WASHINGTON, 1 October 2003 — Rampant anti-Muslim hysteria; the devastation from hurricane Isabel; Muslims in the US military alleged to be spies; President George W. Bush preaching to the UN; the US quagmire in Iraq; Democratic presidential hopefuls taking aim at each other rather than the Rebublicans; and the prospect of actor Arnold Schwarzenegger as the next governor of California... It’s all a bit too much to for anyone to take. So, for a mental health-break I did what any clear-thinking woman would do. I went to a museum to drool over the world’s greatest diamond collection.
The red, blue, yellow, and “pumpkin” diamonds can be ogled at the Smithsonian Institution’s Natural History Museum, where seven of the world’s rarest diamonds are on display until the end of the month in an exhibit called “The Splendor of Diamonds.”
Meant to provide company to the legendary 45.52 carat Hope diamond, which sparkles alluringly as it rotates in its four-sided velvet display case, the seven are on loan from collections around the world.
The show includes the plum-sized De Beers Millennium Star, a flawless, colorless pear-shaped 203.04-carat stone that took diamond cutters thee years to complete. It is the behemoth of the group and one of the largest diamonds in the world.
According to information provided by the museum, the Millennium Star, when on display in London, was too beautiful to resist. On Nov. 7, 2000, a robbery was attempted by thieves who used a bulldozer, nail guns and smoke grenades to plow into the exhibit. Their getaway “car” was a boat waiting for them on the River Thames. Fortunately, Scotland Yard had been tipped off, and they captured the robbers before they could make off with the precious gem.
Before going on display in the Smithsonian, the Millennium Star was worn once — by the model Iman at the Cannes Film Festival in 2002.
One lucky woman at the Smithsonian was able to briefly wear the Steinmetz Pink, which she said was “not too heavy” at 59.60 carats. It is considered by some to be one of the rarest, finest, and most precious stones ever seen. It was unveiled last May in Monaco, and this is the very first time it’s been on public display.
There is also the comparatively small Harry Winston Pumpkin Diamond, so called because of its vivid orange color. Its last most conspicuous appearance was at the 2002 Academy Awards, when Halle Berry wore it in a ring as she won the Oscar for best actress.
The massive 101.29-carat Allnatt is one of the world’s largest yellow diamonds. And the Heart of Eternity, at 27.64 carats, glints a gorgeous dark blue next to the 5.51-carat Ocean Dream green, whose official color is Fancy Deep blue-green, rated by the Gemological Institute of America. It is the world’s largest naturally occurring blue-green diamond.
The Moussaieff Red is a bulging faceted triangle weighing 5.11 carats, and was discovered in the rough in the 1990s by a Brazilian farmer. Imagine tripping over that in your back yard. Now owned by Moussaieff Jewelers in London, it is the largest known red diamond in the world.
“The diamonds in this collection represent all the important features that make diamonds special to us — size, color and overall quality,” said Jeffrey Post, curator of the National Gem Collection at the Natural History Museum. “Each of the diamonds is the finest of its kind and together with the museum’s gem collection makes for an exhibit of truly historic proportions.”
Diamonds are associated with love and luck, said Arnold Duke, vice president of the International Gem and Jewelry Show recently held in Virginia. Part of their value lies in the fact that they can be easily transported. Unlike real estate, royalty or the wealthy could take diamonds with them if they had to flee somewhere in a hurry.
Diamonds did not emerge as the symbol of romantic love until this century. The clever “A Diamond is Forever” ad campaign launched in 1939 by De Beers turned the gemstone into the worldwide choice for engagement rings.
The collection is truly splendid, a great “cure-all” for those who appreciate the exquisite beauty of these stones. And, as only the Smithsonian can, it effortlessly teaches a tremendous amount about more than just five shiny gems.
It would be unfair not to mention the fabled Hope Diamond, since it is also on display in the same room at the museum and remains the focal point in the exhibition.
According to legend, and materials offered by the Smithsonian and on the Internet, this extraordinary diamond once served as an eye in the statue of the Hindu deities Rama-Sita but was stolen by a Brahman priest. The irate deity decreed that bad luck would befall anyone who should wear her eye as jewelry. The fate of the dishonest priest is unknown, but in 1642 pioneer gem trader Jean Baptiste Tavernier brought the diamond to France. He had returned from India with enough jewels to win a barony from grateful King Louis XIV, to whom he sold the 112.5-carat, round, non-faceted blue diamond. Louis XIV admired it greatly, naming it “The Blue Diamond of the Crown,” although it became better known as the “French Blue.” He had it re-cut into a teardrop shape of 67.5 carats.
How Tavernier acquired the blue gem is not known, but reports suggest that the legendary curse followed the smuggler/jewel merchant. He was, according to some accounts, devoured by wolves on the steppes of Russia.
Tavernier did die during a trip to Russia, and he may even have been chased by wolves. But since wolves are no longer certified as human-hungry beasts, the legend has a flimsy foundation. More likely, since Tavernier was 84 years old during his last winter in Russia, he may have died of a bad cold.
King Louis, although awed by the French Blue, feared its legend of ill fortune. He is said to have worn it only once, whereupon he contracted a fatal case of smallpox. His successor, Louis XV, completely refrained from touching it and seems to have escaped its curse. But Louis XVI didn’t. Both he and his queen, Marie Antoinette, used the diamond frequently, wearing it at almost all royal functions. They both lost their heads on the guillotine during the French revolution.
After the revolution the French Blue, along with other crown jewels, was placed in a loosely guarded glass case. In a famous robbery in 1792, the robbers managed to walk off with it. The diamond was not seen again for nearly 40 years.
In all probability it was sold in Spain, where it was re-cut to avoid detection. The Goya portrait of Queen Marie Louise shows her wearing a deep blue diamond cut very much like the one offered for sale in London in 1830. A rounded oval of 44.5 carats, it was later identified as the missing blue.
The diamond reemerged in London in 1812, and subsequently became the property of a British king, George IV. It was then purchased for the sum of $90,000 by Mr. Henry Thomas Hope, a rich British banker and gem collector, whose family held it through the 19th century. The gem has ever since been known as the Hope Diamond.
The Hope family added to the bad-luck stories. When Henry Hope died without marrying, a condition considered most unfortunate in those days, his contemporaries blamed it on the curse of the diamond. The blue was willed to his nephew, for whom Henry was said to have had very little regard. The nephew, whose wife ran away with another man, eventually became destitute and was forced to sell the diamond in an unsuccessful attempt to stave off bankruptcy. He died cursing his uncle who had forced the deadly blue on him.
By the time the diamond passed out of the Hope family in 1906, the stories that it brought bad luck had become widely known. Its next owner was a Parisian gem dealer, Jacques Celot, who committed suicide in 1907. His estate then sold the jewel to Prince Kanitovski, a Russian playboy who was conducting an affaire with a beautiful French actress. He gave her the fateful diamond to wear during one of her performances. In a fit of jealous rage over several men admiring the diamond, he shot her dead in the middle of the play. Two days later he was assassinated, and his killer or killers were never apprehended. It was said the murder was committed by other admirers of the dead actress.
Tragedies continued to haunt successive owners with monotonous regularity until, in 1911; the diamond was purchased for $154,000 by Evelyn Walsh McLean, whose father had struck it rich in the Colorado gold mines. She scoffed at the diamond’s curse, had it mounted in a necklace surrounded by white diamonds, and wore it almost constantly. But she lived to see a son killed in an automobile accident, a daughter die of an overdose of sleeping pills, and her husband confined to a mental institution. She died in 1947, lonely and slightly deranged, at age 61.
The Hope diamond was purchased from her estate by the New York gem dealer Henry Winston for $180,000. He freely displayed it in a number of shows with no ill effects, and finally, in November 1958, donated it to the Smithsonian Institution under somewhat comical circumstances. Winston mailed it by parcel post. The postage was only $2.44, but for $145 he insured the package for $1 million.
The Hope Diamond remains at the Smithsonian, a favorite sight for visitors. In a case of bulletproof glass it rests quietly in colorful splendor for all to marvel at it but none to touch. Not even the guards are permitted contact.
The diamond weighs 45.52 carats and is not white, as we are accustomed to seeing diamonds, but deep blue. It’s in a setting designed by Pierre Cartier — surrounded by 16 alternating pear-shaped and cushion-cut white diamonds, on a chain of 45 white diamonds. Deep-blue diamonds rarely exceed a few carats in size, and the Hope Diamond is, in fact, the largest such diamond known.
Formed a hundred miles beneath the surface of the earth and carried upward by a volcanic eruption more than a billion years ago, it is an excellent example of the fact that gems are one of the few things that look good no matter how old they are.
