Tea at Trianon: Marie-Antoinette's Diamonds and Pearls

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Thursday, June 14, 2018

Marie-Antoinette's Diamonds and Pearls

The Queen's tear drop earrings

The famous tear drop pearl earrings of Queen Marie-Antoinette are being auctioned by Sotheby's, after long being in the private collection of the House of Bourbon-Parma. After being whisked out of France during the Revolution, the jewels belonged to the Queen's surviving daughter Marie-Thérèse Charlotte of France and then passed to Marie-Thérèse Charlotte's beloved niece Louise d'Artois, Duchess of Parma. Other pieces belonging to the Queen are being sold as well. The jewels are being publicly displayed for the first time in two hundred years. From The Daily Mail:

Marie Antoinette's personal collection of pearls is set to go under the hammer in a landmark jewellery sale. The remarkable items, which were smuggled out of France during the Revolution, are being offered for sale as part of a $5million catalogue of royal jewels being put up for auction at Sotheby's, Geneva, later this year. According to the auction house, the Queen's pearls have not been on public display for the last 200 years and have been kept in immaculate condition by a private owner. Among the collection is a diamond pendant supporting 'a pearl of exceptional size', which is estimated at $1-2million. (Read more.)

The infamous diamond necklace shown in the article in a drawing was never owned by Marie-Antoinette; she never even wanted to own such a gaudy piece. Indeed, she was the innocent victim of a criminal conspiracy, as is related in the book, Daughter of the Caesars.