Carl Linnaeus
1707 – 1778 · 71 years · Uppsala · Europe
Created the unified classification of living things and the two-part naming of species that biologists still use.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 18th century
Portrait: Alexander Roslin · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Voltaire — French Enlightenment writer, 13 years older
- Johann Sebastian Bach — German composer and organist, 22 years older
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe — German poet and thinker, 42 years younger
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart — Austrian composer, 49 years younger
- Isaac Newton — English physicist and mathematician, 64 years older
- Frederick the Great — King of Prussia, 5 years younger
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Mikhail Lomonosov — Russian polymath, 4 years younger
- Catherine the Great — Empress of Russia, 22 years younger
- Peter the Great — first Emperor of Russia, 35 years older
- Leonhard Euler — Swiss mathematician, born the same year
- Elizabeth — empress who founded Moscow University, 2 years younger
- Alexander Suvorov — Russian generalissimo, 23 years younger
Middle East
- Nader Shah — Shah of Iran and conqueror, 19 years older
- Ahmed III — sultan of the 'Tulip Era', 34 years older
- Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab — Islamic religious reformer, 4 years older
- Mustafa III — sultan who lost the war to Catherine II, 10 years younger
- Abdul Hamid I — sultan of the Küçük Kaynarca peace and the loss of Crimea, 18 years younger
- Osman III — sultan who spent 50 years in the 'cage', 8 years older
Africa
- Usman dan Fodio — founder of the Sokoto Caliphate, 47 years younger
- Moulay Ismail — Sultan of Morocco, 62 years older
- Osei Tutu I — founder of the Ashanti Empire, 47 years older
Asia
- Kangxi Emperor — Qing emperor of China, 53 years older
- Qianlong Emperor — Qing emperor of China, 4 years younger
- Tokugawa Yoshimune — reforming shogun who allowed Western books, 23 years older
- Tipu Sultan — ruler of Mysore, 44 years younger
- Katsushika Hokusai — Japanese artist, 53 years younger
- Tokugawa Ieshige — ailing shogun whose speech only one courtier understood, 5 years younger
Americas
- Benjamin Franklin — American scientist and statesman, 1 year older
- George Washington — first President of the United States, 25 years younger
- Túpac Amaru II — leader of an Andean uprising, 31 years younger
- Thomas Jefferson — third President of the United States, 36 years younger
- Toussaint Louverture — leader of the Haitian Revolution, 36 years younger
- Andrew Jackson — 7th US president, the Trail of Tears and the Jacksonian era, 60 years younger
Oceania
- James Cook — British navigator, 21 years younger
- Tupaia — Tahitian navigator and priest, 18 years younger
- Kamehameha I — first King of Hawaii, 51 years younger
- Arthur Phillip — first Governor of New South Wales, 31 years younger
- Bennelong — Aboriginal intermediary, 57 years younger
The world in their lifetime
- 1709 Battle of Poltava — aged 2, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1721 Proclamation of the Russian Empire — aged 14, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1747 Ahmad Shah Durrani founds the Afghan state — aged 40, Middle East
- 1755 Lisbon earthquake — aged 48, Europe
- 1756–1763 Seven Years' War — aged 49, Europe
- 1757 Battle of Plassey — aged 50, Asia
- c. 1760 Start of the Industrial Revolution — aged 53, Europe
- 1762 Accession of Catherine the Great — aged 55, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1764 Founding of the Hermitage — aged 57, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1768–1771 Cook's first voyage — aged 61, Oceania
- c. 1768 Extinction of Steller's sea cow — aged 61, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1769 Watt's steam engine — aged 62, Europe
- 1772–1795 Partitions of Poland — aged 65, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1776 US Declaration of Independence — aged 69, Americas