pages

William Kidd

chapter |4 pages

Jean De La Fontaine

chapter |4 pages

Joseph-Louis Lagrange

chapter |4 pages

John Lambert

chapter |4 pages

Sieurde La Salle

René-Robert Cavelier

chapter |4 pages

William Laud

chapter |4 pages

François Laval

chapter |3 pages

Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier

chapter |5 pages

Sir Thomas Lawrence

chapter |4 pages

Nicolas Leblanc

chapter |4 pages

Ann Lee

chapter |4 pages

First Duke of Leeds

Thomas Osborne

chapter |4 pages

Antoni van Leeuwenhoek

chapter |5 pages

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

chapter |4 pages

André Le Nôtre

chapter |4 pages

Leopold I

chapter |4 pages

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

chapter |4 pages

Linnaeus

Carl von Linné

chapter |4 pages

Hans Lippershey

chapter |6 pages

John Locke

chapter |3 pages

Louis XIII

chapter |5 pages

Louis XIV

chapter |4 pages

Marquis de Louvois

François-Michel le Tellier

chapter |4 pages

Alexander McGillivray

chapter |3 pages

Sir Alexander Mackenzie

chapter |4 pages

Colin Maclaurin

chapter |5 pages

James Madison

chapter |3 pages

Marcello Malpighi

chapter |4 pages

Horace Mann

chapter |3 pages

François Mansart

chapter |3 pages

Jules Hardouin-Mansart

chapter |6 pages

First Earl of Mansfield

William Murray

chapter |4 pages

Jean-Paul Marat

chapter |4 pages

Maria Theresa

chapter |4 pages

Marie-Antoinette

chapter |4 pages

First Duke of Marlborough

John Churchill

chapter |4 pages

George Mason

chapter |4 pages

Massasoit

Ousamequin (Yellow Feather)

chapter |4 pages

Cotton Mather

chapter |4 pages

Increase Mather

chapter |3 pages

Matsuo Bashō

chapter |4 pages

Jules Mazarin

chapter |5 pages

Marin Mersenne

chapter |4 pages

Metacomet

King Philip

chapter |5 pages

John Milton

chapter |3 pages

Comte de Mirabeau

Honoré-Gabriel Riqueti

chapter |5 pages

Molière

Jean-Baptiste Poquelin

chapter |4 pages

George Monck

chapter |5 pages

Gaspard Monge

chapter |3 pages

Duke of Monmouth

chapter |3 pages

Mary Wortley Montagu

chapter |4 pages

Montesquieu

Charles-Louis de Secondat

chapter |5 pages

Claudio Monteverdi

chapter |4 pages

Robert Morris

chapter |5 pages

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

chapter |4 pages

William Murdock

chapter |4 pages

John Nash

chapter |3 pages

Jacques Necker

chapter |3 pages

John Newbery

chapter |3 pages

Thomas Newcomen

chapter |5 pages

Sir Isaac Newton

chapter |4 pages

Nikon

chapter |4 pages

Lord North

chapter |3 pages

Titus Oates

chapter |2 pages

Ogata KŌRin

chapter |5 pages

James Edward Oglethorpe

chapter |4 pages

Duc D'orléans

chapter |3 pages

Axel Oxenstierna

chapter |4 pages

Thomas Paine

chapter |3 pages

Denis Papin

chapter |4 pages

Blaise Pascal

chapter |4 pages

William Paterson

chapter |4 pages

Charles Willson Peale

chapter |4 pages

Henry Pelham

chapter |4 pages

William Penn

chapter |5 pages

Peter the Great

chapter |4 pages

Peter III

chapter |3 pages

Arthur Phillip

chapter |4 pages

Zebulon Montgomery Pike

chapter |4 pages

William Pitt the Elder

First Earl of Chatham

chapter |4 pages

William Pitt the Younger

chapter |4 pages

Pocahontas

chapter |5 pages

Pontiac

chapter |3 pages

Alexander Pope

chapter |4 pages

Nicolas Poussin

chapter |4 pages

Powhatan

chapter |3 pages

Thomas Pride

chapter |4 pages

Joseph Priestley

chapter |4 pages

Samuel Von Pufendorf

chapter |4 pages

Henry Purcell

chapter |3 pages

John Pym

chapter |4 pages

Jean Racine

chapter |4 pages

Jean-Philippe Rameau

chapter |4 pages

Rembrandt

chapter |4 pages

Paul Revere

chapter |5 pages

Sir Joshua Reynolds

chapter |5 pages

Cardinal de Richelieu

Armand-Jean du Plessis

chapter |4 pages

Robespierre

chapter |4 pages

Comte de Rochambeau

chapter |4 pages

George Rodney

chapter |5 pages

John Roebuck

chapter |4 pages

George Romney

chapter |3 pages

Betsy Ross

chapter |4 pages

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

chapter |4 pages

Peter Paul Rubens

chapter |3 pages

Benjamin Rush

chapter |4 pages

Louis de Saint-Just

chapter |4 pages

Santorio Santorio

Sanctorius Sanctorius

chapter |4 pages

Alessandro Scarlatti

chapter |4 pages

Friedrich Schiller

chapter |4 pages

Heinrich Schütz

chapter |3 pages

Samuel Sewall

chapter |4 pages

First Earl of Shaftesbury

Anthony Ashley Cooper

chapter |4 pages

Shah Jahan

chapter |3 pages

Granville Sharp

chapter |3 pages

Daniel Shays

chapter |4 pages

Roger Sherman

chapter |3 pages

ŚIvajī

chapter |4 pages

Adam Smith

chapter |4 pages

John Smith

chapter |3 pages

Sōtatsu

chapter |4 pages

Lazzaro Spallanzani

chapter |4 pages

Baruch Spinoza

chapter |5 pages

Georg Ernst Stahl

chapter |4 pages

Miles Standish

chapter |4 pages

First Earl Stanhope

chapter |4 pages

Antonio Stradivari

chapter |4 pages

First Earl of Strafford

Thomas Wentworth

chapter |5 pages

Gilbert Stuart

chapter |4 pages

Peter Stuyvesant

chapter |3 pages

Emanuel Swedenborg

chapter |5 pages

Jonathan Swift

chapter |3 pages

Thomas Sydenham

chapter |3 pages

Abel Janszoon Tasman

chapter |3 pages

Kateri Tekakwitha

chapter |4 pages

Georg Philipp Telemann

chapter |4 pages

Giovanni Battista Tiepolo

chapter |4 pages

Tokugawaieyasu

Matsudaira Takechiyo

chapter |4 pages

Evangelista Torricelli

chapter |3 pages

Lennart Torstenson

chapter |4 pages

Toussaint-Louverture

chapter |3 pages

Jethro Tull

chapter |3 pages

Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot

chapter |4 pages

Sir John Vanbrugh

chapter |3 pages

George Vancouver

chapter |3 pages

Lope De Vega Carpio

chapter |4 pages

Diego VelÁzquez

chapter |4 pages

Jan Vermeer

chapter |4 pages

Giambattista Vico

chapter |4 pages

Élisabeth VigÉe-Lebrun

chapter |3 pages

Saint Vincent De Paul

chapter |4 pages

Antonio Vivaldi

chapter |5 pages

Alessandro Volta

chapter |4 pages

Voltaire

François-Marie Arouet

chapter |5 pages

Sir Robert Walpole

chapter |4 pages

George Washington

chapter |4 pages

James Watt

chapter |4 pages

Antoine Watteau

chapter |4 pages

Noah Webster

chapter |5 pages

Josiah Wedgwood

chapter |5 pages

John Wesley

chapter |4 pages

Eli Whitney

chapter |4 pages

William Wilberforce

chapter |4 pages

John Wilkes

chapter |4 pages

John Wilkinson

chapter |4 pages

William III

chapter |4 pages

Roger Williams

chapter |5 pages

James Wilson

chapter |3 pages

Johann Joachim Winckelmann

chapter |4 pages

John Winthrop

chapter |4 pages

John Witherspoon

chapter |4 pages

James Wolfe

chapter |5 pages

Mary Wollstonecraft

chapter |4 pages

Sir Christopher Wren

chapter |4 pages

John Peter Zenger

chapter |4 pages

Graf Von Zinzendorf

Nikolaus Ludwig