7 posts
Why was Marie Curie important? Because she changed what scientists thought an atom was, found two new elements with her husband Pierre, and turned a strange new kind of radiation into a tool for medicine. She was also…
Why is Shakespeare still important, more than 400 years after he died? He wrote for a London playhouse, borrowed most of his plots, and left few traces of his private life. Yet his plays are still staged across the world…
Why was Isaac Newton so important? Because he changed five things at once: he showed that one force of gravity runs the heavens and the earth, set out the laws of motion, proved that white light is a mix of colours,…
Gutenberg's printing press is on almost every list of world-changing inventions. But "it changed the world" is easy to say and hard to check. This guide shows what books were like before Johannes Gutenberg, how his…
If you want to know Aristotle's contribution to science, start with animals. Most people remember Aristotle as a philosopher of ethics and politics. But the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy calls him "the originator…
Genghis Khan influence is easy to feel and hard to pin down. He founded the Mongol Empire and ruled it from 1206 until he died in 1227. Medieval chroniclers said his campaigns killed millions. Yet he also gave the…
Ask a few historians to name the most influential people in history and you will get different lists. Some names show up almost every time. Others depend on who is counting and what they count. This guide shows you how…