1600–1699
The 17th century
Whose working lives fell in the 17th century. Books are measured from 1800 and readers from 2015, so for this period we can say who lived then, not who was talked about then.
Lived then
The most notable people whose working lives fell in the 17th century, ranked where Wikipedia coverage and readership agree.
#PersonIn print, 1800–2019Echoed
- 1
Matthew Henry1662–1714 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors22 decades - 2
Edward Alleyn1566–1626 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors22 decades - 3
John Cotton1585–1652 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors22 decades - 4
Samuel Rutherford1600–1661 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors20 decades - 5
John Lightfoot1602–1675 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors15 decades - 6
Gilbert Sheldon1598–1677 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors11 decades - 7TSThomas Shepard1605–1649 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured—
- 8
William Pynchon1590–1662 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured— - 9
Peter Heylin1599–1662 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actors10 decades - 10
John Davenport1597–1670 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured— - 11
Isaac Penington1616–1679 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured— - 12
Robert South1634–1716 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured— - 13
William Twisse1578–1646 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured— - 14CBChristopher Beeston1579–1638 · 🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Actorsnot measured—
How this is measured
- Placing people in time. Each person belongs to the century in which they were most active — around age 35, and never after their death.
- Who ranks highest. Within a century, people are ranked where two independent signals agree: how many of the world’s Wikipedia language editions cover them, and how many people actually read about them. Article counts alone can be lifted by a person’s own circle; readers cannot.
- Fame in print. The curves count how often a name appears in Google Books from 1800 to 2019, as a share of all the words printed each year, in the person’s own language wherever that corpus exists. Those decades are over, so each measurement is made once and kept.
- What is left out. A lifetime is measured only from 1820, when there is enough print to judge; the five years after a death are skipped as obituaries; and a name shared with someone equally notable is credited to neither.