Sir Isaac Newton, Emily Dickenson, And Other Famous People From History Who Likely Died Virgins

In 2026, we’re very used to hearing about the extremely active sex lives of famous people (even when we really, really don’t want to). Basketball legend Wilt Chamberlain, for example — seen below in an absolutely ridiculous photo playing softball with Playboy bunnies — famously claimed to have bedded 20,000 women in his life!

He is one of the most famous names in science — everyone has heard the (likely apocryphal) story about the apple falling out of the tree, hitting him on the head, and sparking his discovery of gravity — but he’s also probably the most famous virgin in history. Newton never married, never had children, and was never romantically linked to anyone — there weren’t even rumors! That alone is unusual for a prominent public figure in 17th-century England. But what really seals it is the paper trail. Newton died leaving behind thousands of pages of letters, journals, and notebooks…all of which obsessed endlessly over mathematics, theology, alchemy, and petty rivalries (the man could hold a grudge). But mentions of romantic interest? Nope.

Biographers generally describe him as intensely private, socially withdrawn, emotionally isolated, and uncomfortable with intimacy. So, instead of putting effort into getting into a romantic relationship, he poured nearly all of his energy into work and religious obsession. Some modern writers have speculated that Newton may have been what we’d now describe as asexual, but they’re wary of making a retroactive diagnosis (after all, the dude has been in the ground for 300+ years).

Now this is the one example of a living celeb on the list. Lolo Jones created one of the most talked-about personal storylines of the 2012 Olympic cycle when she openly admitted she was a virgin and intended to stay that way until marriage. Jones — a two-time Summer Olympian and later a Winter Olympian as a bobsledder — told Bryant Gumbel, “It’s just something, a gift that I want to give to my husband … It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Harder than training for the Olympics.” Jones’ decision to remain a virgin until marriage is rooted in her deep belief in Christianity.

Eight years later, Jones said on the Tamron Hall Show that she was still a virgin as she approached 40, and that she froze her eggs to better her chances of having a child one day. “I don’t want another woman to feel stuck,” she said. “Like they don’t have power in this situation.” She added, “At 39, I felt the panic of everything coming down on me.”

This one will probably surprise you, considering how emotionally charged her poetry was, but there is no credible evidence that Emily Dickinson ever had a physical romantic relationship of any kind. Here’s the evidence (or lack thereof): Dickinson never married. She was never publicly linked to a lover. By her mid-30s, she had largely withdrawn from society. In time, she’d rarely leave her family home in Amherst and often communicated with visitors from behind closed doors. She also dressed almost exclusively in white later in life and lived a tightly controlled, ritualized existence. Huh.

Her writing, though, could be intense, and her letters, especially those addressed to her sister-in-law Susan Gilbert Dickinson, may have hinted at something more. For example, in one letter to Gilbert she wrote: “Susie, will you indeed come home next Saturday, and be my own again, and kiss me as you used to?” But overall, there’s not much written evidence of touch, sex, courtship, or physical intimacy.

Tesla’s work on alternating current (AC), radio, and electrical power literally changed the modern world. How many people can say that? But another side of Tesla’s life — his love life — wasn’t nearly as electric. Tesla never married or had any known romantic or sexual relationships with men or women during his life. A big reason why? He believed that abstaining from romance/sex actually helped him focus on his scientific work and invention.

In a 1924 interview with the Galveston Daily News, Tesla said, “Now the soft-voiced gentle woman of my reverent worship has all but vanished. In her place has come the woman who thinks that her chief success in life lies in making herself as much as possible like man — in dress, voice, and actions, in sports and achievements of every kind.” Make of that quote what you will, but it is often cited by biographers as part of Tesla’s broader explanation for why he was celibate. Tesla didn’t have a lover or partner, but he did have…a white pigeon. He cared for the pigeon in his later years and told friends, “I loved that pigeon as a man loves a woman … as long as I had her, there was a purpose to my life.” Well, okay!

Florence Nightingale is like the patron saint of nursing — her heroic work during the Crimean War and afterward, both helping patients and seeking reform, basically created modern professional nursing. But one thing she didn’t contribute to is the stereotype of the sexy nurse…because she seems to have never had a romantic or sexual relationship. Born into a wealthy Victorian family, a teenage Nightingale believed she’d received a “calling” from God to help the sick and poor. Her parents wanted her to marry and raise a family, but Nightingale chose nursing instead, telling them she refused to marry. Historians note that there were suitors — at least one prominent politician and writer proposed — but Nightingale turned them down because she believed marriage would interfere with her “God-given work.”

Today many wonder if Nightingale’s close friendships might have contained romantic elements — or whether she may have been aromantic or asexual — but, like many of the people on this list from the past, there’s just no evidence to confirm it. Some conjecture she may have been gay and, times being what they were, was forced to quietly pursue love and sex. But you know what? If she were celibate, like Tesla and Newton, they all changed the world for the better. If doing that meant sacrificing getting a little action, then we owe them a debt of gratitude!

The Scottish playwright and novelist best known for Peter Pan had one of the most unusual personal lives among major literary figures (and that’s saying something). In 1894, Barrie married actor Mary Ansell, whom he’d met through the London theatre world. The wedding was modest and private, and the couple never had children. What makes this marriage particularly striking is that it was reportedly never consummated. They separated in 1909 after Mary had an affair with another man, and evidence from the divorce proceedings confirmed they never, you know.

In his fiction, Barrie seemed to explore this dimension indirectly: in the semi-autobiographical novel Tommy and Grizel, a character laments, “Grizel, I seem to be different from all other men; there seems to be some curse upon me… You are the only woman I ever wanted to love, but apparently I can’t.” After the divorce, Barrie became closely involved with the Llewelyn Davies family, especially their five sons, who inspired Peter Pan. Over the years, there have been a lot of innuendos suggesting he was a pedophile, but no evidence of sexual abuse has ever been found.

Hans Christian Andersen’s writing — notably fairy tales like The Little Mermaid or The Princess and the Pea — don’t exactly scream sex or steamy romance. That’s fitting, because, like fellow author J.M. Barrie, Andersen never married nor had a known sexual relationship in his life. Andersen, who was likely bisexual, crushed hard on both men and women, notably Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind and Edvard Collin, the son of a Danish statesman. But his love for them was unrequited. Andersen pursued other men in letters, but none of those relationships were consummated either. So what’s the deal with poor Hans? You’d think he would’ve been able to find someone to return his affections; he was a famous author, after all. Well, one explanation for his virginity is that he was anxious and flustered about sex (whether due to sexual fear/aversion, guilt/shame, or intense sensitivity).

His diary entries (side note: Did EVERYBODY keep a diary back then or what?) often describe him as trembling and feeling overwhelmed in sexual situations, such as when men suggested they go meet women, and he yelled “No! No!” and ran home. Another entry tells how, at age 61, he finally dared to step inside a brothel, something he always wanted to do, but failed to have sex: “Four girls came up to me; the youngest was no more than eighteen. I asked her to stay — she wore a simple dress. I felt very sorry for her.” He paid the madame five francs, but “didn’t do anything; just looked at the poor child, who was totally ashamed, and was surprised that I only looked at her.”

Queen Elizabeth’s hold on the throne was always tenuous. The daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, she was declared illegitimate after her parents’ marriage was annulled and her mother was executed. (Not to get too deep into the royal weeds here, but the charges against Anne were largely a sham, ginned up so Henry could marry someone else.) And when Elizabeth finally did ascend to the throne — after her brother Edward VI and her sister Mary I both died — many still didn’t view her as their rightful ruler. So how did she manage to reign for 44 years? One way was by never taking a husband and branding herself as the “Virgin Queen.”

But did the “Virgin Queen” literally die a virgin? Historians aren’t sure. Some think she was secretly getting action (or even secretly married!), and point to her intensely close emotional relationship with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Contemporary observers gossiped endlessly about their closeness, and foreign ambassadors routinely reported rumors that Dudley had access to the queen’s private chambers late at night. Maybe, but none of those claims have ever been substantiated with hard evidence. And no surviving letters, medical records, eyewitness testimony, or contemporary documentation prove that Elizabeth ever had a sexual relationship. It’s a very real possibility that she did indeed never lose her virginity. Sex, after all, would be a real threat to her power. Imagine the fallout if the “Virgin Queen” got pregnant!

Here’s a shocking, if true, but admittedly ambiguous, one. Andy Warhol — the pop art provocateur behind the avant-garde film Blow Job and the “Sex Parts” series — might never have had sex himself. Even past fifty years old, Warhol still claimed in interviews to be a virgin, and wrote bluntly about his lack of interest in physical relationships for much of his life, describing himself as someone who got “nervous around people physically.” He also wrote in his book The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, “The most exciting thing is not-doing-it. If you fall in love with someone and never do it, it’s much more exciting.” This all jibes with Andy Warhol, as you picture him, as a voyeuristic artist more interested in observing and documenting than anything else.

Of course, I said the case for Warhol’s virginity was ambiguous, and that’s because others scoff at the notion. Author and 80s-era Club Kid Dianne Brill said on the Night Fever podcast, “Well, he did have a big penis, and he did have sex,” while others said the whole virginity claim was just a persona he wanted to cultivate, one that distanced him from sex and made his art more marketable. Also, could he really have spent so much time in hedonistic, drug-fueled, and sexually charged atmospheres like The Factory and Studio 54 without even once getting in on the action? I’ll let you decide.

Kant was not only one of the most influential philosophers who ever lived, but was also legendary for his obsessively regimented lifestyle. Neighbors in Königsberg (in modern day Russia) supposedly set their clocks by his daily afternoon walk because it happened at the exact same minute every day. Chaos was not welcome in the Kant household. That extreme self-control extended to his romantic life (or lack thereof). Kant never married, never had kids, and left behind no record of any romantic or sexual relationships of any kind. His surviving letters and biographies are packed with dense philosophy, ethical theory, and metaphysics, but nothing about the longings of the heart (or loins).

And when Kant did write about sex in his philosophical work, it was mostly to warn against it. In Lectures on Ethics, he described sexual desire as something that reduces people to objects and disrupts rational self-control, arguing that unchecked passion threatens human dignity and moral clarity. Biographers posit Kant likely lived a celibate life, mainly because it didn’t fit into his hyper-disciplined worldview. He preferred clean logic, predictable routines, and intellectual purity over emotional messiness or physical indulgence.