“I have commissioned activities aimed at the purchase of Maria Skłodowska-Curie’s house near Paris,” Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki wrote on Twitter on Monday.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is in contact with the Polish Embassy in France on this matter. This place is a part of Polish history,” the head of government pointed out.

“Poland should buy the house of Marie Skłodowska-Curie near Paris and create a museum there devoted to the great Pole,” wrote Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, Law and Justice (PiS) party MEP.

The 120 square metres house of Piotr Curie and Marie Skłodowska-Curie in Saint-Rémy-lès-Chevreuse in the Yvelines department near Paris, was put up for sale for EUR 790,000 and requires renovation estimated at EUR 200,000.

In the years 1904-06, the couple frequently visited the house with their family. The building is decorated with old tapestries and terracotta from the early 20th century, real estate agents emphasised. The property comes with a 900 square metres garden

Marie Skłodowska-Curie in 1903, together with her husband Piotr Curie and Henri Becquerel, received the Nobel Prize in Physics for research on the phenomenon of radioactivity discovered by Becquerel. In 1911 she was awarded the Nobel Prize again, this time in chemistry, for the discovery of the elements polonium and radium.

On April 19 1906, Pierre Curie was killed in a road accident. On May 13 of the same year the physics department of the University of Paris decided to retain the chair that had been created for Maire’s late husband and offer it to her. She accepted it, hoping to create a world-class laboratory as a tribute to her husband Pierre. She was the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris.