216,588 profiles ranked

← 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. 1Zhu Xi1130-1200 · 12th century · China · Writers870
  2. 2Li Hongzhang1823-1901 · 19th century · China · Politicians149
  3. 3Zhang Zhidong1837-1909 · 19th century · Politicians86
  4. 4Zuo Zongtang1812-1885 · 19th century · China · Politicians43
  5. 5Ban Gu32-92 · 1st century · Writers40
  6. 6Ge Hong284-364 · 4th century · Academics40
  7. 7Chen Shou233-297 · 3rd century · Writers14
  8. 8Mao Zedong1893-1976 · 20th century · China · Politicians12
  9. 9Lu Xun1881-1936 · 20th century · China · Writers11

Lived then

The most notable people whose working lives fell in the 19th century, ranked where coverage and readership agree.

  1. 1E. T. A. Hoffmann1776-1822 · Germany · Writers21 decades
  2. 2Heinrich von Kleist1777-1811 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  3. 3Helmuth von Moltke the Elder1800-1891 · Germany · Writers13 decades
  4. 4Gerhart Hauptmann1862-1946 · Germany · Writers13 decades
  5. 5Karl May1842-1912 · Germany · Writers14 decades
  6. 6Novalis1772-1801 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  7. 7Friedrich Hölderlin1770-1843 · Germany · Writers18 decades
  8. 8Theodor Fontane1819-1898 · Germany · Writers17 decades
  9. 9Georg Büchner1813-1837 · Germany · Writers17 decades
  10. 10Theodor Storm1817-1888 · Germany · Writers17 decades
  11. 11Wilhelm Grimm1786-1859 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  12. 12Leopold von Ranke1795-1886 · Germany · Writers16 decades
  13. 13Bettina von Arnim1785-1859 · Germany · Writers18 decades
  14. 14Friedrich Schlegel1772-1829 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  15. 15Wilhelm Hauff1802-1827 · Germany · Writers20 decades
  16. 16Frank Wedekind1864-1918 · Germany · Writers12 decades
  17. 17Clemens Brentano1778-1842 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  18. 18Eduard Mörike1804-1875 · Germany · Writers18 decades
  19. 19Wilhelm Dilthey1833-1911 · Germany · Writers14 decades
  20. 20Ernst Moritz Arndt1769-1860 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  21. 21Elisabeth of Wied1843-1916 · Germany · Writers0 decades
  22. 22Friedrich Rückert1788-1866 · Germany · Writers22 decades
  23. 23Anne Catherine Emmerich1774-1824 · Germany · Writers8 decades
  24. 24Multatuli1820-1887 · Germany · Writers9 decades
  25. 25Philipp Mainländer1841-1876 · Germany · Writers2 decades
Show 75 more

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.