← Fame through time1800-1899
The 19th century
Whose names filled the books of the 19th century - anyone at all, however long dead - counted as mentions per million words printed, so a period that simply published more does not inflate anyone.
Talked about then
Whose names appeared most in Chinese books during the 19th century, whenever they lived.
- 1
Zhu Xi870 - 2
Li Hongzhang149 - 3
Zhang Zhidong86 - 4
Zuo Zongtang43 - 5
Ban Gu40 - 6
Ge Hong40 - 7Chen Shou14
- 8
Mao Zedong12 - 9
Lu Xun11
Lived then
The most notable people whose working lives fell in the 19th century, ranked where coverage and readership agree.
- 1
Wilhelm Busch15 decades - 2
Max Liebermann13 decades - 3
Lovis Corinth11 decades - 4
Carl Spitzweg10 decades - 5
Franz Xaver Winterhalter3 decades - 6
Philipp Otto Runge17 decades - 7
Franz Stuck9 decades - 8
Henry van de Velde7 decades - 9
Alexej von Jawlenskynot measured- - 10
Max Klinger14 decades - 11
Wilhelm von Gloeden3 decades - 12
Hans Thoma14 decades - 13
Rudolf von Alt10 decades - 14
Heinrich Zillenot measured- - 15
Adolf von Hildebrand11 decades - 16
Willy Stöwernot measured- - 17
Princess Mathilde of Saxonynot measured- - 18
Joseph Anton Kochnot measured- - 19
Guglielmo Plüschownot measured- - 20
Adolf Hölzelnot measured- - 21
Lesser Urynot measured- - 22
Carl Röchlingnot measured- - 23
Nicola Perscheidnot measured- - 24Otto Wilhelm Thoménot measured-
- 25
Friedrich August von Kaulbachnot measured-
How to read these rankings
- Attention, not reputation. A place on these lists reflects the attention a person still draws in the public record. It is not a judgement on the life.
- Fame in print. The curves show how often a name appeared in the books of each decade from 1800 to 2019, drawn from the Google Books Ngram corpus.
- Gaps are left as gaps. Where the record is too thin to be fair, we would rather show nothing than guess.