Created in Peace

Bertha Sophie Felicitas Gräfin Kinsky von Wchinitz und Tettau, later known as Bertha von Suttner, was born on 9 June 1843 in Prague, then part of the Austrian Empire (today the Czech Republic). Her father, Franz Michael de Paula Josef Graf Kinsky, an Austrian field marshal, died before her birth, leaving her mother, Sophie Wilhelmine von Körner, to raise her in more modest conditions than her noble title suggested. From an early age, she studied languages, music, and literature, which fostered an independent outlook that shaped both her writing and her later advocacy for peace.

In 1876, Bertha von Suttner briefly worked as secretary to Alfred Nobel in Paris before marrying Arthur Gundaccar von Suttner. The couple spent nearly a decade in Georgia in the Russian Empire, supporting themselves through writing. It was during this period that she developed her literary voice. Returning to Austria in 1885, she gained international attention with her 1889 novel Die Waffen nieder! (Lay Down Your Arms!), a powerful account of the human cost of war. The book, widely translated and published in multiple editions, became one of the central works of the peace movement.

In the years that followed, Bertha von Suttner became an important leader in peace activism, organizing societies, addressing international congresses, and continuing her writing on disarmament and human rights. Her long correspondence with Alfred Nobel is thought to have influenced his decision to establish the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1905, she became the first woman to receive that award. She died in Vienna on 21 June 1914, just weeks before the outbreak of World War I, leaving behind a legacy that linked literature, advocacy, and the conviction that human progress depends on peace and, as she wrote, “fair and equal cooperation between the sexes.”