Born on April 27

Mughal empress and favorite wife of Emperor Shah Jahan. Her death in childbirth in 1631 inspired the construction of the Taj Mahal, a marble mausoleum raised to her memory that became one of the most famous monuments in the world.

French novelist and salonnière (1682–1749), she hosted one of the most influential literary salons of the eighteenth century in Paris. The mother who abandoned d'Alembert at birth, she is the author of sentimental and historical novels such as the Mémoires du comte de Comminge.

Mary Wollstonecraft was an 18th-century British philosopher and writer, a pioneer of feminism. Her landmark work, *A Vindication of the Rights of Woman* (1792), demands equal education and civil rights for women. She embodies Enlightenment thinking applied to the condition of women.

American inventor and painter (1791–1872), Samuel Morse is famous for developing the electric telegraph and the code that bears his name. His invention revolutionized long-distance communications in the 19th century.

Paul Gordan was a 19th-century German mathematician, famous for his work on invariant theory. Nicknamed the “king of invariant theory,” he left his mark on algebra through his mastery of calculations.

American civil rights activist and wife of Martin Luther King Jr. After her husband's assassination in 1968, she continued his fight for racial equality and peace, founding the King Center in Atlanta.

French actress born in 1932, Anouk Aimée established herself as one of the leading figures of European auteur cinema. Her role in *Un homme et une femme* by Claude Lelouch (1966) brought her international acclaim.

Aminata Sow Fall (born in 1941) is a pioneering Senegalese novelist of Francophone African literature. Her novel La Grève des Bàttu (1979) brought her international recognition and explores social inequalities in postcolonial Africa.