Historical figures in Oxford
The atlas holds 50 people and 81 moments here, from 1492 to 2015. The most recorded lives are J. R. R. Tolkien, Howard Florey and Winston Churchill. Among them Writers, Philosophers and Scientists, across the Cold War and the Space Age.
Notable people
Jonathan Swift
in 1692
1 moment here
Anglo-Irish writer, satirist, political pamphleteer, and Church of Ireland cleric, best known for Gulliver's Travels, A Tale of a Tub, and A Modest…
Jorge Luis Borges
in 1971
1 moment here
Argentine writer, poet, essayist, translator, lecturer, librarian, and critic. Borges was born in Buenos Aires, lived in Switzerland and Spain during…
J. R. R. Tolkien
from 1911 to 1972
10 moments here
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was an English philologist, university professor, and author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.…
Katherine Mansfield
in 1916
1 moment here
Katherine Mansfield (Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp, later Murry) was a New Zealand modernist short-story writer, poet, critic and diarist.…
Ludwig Wittgenstein
in 1947
1 moment here
Austro-British philosopher whose work in logic, language, mathematics, and mind shaped twentieth-century analytic philosophy.…
Macfarlane Burnet
in 1954
1 moment here
Australian virologist and immunologist Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet, known as Macfarlane Burnet, shared the 1960 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine…
Manmohan Singh
from 1960 to 1962
2 moments here
Indian economist, academic, civil servant, finance minister and prime minister of India from 2004 to 2014.…
Margaret Thatcher
in 1943
1 moment here
British stateswoman Margaret Hilda Thatcher (née Roberts) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990, the first woman to hold the…
Mark Twain
in 1907
1 moment here
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, known as Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, journalist, lecturer, riverboat pilot, and traveler.…
Maryam Mirzakhani
in 2015
1 moment here
Iranian mathematician whose work transformed the study of hyperbolic surfaces, moduli spaces, and dynamics.…
Osama bin Laden
in 1971
1 moment here
Saudi-born founder and first emir of al-Qaeda. His documented movements include childhood and education in Saudi Arabia and England; militant…
Oscar Wilde
in 1874
1 moment here
Irish author, poet, playwright, critic, and leading figure in late nineteenth-century aestheticism.…
Rabindranath Tagore
from 1920 to 1930
2 moments here
Bengali poet, novelist, dramatist, composer, painter, philosopher, social reformer, and educationist.…
Ronald Reagan
in 1992
1 moment here
American broadcaster, actor, labor leader, governor of California, and 40th president of the United States.…
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
in 1929
1 moment here
Indian philosopher, academic, diplomat, and statesman. Radhakrishnan taught at leading Indian and British universities, served as vice-chancellor of…
Stephen Hawking
from 1942 to 1959
2 moments here
English theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author whose work on singularities, black-hole thermodynamics, and Hawking radiation reshaped modern…
Swami Vivekananda
in 1896
1 moment here
Indian Hindu monk, philosopher, teacher, and chief disciple of Ramakrishna. Born Narendranath Datta in Calcutta, he travelled widely through India…
Sydney Brenner
from 1952 to 1980
3 moments here
South African-born molecular biologist whose career moved from Johannesburg and Oxford to Cambridge, California, Singapore and other scientific…
Theodore Roosevelt
in 1910
1 moment here
Theodore Roosevelt Jr. (1858–1919) was the 26th president of the United States, serving from 1901 to 1909.…
Thomas Hobbes
in 1603
1 moment here
English philosopher and political theorist, best known for Leviathan (1651). Hobbes’s documented movements include study at Oxford, European travel…
Thomas More
in 1492
1 moment here
English lawyer, humanist author, royal councillor, Speaker of the House of Commons, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and Lord Chancellor under…
T. S. Eliot
from 1914 to 1927
3 moments here
Thomas Stearns Eliot was a St. Louis-born poet, critic, editor, and playwright who studied in Massachusetts, Paris, Germany, and Oxford before making…
V. S. Naipaul
in 1950
1 moment here
Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul was a Trinidad-born British novelist, essayist, and travel writer.…
William Makepeace Thackeray
in 1857
1 moment here
English novelist, illustrator, journalist, lecturer, and editor, best known for Vanity Fair.…
Moments
- 1950 Move to Holywell Street J. R. R. Tolkien
- 1950 Arrival for Oxford study V. S. Naipaul
- 1950 Law studies at Christ Church Zulfikar Ali Bhutto
- 1952 Waynflete Lectures John Eccles
- 1952 Doctoral study at Oxford Sydney Brenner
- 1953 Rhodes Scholar at Oxford Bob Hawke
- 1953 Move to Sandfield Road J. R. R. Tolkien
- 1954 Litchfield Lecture at Oxford Macfarlane Burnet
- 1955 Royal Society scientific meeting Alexander Prokhorov
- 1955 First O'Donnell Lecture J. R. R. Tolkien
- 1959 Undergraduate study at University College Stephen Hawking
- 1960 Doctoral study at Oxford Manmohan Singh
- 1962 Provost's lodgings at Queen's College Howard Florey
- 1962 DPhil completed at Oxford Manmohan Singh
- 1962 Receives Oxford honorary degree Charlie Chaplin
- 1965 Buried at Bladon Winston Churchill
- 1966 Doctor Faustus performance Elizabeth Taylor
- 1967 Marriage to Margaret Jennings Howard Florey
- 1968 Death at the provost's lodgings Howard Florey
- 1971 Oxford honorary doctorate Jorge Luis Borges
- 1971 English-language course in Oxford Osama bin Laden
- 1972 Return to central Oxford J. R. R. Tolkien
- 1973 Relocates for Oxford study Benazir Bhutto
- 1976 Herbert Spencer Lecture Sydney Brenner
- 1977 President of the Oxford Union Benazir Bhutto
- 1980 Archibald Garrod Lecture Sydney Brenner
- 1990 Idrios Lecture John Eccles
- 1992 Addresses Oxford Union Ronald Reagan
- 1996 Death in Oxford Abdus Salam
- 1997 Address to the Oxford Union Fidel V. Ramos
- 2015 Visits Oxford and meets Mirzakhani Society Maryam Mirzakhani