Claim profile
1000–1 BC

The 1st millennium BC

Whose working lives fell in the 1st millennium BC. 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 millennium BC, ranked where Wikipedia coverage and readership agree.

CountryAll🇮🇹 Italy🇹🇷 Turkey🇨🇳 China🇮🇳 India🇪🇬 Egypt🇫🇷 France🇯🇵 Japan🇪🇸 Spain🇧🇷 Brazil🇩🇪 Germany
FieldAllPoliticiansHistorical FiguresWritersAcademicsModelsArtistsScientistsReligious FiguresDoctorsArchitects
  1. 1VitruviusVitruvius80 BC–15 BC · 🇮🇹 Italy · Architects22 decades
  2. 2VITRUVVITRUV80 BC–15 BC · Architects0 decades
  3. 3Hippodamus of MiletusHippodamus of Miletus498 BC–408 BC · Architects0 decades
  4. 4IctinusIctinusborn 500 BC · Architects17 decades
  5. 5CCallicrates470 BC–420 BC · Architects19 decades
  6. 6SOSostratus of Cnidus300 BC–260 BC · Architects0 decades
  7. 7DinocratesDinocrates400 BC–360 BC · Architects11 decades
  8. 8MMnesikles500 BC–460 BC · Architects0 decades
  9. 9EupalinosEupalinos600 BC–600 BC · Architects0 decades
  10. 10HOHermogenes of Priene240 BC–200 BC · Architects0 decades
  11. 11PhilonPhilon400 BC–360 BC · Architectsnot measured—
  12. 12MetagenesMetagenesborn 550 BC · Architects4 decades
  13. 13LLibon500 BC–500 BC · Architects1 decades
  14. 14HOHermodorus of Salamisborn 200 BC · Architects0 decades
  15. 15Paeonius of EphesusPaeonius of Ephesus420 BC–380 BC · Architects0 decades

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.