Who Was Alive
Joseph Black
James Heath (engraver) after Henry Raeburn, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Joseph Black

British physicist and chemist

Born 16 April 1728 · died 6 December 1799, aged 71

Who was alive at the same time as Joseph Black?

  1. Johann Sebastian Bach, 1685 – 1750
  2. Voltaire, 1694 – 1778
  3. Benjamin Franklin, 1706 – 1790
  4. Leonhard Euler, 1707 – 1783
  5. Carl Linnaeus, 1707 – 1778
  6. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1712 – 1778
  7. Adam Smith, 1723 – 1790
  8. Immanuel Kant, 1724 – 1804
  9. Joseph Black, 1728 – 1799
  10. James Cook, 1728 – 1779
  11. George Washington, 1732 – 1799
  12. John Adams, 1735 – 1826
  13. Thomas Jefferson, 1743 – 1826
  14. Francisco Goya, 1746 – 1828
  15. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1749 – 1832
  16. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1756 – 1791
  17. Friedrich Schiller, 1759 – 1805
  18. Ludwig van Beethoven, c. 1770 – 1827
  19. Napoleon, 1769 – 1821
  20. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, 1770 – 1831
  21. Jane Austen, 1775 – 1817
  22. Carl Friedrich Gauss, 1777 – 1855
  23. Lord Byron, 1788 – 1824
  24. Alexander Pushkin, 1799 – 1837

Drag across the timeline, or use the arrow keys, to see who was alive in any year and the age each person reached that year. Dashed lines mark world events. Faded ends mark uncertain dates.

When Joseph Black was born, Johann Sebastian Bach was 43, Voltaire was 33, Immanuel Kant was 3, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was 15 and Adam Smith was 4.

When Joseph Black died, Napoleon was 30, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was 50, George Washington was 67, Immanuel Kant was 75 and Alexander Pushkin was under a year old.

Born during Joseph Black’s lifetime: Napoleon, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, George Washington, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig van Beethoven, Alexander Pushkin, Thomas Jefferson and Lord Byron.

Not quite contemporaries: Isaac Newton died about a year before Joseph Black was born, Abraham Lincoln was born about 10 years after Joseph Black died, Charles Darwin was born about 10 years after Joseph Black died and Victor Hugo was born about 3 years after Joseph Black died.

What happened in Joseph Black’s lifetime

Where Joseph Black’s contemporaries were born

Joseph Black is labelled; the others are the best-known people we track who lived at the same time. Each dot is a birthplace from Wikidata (81 of 81 placed); tap one to open that person.
Birthplaces as a list

Compare Joseph Black

The 150 best-known contemporaries

379 of the people we track were surely alive at the same time as Joseph Black. The 150 best known are listed here. See also everyone alive in 1764.

  1. Napoleon 1769 – 1821
  2. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1749 – 1832
  3. George Washington 1732 – 1799
  4. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart 1756 – 1791
  5. Ludwig van Beethoven c. 1770 – 1827
  6. Johann Sebastian Bach 1685 – 1750
  7. Voltaire 1694 – 1778
  8. Immanuel Kant 1724 – 1804
  9. Alexander Pushkin 1799 – 1837
  10. Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1712 – 1778
  11. Adam Smith 1723 – 1790
  12. Thomas Jefferson 1743 – 1826
  13. Lord Byron 1788 – 1824
  14. Benjamin Franklin 1706 – 1790
  15. Carl Linnaeus 1707 – 1778
  16. Jane Austen 1775 – 1817
  17. Carl Friedrich Gauss 1777 – 1855
  18. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel 1770 – 1831
  19. Leonhard Euler 1707 – 1783
  20. John Adams 1735 – 1826
  21. James Cook 1728 – 1779
  22. Francisco Goya 1746 – 1828
  23. Friedrich Schiller 1759 – 1805
  24. Michael Faraday 1791 – 1867
  25. Hokusai 1760 – 1849
  26. James Madison 1751 – 1836
  27. Honoré de Balzac 1799 – 1850
  28. Simón Bolívar 1783 – 1830
  29. Arthur Schopenhauer 1788 – 1860
  30. Franz Schubert 1797 – 1828
  31. Antonio Vivaldi 1678 – 1741
  32. Heinrich Heine 1797 – 1856
  33. John Quincy Adams 1767 – 1848
  34. Andrew Jackson 1767 – 1845
  35. Jonathan Swift 1667 – 1745
  36. William Blake 1757 – 1827
  37. Montesquieu 1689 – 1755
  38. George Frideric Handel 1685 – 1759
  39. James Watt 1736 – 1819
  40. David Hume 1711 – 1776
  41. Joseph Haydn 1732 – 1809
  42. James Monroe 1758 – 1831
  43. Catherine the Great 1729 – 1796
  44. Denis Diderot 1713 – 1784
  45. Martin Van Buren 1782 – 1862
  46. John Keats 1795 – 1821
  47. Daniel Defoe c. 1661 – 1731
  48. Zachary Taylor 1784 – 1850
  49. James Buchanan 1791 – 1868
  50. James K. Polk 1795 – 1849
  51. John Tyler 1790 – 1862
  52. Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792 – 1822
  53. Alexander von Humboldt 1769 – 1859
  54. William Wordsworth 1770 – 1850
  55. William Henry Harrison 1773 – 1841
  56. Walter Scott 1771 – 1832
  57. Stendhal 1783 – 1842
  58. Thomas Paine 1737 – 1809
  59. Samuel Johnson 1709 – 1784
  60. Marie Antoinette 1755 – 1793
  61. Maximilien Robespierre 1758 – 1794
  62. Joseph Fourier 1768 – 1830
  63. Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres 1780 – 1867
  64. Mary Shelley 1797 – 1851
  65. Auguste Comte 1798 – 1857
  66. Mary Wollstonecraft 1759 – 1797
  67. Antoine Lavoisier 1743 – 1794
  68. Adam Mickiewicz 1798 – 1855
  69. Pierre-Simon Laplace 1749 – 1827
  70. Louis XVI 1754 – 1793
  71. Frederick the Great 1712 – 1786
  72. Edmund Burke 1729 – 1797
  73. Robert Burns 1759 – 1796
  74. Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1772 – 1834
  75. Alexander Pope 1688 – 1744
  76. Eugène Delacroix 1798 – 1863
  77. André-Marie Ampère 1775 – 1836
  78. Thomas Carlyle 1795 – 1881
  79. Alessandro Volta 1745 – 1827
  80. Jean Le Rond d'Alembert 1717 – 1783
  81. William Herschel 1738 – 1822
  82. Edward Jenner 1749 – 1823
  83. Johann Gottlieb Fichte 1762 – 1814
  84. Novalis 1772 – 1801
  85. Charles Babbage 1791 – 1871
  86. John Dalton 1766 – 1844
  87. Giacomo Leopardi 1798 – 1837
  88. Alexander I of Russia 1777 – 1825
  89. George Berkeley 1685 – 1753
  90. Mikhail Lomonosov 1711 – 1765
  91. Jean-Baptiste Lamarck 1744 – 1829
  92. Washington Irving 1783 – 1859
  93. Alphonse de Lamartine 1790 – 1869
  94. Pope Pius IX 1792 – 1878
  95. George III 1738 – 1820
  96. Carl von Clausewitz 1780 – 1831
  97. Alessandro Manzoni 1785 – 1873
  98. Gioachino Rossini 1792 – 1868
  99. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing 1729 – 1781
  100. Louis XV 1710 – 1774
  101. Maria Theresa 1717 – 1780
  102. Giacomo Casanova 1725 – 1798
  103. Marquis de Sade 1740 – 1814
  104. Jeremy Bentham 1748 – 1832
  105. Thomas Robert Malthus 1766 – 1834
  106. Nicholas I of Russia 1796 – 1855
  107. Edward Gibbon 1737 – 1794
  108. Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson 1758 – 1805
  109. Joseph-Louis Lagrange 1736 – 1813
  110. Alexander Hamilton 1757 – 1804
  111. Niccolò Paganini 1782 – 1840
  112. Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington 1769 – 1852
  113. Georg Ohm 1789 – 1854
  114. Johann Gottfried Herder 1744 – 1803
  115. Humphry Davy 1778 – 1829
  116. Charles-Augustin de Coulomb 1736 – 1806
  117. Shaka c. 1787 – 1828
  118. Nikolai Lobachevsky 1792 – 1856
  119. Edmond Halley 1656 – 1742
  120. Anders Celsius 1701 – 1744
  121. Hans Christian Ørsted 1777 – 1851
  122. Pope Gregory XVI 1765 – 1846
  123. Wilhelm von Humboldt 1767 – 1835
  124. David Ricardo 1772 – 1823
  125. Amedeo Avogadro 1776 – 1856
  126. Samuel Morse 1791 – 1872
  127. Isabelle de Charrière 1740 – 1805
  128. Pope Pius VII 1742 – 1823
  129. William IV 1765 – 1837
  130. Friedrich Hölderlin 1770 – 1843
  131. Pierre-Augustin de Beaumarchais 1732 – 1799
  132. Klemens von Metternich 1773 – 1859
  133. Carlo Goldoni 1707 – 1793
  134. Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord 1754 – 1839
  135. Paul I of Russia 1754 – 1801
  136. Jacques-Louis David 1748 – 1825
  137. George IV 1762 – 1830
  138. François-René de Chateaubriand 1768 – 1848
  139. Joseph Priestley 1733 – 1804
  140. James Fenimore Cooper 1789 – 1851
  141. Georges Danton 1759 – 1794
  142. Pope Leo XII 1760 – 1829
  143. Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling 1775 – 1854
  144. E. T. A. Hoffmann 1776 – 1822
  145. Wilhelm I 1797 – 1888
  146. Pope Benedict XIV 1675 – 1758
  147. Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon 1707 – 1788
  148. Germaine de Staël 1766 – 1817
  149. Thomas Young 1773 – 1829
  150. Caspar David Friedrich 1774 – 1840