Contemporaries

Who were Newton's contemporaries?

Isaac Newton lived from 1643 to 1727. Among his contemporaries were not only great rivals like Leibniz, but painters, composers and writers too.

Newton
1643–1727
Bach
1685–1750
Vermeer
1632–1675
Leibniz
1646–1716
Voltaire
1694–1778
1650 1690 1730 1770
Science Music Art Literature

Newton's lifespan is highlighted. The other bars show some notable contemporaries.

Parallels

Meanwhile, in the same years.

The calculus dispute

Newton and Leibniz invented calculus independently of each other, and in their later years they quarreled bitterly over who had invented it first.

Light in Delft

Newton used a prism to show that white light is made of all the colors, while Vermeer in Delft brought light itself onto the canvas.

A new music begins

Bach was born in 1685, just two years before Newton published his Principia in 1687, one of the most important works in science.

Reason takes hold

When Newton died in 1727, Voltaire was a young man of 32. Later, he would make Newton's ideas known in France.

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Parallel shows you contemporaries at a glance, across art, music, science and politics. For anyone you are curious about, you can see who lived at the same time.

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