A brief history of Stephen Hawking, his fame and his fortune

To the world at large, Stephen Hawking, who was born on Galileo's death anniversary and died on Einstein's birth anniversary, was the most brilliant mind of the 20th and the 21st centuries. Hawking, however, was possibly the world's richest scientist, who didn't just earn money for himself, but also others.

$40 million or Rs 260 crore was his net worth, according to Forbes magazine - that's a comfortable existence by any yardstick.
That, of course, is nowhere near the fortune of the man seen standing in the photograph, next to Hawking, Bill Gates, who is among the top three richest men in the world.

$6 million or Rs 39 crore was the amount that was rejected by Cambridge University, when offered by an American philanthropist organisation, to fund a professorship in cosmology in Hawking's name. It included an annual salary of 140,000 or Rs 1.27 crore. The university said it was "too generous".

80,000 or Rs 72.6 lakh or thereabouts is what Hawking earned as his annual salary, during his years as a Cambridge professor.

$3 million or Rs 19.5 crore were his annual earnings from book royalties, talks and other celebrity appearances, which included cameos on sitcoms like The Big Bang Theory, The Simpsons and Star Trek, among others. He also modelled for TV commercials for a few companies, including British Telecom and had applied for trademark protection on his name.

$123.73 million or Rs 804 crore is what the biopic on Hawking, Theory of Everything, earned - apart from garnering an Oscar for Best Actor for lead actor Edward Redmayne, who portrayed Hawking on screen.

A Brief History of Time, Hawking's best selling book, has been bought by one in every 750 men, women and children in the world, as well as translated into 40 languages, since it was first published on April 1, 1988. Enriching enough for the readers, the publishers and Hawking himself.