A prestigious prize

The Nobel Prize is considered the most prestigious award in the world. Prize-winning discoveries include X-rays, radioactivity and penicillin. Peace laureates include Nelson Mandela and the 14th Dalai Lama. Nobel laureates in literature have thrilled readers with works such as One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel García Márquez) and The Grass is Singing (Doris Lessing).

Every year in early October, the world turns its gaze towards Sweden and Norway as the Nobel laureates are announced in Stockholm and Oslo. And on 10 December, the Nobel Day, award ceremonies take place in Stockholm and Oslo. Since 1901 prizes in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace have been awarded.

In 1968, Sweden’s central bank (Sveriges Riksbank) also established the Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel. The prize is based on a donation received by the Nobel Foundation in 1968 from the central bank to mark the bank’s 300th anniversary. This prize is awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, following the same principles as the Nobel Prizes.

The man behind the prize

The Nobel Prize is the legacy of Alfred Nobel, a chemist, engineer, inventor and entrepreneur. Nobel was born on 21 October 1833 in Stockholm, Sweden, and died on 10 December 1896 in San Remo, Italy.

When he signed his last will in 1895, Nobel declared that his remaining assests – totalling more than SEK 31 million – should be converted into a fund and that the interest should be distributed annually as prizes to ‘those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind’.

Nobel’s own inventions include a blasting cap, dynamite and smokeless gunpowder. He became famous across the world when the St. Gotthard Tunnel in the Swiss Alps was completed in 1881 and dynamite was used for the first time on a large scale.

At the time of his death, Nobel held 355 patents in different countries. There were Nobel companies in more than 20 countries, with explosives of all kinds being manufactured under his patents in around 90 factories worldwide. Nobel lived and worked in many countries, including Sweden, Russia, France, the UK, Germany and Italy.