Royal jewels: Princess Ingeborg's Fabergé brooch - sold during WWII?

A Fabergé brooch (external link) which was given by the King's maternal grandfather, Prince Carl of Sweden, to Princess Ingeborg on the occasion of their fifteenth wedding anniversary in 1912 was sold by the auction house Coutau-Bégarie in Paris this week.
Several people have asked me about this and the auctioneer's claim that the brooch was sold by Crown Princess Märtha out of necessity during the Second World War. I do not know what is the auction house's source, but to me this seems like a misunderstanding or a supposition.
As I was able to reveal in my 2007 biography of Princess Astrid, Kvinne blant konger, the emerald parure now worn by the Queen was given to Crown Princess Märtha by Princess Ingeborg at the Central Station in Stockholm when she departed for the USA in the summer of 1940. Princess Ingeborg's intention was that her daughter could sell the emeralds if she never returned to Norway (which must have seemed a likely outcome in 1940), but the daring rescue of that the Bank of Norway's gold reserve meant that the Norwegian government-in-exile (unlike others) was able to provide for itself throughout the war and that the royal family did not have to sell their possessions in order to survive.
It therefore seems highly unlikely that Crown Princess Märtha sold the Fabergé brooch out of necessity during WWII.

My latest articles: Norwegian crown jewels and Mohammed bin Salman

Court intrigues are always fun, and in the October issue of Majesty (Vol. 38, No. 10) I write about the latest developments in the ongoing struggle for the Saudi succession and the new Crown Prince, 32-year-old Mohammed bin Salman, who ousted his cousin Mohammed bin Nayef in what amounted to a palace coup this summer and now seems set to rule the world's most powerful monarchy for perhaps fifty years or more.
In the same issue my series on crown jewels continues with an article on the Norwegian ones, which, although mostly made in Sweden, have been symbols of Norway's independence for nearly two centuries.
The magazine is already on sale in Britain and will hit the shops in Norway on Thursday of this week.

My lastest article: Swedish crown jewels and the mother-in-law of Europe

In the September issue of Majesty I embark on a new series on crown jewels, starting with the exquisite Swedish ones, which are the oldest of an extant monarchy. The series will continue next month with the Norwegian crown jewels.
In the same issue I also write about Queen Louise of Denmark, the consort of King Christian IX, an influential lady who arranged dynastic marriages in the mistaken belief that they would prevent wars. Known as "the mother-in-law of Europe", she was also the mother-in-law from hell, at least for her daughter-in-law Louise.
The magazine is already in sale in Britain and will go on sale in Norway on the coming Thursday, which happens to be the bicentenary of Queen Louise's birth.

My latest article: Fabergé eggs and King Willem-Alexander

Easter will soon be upon us, and in the April issue of Majesty (Vol. 38, No. 4) I mark the occasion with an article on the imperial Fabergé eggs, the splendid works of art that were created as Easter eggs for the Russian empresses Maria Fyodorovna and Alexandra Fyodorovna, a tradition that, along with the Russian monarchy, came to an end 100 years ago this year.
As April will also see the fiftieth birthday of King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands (on 27 April) I have also contributed a profile of him. The magazine went on sale in Britain two weeks ago and is on sale in Norway from today.

A radio documentary and three lectures

On Thursday next week, 25 years will have passed since the solemn blessing of the King and Queen in Nidaros Cathedral and to celebrate the silver jubilee they embark on a twelve-day tour of the kingdom by the Royal Yacht "Norge" tomorrow. My "contributions" to the jubilee will, except for my latest book, be a radio documentary and three lectures in Trondheim next week.
In the radio documentary, which will be broadcast by the NRK radio channel P2 as part of the programme "Museum", I tell the story of the struggle over the crown of Norway between the kings Christian I and Karl Knutsson in 1448-1450, how that power struggle made Nidaros Cathedral the coronation church for the first time and how one created a myth, which many still believe in, that this was where Norwegian kings had always been crowned. The programme will be broadcast at 6.03 p.m. on Saturday and 8.03 a.m. on Sunday, but is already now available as a podcast (external link).
On Monday at 6 p.m. I will be the guest of Trondhjems Historiske Forening (Trondheim Historical Society) in the Suhm House at Kalvskinnet to give a lecture on Trondheim as the city of coronations - more information may be found here (external link). On Tuesday at 2 p.m. I will present new knowledge of the crown jewels in a lecture at Nordenfjeldske Kunstindustrimuseum (the museum of decorative arts and design) in Munkegata, about which you can read here (external link), and on Wedneday at 1 p.m. I will be at the Archbishop's Palace to give a lecture on the history of coronations and how and why they were replaced by solemn blessings - more information about that here (external link). If I have any readers in or near Trondheim I would be happy to see you at the lectures.

Royal jewels: Princess Astrid’s aigrette(s)

In recent years it seems Princess Astrid, who is now 82, has more or less given up wearing her larger tiaras, i.e. the Vasa diadem of her mother and the diamond and turquoise coronet of her great-grandmother, Queen Alexandra of Britain. These days she mostly chooses lighter pieces, primarily the gold bandeau of her great-grandmother Queen Sophie and an aigrette that is one of the most versatile and peculiar pieces of royal jewellery.
The latter is really two different pieces of jewellery; in other words the base is the same, but there are two different ornaments that can be attached to it.
The version most frequently worn – most recently for the state banquet during the Israeli state visit in May – has a pair of diamond Mercury wings that tremble as the wearer moves. The other version – seen at the state banquet for the President of Estonia last week – has a ruby set in diamonds in the shape of a flower from which two long-stemmed flowers of diamonds and rubies emerge.
When I wrote my biography of her, which was published seven years ago, Princess Astrid told me she is always teased when she wears the aigrette in is latter setting, “people say they suppose one [flower] receives London and the other Moscow”.
The Victorian and Edwardian eras were the heyday of aigrettes, which could be worn as a head ornament with ostrich feathers (Princess Astrid says she has not contemplated that look). Princess Astrid’s aigrette originally belonged to her grandmother, Queen Maud, whose jewels were divided between her three grandchildren in the autumn of 1968. Unlike the Vasa tiara and the turquoise coronet it will not pass to the King upon Princess Astrid’s death, but be inherited by her children.

Princess Ragnhild’s granddaughter marries – in a tiara

This is a bit of old news by now, but on 9 August the late Princess Ragnhild’s granddaughter, Victoria Ribeiro, married Felipe Falcão, to whom she became engaged in November last year. The only member of the royal family present seems to have been the bride’s grandfather, Erling S. Lorentzen.
25-year-old Victoria Ribeiro, who has taken her husband’s surname, is the only child of Princess Ragnhild’s and Erling Lorentzen’s eldest daughter, Ingeborg, and her husband, Paulo Ribeiro. She is a graphic designer and runs her own company, called Vi Ragna.
I have only seen a couple of photos from the wedding, but it was interesting to note that the bride wore a tiara, which is a first for the non-royal descendants of the royal family. As the family are very well-off there is no reason to believe that the tiara is a fake, but it was not one of the two owned by Princess Ragnhild.
On the other hand it has some resemblance with the diamond tiara (convertible to a bracelet) which was a wedding present to Crown Princess Märtha from her uncle and aunt, King Gustaf V and Queen Victoria of Sweden. But this now belongs to Princess Astrid, who wore it for the first and so far only time for the state banquet during the Latvian state visit in 2011, and although Princess Astrid could have lent it to her goddaughter for her wedding it seems somewhat unlikely that it should have been sent all the way across the Atlantic to Brazil.
Victoria Ragna Lorentzen Ribeiro was born in Rio de Janeiro on 19 December 1988 and christened in the Palace Chapel in Oslo the following summer in the presence of her great-grandfather, King Olav V. Given the geographical and genealogical distance she plays no public role and rarely attends royal family events. Except for her grandmother’s funeral in the Palace Chapel in Oslo two years ago I believe her last such appearance was at the big family gathering held in Trondheim in 2006 for the centenary of King Haakon VII’s and Queen Maud’s coronation. However, she and her cousins Sophia Anne Lorentzen and Alexandra Lorentzen Long cut the ribbon when the new Norwegian seamen’s church in Rio de Janeiro, named Princess Ragnhild’s Church in honour of their grandmother, was opened on 3 May this year.

UPDATE (1 November): Having seen a better picture I can now say that it is indeed not Princess Astrid's tiara, but a previously unseen one.

My latest article(s): Emeralds and Reims

I have two articles in the September issue of Majesty (Vol. 35, No. 9), which went on sale on Thursday. The first one deals with the emerald parure that is the pièce de résistance of the Norwegian jewellery collection and often worn by the Queen.
When writing my biography of Princess Astrid, which was published in 2007, I started doing some research into the history of this magnificent parure and in this article I sum up the research done in the intervening years, thereby rejecting some of the myths about this parure that are frequently repeated in the media, and following its provenance, its sometimes dramatic history and the changes made to it through the year, including the dispersal of the necklace's pendants and the unfortunate removal of some of the main stones from the tiara.
In the second I article I write about the Cathedral of Reims, the French coronation church whose significance was so great that French kings could not really be crowned anywhere else. This beautiful cathedral held a special place in French minds, but sadly became one of the first and most important cultural heritage victims of the First World War when German bombs left it in ruins in September 1914. However, it was lovingly rebuilt in the interwar years and now takes its rightful place as part of the UNESCO World Heritage list.

The division of Princess Lilian’s estate

The Swedish newspaper Expressen on Saturday published details about the last will of Princess Lilian, who died in March at the age of 97. Such things are public in Sweden, and the Princess’s will and the inventory of her property drawn up after her death show that, as expected, nothing has been left for her nearest blood relatives, the half-sisters Janice Rees and Sonia Roberts, with whom she had no contact. Instead, the main beneficiaries of her will are the three children of the King of Sweden, the Queen of Sweden, Princess Lilian’s first cousin Jean Beaumond and the latter’s daughter Christine Robinson.
The Princess left assets worth 55,556,182 SEK, which does not include her home, Villa Solbacken at Djurgården in Stockholm, which was the property of her late husband, Prince Bertil, and in his will was left to Prince Carl Philip, but with his widow retaining the right to live there for the rest of her life. Prince Carl Philip also inherits everything in the villa which has not been specifically left to someone else.
The Princess’s second home, an apartment in 101 Chesterfield Gardens in Mayfair in London valued at 15,392,000 SEK is left to Christine Robinson, who has already lived there for fifteen years. All real and personal estate in England not specifically willed to someone else is to be shared equally between Jean Beaumond and Christine Robinson.
Princess Lilian’s collection of jewellery and silver, estimated to be worth 5,311,200 SEK, is divided between several relatives. As announced already in Princess Lilian’s memoirs, published in 2000, Crown Princess Victoria inherits the delicate laurel leaf tiara which was a wedding present to Prince Bertil’s mother, Crown Princess Margareta, in 1905 and which Crown Princess Victoria wore at Princess Madeleine’s wedding earlier this year.
The Crown Princess also inherits what is described as a ‘diadem of steel, white gold and diamonds’, but it is not quite clear to me what diadem this is. Expressen illustrates it with a photo of Princess Lilian wearing the sunray tiara, but this is obviously not the one as this was left to one of the family foundations by Queen Victoria. Crown Princess Victoria has recently worn twice a previously unseen diadem of cut steel, but this does not fit the description and was also worn once before Princess Lilian’s death.
Queen Silvia inherits a rather unusual necklace of five row of pearls adorned with large rubies, emeralds and sapphires as centre stones, also an inheritance from Crown Princess Margareta, as well as a modern necklace with a tennis player, a fur coat and 5,000,000 SEK. Princess Madeleine is left an aquamarine heart and a ring with an aquamarine.
Jean Beaumond, who also receives £ 500,000, is bequeathed a gold necklace with three medallions of rubies and diamonds, while her daughter receives a ring with diamonds and pearls, two boxes of bijouterie and £ 5,000.
Further, there is a watch of gold and diamonds for Princess Désirée’s daughter Hélène Silfverschiöld, who was Princess Lilian’s goddaughter, and a seat of earrings of diamonds and aquamarines as well as 50,000 SEK for another goddaughter, Eva Lilian Nilsson Wrede. A gold watch and 100,000 SEK was left to Baroness Elisabeth Palmstierna, Prince Bertil’s and Princess Lilian’s loyal Marshal of the Court, who served the royal family for six decades, retired at the age of 95 and died 27 days after Princess Lilian.
Other members of the staff are also remembered. The sisters Dagmar and Maj-Christin Nilsson, long-serving housekeepers, each receive 50,000 SEK, while the chauffeur, Stig Jurlander, inherits the Mercedes Benz car.
King Carl Gustaf inherits several artworks, including a portrait of his grandmother, Crown Princess Margareta, which hung at Villa Solbacken. A water colour portrait of Princess Lilian, also from Villa Solbacken, is however left to Jean Beaumond, while a portrait of the Princess’s great friend, the actress Kay Kendall, is left to Kendall’s sister, Rolla Campbell.
100,000 SEK are left to SOS Barnbyar in Sweden, while £ 1,000 goes to Anita, an poor child in India Princess Lilian ‘adopted’. The Anglican Church in Stockholm receives 10,000 SEK.
484,828 SEK go towards covering the costs of Princess Lilian’s funeral.

Royal jewels: Princess Madeleine’s wedding jewellery

There had been some speculation ahead of Saturday’s wedding between Princess Madeleine and Christopher O’Neill about what tiara the bride would wear, with speculation focusing on the cameo tiara which was worn by Crown Princess Victoria, Queen Silvia, Princess Désirée and Princess Birgitta for their weddings and has thereby come to being considered as some sort of tradition for weddings.
However, Princess Madeleine chose to break this “tradition” and rather wear the tiara most closely associated with her. This tiara may be considered a modern interpretation of the classic fringe tiaras, but very little is known about its origins or provenance. It was first seen on Queen Silvia in the late 1980s, but the royal court only describes it as “private” and has never given further information about it, so it is not known if it was purchased by King Carl Gustaf and Queen Silvia or if it was a gift or possibly an inheritance from someone.
Since her coming of age in 2000 Princess Madeleine has frequently worn the tiara, which may also be worn as a necklace, but Queen Silvia has also continued to wear it occasionally.
While the tiara appears to be of a rather young age, the earrings worn by Princess Madeleine for her weddings are very old. Apparently they belonged to Queen Lovisa Ulrika, the Prussian-born consort of King Adolf Fredrik, who died in 1782. They left Sweden when King Gustaf IV Adolf was deposed in 1809, and is known as “the Vasa earrings” as ex-Crown Prince Gustaf received the title Prince of Vasa from the Austrian emperor. His only child, Queen Carola of Saxony, apparently passed the earrings on to a great-granddaughter of Gustaf IV Adolf, Princess Victoria of Baden, who became Queen of Sweden through her marriage to King Gustaf V.
Princess Madeleine also wore a bracelet which seems to have belonged to Princess Lilian, her beloved great-aunt and substitute grandmother, who died in March this year. Crown Princess Victoria also chose to honour their great-aunt by wearing jewellery inherited from her, namely a delicate laurel wreath tiara which Queen Sophia presented to her granddaughter-in-law Margareta when she married the future Gustaf VI Adolf in 1905. She also wore a necklace, originally a stomacher, which is known to have belonged to Queen Josephina and which was frequently worn by Princess Lilian.

Royal jewels: The Brazilian tiara

The grandest of the many grand tiaras in the possession of the Swedish royal family is the so-called Brazilian tiara, formerly wrongly known as the Coronation tiara. This magnificent piece of jewellery is normally only worn for the grandest of occasions. Queen Silvia has made it a tradition to wear it for incoming state visits from reigning monarchs and she also wore it for Crown Princess Victoria’s and Prince Daniel’s wedding in 2010 and for the sixtieth birthday of King Carl Gustaf in 2006. She has also worn it for most official portraits.
The myth that this tiara was worn by Swedish queens on their way to the coronation church ever since the eighteenth century can be traced no further than to a book written by the royal postcard collector Sigyn Reimers in 1957 (a book which also seems to be the original source for the equally wrong claim that the emerald parure now in the possession of the King of Norway belonged to Empress Joséphine of the French and was worn by her at the coronation in 1804).
However, there are no traces of this splendid piece of jewellery until the inventory of the jewels of the Dowager Queen Josephina of Sweden and of Norway which was drawn up after her death in 1876. In this inventory the tiara and a matching necklace, a brooch and a pair of earrings are valued at 248,000 SEK, making it by far the most expensive parure in the inventory – the so-called Leuchtenberg sapphires are, for comparison, valued at 69,500 SEK, and the emerald parure now in Norway at 41,000 SEK.
The art historian Göran Alm, who recently retired as head of the Bernadotte Library at the Swedish Royal Collection, has furthermore discovered that Queen Josephina in a draft of her will describes it as “the great Brazilian parure”, leaving it to the royal jewellery foundation. This makes it obvious that the parure only came to Sweden as part of the great inheritance from Queen Josephina’s younger sister, the Dowager ex-Empress Amélie of Brazil, who died in Lisbon in 1873, an inheritance which also included the above-mentioned emerald parure and many other splendid items.
The inheritance was shipped to Kristiansand in Norway onboard the Norwegian naval corvette “Balder” and from there to Stockholm. Thus the tiara arrived in Sweden after the last coronation in the country’s history had been held in May 1873, making it possible to reject conclusively the myth put forward by Sigyn Reimers.
The Brazilian author Claudia Thome Witte, who is writing a biography of Empress Amélie, has recently revealed that the tiara was a wedding present to her from her husband, Emperor Pedro I, in 1829. The diamonds had originally belonged to the Emperor’s first wife, Leopoldina, née Archduchess of Austria, and had been inherited by their children following the Empress’s death in 1826. Pedro acquired the diamonds by assuming a debt in bonds as compensation to the children and presented the tiara to his new bride, who first wore it for the hand-kissing ceremony following her wedding. Empress Amélie wrote to her mother, Dowager Duchess Auguste Amalie of Leuchtenberg, that “the tiara [was set] with the best Brazilian diamonds in various sizes and [of] so pure clarity that [they] seemed made of water”.
There are no known portraits of Queen Josephina wearing the tiara, but following her death in 1876 it was worn by her daughter-in-law, Queen Sophia (pictured above with it and parts of the emerald parure) and subsequently by Queen Victoria. Following Queen Victoria’s death in 1930 it was worn rather frequently by her daughter-in-law, Crown Princess and from 1950 Queen Louise. Queen Louise often wore it to the State Opening of Parliament and in 1937 also at the coronation of her second cousin, King George VI of Britain. After Queen Louise’s death in 1965 it was not seen again until her step-grandson Carl XVI Gustaf married in 1976 and Queen Silvia immediately began to wear it. Now that its Brazilian origins have been established this seems particularly fitting, as Queen Silvia is herself half Brazilian.

My latest article: The Crown Prince’s crown

The 2011 edition (yes, they are a year behind schedule) of Trondhjemske Samlinger, the yearbook of Trondhjems Historiske Forening, is now out and, in succession to my article on the crowns of the King and Queen in the previous issue, I have contributed an article about the history and context of the Crown Prince’s crown.
It is the only part of the crown regalia made in Norway and the only item which has never been used. The crown was designed by the artist Johannes Flintoe and made by the jeweller Herman Colbjørnsen Øyset in 1846-1847 for the planned coronation of King Oscar I and Queen Josephine (which eventually never happened).
At subsequent coronations there was never an adult Crown Prince to wear it and as there has, thankfully, never been a crown princely funeral it has also not been used in the same ceremonial way as the King and Queen’s crowns. The crown was inspired by Swedish ideals and is almost unique in Europe, where crowns for the heir to the throne are a rarity.
The photo (which is copyright of myself) shows Flintoe’s original drawing for the crown (in the National Archives), which I believe has never before been published.

Royal jewels: Queen Maud’s grand diamond tiara

One of the tiaras most frequently worn by Queen Maud, particularly in her younger years, was a grand diamond tiara in three “levels” – a bandeau supporting floral motifs surmounted by thirteen diamond prongs, which were originally interchangeable with turquoise prongs.
The tiara was a wedding present to the then Princess Maud of Britain when she married Prince Carl of Denmark in 1896. She wore it to the coronation of her parents, King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra of Britain, on 9 August 1902 and was also portrayed with it on several occasions during her first years as Queen of Norway after 1905. There is also a miniature in which she wears the tiara with the turquoise prongs, which were later removed and apparently used for other pieces of jewellery.
For the first decades of her husband’s reign, this tiara and a pearl and diamond tiara which had also been a wedding present, were Queen Maud’s only substantial tiaras. Following the death of her mother in 1925 she also inherited the Maltese cross circlet and a turquoise and diamond circlet shaped as an open crown, giving her a wider range of choice. It seems she wore her grand diamond tiara for the wedding of her son, Crown Prince Olav, to Princess Märtha of Sweden on 21 March 1929.
When Queen Maud went to England in the autumn of 1938, she took most of her jewellery with her to have it cleaned. When the Queen died during in London during that stay, her jewels remained in her native country and were kept at Windsor Castle until 1953, when Crown Prince Olav and Crown Princess Märtha brought it home following the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II of Britain.
However, as Crown Princess Märtha died the following year, she never got the chance to use her mother-in-law’s jewellery, which was stored away until 1968, when Crown Prince Harald married Sonja Haraldsen. The jewels were then divided among King Olav’s three children and the grand diamond tiara went to Princess Ragnhild, who had until then had only one tiara.
Princess Ragnhild wore her grandmother’s diamond tiara to several of the royal events she attended in the following years. But from the 1990s the ageing Princess was rarely seen with this grand piece, which is probably rather heavy, opting instead to wear her other tiara, consisting of platinum circles set with large pearls, which she had inherited from her maternal grandmother, Princess Ingeborg of Sweden, in 1958.
I understand that, under a family agreement, the diamond tiara will, following the death of Princess Ragnhild, pass to the King to be worn by other members of the royal family. The platinum tiara will on the other hand remain in the Lorentzen family, as this was inherited by Princess Ragnhild directly from her Swedish grandmother.

Royal jewels: Queen Desideria’s malachite parure

Today the Nordic Museum in Stockholm opens a new exhibition showing some 1,000 items of jewellery from the museum’s vast collection. Among the highlights is a neoclassical parure of gold and malachite which has belonged to Queen Sophia of Sweden and of Norway.
The parure consists of a tiara, a necklace, a large brooch, a pair of earrings (one of them damaged) and two bracelets. The tiara is 5 centimetres high and 19 centimetres long, while the necklace measures 44.5 centimetres.
Gold of four nuances surround the cameos carved in malachite with classical scenes after the great Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen. The central cameo of the tiara shows “day”; the brooch depicts “night”. In the necklace are cameos showing Aiskylos and Hygieia, Hercules and Hebe.
The tiara bears the mark “SP” and the French assay mark 1819-1839, which has made it possible to establish that it was created by the jeweller Simon Petiteau (1782-ca. 1860) in Paris, probably in the 1820s or 1830s.
It has been suggested that the parure may have belonged to Queen Desideria of Sweden and of Norway, and a look at the inventory of her jewels drawn up after her death in December 1860s proves that this is indeed the case. The parure is also listed in the jewellery inventory of her daughter-in-law Queen Josephina following her death in 1876 and then in the inventory after Queen Sophia’s death in 1913.
Apparently none of the heirs of Queen Sophia wanted this parure, which may have seemed very out of date by 1913, and it was decided to donate it to the Nordic Museum. Queen Sophia also owned a similar parure of gold and lava which had also belonged to Queen Desideria and is now the property of Queen Sophia’s great-great-granddaughter, Désirée af Rosenborg, who was given it by her grandmother, Princess Margaretha of Denmark, on her coming of age.
There is also a similar parure, of malachite and pearls, which may have belonged to Empress Joséphine of the French, in the possession of the Fondation Napoléon.
No definite closing date has been set for the exhibition at the Nordic Museum, but it is expected to last at least until May. Read more about the exhibition here (external link). All photos are press photos by Mats Landin, copyright the Nordic Museum.

New books: Jubilee diamonds

Hugh Roberts’s The Queen’s Diamonds is not the only book accompanying the current exhibition of Queen Elizabeth II of Britain’s diamonds at Buckingham Palace. In addition to that monumental book there is also the smaller Diamonds: A Jubilee Celebration by Caroline de Guitaut, curator of decorative arts at the Royal Collection.
While Roberts’s volume is the definite account, de Guitaut’s book aims at a more general audience. While Roberts’s book gives the detailed history of 74 items of jewellery, there are only 22 included in this book, but the selection is varied and representative of many different sort of diamonds, types of jewellery and historical epochs. The items included in de Guitaut’s book are those which are also included in the exhibition.
de Guitaut’s book also includes some items from the diamond exhibition which are not included in Roberts’s book, most of them not Queen Elizabeth’s personal property: Queen Victoria’s small diamond crown, Queen Alexandra’s coronation fan, a snuff box once belonging to King Friedrich II of Prussia and two jewelled swords.
It opens with a short general introduction to the history of diamonds and their association with the English/British royal family. Like Roberts’s book it is well illustrated, both with close-ups of the jewels and photos of them being used. However, there are some mistakes in the captions which appear unnecessary: Lord Snowdon is certainly not 119 years old, although a caption says he is born in 1893; the King of Norway’s name is not Harold, but Harald; and a photo of Queen Mary wearing the tiara and necklace made for the Dehli Durbar in 1911 cannot possibly show her “as Princess of Wales” in 1910, as the jewellery had not yet been created by then.
Caroline de Guitaut’s book can well be read on its own as an introduction to the British royal diamonds, but also as a useful supplement to Roberts’s larger book.

New books: British royal diamonds

As Queen Elizabeth II of Britain is in possession of some of the world’s most spectacular diamonds it seems only logical that the Royal Collection is marking her diamond jubilee with an exhibition on diamonds at Buckingham Palace this summer. There are two books to go along with the exhibition, both published by the Royal Collection: a smaller one by Caroline de Guitaut, aimed at a general audience, and a large one by Hugh Roberts, aimed at those who want the details.
However, Roberts’s monumental book, The Queen’s Diamonds, is not a complete account of all the jewels in the possession of Queen Elizabeth II. Such a work would surely require volumes, and this book is restricted to jewellery consisting entirely or primarily of diamonds, leaving out the emeralds, the sapphires, the rubies and so on. But this seems a fitting choice not only given the occasion of the diamond jubilee, but also because diamonds are arguably the stones most worn by and most associated with Queen Elizabeth. (Britain is also one of the few countries where the crown jewels are still worn by the Queen, but these are not included in the book as they are state property and not personal possessions of the monarch).
The book treats the selection of jewels chronologically. There are chapters devoted to Queen Adelaide, Queen Victoria, Queen Alexandra, Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth (the Queen Mother) and Queen Elizabeth II, and after an introduction about each queen, her jewellery and her use of it we find what is to all means and purposes a catalogue of individual pieces of jewellery acquired by the queen in question, describing their origins, their provenance and the changes made to them.
Altogether there are some 74 pieces of jewellery included in the book, among them eleven tiaras and several necklaces, brooches, earrings, bracelets, pendants, rings and other items. There are three entries for Queen Adelaide, eight for Queen Victoria, six for Queen Alexandra, 29 for Queen Mary, fourteen for the late Queen Elizabeth and fourteen for Queen Elizabeth II, reflecting that much of the jewels worn by the current Queen have been acquired during the past three generations.
The book is very richly illustrated. All the items are shown in full, but for many there are also detailed close-ups, and for most of them there are also historical photos of the jewels being worn (sometimes the captions does not say when and where, which is a minus).
Along the way, some mysteries are solved and some misunderstandings corrected, making this the definite account of the British royal diamonds. However, while reading the book I occasionally wished for more details. For instance, the footnote saying that one of the tiaras most frequently worn by Queen Alexandra was inherited by Princess Victoria and then “disposed of” begs the questions how, when and perhaps why. Sometimes a subtle difference in wording also seems to suggest what might have been spelt out. For instance, the phrase “was loaned” seems to suggest an occasional loan, while the phrase “has been loaned” appears to indicate a permanent loan.
Perhaps one might also wish for more on each queen’s use of jewels, for instance how they used their jewellery for ceremonial purposes and for the enhancement and staging of the monarchy and themselves. For instance one may note that the current Queen has worn the so-called Diamond Diadem on her arrival to every State Opening of Parliament, but apparently this was not the case with her predecessors (her mother and grandmother wore private tiaras or their coronation crowns without arches). Roberts claims that the diadem has been worn by all the queens treated in the book and notes that it was slightly altered in 1937 for George VI’s consort. But apparently there is no record of Queen Elizabeth actually having worn it, which makes one wonder what may be the reasons for this.
This being an “official” publication means that some potentially interesting issues are passed over, probably out of discretion. For instance, Roberts writes that Queen Adelaide dutifully handed over what was considered crown heirlooms to Queen Victoria within days of William IV’s death and we know from James Pope-Hennessy’s official biography of Queen Mary that it caused some tensions when Queen Alexandra after the death of Edward VII insisted on retaining some of the jewels which should by right have been handed over to the new Queen. In Roberts’s book one notes that some of these crown heirlooms, which should have passed to Queen Elizabeth II in 1952, were apparently retained by Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother for a full fifty years until her own death. No point is made out of this, but one may wonder if this was by special arrangement or if the new Queen simply did not care (or thought she already had access to enough jewellery as it was).
Nevertheless, this is a well-researched and beautifully illustrated account of the diamonds in the possession of Queen Elizabeth II and the book will by its sheer existence be an inescapable work of reference for anyone with an interest in the history of royal jewels.

What to see: The funerary regalia of Gustaf I, Johan III and their queens, Uppsala

The Swedes have a penchant for opening the graves of their monarchs, a practice which is perhaps ethically debatable, but has, on the other hand, provided much of interest for scientist, historians and art historians, including the chance to see the regalia with which past kings and queens were buried.
The largest collection is to be found in the treasury of Uppsala Cathedral, housed in one of the great church’s towers, where one may view the regalia from the graves of King Gustaf I and his three wives as well as King Johan III and his two wives.
Before his death in 1560, King Gustaf I (in recent years popularly but unhistorically known as “Gustaf Vasa”) had chosen the Chapel of Our Lady behind the high altar in Uppsala Cathedral as the place of his burial. His coffin was taken there together with those of his first two wives, Catharina (of Saxe-Lauenburg) and Margareta (Leijonhufvud), who died in 1535 and 1551 respectively and had until then rested in the Cathedral of Stockholm. Atop the coffins were life-size wax effigies, each wearing royal regalia which were buried with the king and queens.
King Gustaf’s crown is of gilt silver and very simple. For his coronation the following year, Gustaf’s eldest son, Erik XIV, ordered a sumptuous new crown (which remains the royal crown of Sweden), which, together with the funerary crowns of his parents and stepmother, marks the introduction of arched crowns in Sweden as opposed to the older open crowns. However, these three crowns, and in particular that of the King, look like the crown ring and the arches do not really belong together. The two queens’ crowns are made by the Stockholm goldsmith Hans Rosenfelt, while the maker of Gustaf I’s crown is unknown. Rosenfelt also made the three identical sceptres of gilt silver for King Gustaf, Queen Catharina and Queen Margareta. The three crowns may be seen in the first photo, while the second shows the sceptres.
Gustaf I’s third wife, Queen Catharina (Stenbock), outlived him by 61 years and it was consequently only in 1621, by which all his sons were dead and Sweden was well into the reign of his grandson Gustaf II Adolf, the last male of the Swedish Vasa dynasty, that she was buried in Uppsala Cathedral. From her grave one has removed a small and unfortunately rather damaged crown of pearls held together by silver thread (third photo), which the long-lived queen may well have worn during her lifetime (one is almost reminded of the small diamond crown made for Queen Victoria of Britain in 1870).
The funerary regalia of Gustaf I’s second son, the art-loving King Johan III, who died in 1592, and his wives are more elaborate than those of the previous generations. King Johan’s funerary crown is of pure gold and set with real emerald and almandines, a sort of garnets, while his sceptre and orb are both of gold set with almandines. The funerary crown of his first wife, Catharina Jagellonica, is also of gold and set with sapphires, pearls and almandines, but, rather economically, undecorated on those parts of the crown which would not be visible when the crown was worn by a dead body lying in a coffin. These two crowns are pictured in the fourth photo, while the fifth shows the sceptres of Johan III and his two wives as well as the King’s orb.
Queen Catherina’s sceptre is one of the most unusual items among the funerary regalia and was probably used by her already during her lifetime. It is made of agate and ebony wood and has a handle of gold set with turquoises and almandines. On its top are a large amethyst and a somewhat smaller sapphire, while an amethyst is also found at the bottom of the sceptre. The regalia of Johan III’s second wife, Queen Gunilla (Bielke), are much simpler, comprising a crown (sixth photo), a sceptre and an orb, all of them of undecorated gilt silver.
There are also two swords among the Vasa regalia, one made in Germany around 1540 which belonged to Gustaf I and has an engraving of Adam and Eve in gilt silver on its scabbard (seventh photo), and a simpler one which belonged to Johan III.
It seems the Vasa graves in Uppsala Cathedral were rarely left in peace, and that visitors were allowed to view not only the tombs, but the coffins and even the remains themselves. The coffins were opened on a number of occasions and in 1856 the funerary regalia of Johan III and his wives were permanently removed to be put on display in the Cathedral. Later the regalia of Gustaf I and his wives have also been removed from the coffins and now form part of the collections to be seen in the Cathedral’s treasury.
Today the funerary regalia of Queen Maria Eleonora, the widow of Gustaf II Adolf, are apparently the only ones left in their grave, while those of other kings and queens may be seen in cathedrals and museums. The tradition of burying Swedish kings and queens with regalia came to an end with King Carl XI and his wife Ulrika Eleonora the Elder, who decreed that no such regalia should be made for them.
The only piece of funerary regalia subsequently made is the crown made for the funeral of Dowager Queen Lovisa Ulrika in 1782, but this was not buried with her and remains in use for the funerals of Swedish kings and queens, most recently the funeral of King Gustaf VI Adolf in 1973.

Princess Christina’s tiara stolen and thrown into the sea

Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet yesterday reported that jewellery worth at least some 855,000 SEK has been stolen from King Carl Gustaf’s sister Princess Christina by a 19-year-old friend. Among the stolen jewels is a tiara which belonged to Queen Sophia and which the thief is reported to have thrown into the deep water on which Stockholm is located.
The thief, who has admitted his crimes, came to Sweden alone as a minor in 2010 and befriended the Princess’s husband Tord Magnuson. At times he was allowed to stay with the couple in their apartment at Slottsbacken 2, a house directly opposite the Royal Palace in Stockholm.
While alone in the apartment one day in April he happened to discover the key to the safe and helped himself to an aquamarine ring which belonged to the Princess’s great-grandmother Helen, Princess of Britain and Duchess of Albany, worth some 25,000 SEK, a diamond ring from Princess Sibylla worth 450,000 SEK, a pair of gold cufflinks inherited from King Gustaf VI Adolf and estimated to be worth 30,000 SEK, and a bracelet of unknown value which was a present to Princess Christina from Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia. This jewellery he sold for a total of 9,000 SEK (!) to a couple of drug dealers intending to melt them down for new jewellery. Police has not succeeded in tracing these two men.
During a private party on 18 May, the 19-year-old used the opportunity when the Princess and her husband took the other guests on a guided tour of the Royal Palace across the street to access the safe again and steal Princess Christina’s tiara. According to Aftonbladet the tiara had belonged to Princess Sibylla, but this must be incorrect, as Princess Christina is only known to possess one tiara, namely a small diadem of old diamonds and small pearls which once was the property of Queen Sophia of Sweden and of Norway. The tiara, made by the jeweller Ribbhagen, was left to Princess Christina by her godmother, Queen Sophia’s granddaughter Elsa Cedergren, who died in 1996 at the age of nearly 103. Its value is estimated at 350,000 SEK, but this seems to be only the material value and does not include the value its historical provenance would surely add were it to be sold.
The culprit has explained that on his way from Princess Christina’s and Tord Magnuson’s to Stureplan, where he continued partying, he stopped at Riksbron (the State Bridge) behind the Parliament Building and threw the tiara into the water. Divers have searched for it, but without any results.

New books: A stunning book on the British crown jewels

When Queen Elizabeth II of Britain recently visited Westminster Abbey she was shown the Coronation Chair, which was being restored, and remarked that she had not actually seen it since sitting in it on 2 June 1953. With Elizabeth II in the second half of her eighties, the Coronation Chair being restored is of course a sign of the fact that the next British coronation is approaching. Perhaps this is also the context in which one should see the publication of a two-volume, scholarly work on the British crown jewels in 2008 and now another book on the same topic aiming at a more general public.
The Crown Jewels by historian Anna Keay, who is curatorial director of English Heritage, was published by Thames & Hudson in cooperation with the Royal Collection and Historic Royal Palaces at the end of last year and is a stunningly beautiful book in its design and choice of high-quality illustrations.
They include many paintings showing the splendours of past state occasions, but also other historical illustrations as well as close-up photographs of the items in the crown jewels collection, whole pieces as well as details. A clever touch has been to bring together several items of regalia to be photographed together for comparison, for instance the crowns of Queens Alexandra, Mary and Elizabeth, or the Imperial State Crown from 1937 alongside the now empty frames of the state crowns from 1838 and 1714.
The well-written text takes the reader on a chronological journey through the history of British crown jewels and regalia, starting with the so-called “Mill Hill warrior”, the body of an Iron Age king dating to 200-150 BC who was found by archaeologists in 1988, wearing on his head the earliest known English crown.
Three chapters are dedicated to early English regalia, but it is a sad fact that the 12th century coronation spoon is the only medieval item in the collection. The other older crown jewels were melted down when the country became a republic following the execution of Charles I in 1649.
New regalia thus had to be made when his son Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660 and Keay points out how one was so keen to link these new regalia to their lost medieval predecessors that one recreated even pieces one did not know what were supposed to be used for.
Several pieces have been added also in the centuries following the restoration and they are all covered by this book. Sadly, several grand pieces are no longer in existence or survive simply as empty frames, such as the dazzling all-diamond crown commissioned by George IV for his coronation in 1821, which was set with hired jewels subsequently returned to the jeweller.
Other pieces have fallen into disuse, such as the crown made for James II’s wife, Mary of Modena, which William IV’s Queen Adelaide thought unsuitable for use. Every queen consort since then has had a new crown made for her, although Queen Mary had intended that the exquisite crown she had made in 1911 should be the permanent crown of queens consort. However, when it became clear that she intended to attend the coronation of her son George VI in 1937 and wear that crown (without its arches), a new crown had to be made for her daughter-in-law Elizabeth.
The book also deals with the items which are not strictly speaking regalia, but are kept with them in the Tower and thus counted as crown jewels, such as the splendid tableware used for the coronation banquets, baptismal fonts and other items intended for the royal chapels, processional swords and maces. Thus the book also serves as some sort of splendid catalogue of the items one will see on a visit to the Tower of London.
“While the Crown Jewels are unquestionably impressive in their own right [...] it is their use at great ceremonial occasions that gives them their real power. The objects in the collection were not designed to be viewed in the solitary splendour of a glass case, but to play in the ensemble orchestra of royal ritual”, the author observes on the penultimate page of the book. My only objection to this book is precisely that it does not say much about the actual use of the crown jewels.
For instance, Keay does note that St Edward’s crown, until then used for the actual crowning but replaced with the state crown before the monarch left the Abbey, ceased to be used by the early eighteenth century, a practice which was only revived by George V in 1911. But otherwise we hear little about the regalia’s use for other occasions than coronations.
My first “personal acquaintance” with the British regalia was seeing the crown of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother resting on top of her coffin at her lying-in-state in Westminster Hall. But although Keay tells us that St Edward’s crown was placed on the coffin of Edward VII, Queen Victoria’s small diamond crown on hers and a replica of the state crown on Charles II’s the reader is left to wonder if crowns being placed on royal coffins have been a common practice and if so for how long.
Similarly one may wonder how old the tradition of wearing the crown at state openings of parliament is. The current practice dates only to George V and 1913, but was this the invention of a tradition or had crowns been worn to Parliament by earlier monarchs?
A more thorough treatment of the use of the regalia than just a word here and there would have served to bring the regalia to life, so to speak, and also give a fuller picture of their symbolical and ceremonial meaning.

Royal jewels: Queen Sophia’s alleged coronation tiara (Estelle Bernadotte’s tiara)

My recent blogpost about Countess Estelle Bernadotte af Wisborg has already attracted hundreds of readers since its publication three weeks ago, as the interest in her has understandably soared after the name Estelle was given to the new-born Swedish heiress. Several readers have asked for further details about Estelle Bernadotte’s grand tiara, which I wrote had been sold. Therefore, here is what I know:
There is some confusion about what stones there are in the parure. The art historian Göran Alm, head of the Bernadotte Library, has described them as “white sapphires”, while they are identified as pink topazes in the inventory of jewellery drawn up after the death of Dowager Queen Sophia of Sweden in 1913. Queen Sophia herself described them as pale rubies in her will of 31 October 1907, while they have been called pink tourmalines by her descendants.
The first certain owner of this tiara was Queen Sophia of Sweden and of Norway, although there is an uncertain tradition that it may have belonged to her mother-in-law, Queen Josephina, or at least have been a gift from her.
There are no jewels matching any of the above descriptions in the inventory of Queen Josephina’s jewellery following her death in 1876, but this is understandable, as the jewellery seems to have belonged to her daughter-in-law already before that time.
The tiara’s first known appearance is a portrait of Queen Sophia (in the possession of the King of Sweden) painted by Hilda Lindgren in 1875, three years after Oscar II’s accession to the throne. In this painting the Queen wears the tiara, but other jewellery rather than the rest of the parure. There is also an identical photograph, making it apparent that the portrait was painted after a photo.
Queen Sophia also wears the tiara in Knud Bergslien’s painting of her and Oscar II’s Norwegian coronation in Trondhjem Cathedral (now Nidaros Cathedral) on 18 July 1873, which hangs in the Hall of Mirrors at the Royal Palace in Oslo. However, this does not necessarily mean that she actually wore the tiara for the coronation, as the painting was executed only in 1882 and it might be possible that Bergslien has painted the tiara after Lindgren’s portrait, which until the dissolution of the union of crowns in 1905 hung in Oscar II’s office at the Royal Palace in Kristiania (now Oslo).
Dowager Queen Sophia died in 1913 and in the inventory of her jewels one finds a parure consisting of a necklace of pink topazes and diamonds, a golden bracelet with one large pink topaz set in diamonds, a tiara of nine large pink topazes and diamonds, and a brooch made of one large pink topaz and diamonds. The value of the parure was estimated at a meagre 9,600 SEK (which might be compared to 222,450 SEK for the emerald parure which now belongs to the King of Norway).
In her will, Queen Sophia left the parure to her daughter-in-law Princess Ebba Bernadotte, the wife of her second oldest son, Prince Oscar Bernadotte. There are photos of Princess Ebba Bernadotte wearing it, for instance to the eightieth birthday of King Gustaf V in 1938.
Princess Ebba Bernadotte died in 1946 and the parure was next worn by her daughter-in-law Countess Estelle Bernadotte af Wisborg. Estelle Bernadotte wore it frequently throughout her life and according to her daughter-in-law bought matching earrings, bracelet and ring.
Following Estelle Bernadotte’s death in 1984 the parure was inherited by her eldest surviving son, Count Folke (“Ockie”) Bernadotte af Wisborg, whose wife Christine wore it to at least one royal banquet in the 1980s and possibly also in the 1990s.
However, Countess Christine Bernadotte af Wisborg has told me that she and her husband, in consultation with their children, decided to sell the parure, preferably to the Swedish royal family as they wanted the jewellery to remain in the Bernadotte family. The Swedish court contacted the Norwegian royal family, who was interested and bought the parure. The Countess cannot remember which year this happened, something I interpret as that it cannot have been very recently.
However, no member of the Norwegian royal family has ever worn the parure, although there should have been plenty of opportunities for doing so, for instance during one of the official visits exchanged between Norway and Sweden to mark the centenary of the dissolution of the union in 2005. This was a reservation I also added when I published the information given me by Christine Bernadotte in an article on the royal crowns of Norway in the 2010 edition of the yearbook Trondhjemske Samlinger.
Recently I mentioned this information to Kjell Arne Totland, former royal reporter for the weekly magazine Se og Hør, but when interviewed by the Norwegian TV channel TV2 Nyhetskanalen following the birth of Princess Estelle he stated that the parure had been bought by the main line of the Swedish royal family. I do not know what were his sources for this, but it cannot have been me, as I clearly said the Norwegian, not the Swedish royal family. Kjell Arne Totland speculated that Count Bertil Bernadotte af Wisborg, the younger son of Estelle Bernadotte and a close friend of King Carl Gustaf, may have acted as intermediary.
The TV2 interview was picked up by the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, which ran a short story on it on 28 February. The weekly magazine Svensk Damtidning followed it up with an article in this year’s issue no 11, in which Count Folke Bernadotte confirms the information his wife gave me about the sale to the Norwegian royal family.
The magazine’s journalist Margareta Heed further claims that the tiara was bought from the Norwegian royal family by Prince Daniel and presented to Crown Princess Victoria at the hospital after she had given birth to Princess Estelle.
It is, however, worth noting that Svensk Damtidning gives no sources for this and that the magazine is not always very reliable. There are also several factual mistakes about the tiara in that article (and it is reported in the same issue that Princess Madeleine had returned to New York, although she was seen in Stockholm the previous evening and had engagements in the Swedish capital the following week).
So there the issue stands at present, with several loose treads left, such as the question of why the Norwegian royals never used the jewels if they did in fact possess them.