Died on Saturday, 7th February – Famous Deaths

07/02/2025

Dafydd Elis-Thomas, Welsh academic and politician (born 1946)

Dafydd Elis Elis-Thomas, Baron Elis-Thomas, was a Welsh politician who served as the leader of Plaid Cymru from 1984 to 1991 and represented the Dwyfor Meirionnydd constituency in the Senedd from 1999 to 2021.

---

Tony Roberts, American actor and singer (born 1939)

David Anthony Roberts was an American actor known for his roles on stage and screen. He is best known for his collaborations with filmmaker Woody Allen, having acted in six of his films, most notably Annie Hall (1977).

---

07/02/2020

Li Wenliang, Chinese ophthalmologist who initially warned about COVID-19 (born 1985)

Li Wenliang was a Chinese ophthalmologist who warned his colleagues about early COVID-19 infections in Wuhan.

---

07/02/2019

John Dingell, American politician (born 1926)

John David Dingell Jr. was an American politician from the state of Michigan who served as a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1955 until 2015. A member of the Democratic Party, Dingell holds the record as the longest-serving member of Congress in American history.

---

Albert Finney, English actor (born 1936)

Albert Finney was an English actor. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and worked in the theatre before attaining fame for film acting during the early 1960s, debuting with The Entertainer (1960), directed by Tony Richardson, who had previously directed him in theatre. He maintained a successful career in theatre, film and television.

---

Jan Olszewski, Polish politician, 3rd Prime Minister (born 1930)

Jan Ferdynand Olszewski was a Polish conservative lawyer and politician who served as the Prime Minister of Poland for five months between December 1991 and early June 1992 and later became a leading figure of the conservative Movement for the Reconstruction of Poland.

---

Frank Robinson, American baseball player, coach, and manager (born 1935)

Frank Robinson, nicknamed "the Judge", was an American professional baseball outfielder and manager in Major League Baseball (MLB) who played for five teams over 21 seasons: the Cincinnati Reds (1956–1965), Baltimore Orioles (1966–1971), Los Angeles Dodgers (1972), California Angels (1973–1974), and Cleveland Indians (1974–1976). In 1975, Robinson became the first Black manager in big-league history, as the player-manager of the Indians.

---

07/02/2017

Richard Hatch, American actor (born 1945)

Richard Lawrence Hatch was an American actor and writer. He began his career as a stage actor before moving on to television work in the 1970s. Hatch is best known for his roles as Captain Apollo in the original Battlestar Galactica television series and Tom Zarek in the reimagined series.

---

Hans Rosling, Swedish academic (born 1948)

Hans Rosling was a Swedish physician, academic and public speaker. He was a professor of international health at Karolinska Institute and was the co-founder and chairman of the Gapminder Foundation, which developed the Trendalyzer software system. Widely regarded as one of the most influential physicians and geographers in the modern world, he held presentations around the world, including several TED Talks in which he promoted the use of data to explore development issues. His posthumously published book Factfulness, coauthored with his daughter-in-law Anna Rosling Rönnlund and son Ola Rosling, became an international bestseller.

---

Tzvetan Todorov, Bulgarian philosopher (born 1939)

Tzvetan Todorov was a Bulgarian-French historian, philosopher, structuralist literary critic, sociologist and essayist. He was the author of many books and essays, which have had a significant influence in anthropology, sociology, semiotics, literary theory, intellectual history and culture theory.

---

07/02/2015

Billy Casper, American golfer (born 1931)

William Earl Casper Jr. was an American professional golfer. He was one of the most prolific tournament winners on the PGA Tour from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s.

---

Marshall Rosenberg, American psychologist and author (born 1934)

Marshall Bertram Rosenberg was an American psychologist, mediator, author, and teacher. Starting in the early 1960s, he developed nonviolent communication, a process for supporting partnership and resolving conflict within people, relationships, and society. He worked worldwide as a peacemaker, and in 1984 founded the Center for Nonviolent Communication, an international nonprofit organization for which he served as Director of Educational Services. Rosenberg's motivation for developing nonviolent communication was based on his own experiences at the Detroit race riot of 1943, as well as the antisemitism that he experienced in his early life.

---

Dean Smith, American basketball player and coach (born 1931)

Dean Edwards Smith was an American men's college basketball head coach. Called a "coaching legend" by the Basketball Hall of Fame, he coached for 36 years at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Smith coached from 1961 to 1997 and retired with 879 victories, which was the NCAA Division I men's basketball record at that time.[a] Smith had the ninth-highest winning percentage of any men's college basketball coach (77.6%). Smith's career total of 879 wins lasted until 2005 when Pat Summitt surpassed him with her 880th victory. During his tenure as head coach, North Carolina won two national championships and appeared in 11 Final Fours. Smith played college basketball at the University of Kansas, where he won a national championship in 1952 playing for Hall of fame coach Phog Allen.

---

John C. Whitehead, American banker and politician, 9th United States Deputy Secretary of State (born 1922)

John Cunningham Whitehead was an American banker and civil servant, a board member of the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation, and, until his resignation in May 2006, chairman of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation.

---

07/02/2014

Doug Mohns, Canadian-American ice hockey player (born 1933)

Douglas Allen "Diesel" Mohns was a professional ice hockey player who played 22 seasons in the National Hockey League from 1953–54 until 1974–75. Mohns twice won the most coveted prize in junior hockey, the Memorial Cup. He played on the 1951 and 1953 Barrie Flyers teams.

---

07/02/2013

Krsto Papić, Croatian director and screenwriter (born 1933)

Krsto Papić was a Croatian screenwriter and film director whose career spanned over five decades. He is generally considered among the best directors of former Yugoslavia, and counted among the Yugoslav Black Wave.

---

07/02/2012

Harry Keough, American soccer player and coach (born 1927)

Harry Joseph Keough was an American soccer defender who played on the United States national team in their 1–0 upset of England at the 1950 FIFA World Cup. He spent most of his club career in his native St. Louis, winning a national junior championship, two National Challenge Cup and seven National Amateur Cup titles. He coached the Saint Louis University men's soccer team to five NCAA Men's Soccer Championships. The Keough Award, named after him, his brother Bill, and his son Ty Keough, is presented each year to the outstanding St. Louis–based male and female professional or college soccer player.

---

07/02/2010

Franco Ballerini, Italian cyclist and coach (born 1964)

Franco Ballerini was an Italian road racing cyclist.

---

07/02/2009

Blossom Dearie, American singer and pianist (born 1924)

Margrethe Blossom Dearie was an American jazz singer and pianist. She had a distinctive light and girlish voice. Dearie performed regular engagements in London and New York City over many years and collaborated with many musicians, including Johnny Mercer, Miles Davis, Jack Segal, Johnny Mandel, Duncan Lamont, Bob Dorough, Dave Frishberg, and Jay Berliner.

---

07/02/2006

Princess Durru Shehvar of the Ottoman Empire (born 1914)

Hatice Hayriye Ayşe Dürrüşehvar Sultan, after marriage named Durru Shehvar Durdana Begum Sahiba, Princess of Berar; was an Ottoman princess by birth and Hyderabad princess by marriage. She was the only daughter of the last caliph Abdulmejid II, who was the last heir apparent to the Ottoman Imperial throne and the last Caliph of the Ottoman Caliphate.

---

07/02/2005

Atli Dam, Faroese engineer and politician, 5th Prime Minister of the Faroe Islands (born 1932)

Atli Pætursson Dam was a Faroese politician who served as prime minister of the Faroe Islands on three occasions. From 1970 to 1981, 1985 to 1989, and 1991 to 1993. To this date, he is the longest-serving prime minister in Faroese history, having served a total of 16 years.

---

07/02/2003

Augusto Monterroso, Guatemalan author (born 1921)

Augusto Monterroso Bonilla was a Honduran writer who adopted Guatemalan nationality, known for the ironical and humorous style of his short stories. He is considered an important figure in the Latin American "Boom" generation, and received several awards, including the Prince of Asturias Award in Literature (2000), Miguel Ángel Asturias National Prize in Literature (1997), and Juan Rulfo Award (1996). Monterroso was a member of the Honduran Academy of Language.

---

07/02/2001

Anne Morrow Lindbergh, American author and pilot (born 1906)

Anne Spencer Morrow Lindbergh was an American writer and aviator. She was the wife of decorated pioneer aviator Charles Lindbergh, with whom she made many exploratory flights.

---

07/02/2000

Doug Henning, Canadian magician and politician (born 1947)

Douglas James Henning was a Canadian magician, illusionist, escape artist and politician.

---

07/02/1999

King Hussein of Jordan (born 1935)

Hussein bin Talal al-Hashimi was King of Jordan from 1952 until his death in 1999. A member of the House of Hashim, he is regarded as a 40th-generation direct descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

---

Bobby Troup, American actor, pianist, and composer (born 1918)

Robert William Troup Jr. was an American actor, jazz pianist, singer, and songwriter. He is best known as the composer of the rhythm and blues standard "(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66" and for portraying the role of Dr. Joe Early in the television program Emergency! co-starring with his wife Julie London, in the 1970s.

---

07/02/1994

Witold Lutosławski, Polish composer and conductor (born 1913)

Witold Roman Lutosławski was a Polish composer and conductor. Among the major composers of 20th-century classical music, he is "generally regarded as the most significant Polish composer since Szymanowski, and possibly the greatest Polish composer since Chopin". His compositions—of which he was a notable conductor—include representatives of most traditional genres, aside from opera: symphonies, concertos, orchestral song cycles, other orchestral works, and chamber works. Among his best known works are his four symphonies, the Variations on a Theme by Paganini (1941), the Concerto for Orchestra (1954), and his cello concerto (1970).

---

07/02/1991

Amos Yarkoni, Israeli colonel (born 1920)

Amos Yarkoni, was an officer in the Israel Defense Forces and one of six Israeli Arabs to have received the IDF's third highest decoration, the Medal of Distinguished Service. He was the first commander of the Shaked Reconnaissance Battalion of Israel's Southern command.

---

07/02/1990

Alan Perlis, American computer scientist and academic (born 1922)

Alan Jay Perlis was an American computer scientist and professor at Purdue University, Carnegie Mellon University and Yale University. He is best known for his pioneering work in programming languages and in 1966 he became the first recipient of the ACM Turing Award.

---

Alfredo M. Santos, Filipino general (born 1905)

Alfredo Manapat Santos was Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines in 1962 to 1965, making him the first four-star general of the Philippines' armed forces.

---

07/02/1986

Cheikh Anta Diop, Senegalese historian, anthropologist, and physicist (born 1923)

Cheikh Anta Diop was a Senegalese historian, anthropologist, physicist, and politician who studied the human race's origins and pre-colonial African culture. Diop's work is considered foundational to the theory of Afrocentricity, though he himself never described himself as an Afrocentrist. The questions he posed about cultural bias in scientific research contributed greatly to the postcolonial turn in the study of African civilizations.

---

07/02/1979

Josef Mengele, German SS officer and physician (born 1911)

Josef Mengele, often dubbed the "Angel of Death", was a German military officer and physician during World War II at the Soviet front and then at Auschwitz during the Holocaust. He conducted research and experiments on prisoners at the Auschwitz II-Birkenau concentration camp, where he was a member of the team of doctors who selected victims to be murdered in the gas chambers.

---

07/02/1972

Walter Lang, American director and screenwriter (born 1896)

Walter Richard Lang was an American film director.

---

07/02/1968

Nick Adams, American actor and screenwriter (born 1931)

Nicholas Aloysius Adamshock, better known as Nick Adams, was an American film and television actor and screenwriter. He was noted for his roles in several Hollywood films during the 1950s and 1960s, including Rebel Without a Cause along with his starring role in the ABC television series The Rebel (1959–1961). He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Twilight of Honor (1963). He also led the cast of several Japanese productions, including Frankenstein Conquers the World, Invasion of Astro-Monster and The Killing Bottle.

---

07/02/1964

Sofoklis Venizelos, Greek captain and politician, 133rd Prime Minister of Greece (born 1894)

Sofoklis Venizelos was a Greek politician who served three times as Prime Minister of Greece: in 1944, 1950 and 1950–1951.

---

07/02/1963

Learco Guerra, Italian cyclist and manager (born 1902)

Learco Guerra was an Italian professional road racing cyclist. The highlight of his career was his overall win in the 1934 Giro d'Italia. He was born in San Nicolò Po, a frazione of Bagnolo San Vito in Lombardy, gained the nickname of "Human Locomotive" for his enduring quality in plain stages. After mediocre attempts to play football, Guerra became a professional cyclist in 1928, at 26. The following year he became Italian champion, racing as an independent or semi-professional.

---

07/02/1960

Igor Kurchatov, Russian physicist and academic (born 1903)

Igor Vasilyevich Kurchatov was a Soviet physicist who played a central role in organizing and directing the former Soviet program of nuclear weapons. He has been called the "father of the Russian atomic bomb".

---

07/02/1959

Nap Lajoie, American baseball player and manager (born 1874)

Napoléon Lajoie, also known as Larry Lajoie, was an American professional baseball second baseman who played 21 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB). Nicknamed "the Frenchman", he represented both Philadelphia franchises and the Cleveland Bronchos, which was renamed "the Naps" by fans after him, and which he led as its player-manager from 1905 through 1909.

---

Daniel François Malan, South African minister and politician, 5th Prime Minister of South Africa (born 1874)

Daniël François Malan was a South African politician who served as the fourth prime minister of South Africa from 1948 to 1954. The National Party implemented the system of apartheid, which enforced racial segregation laws, during his tenure as prime minister.

---

Guitar Slim, American singer and guitarist (born 1926)

Eddie Jones, known as Guitar Slim, was an American guitarist in the 1940s and 1950s, best known for the million-selling song "The Things That I Used to Do", for Specialty Records. It is listed in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll. Slim had a major impact on rock and roll and experimented with distorted tones on the electric guitar a full decade before Jimi Hendrix.

---

07/02/1944

Lina Cavalieri, Italian soprano and actress (born 1874)

Natalina "Lina" Cavalieri was an Italian operatic dramatic soprano, actress, and monologist.

---

07/02/1942

Ivan Bilibin, Russian illustrator and stage designer (born 1876)

Ivan Yakovlevich Bilibin was a Russian illustrator and stage designer who took part in the Mir iskusstva, contributed to the Ballets Russes, co-founded the Union of Russian Artists, and from 1937 was a member of the Artists' Union of the USSR. Ivan Bilibin gained popularity with his illustrations of Russian folk tales and Slavic folklore. Throughout his career he was inspired by the art and culture of medieval Russia.

---

07/02/1940

James McCormick (Irish republican), Executed Irish Republican (born 1910)

James McCormick was born in Mullingar, County Westmeath, Ireland and joined the Irish Republican Army (IRA) in Tullamore, County Offaly. He was executed for his role in the 1939 Coventry bombing, which killed five civilians and injured seventy others.

---

Peter Barnes (Irish republican), Executed Irish Republican (born 1907)

Peter Barnes was an Irish republican. He was born in Banagher, King's County (Offaly). As a young man Barnes joined Fianna Éireann and in 1924 became a member of the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

---

07/02/1939

Boris Grigoriev, Russian painter and illustrator (born 1886)

Boris Grigoriev was a painter, graphic artist, and writer.

---

07/02/1938

Harvey Samuel Firestone, American businessman, founded the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company (born 1868)

Harvey Samuel Firestone Sr. was an American businessman, and the founder of the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company, one of the first global makers of automobile tires.

---

07/02/1937

Elihu Root, American lawyer and politician, 38th United States Secretary of State, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1845)

Elihu Root was an American lawyer, Republican politician, and statesman who served as the 41st United States Secretary of War under presidents William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt and the 38th United States Secretary of State, also under Roosevelt. In both positions as well as a long legal career, he pioneered the American practice of international law. Root is sometimes considered the prototype of the 20th-century political "wise man", advising presidents on a range of foreign and domestic issues. He also served as a United States Senator from New York and received the 1912 Nobel Peace Prize.

---

07/02/1921

John J. Gardner, American politician (born 1845)

John James Gardner was an American Republican Party politician who represented New Jersey's 2nd congressional district in the United States House of Representatives for ten terms from 1893 to 1913, and was Mayor of Atlantic City, New Jersey.

---

07/02/1920

Alexander Kolchak, Russian admiral and explorer (born 1874)

Admiral Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak was a Russian navy officer and polar explorer who led the White movement in the Russian Civil War. When he assumed the title of Supreme Ruler of Russia in 1918, Kolchak headed a military dictatorship, which ruled over the territory of the former Russian Empire controlled by the Whites. He was a proponent of Russian nationalism and militarism, and opposed democracy as a principle which he believed was tied to pacifism, internationalism, and socialism.

---

Charles Langelier, Canadian journalist, judge, and politician (born 1850)

Charles Langelier was a Canadian lawyer, politician, judge, journalist, and author.

---

07/02/1919

William Halford, English-American lieutenant, Medal of Honor recipient (born 1841)

William Halford was a sailor, and later an officer, in the United States Navy. He also received the Medal of Honor.

---

07/02/1897

Galileo Ferraris, Italian physicist and engineer (born 1847)

Galileo Ferraris was an Italian university professor, physicist and electrical engineer, one of the pioneers of AC power system and inventor of the induction motor, although he never patented his work. Many newspapers touted that his work on the induction motor and power transmission systems was one of the greatest inventions of all ages. He published an extensive and complete monograph on the experimental results obtained with open-circuit transformers of the type designed by the power engineers Lucien Gaulard and John Dixon Gibbs.

---

07/02/1891

Marie Louise Andrews, American story writer and journalist (born 1849)

Marie Louise Andrews was an American author and editor from Indiana. She was a founder of the Western Association of Writers, and served as its secretary from its founding until June 1888, when she retired. She was prolific in both verse and prose, but she never published her works in book form, and little of her work has been preserved.

---

07/02/1878

Pope Pius IX (born 1792)

Pope Pius IX was head of the Catholic Church from 1846 to 1878. His reign of nearly 32 years is the longest verified of any pope in history and second only to Saint Peter according to Catholic tradition. He was notable for convoking the First Vatican Council in 1868 which defined the dogma of papal infallibility before taking a break in summer of 1870. The council never reconvened. At the same time, France started the Franco-Prussian War and removed the troops that protected the Papal States, which allowed the Capture of Rome by the Kingdom of Italy on 20 September 1870. Thereafter, he refused to leave Vatican City, declaring himself a "prisoner in the Vatican".

---

07/02/1873

Sheridan Le Fanu, Irish author (born 1814)

Joseph Thomas Sheridan Le Fanu, often shortened to J. S. Le Fanu, was an Irish writer of Gothic tales and mystery novels. He is considered by literary critics to be among the greatest ghost story writers of the Victorian era, as several of his works were central to the development of the genre. In addition to short stories, Le Fanu was also the author of novels such as Uncle Silas (1864), macabre poems, and the collection of five stories In a Glass Darkly (1872), in which the novella Carmilla (1872) is significant as a foundational work of vampire literature.

---

07/02/1871

Henry E. Steinway, German-American businessman, founded Steinway & Sons (born 1797)

Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg, anglicized name Henry Engelhard Steinway, was a German-American piano maker. He was the founder of the piano company Steinway & Sons.

---

07/02/1864

Vuk Karadžić, Serbian philologist and linguist (born 1787)

Vuk Stefanović Karadžić was a Serbian philologist, anthropologist and linguist. He was one of the most important reformers of the modern Serbian language. Vuk Karadžić was a versatile scholar and the founder of several Serbian academic disciplines, with a significant contribution to historiography. For his collection and preservation of Serbian folktales, Encyclopædia Britannica labelled Karadžić "the father of Serbian folk-literature scholarship." He was also the author of the first Serbian dictionary in the new reformed language. In addition, he translated the New Testament into the reformed form of the Serbian spelling and language.

---

07/02/1862

Francisco de Paula Martínez de la Rosa y Berdejo, Spanish playwright and politician, Prime Minister of Spain (born 1787)

Francisco de Paula Martínez de la Rosa y Cornejo was a Spanish statesman and dramatist and the first prime minister of Spain to receive the title of President of the Council of Ministers.

---

07/02/1849

Mariano Paredes, Mexican general and 16th president (1845–1846) (born 1797)

José Mariano Epifanio Paredes y Arrillaga was a Mexican conservative general who served as president of Mexico between December 1845 and July 1846. He assumed office through a coup against the liberal administration led by José Joaquín de Herrera. He was the grandfather of 38th Mexican President Pedro Lascuráin Paredes.

---

07/02/1837

Gustav IV Adolf of Sweden (born 1778)

Gustav IV Adolf or Gustav IV Adolph was King of Sweden from 1792 until he was deposed in a coup in 1809. He was also the last Swedish monarch to be the ruler of Finland.

---

07/02/1823

Ann Radcliffe, English author (born 1764)

Ann Radcliffe was an English novelist who pioneered the Gothic novel, and a minor poet. Her fourth and most popular novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho, was published in 1794. She is also remembered for her third novel, The Romance of the Forest (1791) and her fifth novel, The Italian (1797). Her novels combine suspenseful narratives, exotic historical settings, and apparently-supernatural events.

---

07/02/1819

August Wilhelm Hupel, German-Estonian linguist and author (born 1737)

August Wilhelm Hupel was a Baltic German publicist, estophile and linguist.

---

07/02/1801

Daniel Chodowiecki, Polish-German painter and academic (born 1726)

Daniel Niklaus Chodowiecki was a German painter and printmaker of Huguenot and Polish ancestry, who is most famous as an etcher. He spent most of his life in Berlin, and became the director of the Berlin Academy of Art.

---

07/02/1799

Qianlong Emperor of China (born 1711)

The Qianlong Emperor, also known by his temple name Emperor Gaozong of Qing, personal name Hongli, was the fifth emperor of the Qing dynasty and the fourth Qing emperor to rule over China proper. He reigned officially from 1735 until his abdication and retirement in 1796, but retained ultimate power subsequently until his death in 1799, making him one of history's longest-reigning and longest-lived monarchs.

---

07/02/1779

William Boyce, English organist and composer (born 1711)

William Boyce was an English composer and organist. Like Beethoven later on, he became deaf but continued to compose. He knew Handel, Arne, Gluck, J.C. Bach, Abel, and a very young Mozart, all of whom respected his work.

---

07/02/1736

Stephen Gray, English astronomer and physicist (born 1666)

Stephen Gray was an English dyer and astronomer who was the first to systematically experiment with electrical conduction. Until his work in 1729 the emphasis had been on the simple generation of static charges and investigations of the static phenomena. Gray showed that electricity can be conducted through metals and that it appeared on the surfaces of insulators.

---

07/02/1693

Paul Pellisson, French lawyer and author (born 1624)

Paul Pellisson was a French writer, associated with the Baroque Précieuses movement.

---

07/02/1642

William Bedell, English bishop and academic (born 1571)

The Rt. Rev. William Bedell, D.D., was an English Anglican bishop who served as the 5th Provost of Trinity College Dublin from 1627 to 1629. He also served as Lord Bishop of Kilmore and as a member of the Irish House of Commons from January 1628 to July 1628.

---

07/02/1626

William V, Duke of Bavaria (born 1548)

William V, called the Pious, was the duke of Bavaria from 1579 to 1597.

---

07/02/1623

Thomas Cecil, 1st Earl of Exeter, English soldier and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Northamptonshire (born 1546)

Thomas Cecil, 1st Earl of Exeter, known as Lord Burghley from 1598 to 1605, was an English politician, courtier and soldier.

---

07/02/1603

Bartholomäus Sastrow, German politician (born 1520)

Bartholomäus Sastrow, sometimes anglicised Bartholomew, was a German official, notary, and mayor of Stralsund. He left a culturally and historically important autobiography, written in 1595 when he was 75 years of age. There is a plaque marking the site of his birth at Lange Straße 54 in Greifswald.

---

07/02/1560

Bartolommeo Bandinelli, Florentine sculptor (born 1493)

Baccio Bandinelli was an Italian Renaissance sculptor, draughtsman, and painter.

---

07/02/1520

Alfonsina de' Medici, Regent of Florence (born 1472)

Alfonsina Orsini was a regent of Florence. She governed the Republic of Florence during the absences of her son, Lorenzo II de' Medici, in the period of 1515–1519. Her rule was feared as a sign of the end of republican government there. She was born from a noble family and raised in the royal court of Naples. She was the spouse of Piero di Lorenzo de' Medici from 1488 and the mother of Lorenzo II de' Medici and two daughters. She helped restore the Medicis to power after they had been exiled, worked to secure a French royal marriage for her son, and was also influential at the court of Pope Leo X, her brother-in-law.

---

07/02/1333

Nikko, Japanese priest, founder of Nichiren Shoshu Buddhism (born 1246)

Nikkō Shōnin , Buddhist name Hawaki-bō Byakuren Ajari Nikkō (伯耆房白蓮阿闍梨日興), was one of the six senior disciples of Nichiren and was the former Chief Priest of Kuon-ji temple in Mount Minobu, Japan. Various Nichiren sects in Japan claim to have been founded by Nikkō, the most prominent being Nichiren Shōshū and some lineages within Nichiren Shū.

---

07/02/1320

Jan Muskata, Bishop of Kraków (born 1250)

Jan Muskata was bishop of Kraków from 1294 to 1309.

---

07/02/1317

Robert, Count of Clermont (born 1256)

Robert of Clermont was a French prince du sang who was created Count of Clermont in 1268. He was the sixth and last son of King Louis IX and Margaret of Provence.

---

07/02/1259

Thomas, Count of Flanders

Thomas II was the Lord of Piedmont from 1233 to his death, Count of Flanders jure uxoris from 1237 to 1244, and regent of the County of Savoy from 1253 to his death, while his nephew Boniface was fighting abroad. He was the son of Thomas I of Savoy and Margaret of Geneva.

---

07/02/1165

Marshal Stephen of Armenia

Stephen of Armenia was the marshal of Armenia, the son of Leo I, Prince of Armenia and Beatrice of Rethel.

---

07/02/1127

Ava, German poet (born 1060)

The poet Ava, also known as Frau Ava, Ava of Göttweig or Ava of Melk, was the first named female writer in any genre in the German language. She is the author of five poems which focus on Christian themes of salvation and the second coming of Christ. Her work on the lives of John the Baptist and Jesus "has been praised as the first German epic". Her simple rhyming couplets made complex biblical teachings accessible in the vernacular.

---

07/02/1065

Siegfried I, Count of Sponheim (born c. 1010)

Siegfried I is considered the progenitor of the Carinthian ducal House of Sponheim (Spanheimer) and all of its lateral branches, including the Counts of Lebenau and the Counts of Ortenburg. He is documented as Count of Sponheim from 1044 and served as margrave of the Hungarian March in 1045/46 and as count in the Puster Valley and the Lavant Valley from 1048 until his death.

---

07/02/1045

Emperor Go-Suzaku of Japan (born 1009)

Emperor Go-Suzaku was the 69th emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession.

---

07/02/0999

Boleslaus II the Pious, Duke of Bohemia (born 932)

Year 999 (CMXCIX) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar.

---

07/02/0318

Jin Mindi, emperor of the Jin Dynasty (born 300)

Emperor Min of Jin, personal name Sima Ye, courtesy name Yanqi (彥旗), was an emperor of the Jin dynasty and the last of the Western Jin.

---

07/02/0199

Lü Bu, Chinese warlord

Lü Bu, courtesy name Fengxian, was a Chinese general and warlord who lived during the late Eastern Han dynasty. Originally a subordinate of Ding Yuan, he murdered the minor warlord and defected to the powerful Dong Zhuo. In 192, he killed Dong Zhuo after being instigated by Wang Yun and Shisun Rui (士孙瑞), but was defeated and driven away from Chang'an by Dong Zhuo's followers.

---