Real people named in the first chapter are:

-Nathaniel Hawthorne (Preface to "The House of the Seven Gables"): He lived from 1804 to 1864 in U.S.A. and was an American novelist.

-Robert Browning (Mr Sludge, The Medium): He was born in 1812 and died in 1889. In his life he was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues. He became one of the foremost Victorian poets.

-Thomas Carlyle: (4 December 1795 – 5 February 1881) was a Scottish satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher. He lived during the Victorian era and was a Calvinist.

-George Eliot: (1819-1880) Her pen name was George Eliot, but her real name was Mary Anne Evans. She was an English novelist, journalist and translator.

-Giambattista Vico: (1668-1744) He was an Italian political philosopher, rhetorician, historian, and jurist.

-Frederic Leighton, 1st Baron Leighton (3 December 1830–25 January 1896), known as Sir Frederic Leighton, between 1886 and 1896 was an English painter and sculptor. His works depicted historical, biblical and classical subject matter.

-Edward Gibbon:   (April 27, 1737– January 16, 1794) was an English historian and Member of Parliament. His most important work was The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

-Venerable Bede: (673-735) he was a monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth. He was a famous author and scholar: he had the title of  "The Father of English History" for his important work Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum.

-Christina Rossetti: (1830-1894) She lived from 1830 to 1894 and was an English poet who wrote a variety of romantic, devotional and children's poems.