School teaches history in chapters: Egypt, then Greece, then Rome, the Middle Ages, the modern era. It feels as if one thing ended and the next began. In reality everything ran in parallel, and sometimes the overlaps are startling. Here are people and events that shared the same moment, even though they seem to belong to different worlds.
The ancient world is closer than you think
Cleopatra and the iPhone
Cleopatra lived closer in time to the first iPhone than to the building of the Great Pyramid. The pyramid went up around 2560 BC and Cleopatra died in 30 BC — more than two and a half thousand years apart. From Cleopatra to the first iPhone is about two thousand. To Cleopatra, the pyramids were as ancient as she is to us.
Mammoths and the pyramids
When the Great Pyramid of Giza was being built, woolly mammoths still lived on Wrangel Island. The last mammoths survived on Wrangel Island in the Arctic Ocean and died out about 4,000 years ago. So while Egyptians were hauling stone blocks, woolly giants were still roaming at the edge of the world.
It gets better: The last mammoths lived closer in time to the Moon landing than to the paintings of Chauvet Cave.
The Rosetta Stone and us
The Rosetta Stone is closer in time to us than to the Great Pyramid. And the Great Pyramid itself stayed the tallest building on Earth for almost 3,900 years, until the spire of Lincoln Cathedral overtook it.
Pythagoras, the Buddha and Confucius
Pythagoras and Gautama Buddha were contemporaries. Add Confucius: Pythagoras and Confucius were contemporaries too. Around 500 BC, Greece, India and China produced, almost at once, ideas that still shape half the world.
The Middle Ages, but not where you expect
Oxford and the Aztecs
The University of Oxford is older than the Aztec Empire. Teaching at Oxford began around 1096, while Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital, was founded in 1325. When the Spanish took the city in 1521, Oxford dons had been lecturing for four centuries.
Moscow and Mexico City
Moscow and Mexico City began their rise in the same year: in 1325 Ivan Kalita became Prince of Moscow, and the Aztecs, by tradition, founded Tenochtitlan — the future Mexico City — on an island in a lake. Two future megacities on opposite sides of the world began their rise in the same year, knowing nothing of each other.
A Japanese inn and Russia
A Japanese inn is older than Rus. Nishiyama Onsen Keiunkan has been taking guests since 705 — 157 years before the Varangians were invited to rule — and Guinness lists it as the world's oldest hotel. It is still open, run by the same family for more than fifty generations.
Gutenberg and the Korean alphabet
The Korean alphabet and Gutenberg's press are the same age: King Sejong proclaimed Hangul in 1446, and around 1450 Mainz began printing with movable type. Europe worked out how to print books fast, and Korea how to make writing easy for everyone — in the same decade.
The early modern world: neighbours in time
Ivan the Terrible and Shakespeare
Ivan the Terrible and William Shakespeare were contemporaries. What's more, Shakespeare and Galileo were born in the same year, 1564. While Ivan's terror raged in Moscow, the future author of Hamlet was growing up in Stratford.
Harvard, St Petersburg and the USA
Harvard is 67 years older than St Petersburg: the Massachusetts college was founded in 1636, and Peter the Great founded his city on the Neva in 1703. And St Petersburg is older than the United States: the city was founded in 1703, independence was declared in 1776. Catherine the Great saw the USA being born.
Peter the Great and Gagarin
Peter the Great lived closer in time to Gagarin's spaceflight than to the Christianization of Rus. The Christianisation of Rus was in 988 and Peter was born in 1672 — almost seven centuries. From Peter's death to Gagarin's flight is only 236 years.
The 19th and 20th centuries: old meets new
Lincoln and Darwin
Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin were born in the same year. Not just the same year — the same day, 12 February 1809. One would end slavery in the US, the other would change how we see the origin of life.
Dostoevsky and the telephone
When the telephone was invented, Fyodor Dostoevsky was still alive. In fact, the telephone was being demonstrated on the very day Custer died at Little Bighorn: the age of the Indian Wars and the age of the telephone overlapped.
Tolstoy and the aeroplane
When the Wright brothers made the first aeroplane flight, Leo Tolstoy was still alive. What's more, the Crimean War veteran Tolstoy lived to appear on film.
Queen Victoria and Charlie Chaplin
Queen Victoria and Charlie Chaplin were contemporaries. Chaplin was born in 1889 and Victoria reigned until 1901, so young Charlie grew up in Victorian London.
A Lincoln assassination witness on TV
A witness to Lincoln's assassination talked about it on television. A single human life spanned the gap between the shot at Ford's Theatre and a television studio.
China's last emperor and the space age
The last Emperor of China lived to see Gagarin fly. Puyi took the throne in 1908 aged two, abdicated in 1912 and died in 1967 as an ordinary citizen of the People's Republic who had worked as a gardener and an editor. Puyi took the throne in 1908 in a world of emperors and died in a world of satellites and rockets.
Van Gogh and the internet
What about dinosaurs and humans?
No. This is the most common "same time" mix-up. Non-bird dinosaurs died out about 66 million years ago, while modern humans appeared only about 300,000 years ago. The gap between people and dinosaurs is 200 times longer than the whole history of our species.
There is a pair just as good, though: Tyrannosaurus lived closer in time to us than to Stegosaurus. Stegosaurus died out around 150 million years ago and Tyrannosaurus about 66 million years ago. To a T. rex, a Stegosaurus was a deeper antiquity than a T. rex is to us.
How to find overlaps like these yourself
They are hard to spot because history is usually told country by country. The Panchronia globe shows the whole world in a chosen year: move the timeline and see who ruled, what was being built and where wars were fought on every continent at once.
- See the world in the year the Great Pyramid was built
- The world when Shakespeare and Galileo were born
- 1809: the year Lincoln and Darwin were born
More pairs like these are in Time paradoxes, and the Which came first? quiz tests how good your sense of time really is.
Did humans live at the same time as dinosaurs?
No. Dinosaurs (apart from birds) died out about 66 million years ago, and modern humans appeared about 300,000 years ago. The mammals that lived alongside dinosaurs were mostly the size of a rat.
Were mammoths alive when the pyramids were built?
Yes. The Great Pyramid was built around 2560 BC, and the last mammoths lived on Wrangel Island until about 2000 BC. On the mainland, mammoths had died out much earlier, around 10,000 years ago.
Is Cleopatra really closer to the iPhone than to the pyramids?
Yes. More than 2,500 years passed between the Great Pyramid (c. 2560 BC) and Cleopatra's death (30 BC), and about 2,040 years between Cleopatra and the first iPhone (2007).
Which is older, Oxford or the Aztec Empire?
Oxford. Teaching there began around 1096, while Tenochtitlan was founded in 1325 and the Aztec Triple Alliance formed in 1428.