Pythagoras<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pericles<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Herodotus<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Paul the Apostle<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Plutarch<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Marcus Aurelius<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Faxian (337 CE \u2013 c. 422 CE) travelling monk \u2013 was a Chinese Buddhist monk and translator who traveled by foot from China to India, visiting sacred Buddhist sites in Central, South and Southeast Asia between 399 and 412 to acquire Buddhist texts. He described his journey in his travelogue, A Record of Buddhist Kingdoms (Foguo Ji \u4f5b\u570b\u8a18).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Al-Khwarizmi (c.\u2009780 \u2013 c.\u2009850)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ibn Sina \/ Avicenna (980-1037) \u2013 persian polymath, wrote The Book of Healing, also influenced by Aristotle<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ibn Rushd<\/strong> (aka Averroes)’ wrote his extensive commentaries on Aristotle because his Caliph Abu Yaqub was curious to understand Aristotle, but found them difficult to understand<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ibn Rushd<\/strong>‘s Aristotle commentaries were translated into Latin and Hebrew (by who?), and these translations “reawakened western European interest in Greek thinkers”, which is surely upstream of the “Renaissance”? Disproportionately all because of a curious Caliph<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the 1200s we had Fibonacci, Aquinas, Osman I, William Wallace, and the tail end of Genghis Khan. As the century rep I’ma go with MARCO POLO, described by some as “a medieval Herodotus”. Mainly I like that his story evocatively spans the Silk Road. he was born in Venice in 1254 he died also in Venice in 1324, aged 69 his father and uncle (Niccolo & Maffeo) were travelling merchants before he was born, they lived a few years in Constantinople, then Crimea, Bukhara\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n the backstory of Niccolo & Maffeo is actually really interesting. They left Venice when Marco was an infant. They narrowly escaped Byzantine conquest, which would have likely resulted in them being killed. Avoided political unrest in Crimea. They were invited to meet Kublai Khan<\/p>\n\n\n\n this whole voyage took about 16 years. When they returned to Venice, yung Marco was living with an aunt, because his mum had recently died. Also, Pope Clement IV had died, and it took 3 years to elect another Pope (Gregory X, above) complicating Kublai\u2019s request.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So the Polo brothers and Marco (17yo) set out on their second voyage. They were initially accompanied by two Dominican friars who \u201cdid not complete the voyage due to fear\u201d. They spent 17 years in Kublai\u2019s China. Wiki doesn\u2019t say much else about the brothers after that<\/p>\n\n\n\n so back to Marco. Kublai Khan was impressed by his manners and storytelling etc and appointed him as a foreign emissary, which must\u2019ve been quite a flex for a Khan, to have some Venetian dude running your errands. Diplomatic missions to Southeast Asia\u2026 came pretty close to SG!<\/p>\n\n\n\n so all 3 Polos returned to Venice. Kublai wanted to keep them, but as he grew old he sent them on a final quest to accompany a Mongol princess to Persia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When they returned, Venice was at war with Genoa. Marco supported the war efforts and was imprisoned for it by the Genovese- and it was in prison that he dictated a detailed account of his travels to a cellmate, Rustichello, who happened to be a writer! What luck!!<\/p>\n\n\n\n After release from prison a few years later, the rest of Marco\u2019s life seems to resolve happily. Family wealthy from trading, married, had 3 daughters, grew old, died in bed of some illness. Interestingly there is no single authoritative copy of his travels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the 1300s we had Petrarch, Chaucer. Mansa Musa showing off his wealth. Tamerlane murdering mfs across the steppes. The Black Death murdering mfs across Europe. To rep the century tho I’ma pick DANTE ALIGHIERI.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dante was born in Florence his mother died when he was 9 father (was probably a moneylender) remarried Dante fell in love with a girl (Beatrice) when he was 9, but was promised to another (Gemma), who he married and had 4 kids with. Beatrice features in his work, Gemma doesn’t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dante’s Divine Comedy is widely regarded the greatest literary work in the Italian language, which he kind of pioneered. You could think maybe of him as the “Italian Shakespeare”, which is a comparison Italian speakers might be offended by \u2013 perhaps they think of Shakespeare as the “English Dante”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here\u2019s Friedrich Engels praising Dante when trying to appeal to Italians to make communism happen: “Dante was both the last poet of the Middle Ages and the first poet of modern times. Today, as in 1300, a new era is approaching. Will Italy give us the new Dante, who will mark the hour of birth of this new, proletarian era?” – 1893, preface to Italian edition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dante’s depictions of Hell, Purgatory and Heaven provided inspiration for the larger body of Western art and literature. He influenced Chaucer, Milton, Tennyson and others. In Italy he is often referred to as il Sommo Poeta (“the Supreme Poet”).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dante was exiled from Florence, the city of his birth, and it seems that city officials only formally apologized in 2008, almost 700 years later. There was a symbolic re-trial in 2021, and they had to do it via Zoom because of Covid \ud83d\ude02\ud83d\ude05<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s tempting to pick Da Vinci, but he’s sort of the obvious choice (like Shakespeare might be for 1500s for many). I’ma go with DESIDERIUS ERASMUS. honorable mentions to gutenberg, jeanne d’arc, copernicus… martin luther kind of on the tail end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m shocked at how recently I learned about Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (1466-1536), who according to Wikipedia is considered one of the greatest scholars of the northern Renaissance. He corresponded with literally hundreds of people in the 1500s. He was born out of wedlock in Rotterdam, Netherlands. Both of his parents died in a plague.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He became a catholic priest like his father, studied at monastic schools, was possibly gay, was offered the post of secretary to a Bishop on account of his skill in Latin and his reputation as a man of letters\u2026 studied at the university of Paris, taught at Oxford\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n he urged internal reform of the Catholic Church, was good friends with Thomas More (Utopia), was lauded as \u201cPrince of the Humanists\u201d, famously argued with Martin Luther on the subject of free will, travelled widely across Europe, and died of dysentery at 69.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The man wrote thousands<\/em> of letters, getting replies from Pope Adrian VI, Pope Leo X, Henry VIII\u2026 a bastard child who was orphaned at 17!<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cDespite a chronic shortage of money, he succeeded in learning Greek by an intensive day-and-night study of three years, continuously begging in letters that his friends send him books and money for teachers.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Erasmus and Da Vinci were alive at the same time (Leo X was, after all, a Medici, the second son of Lorenzo the Magnificent), but it doesn\u2019t look like they corresponded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stefan Zweig wrote quite a moving biography of him: Erasmus of Rotterdam, 1934.<\/p>\n\n\n\n 1500s gotta be MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE. honorable mentions for akbar, shakespeare, galileo, suleiman, cervantes, kepler<\/p>\n\n\n\n Michel de Montaigne was born in Ch\u00e2teau de Montaigne, Saint-Michel-de-Montaigne, and he died in Ch\u00e2teau de Montaigne, Saint-Michel-de-Montaigne. Damn… this guy was rich, huh<\/p>\n\n\n\n during his lifetime he was “admired more as a statesman than an author”, and people thought he was a self-indulgent digresser. At age 38 he went into isolation for almost 10 years to get his writing done. couple of years after he came out of his decade of self-imposed isolation and social distancing… new plague just dropped\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n he died of quinsy \u2013 first i’m hearing of this, it’s peritonsillar abcess… basically a bad mouth infection. yikes. for all his wealth, he didn’t have access to antibiotics. these days you don’t even need hospital admission for this. you just need Alexander Fleming, born 1881<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMontaigne believed that, to learn truly, a student had to take the information and make it their own\u201d \u2013 my man michel figured out the problem with traditional schooling almost 500 years ago and we still here indoctrinating kids<\/p>\n\n\n\n he influenced Pascal, Emerson (“so sincerely it spoke to my thought and experience”), Nietzche (“That such a man wrote has truly augmented the joy of living on this earth”), Eric Hoffer. Some scholars suggest that Montaigne even influenced Shakespeare<\/p>\n\n\n\n He prefaced his essays with: “I am myself the matter of this book; you would be unreasonable to suspend your leisure on so frivolous and vain a subject.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOff I go, rummaging about in books for sayings which please me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n “If my humors happen to please some worthy man… he will try to meet me. I give him a big advantage… for all (the) long acquaintance and familarity could have gained for him in several years, he can see in 3 days in this record, and more exactly.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ada Palmer: “achieving the highest honors, but preferring life alone in his library, and frequently retiring to do just that, only to be dragged back into politics actually by popular demand…” “it must have been as difficult as it was wonderful to be Montaigne”<\/p>\n\n\n\n1200s: Marco Polo<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
1300s: Dante Alighieri<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
1400s: Desiderius Erasmus<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
1500s: Michel de Montaigne<\/h2>\n\n\n\n