you
there have been a handful of jewels that
I can remember just stuck out as being
absolutely extraordinary and this is
certainly one of them
the first time I saw it was when we sold
it in Zurich in 1979 I was just bowled
over by it I think it's difficult to
exaggerate the importance of these
emeralds certainly in the 35 years that
I've been working in the auction
business this is undoubtedly the
greatest row of original fabulous
quality Columbian stones eleven of them
perfectly matched and what's
extraordinary is that if you wanted to
describe to somebody what color the
great emerald is you would point at
these stones they're like green berries
it's what is known as the old mine
material the emeralds themselves are
absolutely remarkable we've estimated
the way to be well over 500 carats which
is a huge amount they would have been
mined in Colombia in my opinion probably
in the sixteenth century and they would
have been traded with India the emeralds
are typical of a way of wearing emeralds
in India in the 17th century cutting
them into almost rolled pebble beads and
then characters would be drilled along
the main axis with this rather thick
drill hole and so one can easily imagine
these being worn around the neck of a
Maharaja or a prince and then
subsequently finding their way into
France at the turn of the 19th century
there's really no period of European
history where jewelry was more glamorous
and more abundant than the Belle époque
at the end of 19th century prince Kido
henckel von donnersmarck was at the time
perhaps the richest man in Germany and
whether richest men in Europe came from
a family that had made their fortune
principally in mining and in finance but
also earning large estates in Silesia in
1887 he married a Russian aristocrat
called Katarina slips off and this tiara
was commissioned for her as a gift
we know that the donners marks were
commissioning jewels from bucheron but
also from show me at the end of the 19th
century and this jar is not signed but
for me I would pump for shown a mouthful
a dia
probably dating about 1897 to 1900 the
design of the tiara the base of the
tiara is typical of the late part of the
19th century of this turn-of-the-century
Belle Epoque very delicate garland form
set with diamonds and studded with these
larger cushion slightly yellow diamonds
which contrasts perfectly I think
when we first offer this tiara for sale
in Zurich in 1979 we mentioned that it
was a family tradition that the emeralds
had formed had been part of the French
crown jewels it's probably more precise
to say that they may well have been part
of the personal jewelry collection of
Empress urgentiy the context of the sale
in which we've placed this tiara is in
this section which have become an annual
event now in Geneva every man of noble
jewels which are precisely their jewels
that we've collected from Noble and Hera
socratic families principally in Europe
for me this is the most glamorous jewel
we've offered at auction in the last 30
years in fact since it was last offered
I can think of no other jewels it sums
up the glamour and the grandeur of the
Belle époque as well as this
you