Admiral George Anson, 1st Baron Anson PC RN, was a British admiral and a wealthy aristocrat, noted for his circumnavigation of the globe and his role overseeing the Royal Navy during the Seven Years' War. The indomitable perseverance he...

William Hogarth was an English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic, and editorial cartoonist who has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like...

Colin Maclaurin was a Scottish mathematician who made important contributions to geometry and algebra. The Maclaurin series, a special case of the Taylor series, is named after him. Maclaurin also made significant contributions to the gr...

Pierre-Louis Moreau de Maupertuis was a French mathematician, philosopher and man of letters. He became the Director of the Académie des Sciences, and the first President of the Berlin Academy of Science, at the invitation of Frederick the...

Bertrand-François Mahé de La Bourdonnais (comte de La Bourdonnais) was a French naval officer and administrator, in the service of the French East India Company. He went to sea when a boy, and in 1718 entered the service of the French East...

Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, 1st Marquis of Pombal and 1st Count of Oeiras, known as the Marquis of Pombal, was a Portuguese statesman and diplomat who effectively ruled the Portuguese Empire from 1750 to 1777 as chief minister to Kin...

The Great Northern War (1700–1721) was a conflict in which a coalition led by the Tsardom of Russia successfully contested the supremacy of the Swedish Empire in Northern, Central and Eastern Europe. The initial leaders of the anti-Swedish...

The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It originated with the overseas possessions and trading posts establ...

The War of the Spanish Succession was fought among several European powers, principally the Holy Roman Empire, Great Britain, the Dutch Republic, Portugal, and the Duchy of Savoy, against the Kingdoms of France and Spain and the Electorate...

Anders Celsius became famous for his recommendation in 1742 to divide the temperature scale of a mercury thermometer at 760mm mercury air pressure into 100 degrees, where 100 is the frozing point and 0 the boiling point of water. Because of...

Thomas Bayes was a British mathematician and Presbyterian minister, known for having formulated a special case of Bayes' theorem. Bayes was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1742. Bayes is known to have published two works in his li...

François Antoine de Legall de Kermeur was a French chess player. His name is variously written Kermur, Sire de Legalle, by Twiss, and Kermur and Kermuy, Sire de Legal, by others. In the List of Subscribers to Philidor's second edition it st...

John Wesley was an 18th-century Anglican clergyman and Christian theologian who was an early leader in the Methodist movement. Methodism had three rises, the first at Oxford University with the founding of the so-called "Holy Club", the sec...

Admiral John Byng was a Royal Navy officer. After joining the navy at the age of fourteen he participated at the Battle of Cape Passaro in 1718. Over the next thirty years he built up a reputation as a solid naval officer and received promo...

Willem, Count Bentinck, Lord of Rhoon and Pendrecht was a Dutch nobleman and politician, and the eldest son from the second marriage of William Bentinck, 1st Earl of Portland. He was created Count (Graf) Bentinck of the Holy Roman Empire in...