1700–1799
The 18th century
Whose working lives fell in the 18th 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 18th century, ranked where Wikipedia coverage and readership agree.
#PersonIn print, 1800–2019Echoed
- 1
Giacomo Casanova1725–1798 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writers20 decades - 2
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Carlo Goldoni1707–1793 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writers22 decades - 3
Pietro Metastasio1698–1782 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writers22 decades - 4
Lorenzo Da Ponte1749–1838 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writers19 decades - 5
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Giuseppe Parini1729–1799 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writers22 decades - 6
Egidio Forcellini1688–1768 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writers17 decades - 7
Girolamo Baruffaldi1675–1755 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writersnot measured— - 8
Luigi Bossi Visconti1758–1835 · 🇮🇹 Italy · Writersnot 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.