Re: The Maharaja of Patiala's diamond necklace Archived Message
Posted by Richard  on November 23, 2011, 12:47 pm, in reply to "Re: The Maharaja of Patiala's diamond necklace"
I was lucky enough to visit the exhibition entitled,Maharajah The Splendour of Indias Royal Courts the exhibition catalogue is/was available from Amazon.co.uk.This necklace was among other pieces on display,along with "The Hindou Necklace" made for The Maharani of Baroda Sita Devi,white diamonds with magnificent polished emerald drops,designed and made by Van Cleef and Arpels.
An emerald and diamond belt buckle,set with an engraved emerald of over 400 carats,both sold 15th May 2002 by Christie's in Geneva.An Art Deco Emerald Bead and Diamond Necklace by Cartier along with some magnificent original workshop drawings by Cartier and Mauboussin of necklaces.All pieces i had seen in books and catalogues,and now finally in the flesh,breathtaking pieces indeed.
Another magnificent treasure in the exhibition was,The Jade Elephant Mystery Clock,an amazingingly carved chinese jade elephant with a jewelled mystery clock resting on a gem encrusted replica blanket and head dress.One of my favourite mystery clocks,originally sold in 1989 by Christie's in New York for over $1.5 million dollars a record at the time.
I hope this helps,just google the names of the pieces and you can see how extraordinary they are.
--Previous Message--
: Thanks for this John, an interesting history.
:
: The V&A museum in London did an exhibition
: from the Raj a few years ago and there was
: some wonderful jewellery on display there.
: I wonder if anyone can confirm what those
: pieces were ?
: (was this one of them ?)
:
:
: --Previous Message--
:
:
: I recently received some information from
: the Hotel Beau Rivage in Geneva where they
: are renovating a suite named after the
: Maharaja of Patiala.
: Included in this information was the story
: of his diamond necklace 'the largest piece
: of jewelry ever made'.
: In 1888 a yellow diamond was discovered in
: South Africa weighing 428 carats & after
: it was cut 234.65 carats, the largest yellow
: octahedron diamond in the world. It was
: called the De Beers diamond & was
: acquired by the Maharaja of Patiala. In 1928
: he ordered a necklace from Cartier - 2930
: diamonds with the De Beers as the
: centrepiece. There were also seven other
: large diamonds in the necklace weighing
: between 18 and 73 carats as well as several
: Burmese rubies.
: The necklace was last seen worn by the
: Maharaja's son just befor the end of the
: British Raj. It then disappeared.
: In 1982 the diamond reappeared at a
: Southeby's auction & sold for $3.16
: milion.
: Sixteen years later someone discovered the
: rest of the necklace in a second-hand
: jewelry shop in London. The important stones
: had disappeared, unsurprisingly. Cartier
: bought this skeleton & spent four years
: restoring it, using synthetic stones.
: Wouldn't it make a great story if the
: necklace could tell its tale?
: Also, the Indian Princes were famed for
: their jewels, I wonder how much they still
: retain.
:
:
:
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