Our list of the twenty richest, based on scholarly estimates and adjusted for inflation, includes entrepreneurs, warriors, and robber barons. We did not include monarchs, whose vast wealth is considered public.
Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and Carlos Slim are the only living men who crack the list — and that’s only counting their net worth at bubble peaks.
You’ll notice much of the list come from England and America. Partly this happens because that’s where estimates were available. But it’s also true extreme private wealth occurred only several times in history, such as: The great lords of England, the Gilded Age, and today’s credit bubble.
The 20 Richest People Of All Time are:
- John D. Rockefelle
- Andrew Carnegie
- William The Conqueror
- Cornelius Vanderbilt
- Alan Rufus
- Bill Gates
- William de Warenne
- John Jacob Astor
- Richard Fitzalan 10th Earl of Arundel
- Stephen Girard
- John of Gaunt
- A.T. Stewart
- Frederick Weyerhaeuser
- Henry Duke of Lancaster
- Jay Gould
- Stephen Van Rensselaer
- Marshall Field
- Sam Walton
- Warren Buffett
- Carlos Slim
