Throughout history, countless women have broken barriers, challenged expectations, and changed the course of the world through their courage, leadership, discoveries, and achievements. Their influence can still be seen today across politics, science, the arts, human rights, and countless other fields. Here are 28 women who changed history forever.
Cleopatra VII
Cleopatra was the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt. Fluent in several languages, she formed alliances with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony in a final attempt to preserve Egypt's independence before it became a Roman province.
Joan of Arc
At just 17 years old, Joan of Arc helped lift the Siege of Orléans in 1429 during the Hundred Years' War. She was captured, tried for heresy, and executed at age 19 before later being declared a saint.
Marie Curie
Marie Curie became the first person to win Nobel Prizes in two different scientific fields. She discovered the elements polonium and radium and pioneered research into radioactivity.
Rosa Parks
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to surrender her bus seat in Montgomery, Alabama. Her arrest sparked the 381-day Montgomery Bus Boycott, a defining moment in the American Civil Rights Movement.
Harriet Tubman
After escaping slavery herself, Harriet Tubman returned to the South around 13 times and helped lead roughly 70 enslaved people to freedom through the Underground Railroad.
Florence Nightingale
During the Crimean War, Florence Nightingale dramatically reduced hospital death rates by improving sanitation. Her statistical research also transformed modern nursing and hospital design.
Empress Wu Zetian
Wu Zetian remains the only woman to rule China as emperor in her own right. During her reign, the imperial examination system expanded and government positions increasingly rewarded merit over noble birth.
Queen Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I ruled England for 44 years during the Elizabethan Age. Her reign saw the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 and the flourishing of English literature.
Ada Lovelace
Ada Lovelace wrote what is widely recognized as the first computer algorithm while working on Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine. She also predicted that computers could someday create music and images.
Catherine the Great
Catherine the Great ruled Russia from 1762 to 1796. Under her leadership, the empire expanded significantly while embracing many Enlightenment ideas.
Susan B. Anthony
Susan B. Anthony spent more than 50 years campaigning for women's voting rights in the United States. Although she died before women gained the vote nationwide in 1920, her activism laid the groundwork for the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Emmeline Pankhurst
Emmeline Pankhurst founded the Women's Social and Political Union in 1903. Her organization used marches, protests, and hunger strikes to push for women's suffrage in Britain.
Anne Frank
While hiding from German persecution during World War II, Anne Frank documented everyday life in her diary. After the war, it became one of the world's most widely read books.
Amelia Earhart
In 1932, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Her disappearance during an around-the-world flight in 1937 remains one of aviation's greatest mysteries.
Sacagawea
Sacagawea guided and interpreted for the Lewis and Clark Expedition across the American West. Her knowledge of local geography and languages proved invaluable.
Eleanor Roosevelt
After serving as First Lady of the United States, Eleanor Roosevelt chaired the committee that drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948.
Jane Goodall
Beginning in 1960, Jane Goodall transformed scientists' understanding of chimpanzees by documenting tool use, hunting behavior, and complex social relationships in the wild.
Hedy Lamarr
Known as a Hollywood actress, Hedy Lamarr also co-invented a frequency-hopping communication system during World War II. The idea later influenced technologies including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS.
Indira Gandhi
Indira Gandhi became India's first and only female prime minister. She led the country through the 1971 war that resulted in the creation of Bangladesh.
Wangari Maathai
Wangari Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, which helped women plant tens of millions of trees across Kenya. In 2004, she became the first African woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize.
Malala Yousafzai
After surviving an assassination attempt in 2012, Malala Yousafzai became a global advocate for girls' education. At age 17, she became the youngest Nobel Prize laureate in history.
Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo created around 150 paintings, many depicting her physical pain and identity after a devastating bus accident. Her work became a symbol of Mexican art and feminism.
Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa founded the Missionaries of Charity in 1950. The organization grew to operate hundreds of missions caring for the poor, sick, and dying around the world.
Boudica
Around AD 60, Boudica led a massive uprising against Roman rule in Britain. Her forces destroyed several Roman settlements before the rebellion was eventually crushed.
Rachel Carson
Rachel Carson published Silent Spring in 1962, exposing the environmental dangers of pesticides like DDT. The book helped launch the modern environmental movement.
Hypatia
Hypatia taught mathematics, astronomy, and philosophy in Alexandria during the late Roman Empire. She became one of history's best-known female scholars after her murder in AD 415.
Queen Victoria
Victoria ruled the United Kingdom for nearly 64 years, longer than any British monarch until the 21st century. The Victorian Era saw rapid industrialization and the expansion of the British Empire.
Elizabeth Blackwell
In 1849, Elizabeth Blackwell became the first woman to earn a medical degree in the United States. She later founded hospitals and medical colleges that opened new opportunities for women in medicine.
