Famous People Born In 1494

Francis I, son of Charles, Count of Angoulême, was the king of France from 1515 to 1547. He was an art connoisseur and invited Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci to his court. His contribution to the promotion of French language earned him the title Father and Restorer of Letters.

François Rabelais was a French writer, Renaissance humanist, physician, monk, and Greek scholar. Regarded as one of the great writers by Western literary critics, Rabelais is also considered one of the creators of modern European writing. He is remembered for Gargantua and Pantagruel, a pentalogy of novels that are regarded as one of the earliest forms of the modern novel.

An ideal elite Renaissance woman, Bona Sforza was the queen of Poland and the wife of Sigismund I the Old. She is remembered for her fiery resistance to the Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian I, when he suggested Bona be planted as a Habsburg spy to counter the Jagiellonian dynasty.

Pontormo was an Italian Mannerist painter and portraitist from the Florentine School. His style was remarkably different from what characterized the art of the Florentine Renaissance. Orphaned young, he struggled for several years before he was able to establish his painting career. He painted many altarpiece canvases and frescoes, of which only a few survive today. 

Spanish Islamic scholar Leo Africanus is best remembered for his Description of Africa, which served as a relevant treatise on the geography of Africa. Educated in Morocco, he had traveled through places such as Aswan and Timbuktu. He was later captured and converted to Christianity as Giovanni Leone.

English scholar, William Tyndale, became a leading figure in the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. He is known for translating the Bible into English. An active writer, he wrote extensively on political issues and religion. He was accused of heresy and condemned to be burned to death. Executed in 1536, he is honored as a martyr.

Respectfully remembered for her attempts to defend Sweden against Christian II of Denmark, Christina Gyllenstierna was known simply as Lady Christina during her lifetime. A leader of the Swedish resistant, she defended Stockholm—besieged by land and sea—for four months before she was persuaded to capitulate in exchange for a letter of amnesty for her family and her followers.

Hans Tausen was a Danish Lutheran thelogian who served as a bishop in Ribe. He is credited with publishing the first translation of the Torah into Danish in 1535. The most important Lutheran theologian of his time, Tausen played a major role in effecting the transition from Catholicism to Lutheranism in the kingdoms governed by the Danish-based House of Oldenburg.