19th Century– tax –

This article contains affiliate links. If you buy through them, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy. The author of War and Peace and Anna Karenina, and in his later years a religious thinker w...

Vincent Willem van Gogh. Though he was a painter who received little recognition during his lifetime, he is now known as a figure who left an indelible mark on the history of world art. Brilliant colors, violent brushstrokes, and a life ...

The Brothers Grimm. When we hear their name, what first comes to mind is likely a delightful collection of fairy tales, adorned with colorful illustrations. Yet Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm—who also left an immense legacy as linguists—were qu...

Ludwig van Beethoven, the towering master of classical music. His Symphony No. 5 “Fate” and Symphony No. 9 “Choral” continue to resound as if they were common property of all humankind. Even as deafness consumed him, he carved sound out ...

In the early 19th century, when London’s fog still wrapped the city in its familiar scent, a man moved between the salons and the bedrooms of high society, armed only with poetry. George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron.A leading figure of ...

He was called the Hero of the Late Tokugawa Era — Sakamoto Ryoma. He forged the Satsuma–Choshu Alliance, advanced the restoration of imperial rule,and became a driving force behind Japan’s transformation into a modern nati...

A boy born on the Mediterranean island of Corsica would one day build an empire and shake the world— Napoleon Bonaparte. Racing through the storms of revolution and triumphing on countless battlefields,his life was forever shadowed by tw...