Diamond necklace linked to executed French queen up for auction

Sotheby's auction house has just sold a diamond necklace believed to be linked to the scandal that contributed to the downfall of Queen Marie Antoinette during the French Revolution.

The necklace with nearly 500 diamonds has great historical value.

A diamond-encrusted necklace possibly related to the late French Queen Marie Antoinette was sold for $4.81 million (more than VND122 billion) at an auction in Geneva (Switzerland) on November 13.

Put up for sale by a private Asian collector, the jewelry features 300 carats of diamonds and fetched a higher price than expected, Reuters reported, citing auction house Sotheby's.

“There is clearly a niche market for historic jewelry with unusual provenance. People are not just buying the object, they are buying the whole history that goes with it,” said Sotheby’s jeweler Andres White Correal.

The necklace above features diamonds from a previous necklace that contributed to the downfall of the late Queen Antoinette.

Antoinette was a member of the Austrian royal family who became the wife of King Louis XVI of France. Both were sent to the guillotine in 1793 during the French Revolution.

The original necklace was at the center of a scandal in 1785 known as the "diamond necklace affair." At that time, an impoverished aristocrat named Jeanne de la Motte posed as the queen of France and bought the necklace without paying for it.

A subsequent trial found the queen innocent, but did little to lessen her growing reputation for extravagance, which helped fuel the revolution and overthrow of the French monarchy.

The diamonds from the original necklace, made in the 1770s, were later sold individually on the black market and are therefore almost impossible to trace.

However, some experts, after assessing the quality and age, determined that some of the stones were set into the necklace auctioned above. This necklace, which looks like a scarf, can be worn open or knotted in the front.

A previous owner of the necklace was the Marquess of Anglesey, whose family wore it at the coronation of the late Queen Elizabeth II, Sotheby's said.

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/dau-gia-vong-co-kim-cuong-lien-quan-nu-hoang-phap-bi-hanh-hinh-185241114105536016.htm