The Local: Swedish industrialist and scholar Alfred Nobel (1833-1896), who made a substantial fortune from his invention of dynamite in 1866, established the Nobel Prizes in his will.

His 1895 testament stipulated his fortune was to be placed in a fund destined to honour “those who, during the preceding year, shall have conferred the greatest benefit on mankind.”

He died a year later in San Remo, Italy.

He had decreed the bulk of his estate should be invested in “safe securities,” and as a result, some 31.5 million Swedish kronor, the equivalent today of about 1.5 billion kronor ($222 million) were used to create the Nobel Foundation.