The scientific library of the late Nobel Prize-winner Professor Peter Higgs, is expected to fetch up to £25,000 at auction this month.
The theoretical physicist was best known for his 1964 prediction of the “Higgs Boson”, also known as the “God particle”, which helps to explain why the most basic building blocks of the universe have mass.
He shared the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physics with François Englert for the work, which was confirmed by experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider in 2012.
Higgs died in April last year aged 94 at his home in the New Town, leaving a personal library comprising over 280 scientific volumes published between 1937 and the 2000s.
The books, almost all of which feature Higgs’ handwritten ownership inscriptions on the fly leaf, are being offered for sale by his family.
They will go under the hammer in Bonhams’ sale of Books, Atlases and Manuscripts, running online from 10-19 November. Offered as a single lot, the collection is estimated to fetch £15,000-25,000.
Matthew Haley, Bonhams UK Head of Books, said the collection offered a unique insight into the books that helped inform Higgs’ genius.
He said: “We are delighted to be able to offer Professor Higgs’ personal library. This collection gives a compelling insight into the books he was exploring throughout his life. In the words of Isaac Newton, he was ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’.
“What makes these books so special is that almost all of them have his ownership inscription inside.”
The books formed Higgs’ scientific reading material dating back to the 1940s when he studied physics at King’s College, London.
They also helped inform Higgs during his research fellowship at University College and Imperial College in the 1950s, and at the University of Edinburgh where, following his appointment as Lecturer at the Tait Institute of Mathematical Physics, he spent the remainder of his academic career.
Higgs’ collection features works by luminaries in the field of physics including fellow Nobel Prize winners Paul Dirac, Erwin Schrödinger, Max Born, D.E. Rutherford and Enrico Fermi, among others.
They cover subjects including quantum mechanics, mathematical and nuclear physics, string theory, thermo-dynamics and algebraic mathematics.
Higgs was born in 1929 in Newcastle upon Tyne. He attended Cotham Grammar School in Bristol from 1941 to 1946, where he was inspired by the work of one of the school’s alumni, Paul Dirac, a founder of quantum mechanics, who won the 1933 Nobel Prize in Physics alongside Erwin Schrödinger.
He graduated from King’s College London with a first-class honours degree in physics in 1950 and achieved a master’s degree in 1952.
Higgs fell in love with Edinburgh after hitchhiking to the city en route to the Highlands in 1949.
He returned to undertake a two year post-doctorate degree at the University of Edinburgh in 1954 and in 1960 he landed a lectureship in mathematical physics.
In 1964, he proposed a mechanism to explain why the most basic building blocks of the universe have mass. It predicted the existence of a Higgs particle, the discovery of which was claimed at the Large Hadron Collider 48 years later.
Later, as Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Edinburgh, he would admit the celebrity status that followed turned his life upside-down.
The “Higgsteria” saw students queue for autographs and a flood of requests to speak at events and sign photos.
Prof Higgs lived in the Scottish capital for over 60 years and received the Freedom of the City of Edinburgh in 2014.
Charles Graham-Campbell, Director of Bonhams Scotland, added: “Professor Peter Higgs made an incredible contribution to our understanding of the universe and created an incredible legacy in the scientific field.
“These books offer a unique opportunity for collectors and institutions to share in his academic pursuits. We expect global interest.”
