Kösem Sultan
c. 1589 – 1651 · 62 years · Istanbul · Middle East
Wife of Ahmed I and mother of two sultans who for decades effectively governed the Ottoman Empire during the 'Sultanate of Women'.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 17th century
Portrait: Claes Rålamb · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- René Descartes — French philosopher and mathematician, 7 years younger
- Galileo Galilei — Italian physicist and astronomer, 25 years older
- Rembrandt — Dutch painter, 17 years younger
- Miguel de Cervantes — Spanish novelist, 42 years older
- William Shakespeare — English playwright and poet, 25 years older
- Elizabeth I — Queen of England, 56 years older
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Michael I — first tsar of the Romanov dynasty, 7 years younger
- Alexis the Most Quiet — tsar of the 1649 Law Code and the church schism, 40 years younger
- False Dmitry I — pretender who claimed to be Tsarevich Dmitry, 8 years older
- Bohdan Khmelnytsky — Hetman of the Zaporozhian Host, 6 years younger
- Dmitry Pozharsky — prince and militia leader, 11 years older
- Vasily Shuisky — boyar tsar of the Time of Troubles who died in Polish captivity, 37 years older
Middle East
- Abbas the Great — Safavid Shah of Iran, 18 years older
- Murad IV — sultan who retook Baghdad and banned tobacco, 23 years younger
- Evliya Çelebi — Ottoman traveller, 22 years younger
- Mustafa I — mentally unstable sultan enthroned twice, 11 years younger
- Ibrahim the Mad — sultan nicknamed 'the Mad', 26 years younger
- Ahmed I — sultan who built the Blue Mosque, 1 year younger
Africa
- Njinga of Ndongo and Matamba — Queen of Ndongo and Matamba, 6 years older
- Fasilides — Emperor of Ethiopia, 14 years younger
- Ahmed Baba — Timbuktu scholar, 33 years older
- Ahmad al-Mansur — Sultan of Morocco, 40 years older
Asia
- Tokugawa Ieyasu — first Tokugawa shogun, 46 years older
- Akbar the Great — Mughal emperor, 47 years older
- Shah Jahan — Mughal emperor, 3 years younger
- Nur Jahan — Mughal empress, 12 years older
- Tokugawa Iemitsu — shogun who closed Japan to the Europeans, 15 years younger
- Tokugawa Hidetada — second Tokugawa shogun, who locked in the house's grip on the daimyo, 10 years older
Americas
- Samuel de Champlain — French explorer, 22 years older
- Inca Garcilaso de la Vega — chronicler, son of a conquistador and an Inca princess, 50 years older
- Pocahontas — Powhatan chief's daughter, 7 years younger
Oceania
- Abel Tasman — Dutch navigator, 14 years younger
The world in their lifetime
- 1591 Battle of Tondibi and fall of Songhai — aged 2, Africa
- 1592–1598 Imjin War — aged 3, Asia
- 1598–1613 Time of Troubles — aged 9, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1598 Edict of Nantes — aged 9, Europe
- 1600 Battle of Sekigahara — aged 11, Asia
- 1600 Eruption of Huaynaputina — aged 11, Americas
- 1600 East India Company founded — aged 11, Europe
- c. 1605–1694 Quilombo of Palmares — aged 16, Americas
- 1607 Founding of Jamestown — aged 18, Americas
- 1609 Jesuit reductions among the Guaraní — aged 20, Americas
- 1610 Galileo's telescopic discoveries — aged 21, Europe
- 1612 Minin and Pozharsky liberate Moscow — aged 23, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1613 Election of Michael Romanov as Tsar — aged 24, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1618–1648 Thirty Years' War — aged 29, Europe
- 1624–1663 Nzinga becomes Queen of Ndongo — aged 35, Africa
- 1632–1653 Building of the Taj Mahal — aged 43, Asia
- 1644 Fall of the Ming, rise of the Qing — aged 55, Asia
- 1648 Peace of Westphalia — aged 59, Europe
- 1649 Execution of Charles I of England — aged 60, Europe