← Fame through time1-99
The 1st century
Whose working lives fell in the 1st 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 1st century, ranked where coverage and readership agree.
- 1
Paul the Apostle18 decades - 2
Neronot measured- - 3
Pliny the Elder22 decades - 4
Tacitusnot measured- - 5
Josephus21 decades - 6
Pliny the Younger22 decades - 7
Juvenalnot measured- - 8
Martialnot measured- - 9
Petroniusnot measured- - 10
Lucan22 decades - 11
Statiusnot measured- - 12
Pomponius Mela22 decades - 13
Dio Chrysostom22 decades - 14
Phaedrus22 decades - 15
Persius22 decades - 16
Ban Zhao2 decades - 17
Marcus Velleius Paterculus0 decades - 18
Sosthenesnot measured- - 19Apionnot measured-
- 20
Ban Gu9 decades - 21Gaius Valerius Flaccus0 decades
- 22Philo of Byblos0 decades
- 23
Xu Shen6 decades - 24
Columella22 decades - 25Ban Biaonot 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.