PEOPLE KNOWN FOR: reform
emperor of France
Napoleon I was a French general, first consul (1799–1804), and emperor of the French (1804–1814/15), one of the most celebrated personages in the history of the West. He revolutionized military organization...
3rd president of the United States
Thomas Jefferson was the draftsman of the Declaration of Independence of the United States and the nation’s first secretary of state (1789–94) and second vice president (1797–1801) and, as the third president...
English statesman
Oliver Cromwell was an English soldier and statesman, who led parliamentary forces in the English Civil Wars and was lord protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1653–58) during the republican Commonwealth....
king of Prussia
Frederick II was the king of Prussia (1740–86), a brilliant military campaigner who, in a series of diplomatic stratagems and wars against Austria and other powers, greatly enlarged Prussia’s territories...
German chancellor and prime minister
Otto von Bismarck was the prime minister of Prussia (1862–73, 1873–90) and founder and first chancellor (1871–90) of the German Empire. Once the empire was established, he actively and skillfully pursued...
emperor of Russia
Peter I was the tsar of Russia who reigned jointly with his half-brother Ivan V (1682–96) and alone thereafter (1696–1725) and who in 1721 was proclaimed emperor (imperator). He was one of his country’s...
president of Turkey
Kemal Atatürk was a soldier, statesman, and reformer who was the founder and first president (1923–38) of the Republic of Turkey. He modernized the country’s legal and educational systems and encouraged...
pope
St. Gregory the Great ; Western feast day, September 3 [formerly March 12, still observed in the East]) was the pope from 590 to 604, a reformer and excellent administrator, “founder” of the medieval papacy,...
Byzantine emperor
Justinian I was a Byzantine emperor (527–565), noted for his administrative reorganization of the imperial government and for his sponsorship of a codification of laws known as the Code of Justinian (Codex...
king of Sweden
Gustavus Adolphus was the king of Sweden (1611–32) who laid the foundations of the modern Swedish state and made it a major European power. Gustavus was the eldest son of Charles IX and his second wife,...
prime minister of United Kingdom
William Pitt, the Younger was a British prime minister (1783–1801, 1804–06) during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. He had considerable influence in strengthening the office of the prime minister....
emperor of France
Napoleon III was the nephew of Napoleon I, president of the Second Republic of France (1850–52), and then emperor of the French (1852–70). He gave his country two decades of prosperity under a stable,...
pope
St. John XXIII ; beatified September 3, 2000; canonized April 27, 2014; feast day October 11) was the pope, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, from 1958 to 1963. He was one of the most popular popes...
prime minister of United Kingdom
David Lloyd George was a British prime minister (1916–22) who dominated the British political scene in the latter part of World War I. He was raised to the peerage in the year of his death. Lloyd George’s...
Athenian statesman
Pericles was an Athenian statesman largely responsible for the full development, in the later 5th century bce, of both the Athenian democracy and the Athenian empire, making Athens the political and cultural...
emperor of Yuan dynasty
Kublai Khan was a Mongolian general and statesman, who was the grandson and greatest successor of Genghis Khan. As the fifth emperor (reigned 1260–94) of the Yuan, or Mongol, dynasty (1206–1368), he completed...
Holy Roman emperor
Frederick II was the king of Sicily (1197–1250), duke of Swabia (as Frederick VI, 1228–35), German king (1212–50), and Holy Roman emperor (1220–50). A Hohenstaufen and grandson of Frederick I Barbarossa,...
emperor of Qing dynasty
Kangxi was the second emperor (reigned 1661–1722) of the Qing (Manchu) dynasty (1644–1911/12). To the Chinese empire he added areas north of the Amur River (Heilong Jiang) and portions of Outer Mongolia,...
emperor of Russia
Alexander I was the emperor of Russia (1801–25), who alternately fought and befriended Napoleon I during the Napoleonic Wars but who ultimately (1813–15) helped form the coalition that defeated the emperor...
empress of Russia
Catherine the Great was a German-born empress of Russia (1762–96) who led her country into full participation in the political and cultural life of Europe, carrying on the work begun by Peter the Great....
king of England
Henry II was the duke of Normandy (from 1150), count of Anjou (from 1151), duke of Aquitaine (from 1152), and king of England (from 1154), who greatly expanded his Anglo-French domains and strengthened...
Roman emperor
Diocletian was a Roman emperor (284–305 ce) who restored efficient government to the empire after the near anarchy of the 3rd century. His reorganization of the fiscal, administrative, and military machinery...
prime minister of United Kingdom
William Ewart Gladstone was a statesman and four-time prime minister of Great Britain (1868–74, 1880–85, 1886, 1892–94). Gladstone was of purely Scottish descent. His father, John, made himself a merchant...
Roman emperor
Theodosius I was a Roman emperor of the East (379–392) and then sole emperor of both East and West (392–395), who, in vigorous suppression of paganism and Arianism, established the creed of the Council...
Italian saint
St. Francis of Assisi ; canonized July 16, 1228; feast day October 4) was the founder of the Franciscan orders of the Friars Minor (Ordo Fratrum Minorum), the women’s Order of St. Clare (the Poor Clares;...
prime minister of United Kingdom
Benjamin Disraeli was a British statesman and novelist who was twice prime minister (1868, 1874–80) and who provided the Conservative Party with a twofold policy of Tory democracy and imperialism. Disraeli...
Roman emperor
Vespasian was a Roman emperor (ad 69–79) who, though of humble birth, became the founder of the Flavian dynasty after the civil wars that followed Nero’s death in 68. His fiscal reforms and consolidation...
British politician
Charles James Fox was Britain’s first foreign secretary (1782, 1783, 1806), a famous champion of liberty, whose career, on the face of it, was nevertheless one of almost unrelieved failure. He conducted...
president of Yugoslavia
Josip Broz Tito was a Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman. He was secretary-general (later president) of the Communist Party (League of Communists) of Yugoslavia (1939–80), supreme commander of the Yugoslav...
political leader of Cuba
Fidel Castro was the political leader of Cuba (1959–2008) who transformed his country into the first communist state in the Western Hemisphere. Castro became a symbol of communist revolution in Latin America....
emperor of Russia
Alexander II was the emperor of Russia (1855–81). His liberal education and distress at the outcome of the Crimean War, which had demonstrated Russia’s backwardness, inspired him toward a great program...
United States senator
John McCain was a U.S. senator who was the Republican Party’s nominee for president in 2008 but was defeated by Barack Obama. McCain represented Arizona in the U.S. House of Representatives (1983–87) before...
Roman tribune
Gaius Gracchus was a Roman tribune (123–122 bce), who reenacted the agrarian reforms of his brother, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, and who proposed other measures to lessen the power of the senatorial...
German general [1800–1891]
Helmuth von Moltke was the chief of the Prussian and German General Staff (1858–88) and the architect of the victories over Denmark (1864), Austria (1866), and France (1871). Moltke’s father, a man of...
elector of Brandenburg
Frederick William was the elector of Brandenburg (1640–88), who restored the Hohenzollern dominions after the devastations of the Thirty Years’ War—centralizing the political administration, reorganizing...
Italian preacher
Girolamo Savonarola was an Italian Christian preacher, reformer, and martyr, renowned for his clash with tyrannical rulers and corrupt clergy. After the overthrow of the Medici in 1494, Savonarola was...
French statesman
Jean-Baptiste Colbert was a French statesman who served as comptroller general of finance (1665–83) and secretary of state for the navy (1668–83) under King Louis XIV of France. He carried out the program...
British colonial administrator
Robert Clive was a soldier and the first British administrator of Bengal, who was one of the creators of British power in India. In his first governorship (1755–60) he won the Battle of Plassey and became...
prime minister of Prussia
Karl, Reichsfreiherr vom und zum Stein was a Rhinelander-born Prussian statesman, chief minister of Prussia (1807–08), and personal counselor to the Russian tsar Alexander I (1812–15). He sponsored widespread...
British colonial administrator
Warren Hastings was the first and most famous of the British governors-general of India, who dominated Indian affairs from 1772 to 1785 and was impeached (though acquitted) on his return to England. The...
Mughal emperor
Akbar was the greatest of the Mughal emperors of India. He reigned from 1556 to 1605 and extended Mughal power over most of the Indian subcontinent. In order to preserve the unity of his empire, Akbar...
king of Sweden
Charles XII was the king of Sweden (1697–1718), an absolute monarch who defended his country for 18 years during the Great Northern War and promoted significant domestic reforms. He launched a disastrous...
prime minister of United Kingdom
Robert Peel was a British prime minister (1834–35, 1841–46) and founder of the Conservative Party. Peel was responsible for the repeal (1846) of the Corn Laws that had restricted imports. He was the eldest...
British social reformer
Robert Owen was a Welsh manufacturer turned reformer, one of the most influential early 19th-century advocates of utopian socialism. His New Lanark mills in Lanarkshire, Scotland, with their social and...
president of Soviet Union
Mikhail Gorbachev was a Soviet official, general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) from 1985 to 1991 and president of the Soviet Union in 1990–91. His efforts to democratize his...
Byzantine emperor
Heraclius was an Eastern Roman emperor (610–641) who reorganized and strengthened the imperial administration and the imperial armies but who, nevertheless, lost Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and Byzantine...
Roman emperor
Claudius was a Roman emperor (41–54 ce), who extended Roman rule in North Africa and made Britain a province. The son of Nero Claudius Drusus, a popular and successful Roman general, and the younger Antonia,...
English theologian
John Wycliffe was an English theologian, philosopher, church reformer, and promoter of the first complete translation of the Bible into English. He was one of the forerunners of the Protestant Reformation....
Greek statesman and poet
Solon was an Athenian statesman, known as one of the Seven Wise Men of Greece (the others were Chilon of Sparta, Thales of Miletus, Bias of Priene, Cleobulus of Lindos, Pittacus of Mytilene, and Periander...
Ottoman sultan
Mehmed II was an Ottoman sultan from 1444 to 1446 and from 1451 to 1481. A great military leader, he captured Constantinople and conquered the territories in Anatolia and the Balkans that constituted the...
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