The top 20 women

THE top 20 women who changed the world as voted by readers of BBC History magazine are:

1. Marie Curie (scientist)

2. Rosa Parks (civil rights activist)

3. Emmeline Pankhurst (suffragette)

4. Ada Lovelace (computer pioneer)

5. Rosalind Franklin (chemist)

6. Margaret Thatcher (Prime Minister)

7. Angela Burdett-coutts (philanthropist)

8. Mary Wollstonecraft (women’s rights)

9. Florence Nightingale (nurse)

10. Marie Stopes (birth control pioneer)

11. Eleanor of Aquitaine (wife of Henry II)

12. The Virgin Mary

13. Jane Austen (novelist)

14. Boudicca (ancient warrior queen)

15. Diana, Princess of Wales

16. Amelia Earhart (pioneering pilot)

17. Queen Victoria

18. Josephine Butler (social reformer)

19. Mary Seacole (Crimea War nurse)

20. Mother Teresa (missionary)