Curated category
University of Paris alumni
- Thomas AquinasIn the year 1244, a young man named Thomas Aquinas sat bound in the stone tower of Monte San Giovanni Campano. He was nineteen years old and dressed in the…
- T. S. EliotThomas Stearns Eliot was born on the 26th of September 1888 in St. Louis, Missouri. He lived at a house on Locust Street for his first sixteen years before…
- André de GouveiaAndré de Gouveia entered the Collège Sainte-Barbe in Paris during the early 1500s. He was one of the first Portuguese students to study there under his uncle…
- Denis DiderotDenis Diderot was born on the 5th of October 1713 in the city of Langres. His father Didier worked as a cutler and his mother Angélique Vigneron supported…
- Victor HugoVictor-Marie Hugo was born on the 26th of February 1802 in Besançon, a city in eastern France. His father Joseph Léopold Sigisbert Hugo served as a general…
- John CalvinOn the 10th of July 1509, a boy named Jehan Cauvin was born in the town of Noyon within the province of Picardy. His father Gérard Cauvin worked as a…
- Ignatius of LoyolaÍñigo López de Oñaz y Loyola entered the world inside a stone fortress in Azpeitia, Gipuzkoa. His parents belonged to the minor nobility of the Basque region.
- Diogo de GouveiaDiogo de Gouveia was born in Beja around the year 1471. He entered Paris in 1499 to study at the Collège de Montaigu. Two scholarships from Jan Standonck…
- Marie CurieMaria Salomea Skłodowska was born on the 7th of November 1867 in Warsaw, then part of the Russian Empire. Her family had lost their property and fortunes…
- Jean-Luc GodardJean-Luc Godard was born on the 3rd of December 1930 in the 7th arrondissement of Paris. His father Paul Godard worked as a Swiss physician while his mother…
- Francis XavierFrancis Xavier entered the world on the 7th of April 1506 inside the Castle of Xavier. His father Don Juan de Jasso y Atondo served as president of the Royal…
- Joseph CampbellIn 1929, Joseph Campbell moved into a rented shack in Woodstock, New York. The structure lacked running water and relied on scattered wells for its supply.
- Claude Lévi-StraussClaude Lévi-Strauss was born on the 28th of November 1908 in Brussels. His parents were French Jews who had moved there for his father's work as a portrait…
- Simone de BeauvoirSimone Lucie Ernestine Marie Bertrand de Beauvoir entered the world on the 9th of January 1908 in a wealthy Parisian family.
- Jacques-Louis DavidJacques-Louis David was born on the 30th of August 1748 into a prosperous family in Paris. When he was about nine years old, his father died in a duel.
- ErasmusDesiderius Erasmus was born in Rotterdam on the 27th or the 28th of October, likely around 1466. His parents could not legally marry because his father…
- Antoine LavoisierAntoine-Laurent de Lavoisier was born on the 26th of August 1743 to a wealthy family of nobility in Paris. He inherited a large fortune at the age of five…
- Jan AssmannJohann Christoph Assmann, known as Jan, was born on the 7th of July 1938 in Germany. He studied Egyptology and classical archaeology across four cities…
- Antoine-Jean GrosAntoine-Jean Gros entered the world on the 16th of March 1771 in Paris. His father Jean-Antoine Gros worked as a miniature painter while his mother…
- Emmanuel Joseph SieyèsEmmanuel Joseph Sieyès was born on the 3rd of May 1748 in Fréjus, a southern French town. He entered the seminary of Saint-Sulpice in Paris and spent ten…
- Andreas VesaliusAndries van Wesel was born on the 31st of December 1514 in Brussels. His family had served three generations of Habsburg emperors as physicians and…
- Raymond QueneauRaymond Auguste Queneau entered the world on the 21st of February 1903 at 47, rue Thiers in Le Havre. He was the only child born to Auguste Queneau and…
- Alexis de TocquevilleAlexis Charles Henri Clérel, comte de Tocqueville entered the world on the 29th of July 1805. He descended from an old Norman family that had produced…
- Pierre de RonsardPierre de Ronsard was born at the Manoir de la Possonnière in the village of Couture-sur-Loir, Vendômois on the 11th of September 1524.
- Yves BonnefoyYves Jean Bonnefoy was born on the 24th of June 1923 in Tours, France. His father Marius Elie Bonnefoy worked as a railroad worker while his mother Hélène…
- Gabriel MarcelGabriel Honoré Marcel entered the world on the 7th of December 1889 in Paris, France. His mother Laure Meyer was Jewish and died when he was very young.
- Charles-François LebrunCharles-François Lebrun was born in Saint-Sauveur-Lendelin on the 19th of March 1739. He studied philosophy at the Collège de Navarre before entering public…
- Vincent CroninVincent Archibald Patrick Cronin entered the world on the 24th of May 1924 in Tredegar, Monmouthshire. His father was A.J.
- Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-PérigordCharles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord entered the world on the 2nd of February 1754 in Paris. He was born into an ancient aristocratic family that lacked…
- Jules MicheletJules Michelet was born on the 21st of August 1798 in Paris. His father worked as a master printer, and young Jules often assisted him with his work.
- Louis de BroglieLouis Victor Pierre Raymond, 7th Duc de Broglie, entered the world on the 15th of August 1892 in Dieppe, France. He belonged to a noble family that had held…
- Juan Luis VivesOn the 6th of March 1493, a boy named Juan Luis Vives was born in Valencia to a family that had converted from Judaism to Christianity decades before.