William of Ockham
c. 1287 – 1347 · 60 years · Oxford · Europe
Philosophy: Nominalism, Scholasticism
The leading nominalist: universals exist only in the mind and in words, not as things in themselves. His rule against multiplying entities beyond necessity became known as Ockham's razor.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 14th century
Portrait: self-created (Moscarlop) · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Dante Alighieri — poet, author of the Divine Comedy, 22 years older
- Edward III — king who began the Hundred Years' War and won at Crécy, 25 years younger
- Charles IV — emperor who made Prague an imperial capital and issued the Golden Bull, 29 years younger
- Philip IV the Fair — king who destroyed the Knights Templar, 19 years older
- Edward I Longshanks — conqueror of Wales, called the Hammer of the Scots, 48 years older
- Louis the Bavarian — emperor excommunicated by the pope and crowned in Rome without him, 5 years older
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Ivan Kalita — prince who began the gathering of Russian lands around Moscow, 1 year younger
- Sergius of Radonezh — saint and abbot, 27 years younger
- Yury of Moscow — first Moscow prince to become grand prince of Vladimir, 6 years older
- Simeon the Proud — grand prince "of all Rus" who died of the plague, 29 years younger
- Ivan II the Fair — grand prince of Moscow, father of Dmitry Donskoy, 39 years younger
- Daniel of Moscow — first prince of Moscow, founder of the Moscow line of the Rurikids, 26 years older
Middle East
Africa
- Mansa Musa — ruler of the Mali Empire, 7 years older
- Ibn Battuta — traveller, 17 years younger
- Ibn Khaldun — historian and thinker, 45 years younger
Asia
- Marco Polo — Venetian traveller, 33 years older
- Timur — emir and conqueror, 49 years younger
- Emperor Go-Daigo — emperor who overthrew the Kamakura shogunate, 1 year younger
- Ashikaga Takauji — founder of the Muromachi shogunate who turned on Go-Daigo, 18 years younger
- Gajah Mada — prime minister of Majapahit, 3 years younger
- Ashikaga Yoshiakira — second Ashikaga shogun, who held Kyoto against the Southern Court, 43 years younger
The world in their lifetime
- 1293 Founding of Majapahit — aged 6, Asia
- c. 1300 Onset of the Little Ice Age — aged 13, Europe
- 1309–1377 Avignon Papacy — aged 22, Europe
- 1315–1317 Great Famine — aged 28, Europe
- 1324 Hajj of Mansa Musa — aged 37, Africa
- c. 1325 Founding of Tenochtitlan — aged 38, Americas
- c. 1327 The Djinguereber Mosque in Timbuktu — aged 40, Africa
- 1337–1453 Hundred Years' War — aged 50, Europe
- c. 1337 Sergius of Radonezh founds his monastery — aged 50, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1347–1351 Black Death — aged 60, Europe