Re: Wonder if they asked the king first Archived Message
Posted by Arthur on September 30, 2014, 4:49 am, in reply to "Re: Wonder if they asked the king first "
You got it, Mrs Diamond! A gift from the O'Neills to the King (or to the Queen)! Nobody could blame the King for expensing his money in baubles, nor for receiving suspiscious gifts from wealthy "strangers"! Chris, now you know what to present to your Mama-in-law for her next birthday in December! I do not know what happened with the pearl girandole earrings worn by Queen Josefina. Christie's description for the 1995 auction indicated that "The girandole earrings which Queen Josephina wears in the portrait could be those delivered to the Empress in Plombières by F. R. Nitot, Imperial jeweller, in 1809, composed of "6 perles poires dont les deux plus fortes sont vierges et très belles plus de huit perles rondes"" (six pear-shaped pearls, of which the biggest two are "virgin" [not sure of the translation of this word] and very beautiful, and eight round pearls). But Christie's does not provide information about the further whereabouts of these girandole earrings. Christie's description of the necklace also mention that the rose diamond silver caps to the seven pear-shaped pearls fringing the necklace "are by the same hand" as the diamond caps of another pair of pearl earrings from Empress Joséphine, which is now in the Louvre Museum's collection in Paris (these earrings were inherited by the Russian branch of the Dukes of Leuchtenberg, and were given to the Louvre in 1973): http://cartelfr.louvre.fr/cartelfr/visite?srv=car_not_frame&idNotice=11360&langue=fr (the picture above was taken by myself in May 2014, at an exhibition about Empress Joséphine for the 200th anniversary of her death in the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris - and I can assure you that these earrings are huge and truly beautiful! ). --Previous Message-- : Wow, Arthur! Great find! I do wish that king : Carl Gustaf buys it back (or perhaps : Madeleine's new relatives, the O'Neill : family?). : If this necklace is once again worn with the : cameo tiara, I will faint of happiness! : By the way, do we know what happened to : Josefina's pearl girandole earrings? : : :
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