EINSTEIN, Albert. Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper; Über einen die Erzeugung und Verwandlung des Lichtes betreffenden heuristischen Gesichtspunkt; Über die von der molekularkinetischen Theorie der Warme geforderte Bewegung von in ruhenden Flussigkeiten suspendierten Teilchen. Annalen der Physik, vol 17.
Leipzig: Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1905. First edition.

“One of the most remarkable volumes in the whole scientific literature. It contains three papers by Einstein, each dealing with a different subject and each today acknowledged to be a masterpiece, and the starting point of a new branch of physics.” (Max Born). Dibner 167; Grolier/Horblit 26b; Norman 691a.

“It is probably no exaggeration to say that Einstein and Newton have been the greatest physicists of all times. Einstein’s name is generally associated with the theory of relativity, which has profoundly revolutionized man’s ideas of space and time. But as Max Born said in one of his articles, Einstein would probably have been one of the greatest scientists, even had he not written a single line on relativity. Einstein made a spectacular appearance on the physics scene in 1905 [his ‘annus mirabilis’] when he published these three papers in one and the same volume of the Annalen der Physik, the three papers having been submitted within a period of only three and half months.” (Emil Wolff, Einstein’s Researches on the Nature of Light).

In the first paper (‘On a Heuristic Viewpoint Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light’), published in March, “Einstein postulated that light is composed of individual quanta (later called photons) that, in addition to wavelike behavior, demonstrate certain properties unique to particles. In a single stroke he thus revolutionized the theory of light and provided an explanation for, among other phenomena, the emission of electrons from some solids when struck by light, called the photoelectric effect.” (Britannica). It was for this paper on the photoelectric effect that Einstein was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics in 1921. The second paper (‘On the Motion Required by the Molecular Kinetic Theory of Heat of Small Particles Suspended in a Stationary Liquid’), published in May, provided the first mathematical model of the phenomena of Brownian motion. It is generally regarded as the first proof that molecules exist.

The third paper is his most celebrated work, introducing the theory of special relativity, in which he fundamentally revolutionized the field of mechanics - probably the greatest achievement since the publication of Newton’s Principia. “Toward the end of June it was all written up, and on June 30 receipt of the manuscript was recorded at the editorial office of Annalen in Berlin. The thirty-page article, published three months later, was titled ‘On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies’. It was a treatise beyond compare and without precedent, one of the greatest scientific achievements in content and one of the most brilliant in style. Of course, there were later additions, some from Einstein himself and some from others, but these were mere addenda to a theory which had appeared before all the world ready and complete, valid for all time” (Folsing, Albert Einstein).



Three papers in: Annalen der Physik, Vierte Folge, vol. 17, pp. 891-921; 132-148; 549-560. The complete volume offered here in contemporary half calf. 8vo: 216 x 141 mm. Pp. viii,1020 and 5 plates. Old German library stamp to title page. Some moderate water staining to the bottom of the front and rear boards and the firts and last pages, the Einstein papers unaffected.