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Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla -

Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla engaged in what was described at the time as the "war of the currents"—AC versus DC, the electrical currents each inventor favored. But the rivalry between Tesla and Edison was more than a battle of ideas. It was also a financial war between companies, the prize being the ability to power America.

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Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier -

Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier shared sport's greatest ever rivalry, which lasted for decades. In the 1970s, the two undefeated heavyweights squared off in a trilogy of matches. Frazier won only the first, the third being the famous October 1, 1975, "Thrilla in Manila." Frazier took much of the abuse on the chin, but in later years refused to reconcile with his former tormentor.

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Benjamin Disraeli and William Gladstone -

William Gladstone and Benjamin Disraeli put a new spin on being in opposition. Both served terms as the prime minister of Great Britain under Queen Victoria, Gladstone as a Liberal politician, Disraeli as a Conservative. Each loathed the other, their politics as well as their personalities clashing on numerous occasions.

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Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr -

At dawn on July 11, 1804, Alexander Hamilton, the first and former US secretary of the treasury, and Aaron Burr, the third US vice president at the time, drew pistols after Burr had challenged Hamilton to a dual, the culmination of a bitter rivalry that had developed over years between the two men. Burr shot and mortally wounded his antagonist, who died the following day.

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House of Lancaster and House of York -

A royal family squabble led to the Wars of the Roses (1455 to 1487), a series of brutal civil wars for the English throne fought between the House of Lancaster and the House of York. Peace was finally restored when Lancastrian Henry VII married Elizabeth of York and a new royal dynasty emerged.

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Zora Hurston and Langston Hughes -

American poet Langston Hughes famously had a falling out with his friend and literary partner Zora Neale Hurston, after the latter listed herself as the sole author of their 1930 play 'Mule Bone,' a work Hughes insisted was a joint effort. As the collaborative encounter dissolved, it was suggested that Hurston's actions may have been motivated by unrequited love on the part of Hughes, who some scholars believe was homo******.

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Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots -

The bitter feud between Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots is a story of two women who were cousins and rivals in power. Elizabeth, the Protestant (and likely illegitimate) offspring of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, claimed the English throne. Catholics, however, favored Mary. Elizabeth ultimately settled the score by signing Mary's death warrant in 1587.

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Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur -

A vendetta that ended violently and in a blaze of publicity, the long-running feud between rap artists Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls—essentially a East Coast-West Coast musical turf war—concluded tragically, first with the murder of Tupac on September 7, 1996, in a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas, and then later with the slaying of Smalls on March 8, 1997, in Los Angeles. In November 2023, former street gang leader Duane Keith Davis pled not guilty to murdering Shakur.

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Adolf and Rudolf Dassler -

In 1919, German brothers Adolf ("Adi") and Rudolf ("Rudi") Dassler founded an athletic shoe manufacturing company. In 1948, the siblings abruptly closed the business, thus sparking one of the most bizarre feuds of recent history. This fraternal fracas led to Adi establishing Adidas, with Rudi setting up Puma. These two international sporting goods companies are headquartered in the same town, Herzogenaurach.

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Joan Crawford and Bette Davis -

The rivalry between silver screen icons Bette Davis and Joan Crawford is the stuff of legend. For decades the two actresses openly detested each other. Then in 1962, with the careers of both on the wane, the pair starred opposite each other in the psychological horror movie 'Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?' Ironically, the bitter Hollywood feuding between the film's two stars was pivotal to the picture's success.

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Akō vendetta -

The Akō vendetta of 1701 ranks as one of the most infamous feuds in Japanese history. It began after Asano Naganori, a shogun (or hereditary military dictator), attacked and injured his former teacher, Kira Yoshihisa. Asano was arrested and later forced to take his own life by committing seppuka. His death left his 47 samurai leaderless to become ronin, or wandering samurai. To avenge their master, the 47 ronin captured and beheaded Kira. But following tradition, they themselves were obliged to commit ritualistic seppuku for the crime of murder.

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Margaret Drabble and A.S. Byatt -

The sibling rivalry between English sisters and literary luminaries Margaret Drabble and A.S. Byatt had simmered since childhood. It boiled over into adulthood when younger sister Drabble published her first novel ahead of Byatt, who aspired to a similar achievement (she was published for the first time the following year). While both were hugely successful in later years, the damage done was beyond repair. The conflict between the two ended only with Byatt's death in 2023.

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Campbells and MacDonalds -

The Campbells and MacDonalds, two rival Scottish Highland clans with a propensity for rustling cattle, had a long history of feuding. But when the MacDonalds refused to pledge allegiance to King William and Queen Mary, a group of enraged Campbell family members readily enlisted into a government regiment that rode into MacDonald territory in Glencoe. The unsuspecting MacDonalds hosted their guests as was the tradition. But on the night of February 12, 1692, the regiment attacked and killed 38 men, women, and children in what became known as the Glencoe Massacre. Many more died of exposure in freezing conditions after evading the onslaught.

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Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk -

There's no love lost between tech giants Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk. The two billionaires have been feuding on and off for 15 years. Amazon founder Bezos and Musk, SpaceX chief and CEO of Tesla, have been trading insults since 2004, with both immersed in a bumpy ride to launch a viable space tourism product.

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John Keats and Lord Byron -

The English romantic poets Lord Byron and John Keats clashed on several levels. Byron, snobbish and privileged, looked down on his middle-class rival. Byron disliked Keats's poetry on an aesthetic level. Keats in return considered Byron's overrated, slavish, and unoriginal. Neither lived long: Keats died in 1821, aged 25; Byron passed away in 1824, aged 36.

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Henry Winkler and Tom Hanks -

For a while, Henry Winkler and Tom Hanks shared a curious feud that was confirmed by director Ron Howard after reported differences between the pair surfaced during the shooting of the 1989 film 'Turner & Hooch.' Winkler was hired as the original director of the movie, but was fired for allegedly not becoming friends with Hanks. Howard later elaborated, saying their relationship "was disappointing."

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Steve Jobs and Bill Gates -

Two names synonymous with the personal computer revolution, Steve Jobs and Bill Gates engaged in a feud for many years, characterized by insults, lawsuits, and betrayals. Paradoxically, their love-hate relationship spurred the success of Microsoft and Apple. By all accounts, the two had settled their differences before Jobs' passing from cancer in 2011.

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Kenny Baker and Anthony Daniels -

This particular feud could also be described as that between CP30 and R2D2. Actors Anthony Daniels and Kenny Baker respectively played the roles of the two droids in the 'Star Wars' franchise. But Daniels had nothing but contempt for his co-star. The dislike was mutual. In an interview with Hollywood.com, Baker complained that, "Anthony doesn't mix at all... Once, when I said hello to him, he just turned his back on me and said, 'Can't you see I'm having a conversation?' I was blazing with rage."

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Richard Owen and Charles Darwin -

English naturalist, geologist, and biologist Charles Darwin is the author of 'On the Origin of Species,' published in 1859 and considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. Richard Owen, another eminent biologist who coined the term dinosauria from where we get the word dinosaur, was an outspoken critic of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. Their spat ended up being played out in the English newspapers, with each badmouthing the other in print.

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Hatfields and McCoys -

The long vendetta between the Hatfields and the McCoys has gone down in American history as one of the most legendary family feuds ever recorded. The animosity between the two warring Appalachian clans boiled over in 1878 after the alleged theft of a hog. After that, the bloodletting started, culminating in the infamous 1888 New Year's Day ambush that left several members of the McCoy family dead. It was only during the second decade of the 20th century that the feuding ended.

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Sarah Jessica Parker and Kim Cattrall -

There was enough drama surrounding the feud between Sarah Jessica Parker and her 'S** and the City' castmate Kim Cattrall to make a separate show, such was the animosity between the two actresses. A difference in salary was the main culprit, but a genuine dislike for one another also fueled this very personal conflict.

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Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin -

For 63 days, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, two of the most influential figures in the history of art, shared an intense and turbulent friendship while living together in a house in Arles, France, at the end of 1888. But their relationship had a competitive undercurrent. Gauguin, for example, chose to paint some of the same subjects as van Gogh. A clash of personality only made things more fraught, with van Gogh especially becoming more erratic. Eventually Gauguin made a fateful decision to leave Arles. What happened next depends on the historian you choose to believe. In one version, a distraught van Gogh has a mental breakdown and cuts off the lower part of his left ear. In another, Gauguin severs his rival's ear with a sword during an argument.

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Roger Waters and David Gilmour -

What started out as a musical difference of opinion ended up forming a bitter divide between Pink Floyd's Roger Waters and David Gilmore. The relationship was already crumbling in 1979 as the band was recording the classic album 'The Wall.' It soured completely when Waters walked away in 1984 and Gilmore carried on using the band's name. Despite a brief reunion for 2005's Live 8 concert, Waters and Gilmore have never really buried the hatchet.

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Sterling Clark and Stephen Clark -

Brothers Robert Sterling Clark (better-known by his middle name) and Stephen Carlton Clark were the sole heirs, along with two other brothers, to the Singer sewing machine fortune. But in 1923 when Sterling married his French mistress, who had a daughter from a previous affair, he demanded that the family's trust fund be extended to his new bride and her child. Stephen Clark refused to agree to the change. In response, Sterling withdrew his quarter of the trust's assets, sold his properties, and never spoke to his brother again.

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Al Capone and Bugs Moran -

Two of the most notorious gangsters of the 1920s, Chicago mobsters Al Capone and Bugs Moran fostered an intense rivalry for control of the illegal liquor trade during the Prohibition era in the United States. Their feuding reached a bloody climax in one of the most infamous crimes in modern American history, the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Seven of Moran's gang were murdered on February 14, 1929, though Capone denied any responsibility for the atrocity.

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Norman Mailer and Gore Vidal -

Public spats and even a punch-up characterized the long-running feud between author and playwright Norman Mailer and the writer Gore Vidal. At one point in 1971, Vidal compared Mailer to Charles Manson. Later, Mailer headbutted his nemesis, calling him "a liar and a hypocrite."

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Brian Wilson and Mike Love -

Creative differences are often cited for the reason behind a band splitting up, or discord between musicians. The relationship between Brian Wilson and Mike Love of The Beach Boys had been fraught since the mid-1960s. Tensions resurfaced in 1990 when Love sued his bandmate for compensation for songs he had co-written with Wilson. Love was partially victorious, but bad vibrations between the two musicians still exist to this day.

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Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna -

The rivalry between Brazilian Ayrton Senna and Frenchman Alain Prost is perhaps one of the most famous in Formula One history. They were certainly the protagonists of the greatest F1 duels, spanning over several seasons. And off the track, theirs was never the friendliest of relationships.

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Billy Martin and George Steinbrenner -

But perhaps the most epic of rivalries in sport was that between Billy Martin and George Steinbrenner. Outspoken New York Yankees owner Steinbrenner and cocky manager Martin clashed on numerous occasions. Martin was hired and fired no less than five times between 1975 and 1985, though he did manage to lead the Yankees to a World Series win in 1977.

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Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan -

In a story worthy of a movie—we'll come to that in a minute—figure skater Tonya Harding was at the center of one of the biggest sports scandals in recent history after being implicated in the January 1994 attack on her rival Nancy Kerrigan, struck in the knee with a baton by an assailant hired by Kerrigan's husband. The episode served as inspiration for the 2017 film 'I, Tonya.'

Sources: (History) (Smithsonian Magazine) (The Guardian) (Hollywood.com) (Los Angeles Times) (CBS News) (Far Out Magazine) (Stacker) 

See also: Historic rivalries that shaped the world

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