Mahmud II
1785 – 1839 · 54 years · Istanbul · Middle East
Reign: 1808 – 1839 (Ottoman Empire)
In 1826 he destroyed the Janissary corps and began building a European-style army, introducing the fez and ministries. Under him Greece won independence and Muhammad Ali of Egypt defeated the sultan's armies.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 19th century
Portrait: Henry Guillaume Schlesinger · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe — German poet and thinker, 36 years older
- Ludwig van Beethoven — German composer, 15 years older
- Napoleon Bonaparte — Emperor of the French, 16 years older
- Charles Darwin — naturalist, author of evolutionary theory, 24 years younger
- Karl Marx — philosopher and economist, 33 years younger
- Queen Victoria — Queen of the United Kingdom, 34 years younger
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Alexander Pushkin — Russian poet, 14 years younger
- Fyodor Dostoevsky — novelist, 36 years younger
- Catherine the Great — Empress of Russia, 56 years older
- Leo Tolstoy — novelist, 43 years younger
- Nicholas I — emperor who crushed the Decembrist revolt, 11 years younger
- Alexander I — emperor who defeated Napoleon, 8 years older
Middle East
- Abdulmejid I — sultan of the Tanzimat reforms, 38 years younger
- Selim III — reforming Ottoman sultan, 24 years older
- Mustafa IV — sultan who overthrew the reformer Selim III, 6 years older
Africa
- Muhammad Ali of Egypt — ruler of Egypt, 16 years older
- Shaka — King of the Zulu, 2 years younger
- David Livingstone — explorer of Africa and missionary, 28 years younger
- Ranavalona I — Queen of Madagascar, 7 years older
- Moshoeshoe I — founder of Lesotho, 1 year younger
- Usman dan Fodio — founder of the Sokoto Caliphate, 31 years older
Asia
- Katsushika Hokusai — Japanese artist, 25 years older
- Tokugawa Ienari — longest-serving shogun, for half a century, 12 years older
- Qianlong Emperor — Qing emperor of China, 74 years older
- Tipu Sultan — ruler of Mysore, 34 years older
- Tokugawa Ieyoshi — shogun who died just after the Black Ships arrived, 8 years younger
- Tokugawa Iesada — shogun under whom Japan opened its ports to the West, 39 years younger
Americas
- Simón Bolívar — liberator of South America, 2 years older
- Abraham Lincoln — 16th President of the United States, 24 years younger
- George Washington — first President of the United States, 53 years older
- Andrew Jackson — 7th US president, the Trail of Tears and the Jacksonian era, 18 years older
- José de San Martín — liberator of Argentina, Chile and Peru, 7 years older
- Thomas Jefferson — third President of the United States, 42 years older
Oceania
- Kamehameha I — first King of Hawaii, 27 years older
- Hongi Hika — Ngāpuhi Māori chief, 13 years older
- Arthur Phillip — first Governor of New South Wales, 47 years older
- Bennelong — Aboriginal intermediary, 21 years older
- Truganini — Aboriginal Tasmanian woman, 27 years younger
- Henry Parkes — Premier of New South Wales, 'Father of Federation', 30 years younger
The world in their lifetime
- 1787 US Constitution — aged 2, Americas
- 1788 First Fleet arrives in Australia — aged 3, Oceania
- 1789 Storming of the Bastille — aged 4, Europe
- 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen — aged 4, Europe
- 1791–1804 Haitian Revolution — aged 6, Americas
- 1796 Jenner's first vaccination — aged 11, Europe
- 1798 Battle of the Pyramids — aged 13, Africa
- 1803 Louisiana Purchase — aged 18, Americas
- 1804 Coronation of Napoleon — aged 19, Europe
- 1804–1813 First Serbian Uprising — aged 19, Europe
- 1804–1903 Usman dan Fodio's jihad and the Sokoto Caliphate — aged 19, Africa
- 1805–1848 Muhammad Ali becomes ruler of Egypt — aged 20, Africa
- 1805 Battle of Trafalgar — aged 20, Europe
- 1810–1826 Spanish American wars of independence — aged 25, Americas
- 1812 Napoleon's invasion of Russia — aged 27, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1814–1815 Congress of Vienna — aged 29, Europe
- 1815 Eruption of Mount Tambora — aged 30, Asia
- 1815 Battle of Waterloo — aged 30, Europe
- 1816 Year Without a Summer — aged 31, Europe
- 1817–1824 First cholera pandemic — aged 32, Asia
- 1817 San Martín's Crossing of the Andes — aged 32, Americas
- 1819 Raffles founds modern Singapore — aged 34, Asia
- 1822 Independence of Brazil — aged 37, Americas
- 1828 Treaty of Turkmenchay — aged 43, Middle East
- c. 1831 Hokusai's Great Wave off Kanagawa — aged 46, Asia
- 1833 Abolition of slavery in the British Empire — aged 48, Europe
- c. 1835–1846 The Great Trek — aged 50, Africa
- 1835 Darwin in the Galápagos — aged 50, Americas
- 1838–1839 Trail of Tears — aged 53, Americas
- 1839–1842 First Opium War — aged 54, Asia
- 1839 Birth of photography: the daguerreotype — aged 54, Europe
- 1839 The Edict of Gülhane opens the Tanzimat — aged 54, Middle East
- 1839–1842 First Anglo-Afghan War — aged 54, Middle East