The first Nobel Prizes were awarded
On this day · 10 December 1901
On December 10, 1901, five inaugural Nobel Prizes were handed out, five years to the day after Alfred Nobel died.
On December 10, 1901, the very first Nobel Prizes were presented, honoring work in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, and peace. Four were given in Stockholm; the Peace Prize was awarded separately in Christiania, the city now called Oslo.
The roll of first laureates is a who’s who of their era. Wilhelm Röntgen took physics for discovering X-rays, Jacobus van ‘t Hoff chemistry, and Emil von Behring medicine for his diphtheria antitoxin. Sully Prudhomme won the literature prize, while the peace award was split between Red Cross founder Henry Dunant and Frédéric Passy.
The ceremony fell exactly five years after Nobel’s death, the moment his will had quietly set in motion.
The dynamite magnate had left most of his fortune to fund the prizes, a bequest his relatives contested and lawyers spent years untangling. That the awards happened at all was something of an achievement. More than a century on, December 10 remains the fixed date for every Nobel ceremony.
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