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Curated category

Leaders who took power by coup

  • NapoleonNapoleon Bonaparte was born on the island of Corsica on the 15th of August 1769 to Carlo Maria Buonaparte and Maria Letizia Ramolino.
  • Bumin QaghanThe name Bumin appears in Old Turkic inscriptions, yet Chinese records refer to the same historical figure as Tumen. These two names do not match…
  • Fidel CastroFidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was born out of wedlock on the 13th of August 1926 at his father's farm in Birán, Cuba. His father, Ángel Castro y Argiz, had…
  • Benito MussoliniBenito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was born on the 29th of July 1883 in Dovia di Predappio, a small town in the province of Forlì.
  • Mahmud IIOn the 20th of July 1785, Mahmud II was born into the Ottoman imperial family. His father Abdul Hamid I died in 1789, leaving young Mahmud confined within…
  • SuhartoOn the 8th of June 1921, a boy named Suharto was born inside a house with walls made of plaited bamboo in the hamlet of Kemusuk.
  • Edward IIIOn the 25th of January 1327, a fourteen-year-old boy named Edward was proclaimed king in London. His father, King Edward II, had been forced to relinquish…
  • Józef PiłsudskiJózef Klemens Piłsudski was born on the 5th of December 1867 at the manor of Zulov, now known as Zalavas in Lithuania. His family had been part of the Grand…
  • Hafizullah AminHafizullah Amin was born on the 1st of August 1929 in Qazi Khel village, a small community within the town of Paghman. His father died when he was eight…
  • Elizabeth of RussiaElizabeth was born at Kolomenskoye, near Moscow, Russia, on the 18th of December 1709. Her parents were Peter the Great and Catherine, a former maid who had…
  • Catherine the GreatOn the 2nd of May 1729, a girl named Sophia Augusta Frederica was born inside the Ducal Castle in Stettin. Her father held the rank of Prussian general while…
  • GalbaServius Sulpicius Galba arrived in the world near Terracina on the 24th of December 3 BC. He emerged from a wealthy family that held no blood ties to the…
  • OthoMarcus Salvius Otho entered the world on the 28th of April AD 32. His grandfather Marcus had served as a senator before him.
  • Francisco FrancoOn the 4th of December 1892, Francisco Franco was born in the Calle Frutos Saavedra of Ferrol, Galicia. He entered the Infantry Academy in Toledo at age…
  • TrajanMarcus Ulpius Traianus arrived in the world on the 18th of September AD53 within the Roman province of Hispania Baetica.
  • Vladimir LeninVladimir Ilyich Ulyanov was born on the 22nd of April 1870 in Streletskaya Ulitsa, a street in the city of Simbirsk. He grew up as the third child among…
  • Mobutu Sese SekoIn 1949, a young Joseph-Désiré Mobutu stowed away aboard a boat traveling down the Congo River to Léopoldville. He was only nineteen years old and had been…
  • Carlos Castillo ArmasCarlos Castillo Armas was born on the 4th of November 1914 in Santa Lucía Cotzumalguapa. He grew up as the son of a landowner but remained out of wedlock and…
  • Paul BarrasPaul François Jean Nicolas, Vicomte de Barras was born at Fox-Amphoux on the 30th of June 1755. He descended from a noble family of Provence and entered the…
  • SullaLucius Cornelius Sulla Felix was born in Rome around 138 BC into a branch of the patrician gens Cornelia that had fallen to poverty.
  • Efraín Ríos MonttEfraín Ríos Montt was born on the 16th of June 1926 into a large ladino family of the rural middle class in Huehuetenango, a small city in the highlands of…
  • SomerledSomerled died in 1164, yet his birth remains a historical ghost. No contemporary pedigree outlines his ancestry with certainty.