Albert Einstein's String Instrument Fetches Nearly £1 Million at Bidding Event
A musical instrument formerly belonging to Albert Einstein has gone for £860k during a sale.
This 1894 Zunterer violin is believed as the scientist's initial instrument while being initially expected to fetch around £300k as it went on the block in South Cerney, Gloucestershire.
One philosophy book that Einstein gifted to an acquaintance also sold for the amount of £2,200.
Each of the final bids will have an additional 26.4% commission added on top, which means the total cost for Einstein's violin will rise above £1m.
Sale experts estimate that once the additional charges are applied, this auction may become the highest ever for a string instrument not previously owned by a concert violinist or created by the Stradivarius workshop – while the earlier record being held by an instrument which was likely played during the Titanic voyage.
One cycling saddle also owned by the physicist remained unsold in the bidding and could be re-listed.
Each of the objects presented in the sale were passed to his good friend and physicist Max von Laue in the latter part of 1932.
Shortly afterwards, the scientist escaped to the US to flee the increase of prejudice and Nazism in the country.
Max von Laue passed them on to an acquaintance and follower of the scientist, Margarete after twenty years, and it was a family member that has decided to sell them.
A second violin formerly possessed by Einstein, which was gifted to him when he arrived in the United States in 1933, was sold at auction for $516.5k (£370,000) in the United States in 2018.
