Abdulmejid I
1823 – 1861 · 38 years · Istanbul · Middle East
Reign: 1839 – 1861 (Ottoman Empire)
The Edict of Gülhane (1839) opened the Tanzimat era, proclaiming equality of subjects before the law. He fought Russia in the Crimean War alongside Britain and France and built Dolmabahçe Palace.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 19th century
Portrait: Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Charles Darwin — naturalist, author of evolutionary theory, 14 years older
- Karl Marx — philosopher and economist, 5 years older
- Queen Victoria — Queen of the United Kingdom, 4 years older
- Victor Hugo — novelist and poet, 21 years older
- Napoleon III — last French monarch, who surrendered to Prussia at Sedan, 15 years older
- Charles Dickens — novelist, 11 years older
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Fyodor Dostoevsky — novelist, 2 years older
- Leo Tolstoy — novelist, 5 years younger
- Dmitri Mendeleev — chemist, creator of the periodic table, 11 years younger
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky — composer, 17 years younger
- Alexander Pushkin — Russian poet, 24 years older
- Alexander II of Russia — Emperor of Russia, 5 years older
Middle East
- Abdul Hamid II — the 'Red Sultan' who dissolved the first parliament, 19 years younger
- Mahmud II — sultan who destroyed the Janissaries, 38 years older
- Abdulaziz — first sultan to visit Western Europe, 7 years younger
- Mehmed V Reşad — sultan under whom the empire entered World War I, 21 years younger
Africa
- David Livingstone — explorer of Africa and missionary, 10 years older
- Muhammad Ali of Egypt — ruler of Egypt, 54 years older
- Menelik II — Emperor of Ethiopia, 21 years younger
- Ranavalona I — Queen of Madagascar, 45 years older
- Moshoeshoe I — founder of Lesotho, 37 years older
- Samori Ture — founder of the Wassoulou Empire, 5 years younger
Asia
- Katsushika Hokusai — Japanese artist, 63 years older
- Tokugawa Yoshinobu — last shogun, who handed power back to the emperor, 14 years younger
- Tokugawa Ienari — longest-serving shogun, for half a century, 50 years older
- Tokugawa Iesada — shogun under whom Japan opened its ports to the West, 1 year younger
- Tokugawa Ieyoshi — shogun who died just after the Black Ships arrived, 30 years older
- Empress Dowager Cixi — Empress Dowager of China, 12 years younger
Americas
- Abraham Lincoln — 16th President of the United States, 14 years older
- Thomas Edison — inventor and businessman, 24 years younger
- Benito Juárez — President of Mexico, 17 years older
- Ulysses S. Grant — 18th US president, commanding general of the Union Army, 1 year older
- José de San Martín — liberator of Argentina, Chile and Peru, 45 years older
- Mark Twain — writer and humorist, 12 years younger
Oceania
- Truganini — Aboriginal Tasmanian woman, 11 years older
- Henry Parkes — Premier of New South Wales, 'Father of Federation', 8 years older
- Liliʻuokalani — Queen of Hawaii, 15 years younger
- Kate Sheppard — suffragist, 24 years younger
The world in their lifetime
- 1828 Treaty of Turkmenchay — aged 5, Middle East
- c. 1831 Hokusai's Great Wave off Kanagawa — aged 8, Asia
- 1833 Abolition of slavery in the British Empire — aged 10, Europe
- c. 1835–1846 The Great Trek — aged 12, Africa
- 1835 Darwin in the Galápagos — aged 12, Americas
- 1838–1839 Trail of Tears — aged 15, Americas
- 1839–1842 First Opium War — aged 16, Asia
- 1839 Birth of photography: the daguerreotype — aged 16, Europe
- 1839 The Edict of Gülhane opens the Tanzimat — aged 16, Middle East
- 1839–1842 First Anglo-Afghan War — aged 16, Middle East
- 1845–1852 Great Famine in Ireland — aged 22, Europe
- 1846 First public demonstration of ether anaesthesia — aged 23, Americas
- 1846–1848 Mexican–American War — aged 23, Americas
- 1847 Liberia declares independence — aged 24, Africa
- 1848–1849 Revolutions of 1848 — aged 25, Europe
- 1848 The Communist Manifesto — aged 25, Europe
- 1851 The Australian gold rushes — aged 28, Oceania
- 1853–1854 Commodore Perry's Black Ships — aged 30, Asia
- 1853–1856 Crimean War — aged 30, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1859 Darwin's On the Origin of Species — aged 36, Europe
- 1861 Unification of Italy — aged 38, Europe
- 1861 Emancipation of the serfs in Russia — aged 38, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1861–1865 American Civil War — aged 38, Americas