Not Just Physics: 43 Love Letters by Albert Einstein Sold at Christie’s for Half a Million Euros

Albert Einstein loved not only physics but also women. This is evidenced by his letters, which were sold at Christie's.  43 letters of the famous German scientist Albert Einstein addressed to his first wife Mileva Maric and written between February 1898 and September 1903 were put up for auction at Christie's in London. The lot was preliminarily estimated at 700,000-1,000,000 British pounds (848,624-1,212,320 euros). As a result, the letters were sold for 441,000 pounds (535,393 euros).

The letters not only provided an insight into the emotional world of young Albert Einstein, but also showed the development of his scientific theories. Einstein and Mileva Maric, a young Serbian woman, met at the ETH Zurich in 1896, when he was 17 and she was 20.

Einstein's Love Letters is the most important source on Einstein's early life and intellectual development, containing almost half of Einstein's correspondence that survived until the end of 1903, tracing the development of his early scientific thinking and his relationship with his first wife Mileva Maric, including the only known information about their daughter Lieserl, who was born the year before they were married.

Albert Einstein and Mileva Maric were married on 6 January 1903, and the lot includes an announcement of their marriage. The last letter from the correspondence sold at auction in London mentions Mileva's new pregnancy (her son Hans-Albert was born on 14 May 1904) and discusses the illness of their daughter Lieserl. Nothing more is known about Lieserl; it is assumed that she died of scarlet fever shortly after this letter.

A special love grew between Mieville and Albert: ‘With her, Einstein was able to combine his love life with his scientific life,’ says Renn, adding that ’they could talk about literally anything!’ Mileva was obviously on a par with Albert in mathematical matters. But experts are still debating Mileva's role in the development of relativity.

Albert Einstein's letters, which were kept for a long time in the Bern Historical Museum, were published in 2018. They show the genius of the century as a great romantic: ‘What an infinite happiness is the feeling that we are one soul together,’ he enthuses. - ‘Love makes us great and rich, and no God can take it away from us.