Education
In St. Petersburg, the Nobel family enjoyed a living standard far higher than they had experienced in Stockholm. But theirs was not a life of luxury. The Nobels lived in a single-story wooden house that gave an impression of bourgeois comfort.
The family invested in the education of the boys. All instruction was provided by private tutors in their home. Today this may seem peculiar and be viewed as a sign of high-bourgeois status, but this was not the case in St. Petersburg at that time. The Nobel brothers had a Swedish tutor – Lars Santesson, Master of Arts – who taught them Swedish language and history, but also provided them with a broad knowledge, including world literature and philosophy. They also had a skilled Russian teacher, Ivan Peterov who among other subjects taught them the fundamentals of mathematics, physics and chemistry. They learned five languages fluently – aside from their native Swedish they also spoke Russian, English, French, and German. Robert and Ludvig became engineers, while Alfred studied chemistry. His chemistry teachers were Professors Nikolai N. Zinin and Yuli Trapp. Professor Zinin later drew Alfred and Immanuel's attention to nitroglycerine.