Year 414 (CDXIV) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Constantius and Constans (or, less frequently, year 1167 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 414 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Chris Austin Hadfield, O.Ont, MSC, CD (born 29 August 1959) is a Canadian astronaut from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) who was the first Canadian to walk in space. Hadfield has flown two space shuttle missions, STS-74 in 1995 and STS-100 in 2001. He has served as CAPCOM for both Space Shuttle and International Space Station (ISS) expeditions. He is currently training for a long duration stay on board the ISS, which will include command of Expedition 35 in 2012–13. He will be the first Canadian to command the ISS. He is enthusiastic about the prospects for a manned mission to Mars, and when asked if he would consider a one-way journey to Mars to be the first to visit, he said "I would be honoured to be given the opportunity."

Chris Hadfield was born in Sarnia, Ontario. His parents are Roger and Eleanor Hadfield who currently reside in Milton, Ontario. Hadfield was raised on a corn farm in southern Ontario and became interested in flying at a young age—from his own words in the interview to STRF.RU, he came to the idea of being astronaut when he was nine on the day of Apollo moon landing, which he had seen on TV then. Hadfield is married to his high-school girlfriend Helene Hadfield, and they have three adult children together.

Vladimir Davidovich Ashkenazy (Russian: Владимир Давидович Ашкенази, Vladimir Davidovič Aškenazi; born July 6, 1937) is a Russian-Icelandic conductor and pianist. Since 1972 he has been a citizen of Iceland, his wife Þórunn's country of birth. Since 1978, because of his many obligations in Europe, he and his family have resided in Meggen, near Lucerne in Switzerland. He is currently Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

Ashkenazy was born in Gorky, Soviet Union (now Nizhny Novgorod, Russia), to the pianist and composer David Ashkenazi and to the actress Yevstolia Grigorievna, born Plotnova. His father was Jewish and his mother was the daughter of a family of Russian Orthodox peasants. He began playing piano at the age of six and, showing prodigious talent, was accepted to the Central Music School at age eight studying with Anaida Sumbatyan. Ashkenazy went on to graduate from the Moscow Conservatory where he studied with Lev Oborin and Boris Zemliansky, winning second prize in the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1955 and the first prize in the Queen Elisabeth Music Competition in Brussels in 1956. He shared the first prize in the 1962 International Tchaikovsky Competition with British pianist John Ogdon. As a student, like many in that period, he was harassed by the KGB to become an "informer." He did not really cooperate, and despite pressures from the authorities, in 1961 married the Iceland-born Þórunn Jóhannsdóttir, who studied piano at the Moscow Conservatory. To marry Ashkenazy, Þórunn was forced to give up her Icelandic citizenship and declare that she wanted to live in the USSR.