THE HOPE ,TITANIC DIAMOND
WAS STOLEN FROM LOUIS XIV
ON 1792 SEPTEMBER 11
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The Hope Diamond is one of the most famous jewels in the world, with ownership records dating back almost four centuries. Its much-admired rare blue color is due to trace amounts of boron atoms. Weighing 45.52 carats, its exceptional size has revealed new findings about the formation of gemstones.
The jewel is believed to have originated in India, and is known to have been cut from the French Blue (Le bleu de France), presented to King Louis XIV. It acquired its name when it appeared in the catalogue of a gem collection owned by a London banking family called Hope in 1839. Later it was sold to Washington socialite Evalyn Walsh McLean who was often seen wearing it. Since 1958, it has been on exhibition at Washington’s National Museum of Natural History.
The Hope Diamond has long been rumored to carry a curse, possibly due to agents trying to arouse interest in the stone. It was last reported to be insured for $250 million
History[edit]
Geological beginnings[edit]
The Hope Diamond was formed deep within the Earth approximately 1.1 billion years ago.[22] Like all diamonds, it is formed when carbon atoms form strong bonds.[22]
India[edit]
Tavernier's original sketch of the Tavernier Blue
Cubic zirconia replica of the Tavernier Blue
Several accounts, based on remarks written by the gem's first known owner, French gem merchant Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, suggest that the gemstone originated in India, in the Kollur mine in the Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh (which at the time was part of the Golconda kingdom), in the seventeenth century.[23][24][25]
It is unclear who had initially owned the gemstone, where it had been found, by whom, and in what condition. But the first historical records suggest that Tavernier obtained the stone in the mid-1600s, possibly by purchase[12] or by theft.[17]
CURSE OF THE DIAMOND
The rulers of Bahminis time is worst to hindus ,after 1565 after the victory of vijayanagara dynasty their temples are demolished a rama kovil was lootted ,by bahmini sultans the golden idol of sitadevi eye were plucked one eye blue diamond near bhatrachalam area.
Tavernier brought to Paris a large uncut stone which was the first known precursor to the Hope Diamond. This large stone became known as the Tavernier Blue diamond. It was a crudely cut triangular shaped stone of 115 carats (23.0 g).[11] Another estimate is that it weighed 112.23 carats (22.446 g) before it was cut.[17] Tavernier's book, the Six Voyages (French: Les Six Voyages de J. B. Tavernier), contains sketches of several large diamonds that he sold to Louis XIV in possibly 1668[9] or 1669; while the blue diamond is shown among these,
Tavernier mentions the mines at "Gani" Kollur as a source of colored diamonds, but made no direct mention of the stone. Historian Richard Kurin builds a highly speculative case for 1653 as the year of acquisition,[26] but the most that can be said with certainty is that Tavernier obtained the blue diamond during one of his five voyages to India between the years 1640 and 1667. One report suggests he took 25 diamonds to Paris, including the large rock which became the Hope, and sold all of them to King Louis XIV.[27]
For this transgression, according to the legend, Tavernier was torn apart by wild dogs on a trip to Russia (after he had sold the diamond).
This was the first horrible death attributed to the curse. Another report suggested that in 1669, Tavernier sold this large blue diamond along with approximately one thousand other diamonds to King Louis XIV of France for 220,000 livres, the equivalent of 147 kilograms of pure gold.[11][28] In a newly published historical novel,
The French Blue, gemologist and historian Richard W. Wise proposed that the patent of nobility granted Tavernier by Louis XIV was a part of the payment for the Tavernier Blue.
In 1642 a man by the name of Jean Baptiste Tavernier, a French jeweler who traveled extensively, visited India and bought a 112 3/16 carat blue diamond. (This diamond was much larger than the present weight of the Hope diamond because the Hope has been cut down at least twice in the past three centuries.) The diamond is believed to have come from the Kollur mine in Golconda, India.
Tavernier continued to travel and arrived back in France in 1668, 26 years after he bought the large, blue diamond. French King Louis XIV, the "Sun King," ordered Tavernier presented at court. From Tavernier, Louis XIV bought the large, blue diamond as well as 44 large diamonds and 1,122 smaller diamonds.
According to the theory, during that period Colbert, the King's Finance Minister, regularly sold offices and noble titles for cash, and an outright patent of nobility, according to Wise, was worth approximately 500,000 livres making a total of 720,000 livres, a price about half Tavernier's estimate of the gem's true value.[29]
There has been some controversy regarding the actual weight of the stone; Morel believed that the 1123⁄16 carats[17] stated in Tavernier's invoice would be in old French carats, thus 115.28 metric carats.
Tavernier was made a noble and died at he age 84 in Russia (it is not known how he died).1According to Susanne Patch, author of Blue Mystery: The Story of the Hope Diamond, the shape of the diamond was unlikely to have been an eye (or on the forehead) of an idol.2
France[edit]
In 1678, Louis XIV commissioned the court jeweller, Sieur Pitau, to recut the Tavernier Blue, resulting in a 67.125-carat (13.4250 g) stone[8] which royal inventories thereafter listed as the Blue Diamond of the Crown of France (French: diamant bleu de la Couronne de France[30]). Later English-speaking historians have simply called it the French Blue. The king had the stone set on a cravat-pin.[31]
According to one report, Louis ordered Pitau[32] to "make him a piece to remember", and Pitau took two years on the piece, resulting in a "triangular-shaped 69-carat gem the size of a pigeon's egg that took the breath away as it snared the light, reflecting it back in bluish-grey rays."[12] It was set in gold and was supported by a ribbon for the neck which was worn by the king during ceremonies.[8]
At the diamond's dazzling heart was a sun with seven facets – the sun being Louis' emblem, and seven being a number rich in meaning in biblical cosmology, indicating divinity and spirituality.
— report in Agence France-Presse, 2008[12]
Marie Antoinette before her public execution by guillotine on Place de la Révolution, on 16 October 1793
In 1749, Louis XIV's great-grandson, King Louis XV, had the French Blue set into a more elaborate jewelled pendant for the Order of the Golden Fleece by court jeweler André Jacquemin.[8] The assembled piece included a red spinel of 107 carats shaped as a dragon breathing "covetous flames", as well as 83 red-painted diamonds and 112 yellow-painted diamonds to suggest a fleece shape.[12]
The piece fell into disuse after the death of Louis XV. The diamond became the property of his grandson King Louis XVI.[11]
Theft and disappearance[edit]
On September 11, 1792, while Louis XVI and his family were imprisoned in the Temple in the early stages of the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution, a group of thieves broke into the Royal Storehouse, the Hôtel du Garde-Meuble de la Couronne (now Hôtel de la Marine), and stole most of the Crown Jewels during a five-day looting spree.[12]
While many jewels were later recovered, including other pieces of the Order of the Golden Fleece, the French Blue was not among them and it disappeared from history.[9] On 21 January 1793, Louis XVI was guillotined and Marie Antoinette was guillotined on 16 October of the same year: these beheadings are commonly cited as a result of the diamond's "curse", but the historical record suggests that Marie Antoinette had never worn the Golden Fleece pendant because it had been reserved for the exclusive use of the king.[citation needed]
A likely scenario is that the French Blue, sometimes also known as the Blue Diamond,[12] was "swiftly smuggled to London" after being seized in 1792 in Paris.[12] But the exact rock known as the French Blue was never seen again, since it almost certainly was recut during this decades-long period of anonymity,[12] probably into two pieces, and the larger one became the Hope Diamond. One report suggested that the cut was a "butchered job" because it sheared off 23.5 carats from the larger rock as well as hurting its "extraordinary lustre."[12]
It had long been believed that the Hope Diamond had been cut from the French Blue[33] until confirmation finally happened when a three-dimensional leaden model of the latter was rediscovered in the archives of the National Museum of Natural History in Paris in 2005. Previously, the dimensions of the French Blue had been known only from two drawings made in 1749 and 1789; although the model slightly differs from the drawings in some details, these details are identical to features of the Hope Diamond, allowing CAD technology to digitally reconstruct the French Blue around the recut stone.[34][35]
Historians suggested that one robber, Cadet Guillot, took several jewels, including the French Blue and the Côte-de-Bretagne spinel, to Le Havre and then to London, where the French Blue was cut in two pieces. Morel adds that in 1796, Guillot attempted to resell the Côte-de-Bretagne in France but was forced to relinquish it to fellow thief Lancry de la Loyelle, who put Guillot into debtors' prison.
In a contrasting report, historian Richard Kurin speculated that the "theft" of the French Crown Jewels was in fact engineered by the revolutionary leader Georges Danton as part of a plan to bribe an opposing military commander,
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| Duke Karl Wilhelm of Brunswick. |
When under attack by Napoleon in 1805, Karl Wilhelm may have had the French Blue recut to disguise its identity;
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| Caroline of Brunswick |
Although Caroline was the wife of the Prince Regent George (later George IV of the United Kingdom),
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| caroline of brunswick with Prince Regent George |
Caroline's nephew, Duke Karl Friedrich, was later known to possess a 13.75-carat (2.750 g) blue diamond which was widely thought to be another piece of the French Blue.
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| Duke Karl Friedrich |
This smaller diamond's present whereabouts are unknown, and the recent CAD reconstruction of the French Blue fits too tightly around the Hope Diamond to allow for the existence of a sister stone of that size.
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