Senesino

Francesco Bernardi, known as Senesino, was a celebrated Italian contralto castrato, particularly remembered today for his long collaboration with the composer George Frideric Handel. He was also involved in a public scandal with the soprano Anastasia Robinson in 1724 which was circulated widely by the satirist Jonathan Swift, and inspired a number of anonymously written obscene, misogynistic, and at times sexually subversive epistles written between 1724 and 1736 which have become a topic of study among scholars of Restoration literature.

31 October 1686

Born on the same birth day (31 October): Ad-Rock • Antonio Davis • Dave Trembley • Hedvig Taube • Hedwig, Abbess of Quedlinburg • Irina Denezhkina • Jimmy Savile • Joe West (umpire) • John Evelyn • John Keats • Jordan Bannister • Joseph Gelineau • Judith Wilcox, Baroness Wilcox • Julia Lee (musician) • Mari Jungstedt • Marie Louise Andrews • Mercedes Arn-Horn • Michalis Chrisochoidis • Mikkey Dee • Neal Stephenson • Robert Rheault • Ron Rifkin • Sally Kirkland

Born in the same month (October 1686): Allan Ramsay (poet)